Page 19 of The Other Mother

YOU TOOK EVERYTHING FROM ME

T he support group room of the Desert Springs Wellness Center smells like essential oils.

Lavender and eucalyptus can't quite mask the underlying scent of institutional carpet and women who haven't showered in days.

The late October heat wave makes everything worse.

The air conditioning is broken again, and the room feels like a greenhouse filled with wilting plants.

I showed up late because Eva had a meltdown right as we were leaving the house.

She's been doing that more lately, like she can sense my anxiety and feeds off it.

By the time I get her settled in her carrier and make it through the parking lot, my shirt is damp with sweat and my hair is sticking to my neck.

Earlier this morning, before the chaos of getting ready, Adam had tried to be sweet. He brought me coffee in bed (the good stuff from the expensive machine he insisted we needed when we moved here) and sat on the edge of the mattress while I fed Eva.

"You should stay home today," he'd said, running his hand through my unwashed hair. "Skip the group. I can stay home. We could order takeout, watch something mindless on Netflix."

It was tempting. The idea of curling up on our oversized sectional, Eva sleeping on my chest while Adam rubbed my feet the way he used to when I was pregnant. Back when touching me felt natural to him, before I became this fragile thing he had to handle carefully.

"I need to go," I'd told him. "It helps."

He'd nodded, but I caught the relief in his eyes. He wanted me to get better, but he also wanted me to get better quietly, without asking uncomfortable questions or making him late for golf.

After he left for work, I'd tried to write for the first time in weeks. Just a few sentences in the notebook I keep hidden under my side of the bed. It’s not much, observations about motherhood, fragments that might someday become part of a story.

But when I read back what I'd written, it didn't sound like me at all.

The handwriting was mine, but the voice felt foreign, disconnected.

The baby cries and I feel nothing. I pick her up because that's what mothers do, but inside I'm empty. Like someone hollowed me out and forgot to put anything back.

I'd torn out the page and thrown it away, then fished it out of the trash and hidden it with the pacifier in my sock drawer. Evidence of something, though I wasn't sure what.

The familiar circle of mismatched chairs is already full except for one seat. My stomach drops when I see who's sitting next to the empty chair.

Mara.

She’s wearing the same clothes she had on at the grocery store—faded jeans and a plain t-shirt that hangs loose on her thin frame. Her dark hair is pulled back in a ponytail that looks like it hasn't been washed in days. She's staring at her hands, not acknowledging anyone else in the room.

I consider leaving. Making some excuse about Eva being fussy, about forgetting something in the car. But the group leader, Janet, has already spotted me and is waving me in with that aggressively cheerful smile therapists perfect in graduate school.

"Claire! So glad you could make it. We were just getting started."

I have no choice but to sit in the empty chair. Mara doesn't look at me, but I can feel her presence. Eva fusses in her carrier, and I rock it gently, hoping she'll stay quiet.

The room is painted that particular shade of beige that's supposed to be calming but just makes everything look dead. I stare at one of the motivational posters that promises that I’m stronger than I think. It’s boring at best, and annoying at worst. I fight the urge to pull it down.

Janet starts with her usual check-in routine. How is everyone feeling today? What are we grateful for? The other women respond with the kind of careful answers you give when you're trying to convince yourself as much as everyone else that you're okay.

One woman talks about her two-month-old finally sleeping for three-hour stretches. Another shares that she made it through a whole Target trip without crying in the diaper aisle. Someone else mentions that her mother-in-law visited and actually helped instead of criticizing everything she did.

Normal problems. Normal struggles. The kind of postpartum challenges that have solutions. More sleep, better support, time for healing.

Then it's Mara's turn.

She raises her head for the first time since I walked in, and her eyes are completely dry. Not the red-rimmed look of someone who's been crying, but the glassy, empty stare of someone who's moved beyond tears into something much darker.

"I'm tired," she says, and her voice is too calm. Too controlled. "Honestly? I can't keep doing this."

The room goes quiet. Even Eva stops fussing.

"People keep telling me to move on. That I imagined it. That she died." She pauses, and when she continues, there's a tremor underneath the control. "But I didn't imagine what I saw. Or what I felt when they took her out of my arms."

My chest tightens. Around the circle, I can see the other women shifting uncomfortably. This isn't the kind of sharing Janet encourages. It’s too raw, specific, potentially triggering for the rest of us.

Mara turns and looks directly at me. Her eyes are the color of muddy water, and they seem to see straight through my skin to whatever's rotting underneath.

"When someone steals your child ... " she says, never breaking eye contact, "and everyone thinks you're the crazy one ... "

The air in the room changes. It feels thinner, harder to breathe. I can hear my own heartbeat in my ears, can feel sweat beading on my upper lip despite the air conditioning.

One woman makes a small gasping sound while another one puts her hand to her throat. They all look at Mara like they’re watching a car accident happen in slow motion.

