Boss Me

by Claire Adams

  “Yeah,” I said to Ben, taking another sip of my beer. “If you don’t mind being available next Thursday, too, that’d be great.”

  On Sunday, when my parents got back from taking Declan to the water park, he had a new remote control airplane they had bought him.

  “I know it’s an indulgence,” my mom said, “but he was so excited when he saw it, so we just couldn’t resist.”

  We were sitting on the deck, watching as my dad and Declan played around with the remote control, and then fly the airplane into the air.

  “Well, thanks again for taking him out,” I said. “Not just today, but all these Sundays.”

  “It’s the least we could do, and you know that. Did you have a good time while we were out?”

  I shrugged. “Yeah. I went for a bike ride.” The truth was, it was hot and humid, and with every pedal stroke I’d been tempted to just turn around, but I forced myself to finish the route.

  “Declan seemed to enjoy himself today,” my mother said, watching as the plane did loops and twirls through the air. “He asked if we could go fishing next week.”

  “I’ll have to dig out his old fishing pole, if I can find it.”

  “We’ve still got your old one. It’s in good shape.” She paused. “He also asked us if we could invite Allie.”

  “Did he?”

  “Yes. He said since you usually don’t go with us, that maybe Allie could go.”

  “Oh. Well... that doesn’t entirely surprise me. He’s been asking about her.”

  “It’s hard, isn’t it? And he doesn’t understand the details about all of that. Not that he should, at that age.”

  “I know. I tried to explain it to him the best I could, but I think it just frustrated him even more. Because Declan thinks if we’re fighting, we should just make up and then everything can go back to the way it used to.”

  My mother smiled faintly. “Wouldn’t it be nice if it were that easy?”

  “It would.”

  “This whole thing has been bothering me, though,” she said. “I’ve been losing sleep over it.”

  “You’re not the only one who’s been losing sleep over things.” I paused. “I went and saw a therapist on Thursday.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes. I’m not sure if I’m going to continue with the therapy, though.”

  “It’s good you’re at least trying it. It can really help. I appreciate you telling me. Though I feel guilty over that, too. I think I’m probably a large reason why you’re in therapy to begin with.”

  “You feel guilty over a lot of things, don’t you?” The reply sounded snappier than I meant it to.

  “Of course I do,” my mother said. “How could I not? But we can’t go back in time. We can’t go back and change things, no matter how much I sometimes wish that we could.”

  “I know, Mom.”

  She took a deep breath and then exhaled loudly. “You know,” she said, “there was a time when I lost both you and your sister. Do you remember that? I think you were probably 6 or so.”

  “You lost us?”

  “I lost the two of you. For almost an hour. We had gone to Provincetown, and were walking down Commercial Street. We had just stopped at the saltwater taffy place, and you and Marissa had little bags of candy. And then your father and I happened to run into friends of ours that we hadn’t seen in ages, and we started talking, and they hadn’t met you guys before, so we introduced you, and you guys went and sat on one of the benches out front of this little shop that we were standing by, and I just... I got caught up in the conversation. Your father and I both did. And I remember finally looking over—I don’t even remember how much time had passed—and the bench was empty.”

  “Really?” I said. “That really happened?” But now that she mentioned it, I did have a vague recollection, just a snippet, really, of a memory: sliding off the granite bench, the way a rough spot on the edge scraped the back of my legs, taking my sister by the hand as I told my parents we were just going for a walk. I knew they hadn’t heard me, but I had felt completely safe on the streets of Provincetown, had no fear whatsoever that anything bad would ever be able to happen to us. I had kept waiting for one of my parents to call us back, but that call never came, and we kept walking, down to the Wharf, where we sat in the warm sand and watched the waves roll in.

  The only other thing I remembered from that day was a feeling, a feeling of exhilaration, that I had done something I knew my parents wouldn’t want me to do, but I had anyway, and it turned out just fine.

  I looked at my mother and shrugged. “I remember that a little bit,” I said. “I think. Marissa and I went down to the Wharf. We sat in the sand and ate the rest of our candy.”

  “When we finally found you, I was so relieved. And at the same time, I was so, so angry with myself. And your father. What kind of parents were we, letting our kids just wander off like that? Because we were too busy talking? Everyone was always telling me what a great mother I was, but what good mother would let their kids just get lost? It was a terrible feeling, so I know how you feel, Cole. But what you have to understand is that all parents make mistakes sometimes. No parent is able to pay 100 percent of their attention to their children 100 percent of the time. No matter what we tell ourselves. I had a hard time accepting that, for a while, but I had to forgive myself. Because you guys were fine, and because that was a very good lesson that I would never forget.”

  She gave me a pointed look, and I knew she was expecting that I would say I realized I’d made a mistake and that I would give Allie a call right then and there. But I had already broken up with her; I wasn’t going to call her up and say I changed my mind. Even if there was a very large part of me that wanted to do exactly that, I wasn’t going to because that just seemed ridiculous.

  “My decision’s already been made,” I said to my mother. “It’s not something that I’m going to walk back on now. I appreciate you sharing that story with me, and I know that no parent is perfect.”

