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It's mid-July, and Sophie and I are playing together in the middle of the street. We're playing in the middle of Eagle Street, a gently curving, passably quaint New England street. It is home to a mix of small, struggling shops--a bakery, a toy store, two pizza places, Jack's Famous Hot Dogs--and a handful of perpetually empty storefronts. I have seen pictures of Eagle Street from the early 1900s, and most of its buildings have changed surprisingly little. On the days when I remember to look up at the second and third and fourth stories of these buildings, the unexpected loveliness of the old architecture makes me smile. I trust old buildings. But today, I forget to look up. No one here is looking up. Today, the story belongs to Eagle Street itself--not its buildings, but its dark river of asphalt. Today, it's not here. The street is gone. Vanished. The kids can tell you where it's gone. Local children wait all year for this single summer day. They come to Eagle Street, clutching plastic shovels and buckets, wearing flip-flops and bathing suits and sunglasses. They come to Eagle Street, and the beach comes to them. This is not Cape Cod. This is North Adams, Massachusetts--a scrappy, hard-luck mill town high in the hills of the northwest corner of the state. The nearest real beach is one hundred fifty miles away. The population here is an interesting mix: dreadlocked artists, the camo-and-ammo hunting crowd, organic farmers, pinstriped lawyers, teen moms and dads, professors and college students, long-time townies. We tend not to agree on much. But we're united in our belief that summer just isn't summer without a trip to the beach. So once a year, we make our own beach. For one day, Eagle Street is the place to be. Big yellow trucks arrive early in the morning to dump tons and tons of sand on the street surface. By late afternoon, the licorice-black road has vanished under mounds of perfectly sandy sand, and an old-fashioned beach party is underway. Vendors sell balloons and ice cream in the mid-afternoon sunshine. Local bands plead with the crowd to buy their CDs. Inflatable wading pools, filled with tap water, stand in for the sea. The police have stopped traffic for us, but time is short. The sand will be here for just a few more hours, so we all play hard. We appreciate the gift we have been given. We play like we mean it. Some of the children dig zealously in the sand with their shovels, eager to hit the black surface beneath. Others work hard to preserve the illusion of limitless sand. They dig little, preferring instead to build up areas, creating careful dunes and picture-book sandcastles, maybe even an alligator or two. Sophie is a builder, not a digger. We choose a location, and we stay there. Unlike many of the other kids, Sophie has no desire to prowl the length of the sand-filled street, searching for friends or soda or cotton candy or discarded beach toys. Sophie stays put, and so do I. We don't do alligators. We don't do castles. We do cakes, over and over. We make a sand cake and garnish it with an eclectic mix of imaginary ingredients. We call out the names of the ingredients as we add them: radishes, ketchup, sushi, eggs, flour, salt, pepper, onions, hot fudge, strawberries, cherries, peanuts, pickles. When the cake is finished (Sophie decides when; I am not permitted to offer an opinion) Sophie grins and hops into the middle of it, smashing it flat. Then we set to work again. And again. After forty-five minutes of this, I resign from my position as sous-chef. Instead, I rain a bit of sand on Sophie's head from my fingers, pretending to be a rumbling thundercloud. She smiles beatifically as I do this, looking off into the distance, some new mystery playing about her lips. She does not tell me what she is thinking. I know better than to ask. I wonder, as I always do, but I do not ask. For the most part, Sophie has ignored the bucket, the shovel, and the plastic whale mold that another mother has offered us. Sophie's hands and feet are her toys of choice, and she wants me to join her. I try to pretend that I like the sensation of the sand between my fingers and toes, but I can tell I'm not doing a good job. I am still too prissy, as usual, and there is an air of quiet resignation about her as she glances at me, her unlucky lot in life--a mother who hates sandboxes, a mother who fears the truth of the origin and composition of the sand used here on the street. Still, she will try to make do with me, as she always does. I try to behave. I try to get dirtier. I try to look like I like getting dirtier. Sophie announces a new game, starring our feet: Her left foot will play Nemo, the clownfish with the gimpy fin. Her right foot will play Marlin, his anxious, neurotic father. My left foot waits in the wings--an understudy--but my right foot has an important role: the boat that the naughty Nemo will touch, to spite his dad. Action. I know my lines. We have played this before, always with feet. It is my job to bury Nemo in the sand when he touches the boat--his punishment for being a wayward little fish. He will cry, terribly frightened of the mysterious "Bad Man" who has buried him alive, but Marlin will eventually dig him out. There is always a successful rescue, and it is always followed by a loving embrace. Sophie adores this game. She would play it for hours