Sara
      1990–1991


BY PURE CHANCE, or maybe karmic distribution, all three clients at the hair salon are pregnant. We sit underthe dryers, hands folded over our bellies like a row of Buddhas. “My top choices are Freedom, Low, andJack,” says the girl next to me, who is getting her hair dyed pink.

“What if it’s not a boy?” asks the woman sitting on my other side.

“Oh, those are meant to be for either.”

I hide a smile. “I vote for Jack.”

The girl squints, looking out the window at the rotten weather. “Sleet is nice,” she says absently, and thentries it on for size. “Sleet, pick up your toys. Sleet, honey, come on, or we’re gonna be late for the Wilcoconcert.” She digs a piece of paper and a pencil stub out of her maternity overalls and scribbles down thename.

The woman on my left grins at me. “Is this your first?”

“My third.”

“Mine too. I have two boys. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”

“I have a boy and a girl,” I tell her. “Five and three.”

“Do you know what you’re having this time?”

I know everything about this baby, from her sex to the very placement of her chromosomes, including theones that make her a perfect match for Kate. I know exactly what I am having: a miracle. “It’s a girl,” Ianswer.

“Ooh, I’m so jealous! My husband and I, we didn’t find out at the ultrasound. I thought if I heard it wasanother boy, I might never finish out the last five months.” She shuts off her hair dryer and pushes it back.

“You have any names picked?”

It strikes me that I don’t. Although I am nine months pregnant, although I have had plenty of time to dream, Ihave not really considered the specifics of this child. I have thought of this daughter only in terms of whatshe will be able to do for the daughter I already have. I haven’t admitted this even to Brian, who lies at nightwith his head on my considerable belly, waiting for the twitches that herald—he thinks—the first femaleplacekicker for the Patriots. Then again, my dreams for her are no less exalted; I plan for her to save hersister’s life.

“We’re waiting,” I tell the woman.

Sometimes I think it is all we ever do.

There was a moment, after Kate’s three months of chemotherapy last year, that I was stupid enough tobelieve we had beaten the odds. Dr. Chance said that she seemed to be in remission, and that we would justkeep an eye on what came next. And for a little while, my life even got back to normal: chauffeuring Jesse tosoccer practice and helping out in Kate’s preschool class and even taking a hot bath to relax.

And yet, there was a part of me that knew the other shoe was bound to drop. This part scoured Kate’s pillowevery morning, even after her hair started to grow back with its frizzy, burned ends, just in case it startedfalling out again. This part went to the geneticist recommended by Dr. Chance. Engineered an embryo giventhe thumbs-up by scientists to be a perfect match for Kate. Took the hormones for IVF and conceived thatembryo, just in case.

It was during a routine bone marrow aspiration that we learned Kate was in molecular relapse. On theoutside, she looked like any other three-year-old girl. On the inside, the cancer had surged through her systemagain, steamrolling the progress that had been made with chemo.

Now, in the backseat with Jesse, Kate’s kicking her feet and playing with a toy phone. Jesse sits next to her,staring out the window. “Mom? Do buses ever fall on people?”

“Like out of trees?”

“No. Like…just over.” He makes a flipping motion with his hand.

“Only if the weather’s really bad, or if the driver’s going too fast.”

He nods, accepting my explanation for his safety in this universe. Then: “Mom? Do you have a favoritenumber?”

“Thirty-one,” I tell him. This is my due date. “How about you?”

“Nine. Because it can be a number, or how old you are, or a six standing on its head.” He pauses only longenough to take a breath. “Mom? Do we have special scissors to cut meat?”

“We do.” I take a right and drive past a cemetery, headstones canted forward and back like a set of yellowedteeth.

“Mom?” Jesse asks, “is that where Kate will go?”

The question, just as innocent as any of the others Jesse would ask, makes my legs go weak. I pull the carover and put on my hazard lights. Then I unbuckle my seat belt and turn around. “No, Jess,” I tell him. “She’sstaying with us.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald?” the producer says. “This is where we’ll put you.”

We sit down on the set at the TV studio. We’ve been invited here because of our baby’s unorthodoxconception. Somehow, in an effort to keep Kate healthy, we’ve unwittingly become the poster children forscientific debate.

Brian reaches for my hand as we are approached by Nadya Carter, the reporter for the newsmagazine. “We’rejust about ready. I’ve already taped an intro about Kate. All I’m going to do is ask you a few questions, andwe’ll be finished before you know it.”

Just before the camera starts rolling, Brian wipes his cheeks on the sleeve of his shirt. The makeup artist,standing behind the lights, moans. “Well, for God’s sake,” he whispers to me. “I’m not going on national TVwearing blush.”

The camera comes to life with far less ceremony than I’ve expected, just a little hum that runs up my armsand legs.

“Mr. Fitzgerald,” Nadya says, “can you explain to us why you chose to visit a geneticist in the first place?”

Brian looks at me. “Our three-year-old daughter has a very aggressive form of leukemia. Her oncologistsuggested we find a bone marrow donor—but our oldest son wasn’t a genetic match. There’s a nationalregistry, but by the time the right donor comes along for Kate, she might not…be around. So we thought itmight be a good idea to see if another sibling of Kate’s matched up.”

“A sibling,” Nadya says, “who doesn’t exist.”

“Not yet,” Brian replies.

“What made you turn to a geneticist?”

“Time constraints,” I say bluntly. “We couldn’t keep having babies year after year until one was a match forKate. The doctor was able to screen several embryos to see which one, if any, would be the ideal donor forKate. We were lucky enough to have one out of four—and it was implanted through IVF.”

Nadya looks down at her notes. “You’ve received hate mail, haven’t you?”

Brian nods. “People seem to think that we’re trying to make a designer baby.”

“Aren’t you?”

“We didn’t ask for a baby with blue eyes, or one that would grow to be six feet tall, or one that would have anIQ of two hundred. Sure, we asked for specific characteristics—but they’re not anything anyone would everconsider to be model human traits. They’re just Kate’s traits. We don’t want a superbab............