Our little girls left today. With the rap of a gavel they were transferred from our home to the care of a lovely family who have worked for months to see this day come about. It was the exact answer to our prayers but it was a bittersweet day nonetheless.
We had only a day to prepare the girls; once Vermont DCF was involved things moved very rapidly. We had been told the court would rule on their case mid-week, but we got a call Monday afternoon saying they had to be tranferred to foster care that very night. We scrambled to explain to the girls why they had to leave our home so abruptly, doling out little scraps of information a piece at a time over the course of the afternoon. "You know we are moving. . . . you will be staying with the B's when we move (this move is still two months away). . . school is starting soon and you need to move to the place where you will be going to school. . . " Anything to avoid saying "Judge, court, foster care, not coming back."
Then we learned that they would have to appear in court today - without us or any familiar grown-ups. Just two scared little girls with a judge in a black robe and a group of adults they have never laid eyes on. How would we explain that to them??
But there are harder things to explain. Like why the Daddy who used to tuck them in at night with the reassurance that, "Nobody's going to get my girls" disappeared and never came back to get his girls. Like why so many children's books and songs are about Mommies and Daddies who always come back for their babies but their Mommy and Daddy seemd to have forgotten about them.
Today we arrived at court in separate cars. J and S came with their new foster parents, I came alone. The girls were immediately nervous when we entered the building through the security clearance. They kept asking what the guard was looking for, and what would he do if we did have a gun? They exhibited their usual anxiety when a police officer walked past; "Is someone going to get arrested?"
We went up to the tiny playroom with cheap, bad artwork on the walls and a shelf of old, dog-eared, unattractive books in order to wait. I saw the look of recognition on J's face when the social worker walked in. She was the same young woman who was at her apartment "when the police took my Mommy away." She was accompanied by the weird sisters, the three of them filling the doorway of the tiny room, smiling strangely down at us as we sat on the low, sagging couch. They clutched their clipboards, looking every inch the part of aging feminists out to save women and children from bad men.
The girls squirmed uncomfortably at their awkward, perky self-introductions. "Hi, I'm ----. I'm your guardian ad litem. My job is to make sure you are taken care of." The girls shrank back into the sofa, clinging to my arms. "Isn't that what I have been doing for the last six months?", I thought.
"Hi, my name is ____."continued the other woman. "I'm your attorney. Do you know what a lawyer does? Have you seen lawyers on TV?" (This to a 5 and 6 year old who can barely sit through an episode of Scooby-Doo, never mind court TV). "I'm on the J and S team!" with forced enthusiasm. "I'm here to work for you!" The girls have no idea what she is saying, or why she knows their names and is acting so familiar.
My husband quips to the little girls that maybe they can get her to wash their dishes for them. She does not find this amusing, especially from a man.
I resume reading the 1968 version of "The Country Mouse and the Town Mouse" to the girls and the women drift out of the room. We wait. We play made-up games using the baby toys in the room for props, read another few books and wait some more. Finally the social worker reappears and tells the girls the judge "wants to say Hi" to them. They beg me to come in with them and she agrees since "the hearing is really over."
We enter the cavernous court room where five women are turned in their chairs staring at us as we enter. No one, in fact, seems to be doing anything but staring at us. The judge, a friendly- looking man in black robes booms out from the far end of the room, "Hi. Which one of you is J?" Under the scrutiny of so many adults both girls blush and dip their heads. The well-meaning man talking loudly from his elevated seat goes through a little performance meant to put children at ease, bringing out his "friends," two large, dingy stuffed animals that look like they are glued onto uncomfortable seats. He puts them on the railing in front of his bench and makes some joke about the bear falling asleep in the last hearing and getting slapped. This time I am the one who fails to see the humor.
So finally, in order to humor the judge, we take the girls up to his bench where he offers J the gavel, which she declines to take, hiding her face on my shoulder. Mercifully, the hearing is really over. He raps the gavel and announces the court is adjourned. Everyone rises and he sweeps out the door. The girls heave a sigh of relief.
Outside they play happily, though in a rather subdued fashion with their new brothers and sister. Although we know they understand something big has happened, they are careful not to ask any questions. I suspect they don't want to hear the answers. One of them says she misses my five year old with whom she has shared a bedroom the past half year. Later she confides in me shyly that she would "like to have a playdate with the girl with the blue bag" who happens to be the social worker. I think she represents some tie to her Mommy and Daddy and her past life.
We hug the girls who are wearing oak seed pods on their noses and ears, decorated by their new foster sister. I hug their foster mom, giving her my blessing and aching to think how much more grace she will need than she knows yet. We wave goodbye to the family in the silver van as they drive off, five kids under nine years old packed into booster seats. It is a good ending; perhaps the best we could ever hope for. Pehaps the kindest thing the girls' father ever did for them was to leave them in good hands and disappear. But my eyes are still wet as I walk to my car.
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