One Small Thing

by Barksdale Inclan, Jessica

  She sat back hard against her chair. Dan stepped on the accelerator and wiped his forehead with his hand. “I’m nervous, Avery. This hasn’t been easy. Yeah, I should have told you. Everything. I know that. Yes, you needed to know I lived a terrible, awful life before I met you. I’ve been thinking about it since the phone call. I know I’ve screwed up everything. Maybe even our marriage, but I thought you loved me. Who you married is who I really am, Avery. I had stuff in the past, but that became part of what I am now. Don’t you see? I thought that you really meant what we said to each other. This is the worse part we were talking about. We’ve had the better.”

  Turning to him, she felt her mouth hang open, the past two years a jumble of unarticulated anger in the pit of her stomach. Month after month of nothing, examinations and exploratory surgery and hormones, failure after failure after failure. That had been worse enough. “So I’m just supposed to take it all in. Your drug use. The drug addict you lived with. Her poor, sad son that has a room in my house, in my baby’s nursery?” She tried to breathe down her tears, but there they were, unwelcome and hot in her eyes. “I’m supposed to be some kind of mix between Deepak Chopra and Martha Stewart, able to deal with all humankind’s crap with kindness and to be a god dam whiz at redecorating and furnishing a boy’s room. You want me to accept it all. But what about me, Dan? What happens to me in this?”

  “It’s just not about you, Avery. Christ!” Dan clutched the steering wheel. “It’s about a boy. A boy whose been abandoned. His mother died! You said you understood that.”

  “I do!” she cried, remembering the first dream she’d had about her father after he died—he was standing at the mantel talking to her, his pipe in one hand, the stem moving up and down as he made a point. When she woke up, she smelled tobacco for just a second, and then she remembered what was real, what she was left with. “But how can I possibly be expected to be anybody to him.”

  “You’re supposed to be somebody to me,” Dan said more quietly. “You are supposed to be my wife.”

  Avery closed her eyes and leaned back against the headrest. She felt the hum of highway under the car and in her feet, and she remembered the airplane, her giddy nerves as she flew home, Mischa’s voice still in her ear. She thought of her and Dan’s bed, the forbidden zone in the middle, the way they’d been talking in shorthand for two weeks. Was this a marriage? Was this what she’d agreed to at St. Stephens Church, their friends and family all around them listening to every word of their wedding vows? She knew she wouldn’t live like Isabel, who seemed trapped in the same life she’d lived with her father, except he’d been dead for fifteen years

  Smoothing her pants, Avery imagined today like a project, a company that had to be sold PeopleWorks equipment and software. She could do that. She knew she could smile and charm the clients, make them think she wanted nothing more but to come to Tulsa and stay for two weeks at the Doubletree Inn while the system was implemented. Avery could convince Lawrence and Claire and Simone and Perry that her life depended on that very thing. She didn’t have to mean it. If they didn’t buy in, she would walk out the door with only one tiny regret and that was about her commission.

  So today could be like a sales meeting, nothing more. She could sell herself to Midori and Daniel and this Liza and Martin. They would think she was the most amazing wife since Laura Bush. Dan would get off her case and stop making her think about her father and Mischa. If they left her alone, she would have time to breathe. She would have time to decide what she was going to do.

  They all sat in a dark living room, a conglomeration of strange metal gadgets arranged on the coffee table and book cases. Behind the couch where Avery, Dan, and Midori Nolan sat was a row of Bavarian beer steins. Liza and Martin Adams sat in two maroon chairs across from the couch. Liza had a Diet Coke in her hand, and Martin adjusted his glasses, pushing them back against the bridge of his nose. When he spoke to Midori or Dan, Avery stared at him, wondering if he was one of those sick men who took children in for the purpose of using their bodies or for dominating them, king at last. But he seemed simply like a scattered, intelligent man.

