by Rea Frey
Noah’s eyes glaze at the loaded statement, and Lee wonders what he’s thinking about. “Yes,” he says. “People are both. Whether they are your family or friends. People aren’t any one thing.”
“I don’t have many friends,” Mason says.
Lee’s heart snags. “Sure you do.”
“No, I don’t. I don’t like anyone. Except for Noah, Grace, and Luca.”
“That’s three friends right there,” Noah says. “That’s more than a lot of people.” He lifts his hand. Mason, a boy who loathes physical touch, who rarely lets her hug him or physically comfort him, slaps hands with Noah and returns to his food.
“I don’t understand how you do that,” Lee says, lowering her fork to her plate. “You and Grace are the only people who can touch him.”
“I’m sitting right here, you know.”
Noah smiles. “That you are, bud.” He turns his attention to Lee. “You know what? I find that when you stop worrying about the reaction and instead focus on the interaction, miraculous things can happen.”
“Huh.” She moves her food around. “I’ve never heard it put like that before. Focus on the interaction not the reaction. I love that.”
“It’s hardest for you because you’re his mother. But Lee, I promise”—he places his hand on hers and her heart thumps—“he is thriving. He’s doing great. Really. He’s a brilliant child.”
“I am. I am brilliant.”
Noah rolls his eyes good-naturedly. “Note to self: don’t call your students brilliant in front of them.”
Mason studies their hands. “Are you going to get married and have another baby?”
Lee retracts her hand, though she wants to leave it under his.
“I said, are you going to get married and have another baby?”
“No, sweetheart.” She smiles nervously at Noah. “We are not getting married. We’re just friends.” As she says it, that word feels like a betrayal. She doesn’t want to be friends. Friends are bullshit.
“But are you going to get married and have another baby? Babies take forty weeks to be born, and you are getting old. Having babies past the age of thirty-five significantly ups the risks for abnormalities.”
“What are you, a gynecologist?” Lee’s skin warms. She excuses herself to get a glass of water.
Mason goes on about pregnancy, reciting facts he memorized from a human sexuality book. Noah offers his two cents every few minutes, sharing even more facts Mason isn’t aware of. They are like dueling encyclopedias. She thinks of her life before Mason. She thinks of the pregnancy. She thinks of what happened when he was a baby …
She clears her throat and enters the dining room. She is no longer her past. She is no longer that person. She is no longer responsible for that life.
Maybe one of these days she will start to believe it.
8
lee
“You done, bud?” Lee rearranges her face to neutral. “You can finish your project in your room before your shower. I’ll set the timer.”
Mason abandons his dishes on the table and escapes to his room, where he is building a model of Tokyo. She should insist he come back and take his dishes to the sink but relinquishes the demand. Instead, she winds the timer to sixty minutes and scoops his plates and containers from the table. Noah helps her scrape, rinse, and stack the plates in the dishwasher.
“Want to sit for a bit?”
“Um…” Noah looks at his watch again, and for the second time tonight, she wonders what other plans he has. “Sure. I can hang for a bit longer.”
Lee suggests they move to the living room. They bring their ice waters. Not for the first time, she wishes she could offer him beer or wine. She appreciates he never makes a big deal of not drinking in front of her, though she’s insisted that it’s fine if he wants to stock a few beers in her fridge for days when he stays late.
“He’s so excited about the project,” she offers.
“I used to love building models too. Kept me busy.” He fluffs a pillow behind his back and sinks into the cushions.
“Good instincts.” She leans forward to set her glass on a coaster. “It’s insane how much he likes you.”
Noah laughs. “Well, I’d hope so.”
“Are all your other students as brilliant as Mason?” she teases.
“No.” He spins his glass around. “He’s my brightest star.” He smiles. “But you already know that.”
She tilts her head. “I do know that.”
He takes a sip of water and sets his glass on the coffee table beside hers. “I really do feel like he’s progressing. Some of the therapies we’re implementing … both his fine and gross motor skills have developed tremendously.”
Lee studies him as he talks. The exact way he sits, spine erect, crisp shirt, right ankle over left knee. She appreciates his attention to detail, the way his body language is always composed yet relaxed, the way he actually listens when people talk. He is an appropriate person, which is one of the things she likes most about him. She has never had appropriate. She craves appropriate, responsible, honorable.
“Well, whatever you’re doing, it’s working.” She licks her cold lips. “I wish I could have the same effect.”
“It’s my job.” He stretches his legs in front of him, crossing the opposite ankle over his other knee. A sliver of paisley sock catches her eye. “And you’re his mother. Kids are always different with their mothers.”
“True.” Lee thinks about Carol’s email. “So, Carol emailed me today.”
“Oh? Did she finally figure out a cure?” He tents his fingers into double quotes around the word cure.
“Right? No. Actually, she and the girls are going to Black Mountain next Thursday and invited me to go too.”
“Lee, that’s great. You never take a vacation. You should go.”
She fumbles with her fingers in her lap and retrieves her water to give her hands something to do. Her nails tinkle against the glass. “I’d love to, but I would have to leave Mason. I’ve never done that before.”
