It was when I was nearly five years old, the world shook beneath my feet. It was a sweltering day in August 1970. I stood next to my Aunt Lorraine with my hand pressed firmly on her protruding belly. Aunt Lorraine, one of Mom’s younger sisters, was nine months pregnant, a week past her due date and in no mood for the likes of me, an inquisitive little girl completely enchanted with the idea of a live baby inside her belly. 

My mother and grandmother, each with her own expanded waistline, were sitting like bookends on the love seat. Each held a cold glass of iced tea in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other. Aunt Lorraine, whose belly stuck so far out she couldn’t even tie her own shoelaces, was sprawled out on the couch across from them, fanning herself with a Good Housekeeping magazine while the only fan we owned oscillated in front of her. The three of them wanted nothing more than to be left in peace. 

“Don’t press too hard, Annie,” Aunt Lorraine warned. “You might hurt the baby.” The glare on her face showed it was clear she had reached her limits with me. 

“There it is again!” I exclaimed, my eyes dancing with delight. “The baby just kicked. Did you feel that, Aunt Lorraine?” I kept my hand steady on her belly, but my legs were bouncing with excitement as I waited for another movement. 

Aunt Lorraine smiled. “Of course. I feel it every time the baby kicks, but I feel it from the inside.” 

“So is a baby really there?” I asked, not fully believing it. 

“Yes.” 

“How come you don’t need to pick out your baby? Mommy and Daddy went to the special nursery and picked me out. They said there were lots of babies that needed to be adopted and …” 

“Annie! Stop talking so fast,” Mommy scolded. 

I covered my mouth with my hand. 

“Oops … I forgot.” Ever since I could talk, the words came out as fast as lightning; in fact, I did everything super fast. I possessed an endless amount of energy and was forever running, shouting, and moving. I drove everybody crazy. By the time I turned three, my parents had had enough. Where was the sweet, quiet little girl who was supposed to sit nicely all day and play with her dolls? Mom, after reaching her wits’ end, asked my pediatrician for medication to calm me down. He refused and instead told her to enroll me in ballet classes to help release the excess energy.

***

Aunt Lorraine still hadn’t answered my question, and I remained with my hand cupped over my mouth with wide eyes, waiting. 

“No.” Aunt Lorraine sighed. “We don’t need to pick out our baby.” 

My legs stopped bouncing. “Why not?” 

Aunt Lorraine glanced inquisitively at Mommy, who shrugged her shoulders as if to say, You’re on your own with this one. 

“No,” Aunt Lorraine answered, turning back to me. “It’s already here in my belly. Hopefully, the baby is going to come out soon.” She adjusted the pillow behind her back. “Then the baby will stay in the nursery until we both come home.” 

“Like the nursery I was in, like Thomas and Brian too,” I told her. 

“Annie,” Mommy interrupted. “You know what I told you before. When your father and I decided that we wanted a baby, we called the adoption agency and they told us to come to the special nursery. That’s how you, Thomas, and Brian were adopted.” She told me in a brisk, matter-of-fact way, as if she were referring to picking out a dog at the pound. 

I looked at Mommy. 

“But how did I get to the special nursery?” 

She puffed deeply on her cigarette. 

“Another woman gave birth to you. She brought you to the special nursery, and then we came and took you home.” 

“So I was in someone else’s belly?” I asked, for the first time realizing that not everyone was adopted. Up till then, in my fleeting thoughts, I always pictured parents going to a big room where newborn babies, wrapped securely in receiving blankets, were all lined up, waiting patiently. I never thought about how the babies actually got to the nursery, having only pictured the parents arriving, then looking over all the babies like slabs of meat arranged in a deli counter. 

“Yes, you were inside another mother’s belly,” Mommy muttered, as if she hated to admit this fact. 

“So Aunt Lorraine’s baby won’t be adopted?” 

“No!” Mommy, Grandma, and Aunt Lorraine said in unison. 

Another piece of the puzzle slid into place. 

“Not all babies are brought to the nursery to be adopted?” I asked, tilting my head to the side. It wasn’t so much a question but a statement needing confirmation. 

“No, not all babies. Only the ones whose original mothers decide they can’t keep them,” Mommy said, stressing this fact. “Only Thomas, Brian, and you are adopted.” 

My vision of everybody being adopted exploded. Trembling and feeling sick to my stomach, I slid down to my knees on the floor. 

“After we saw you, your father and I decided to keep you.” 

“Oh yes!” Grandma smiled, reaching toward the ashtray on the coffee table. “You were so tiny.” She tapped her cigarette, and a long ash dropped off. “And you cried so much and so loud that Thomas asked if we could pick out a quieter baby.” She cackled. 

I looked at Mommy, then at Grandma. 

“Why can’t I see the mother who had me in her belly? Where is she?” 

“We don’t know where she is, Annie,” Mommy said, shaking her head and glancing at Grandma. 

Grandma shrugged. “After she decided to give you up, she wasn’t allowed to see you.” 

I rested my back against the couch, reflecting on this revelation, then jumped back to my feet. 

“Why not?” I demanded. “Why can’t she see me?” 

I tried to picture what she looked like, but only a picture of a woman veiled in dark gray formed in my mind. Immediately, an aura of mystery formed about this phantom mother of mine --- my other mother. I wanted to see her. 

My urgent question met with silence. The women just sat there watching the smoke from their cigarettes drift toward the fan. 

No valid answer existed for my question. When I was adopted in 1966, the adoption process was kept closed in most states. My state, New Jersey, sealed the original birth certificate containing my birth name after the adoption became legal. From that day on, history was rewritten and I was considered to be the natural child of my adoptive parents. Nobody, not even a court of law could unseal or view the original document. 

I glanced at Aunt Lorraine on the couch, still fanning herself with the magazine. 

“Oh, this heat is unbearable,” she moaned. “Why can’t this baby be born?” 

“The baby will come when it’s good and ready. You can’t rush these things,” Grandma said knowingly. “You were born late, Lorraine, eleven days past your due date.” 

“Was I born late?” I immediately asked. 

Mom rolled her eyes. 

“Oh, I think they told me you were born right on time.” She gulped the remainder of her iced tea. 

The story about how I became a part of my family finally sank in. I truly understood what it was to be adopted, and this realization entered like a charging bull, taking hold of my naïve preconceptions and throwing them to the wind. It left me feeling half naked, as if I was missing some part of myself. But the lasting impression was as clear as a bright, sunny day: My brothers and I were different from everyone else. We were adopted. 

Little did I know, at such a tender age, that I had only scratched the surface of the mystery of my origins. But deep inside, I was sure of one thing: No secret could be kept forever.

Excerpted from The Sound of Hope © Copyright 2012 by Anne Bauer. Reprinted with permission by iUniverse.com . All rights reserved.