  “He took it great,” Liza said, squeezing her Coke can, the small tin sound pinging in the room. “He was like amazed! In fact, he has been acting much better since. I think he’s really excited.”

  Avery cast another glance around the crowded room, knowing she’d be glad to leave this house, too. Martin crossed his arms and nodded, his glasses sliding down his long nose.

  Dan smiled. “That’s good to hear. So when do you think he can come home with us?”

  Midori looked up from her notes. “Well, we have the official papers to deal with. But, not long. A matter of weeks. Maybe only two. Hopefully, he’ll have the time he needs to adjust to his new home before school starts. That will be a hard transition for him.”

  One breath in, one breath out, Lamaze breathing, yoga breathing. Avery tried to keep her eyes open, but all she wanted to do was close them and drift away. Transition. Her whole life had been one transition. She’d been waiting for the one defining moment to mark her passage. But into what? Pushing a child into the world would have been clear, true, pure. Her child was inside her, and then it was outside her. Easy to see the black and white of it all. It was either in or out, life or death, the darkness or the light. Not like the mess her life had become.

  “Avery? Is that okay?” Dan was looking at her, waiting.

  She wanted to say, “No, it’s not okay.” She wanted to give Midori Nolan, Martin and Liza, and Dan a terrible face, something pruned and squished and angry, or maybe she’d blow a raspberry with her lips, spit and sound everywhere. Then Avery would stand up and walk out to the car, sit in the driver’s seat, and take off. She wanted to cry.

  But instead, she nodded and said, “Yes.” And then, remembering how she had to sell this moment as if she were a product, she lifted her lips, feeling the muscles press into her cheeks. “Of course.”

  Liza and Martin looked at each other doubtfully, so Avery added. “It’s been a shock, all of this. Truly. But a boy needs his father.” Liza leaned forward. “And a mother,” Avery tacked on, knowing she was supposedly the mother. Liza leaned back in her chair, and Avery turned to Dan. He was looking at her with such gratitude, she immediately wanted to take her words back, stuff the lie into her mouth and chew it gone.

  “Well, let’s bring Daniel in,” said Midori. “Why don’t you all have a good discussion? He will ask about you and Randi, Dan. He wants to know how you met. I suggest you tell him the basics. The details can come later. It’s up to you, though.”

  “Okay.” Dan sat on the edge of the couch, his hands slipped between his knees, as if he were waiting for a teacher to pass out a final exam. Avery held onto her cushion, trying to find the breath she had counted out before, but every inhale and exhale was in halves or quarters, her stomach scratchy with acid, her heart pounding.

  Liza stood up and walked into the hall. Avery heard her knock on a door and then a muffled conversation. If this were a scary movie, Avery would close her eyes and put her fingers in her ears so she wouldn’t have to listen to the music that was now rising in intensity, cellos and singular piano notes as the monster or murderer or ghost slid silently down the hall, each and all ready to kill or shock or damage. At the movies, she would throw herself into Dan’s side, hold her face against his shoulder, search for his open hand. Now, she looked at him on the opposite end of the couch, his eyes on the hallway, and she knew he wasn’t watching the same thing. He was watching the end of a drama, the characters reunited and redeemed. He wasn’t in the same theatre at all.

  Daniel came down the hallway and stood in the doorway, looking at Dan. He was a small child, skinny, his elbows white and pointy. His jeans were new, but way too big, caught at his middle in a belt that hung down below a T-shirt that said Quicksilver on the front. He wore all-white shoes that Avery recalled having seen on television, a famous basketball star jumping up to the basket, the shoes
brilliant on the screen.

