The impact surprised them both, and when Jenny saw the blood dripping down Summer’s chin, she lifted a hand to her own mouth, her bright green eyes going comically round above it. Summer wasn’t angry that Jenny Carmichael had called Willow names. It was true. Willow was a skinny, white trash drunk. Summer was angry that Jenny Carmichael chose to be intentionally cruel.
Summer could have gone to the nurse for an ice pack. She could tell from the amount of blood that she’d probably need stitches. Instead, she grabbed a wad of paper towels from the bathroom and ran all the way home, pressing them to her lip.
When she walked through the door, she anticipated at least a tiny bit of sympathy from Willow. Maybe some frozen peas slapped onto her face. Willow was fully immersed in a rerun of “I Love Lucy.” She didn’t turn around when Summer came through the front door, and Summer made the terrible mistake of saying, “Mom, I need to talk to you.” At first, Willow mumbled the generic, “How was your day can you get me some aspirin,” greeting she usually used.
Willow turned her head when Summer said, “I need to talk to you.” And the second she saw Summer’s face, she became wide awake.
In the moments that followed, Summer wished so deeply that she’d handled the situation differently. But didn’t all children seek their mothers’ comfort when someone hurt them?
Not always, Summer realized. Not when it’s the mother doing the hurting.
***
“As you know, Derek and I met with Dr. Strasser today.”
Summer and Willow sat at the table on the back patio, Willow jiggling her leg impatiently.
“The head shrinker?” she said, her hateful tone coloring the space between them an acid green.
“No, Willow. The psychologist. He’s a doctor. He went to school for eight years to learn how to help people fix themselves after experiencing crappy childhoods like mine.”
She regretted it the moment she said it. Not because it wasn’t true, but because she knew it would distract Willow from the conversation Summer actually wanted to have.
Willow’s eyes snapped up to meet Summer’s. “Did you ever go hungry?”
Summer shook her head. “Look, that’s not what I want to talk about.”
“But you said it.”
“Because I’m frustrated.”
“Why? Because I’m here to help you? Because I put my life on hold to stay with you?”
A million thoughts raced through Summer’s mind. What life had Willow put on hold? What help was she actually providing? Who did she think she was kidding? Summer put her hands up as if she were surrendering.
“I need to set some boundaries with you.”
Willow looked down at the tabletop. “Boundaries?” she said. Then, after a brief pause, she made eye contact with Summer, a malevolent smile on her face. She shrugged. “Sounds like head-shrinker language to me. Is that what the head shrinker told you to do?”
“If you’re going to stay here, I need you to stop drinking. I need you go to a twelve-step-program. I need you to come home on time when you’re watching the kids. If you’re going to stay here, I need you to contribute in a meaningful way. Cook, clean, do some laundry. Dishes. I need you to be nice to me.”
“What about what I need?”
“What do you need? A roof over your head? Check. Food in your belly? Check. A place to sleep? Oh, okay. Check!”
The volume of Summer’s voice had crescendoed to a yell. Willow stood up, and the legs of her chair scraped the concrete.
“I refuse to stay here to help you if you’re going to put all these restrictions on me.”
Summer felt herself shaking with rage.
“Restrictions?”
“For you to insinuate I have a drinking problem and demand that I go to a twelve-step program is ludicrous. I do not have a drinking problem.” She scoffed, and then went on, “If you ask me to watch the kids, and I take them to the park, I’ll come home when I want to. If they’re having fun, and I’m having fun, we’ll stay at the damned park. They’re not going to starve to death if they get their perfectly portioned afternoon snacks fifteen minutes later than usual. I do contribute in a meaningful way. Having their grandmother around is priceless for your children.”
As Willow stood up and walked back into the house, Summer noticed the only item Willow hadn’t addressed was “be nice to me.”
***
As a sixth-grader, Summer was terrified of Willow. So when Willow’s face contorted into an angry grimace that day Jenny Carmichael split Summer’s lip open, Summer’s first instinct was to run. But she had nowhere to go.
