CHAPTER NINE
Alex
Dr. Cole had discovered an efficient way to make Alex hate Tuesdays. She asked questions and then expected him to answer them. Apparently this qualified as treatment. Alex sat across from her with one ankle resting on the opposite knee and stared at the bookshelf behind her head.
Three weeks had passed since Sophia’s birth.Jessica had been out of the hospital for more than two. Sophia remained in the NICU, gaining weight slowly, breathing with less assistance, learning how to eat without exhausting herself.
Alex knew every number. Every milestone.
Every appointment. Jessica knew them too.
They no longer needed to exchange information about Sophia because both of them attended rounds whenever possible and communicated directly with her doctors.
Alex had expected that competence to make him feel better. It didn't.
Dr. Cole looked down at the notes on her lap.
“You said something interesting last week.”
“That seems unlikely.”
Her mouth almost moved. “I assure you, it happened.”
Alex shifted. “What did I say?”
“That you spent your childhood determined not to become your father.”
His shoulders tightened. “I didn’t come here to talk about my father.”
“You’ve mentioned him in four consecutive sessions.”
“That does not mean he’s relevant.”
“Then we can establish his irrelevance and move on.”
Alex glanced toward the window. Rain moved in thin lines down the glass. Jessica hated days like this. Not rain itself. Rain that couldn't commit. She liked thunderstorms. Heavy summer rain. Snow. Not cold gray drizzle.
Alex knew she would be at the hospital that afternoon.
He knew she would probably forget an umbrella.
He also knew that arriving with one would look like exactly the kind of unnecessary rescuing she had told him to stop doing.
So he had put a spare umbrella in the coat rack near the NICU elevators two days ago.
Alex realized Dr. Cole was watching him. “What?”
“Where did you go?”
“Nowhere.”
“Your wife?”
He exhaled.
“What were you thinking?”
“That it’s raining.”
Dr. Cole waited.
“She hates this weather.”
“And?”
“And nothing.”
“Are you worried she’ll get wet?”
“No.”
That sounded ridiculous even to him.
Dr. Cole glanced at her notes.
“What happened after your brother died?”
Alex stared at her.
“That transition was violent.”
“You’ve avoided the question for three weeks.”
“I was ten.”
“And?”
“My brother was seven.”
“What happened?”
“He died.”
“I know that.”
Alex leaned back. The room suddenly felt smaller. “He drowned.”
Dr. Cole said nothing.
Alex looked toward the window again. “My father had taken us to a friend’s house in Connecticut. There was a pool. A lot of adults. A lot of children. No one saw him go back outside.” His jaw tightened. “I found him.”
Dr. Cole waited.
Alex rubbed his thumb against his palm. “I screamed.”
“How did your father respond?”
“He called 911. Started CPR.”
“Afterward.”
Alex looked down. “He became busy.”
“With what?”
“Everything.”
The answer came more quickly than Alex expected. “Funeral arrangements. Insurance. Selling the house. We moved six months later because my mother couldn’t stand being there.”
“What was your mother doing?”
“Falling apart.”
The phrase sounded ugly. He hated it immediately.
Dr. Cole noticed. “What did that mean?”
“She cried constantly. She stopped sleeping. She called my father at work. She called me at school once because she thought she had heard my brother upstairs.” Alex swallowed. “She was terrified all the time.”
“How did your father respond?”
“He tried at first.”
“With?”
“Doctors. Medication. Therapy.”
“Solutions.”
Alex looked at her. “Yes.”
“And when those didn’t fix it?”
His mouth went dry. “He got angry.”
“At your mother?”
“At the fear.”
“Are those different things to a frightened person?”
Alex didn't answer.
Dr. Cole waited.
He remembered his father standing in the kitchen while Evelyn cried because Alex was late coming home from school. There had been a subway delay. Nothing had happened. Alex had walked through the door to find his mother frantic and his father furious.
He’s fine, Evelyn.
You cannot do this every time something scares you.
Alex closed his eyes. The sentence had been sitting in his memory for thirty years.He had never connected it to his own.