if I would only cooperate for that long. There is something about this once-was-lost scenario that is deeply compelling to her. As we play, several small children gather nearby to get a better look at Sophie's arm. They stare at it for several minutes, wrinkling their noses and squinting. This is nothing new. Sophie's swollen left arm, though less disfigured than it once was, is still far from normal. From her shoulder to her lower forearm, the arm is unmistakably lumpy. The pouchy skin, mottled crimson and purple, looks as if she has been badly burned. But it is not a burn. We are still waiting for the hemangioma to disappear. It is not going away--at least, not as quickly as we would like. We have been waiting for it to disappear since she was two weeks old, when we thought the rapidly growing red patch on her arm was merely a particularly nasty rash. Sophie's pediatrician referred us to a specialist at Children's Hospital in Boston, who identified the alarming lesion as a hemangioma, a benign vascular tumor, distant cousin of the infinitely more palatable strawberry mark. Hemangiomas, the specialist explained, are particularly common in girls, preemies, and twins. The specialist warned us that the lesion would get worse before it got better, and she was right. Deep, painful, bleeding ulcers formed in the center of the tumor, and Sophie's left arm swelled to double the circumference of her right arm. She was not even a year old. The specialist recommended a "wait and see" approach, with no treatment. "These things just need to run their course," she said. "It will disappear over time. Someday, you'll forget it was ever there." Will I? Will she? I watch as the tiny arm-lookers finally disperse. The novelty of Sophie's arm has worn off, and they head off to play. But the damage has been done, at least for me. I warily scan the other groups of people around us, seeking out other freak-seekers. Sure enough, just behind us: a family of long-faced adults and sullen older children, pointing to Sophie's arm, discussing it. They are graceless; they make no attempt to hide their curiosity, even when I glance directly at them. Perhaps it is concern on their part, but I doubt it. During the summer, I fight the urge to cover her up, shield her from prying eyes. In children's clothing stores, I stand too long amid the garment racks, trying to decide: three-quarter-sleeve tee-shirt or sleeveless tank top? I force myself again and again to buy for Sophie the sort of things her friends are wearing: carefree spaghetti-strap tops to beat the heat, flimsy cap-sleeved summer dresses. I don't want her to sweat. But more importantly, I don't ever want her to wonder, somewhere down the line, why she looks so bundled up in summer vacation photos. I never want her to ask why there are no pictures of her "beautiful birthmark," the one we tell her looks like roses blooming. If Sophie notices anyone staring, she does not let on. As usual, she is the most self-contained child in sight. Her ability to focus is startling. Her concentration is fierce. She keeps playing with her feet, her mind deep, deep underwater, battling the "Bad Men" who lurk there. She seems to see none of us. For a moment, I think, Perhaps I am not here. Perhaps none of us are here, except for Sophie. I look away from her, leave her to herself. Beside us, a set of twin girls plays together. Matching pastel clothes, matching neutral faces and colorless hair. Two-and-a-half? Three years old, like Sophie? I have never been good at guessing. I see that the twins, too, have noticed her arm. They occasionally glance over at Sophie, in between bucket-filling shifts, and whisper soberly to each other. But I am no longer thinking about Sophie's arm. My focus has shifted to Sophie's empty small pink sandals, which rest in the sand between us and the whispering twins. Perhaps it is because Sophie's bare feet are out of sight (buried) or perhaps it is because of the twins (just beyond), but for a fleeting second, she is suddenly there, filling those shoes. The one that got away. Why I assume she would have been a she, I cannot say. But for the first time, I see her, her feet pale like Sophie's. I picture her, slipping her toes easily into her sister's discarded sandals. There they are: two dark-haired, watercolor-eyed daughters, about the same size, playing in the sand together. I choke on the apparition. For a moment, I cannot catch my breath. She has never come to me before, not like this. All at once, she is here with us. If I reach for her quickly enough, I might be able to touch her, to gather her into my arms before she can slip away again. I realize: I want her. It is an extravagant, ridiculous thought for someone who often wonders if she can do right by the two children she has already. Would we have ever had Hannah, Sophie's baby sister, if Sophie had arrived with her twin? Still, I am transfixed. I don't know if she notices me or if she knows who I am. I hold my breath and squint to keep her there as long as I can, playing next to her sister. I imagine brushing sand off her cheek, and then from Sophie's. Identical round velvet cheeks, the same moonlit skin. She slipped away before I knew she was there, in a week's worth of blood. I gave little thought to it at the time, assuming that what I was experiencing was simply an unusually heavy period. Weeks later, I was profoundly surprised