All the Good Parts

by Loretta Nyhan

  CHAPTER 27

  “How does it feel to have two hands again?”

  “Wrong question,” Jerry said as he fiddled with the remote. “Ask me what it’s like to have this thing hanging off my upper arm. Answer is, it stinks.” He settled on some Magnum, P.I. reruns and leaned back in his Barcalounger. “Ask me how glad I am you stopped by.”

  “Are you?”

  “Answer is, very. That Lim won’t be back for another hour, so you’ve got good timing.”

  I blushed, knowing how I’d made it here before the aide began her hours—I’d rushed through mine with my other clients, mentally promising to make it up to them the following week. I could have talked to Darryl, or maybe even Dr. Bridge, but I found myself driving fast toward Jerry’s neighborhood, and when I spotted his small, neat bungalow, its green trim framing it like a long-cherished photo, I knew I had to stop.

  He stared at me, blue eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ve got bags under your eyes. Aren’t you sleeping?”

  “You’ve got them, too. We match.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. I’ve been sleeping. All day sometimes.”

  “That’s not good either. Does Mrs. Lim allow it?”

  “I sleep on the days she’s not here.”

  “Maybe I need to come by those days. If you get too much sleep, you’ll be sluggish. It has the opposite effect.”

  He shrugged and turned back to Tom Selleck and his impressive mustache. “What does it matter?”

  I worried for him, but like everything else in my life, there were boundaries, laser lines guarding human behavior, invisible to those who didn’t know where to look, and I usually didn’t. How much do I insert myself in this man’s life? I did that with Garrett, and look how that turned out.

  “Well, you must not hate your prosthesis all that much. You’re wearing it.”

  “I’m afraid of Lim.”

  “She doesn’t sound so bad.”

  “Let’s stop talking about nonsense. You must be here for a reason.”

  “Checking up on you isn’t reason enough?”

  “Please.”

  He was right. I did run to him with my problems. “Sorry. I like your opinion, even if I disagree. Sometimes especially if you disagree. Is that strange?”

  Jerry turned his body awkwardly so he could fit his good hand in mine. “Telling an old guy he’s needed is like a dealer making a person a dope addict. You’ve been giving me a little here, a little there, and now I need it. Go ahead. Talk.”

  I told him everything. When I finished, he said, “Do you want to go to Ireland?”

  “No.” I didn’t have to think about it.

  “There’s the answer to the first problem. Second, do you still want to have a baby?”

  “Yes.” It felt good to answer so emphatically. “But my sister—”

  “Is her own woman. She’s moving with her family.”

  “It’s my family, too.”

  “Oh, sweetheart, it is and it isn’t. You know that.”

  “The situation is complicated.”

  “People say that when they know they have to make a choice between hurting themselves or someone else. Very few things are really complicated. You don’t want to act selfishly, I understand. What you need to know, though, is that the person who would call you selfish doesn’t have to live your life. And life is long, sometimes motherfucking long—excuse my French—and their judgment won’t carry you to the end, only your choices will. Do you know what I’m saying?”

  I nodded, the pain of losing Carly, Donal, and the kids already clogging up my throat because I’d made my decision, made it before I’d even acknowledged it—I was staying here. There was no other way for me. I put my head on Jerry’s shoulder, rasped out a thank-you, and let his solidness hold me up for a moment.

  “And you need to have some fun, kiddo,” he murmured. “Go meet up with this Darryl. Try him on for size. Make your world a little bigger and you’ll have more room to roam.”

  “What if I make it bigger and end up getting lost?”

  “You’ll find your way.”

  We sat together for a while, watching the figures on the television screen move through action plots, exciting lives we’d never have.

  “I should go,” I said when I felt my eyelids getting heavy. “I don’t want to run into The Lim.”

  “Hold on a minute, I got something for you.”

  I helped him from the Barcalounger, with more difficulty than I had in the past. Jerry moved like an old man now, slow and deliberate, as if whatever was pushing against him was winning. He disappeared into his bedroom for a moment and returned holding a small red box. “Take it,” he said gruffly. “I want you to have it.”

  My hands were trembling when I took it from him. The moment felt important. Inside the box was a charm bracelet, with one lone charm dangling from it—a tiny slot machine. “Well,” I said. “Thank you.”

  His laugh held too much sadness. “It was Anna’s. I bought it for her when Paul was born. I figured us having a kid was a gamble. I know it’s kind of stupid, but she liked it. Wore it all the time.

  “We weren’t the best parents, and I can’t even say we tried as hard as we should have, but we cared, at least most of the time. There was love in this house, not always enough, but it was there. I want you to know that.” He nudged my hand, and I slipped the bracelet over my wrist. “I think you can do better than we did. It’s a risk, bringing a life into the world, but the person you are, Leona, lessens the hell out of that risk. Remember that.”

  Later, after a bout of indecision lasting well into the evening, I texted Paul:

  Me: Hi, Paul. This is Leona, your ex-home-health aide. I feel it’s my job to tell you to monitor your father’s sleeping habits more closely. He’s sleeping all day when Mrs. Lim isn’t there.

  Paul: I’m not going to even ask why you retained this number. First, how is my father’s medical care still your responsibility? And second, how do you know this if you aren’t visiting him?

  Me: I might have stopped by the other day.

  Paul: Might have.

  Me: Fine. I did. I needed his advice on something.

  Paul: I’m sure he was more than willing to give it.

  Me: Jesus, just don’t let him sleep all day, okay?