“I said almost the same thing.”
Dr. Cole’s voice remained quiet. “Yes.”
Alex stood. He didn't know why. He walked toward the window. “This is ridiculous.”
“What is?”
“I’m not my father.”
“No one said you were.”
“He left my mother alone in that house for years.”
“You left Jessica alone in a hospital.”
Alex turned.
There was no accusation in Dr. Cole’s expression.
“Once.”
She tilted her head.
Alex heard himself. Once. He had missed the delivery once. Dismissed the blood pressure once. Forgotten appointments more than once. Made her explain symptoms. Made her defend worry. Made her relieve him of responsibility before he asked.
Alex sat again.
Dr. Cole waited.
He looked down at his wedding ring.
“My father loved my mother.”
“I believe you.”
“That sounds like a contradiction.”
“It isn’t.”
Alex looked up.
“Love does not automatically make people safe.”
He stared at her. “That sounds like something Jessica would say.”
“Has she?”
“No.”
Dr. Cole made another note.
Alex hated the scratch of her pen.
“My father wasn’t cruel.”
“You seem invested in proving that.”
“I’m telling you.”
“Then tell me more.”
Alex dragged a hand down his face. “He worked. He took care of us. He never cheated. He never hit anyone. He stayed married to my mother until he died.”
Dr. Cole looked at him. “You’ve listed everything he didn’t do.”
Alex went quiet.
“What did your mother need?”
He knew the answer now. It sat so plainly in front of him that he couldn't understand why he had spent decades refusing to see it. “She needed him not to make her ashamed of being afraid.”
“And Jessica?”
Alex looked away. The room blurred at the edges. “She needed the same thing.”
Evelyn Kane lived in the same Upper East Side apartment Alex had bought her twelve years earlier.
She had objected to the purchase for six months.
Then spent another six renovating it. Alex had learned long ago that his mother’s opposition to luxury generally ended when someone showed her fabric samples.
He rang the bell shortly after noon. Evelyn opened the door wearing cream trousers and a blue sweater, her silver-streaked hair pulled away from her face.
She looked behind him. “Where’s Jessica?”
The question hurt.
“Not with me.”
Evelyn’s expression changed. “I know that. I meant why are you here instead of the hospital?”
“I’m going later.”
“Is Sophia all right?”
“Yes.”
“Jessica?”
“As far as I know.”
Evelyn looked at him for another second before stepping aside. “Come in.”
The apartment smelled like coffee and lemon furniture polish. Alex followed her toward the kitchen. She poured him coffee without asking.
“You look terrible.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
He sat.
Evelyn took the chair across from him.
“How bad is it?”
Alex stared into the cup. “She doesn’t want to come home.”
“So I’ve heard.”
His head lifted. “Who told you?”
“Jessica.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
Alex’s chest tightened. “You spoke to her?”
“I called to ask about Sophia.”
“And she told you we were separated?”
“She told me enough.”
Alex looked away.
Evelyn’s voice softened. “She didn’t say anything cruel about you.”
“That doesn’t help.”
“I wasn’t trying to help.”
He almost laughed. Apparently women over fifty had formed a coalition to deny him comfort.
“Did she tell you what I said?”
“Yes.”
Alex sighed. “Wonderful.”
“No. It wasn’t.”
He looked at his mother. “I need to ask you something about Dad.”
Evelyn’s face changed. She reached for her coffee but didn't drink it. “What?”
“After Daniel.”
His brother’s name entered the room like someone they had all agreed not to invite. Evelyn looked down.
Alex continued. “Did he make you feel like your fear was a problem?”
His mother looked at him for a long time. “Why are you asking?”
“Because I think I did that to Jessica.”
Evelyn closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them, grief had softened her features in a way age never had. “Your father was frightened too.”
“I know.”
“He thought if he could make me reasonable again, he could make everything normal.”
Alex gripped the cup. “Did he tell you that?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because I was married to him for forty-two years.” Her smile was sad. “I eventually learned to translate your father.”