  “Then why are you holding yourself to some unreasonable expectation? I’ve been around you and Allie together—the two of you made a great couple. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so happy than I did when you were with her.”

  “I know,” I said. “She did make me really happy. I don’t want to talk about this anymore, though, okay, Mom? It’s already hard enough as it is, without having to rehash it every time I see you.”

  Luckily, my dad and Declan came back over, Declan asking if I wanted to try flying the airplane.

  “Sure,” I said, pushing myself up out of the chair. “Let me give that thing a try.”

  I walked out into the middle of the yard, Declan trailing after me. I stood there and pushed the controls, moving the little joystick around to steer the plane.

  “Let’s see how high this thing can go,” I said, guiding the plane up, up, up.

  Declan stood next to me, eyes wide. “Wow!” he exclaimed. “Look how high it goes!”

  But then he wanted me to give him the controller, so I handed it over, and stood there next to him as the plane zoomed around us. Across the yard, I could see that Allie had come out of her house and into the backyard. The foliage had grown in enough that we could all pretend that we weren’t aware the other was out there, but I knew she’d be able to hear us. I glanced down and could see that Declan was aware she out there too; he was still pressing the controls but was looking right at her.

  And then the plane took off, sailed right over my head, going higher, clearing the maple tree, and nosediving right into Allie’s yard.

  “Oops,” Declan said.

  “You did that on purpose.”

  “Uh-oh,” my dad was saying. “Where’d it go?”

  Declan was already taking off, running into Allie’s yard. I just stood there.

  “It went next door,” I said.

  My father started to go after him, but then stopped. “Do you want me to...?”

  “Why don’t you let Cole do it,�
�� my mother said, giving me an encouraging look.

  I followed Declan, really not looking forward to having another awkward interaction with Allie. I knew she wouldn’t be looking forward to it, either. I pushed past the blueberry bushes. Declan had retrieved his plane and was showing it to her. She was wearing a pair of cut-offs and a white tank top made of some very soft-looking material that conformed to her every curve.

  “Sorry about that,” I said. She looked over at me, her mouth tightening.

  “That’s all right,” she said, and her voice sounded a little too bright, a little too forced. “Declan just wanted to show me this airplane of his. It’s pretty great.”

  “You want to come over and fly it with me?” Declan asked.

  “I’m actually going to do some work in the garden right now.” Allie pointed to the plot where we could see some things growing. “Look. Those daisies are blooming. Aren’t they pretty?”

  Declan walked over to the flowers, which were an array of whites and pinks. Allie and I both stood there, watching him.

  “I’m sorry he came over here like this,” I said.

  “You don’t have to be sorry.”

  “He’s been asking about you a lot. In fact, he was just asking my parents earlier today if you would be able to go fishing with them next week.”

  A tiny smile curved the corners of her mouth. I tried not to look at her mouth, because when I did, all I could think of was how badly I wanted to kiss her.

  “That’s sweet of him.”

  “It’s hard on him, you know. I haven’t really been quite sure what to say. I think he’s probably confused about it all, more than anything else. Which sucks.”

  “It does,” she said. “But just be honest with him. You don’t have to go into every detail, but he deserves your honesty.”

  There was no way she could be aware of the impact those words had on me, conveying an idea that I had struggled with ever since Declan was a baby.

  “Of course I want to be honest with him,” I said. “But for a kid his age, understanding the whole logistics behind a breakup isn’t really something I think he’d grasp.”

  I was aware suddenly that we were standing awfully close. We hadn’t started that way, had we? But Allie was now less than an arm’s length away from me, and it was almost as though I could feel the heat radiating off her body.

  “Can I pick a flower?” Declan yelled over to us from the garden.

  “Of course you can,” Allie said. “Thank you for asking, though.”

  I took a big step to the side, widening the distance between us. “And then we better get back to our yard, Declan,” I said.

  I watched as he looked at the different choices he had, finally selecting one, a big white daisy, which he plucked and then carefully carried over to us. He held it out to Allie. “This is for you,” he said.

  “Why thank you, Declan.” She took the flower from him. “This one is really beautiful. I’m going to go put it in some water, okay? And then whenever I look at it, I’ll think of you.”

  He smiled and looked deeply pleased.

  And as we walked back over to our yard, he looked at me, that smile still on his face. “Hear that, Dad?” he said. “Miss Allie said she’s going to think of us.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Allie

  I put the daisy that Declan had picked for me in a thin vase I had found in the back of the cupboard over the refrigerator, and I put the vase in the middle of the kitchen table.

  And I did think of him when I looked at it, and how much worse having a kid involved made a breakup. I wasn’t in love with Declan, obviously, but I did love him, and though I supposed it would be possible for he and I to continue to have some sort of relationship, it didn’t really make sense. What were the rules for this sort of thing, anyway? There didn’t seem to be any rules, or at least any that I was aware of. Cole and I hadn’t been together for that long; it’s not like I’d been raising Declan since he was a baby, and he thought of me like a mother or something. It hadn’t even been a full two months, which felt hard to believe.