“Just what have you gotten yourself into, young lady?”
Summer pulled the paper towel, now saturated with blood, away from her lip and felt the wound with the tip of a finger. It wasn’t just a split lip. It was a wide gash.
“Great. That’s going to need stitches,” Willow said. “What the hell happened? What were you thinking? I can’t afford stitches. I can barely afford to feed you.”
She stood up, then, and moved toward Summer with a speed Summer had never witnessed. She looked wildly around the room, her eyes landing briefly on surface after surface, like a fly would do. Summer should have known what was coming, but Willow had never laid a hand on her.
She found what she was looking for, or at least something suitable: a shoe Summer had discarded the night before, next to the couch on the floor. Willow swooped forward and picked it up. A sixth sense had Summer covering her face with her arms.
Willow drew back as if she were going to throw the shoe, and she brought it forward, repeatedly, hitting Summer on the back of the head, the shoulders, and the back. Part of Summer (probably Winter) wanted to scream, to tell Willow exactly why she’d taken a swing at Jenny Carmichael. Jenny Carmichael with her perfectly straight brown hair and her perfectly sober mother and her perfectly shiny Volvo. As Willow continued to whack her with the shoe, Summer wanted to spit the words out, to tell Willow what people thought of her.
But she couldn’t do it. She didn’t want to say the words aloud any more than she wanted to hear them again. Because wasn’t she a reflection of her mother?
So she didn’t say anything. She remained silent and took the beating. She remained silent while Willow drove her to the hospital, their dented, rusted out pea green station wagon weaving all over the road. She remained silent while Willow signed her in. She barely flinched when the doctor gave her a shot to numb her lip, and didn’t utter a word as he sewed in three stitches. She didn’t have to be a reflection of her mother. She was classy. She was strong.
***
At twelve years old, Summer had chosen silence. But now, she was an adult. She didn’t have to be silent. She could have her say. So she listened to Willow’s explanation of why she shouldn’t have to help Summer in a meaningful way. Then she responded.
“Fine,” she said. “I was trying to do the right thing by allowing you to stay here, but obviously, this situation isn’t working out. You need to leave.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Summer always believed nannies were exclusively for exclusive parents. Parents with very few children and lots of extra money hired nannies to raise their kids while they played tennis and drank Old Fashioneds and chatted about the stock market and horse racing.
Derek was now suggesting (well, demanding, actually) that she hire a nanny. Or at least a mother’s helper. The idea didn’t thrill her. She wanted to raise her own kids. Nevertheless, she agreed to interview a few girls for the position. And because she knew she may have a tendency to be judgmental during the process, she asked Delaney and Josie to sit in on the interviews.
Summer looked at them now. Delaney, hands clasped together under her belly, her arms practically pinned to her sides, seemed nervous. Josie, of course, tapped a pen on her notepad, impatiently. This woman doesn’t have time for wrong answers, the tapping said. Summer suppressed a laugh.
“Thanks again for doing this, guys,” Summer said.
> “Wouldn’t miss it,” Josie said, adding a quick, businesslike nod.
Delaney just smiled.
“Josie, you sound like a drill sergeant,” Summer said. “You’re going to intimidate them.”
“If I intimidate them,” Josie said, raising an eyebrow at Summer, “how do you think they’re going to handle your children?”
“Just be nice, okay?” Summer said.
“You asked me to be here,” Josie said.
Delaney laughed. “We’ll do the good cop, bad cop thing. You be the moderator.” Suddenly, she stood up quickly. “I printed out some lists of questions I found on the Internet.”
Summer rolled her eyes. “I know what questions to ask.”
The doorbell rang.
“Cross this one off the list,” Josie said under breath. “She rings a doorbell when she knows you have two kids under two. Never ring the doorbell.”
