Chapter 30
LEO
THERE’S SOMETHING SO ELEMENTAL ABOUT my children in the bathtub with their round bellies and pruned fingers. They compare belly buttons. They make fishies swim. And I’m a fixture in the background to keep shampoo out of eyes, keep them from drowning, keep their little bodies safe from harm.
I bathe Otto, swiping a sudsy washcloth across the crevices in his neck. He giggles and tucks his chin. I ask if Sadie needs help, but she informs me that she can do it all by her own self.
Meanwhile, April is out on the town with her sister.
April left the stove on. April was with another man.
And yet, April is their mother—a court will favor her.
Even if it doesn’t come to that, if she’s reasonable and we’re able to settle, I will still lose my children, because keeping half of something is losing it too.
I pull the drain, and the kids watch the vortex until it’s gone.
I wrap them in towels. Sadie patters away to find her nightgown as I carry Otto to get a diaper.
I zip his pajamas, careful not to pinch, before the kids run to say good night to their grandparents.
Then I read Ferdinand and sing a few lullabies.
They’re asleep by the time I leave the bedroom.
When April gets back from dinner, I’ll tell her that we need to talk. Start making decisions about how to move forward.
But this is easier said than done. It’s after eleven when the sisters tumble into the house, drunk. From my trusty spot on the couch, I hear them immediately.
I go to them and look at Josie, her pupils wide.
“Did you drive?”
She shakes her head, leaning against the wall. “Uber. I’ll get the car tomorrow.”
I look at April. “You don’t usually—”
“I don’t, usually.” She meets my gaze in challenge, and I realize this is no time to talk.
“Okay, then.” I sigh and turn toward bed. “Good night.”
“Is it?”
I groan inwardly and turn back around.
April walks into the front room, cornering me. “What makes it good?”
Josie makes a you’re on your own face behind her sister and escapes up the stairs, skipping the one that creaks.
April plops herself onto the couch and crosses her arms. “Name one good thing.”
“You should go to bed.”
“See? Nothing.”
“Fine, I rescind my ‘good night.’ Just go to bed. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“I’ve heard that one before.”
“What?”
“It’s always later, never now.”
“Well, what is there to say?”
The skin beneath her collarbone is splotchy from the alcohol.
“That I don’t care about Cody!” She’s too loud. “We didn’t even have sex!”
I flinch, unable to block the memory of his hand in her jeans, the knowledge of every curve he was touching. I say quietly, “Marriage vows go beyond sex.”
“Oh, really? Like long talks?”
“What?”
“Long talks with Kim?”
My voice drops. “I’ve never done anything inappropriate with Kim. Are you trying to say talking to a friend is remotely the same as what you did?”
This seems to cut through the booze. Her arms fall from their crossed position, hands going limp in her lap. “No.” She shakes her head and says, almost to herself, “No, it’s not the same.”
“Mommy?” Sadie is suddenly behind me, blood dripping down her chin.
We dash to her, April sobering up.
In our daughter’s palm, a tooth. The first one she’s lost. Our relief is palpable, shock becoming pride. I give her a high five while April goes to grab ice from the kitchen.
Sadie rises onto her toes and back down, her tell of excitement. “Tooth Fairy time!” She gives me a big, overdramatic wink.
April and I argued about the tooth fairy tradition.
She loved it as a kid, but I never experienced it, and I didn’t want to lie to our kids.
So we told Sadie it’s a game of pretend but that we could play it all the same.
She’s been waiting for this moment, more excited because she’s in on the secret.
She has an empty mint tin waiting by the bed.
After getting cleaned up, she scampers back upstairs with her bedhead and bleary eyes, a tiny tooth cupped in her hand like a diamond.
Back when she cut her first tooth, we celebrated with avocado, her first food.
April took pictures and clapped, and Sadie gave us a wide, green, one-toothed smile. I wonder if this is the same tooth.
I frown. I don’t know when Otto cut his first tooth, I realize, or how many he has now.
April asks, “Do you have any quarters?”
I nod. “Yeah. I can do the trade once she’s asleep. I’ll add a little note.”