  I just had to remember what my mother had told me: It wasn’t going to feel like this forever.

  After work on Wednesday, Amy caught up with me as I was walking to my car.

  “Hey,” she said. “You have plans now? I think we need to hang out.” I was about to say that I even though I didn’t have any plans, I didn’t really feel up for going anywhere, but she spoke first, as if she could read my mind. “We don’t have to go out anywhere, if you don’t want to; we can just go to my place and get some takeout or something.”

  And what could I say to that? Really, my only plan had been to go home, hope that I wouldn’t run into Cole, while simultaneously also hoping that I did run into Cole, all the while trying to make myself feel okay about the fact that we weren’t together.

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ll follow you to your house.”

  Amy wasted no time in breaking out the Pinot Grigio, and I accepted a glass, though I told myself I wasn’t going to have more than two at the most.

  “You need a rebound,” Amy said.

  I shook my head. “I think I’m all done with dating.”

  “No, it doesn’t have to be a date. A rebound is just... a person to make you feel better, someone to get you out of the breakup funk.”

  “Is this person aware of it? Because that sounds kind of awful.”

  She smiled. “Well... I might actually have someone in mind.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “It might really help...he’s cool. He’s friends with my cousin, his name’s Jay, and he’s not looking for anything serious, but he’s a lot of fun. You don’t even have to sleep with him if you don’t want to. But you can’t let one breakup completely destroy your life, okay? You just can’t do that. You’re not allowed. Here, I’m texting him right now.”

  I started to protest, but then stopped. Maybe she was right—maybe this was what I needed to stop feeling like this. And really, at this point, I was willing to try almost anything.

  So when he texted Amy back a few minutes later and said that he wasn’t busy that Friday, she set the whole thing up. I was going to meet him at a little café in Gardner, which was good, because it was a big enough town that I probably wouldn’t run into Cole.

  “There,” she said. “You’re all set. Now, don’t feel like there’s any pressure or anything, okay? This is just for fun, and Jay is cool. It’ll be great.”

  I tried to smile, though something was telling me that going on a date like this when I didn’t feel like it wasn’t such a good idea.

  My mother called a few days later.

  “You sound like you’re feeling better,” she said. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m okay. I’m actually going on a date tonight,” I said.

  “You are? That’s great!” my mom exclaimed. “I’m so happy to hear that. I think that’s a really good sign.”

  “You don’t think that it’s too soon? Because I don’t really want to go on the date; I just agreed to it because Amy seemed to think that it was what I needed.”

  “I think it’ll do you some good,” my mother said. “Like I was saying when you were staying over here—you just need to realize that there are indeed many other fish in the sea, and that you are quite the catch. I know that Cole had a lot of good qualities about him, but he’s not the only person out there. Even if this guy isn’t the man of your dreams, it will do you some good to have some fun with someone who isn’t Cole.”

  “I’ll try,” I said, but I felt more trepidation than excitement.

  That feeling didn’t really change when Friday night rolled around. I had managed to avoid seeing Cole during pick-up this afternoon by busying myself in the back office, pretending that I was going through student files. I heard his voice, but I didn’t lift my head up from the desk. I was afraid that if I saw him, I would lose all nerve right then and there and demand that Amy cancel the date for toni
ght. I didn’t even want to think of it like a date; I was just getting together with some guy for dinner. Hopefully, we’d have some decent conversation, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if it turned out to be completely awkward either.

  I wasn’t sure how I would recognize... wait, what his name? I couldn’t remember. I texted Amy as I was getting out of the car, hoping that she had her phone on her and she’d be able to respond immediately, but she didn’t. So I racked my brain, trying to remember. It was something short, wasn’t it?

  I walked to the restaurant, The Flying Moose, and there was a guy standing by the entrance. He had shaggy, light brown hair and a beard, and he was smoking a cigarette.

  I stopped a few feet away from him; maybe this wasn’t the right guy. But right as I was about to walk past and go into the restaurant, he looked at me and said my name.

  I smiled weakly. “Hey,” I said. “Um... I’m sorry, I forget your name.”

  “Jay.”

  Ah, that was it.

  He dropped his cigarette into the ashtray and shook my hand. “I’m sorry, you caught me smoking. I’m not a smoker, I swear.”

  “Sure,” I said. “I can totally see that.”

  “I was a little nervous.”

  “Oh. I hope not on account of me.”

  “Well... yes and no. I haven’t been on a real date in a while, if you don’t mind my saying. Actually, I probably shouldn’t be saying that, should I?” He smiled. “It doesn’t make me sound very good.”

  We both stood there, a second of awkward silence extending to a couple seconds. I couldn’t do this. I just couldn’t do it.

  “It’s not a date,” I finally blurted out.

  He looked at me blankly. “It’s not?”

  “Well, I mean, yes, it is a date, but... I’m kind of being forced to go. I didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” I added quickly. “I don’t know what details Amy told you...”

  “She didn’t really tell me anything. I don’t know Amy that well, actually, I’m friends with her cousin. Is... is something going on that I should know about?”