Risking It All

by Nina Darnton

  “Jeff, he’s a little kid. He’s not some pathological teenager. We know what he was before, a good kid on the neighborhood baseball team. It’s not even a year after his mother’s death. He’s grieving. That’s normal. And he doesn’t come out of his room because he knows you don’t want him around, honey. He feels it. I feel it too.”

  “We do everything we can to make it up to him. Why is he still so angry?”

  She put her hand on his arm and spoke as gently as she could. “He blames us for killing his mother.” She shrugged. “It’s pretty straightforward.”

  He shook his head stubbornly. “He’ll blame Griffin too. He’ll realize it was giving birth to him that killed her.”

  “No. It was an embolism that killed her. You reminded me of that. Now it’s my turn to remind you.”

  “You think he’ll make those fine distinctions? Look, I can’t have this conversation now. I’ve got to go.” He walked out and she followed him into the hallway.

  “This is ridiculous,” she said. “You’re really beginning to sound paranoid.”

  “Just do what I ask, will you?” he insisted. “It’s not asking that much.” He stepped into the elevator.

  “Okay,” she said as the door closed.

  16

  Marcia took the rest of the day off. She had meant to work for a few hours and then spend some quality time with Griffin. She had read essays advocating “quality time,” claiming that it was even better than always being around because it meant less “wasted time.” But more and more she saw this as a theoretical balm to working mothers who felt guilty about being away from their babies for long hours. She was thinking of commissioning a book that reported on psychological studies on this question. Her own opinion was that “quality time” meant “quantity time,” because no one could mandate when Griffin would say his first word or take his first step or, when older, share a picture he had made or confess a troubling thought. Those kinds of interactions often happened on the fly to mothers who just were around a lot. Still, this realization didn’t mean she wanted to quit her job. She loved working and they needed the income. She just didn’t like fooling herself with bromides. She could live with knowing she’d miss some things in her son’s development, as long as her absence didn’t hurt him, which she believed it didn’t. She read a news story online about research showing that children of working mothers actually did better in some ways than children of mothers who stayed at home and, delighted, she forwarded it to all her friends. Still, she vowed to do her best to be there as much as possible.

  That was the plan for today. However, after that last confrontation with Jeff, she couldn’t stop thinking about him and Danny and wondering what, if anything, she could do about their relationship. She blamed herself as well as Jeff. She recognized that she hadn’t spent enough time specifically trying to help Danny integrate into his new life. And she had neglected Jeff, she admitted to herself, thinking pretty exclusively about Griffin’s needs and Danny’s problems and ignoring her husband. She took a spiral notebook and a pen out of her desk and brought it into the kitchen. She plugged in the electric tea kettle, chose a ginger tea bag from the ten boxes of assorted teas she kept in the closet, added some honey and poured the boiling water into her favorite porcelain cup—she’d picked up the idea that tea must be drunk only from a porcelain cup from an English author she had worked with. She waited for the mixture to turn just the right color and when it did, she stirred and brought it close to her nose, inhaling and luxuriating in its aroma. She sat, took a sip and put the cup on the table, then drew a line down the middle of the first page in her notebook. On one side of the line she wrote, “Things to do for Danny,” and on the other: “Things to do for Jeff.” She began with Jeff:

  1)  Prepare some nice meals.

  Right, she thought. I’ll start next week. I’ll make barley soup and lentil salad. He loves those. And I can give Berta a menu for the days I’m at work—no more pizza delivery for a while. She didn’t mind being responsible for their meals since she was home two days a week and Jeff was a terrible cook. Besides, he always did the dishes, a job she disliked.

  2)  Ask Berta to baby-sit once a week and go out for dinner or to a movie.

  That was a pretty obvious fix, she thought. “Date night” after a new baby. They had just let that slide.

  3)  Invite friends over.

  Actually, they didn’t have that many mutual friends anymore, she thought. Their jobs, the baby, the added responsibilities of Danny, had taken all the free time they had and many of the people they used to see had dropped out of their lives. Marcia had always been the person who kept their social life going and she had been preoccupied. She would have to make some calls, she resolved.