when a doctor confirmed that I was pregnant--and had been pregnant for six or seven weeks longer than I had calculated possible. I balked. "No, I know my body," I remember insisting. "If I'm pregnant, I'm only seven weeks along." The doctor turned the ultrasound screen to face me. "See this? This is a big baby," she said, pointing to what was not big, not big at all, and only barely a baby from what I could see. Casually, she showed me the what--for she was not quite a who to me then--that would turn out to be Sophie, glowing and wriggling on the eerie dark of the ultrasound screen. "You're at least thirteen, fourteen weeks pregnant." "But what about all that blood?" I spared no detail. I had cramped and bled for days. I had woken up in a puddle of it. I had stood beside the bed, raining red from my thighs. What of that? Some part of me, I see now, knew exactly what to think. I was leading the witness, fishing for an answer I wasn't ready to hear. The doctor hesitated, sizing me up. "Some women have some spotting in the early weeks of pregnancy," she said, lightly, ever so lightly. She quickly wished me congratulations and left, leaving me alone in the exam room. This was not a path she would take with me. Spotting did not explain the torrent of blood I had described, but I was so enamored with my first strip of ultrasound paper that it was easy to let it go, to let her slip away again. I sat on a bench outside a café on the Upper West Side, sipping a six-dollar fruit smoothie and grinning like a mad fool at the blurry black-and-white images. The doctor and the ultrasound technician had called it a baby. I decided to take their word for it. I had a baby on the way, and at the time, that was all that mattered. At that moment, I did not think of what might have been. I did not stop to wonder how one had managed to stay within me, while the other drifted away in a red river, waving goodbye when I wasn't looking. It was only many months later that a kindly, matter-of-fact nurse spoke to me of vanishing twins. Sometimes, she told me, there is blood--sometimes not. Sometimes, the mother's body reabsorbs the tissue that might have been another child. Stranger still--sometimes, the dead embryo is incorporated into the developing body of the surviving embryo. Incorporated, I thought. Embryos, Inc. It is not something that comes up regularly in polite conversation. I look again at Sophie's swollen arm. Is that where she went? Part of her? It seems too poetic to be possible--literally, a heart on her sleeve. It had always seemed false to mourn. In a world of sad stories, this tale of loss--unproven loss, even--seemed inconsequential. I lost her before I knew I had her--what was there to grieve? There are so many people in the world living lives of unspeakable loss--and what loss could be more unspeakable than the loss of a living, breathing, laughing child? I don't ever want to be that mourning parent, the one sickened for life, poisoned forever by grief unending. I cannot fathom why my life is as untouched by sorrow as it is. I don't want to examine my luck too closely, lest it disappear, but I give thanks cautiously, daily. It is in no way reasonable, but the desire for the impossible is strong: I want nothing to happen, not ever, to Sophie or Hannah. I want my children to stay far, far, far out of harm's way. I want them to know only run-of-the-mill ailments--common colds and scrapes. I want them to know only gentle, loving touch and to know only the kindness, and never the brutality, of strangers. I want to be here for my girls long past the point that they no longer need me. I don't ever want them to have to look around, panicking, Where is she? Where is my mother? before remembering that I am no longer there, no longer in a place where I can be found. I have always told my husband that there is only one death scenario I will accept: we must both be well into our nineties, and we must die peacefully side by side in bed, in our sleep, holding hands. But no sooner than our nineties. Our girls need us. They need us, and that is that. Our sleeves are rolled up, and there is still plenty of work to be done. It is not an easy job, and I am frequently lousy at it, but I dearly love these two girl-children with whom I've been entrusted. I am not willing to hand over this job to anyone else, not yet. Is it narcissistic to imagine us irreplaceable in their lives? It may well be, but I do. I have lost neither of my parents, but just skirting around the edge of the thought, I wince, I duck, I cross quickly to the other side of the street. I imagine our girls, still young, trying to cope with such a devastating event. I think I can imagine Sophie's grief in particular, the sheer enormity of it were she to lose one or both of us too soon, how it might change her, irrevocably. "I could never ever ever leave you and Mommy behind," Sophie said to her father the other night, on the verge of tears. They were only discussing the future possibility of sleep-away camp, but I understand her need to keep us all together for as long as is possible. I feel the same way. I want the grace to continue, the luck to hold out. Let me live, I often find myself praying. Let us all live. No disclaimers, no limited warranties. Just pure, unabridged life. Sophie peers up at me suddenly through her straggly bangs, which are sorely in need of a trim. I smile at her, and