Too Much of a Good Thing

by J. J. Murray

  Joey doesn’t respond, retreating into that silent world of his.

  “He’s not a geek, Rose,” I say, flexing fatherly muscles I’m still developing, “and I don’t want you referring to your brother that way.”

  “Whatever,” Rose says, using her second-most favorite word.

  “Jimmy, what do you miss most about Mommy?” I ask.

  Jimmy shrugs, his eyes drifting to the ceiling. “I dunno.”

  “You have to miss something,” I say.

  He shrugs again. “I dunno.”

  He has to miss something! “Well, think about it, and I’ll ask you again in a few minutes.”

  “Like I said,” Jimmy says, “I don’t know, all right? Gosh.”

  “Gosh” translates to “leave me alone.” I turn to Rose. “What do you miss most?”

  She shakes her head slightly. “I miss the fact that with Mom we didn’t have to have stupid family meetings.”

  I nod. “You’re right. We didn’t have to meet like this to talk. We just ... talked.”

  And here I have to call a family meeting to talk to my own kids when I could be talking to them all the time. I am such a fool. I come home with the food, dump it on the kitchen table, yell “Dinner!” up the stairs, and then they come, grab their share, and disappear into their rooms. We haven’t been communicating. We rush around all morning to get ready for school and work, barking at each other. They go off to their buses, they come home at different times, I’m usually late, and they live in their rooms.

  “From now on, then,” I decide, “we’ll eat dinner together every night like we used to.”

  “You’re not going to cook, are you?” Rose asks.

  I wince. “I probably shouldn’t. You could, couldn’t you?”

  Rose shakes her head. “Mom never taught me, remember?”

  “Well,” I say, “you watched her, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, but watching isn’t learning,” she says.

  Maybe I’ll hire a cook. No. I can’t afford that. “Well, at least we can sit down and eat whatever I bring home or attempt to cook.”

  More silence. I’ll take that as agreement and move on.

  I sit back. “I know this is a silly way to communicate, but I had to do something. And this sure beats the screaming and yelling and fussing and cussing”—I stare Jimmy down—“that I hear just about every day in this house.”

  No reactions.

  How do I get them all on the same page? How can I get them to live in the house that their mother decorated, kept, and filled with love?

  I have to be around more often. It’s as simple as that.

  “I’m taking tomorrow off,” I say.

  Three sets of eyebrows twitch. For my job at Progressive Insurance I usually work on Saturday mornings because so many accidents happen on Friday nights, but tomorrow I’m staying home.

  “And,” I add, “we’re going to do some spring cleaning.”

  “But it isn’t spring,” Jimmy says.

  “You know what I mean. We’re going to clean this house top to bottom, every nook and cranny—”

  “What’s a cranny?” Jimmy interrupts.

  “Everywhere,” I say. “I want this house to shine again. I want this house to look as if your mother still lives here, okay?”

  Joey nods. Rose rolls her eyes. Jimmy slumps lower in his chair. At least they’re finally reacting.

  “We’ll be up at the crack of dawn,” I say, “so get to bed early, okay?”

  More nothing.

  “Okay, um, meeting adjourned.”

  Then something miraculous happens. They don’t tear up the stairs. They leave quietly without a single “stupid-this” or “dork-that” or a “Leave me alone!” or a “Cut it out, puke breath!”

  Silence.

  I’m onto something.

  I think.

  And I have to get online to thank Shawna.

  4

  Shawna

  After a long day managing a McDonald’s, a trip to Kroger with Toni, and a quick meal of fried pork chops, Jiffy cornbread, and green beans, I sit in front of the computer while Toni watches the Cartoon Network, Crystal “advertises” outside, and Junior goes for a walk with Amina to Wasena Park.

  Joe’s reply brings a smile to my lips:

  Shawna:

  It worked! So far, anyway. Thank you. We are cleaning the house from top to bottom tomorrow as a family. Any foreseeable problems?

  Joe

  We cleaned house after Rodney died, too, and I fully intended to stay in that house until I realized that my McDonald’s pay was not enough to keep paying on that house and keep up the kids’ college funds. Everything was tripping along fine that day until we started running into Rodney—his clothes in the laundry room, his size 14 shoes under the bed, his pictures in photo albums, his coats in the closet, all his many uniforms. We ended up bawling together on the bed where we last saw him alive, half the house still a mess.

  Joe needs to know all this, too.

  Joe:

  This may be hard to do, but save your bedroom for last. And unless you want to blow through five boxes of tissues, avoid photo albums.

  Shawna

  “What show is that?” I ask Toni.

  No response.

  “Toni, what are you watching?”

  “I dunno, Mommy,” she replies with attitude, lying facedown on the couch, her eyes glued to three creepy-looking white boys with pasty skin.

  “Well, what’s it about?”

  “Three silly boys,” she sighs.

  “What are their names?”

  “Eddie.”

  “All three of them are named Eddie?”

  She nods.

  Only in America.