Now questioning her decision to ask the girls to join her, Summer got up to answer the door. The girl who blinked back at her from the other side looked about fourteen. Summer panicked and almost shut the door in her face. She reminded herself that her perception of age was a direct function of her own age. And she was getting old.
When Summer led her to the couch, the girl introduced herself as Moonbeam, and Summer laughed out loud.
“Really? Moonbeam?” Josie said.
Without breaking the rhythm, the girl answered, “My mom gave birth to me in a moonbeam on a hot fall night. So she named me Moonbeam.”
“Is this for real?” Josie whispered, way too loudly.
The girl nodded, shrugged one shoulder. “She was kind of a hippie.”
“Next,” Josie said, drawing out the word.
Moonbeam blanched, and Summer said quickly, “She’s joking. Anyway, we have a few questions for you. First of all, what experience do you have watching children?”
“I think the more important questions are, can you do laundry, will you do dishes, and do you know how to get ketchup out of the carpet?” Josie said.
“That’s not on my list,” Delaney said.
Summer held up her hands, and grimaced at Moonbeam, hoping the expression conveyed some kind of apology.
“Um, well, I—” Moonbeam began.
“Summer? Can I talk to you in the bedroom?” Josie again.
Summer dropped her forehead to her palm, but stood up and followed Josie to the bedroom.
“This girl’s not a good fit. You can’t say ‘Um, well, I’ if you’re watching five kids. You need someone with more spunk.”
“You didn’t even give her a chance!” Incredulous, Summer threw up her hands.
“You ain’t got time for this,” Josie said.
Summer laughed, despite herself.
The next applicant, an androgynous individual named Terry, turned the tables on Josie and interviewed Summer.
“How do you deal with discipline?” Terry wanted to know. “What activities do you do with your children?”
(“I just try to keep them alive, basically,” Summer answered.)
“What should I know about health and safety in your house?”
“Just keep ’em alive,” Summer said.
“What role do you see me playing in terms of your family?” Terry said.
“Just keeping my kids alive while my husband and I are working or on a date.”
“What, exactly, will my duties be?”
“Just keep ’em alive,” Josie, Delaney and Summer said.
By the time Terry left, Summer felt exhausted.
She didn’t want to answer these questions. She just wanted someone to help with the kids for a few hours each day. Then, they struck gold. Someone knocked four times on the door, and Josie smiled. “I like that. A nice, brisk knock. This one means business.”
The woman on the other side of the door was mid-twenties, with glasses, dark eyes and a big smile. “You must be Veronica,” Summer said. “Come on in.”
“Wow, it’s like the Spanish Inquisition in here,” she said when she sat down across from Summer, Delaney and Josie. Delaney and Josie elbowed Summer. Veronica did seem promising.
“Look,” Veronica said. “I want to be up front. I don’t have kids, and I don’t plan on having kids. I’m not a mommy type. If you’re looking for soft and mushy, you’re not looking for me.”
“Do you even like kids?” Delaney asked.
“Oh, I love kids,” Veronica said. “And I’m great with them. But I’m more of a crazy aunt type than a nurturing mommy type. I just wanted to put that out there. I won’t take their nonsense, I won’t coddle them and I’ll make them do their chores and homework. But when all of that’s done, we’ll have a lot of fun. I play a mean game of poker, and I’ll kill them at chess.”
Summer nodded. She knew everything she needed to know.
“You’re hired.”
***
“I never thought I’d say this,” Delaney said, “but it feels like we haven’t been here in forever.”
Rowdy’s was hopping this Thursday night, packed with college kids starting their weekend and professionals in loose ties wishing it were Friday.
Benjamin had delivered their drinks—a vodka cranberry for Josie, a water (with a side of green olives) for Delaney and a glass of white wine for Summer—and grinned down at them.
“Ladies! It’s been forever. I’m so happy to see you all together, out on the town again! It feels like I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“We were just saying that,” all three girls said.
