I melt. How am I ever going to leave?
Two Months Later
Months of hospitalization and rehab have taken a toll on Maggie. Her once-plump cheeks have sunken in and her eyelids hang like old curtains. It’s hard to look at her. At the same time, I can’t look away. All I can see is Grandma, right before the end. Back then, Maggie would visit us every day. She and Willow took turns making meals and bringing in the mail. This would be so much different, I thought, wondering how it would work with a three-year-old in the mix. Everything will be so much different than it was supposed to be. I should be used to this. Or, get used to it.
Finally settled on the couch, Maggie uses the clicker to flip on her afternoon game shows. Muting the sound, she turns to me.
“How are you, dear? I mean, are you okay with things?” I know she’s asking about Austin, and more specifically Tristan. They need to get back in here. It’s a conversation I’m not ready to have. I still don’t know how to feel about Maggie knowing, all this time, about Tristan and keeping Austin’s secret. I cannot picture my own grandmother doing that.
“I’m fine. We’re trying to work things out. More importantly, how are you feeling?”
Maggie raises her eyebrows, wincing and hoisting herself against a pillow. She presses her lips tight, like she’s considering her words, before she finally speaks.
“I’m fine, too. But you do know that Austin was just a kid. Just a dumb boy when it happened, right?”
“Austin is older than me.” I want to add that I never cheated on him, never even considered it, and that I’d had my fair share of chances. I don’t say it because I don’t want to hurt her.
“I know, but boys mature more slowly than girls. And, well, they become men. And trust me, that’s not much different. You think I have been alone all these years for no reason, dear? Don’t make the same mistakes I did. You have to understand, Callie. It was a mistake, and he didn’t know how to handle it. Ran away to the army to escape the whole thing. Total coward move. Still, he didn’t have a pot to piss in. Just lost his folks. Barked up the wrong tree, that’s all. Wasn’t even sure the baby was his. He just wanted to run away from it.”
Run away. All I can think of is my own momma, likely following the graying Grateful Dead—How old are they now?—Dead around on tour again. Tristan has no momma either. All he has is Austin and, for now, Maggie.
Just as I’m about to ask Maggie what she means about not repeating her mistakes, Tristan comes flying through the screen door. Behind him is Austin, barking at the little boy to slow down. Tristan stops and turns 360 degrees around. Then, he sticks his tongue out—directly at Austin. When Austin’s jaw drops, Maggie and I burst out laughing.
“Wow.”
“Like father, like son?”
“Get back here!” Austin yells, his dimples dancing. He chases Tristan down the hall, finally reaching him at the end, where he captures him and ruffles his hair. “Oh, what am I going to do with you? I’m fixin’ to…”
Tristan laughs, sticking his tongue out again. “Catch me!”
Austin runs back down the hall, directly toward me. He grabs my arm, pulling on it to use me as a human shield. “Catch Mommy Callie!”
There’s no time to process what Tristan’s just called me. In seconds, he’s off, back down the hall. This time, he’s matched by Rocky.
“Oh, no. No way,” Maggie says.
“But Tristan loves him. Look at them,” I say, ready for a fight. “And he’s only a puppy. Look how cute! Rocky, come! Come say hello.”
“Callalily, I said no!”
Rocky comes bounding toward me, just like Tristan. When he spots Maggie, he jumps up beside her and licks her face.
“Austin! Tell her no!”
I’m amazed how firm her voice is. I’d expected her to be much weaker. Glad to see her strong will is still there, I try not to be disappointed in the inevitability that she may make us get rid of the dog.
“Aww, Grams, why not? Tristan loves him and he’s just a puppy; he’ll settle down.”
“I didn’t sign up for this young man.”
My eyes widen. “I know exactly how you feel. But look, he’s so cute!”
Maggie glares at me, at first, the way Pappy used to. Then, she laughs. “Fine. I’ll give it a chance. But he better be on his best behavior.”
“Oh, he will! We will train him! Besides, he’s male. He’ll eventually mature.” I can’t help taking another jab at her.
“I already said fine,” she says, warning me the conversation is over, but smiling.
“Thank you!”
“No,” she looks at me warmly. “Thank you.”
Epilogue
It takes a full year for me to truly get over Austin’s fling. Tristan, of course, makes it easier. Today, as I snap a periwinkle bowtie around his neck, and tell him—no, he cannot play with Rocky right now—I can’t help but laugh. I smile at the panic I felt the day Sally O’Mason left me with him—the snot-faced little boy who has become our world:
* * *
How am I supposed to know what to do with a three-year-old? I’m barely a grown-up myself. I have to get to Maggie’s hospital room. She needs me. And Austin? Oh, when I get my hands on him…
I squirm, trying to figure out what to do with all the paperwork as I watch Sally struggle with the latch on her briefcase. I hold my breath, opening Maggie’s door to let the little boy in. I peer out, to the end of her driveway where a winding gravel path tempts me to run. Sally grumbles about people “breeding too much” and hands me a crumpled business card. She tells me, for the millionth time, to have Austin call her the moment he returns. There’s “court” and “parental rights.”
I try to focus on her words, imagining this could be a nightmare or just a big mistake—knowing it’s unlikely. I’m glad she’s in a rush to leave, though, I have no idea what I will do with the kid when she’s finally gone.
Sally grunts and tells me only deadbeats forget to mention their son. I have no idea what she expects me to say. “We women don’t do that shit. Men are just weak. So anyway…”
I turn slightly, to see Tristan rolling on Maggie’s living room floor. He seems okay, I decide, and turn back to her. I give her directions to the Donavan’s, and tell her I’ll stay in touch. I promise to have Austin call. And then, she’s gone.
A three-year-old, it seems, is a mini-human with a perpetually runny nose. A three-year-old likes to roll, squeal, and climb on things. A three-year-old, this one anyway, has a smile brighter than Rainbow’s, laughs at his own burps, and is fascinated with the buttons on the clicker.
“Come on, we’ve got to go.”
Tristan looks at me, shrugs, and returns to the clicker. He takes in big gulps of air, purposely trying to give himself the hiccups. He waves the clicker at me, laughing. Finally, I take it out of his hands and put on the first cartoon I can find. He sits, cross-legged on Maggie’s area rug while I dash to the porch to see if Sally’s left a car seat.
Relieved, I return to check on him and figure out a plan. I sit on the couch, fumbling through paperwork. I tell Tristan—out loud—that his case manager’s “lost her mind.” I don’t look at him. Afraid I’ll get lost in his dimples, again, and preferring not to.