This is Brenda Ainsworth’s third interview for the book she is writing about four single moms supporting each other. I originally created the interview to help me define my characters but then added the interviewer as a major character along with the interview. Day Care Moms can be bought thru on-line bookstores in e-book format or paperback. I've introduced Anne De Ruvo on my blog June 21 and Maureen D’Orlando’s July 1. This is an interview with Kayla, the birth mother of Maude. Kayla gave Maude up for adoption but still is a part of the little girl’s life. Next week, I’ll post Ashley’s interview. She adopted Kayla.

I was impressed with Ashley from the first time I met her. Our first interview was followed up with many emails where she was always forthcoming. It was here I realized that the book would need other women whose lives the four women touched. I’ve checked with my agent, who checked with the woman paying me, and she agreed. I pointed out, yet again, it would be nice if I could meet the woman paying me at least via email.

I did suggest to Barbara that she try to increase the fee considering how complicated the project was becoming. I’m not trying to make it more complicated. The women’s lives had their own complications. If I were to show their stories as well as prove that women working together can make life easier for all, I need to do more than just touch the surface of their daily routines.

I haven’t heard back. I suppose I could do a sloppy job, but that isn’t my nature. Maybe it is vanity, but I was given a natural talent that allows me to be a good wordsmith. Let me put it another way: I want this book to be really, really good.

One woman I want to talk to is Kayla Willson, Maude’s birth mother. So often I’ve seen adults fight over the custody of a child. Everyone loses, especially the kid. So, when Kayla gave Maude to Ashley, but still stayed in the kid’s life, WOW! Win-win-win!

Maude is much too young to be interviewed, although Ashley says I’m welcome to come play with the kid as often as I need to.

I did for the first-time last Sunday.

Maude was in her room, which is painted a pretty light violet with white matching furniture. The curtains are white with a violet print. Three original paintings in a Mary Cassett style are of little girls doing little girl things: a tea party, swinging, playing with a doll. Her toys include a kitchen stove and sink as well as a desk and bookcases filled with toys and books.

Not very feminist. I think of Ashley as being very feminist considering her concentration in family law. I’ve heard her reputation sends terror into the hearts of errant husbands.

Maude has a big dollhouse. “It has a staircase,” she said. “Some dollhouses don’t. That’s stupid.”

I wasn’t aware when Kayla came into the room. She was on a week-long exchange between her school and Harvard Medical and stayed with Maude and Ashley during her off time, a chance to see “the two most important women in my life.”

“They could use a ladder, I suppose,” Maude said. “Or a rope, but the bedrooms are upstairs and the toilet downstairs, so going pee-pee would be hard, ‘specially if you’re sleepy.”

Kayla and I exchanged looks. We watched Maude play for a good ten minutes and I could see her adoration of the little girl.

Kayla pointed her head in the direction of the door. Maude was so engrossed in dictating to the husband doll how the bedroom furniture should be rearranged that she seemed to have forgotten we were there.

After shutting the door, Kayla said, “I know you want to interview me. How about now in the kitchen with a cup of tea?”

I’m a coffee drinker, but I take what is offered rather than create any dissonance no matter how tiny. Better than the Skype interview we had originally talked about.

Ashley was using the time Kayla was there to work later than usual. Another win-win, giving Kayla extra time with Maude. Both women had told me this separately. I noticed that often they would say the same thing. I wondered where they might disagree.

Me: You’re from Dallas?

KW: Yes. My father worked in a credit union. My mother was, is, a nurse. They’re divorced.

Me: How old were you when that happened?

KW: Thirteen. My mother is a devout Catholic. My father a lapsed one. He remarried.

Me: Do you like your stepmother?

KW: She could write the Ugly Stepmother Manual.

Me: (I wanted more detail, but since our time was limited before Ashley came home, I decided to save it for another time.) Do you mind telling me how you got pregnant? (I learned a long time ago to get permission for painful questions.)

KW: Stupidity. I was raised in the no-sex-before-marriage, be-like-the-Virgin-Mary school. Then I fell in love with my chem professor. He wasn’t married, and he didn’t want to be.

Me: Why didn’t you get an abortion?

KW: I’m not against abortion. I thought about it, but I couldn’t.

Me: Where were you when this happened?

KW: My junior year at BU, Boston University. I had a scholarship.

Me: Did you tell your parents? (Kayla gives me a long, long look.)

KW: My stepmother hates me and would turn my father against me. My mother might have disowned me.

Me: Do you know this for certain or ...?

KW: My mother recommended a friend do that to her daughter when she ended up pregnant and single.

Me: Maybe it would be different for her own daughter? Think how Dick Cheney became much more tolerant toward gays when he discovered his daughter was a lesbian.

KW: You don’t know my mother. No shades of gray for her.

Me: (I was afraid if I continued that line of questioning, I’d lose the rapport we seemed to be building.) Did you think about keeping the baby?

KW: Oh yes. I wasn’t sure how I would support my daughter. I wanted to be a doctor since I was a kid, and there’s no way I could have done that had I kept her. I think I changed my mind every five minutes on what to do.

Me: What sent you to Ashley’s firm?

KW: A friend whose sister had dealt with the firm. The first appointment was more of a crying fest. She had her mom or maybe it was her father take her next appointment and gave me all the time I needed.

Me: And ...

KW: I told her I had two adopted friends, and their adopted parents were awful. Nothing like the happy family people say happens if you give up your baby. Not that it is always like that. I thought if we could find a family that might let me be part of the baby’s life, I could make sure she’d be okay. And Ashley said ...

Me: So, you decided to go the open adoption route.

KW: Yes, but I wasn’t sure how to go about it. Open adoption wasn’t Ashley’s strong suit, but she took me on.

Me: Did you think of changing to someone more experienced?

KW: It turns out we did, but not for the reasons you might think. Ashley wanted Maude but ethically she couldn’t do it herself. It would seem like baby stealing. She found a friend from her law school that could.

Me: How did you feel?

KW: Relieved, sad, happy, confused, sometimes within minutes of each other.

Me: How has it worked out?

KW: Sometimes I feel I am in one of those nincompoopy Hollywood movies where everything ends happily. Of course, Maude is only four and ...

“Anyone home? I brought Chinese food,” I hear Ashley call.

There’s much more I want to ask. Like Kayla says, it seems like a nincompoopy movie, but now I will eat my egg rolls and observe how everyone is acting. Actions not words, my motto.