The Blooming Flower (on hold)

Chapter 10

All through the appointment Allison couldn't stop thinking about the woman she saw in the waiting room. Why did she feel so connected to her? She felt like they'd met for a reason even though they didn't formally meet; she didn't even know the woman's name. The entire encounter was utterly intuitive with no direct communication. That's what was so surreal and magical about it. How could she possibly have intuition of a stranger? Could this woman have something to do with her baby? Could she possibly be the future mother of her child?

"No, listen to yourself, Allie. You sound ridiculous!" she criticized herself.

It would be too good to be true, meeting the future parents of your baby before you've even begun the adoption process. But then again, she shouldn't be so pessimistic; miracles do happen once in a blue moon. Maybe that blue moon was now; maybe God had answered her prayers by sending her the perfect parents she was looking for for her baby early. But what good would that do if it didn't change the fact that she still had to go through all the technical things? And how would she even know that these were the people who were going to raise her baby? She sighed in exasperation at this inner conflict she was having with herself.

And this was so not the time or the place; she needed to be focusing on filling out the paper work in front of her. She'd only filled one thing out: her and Todd's names, the most basic piece of information among much more information that, while not ruling out the significance of their names, was clearly more resourceful in getting this procedure done. Well, she had the question in her mind of whether these were the imminent caregivers of her child so she might as well be optimistic and not reject this possibility.

"Allie," said Todd. "Are you paying attention?"

"No," Allie reluctantly and guiltily responded.

"What's wrong?" he asked. "You look distracted; something's on your mind. What is it?"

"Nothing," she lied. "I'm fine."

Todd sighed, clearly having that clairvoyance that something was on his girlfriend's mind. "Okay," he said. "You just seem like something's distracting you. I mean, you haven't really filled any of the paper work out, and you're not listening to me. We have to do this together. Now let's fill out all the other basic information. Then, we need to decide what kind of family we want for our baby."

"Yeah," said Allison, suddenly more alert now and focused on getting this done.

She'd reached some closure now anyway. She was just going to keep it in her mind that it was a definite possibility that that woman was the prospective mother of her daughter or son. She filled out all the rest of the basic information on the paper work including her estimated due date, which the nurse had written on the verification form as March 19th, 2014.

"Now," said Todd when they had gotten all the basic information written down. "We agreed that we want to still have a relationship with our child when we give him up for adoption so we want someone who's willing to have that. What is it called, an open adoption?"

"Yes," said Allison to both his statement that they wanted to have a relationship with their baby and that it was identified as open adoption. "And I want our baby to have a brother or a sister. That's important to me."

Then, Allison suddenly had a thought. There was no child with the woman and her husband. What if they were always infertile and this was their first time adopting? Then, they weren't the perfect parents for her baby. It seemed like such a silly, minor detail that eliminated them from the choices, but her baby having a brother or sister was very important to her. She wanted her son or daughter to grow up with a companion and not have to wait four or five years to start building friendships. She wanted her child to have a friend right from the start, a big brother or sister to look out for him and be his role model.

Allison knew that even if they could raise their baby themselves then she clearly couldn't provide a big brother or sister for him, and he wasn't going to get a biological brother or sister until seven or eight years down the road. It would be okay though because for those eight years he would have his adopted big brother or sister, and he would grow up happy with companionship and love from both his adoptive parents and his big sibling. The thought of this put a smile on Allison's face, but still, she couldn't help but be bewildered by the fact that she still felt this strong connection to the woman in the waiting room. She clearly didn't have a child unless her child was old enough to stay home by himself, which clearly was an impracticability seeing as she was only in her early to mid-thirties. Something was drawing her to this woman, and she didn't know why.

"Allison," said Todd. "Are you listening?" He looked concerned.

Allison snapped out of her deep thinking. "Yeah," she lied again abruptly.

"Allie," said Todd, the skepticism clear on his face. "Come on, I know you. I can tell when something is on your mind. You didn't get away with keeping the secret about your grandmother from me, and you're not going to get away with keeping this from me whatever it is. So you might as well just tell me now. What is it? What's got you so distracted?"

"Did you see that woman in the waiting room?" she asked him, deciding it was silly to keep this a secret from him. In fact, he needed to know; these people could potentially be the forthcoming parents of his child.

"Which one Allie?" he asked her, confused. "There were probably ten women in there, not including you."

"The woman with the blonde curly hair," Allison said as if it were obvious. "She was sitting with her husband. She looked over at me and smiled. They were here to adopt. She wasn't pregnant, that's how I know, and something else told me too. It may sound crazy, but I felt this sort of connection with her like we met for a reason. I feel like she could possibly be the future mother of our baby." The words just spilled out of her, and now that she was speaking her thoughts aloud she knew she sounded insane despite her attempt to tell herself she wasn't crazy. There was no denying it now though that it was complete and utter nonsense. Yet, it still made sense to her somehow as if her logic and illogic were in a quarrel. But she couldn't discern which side was logic and which side was illogic. Any rational person would clearly be able to tell that her thoughts were irrational, but to Allie, something told her they weren't.

"Allie, hold on," said Todd. "What are you talking about? You're not making any sense."

"I know," said Allison, irritated. "But something is telling me that I'm not crazy, that this woman could end up being the mother of our baby."

"Allie," said Todd trying to hold back his irritation with her irrationality and stubbornness. "We don't even know these people; we don't know anything about them, not even their names. So tell me, how could you possibly know whether they are going to raise our child?"

Allison looked regretful that she'd said anything. "I don't," she uttered quietly.

"Exactly," said Todd. "Now, why don't we finish up this paper work, and then we'll go home and have some lunch."

"Okay," said Allison. And she put all thoughts of the woman out of her mind for the rest of the day.