“Well, I’d be here to help.”
She flicks her eyes toward his. “I can’t ask you to do that.”
“Why not?”
She shrugs. She is nervous tonight. She reminds herself that she trusts Noah—that Grace trusts Noah, that Mason trusts Noah—and that, at her very core, she knows what she has always wanted: a man in Mason’s life. In her life. How she wants to present the image of a happy family to the world, but mostly to herself. She wavers for a moment, the seconds eating the silence. Finally, she looks at him and gathers her nerve. “I have a confession to make.”
“Oh?” He jiggles the few remaining ice cubes in his own glass and is clearly thrown by the change in topic.
Lee leans her head against the cushion, eyeing him. “I never know how honest I can be with you. Or what you’re really thinking.”
“Is that your confession?” he teases.
“No.”
“You can always be honest with me. You know that.” His eyes are sincere.
She fingers the tassel on a small throw pillow. “I just don’t want to screw anything up between us.”
He cocks his head. “How would you screw anything up?”
Lee’s past rips across the fabric of her mind. All the missteps, the failures, the earth-shattering mistakes. She lifts her head. “I … like you. As lame as that sounds.”
“I like you too.”
How honest should she be? “Yeah, but I like you like you. Like a woman likes a man she’s interested in. Romantically, I mean.” She sounds ridiculous. Her heart prances around her chest, and she resists sneaking a glance at her T-shirt to see if the imprint of her pulse is punching through the fabric.
“Lee.” Noah inches away slightly. “I’m flattered.”
She follows the movements of his body, how it transforms from relaxed to stiff in an instant. “But you’re physically pulling away.” She jokes, but deep down, the rejection stings.
; No one ever chooses you.
“I’m not. I’m just…” He waves toward Mason’s room. “He’s the priority. I would never want to do anything to get in the way of why I’m here.” He searches her face, but she can’t look at him.
Instead, she stares into her lap. Why is he here? He’s here because Grace introduced them. He’s here because he agreed to teach Mason. He’s here because she wants a man in her house, in her life … and yes, even in her bed. Is that really so difficult to conceive? She finally drags her gaze to his face as she stands. Her body thrums with nerves, desire, and the initial rejection post-confession.
She thinks about scooping his frigid glass from his hands, refilling it, and changing the subject. Instead, she stands in front of him as if to pass, their knees touching, and abruptly leans over him. Noah inhales and looks toward Mason’s room, then directly at her. She can barely think over the pounding of her heart or the fierce hue of his eyes, like twin domes of jade, but she moves closer, never breaking eye contact, and hovers inches from his lips. His hands stutter against her shoulders—caught between pulling her in and pushing her away—but she holds her position. She is never this bold, but she’s so tired of waiting.
He swallows. His Adam’s apple bobs, and she senses it: desire. She can smell the husky scent of his aftershave mixed with his natural scent. It consumes her. She slides her hands against the sides of his face. Moisturized skin slicks her palms. She moves even closer. He sighs, his eyes fluttering closed. He leans toward her, meeting her, but before their lips meet, Noah grips both of her arms and gently pushes her back. “We can’t.”
She stands, every part of her pulsing with need. “Why not?”
“We just can’t.” He thrusts a hand through his hair.
“But why not?” She sounds petulant and tries again. “Look. I know you don’t want to mess up our working relationship, and I get it. I do. I respect how professional you are. It’s one of the things I love—like—most about you.” She reddens at the word love. “But I’ve thought a lot about this. It’s all I’ve thought about, actually.” She replays their easy conversation at dinner, how much Mason enjoyed the two of them talking, the three of them sitting there, like a family. It’s her turn to have a family, isn’t it? After all this time?
“Lee.” He stands, rejecting her again, and something braces inside her. She works to keep her disappointment in check.
“Look, I’m sorry … I just can’t.” He palms the jaw she just touched, and she follows the path of his fingers, unable to look away.
“Are you seeing someone?” The thought of him with another woman boils her blood. She hasn’t waited six months to make a move only to be rejected for someone else.
He doesn’t say anything. Sadness flickers then retreats as he studies her, and she knows there’s something he’s not telling her. Against her better judgment, she walks into her bedroom and locks the door. She wants to stay and talk, but she’s afraid of what he might say.
The weight of his refusal presses hard. In her bathroom, she splashes icy water on her face. She looks in the mirror. A barrage of criticism attacks her: why she’s always second, why she doesn’t get to have what others have, why she has no right to be angry. She calms herself after a few moments as the truth reminds her, and she finally exits the bathroom to apologize.
9
lee
Noah is not on the couch. She walks to Mason’s door and listens, but she doesn’t hear Noah’s voice. In the kitchen, she notices his keys are gone from the table by the back door. She steps into the night, the air crisp, and sees a pop of taillights escaping down the street.
