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Back The Surrogate Save as PDF
Chapters (65)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. Part One
  5. One
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. Thirteen
  18. Fourteen
  19. Fifteen
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-One
  26. Twenty-Two
  27. Twenty-Three
  28. Twenty-Four
  29. Twenty-Five
  30. Twenty-Six
  31. Twenty-Seven
  32. Twenty-Eight
  33. Twenty-Nine
  34. Thirty
  35. Thirty-One
  36. Thirty-Two
  37. Thirty-Three
  38. Part Two
  39. Thirty-Four
  40. Thirty-Five
  41. Thirty-Six
  42. Thirty-Seven
  43. Thirty-Eight
  44. Thirty-Nine
  45. Forty
  46. Forty-One
  47. Forty-Two
  48. Forty-Three
  49. Forty-Four
  50. Forty-Five
  51. Forty-Six
  52. Forty-Seven
  53. Forty-Eight
  54. Forty-Nine
  55. Fifty
  56. Fifty-One
  57. Part Three
  58. Fifty-Two
  59. Fifty-Three
  60. Fifty-Four
  61. Fifty-Five
  62. Fifty-Six
  63. Acknowledgments
  64. About the Author
  65. About the Publisher

I walked out and tried to light up. The fucking wind kept blowing it out. I hunched over and cupped my hand on it. Finally, I took a drag and got it going. I saw something from the corner of my eye. I looked into the kitchen window. Cally was just standing there, watching me.

Sixteen

Ruth

FEBRUARY 1999

Instead of a honeymoon, Hal suggested a ski trip with his sons. They were getting older, and he wanted us to become a family. Plus, it was prime ski season, and his boys were snowboarders. We could honeymoon later; Hal loved to downhill. Their favorite place was Vail, so we splurged and spent a week there in a four-bedroom chalet.

Apparently, with Audrey, they’d vacationed in a single hotel room, with the couple in one bed and the two boys in the other. Now that the boys were larger, and with me being a new and nonbiological member of the family, we had a healthy debate about whether to book two hotel rooms or to rent a house. In the hotel scenario, I would have a room to myself, and Hal and the boys would share a room because the boys weren’t yet eighteen. Hal promised we would ask for adjoining rooms and that he’d sneak into my room at night. When the hotel couldn’t guarantee rooms together, I booked us a house.

From the beginning of the trip, there was tension. At check-in, through security, in the airport food court, the newspaper shop, then walking to the gate, the boys bickered and punched each other, grumbled under their breath, slouched, moaned, and burped. It was as if they were trying to punish me and embarrass Hal, or both, and it was working.

“Stop it,” Hal said.

“You stop it,” said one of the boys.

“No, you stop it,” said the other.

“Boys.” Hal furrowed his brow and lowered his voice.

They copied him: “Dad.”

“That’s enough,” said Hal.

“Is it really?” said one.

“No, I think we need more,” said the other.

“Stop it, now.” Hal made a karate-chop motion on the word “now.” We’d been walking through the terminal, heading to our gate. As if to purposefully annoy, the boys had been walking closely behind us, and we’d felt their sophomoric remarks land on the backs of our necks. But then they were silent. Gone. I turned my head to find them. They had stopped several feet behind us, standing still in the middle of the walkway, with streams of travelers parting around them to avoid a collision.

“Hal,” I said, turning my head back while walking briskly to keep up. “They literally stopped moving when you told them to stop.”

“Good.” Hal charged forward, weaving through strangers.