  4)  Flirt with him sometimes. Ask him about his day. Really want to know. Try to act interested. Try to be interested.

  She paused. There was one more resolution that came quickly to mind but she resisted writing it down. She picked up the pen again. After the last item, she skipped two lines and scrawled:

  5)  Make love.

  She felt uncomfortable writing this, though she recognized how remiss she’d been on that score. The truth was, she had hardly ever wanted to make love since she’d come home from L.A. At first she blamed it on the loss they had suffered, then on the lack of sleep and finally on going back to work, but as time went by and as her sexual urge didn’t return, she began to think there might be a more serious problem. It wasn’t as though she wasn’t still attracted to Jeff. She was, but she was also distant from him, even angry at him a lot of the time, disappointed that he wasn’t more accepting of Danny. On the whole, she thought, it was worse than his not helping Danny to assimilate; he actually seemed to be preventing it. Not deliberately, of course. But by demanding so much of him, by not relating to him, he made every day more tense than it might have been.

  She thought about the times Jeff had reached for her when they were in bed and the series of excuses she had offered. “I can’t. I’m too tired.” “Not tonight, honey, I think I’m getting a cold.” “I had a terrible day. I need to get some sleep.” Even the classic and obvious “I have a headache.” Then one time, unexpectedly, she had felt her body soften, her pulse quicken when he put his arm around her and gently bent to kiss her. She turned toward him, pushing herself close and winding her legs around his. They had barely gotten started—and she was actually beginning to remember how much she enjoyed this—their naked bodies touching, his hands on her breasts, his mouth on hers—when Griffin started to cry. It was just a little cry at first, but she stiffened, and wanted to go to him. “Wait,” Jeff had said. “Maybe he’ll settle.” She waited, but instead of settling, he cried louder. Danny woke up and they could hear him plodding into Griffin’s room, sleepily talking to him as he entered.

  “It’s okay, buddy,” he said, copying words he’d heard Jeff use. “I got you.”

  Now it was Jeff’s turn to stiffen. He hurled his legs over the edge of the bed and stood up, grabbing for his robe, which was folded on the easy chair.

  “It’s okay,” Marcia said. “Let him help. It’s good for both of them.”

  But Jeff ignored her. He walked briskly into the room and took Griffin, who had quieted in Danny’s arms, into his own. “You can go back to bed, Danny,” he said. “You have school tomorrow.” He brought Griffin to Marcia in the kitchen. She was already warming a bottle for him in hopes it would soothe him back to sleep. Her pediatrician had told her she didn’t need to warm the milk anymore, but it just felt kinder to her than giving it to him from the refrigerator. By the time she had fed him and put him back in his crib, whatever sexual spark had ignited between them had fizzled out. They both had turned away from each other and fallen asleep, back to back.

  She stared at her page of resolutions briefly, then got up and rummaged in her desk until she found a thick red pencil she sometimes used for editing notes. Returning to the kitchen table, she looked at her list again. Then she
underlined the last entry two times.

  She turned to Danny’s column and was about to write, but Berta came into the kitchen holding Griffin, and when he saw her, his face lit up with such a happy smile that she could stay away from him no longer. She put her pen down and closed her notebook, determined to return to it later.

  “Hello, my beautiful boy,” she said in that slight singsong voice she used when she spoke to him. Jeff had objected the first time he heard it—it sounded phony to him, or sappy or something like that, she never really understood his objection, but basically he clearly didn’t like what he thought of as “baby talk.” Then she had read an article claiming that research into young infants revealed they were much more responsive to higher pitches and singsong intonations. The writer, a developmental psychologist, theorized that this was the reason most people naturally spoke that way when addressing an infant. She showed the article to Jeff and while he never spoke in that inflected, high-pitched way himself, he stopped objecting when she did.

