When she returns, the social worker is waiting for her. Frida drops the half-eaten candy bar and awkwardly retrieves it, getting a good look at the social worker’s taut calves in black capri pants, her sneakers. The woman is young and striking, maybe in her midtwenties, has evidently come straight from the gym. She wears a spandex jacket over a tank top. A gold cross hangs low above her cleavage. Her arm muscles are visible through her clothes. Her dyed-blond hair is slicked into a ponytail that makes her wide-set eyes look reptilian. She has beautiful skin, but she’s wearing a tremendous amount of foundation, her face made up with contours and highlights. When she smiles, Frida sees her gleaming white movie-star teeth.
They shake hands. The social worker, Ms. Torres, points out the bit of chocolate on Frida’s lips. Before Frida can wipe it away, the social worker begins photographing her. She spots Frida’s torn cuticles and asks her to display her hands.
“Why?”
“Do you have a problem, Ms. Liu?”
“No. It’s fine.”
She takes a close-up of Frida’s hands, then her face. She studies the stains on Frida’s shirt. She props up her tablet and begins typing.
“You can sit.”
“My ex-husband said my custody might be suspended. Is that true?”
“Yes, the child will remain in her father’s care.”
“But it won’t ever happen again. Gust knows that.”
“Ms. Liu, this was an emergency removal because of imminent danger. You left your daughter unsupervised.”
Frida flushes. She always feels like she’s fucking up, but now there’s evidence.
“We didn’t find any signs of physical abuse, but your daughter was dehydrated. And hungry. According to the report, her diaper leaked. She’d been crying for a very long time. She was in distress.” The social worker flips through her notes, raises an eyebrow. “And I’m told your house was dirty.”
“I’m not normally like this. I meant to clean over the weekend. I would never harm her.”
The social worker smiles coldly. “But you did harm her. Tell me, why didn’t you take her with you? What mother wouldn’t realize, If I want or need to leave the house, my baby comes with me?”
She waits for Frida’s response. Frida recalls this morning’s mounting frustration and angst, the selfish desire for a moment of peace. Most days, she can talk herself down from that cliff. It’s mortifying that they’ve started a file on her, as if she were beating Harriet or keeping her in squalor, as if she were one of those mothers who left their infant in the back seat of a car on a hot summer day.
“It was a mistake.”
“Yes, you’ve said that. But I feel like there’s something you’re not telling me. Why would you decide all of a sudden to go into the office?”
“I went to get a coffee. Then I drove to Penn. There was a file I forgot to bring home. I only had a hard copy. I’m working on an article with one of the most senior professors in the business school. He’s complained about me to the dean before. When I misquoted him. He tried to have me fired. And then when I got to the office, I started answering emails. I should have been keeping track of time. I know I shouldn’t have left her at home. I know that. I screwed up.”
Frida tugs at her hair, pulling it loose. “My daughter hasn’t been sleeping. She’s supposed to take two naps a day, and she hasn’t been napping at all. I’ve been sleeping on her floor. She won’t fall asleep unless I’m holding her hand. And if I try to leave the room, she wakes up instantly and totally flips out. The past few days have been a blur. I’ve been overwhelmed. Don’t you have days like that? I’ve been so tired I’ve had chest pains.”
“All parents are tired.”
“I intended to come right back.”
“But you didn’t. You got in your car and drove away. That’s abandonment, Ms. Liu. If you want to leave the house whenever you feel like it, you get a dog, not a kid.”
Frida blinks back tears. She wants to say she’s not the same as those bad mothers in the news. She didn’t set her house on fire. She didn’t leave Harriet on a subway platform. She didn’t strap Harriet into the back seat and drive into a lake.
“I know that I seriously messed up, but I didn’t mean to do this. I understand that it was a crazy thing to do.”
“Ms. Liu, do you have a history of mental illness?”
“I’ve had depression on and off. That’s not what I meant. I’m not—”