  Starting with his dark, still wet hair, she searched Daniel, looking for Dan. At first, it seemed that the test had been wrong. He was so pale, none of Dan’s olive skin in him at all. If she stood up to him and bent down, tilting up his jaw, she would see all the veins that kept him alive, his skin the color of no swim lessons, play dates at the park, nor vitamin D. And then there were the freckles, dark tan points of color flowing across his cheeks and nose, running down the tops of his arms. If she made him take off his baggie jeans, she bet there would be more on his thighs and shins. That wasn’t from Dan’s family, and neither was the body, all bones and sinew. Dan and Jared came from bigger parents, full of muscle and flesh, strong and ready to work. Bill still worked in his yard every weekend, mowing and hedging and cutting. Marian walked every morning with her neighbors, women in visors and sensible shoes, charging down the lanes, walking toward clear arteries and healthy hearts.

  But this boy? He would be sucked under a lawn mower. He would fall to earth from the weight of a chain saw. He would begin to whine after a half-mile walk. He was the kind of kid who is laughed off every playground in the United States, and Avery closed her eyes, pushing back nausea and delight. They were wrong. Completely.

  But then Midori said something to him as she walked out of the room, and he responded. Avery opened her eyes, watching his mouth, the slight tip of chin as he spoke, his lips, full and Italian and Dan’s. This was how Dan’s genes mixed with another woman’s. This is how his wouldn’t mix with hers. Here was the child he couldn’t have until death and social services brought him one.

  After Midori left, Daniel stared at Dan, and then looked toward Avery. She almost flinched and pulled her gaze away from his eyes but managed instead to look back, finding the awkward smile she’d used earlier. “Hi,” she said, breathing away her nausea. “I’m Avery, Dan’s wife.”

  “Do you want to see my room?” he asked.

  Avery looked at Dan, and Dan stood up. “Sure we do.”

  “I want to take my things to your house. I don’t want to leave anything here.”

  Great, Avery thought as she stood up, imagining more strange metal gadgets and mini beer steins. Or worse, Randi’s collection of what? Heavy metal CD’s? People magazines? Leather halter tops?

  “I have my own room here,” Daniel said, leading them down the hall. “I was supposed to share, but I have my own room.” He turned to Avery and Dan, his legs apart, his face turned up. “Do I have my own room at your house? Am I near you? Where will I be?”

  “We’ve got a room all ready for you,” Dan said, leaning over, trying to look into Daniel’s eyes. “It’s just down the hall from our room. Kind of like how all the bedrooms are here.”

  “But much bigger,” Avery said. She brought her hand to her mouth and turned around, glad that Liza and Martin weren’t behind them.

  “Bigger than like this?” Daniel asked. “This house is way big.”

  “Oh, much,” Avery said. The dark walls seemed to close in around her. Liza and Martin needed a skylight in here, or something to give her space. She felt like Alice following the rabbit down hallways, both searching for the way out. “Can we go in?”

  Daniel nodded and pushed open the door. The room was obviously cleaned for the visit—the bedspread tucked tight, the board games, plastic action figures, and comic books arranged in neat piles on the dresser—and Daniel stood in the middle of the carpet, his tiny arms at his sides. “This is my room.”

  Dan walked over to the dresser and began asking Daniel about his toys. Avery closed her eyes and breathed from her center, or the center she imagined, never having quite found it despite the yoga teacher’s coaching. But after a few breaths, her heart began to beat like it ten minutes after kick-boxing class, one two, one, one two, one, one, one.

  She walked over to the desk and sat in the wooden chair, looking up at the mirror that hung on the wall. A black and white photograph of the blonde actress in the show Friends was taped to the right corner.

  “You like her?” she asked, turning to Daniel.

  He shrugged. “Yeah. . I want to meet her. I want to go to the show. But I don’t want to marry her or anything”

  “Oh, well that’s good. She’s already married to one of my favorite actors.”

  Dan shook his head. Why? Did he think Daniel had had enough disappointment, too much for him to know the pretty actress was married to an even prettier actor? He’d better, get used to it, Avery thought. Everyone had to. She looked up at Daniel, who was pulling on a lock of hair above his left ear. When he dropped his hand, the tuft stuck out straight. “Do you have a girlfriend?”

