Page 88 of Margo's Got Money Troubles

“No,” I said firmly.

“So you don’t use drugs of any kind?”

“No.” I stared at her. She stared at me. She was waiting, certain I would crack and confess that actually I did smoke pot now and then. But she could suck it because I absolutely did not smoke pot now and then. Finally, she looked down at her notebook.

“Okay then, let’s get the urine tests over with, shall we?” she said.

“My pleasure,” I said. She took a plastic urine sample cup from her purse, which felt very wrong and way too intimate, and handed it to me.

It was a relief to be alone in the bathroom. I peed in the cup. Being pregnant I had peed in an awful lot of cups, and it was much easier now that there wasn’t a big belly in the way. When I came out, Jinx was holding his cup and waiting to go in, looking cold with dread.

Maribel was by the front door, chatting with Suzie, who had Bodhi on her hip. Suzie looked so small suddenly, like a child holding her baby sibling. When Bodhi saw me, he squealed and reached his little arms out for me, babbling, “Mamamamamamamama,” and I swooped him up and kissed his fat cheek.

“So what I’m going to do,” Maribel said, “is check in with some other members of your family—your mom, your stepdad—talk to them, talk to Bodhi’s pediatrician. And I have your financial statements, James got me those.” She smiled almost too widely, showing her beautiful tiny teeth like pearls.

“So with the 730...” I began. I was hoping it was somehow illegal for her to interfere in that process, some attorney-client privilege or HIPAA thing? At the very least, it seemed like CPS should wait until the accusations were substantiated before they went to Mark and told him Jinx and I were porn-addled drug addicts who ate too much sugary cereal.

“I can speak to your lawyer,” she said. “The case will be under your name, I can find it.”

“Oh,” I said, my heart sinking. “Okay. Who filed the complaint against me?” I asked. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

“That’s confidential information, unfortunately,” Maribel said. “We’ll get your urine tests back, and we can go from there. One thing I can tell you is that Jinx will need to get off methadone in order for Bodhi to stay in the home, so he may want to talk to his doctor about that.”

“Wait, what?” I said. “He just got on the methadone.”

“It’s our policy that caregivers should be clean and able to pass a drug test in order for the child to remain in the home.” It was creepy how she kept calling it “the home.”

“But methadone is a treatment for substance abuse. Why would you want people with substance abuse problems to stop receiving treatment for those problems? What if they relapse?”

“It’s policy,” Maribel said. “And we don’t require they stop treatment. In fact he will have to show proof of being in some kind of treatment, usually a twelve-step program.”

I had done all this research when we got Jinx on the methadone in the first place, so I said, “But why, when methadone has a success rate of sixty to ninety percent, and twelve-step programs have a success rate of between five and ten percent? Why would you insist people adopt the less successful, less science-backed treatment option?” These were the longest sentences I’d managed to speak the whole time.

“In the eyes of the California court system, methadone is just another name for heroin.” She shrugged.

“But it’s not,” I said.

“And yet it is,” she said, smiling confidently.

Bodhi squealed and reached out, grabbing at Maribel’s sleeve. “Sorry,” I said, trying to detach his tight little fist from her T-shirt.

“He’s cute,” she said a little sadly, like she already knew I would lose him. “Look at it this way: when his urine test comes back, your father will test positive for opiates. They could be methadone, or they could be heroin. We have no way of knowing the difference.”

“But you do have a way of knowing because you have paperwork stating he is in a methadone treatment program,” I said. I knew the last thing I should do was get heated, but this was maddening.

“He could also be using. Lots of people on methadone continue to use.”

“His doctor said the methadone blocks the euphoria of the high,” I said.

“Doesn’t stop people from trying,” Maribel said.

Then Jinx was behind me, holding out his pee cup. “Everything okay?” he said.

“This looks great!” Maribel said, as she accepted his pee and put it in her purse. Okay, it wasn’t a purse-purse, it was like a tote bag. She didn’t even check to make sure the lid was on tight, just popped it in a Ziploc bag and tossed it in. “We’ll be in touch,” she said, like this was a job interview.

And I heard Mark’s voice in my head: “Words can be made hollow, and once they are hollow, anything can be done with them.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

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