she smiles back. I realize that her twin has vanished--dissipated into thin air, gone as quickly as she came. "Play with me, Mommy," Sophie begs. I do. For the hundredth time, she acts out Nemo's great distress at being buried under the sand at the bottom of the ocean floor. He struggles, he whimpers, he thrashes. I cheer him on. "You can do it, Nemo! Fight!" With great determination, the little foot-fish breaks free of the sand trap at last. This time around, for now at least, the game is over. The beach party is nearing its end. The trucks wait, ominous, at one end of the street. I take Sophie by the hand and lead her through the throngs of people, all beginning to pack up their belongings and head home. We stop at the bakery to get a dessert to go. There are many fine options, plenty of lacy, froufy cupcakes and dark, chewy brownies, but Sophie chooses the enigmatic almost-smiley-face cookie--the Mona Lisa of pastries. The heavily tattooed man behind the counter smiles warmly at her. She is unfailingly polite and remembers to say thank you and please while looking him in the eye. He calls her a darling--or something like this, a phrase I am surprised to hear come out of his mouth. The tattoos on his arms threw me, but they shouldn't have. His eyes are bright blue and brimming with kindness. I should have looked there first, as she did. Heading for our car, we near the bandstand. Sophie begins to shimmy a little to the music. The mostly expressionless lead singer stands still between lyrics, with one of her hips thrust out as though waiting for a bus. Her band, a local group called Plum Crazy, is churning out a song I recall from my supremely inelegant teen years, sung by the redheaded eighties pop-tart Tiffany: I think we're alone now There doesn't seem to be Anyone around . . . I am smirking. I can't help it. My teen years, neatly encapsulated by the eighties, are now officially retro cover-band material. Then it occurs to me that the song may have been a song of the sixties. Are they playing a cover of a cover? I sit on a curb near the bandstand to watch the end of their set. Sophie stands next to me, wiggling. She likes what she hears, and she continues to bounce happily to the beat. She wants me to dance, too, I can tell. I shake my shoulders for a moment, but we both know I am not really committing. Then Sophie sees a tall, lithe blonde, wearing a kerchief and a baggy but oddly sexy dress. The blonde, in her mid-twenties, is dancing with abandon--golden arms flailing, hair flying, ankle bracelets tinkling. She is lovely. Sophie gazes upon her, enraptured. The adults in the vicinity pretend not to notice the blonde, but we are all casting furtive, longing glances toward her. She is that kind of woman. Sophie creeps a little closer to her inspiration and dances shyly. I understand that what I am feeling is jealousy. I want to be that to my daughter--a magical, sensual, dancing gypsy--but I am wearing a bright-pink Land's End tank top, a sturdy white nursing bra, stained hiking shorts, and ten pounds of extra weight that refuse to budge. I feel trapped, large, bosomy--full of milk for her sister who waits at home with David. I try to do a little better, require a little more of myself. I wave to Sophie and dance with my rump half-on, half-off the curb. It is half-assed dancing, literally, but Sophie is pleased that I am joining in, I can tell. She laughs delightedly and leaps up and down in the sand. Next to Sophie, the blonde's gauzy dress twirls up, revealing the legs I expected to see: long, muscular, and tan. Sophie and I both stare at them. They are the kind of legs I imagine are the mark of someone who, in a past life, was either a racehorse or a soul who did some very fine things in the world. Suffice it to say that I do not have such legs. I do not wish to speculate what my legs say about my past lives. I look at the blonde's legs, and then to Sophie's short legs, kicking and sidestepping. Not half bad, I think. She may have great legs someday, this kid. The band finishes their Tiffany cover and launches right into their last song--another eighties hit, "Sweet Child O' Mine" by Guns N' Roses. The blonde goes nuts. Sophie goes nuts. Even the lead singer finally breaks out of her bored trance, growling and wailing the lyrics: Now and then when I see her face She takes me away to that special place And if I stared too long I'd probably break down and cry Where do we go Where do we go now Where do we go The sun is going down, and the old buildings cast long, jagged shadows over the dispersing crowd. People make their way to their cars, leaving behind a trail of abandoned beach toys and soda bottles. Sophie and her blond enchantress don't seem to notice. They dance on, each a joyful satellite of the other. I am no longer in a hurry to leave. I am watching my elder daughter whirl in the wake of a gypsy, on a beach in the middle of a street. Leave the dance with the one you came with, I think I hear myself say. This, I can do. Sophie wobbles and spins and wobbles some more. She is not graceful, not yet, not even close. But oh, is she lovely--a vision in her striped tank dress and paisley underpants and hot-pink sandals, with her beautiful, blooming, blossoming arm raised high. There is no one here I'd rather leave with. My dance card is full. I stand up and dance.
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