When Benjamin walked away, Josie said to Delaney, “I never thought you’d spend more than a few days away from here, either. I’m so glad we forced you to get a real job.”
“Bartending is a real job,” Delaney said. “It provides a service. A critical one, I might add. And I was good at it.”
“Maybe so, but you were wasting your life after years of vet school,” Josie reminded her.
“Speaking of real jobs,” Delaney said, characteristically changing the subject, “nannying is a real job. How do you like Veronica?”
“Ohmygosh, I think I love her,” Summer said, stretching her arms over her head luxuriously. “I mean, she hung out at the house earlier this week while I was working, and I could hear her out there with the kids, threatening to cut Luke’s head off with a sword if he didn’t finish his homework by the time her phone timer went off. Classic! She’s great.”
“So this is the first time you’ve actually left her with all five kids, right?” Josie said.
“Yeah,” Summer said. “And I feel good about it. I mean, Derek is there, sleeping, but she can handle it.”
Summer couldn’t believe how good it felt to get out of the house and not worry about the kids. Veronica seemed sensible, practical and funny. And the kids really liked her.
A sense of peace was settling over her. She was glad she could say the same about Delaney, who was currently in the middle of describing the paint colors she and Jake had chosen for the living room (“the base is kind of like a creamy butter yellow,” she was saying). This was normal. Talking about jobs and paint colors. It felt so good. Summer could sit here at Rowdy’s forever. Well, she thought, as the college kids at the bar jumped off their stools, cheering, shouting, doing high fives, maybe not forever. But for a long evening, anyway.
“Where’d you go, Summer?” Josie asked, reaching across the table to squeeze Summer’s wrist.
Summer smiled, and knew it was a bit dreamy. “I was just thinking about how much I’m enjoying this,” she said.
“Good,” Josie said. “It’s about time.”
Yes, Summer thought, it is.
***
“So here it is,” Delaney said. “The scene of the crime. She lifted her arms out to the side, palms up. The three girls stood in the living room of her new house, in the same spot where Summer’s water broke just a few weeks before. “But from now on, I want you to think of it as my living room.”
After spending an hour
and a half at Rowdy’s, Delaney begged the girls to come over to her house and help her finalize color choices. Now, she produced a fan of paint chips from her purse.
“I think I have some Scotch tape in here somewhere.”
She tore a few chips off the fan, each a slightly different shade of butter yellow, and taped them to the living room wall.
“Wait, let me guess,” Josie said. “Melted butter, fresh butter, and curdled butter.”
Delaney spun around to face them, looking exasperated.
“Has Jake been talking to you?”
“No! Why?” Josie looked innocent, but almost too innocent. Summer wondered whether she really had talked to Jake.
Delaney sighed. “He thinks all three yellows look so similar we’ll be happy with whatever we choose.”
“You will,” Summer said. “They look pretty similar. I like the creamy butter one.”
Delaney laughed. “That’s not even an actual name. Shit.”
“You know what’s important, Dee?” Summer said. “It’s not paint colors. It’s what happens here—” she pointed at the floor—“and in there”—she pointed at the kitchen—“and over there.” She pointed toward the bedroom. “It’s not about what your house looks like. It’s about the memories you create within the walls. It’s not which color you choose, it’s you and Jake painting the walls together. Trust me, six or seven years from now, you won’t even notice the paint colors. You’ll reminisce about the time—”
“Summer’s water broke the first time we were all here together,” Josie said.
Summer went on: “You’ll think about bringing your new little baby home, which will happen in just a few weeks, and feeling like you don’t quite know what to do. You’ll set the carseat somewhere and take him or her out, and you’ll sit on the couch and feel like your family is home. And that is what matters. So creamy butter, melted butter, churned butter, butter on toast, none of it matters. Okay? Don’t stress over this. It’s a small thing. Inconsequential. Pick one and move on.”
The Motherhood Intervention: Book 3 in the Intervention Series Page 23