  She took Griffin in her arms. “I’ll take him for a while,” she told Berta. She brought him into the living room and held him on her lap, talking to him, handing him toys, which he grasped in his pudgy little hands, shaking them, and of course putting them in his mouth. She sang “Itsy Bitsy Spider” to him, and he rewarded her with a smile. Then she changed his diaper, dressed him in a warmer outfit and put him in his stroller for a walk. It was a bright, crisp day, and she headed for the park, stopping to look in shop windows as she wended her way to the playground, where she sat on a bench watching the toddlers while Griffin dozed. When he awoke, she pushed him in the baby swing for a bit. It was a new one, built on a slant with a headrest, so it was just right for a baby his age. He loved it, just as he did the one they had at home, and it amused them both for a good fifteen minutes. When he got restless, she lifted him out and strapped him back in his stroller for the walk home. It was almost three-thirty, and she thought Danny might be home.

  She was having a cup of tea in the kitchen when she heard a noise at the door, so assuming it was Danny, she walked into the hallway to greet him. He burst into the room, happily laughing and chatting to a boy at his side. She hadn’t seen him so animated since before his mother died. He stopped short when he saw Marcia. “Oh, I didn’t think you were here,” he mumbled, suddenly uncomfortable. He looked at the boy with him and shrugged, embarrassed.

  “I had a meeting at your school so I decided to take the rest of the day off. But who is this?” Marcia asked, smiling.

  “Raul.” Danny spoke so quietly now it was hard to hear him.

  “Hi, Raul. Welcome. I’m Marcia.”

  “Hi,” Raul said. “Could I use the bathroom?”

  “Sure.” She pointed to the guest bathroom in the hallway and he went in.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were bringing home a friend? Did Berta know?”

  “No. It wasn’t like that. We were on the bus playing Minecraft on his iPad. We wanted to finish the game so he came over. I’m sorry.”

  “No need to be sorry. It’s good.”

  Raul came back. He was looking around as he passed the living room with its high ceiling, silk curtains and baby grand piano. “Wow. This is a big place,” he said. She smiled at him. He was about Danny’s height with the same black hair, but Danny’s was straight and Raul’s was curly and longer and his skin a shade darker. They are both handsome boys, she thought.

  “You guys must be hungry. Why don’t you come into the kitchen? I made some Rice Krispie treats. Danny, show Raul where they are and offer him some milk.”

  Neither boy wanted milk but they both accepted a glass of water, and together they devoured half the tray of treats. Marcia followed them and invited them to sit at the kitchen table but Danny ate standing up, shifting from leg to leg.

  “Are you in the same class?” she asked them.

  “Yeah,” Danny answered. “Can we go to my room now?”

  “Sure. Just one thing. Raul, do you need to call your mother so she won’t worry?”

  “No. I told her this morning I was coming here.”

  “Really?” She looked at Danny, who looked at the floor, registering that she had caught him in a lie.

  “How are you getting home?” she asked Raul.

  “My mom is picking me up at five,” he said.

  “And does she know where we live?”

  “Yeah. I told her.”

  Marcia nodded. There was an uncomfortable pause. “Well,” she said, in as bright a voice as she could muster, “go and play, then. Have fun.”

  At five o’clock the doorman called to say that Raul’s mother had arrived. Marcia and Danny accompanied him downstairs to meet her. She was a slight, short woman with long black hair, large brown eyes and the same attractive brown skin tone as her son. She was wearing black jeans and a dark purple car coat and carried a large brown canvas bag on her shoulder. She introduced herself as Maria Ramiro and thanked Marcia for entertaining Raul.

  “It’s a pleasure,” Marcia answered. She stared at her. She didn’t look like one of the mothers from their expensive private school. She also looked slightly familiar. “Excuse me for staring,” Marcia said, “I keep thinking I know you from somewhere but I can’t place where.”

  “I work in this building sometimes,” Maria said. She looked straight at Marcia. Was there a slight defensive tone in her voice? Marcia wasn’t sure. “For the Duncans,” she added with a slight Spanish accent.

  “Oh, right. That must be it. We must have passed each other in the elevator.” Of course, Marcia thought. That’s why she doesn’t look like the other mothers. She’s a housekeeper here. Raul is probably on scholarship.

  “They seem to like each other,” Maria said, gesturing at the boys, who were huddled over Raul’s iPad on the couch in the lobby.

  “Yes. I’m glad. Danny just started this year and he doesn’t have many friends yet.”

