“But I want my baby now,” she cries. “She is my baby. I do not need the mayor to tell me when I can visit my own baby.”

I have a choice to make now. I make it: I let her have it right between the eyes. I don’t shout. But I am way more than stern. “Look. I tried to get you help. You compromised your pregnancy.”

Val is now sobbing uncontrollably. I’m trying to practice tough love, something I’m not very good at. I’m good at tough, and I’m good at love. I’m just not good at them when they’re together.

“Why are you so mean to me?” she says. “Why is everybody in this city so mean to me?”

“Because you don’t listen. Do you love drugs more than your baby?”

That lights up her face with horror. “No. I love my baby. I want my baby,” she yells.

“I know you love her. I know you want her. But you have to show and prove that you love her. You do that by cleaning yourself up.”

But I can’t keep yelling at her. The situation is the usual crazy mess for users: heartbreaking and infuriating.

“Where are you living these days?” I ask.

“I think I can stay with my auntie Sofia,” she says. Then she explains that her mother, who I know is a prostitute and a user, won’t allow her back in her apartment.

“Where does your auntie live?”

“On St. Ann’s Avenue, 149th Street.”

Great. Possibly the worst area of the worst neighborhood in the South Bronx. And that’s a contest that’s got a lot of competition.

I tell her that right now we’re going to visit her baby in the nursery. “You’ll hold the baby for about ten or fifteen minutes. Then we’ve got to go someplace else. We need to go to a social service and addiction center in Washington Heights.”

She interrupts me. She speaks firmly. “No, I like the center on East 35th Street. Don’t boss me around, Lucy. I’m in charge of my life.”

I can’t take it anymore. “Listen, you are not in charge. We’re picking a place where they can help you and help you get your baby back.”

I walk out of the room to clear my mind. Under my breath, I say, “Jesus Christ! When will it ever end?”

Chapter 29

Chapter 29

I WASH VAL’S FACE. “I should have used Easy-Off oven cleaner to remove all this foundation,” I tell her as I scrub. Then I dress her in a clean white T-shirt and a clean pair of powder-blue hospital scrub pants.

Now Val is ready to see her daughter and to play Mommy. I have to say that Val does a damn good job of it. She cuddles and feeds and changes her baby in the hospital visitors’ nursery.