She retreats inside. Regret and shame consume her. She takes deep breaths, but emotion soars. Before she can stop herself, she opens her mouth and screams. It has been so long since she’s used her voice in any obvious way, that at first, it startles her. But then, as the sound rips through her chest and throat, she gains momentum, and screams louder. Mason bolts from his room, eyes wild. His aversion to noise is never lost on her, but tonight, she can’t help it.
She screams until he cups his ears and disappears back into the safety of his room and the consumption of his project. She collapses onto the tile, wanting someone to comfort her, to love her, to want her too.
She remembers when it all started, of course, this horrific feeling of being unwanted. That sudden beginning that had been birthed in the span of a single night—her mother’s murder. Then it was her father’s emotional abandonment. Then it was navigating the mean kids in middle and high school, friendless, without a boyfriend, or a parent to rely on. It was staying up nights worrying about the bills. It was coming home in the afternoons to find her father sitting in the bathroom with a knife, threatening to kill himself from his consuming grief. (He never did; he never would.) Lee felt sorry for him, sorry for the both of them.
It was her father finally getting hurt on the job at the auto shop—which caused spinal arachnoiditis—that led to disability. When he had an excuse not to work and still received a paycheck every month, he blew it on pain pills and booze and felt his contribution to their lives was enough.
Lee thought about leaving him so many times. Leaving the house, leaving him in it, leaving Nashville, but the fear of showing up and finding him dead kept her rooted to the spot. She cleaned, she made dinners, and she worked her way through cosmetology school right after high school to hopefully give them both a better life. His checks weren’t enough; there would always be supplementation. It was only when she met Shirley that her life completely cracked apart.
Lee sighs and peels herself off the floor. She doesn’t want to think about her past. She wipes away her tears, blows her nose, and knocks on Mason’s door, her apology already working itself out in her head. She shouldn’t have yelled like that. As she waits for him to open the door, she replays Noah’s rejection like a dull knife to the gut.
She knocks again. Maybe it’s just her lot in life to be alone, to raise Mason without a father. Isn’t that what she deserves? The gnarled truth burrows deeper until she wants to cry. She bites back more tears as Mason cracks the door and she steps over the threshold, apologizing for scaring him.
As she says the words I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to, she’s saying it to him, of course she is, but really, she means it for someone else.
despair [dih-spair]
noun
1. loss of hope; hopelessness
2. someone or something that causes hopelessness
I know about despair. I practically created it.
The way it wraps around you.
The way it tightens.
The way it chokes and squeezes.
I’ve lived in despair for so many years—agonizing, torturous despair that cuts you off from a normal life.
What’s another word for despair?
Anguish. Desperation. Despondency.
Check, check, check.
The only thing that makes my despair better is if someone else—someone who deserves it, someone who’s asking for it—feels that same misery I feel.
If just for a moment.
If just for a lifetime.
How do you ensure someone’s despair is greater than your own?
I think I’ve figured out the answer to that little riddle.
Now it’s time to put my plan in motion.
10
noah
On the way home, Noah replays what happened. His heart pounds and his throat constricts. He unbuttons his collar and sucks in a breath. His fingers tighten and release on the wheel. Traffic thickens as he heads to his side of town. He checks the time on his phone. Is it too late to call?
Lee fills his head. Her lips. Her breath. That pleading look, followed by a wounded one. Anyone in their right mind would be crazy about her—would jump at the opportunity to date her—but he can’t. For many reasons. All that conversation about good and bad with Mason at dinner has made him uncomfortable. His stomach coils. He possesses his own version of bad—eve
ryone does—but he also has a secret. The more he spends time around Lee, the more he wants—no, needs—to tell her.
But if he does, it could jeopardize his progress with Mason. Mason is the one he really cares about. Mason is the one he wants to keep safe.
He exhales and loops onto the interstate. Friday night activity buzzes around him, but he has tunnel vision. Mason. I must think about Mason. No matter what happens, he does not want to fail this boy. He can’t taint that with convoluted feelings for Lee.
He swallows and thinks of the dream he had the other night. In it, he’d packed a bag for Mason. They’d gotten in a car and driven away from Nashville. Mason hadn’t even asked questions. He’d been happy just to go with him.
Noah knows what it means. Of course he does. He doesn’t have to be a therapist to figure that one out. There’s a direct line that connects there to here.
He grits his teeth and knocks away the despair. “Forget about it. You are not your past.” He almost rolls his eyes at the corniness of his statement, but it’s a mantra he clings to like a lifeline. He is not his past. So he can’t make decisions based on those screwups for his present.
He cranks up the volume on the radio and listens to the latest bubblegum pop hit. Twenty minutes later, he is at his front door. He parks, but then thinks better of it and makes a call.
His heart rate slows when he hears hello. “Want to meet at the Patterson House for a drink?”
He waits for confirmation, ends the call, and makes the short drive to the makeshift speakeasy. He thinks of the dim lights, warm booths, and oversized cocktails. He just needs an escape—from Lee, from Mason, from his own secret, from the dueling thoughts in his head.
As he parks and walks to the nondescript building, he makes a decision to stay focused. Everything will happen as it should in due time.
He just has to be patient.
saturday