She hiccups. “Thanks.”
I run a hand down my face. “I can name two things.”
“What?”
“Two good things about tonight and every night: our children.”
“I—”
“No, listen.” I keep my voice quiet in case of more surprise visitors. “I know we had a fire, and I’m so sorry about everything with your dad, but I still want a divorce. And I want it in whatever way will hurt the kids the least.” I ask her, “Can we do that?”
A promise from her means so little, yet my requests unfurl between us. Have dinner with me. Marry me. Make a home with me. Have children with me. And please, for God’s sake, put our children first when it all comes crashing down.
“You think so little of me.”
“I’m talking about the kids. Don’t make this about you.”
She steps closer, jutting her chin out as she looks up at me. “Of course I’ll do what’s best for them, same as I’ve tried to do every day of their lives, including the many days when you couldn’t even be bothered to show up.” She strides past me unsteadily, and she goes upstairs.
I lie on the couch, letting out a long exhale and thinking of the many days when April didn’t want me to show up. A few days after Cody happened, I did realize I had forgotten April’s birthday. But a forgotten birthday is nothing compared to an affair.
Come morning, I realize I’ve forgotten something else: the tooth fairy.
Naturally, there are tears. Sadie’s eyes like saucers, she sniffles and looks up. “Why didn’t she come?”
And now I wish we had lied to her so that we could blame this on an imaginary fairy instead of having to look her in the eye and admit that I forgot about her very first lost tooth.
But April yanks me into the other room and whispers, “Quick, let me see your phone.”
I hand it over, frowning.
She turns it on silent and frenetically types out a text: GIVE MY APOLOGIES TO MISS SADIE TORRES. I GOT DELAYED IN ASIA BECAUSE MY WINGS GREW TIRED. (FAIRIES NEED REST TOO.) ASK HER TO FORGIVE ME AND PUT HER TOOTH BACK UNDER HER PILLOW. I’LL COLLECT IT TONIGHT!
April reads it back twice, checking for reversals. In her own phone, she changes my name to TOOTH and my last name to FAIRY, and then she sends herself the message. She spins back toward our daughter. “Look!” She waves her phone. “The tooth fairy sent a message!”
Sadie squints skeptically, a hand on her hip. They read the screen together, and her eyes widen when she sees the sender’s name, mystified as to how her parents could possibly do such a thing. “How can a fake fairy send a real message?!”
April winks. “Should we respond?”
“Hmm, I guess just say that I’ll put the tooth back under my pillow like she said?
” Sadie brightens. “And I hope her wings get some rest!” She leaves the room with her tooth in its mint tin and a little hop-skip.
It was brilliant on April’s part. Instinctively I grab her hand, a small squeeze to say, We did it!
A child’s lost tooth is not the most important thing, but it’s the most important thing to one person in one moment.
April smiles at me, and it makes my heart drop.
She’s a good mother, a truly thoughtful person.
And unfortunately, I still love her. This love is akin to hunger—not always present but always returning.
I don’t know if this makes me strong or weak or merely human, but I do know those pink underwire daisies continue to taunt me.
How does someone have a successful divorce?
How can we do this where I won’t be tempted to ignore the scathing pain she caused and trip back into it, but also where I won’t fester and trip into a hatred that might embitter our children?
School starts next month. April will stay with her parents to help with Billy, but my job is in Argyle and I don’t need that commute.
We don’t need this confusion. The fundamental issues beneath our scaffolding remain: I don’t trust her, she doesn’t want me, and this marriage is ending.
We were never going to be able to stay in this sojourn, this catch of breath.
The study of history has taught me two things, simple yet key.
One: some things last. Two: most things don’t.
We can still conspire about the tooth fairy and parent our children together, but we don’t have to be married to do this. It will be better for all of us, eventually.
Sadie is showing Billy the new gap in her teeth. Deb is setting out cantaloupe and breakfast sausage. April is opening the big kitchen window, and morning light is filling the room.
This family. This home with all its oppressive beauty.
I have to get out of here.