  “I heard what happened to him. I’m sorry.”

  “Thank you. The best thing for him is a nice friend like your son.”

  “They speak to each other in Spanish sometimes. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Mind? No. I’m delighted. We don’t know Spanish and I’m sure it makes Danny more comfortable to speak it sometimes.”

  Maria nodded knowingly. “Well, we have to go. Raul still has homework for tomorrow.”

  “Yes, of course. It was nice to meet you.”

  “For me too.” She called Raul and they walked toward the door.

  “Put on your coat,” she told him. “It’s very cold outside.” He obeyed immediately and they left together.

  Marcia put her arm around Danny as they waited for the elevator. “He seems like a very nice boy,” she said. She felt him stiffen, but he didn’t pull away. “He’s my best friend,” he said.

  “That’s great, Danny.” She paused. “You know you don’t have to invite him when you think I’m not home. I’m happy for you to have a friend over. And you can go to his house if he invites you. But I just would like you to tell me, okay?”

  Danny nodded. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I understand. But do we have a deal?”

  Danny smiled. “Yeah. For sure. Thanks.”

  She had meant to speak to Danny today about having to find a new school for next year but she couldn’t bear to have that conversation now. He finally had made a friend and this would mean starting all over again. It seemed so cruel. She wondered if she should appeal to the principal one more time, but didn’t think it would do much good. She decided to wait before telling Danny, let the friendship and his confidence grow; maybe that would improve his behavior at school. Maybe the teachers would notice and suggest giving him another chance. It was so clear that Raul’s Spanish roots, his familiarity with the language, meant a lot to Danny. She had heard them in Danny’s room, laughing together, talking a kind of Spanglish, selecting words from each language. She also heard them playing Minecraft together. She resolved to spe
ak to Jeff about allowing Danny more leeway with electronic devices. She would like to buy him his own iPad for his birthday, which was coming up in a month. Or maybe an iPhone. The iPod he had in L.A. had somehow gotten lost in the move and he’d been too shy to ask for another, she figured. One of those devices would be good for him, she thought, a pathway to connect him to friends. They could set limits on how much he was allowed to use it without prohibiting it completely.

  As she bustled around the kitchen checking the stew Berta had prepared, washing the lettuce, making the salad dressing, she felt happier and more optimistic than she had in a long time. She had been worried about how to celebrate Danny’s upcoming birthday. She had thought he didn’t have even one friend he could invite to a party or out for a pizza and cake. Now he had someone. She felt a pang of hurt for him when she remembered that he called Raul his best friend, when she knew Raul was his only one.

  She told Danny to start his homework and asked Berta to give Griffin his bath as she set the table. Forgetting her earlier disagreement with Jeff, she was excited for him to come home. Not only did she want to start implementing her resolutions, she could hardly wait to share the news about Raul. As she walked back to the kitchen to get some wine, she glanced in the hallway mirror and realized with a scowl that if she was going to be flirtatious with her husband again, she probably needed to comb her hair. She was in the bathroom putting on some makeup when the phone rang.

  “Marcia?” It was Jeff. She started to tell him she had some good news for a change but he cut her off.

  “I’m really sorry, but I can’t get home for dinner. Something’s come up at the office.”

  “What?”

  “I have a dinner for work and it will go late. Don’t wait up.”

  “What came up? I mean, you didn’t know this before you left today?”

  “No. I said it just came up.” His voice was testy, impatient. “I have to go, Marcia. I’ll see you in the morning.” He hung up and she stood at the phone, puzzled and disappointed. Berta came in carrying Griffin, clean and sweet-smelling and ready for bed. She handed him to Marcia and retrieved her coat from the closet. “See you tomorrow,” she said. “Bye-bye, Griffie.” Marcia took him in her arms and hugged him. She carried him into his room, read him Goodnight Moon, wound up his mobile, gave him his pacifier and put him in his crib. He watched the mobile intently and made cooing noises. Relieved he wasn’t crying, she tiptoed out. She walked back into the dining room and removed Jeff’s place setting from the table. Danny came in. “Did you finish your homework?” she asked.