Love Love by Sung J. Woo Page B

were so unhappy, your father and I, and then you came and we were a family and it was as if a thousand anvils had lifted off our chests. We love you so much, every tiny centimeter of you.
    Were we being smart about this? Of course not. We could’ve waited like normal people, gone through the proper channels, but this felt right to us. It felt like destiny, and all it took was a small chunk of our savings. You were worth the risk, Kevin. I’d do it all over again.
    This is not an easy
    Kevin turned the sheet, but there was nothing more. He showed the letter to his father.
    â€œI don’t know.” He shrugged. “Your mother do all. I do nothing.”
    â€œShe says here that she couldn’t get pregnant.” Kevin again went through gestures until his father understood.
    â€œDoctor wrong and stupid. Judy, Miracle Baby, your mother say.”
    Kevin placed the letter behind the centerfold, as his mother must have done almost forty years ago before she slipped them into an envelope and sealed it. What had she been feeling at that moment? He wished he knew. He wished she were here, so he could ask.

7
    W hat if he didn’t show? What if he’d changed his mind? It wouldn’t have been the first time Judy was stood up. It wouldn’t have even been the tenth.
    Just stay calm, she said to herself. Just fucking calm down, okay?
    This was the reason why she didn’t date anymore, why she’d given up this part of her life. It was hard. It was hard to put on mascara, hard to wear heels that jammed her toes, hard to sit here by herself in this restaurant, to wait for her man.
    She took another sip of water. The waiter, lurking at his station in the back of the room, met her eyes and smiled, but when the smile wasn’t returned, when the smile, in fact, was answered with venom, the waiter dropped his gaze and slunk away through the flapping double doors of the kitchen.
    Great. Can’t wait to taste all that spit in my food.
    She stared at the only thing she could stare at without repercussion, the mural on the wall adjacent to her table, a scene of what she assumed was some place in Italy. She’d come to Gaetano’s many times, but she had never had the occasion to study its mural this closely. The waves of the sea were three shades of blue, and where the color was the lightest, the beige stucco poked through.
    This was the way it was, wasn’t it? With everything. With everyone. From afar, people and things looked solid, but upon closer examination, faults revealed themselves. A perfect example of this was her own life. From afar, someone might consider her a brave soul who defied society’s preconceptions and lived life on her own terms. A person of courage who didn’t tie herself down to a meaningless career and was willing to sacrifice financial security for the pursuit of . . . of what, exactly? What was it that she was so passionate about that required her to give up so much?
    â€œAre you doing okay, miss? Anything you need?”
    Her mousy waiter had been replaced by a girl in a ponytail with a smile so wide it had to hurt her jaws. Had Judy been waiting so long that the first waiter’s shift ended? She glanced at her wrist, but she wasn’t wearing her watch. The frayed leather strap was one small yank away from ripping apart, so in an effort to appear as beautiful as possible, she’d dispensed with the need to tell time.
    â€œYes,” Judy told the girl, “I’m doing fine.”
    â€œYou’re waiting for your party to arrive.”
    No. I just like to come to a restaurant and not eat.
    The girl returned a moment later, but not for her. She delivered desserts for the table next to Judy’s, tiramisu for the man and a fruit cup in a martini glass for the woman. This couple had ordered their meal at the same time Judy had been seated. She’d promised herself that if Roger did not show by the time they finished their meal,