  “No,” Daniel said, pressing his lips together. “I don’t think about that stuff. That’s what girls think about.”

  Avery turned back and noticed an open math book on the desk, the problems completed in pencil right on the pages. Vince Bausch and Midori had both said Daniel had learning “issues,” but here were all the problems done correctly, at least as far as she could remember. “You seem to like math, too.”

  “Math makes sense,” Daniel said, his dark eyes on her, and she nodded. Work was the only thing that made sense to her now. Keeping busy. Problems A, B, and C solved by six pm, and then they could celebrate at Andrés for one or two or three hours.

  “So do you want to go get an ice cream?” Dan asked.

  “No.” Daniel sat on his bed, crossing his arms, his mouth pulled down. “Liza says I’m not supposed to have sugar.”

  “A hamburger then? We could walk right down to McDonald’s.” Dan leaned over, his eyes wide. Avery felt the nausea creep back up her throat.

  “No.”

  Standing up, Avery walked past the bookshelf and stood in front of the closet. “What do you want to do then?” she asked.

  “I want—I want to go home with you now.”

  Avery looked at Dan, her eyes wide now, and shook her head, slightly. Dan stood up straight, his hands nervous fish dangling at the ends of his arms. “Well, Daniel, um, I think we have to wait for some paperwork to go through. There’s some legal matters. Official stuff, you know?”

  Daniel pulled harder on the lock of hair. “But Midori said the test meant you were my father. If you’re my father, then you can take me home. I lived with my mother. She was my mother in the real way. I didn’t have to wait for that.”

  Dan seemed to think about what Daniel was saying, and Avery wanted to run to him, lean on his shoulder, say things like, “I was wrong. I’m sorry. I’ll quit my job. Just come home. Leave him here for now. Please?” She thought about the long drive back to the house, the words she could use to fix this, to stop this boy from changing everything. But then she closed her eyes. Daniel hadn’t done a thing wrong. He didn’t deserve anything that had happened to him. If Avery was going to drive away from anyone, it should be Dan.

  “Do you like it here?” Dan asked. “You do like your room.”

  “I’m going to leave anyway, right?” Daniel’s lock of hair stood out from his head like a horn. “I’m going to come live with you, right?” He looked at Avery, his Randi eyes full of water. He wiped at his face quickly, as if they wouldn’t notice, crossing his skinny arms across his chest.

  “Of course you are,” Dan said, leaning down again and putting a hand on Daniel’s shoulder. “You’re my . . . son.”

  “Then I want to go now.”

  Avery pushed back against the closet door. It was happening. Life was cracking clean open and changing in front of her. But before, she tried not to notice it. The morning came, and she’d get up, her list of activities clear and solid, while even all around her people turned on others that they’d adored the day before, scientists made discoveries, men and women fell in love. In this room, though, like in the hospital waiting room with Mara and Loren, she could feel it. No matter what she did, the earth turned toward the sun and poof it was daylight. Poof! Here was her stepson, and she could feel him in the back seat of the Lexus as if they wer
e all driving up Highway 99 right now.

  It wasn’t this moment, but the living afterward that would hurt. It was all the time from this second that would twist her life into another shape. A flare lit in her chest, small but angry. She hated Dan for doing this to her, even if it wasn’t his fault. Even if he had no choice.

  “I’ll go talk to Midori,” she said. Before she turned to the door, she saw Dan reach for Daniel, pull him close, take his small bones into his man body and hug him. As she walked down the hall, she wept for Daniel. For Dan. Maybe even for Randi. For herself and her father, for the hug she wanted from a ghost.

  TWO

  EIGHT

  At his second appointment with Bret Parish, Dan sat silent for long moments. Bret asked questions, and Dan mumbled out short sentences, “Yes. I think so,” or “No. Not yet.” Strangely, he’d felt pushed to this appointment, desperate to have all this feeling inside him uncorked, but now, Bret looking up at him with wide, interested eyes, Dan had nothing to say.