  I’m about to do some surfing, when a message from Joe appears in my mailbox:

  Shawna:

  Luckily, Cheryl’s room is the cleanest in the house, and since she took most of the pictures, I think we’re okay with the photo albums since she won’t be in many of them. What, if anything, should I do with her clothes? Rose has become a Goth and wouldn’t wear any of Cheryl’s old clothes.

  Joe

  Hmm. “Rose may surprise you, Joe,” I whisper.

  “Who are you talking to, Mommy?” Toni asks.

  She doesn’t hear me address her directly, but she can hear me whisper to myself. “Just talking to myself, honey.”

  I type:

  Joe:

  Give Rose first dibs on the clothes anyway. She’s still her mama’s daughter down deep, right? Otherwise, Goodwill, Salvation Army, your church, even some schools could use them.

  Shawna

  And then ... I wait. This doesn’t normally happen to me. Most folks say a quick thank you, and then I never hear from them again. Yet here’s this man somewhere in the world having a conversation with me.

  When his next message appears in my mailbox, I check it quickly:

  Shawna:

  Will do. Have I thanked you yet? I probably haven’t. Sorry. THANK YOU for your prayers and advice. Is there anything I can do for you? I’ve been praying a LOT these days, and I know I can add you to my list.

  Joe

  Whoo. A man I don’t know wants to pray for me, to put me in God’s thoughts. And in a way, he’ll be keeping me in his own thoughts, too. How much of my life do I tell? I try to keep my personal life personal. I mean, I’m hoping that God has another man out there for me, but I can’t be revealing my heart to strangers online. Even local men don’t want to hear that I have three kids. This man, though ... something about his focus on God, his kindness, his obvious ability to communicate with my soul ...

  And to think he’s waiting at his keyboard for my reply!

  Joe:

  I am a widow with three children: Crystal (18), Toni (8), and Junior (15). I have been hanging on for eight years. I can always use a little prayer. Thank YOU.

  Shawna

  My fingertips are sweating. Why? What is happening to me? It’s only a random ma
n. He just needs my help, and I’m doing my best to—

  “Whatcha doin’?” Toni asks, suddenly appearing next to me.

  “Um, just checking my mail.”

  “From who?”

  I look into her baby browns, her eyelashes so long, so thick, so Rodney. “A person who needs my help.”

  “Oh. What’s his name?”

  And so perceptive! “How do you know it’s a man?”

  She points at the screen. “Joe is a boy’s name.”

  Little by little, my youngest child’s ability to read is eroding my privacy. “Yes, I’m helping a man named Joe, and he has three kids just like us.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What are their names?” she asks.

  Hmm. I only know Rose. “Well, the girl’s name is Rose, and—”

  Another message from Joe appears. I click on it and read:

  Shawna:

  Does it get any easier?

  Toni frowns. “Does what get any easier?”

  “Oh, life, living,” I tell her.

  “Oh,” she says. “Well, does it?”

  “Yes, honey,” I say. At least I hope so, Lord Jesus, I hope so. “Is your homework done?”

  “It’s Friday, Mama,” Toni says with a long, slow blink.

  It is. Where’d Thursday go? Weeks end without my knowledge or permission sometimes.

  I have to stop working six days a week. Except for Sunday, every day seems like a Monday. McDonald’s has been wonderful about my crazy schedule, though at first they weren’t. But once they realized that this mother-of-three runs one of the tightest, most efficient (and therefore more profitable) ships in Ronald McDonald’s golden-arched navy, they let me schedule myself. And the hours are almost perfect. I work 8:30 to 3:30 Monday through Saturday, about a forty-two-hour week. I see my kids onto their buses in the morning and get home in time to collect Toni from hers. Crystal and Junior are so-called “latchkey kids,” but the village takes care of them. Other managers call me in to work every now and then to solve a crisis, and when one or more of my kids is sick, I just plain don’t work until they’re well.

  As a mother is supposed to do.

  “Mama?”

  She has caught me daydreaming again. “Yes, Toni?”

  “Didn’t you hear me?”

  Were her lips moving while my mind was traveling? I’ll bet they were. Toni is chatty. “I, um, I didn’t understand your question, honey.”

  “It wasn’t a question, Mommy. Look.” She points at the screen. “It’s Joe.”

  “Oh.”

  One click later, and I’m smiling:

  Shawna:

  Sorry about that. I hit the wrong button before I was done with my message. What I meant to say:

  Does raising children on your own get any easier? I feel like I’m treading water surrounded by two sharks and a dolphin. Rose has the sharpest teeth, Jimmy has the most teeth, and Joey is, well, a dolphin. I can’t figure him out yet. He’s lurking or something, I don’t know. He’s so much like his mother—quiet, intuitive, reserved, intelligent. I guess it’s his silence that scares me so much. It’s almost scary that he’s half-mine. Sorry to ramble. I used to be so organized.

  Joe

  “So did I, Joe,” I whisper.

  “Huh?”

  “Just talking to myself again,” I say, hitting the REPLY button.

  “You’re writing to him again?”

  Why not? It’s Friday night, and I’m talking to a single man. “Joe and I are having a conversation.”

  “So why don’t you just call him on the phone?”

