Chapter Eight #2
“Why are you here?” he said. “Don’t tell me you haven’t seen your mother in eight years.”
“She’s been out to Colorado a few times, but I haven’t been back. I meant to, but one thing or another…she’s actually not doing that great.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said grudgingly. “What’s the matter?”
“Breast cancer. She’s in treatment. She says it’s going okay, but you know…it seemed like a good time to come.”
He hadn’t known her mom well. To hear Sophie tell it she’d been a hands-off parent who left Sophie and her sister to fend for themselves.
Her parents had divorced early, and her dad was hardly in the picture.
No wonder Sophie had missed the maternal gene.
But that was too generous. People made their own choices no matter what kind of childhood they were handed.
He would crawl through fire for Lilah. He could never forgive Sophie for walking away.
She rubbed her other foot, which she’d freed from the boot. “My mom being sick got me thinking I should spend more time with Lilah.”
“What do you mean?” he said warily. “How much more time?”
“I shouldn’t have let four years go by, I still can’t believe it’s been that long. I want to see her more. I do.”
“Lilah’s on an even keel right now,” he said, choosing his words.
“She’s doing well in school, she has friends.
I don’t want to disrupt that.” Colorado had been a whipsaw of emotion for Lilah.
After four long years, her mother wanted her.
Then she didn’t. It had killed him to see it.
He took Lilah back to the therapist after that, but every appointment became a struggle and eventually he let it go.
Sophie shot him an offended look. “I’m not talking about disrupting anything. I’m her mother and I want to see her.”
“Today you do.” As soon as he said it, he knew he’d made a mistake. Backing Sophie into a corner never worked.
“It’s not up to you.” A tone in her voice he didn’t recognize. He was used to her apathy, at least when it came to him and Lilah. This was something new and vaguely threatening.
“No one’s saying you can’t see her,” he backpedaled. “You’re here, aren’t you? I’m just saying she’s had enough disappointment.”
“Don’t lecture me, Glenn. It didn’t work when we were married, and it won’t work now.”
He inhaled deeply. Lilah’s therapist had gently suggested he might want to talk to someone too, but he’d never done it. What was he going to do, spill his guts to a stranger? My wife left and I’m miserable. No shit. Who wouldn’t be miserable? “I just want to know what you have in mind.”
She shrugged. “I just got here. I don’t know what I have in mind. Why does everything have to be mapped out a year in advance?”
He pushed off the bed, done with her. “Because a kid needs to know her parent isn’t going to up and leave.
That’s why. You have no idea what Lilah’s been through, how long she cried after you left, asking every night when you were coming back.
How it’s been for her in school without a mother.
You’ve never given a damn about any of it.
Now she’s half-grown and it sounds fun. Sure, why not.
You can go shopping or some crap like that.
But what about when she’s in a mood and smarts off?
Or won’t get off her phone and do her homework?
” He knew he should back off, but eight years of heartache and struggle came roaring back.
“Any bright ideas about parenting, Sophie? I’d love to hear them. ”
“I’m sorry you’re so bitter, Glenn.” She gave him a disappointed look. “I wish for your sake you’d been able to move on.”
“Fuck you. I’m not bitter.” He glared at her from the doorway. “I’m here. That’s what I am. I’m here.”
She regarded him calmly, which infuriated him even more. He hated that Zen crap.
“She’s on the bus at seven-thirty if you want to catch her before school,” he said as he stalked out of the room.
“That early?” She sounded slightly stunned.
“Yep. We don’t sleep all day.”
Upstairs, he stuck his head cautiously in Lilah’s room, but to his great relief she was still asleep. The only saving grace of this whole fucked up evening was that Lilah had slept through it.
. . .
To his surprise, Sophie got up in the morning.
She floated into the kitchen a few minutes after seven in leggings and a sweatshirt, hair tucked into a sloppy knot.
He still felt raw from the night before.
He hadn’t been able to sleep and had a parched hungover feeling even though he hadn’t had a drop to drink.
Within half an hour he’d let her get to him, and she hadn’t even been trying.
She went unerringly to the right cabinet for a coffee mug, which annoyed him. He should have moved things around so he didn’t seem so predictable. Sure, he’d painted a few walls, but eight years later she still knew where to find a mug.
“We got off to a bad start last night.” She let the coffee steam her face like some sort of spa treatment. “Can we reset?”
He took a swallow of his own coffee. “Sure.” It was still beyond strange to have her here, but at least in the light of day, he felt more in control. “Lilah should be down in a minute.”
He reached past her to set out Lilah’s Frosted Mini-Wheats and poured a glass of orange juice.
Her lunch was already made. He did that the night before—a peanut butter and honey sandwich and an apple.
A box of raisins. She still liked him to pack it, but he knew the time was coming when she wouldn’t.
When she wouldn’t need him for much of anything.
He slid the bagged lunch into Lilah’s backpack, taking a small pleasure in doing this in front of Sophie.
She knew nothing of their routine, the thousands of lunches he’d packed.
The dinners he’d made, the homework he’d supervised.
That heart-stopping moment in second grade when the school nurse called and told him Lilah had fallen off the play equipment.
Thank God it had only been a broken wrist. Only a parent felt that kind of fear.
He was the parent. Like he’d told Sophie last night, he was here.
Motherhood had been difficult for Sophie.
