Look Inside - Dear Baby Girl

Dear Baby Girl,
   In all my fifteen years of growing up, I never once thought about what it’d be like for a new mama to leave the hospital with her baby in another pair of arms. I guess I’ve always fancied the notion of a perfect family, with the daddy beaming over his wife and new child, maybe even a grandma or two hovering nearby, knitting booties or something.
   I don’t know why I think like that, since I never even knew my own daddy. All Mama ever said was that he’d loved her but not enough to stick around. Except for times like father-daughter banquets, I never really missed having a daddy, though. I had Mama. Or at least I always thought I’d have her.
   I’ve prayed about what I’m doing a lot, and this seems to be God’s answer. Pastor Luke thought so when I talked to him about it. So did Sylvie Ponds. They’re the only two folks in town who don’t look sideways at me for carrying you. Even Mama had her druthers about your life . . .
   Merrilee paused long enough to scoop a left-handed fistful of popcorn into her mouth. She started to write more, but the achy place inside her heart simmered like water on a back burner. She carefully placed the pen in the journal’s gutter and set the suitcase and book in the next seat, then wiped her greasy hand on her shorts.
   Tucking her legs up under herself awkwardly, she curled up into the seat and stared out the window. Her face reflected back in the fingerprint-smudged glass, and she glanced away. Anyway, the prairie grass and scrub cedars looked the same as they did around Palmwood and probably wouldn’t give way to anything prettier before the bus got to Austin.
   Mama had been to Austin several times, she’d told Merrilee. Once when she was in a high school track meet—she’d been pretty good back in her day at jumping the hurdles and running sprints, she’d bragged. Then later with some man for a weekend, just for a lark.
   Mighta been my daddy, for all I know. Maybe that’s where they brought me into being. Wouldn’t that be funny, me bringing this baby back to be born where I came from?
   Merrilee popped open the suitcase again and slipped her hand inside the frayed elastic side pouch, fingers digging for the carefully trimmed photo she’d downloaded at the library. The paper was already worn around the edges from too much handling, even though she’d never shown it to anyone, not even Miss Ponds.
   She squinted at the photo, trying to pretend she’d never seen it before. As if she’d just turned the page of a picture album and come across this couple with their dog—which is exactly how she’d found them on the Internet through the Palmwood public library’s lone computer. It’d taken her days to work up the courage to even access the Austin adoption agency’s Web page, but once she had, she’d listlessly paged through image after identical image of smiling, hopeful couples.
   Merrilee fingered the scrap of paper in her pocket. They had no idea she was even on her way. The agency said she could call them when she got to town, if she wanted to wait. It was her decision, they said. All the arrangements were hers to decide.