  Toni is perceptive and logical, though I wish she didn’t have such a bossy tone. Where’d she learn that tone? Oh, yeah. Her older sister. “I don’t have his phone number, honey.” Though it would be easier to chat with Joe, we’d lose the anonymous intimacy of the Internet. We’d also lose the ability to delete something before we actually “say” it. Phone conversations are permanent. E-mail correspondence is, um, take-back-able.

  “Why don’t you ask him for his phone number?” Toni asks.

  “Well, honey, I can’t—”

  “Ask who for his phone number?”

  Crystal’s home? I didn’t even hear her come in.

  She looks over my shoulder at the screen. “Who’s Joe?”

  For eight years, Crystal has been the child with flames in her eyes, the protector of all that was Rodney. In her own heartbreaking way, she has kept me loving her daddy for eight long years, stopping most of my thoughts of finding someone else dead in their tracks with those flaming eyes of hers. Four years ago, I almost dated a slightly younger man, Clifford Smalls, the piano player at Pilgrim Baptist, our church. He had some nice hands and a quiet way about him, but he was always trying to separate me from my kids, almost ignoring the fact that I had three of them hanging on me. On the one and only date I was to have with Clifford, I took the kids with us to the movie. “Couldn’t you get a babysitter?” he had asked. Crystal had overheard and set him straight: “I ain’t no baby, and if you want to be with my mama, we are part of the deal.” Clifford didn’t bother me again. He still plays piano at Pilgrim, and I still watch his hands, those soft, strong—

  “Who is Joe?” Crystal asks again, this time louder and with more venom.

  “Joe is a man Mommy is trying to help,” Toni says. “He has three kids just like us, and their names are Rose, Joey, and Jimmy.”

  Toni is perceptive, logical, a quick reader, and helpful—though this is not really the time for Toni to help her mama, not with Crystal’s eyes on fire.

  “How long has Joe been goin’ on, Mama?” Crystal asks.

  “Two days,” I say. I stare at the blinking cursor to avoid Crystal’s fiery eyes. And now I have completely forgotten what was in Joe’s e-mail. “And if you’ll both excuse me, I’d like to write him back.”

  “Where’s he from?” Crystal asks, not moving.

  I blink. Here come twenty (or more) questions. “I don’t know. We’ve just, um, we’ve just met.”

  “Uh-huh.” Crystal leans on my chair.

  “Really. I don’t know anything about him other than what your sister told you.”

  She drops her face in front of mine, holding me with a withering stare, a stare she learned from me. “So you’re online with a stranger?”

  Here we go with my “The Internet Is a Dangerous Place” sermon in reverse. She thinks she has me, but she doesn’t. “His name is Joe. He’s not a stranger.”

  “So he says.” Crystal stares harder. “That might not be his real name.”

  She is so good at echoing me. “I believe him.”

  “He could be a sexual predator, Mama,” Crystal says.

  Shoot. She has that speech of mine memorized. But after eight years of hunching on Rodney’s pillow, a sexual predator doesn’t sound very bad to me right now.

  “What’s a sexual predder, Mommy?” Toni asks.

  “I’ll tell you later.” I look up at Crystal’s smoldering brown eyes. “Look, I’m helping Joe through his grief just as I’ve done for hundreds of people, Crystal. That’s all.”

  Her eyes relax a little. “So he’s nobody special, huh?”

  He could be, but I can’t answer her question at all. If I say, “No,” I’d be lying. I have something in common with a man who is out there on the Internet waiting for my reply. And if I say, “Yes” or “I hope so,” I’ll have to endure twenty more questions and solar flares coming from Crystal’s eyes. In times like these, a sermon usually does the trick.

  “This man needs my help, Crystal, and I’m so grateful that God, in His infinite wisdom, has blessed me with the gift of—”

  Crystal leaves. All I have to do is mention God, and she’s out of my face. She hasn’t gone completely heathen—yet, and I pray to God that never happens—but when we go to church, Crystal is not really there. She has practically renounced God for stealing her daddy away, keeping her eyes open during prayers at dinner (I
’ve peeked), keeping her beautiful voice silent during hymns, and definitely keeping her mind closed during the sermon.

  But Toni is still there, singing and clapping and praising the Lord. And, unfortunately, Toni is still here beside me while I’m trying to “talk” to a man.

  I stare at her. “You need me for something?”

  She shakes her head. “No.”

  “Are you through watching TV?”

  She nods, runs to the TV, turns it off, and returns to me. “Can I watch?”

  I blink. “You want to watch?”

  She nods.

  She wants to be nosy. I am so entertaining. At least she won’t be watching three silly white boys named Eddie. “Well, come on.” I set her on my lap.

  I click back, reread Joe’s letter, then begin:

  Dear Joe:

  It won’t get any easier unless

  “Unless what?” Toni asks.

  “Toni, please. I’ll read it to you when I’m done.”

  “I can read, Mama.”

  Dear Joe:

  It won’t get any easier unless you reorganize and get your priorities in order. Devise a set daily schedule that includes family time, like an outing, a game, a TV show you all enjoy, a video you all pick out. If necessary, put up a daily schedule of chores

  Which reminds me ... “Is your brother still at the park?”