The baby left her tired and cranky and frustrated that she had no energy for her art.
Glenn did as much as he could, rushing home from work to make dinner and bathe Lilah so Sophie could escape to her studio in the garage.
He was smitten with Lilah, the baby was all he could think about, but Sophie seemed joyless.
“Give it time,” his mother had said. “It doesn’t come easy for some women.” But he could tell his mom was concerned too.
They hired a babysitter to give Sophie a break and made time for date night once a week. But she was remote, and her discontent ate at him.
“What do you want?” he asked at dinner one night. An expensive restaurant, a splurge for their fifth anniversary. Lilah a year now, pulling herself up. She’d be walking soon.
“There’s no mountains here,” Sophie said. “It’s just a wall of green. Everything looks the same.”
“We could take a weekend and go to Vermont, see your mom.” He felt her slipping away. They hardly touched anymore. He didn’t remember the last time they’d laughed together.
“It’s not just that. I feel hemmed in.”
His heart stalled. “What do you mean, hemmed in?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugged it away. “Maybe if I sell a piece I’ll feel better.”
Sophie was accepted into a show in a local gallery, and he put a deck on the house so she could paint outside.
But she was still disengaged. Uninterested in Lilah’s new tooth, impatient when the baby fussed.
She flew to Colorado to visit a college friend and came back gushing about how beautiful the mountains were.
“I missed you,” he said, reaching for her. The house had been too quiet, and she hadn’t called once. She said she was beat and bought him off with a kiss on the cheek.
Awake in bed, he wondered if she’d slept with someone else. If she would.
She stayed for Lilah’s fourth birthday, but by then she’d already checked out. They were sitting on the deck when she told him. End of August, the days shortening. Lilah stuffed with cake, already asleep.
“I can’t do it anymore,” Sophie said.
“What do you mean?” But he knew with a sickening certainty what she meant. “What about Lilah?”
“You’re so much better with her than I am.”
“We’ll get you more help. A nanny. Whatever you need. I know we’ve hit a rough spot, but we’ve been married nine years. You have a four-year-old. How can you just leave?” He heard himself pleading, the futility of it. He would have opened a vein to get her to stay.
In the near dark, a lone firefly floated up from the grass. Fewer of them now in the waning days of summer. “I’m going to Colorado. I’ll stay with Jenny for a while, then we’ll see.”
“We’ll see?” His wife was leaving. The mother of his child. The woman he’d loved for better or worse all of his adult life. “That’s all you can say, we’ll see?”
She finally turned to look at him. “It’s not working, Glenn. It hasn’t worked for a long time. I know you see it.”
She gave his shoulder a squeeze as she went inside but he wasn’t quick enough to shake her off, and he burned with shame that his body still leaped at her touch.
Now, he tossed back the rest of his coffee as Lilah pelted down the stairs, hair flying, shoes in hand. She came to a dead stop when she saw her mother.
Sophie took a step forward, then appeared unsure what to do next. “Oh my God, you’re so big. I never imagined you’d be so big.”
“Hey Mom.” Lilah’s face had done something complicated, rearranging itself into a mixture of wariness and unfiltered hope. “I tried to wait up.” She shot Glenn an accusing look, still miffed he hadn’t let her.
He’d forgotten how much Lilah looked like Sophie, or hadn’t wanted to see.
But he couldn’t miss it with the two of them together.
Lilah was still all arms and legs, but the face was Sophie’s.
The bone structure, the delicate nose. Lilah had resembled him more when she was young but now she was all Sophie.
Except for the eyes. At least she had his eyes.
Not Sophie’s dazzling blue. His and Lilah’s were a sturdy gray.
Sophie opened her arms. “Can I give you a hug?”
Lilah nodded but when Sophie enfolded her, she stiffened, unwilling or unable to put her arms around her mother. When she squirmed away, Glenn felt a small swell of satisfaction, which quickly curdled to shame. This wasn’t some competition; it was Lilah they were talking about.
“How long are you here for?” Lilah hadn’t touched her cereal, she couldn’t tear her eyes from her mother. She ate up Sophie the way you’d devour birthday cake.
“A few days. I’m heading to Vermont to see your grandmother and thought you might want to come.” Sophie said this comfortably, like it was the most natural thing in the world to show up after eight years and whisk your daughter away.
“Grandma?” For a moment, Lilah looked confused.
“Your other grandmother,” Glenn said.
“Um, I don’t know.” Lilah glanced uncertainly at Glenn. He tried to keep his face neutral, but Lilah could read him.
“We can talk about it later,” Sophie said easily.
Lilah looked between them, a sudden worry creasing her face. “I have to catch the bus, but I’ll see you after school. You’ll be around right?”
“Absolutely.” Sophie beamed. “We’ll catch up then.”
“Here.” Glenn tucked a foil wrapped bagel into Lilah’s bag. “You didn’t eat any breakfast. Take this.”
“Thanks.” Lilah surprised him with a kiss on the cheek, then dashed out the door.
“She’s really something,” Sophie said softly.
“Yeah, she is.” He was still warmed by the fact that Lilah had kissed him all on her own without any prompting. In front of her mother. That had to mean something.
To his relief, Sophie went back to bed after Lilah left, and he decided against a second cup of coffee. The only thing that would settle him now was his bees.