Janet clears her throat, her professional composure starting to crack. "Mara, maybe let's pause and?—"

"No." Mara stands abruptly, her chair scraping against the linoleum floor. "I'm done pretending."

She walks out without another word. The door closes with a soft click that somehow sounds final.

For a moment, nobody moves. Janet tries to salvage the session, steering the conversation back to safe topics like sleep schedules and feeding routines .

But something flickers across her face as she gathers her clipboard. It’s a quick flash of unease, or maybe something closer to annoyance.

“Let’s not get distracted by one person’s delusions,” she says with a too-bright smile.

The word delusions catches in my throat. That’s not the language therapists typically use. That’s the kind of word used to dismiss someone.

Everyone keeps glancing at me when they think I'm not looking, and I can practically hear their thoughts: What did she mean? Why was she looking at Claire like that?

I make it through another ten minutes before I can't stand it anymore. I mumble something about Eva needing a diaper change and escape into the hallway. My legs feel unsteady, like I'm walking on a boat deck in rough seas.

Janet appears beside me. She touches my elbow. “Don’t engage her, Claire. She fixates on new moms.”

Her smile is too smooth, like she’s practiced it in a mirror. I realize something, Janet never shares anything about herself. Not one detail.

The parking lot is an oven. The asphalt shimmers with heat waves, and the few palm trees scattered around the wellness center look like they're dying despite the sprinkler system that runs constantly. Everything here is fighting to survive against the desert's determination to kill it.

I'm fumbling with Eva's car seat, my hands shaking so badly I can barely work the straps, when I hear footsteps behind me.

"You took everything from me."

The voice is quiet, conversational almost, but it hits me like a physical blow. I turn around slowly, still holding Eva's carrier.

Mara is standing about ten feet away, her arms hanging at her sides. In the harsh afternoon light, she looks even thinner than she did inside. Her cheekbones are sharp enough to cut glass, and there are dark circles under her eyes that makeup couldn't hide even if she bothered to wear any.

"What are you talking about?" My voice comes out as barely a whisper.

She takes a step closer. "I see it in your eyes. You know something's wrong. You just won't admit it."

I want to deny it, to tell her she's crazy, to get in my car and drive away and never come back to this place. But the words stick in my throat because she's right. I do know something's wrong.

"You don't even know what you did," Mara continues, and now her voice is getting stronger, more urgent. "But you did it. You took her from me, and you don't even remember doing it.”

She takes another step forward. Her voice drops to a whisper .

“You were never supposed to be the mother. I was.”

A pause.

“You were the other mother.”

The words hit deeper than any scream could. It doesn’t sound like an accusation. It sounds like a fact.

The parking lot starts to spin around me. I can feel my knees wanting to buckle, can taste bile in the back of my throat. Eva makes a soft sound in her carrier, and I look down at her perfect little face, her rosebud mouth, her dark eyes that seem too knowing for a six-week-old baby.

For one wild moment, I think about DNA tests. I could order one online, swab Eva's cheek while she's sleeping, send it off to some lab and get definitive proof that she's mine. The thought is so clear, so logical, that I almost laugh with relief.

But then reality crashes back in. What would I tell Adam when the kit arrived?

How would I explain taking samples without his knowledge?

And what if the test came back positive.

What if Eva really is mine and I'm just losing my mind?

Then I'd be the crazy woman who DNA tested her own baby because she couldn't trust her own maternal instincts.

Worse, what if it came back negative? What would that make me? A kidnapper? A victim? I can't even begin to process what that would mean.

"I didn't ... " I start to say, but the words die because I can't finish the sentence.

I can't say "I didn't do anything" because what if I did?

What if there are hours, days even, that I've forgotten?

What if the fog I've been living in since Eva was born isn't just sleep deprivation and hormones but something much worse?

Mara stares at me for another long moment, and I see something in her expression that terrifies me more than anger or accusations ever could. I see pity.

Then she turns and walks away, her footsteps echoing off the concrete until she disappears around the corner of the building.

I stand there in the suffocating heat, holding Eva's carrier with hands that won't stop shaking.

Around me, the desert presses in from all sides.

There are endless brown hills dotted with scrub brush and cacti, a landscape that looks like the surface of Mars.

Nothing green, nothing soft, nothing forgiving.

I think about the pacifier hidden in my sock drawer. About the hospital bracelet numbers that don't match. About the blank spaces in my memory where important moments should be. About the way Adam's jaw tightens when I ask questions about Eva's birth.

I get in the car and buckle Eva into her seat, my movements mechanical and disconnected. In the rearview mirror, I can see her watching me with those dark, serious eyes. She doesn't cry, doesn't fuss. She just watches, like she's waiting for something.

As I pull out of the parking lot, the question that's been circling in my brain for weeks finally crystallizes:

If I didn't do anything wrong, why do I feel like I did?