Far From the Tree

Fifteen-year-old Maya lives in a beautiful house with her adoptive parents and her younger sister, Lauren. Her parents fight constantly, and their fights are becoming “louder than ever” (17). Maya can’t remember a time when her parents got along, but she knows that their fights are made worse by her mom’s drinking problem. Although Maya and Lauren used to be close, “the thirteen-month difference between them” has been “growing only wider with each passing month” (19). Unlike Maya, Lauren is the biological daughter of their parents: “Three months after her parents brought Maya home from the hospital, their mother had discovered that she was pregnant with Lauren” (20). Maya often wonders if her parents would have adopted her if they had known they would have their own baby soon. Maya stands out as the only brunette in a family of redheads, which bothers her.

Despite her parents’ best efforts to make Maya feel like she is a real member of the family, Maya feels like “she [is] anything but normal” (21). Maya only feels truly at peace with her girlfriend, Claire, and although Maya’s parents are supportive of her sexual orientation, she “wishe[s] sometimes that her parents would pay attention to their own relationship, rather than focusing on hers” (23). Maya tends to bottle up her emotions, and although she loves her family, she sometimes wonders about the biological relatives she has never met. Lauren asks if Maya thinks their parents are going to get a divorce, and although Maya is dismissive of the idea, she worries that neither of her parents will want her because she is the adopted child. That night as Maya struggles to sleep, she gets an email titled “Sister?,” but “it [isn’t] from Lauren” (26).

Early one morning, 17-year-old Joaquin skateboards through his neighborhood. Unlike his sisters, Grace and Maya, Joaquin was never adopted but has spent his entire life in foster care. Joaquin’s mother, Melissa Taylor, put him into foster care when he was only a year old and “never [showed] up for any visitations when he was a baby” (28). Joaquin’s mother was white, and his father was, as far as he can tell, Mexican. Joaquin has been in several foster homes, but he has been with his current foster parents, Mark and Linda, for the past two years. The night before, Mark and Linda told Joaquin that they “[want] to adopt [him]” (29), and Joaquin is still stunned and struggling to accept their offer.

Mark and Linda are good people who tell Joaquin they love him, take him to baseball games, and teach him how to drive. Still, Joaquin tells himself that he doesn’t need parents, and he is haunted by his past behavior. He remembers how, as a child, he would “give in to the fury that bubbled up under his skin” and “writhe and scream and howl” (34). Because of this, no one wanted to adopt him, and Joaquin got used to having no one around to love or support him long-term. He admits that many of his foster parents tried to be there for him, but “there [wasn’t] a ton of money or time to go around” (34). He remembers the last time he was adopted, and he decides that “he [is] never going to let it happen again” (35). Although he secretly aches to be a part of a family, Joaquin has decided that he is better off alone.

Grace remembers how she and her parents met with Max and his parents after discovering that Grace was pregnant. Max’s father became very aggressive, blaming Grace for the pregnancy and insisting that “Max has a future” and “this is not a part of his plan” (37), so Max signed away his parental rights. A week after Maya and Grace start emailing each other, Maya’s family invites Grace and her parents over for dinner. Although Grace and Maya look almost identical, Grace “[feels] absolutely nothing” (44) when she looks at her biological sister. Grace and her parents are overwhelmed by the opulence of Maya’s parents’ house, but at dinner, Grace senses a lot of tension in the family. She guesses that Maya and her little sister, Lauren, are “one dessert course away from a full-fledged cage match” (46), and Maya’s parents seem very concerned about appearances.

After dinner, Maya and Grace go to Maya’s room. Maya complains about her parents and Lauren, but when Grace suggests finding their birth mother, Maya is dismissive. After all, “why would [she] want to find a woman who didn’t want [her] in the first place?” (51). Grace realizes that she can “never tell Maya about Peach” (51) because her sister still harbors a lot of anger toward their biological mother. Instead, they decide to try to contact their brother, Joaquin, and Grace sends him an email asking to meet. After dinner, Grace tells her parents that she found Maya “kind of annoying” because she “kept interrupting [Grace], she only talked about herself, and she was sort of rude” (56). Grace’s mom assures her that this is normal for sisters.

A week after sending the email to Joaquin, he finally responds and agrees to meet with Grace and Maya. Maya is newly-grounded from “sneaking out to see Claire one night” (57), but she and Grace plan to meet Joaquin next weekend at the arts center where he works. Maya decides not to tell her parents about it because they are “super into discussing everything” (61), and Maya often struggles to find the words to describe her feelings. She thinks back to the night she snuck out to see Claire and how Claire “[can] understand how Maya [feels] without Maya having to say a word” (61). Maya wonders if Joaquin really wants to meet her and starts thinking about her birth mother. Maya’s feelings about her birth mother are so complicated that she “[doesn’t] have the words to say what she [feels],” so she decides not to say anything at all because she thinks it’s “just easier that way” (62). On the drive to see Joaquin, Maya asks Grace if she has a boyfriend, but Grace gives minimal answers. Maya starts to get nervous around Grace because she wants her older sister to like her and be her friend, but Grace gets annoyed with Maya’s constant talking.

Grace is nervous about meeting Joaquin, but Maya puts on a brave face and claims they can always leave and “block his calls and email” (69). They arrive at the arts center, and Maya notices that their brother looks a lot like them, even though he is “definitely not white like his sisters” (71). Maya immediately feels a kinship with Joaquin, and Grace begins to cry. Joaquin greets his sisters, and the three of them decide to get lunch together and talk.