Read Online Most Precious Blood by Susan Beth Pfeffer - Free Book Online

they too had given her away. It was too much to deal with. She tried to concentrate on Caroline instead.
    Caroline stared down at her plate. “I’ve always known I was adopted,” she said. “My parents never lied to me about it. I had all the books too, all the picture books and story books and nonfiction books about being adopted. And my parents really love me. So do my grandparents. They never treated me any differently from their other grandchildren. Believe me, when I was twelve, I was looking for slights, and there just weren’t any.”
    â€œWhat are you saying?” Val asked. “That it’s okay to be adopted?”
    â€œI’m not sure what I’m saying,” Caroline replied. “I guess I feel bad for you because of how you learned it. I’m glad I’ve always known. My parents brought me up to feel special just because I am adopted. I’m glad my mother screamed at me that day, instead of crying. I knew then she really was my mother, because mothers get mad at their kids, and they scream, and they don’t always let them have what they want. I don’t know how I’d feel if someone just told me out of the blue that I was adopted. I think it would terrify me.”
    â€œI’m not terrified,” Val said. “I don’t even know for sure that it is true.”
    â€œI think it must be,” Caroline said. “From the way Michelle’s behaving. You can tell she knows she did something terrible, but she’s so defensive about it. She won’t say it’s a lie though. I think if it was, she’d be admitting it to everybody.”
    â€œTrue or not, she shouldn’t have said it,” Val declared. “At least not here, not in public. It’s a family matter, and it should be kept private.”
    â€œI guess that’s why she feels so bad,” Caroline said. “Not just telling you, but telling you in public.”
    Caroline’s father was a banker. Her mother played golf. Val had driven past their house often enough to know they had beautiful flowerbeds in front. They had less land than the Castaladis, but their yard seemed larger, because they had no gate around it.
    â€œHow were you adopted?” Val asked. “Do you know?”
    â€œFrom an agency,” Caroline said. “My parents showed me all the paperwork. I don’t know anything about my mother, my natural mother I mean, except her family medical history, which looked pretty boring to me. I guess I’ll care more about that when I have babies.”
    â€œDo you want to know?” Val asked.
    â€œSometimes,” Caroline said. “But not as much as you might think. I haven’t even thought about her in a year or so. Things have been going so well in my life. My mother turned out to be okay, once I stopped being twelve. I’m glad I was adopted through an agency though. I like the fact that it was a traditional adoption, nothing gray market about it.”
    â€œGray market,” Val said. “What’s that?”
    â€œYou know,” Caroline said. “Not done through an agency. Lawyers handle it instead, or doctors. Or a couple puts an ad in the paper and hopes some pregnant woman will see it and contact them. Lots of adoptions are done that way nowadays. But you know my father, old straight-and-narrow. My parents waited five years before the agency came through with me. Five years. But they didn’t have to worry that maybe it wasn’t completely legal or the mother might change her mind the minute she gave birth. And I like the fact my natural mother went through an agency too. It makes me feel respectable, like my parents.”
    â€œFive years is a long time to wait,” Val said. “I guess your mother must have known about it. The adoption I mean.”
    Caroline gave her a funny look. “Of course she did. Mothers always know. You think fathers just bring babies home and hand them over?