Alex looked toward the kitchen window. “Was he cruel?”
“Sometimes.”
The answer surprised him.
Evelyn was usually the first person to defend his father.
“He loved you.”
“He did.”
“He took care of you.”
“He did.”
“He stayed.”
Evelyn leaned back. “Your father stayed in the apartment, Alex. That isn’t always the same thing.”
He looked at her.
She folded her hands. “I would call him at work because I was certain something terrible had happened to you. Sometimes there was no reason. Sometimes you were ten minutes late. Sometimes I had a nightmare.”
Alex remembered.
“He started ignoring the calls.”
“Yes.”
“I thought the therapist told him to.”
“She told him to set boundaries.”
Evelyn gave a small humorless laugh. “Your father interpreted that creatively.”
“What did you do?”
“I stopped calling.”
The answer struck immediately.
He looked at her.
Evelyn watched him understand.
“I stopped asking him to come home. I stopped telling him when I was having a bad day. I learned to have my fear privately because it was easier than watching him become irritated by it.”
Alex’s stomach turned.
“Jesus.”
“You were a child. You didn’t know.”
“I should have.”
“No.”
Evelyn’s tone sharpened. “Do not make my marriage another thing you can use to punish yourself. That would be remarkably self-indulgent.”
Alex almost smiled despite himself.
She leaned toward him. “You didn’t become your father because you missed a hospital visit.”
For one stupid second, relief moved through him.
Evelyn saw it. Her eyes hardened. “You became like him every time you taught Jessica that fear made her difficult to love.”
Alex looked away.
His mother’s voice softened again. “I know you love her.”
“That doesn’t seem to matter.”
“It matters.”
“Not enough.”
“No.”
He looked at her.
Evelyn reached across the table. “You spent your entire life thinking your father’s mistake was that he didn’t love me enough.”
“What was it?”
“He loved me and still made me lonely.”
Alex stared at their joined hands.
Something inside him hurt in a new place.
“I don’t know how to fix this.”
“Maybe stop treating her like something to fix.”
He laughed once. “Have you met Dr. Cole?”
“No.”
“You’d enjoy each other far too much.”
Evelyn smiled faintly. Then she squeezed his hand. “Give Jessica room to decide what she wants.”
“What if she decides she doesn’t want me?”
His mother didn't lie. “Then you live with the consequence. And you become better anyway.”
The NICU smelled exactly the same every day.
Alex had stopped noticing the antiseptic until he walked in from outside.
He washed his hands. Sophia was asleep. Her breathing support had been reduced again.
Alex stood beside the incubator and looked at her tiny face.
Three weeks. Already she looked different from the child he had first seen. Stronger. Less frighteningly small.
He slipped one hand through the opening. “Hi.”
Sophia barely moved.
Alex smiled. “Busy day?”
A chair shifted behind him.
He turned.
Jessica sat near the window with a sketchbook open across her lap. He hadn't seen her when he entered. She wore black leggings and a cream sweater, her hair loose around her shoulders. She looked tired. She also looked more like herself.
Alex felt an ache deep in his chest.. “Sorry.”
“For what?”
“I didn’t know you were here.”
“I gathered.” Her pencil rested between her fingers.
He looked at the sketch. A tiny bird sat beneath a crooked roof. “You’re drawing.”
Jessica looked down. “A little.”
“I’m glad.” Alex returned his attention to Sophia.
Jessica said, “Your mother called me.”
He looked back. “I know.”
“She told you?”
“She said you spoke.”
Jessica nodded. “She apologized to me.”
Alex frowned. “For what?”
“For not seeing what was happening.”
“That isn’t her fault.”
“I told her that.”
“Good” Alex looked at Sophia.
After several minutes, Jessica said, “She gained three ounces.”
“I saw.”
“She’s doing better with the bottle.”
“I heard.”
A pause. “I think she likes you more.”
Alex looked over. “That is obviously true.”
Jessica smiled before she could stop herself. It disappeared quickly. But Alex saw it. He didn't chase it. That might have been the hardest thing he did all day.