  Paul: I’m taking good care of him and I resent your implication that I’m not.

  Me: Maybe you should focus less on spreadsheets and more on interpersonal communication.

  Paul: Maybe you should mind your own beeswax.

  Me: Did you really just type “beeswax,” or was that some kind of autocorrect debacle?

  Paul: Leave us alone, Leona. Don’t make me report your stalker activities to Home Health.

  Me: You really are the definition of asshole.

  Paul: That is quite possibly true, but irrelevant. My father needs a regimented routine. When you come around, you undermine it. So don’t come around. Understood?

  Me: Understood.

  Me: Asshole.

  The Love Community Center wasn’t painted pink and graffitied with hearts and cupids as I’d imagined, but a squat, mud-colored building surrounded by the dried-out, wispy remains of Illinois cornfields in late fall. Twenty minutes early, I parked between the only two cars in the lot, a souped-up Hummer and a minivan with AYSO stickers plastered to the bumper, one of which proclaimed, “Soccer families know how to kick it.” I hoped neither one belonged to Darryl.

  I unclicked my seat belt and opened my laptop, glad to have a little time to review the list of survey questions I’d sent to Darryl in preparation for today’s meeting. I hadn’t heard back yet, but I was pretty certain I’d covered what we needed to complete our project:

  What types of resources does your community offer single mothers?

  Did you use any state-run medical services during your pregnancy and/or after birth?

  How do you manage child care? Do you utilize Head Start or other government-subsidized care?

>   I read on, happy with the clear practicality of my questions, until a cold realization hit me harder than the blustery November wind shaking my tiny Honda—all of my questions were practical. I’d completely ignored the emotional aspects of single motherhood. And I’d done it on purpose, because I didn’t want to know. I was afraid to know.

  It was too late to type the additions. The parking lot had filled while I stared at my screen, and I watched women pluck children from car seats, greet each other warmly, and head inside. I didn’t spot a guy yet, but my phone said it was five minutes until six, almost time for the meeting to begin.

  My whole body shivered with an earthquake of nerves, my heart the epicenter. I took a deep breath to settle things down, not wanting to give Darryl or the single mothers the impression I suffered from convulsions. It helped a little. At least I was able to get out of the car.

  “Could you hold the door?” came a voice from behind me as I entered the building. The woman—petite, African American, casually dressed in jeans and a thick green knit sweater—held a squirming toddler in one arm and an overstuffed diaper bag in the other.

  “Thanks,” she said, smiling at me. She glanced at my messenger bag. “Are you here for the bridge club? Little young for that, aren’t you?”

  “I’m here for the single mothers’ group.”

  “Since you’re not dragging a kid in here, am I right to assume you’re one of the students we’re meeting with today?”

  “Yep.”

  “Little old for a student, aren’t you?” Her laugh, a deep, unrestrained cackle, relaxed me.

  “I’m Leona. And we ancient ones prefer ‘nontraditional student.’”

  She laughed again. “Sara. Nontraditional person. Nice to meet you.”

  The toddler called out for something unintelligible, and Sara produced a pacifier as if from thin air. “He’s too old for them, but whatever,” she said. “They say he won’t go to kindergarten sucking away at one, so I shouldn’t worry. Between you and me, I don’t care if he graduates from college while chomping away at his Binky. It keeps him happy.”

  I shrugged. “I guess it’s not such a big deal.”

  “That’s the great secret,” she said, and kissed her son on the temple. “There are actually very few things that are a big deal. When you figure that out, life becomes so much easier.”

  Her open manner gave me the courage to ask, “Were you a single mother by choice?”

  Her son wiggled impatiently, and she tilted her head toward a bench just inside the foyer. “Do you mind if I change him?”

  “Not at all.”

  Tucking a clean diaper behind his head, she laid him on the hard plastic bench. His large brown eyes watched her every movement. “I went to the Bahamas with a bachelorette party, had a good time, and went home without a care in the world,” she said while changing him with quick, efficient hands. “A month later I figured out I’d brought home an unusual goody-bag present. I was thirty-four. I spent a very long time trying to decide what to do, and an even longer time feeling ashamed of myself for being so reckless.”

  “When did you stop feeling that way?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “Eventually, I thought it might be a bad idea to keep beating myself up. I had this strange feeling that once the baby arrived, he’d be able to feel my shame, and it would be unfair to him. I wanted him to feel joy. At first, I faked it, but one day, I realized I didn’t have to. I was happy.”

  She gathered her son up and tucked his shirt into his cute little jeans. “I worried about doing this whole parenting thing alone, but I’m doing it, and that’s what counts. These ladies definitely help. Some of them have a similar situation, some of them don’t, but it doesn’t matter. We’ve got divorced ladies, widows, and some who were sick and tired of waiting for the right guy and took matters into their own hands.”

  My people, I thought.

  We walked down a long corridor and entered a spacious conference room bisected by a buffet cart holding donut holes and coffee. On one side of it, a group of older folks sat around a small cluster of circular tables, playing cards. On the other, a conflux of women gabbed away, their kids penned into a play area bordered by low bookshelves and scattered with toys.

  “This is Leona,” Sara yelled over the noise. “She’s one of the students.”

  A red-haired woman approached and introduced herself as Eileen, the group’s founder, and then led me to a small podium set in front of a few rows of chairs. “Weren’t there supposed to be two of you?” she murmured.

  “Maybe traffic was bad,” I said, my stomach sinking. It was 6:05.

  “We need to get started,” she said apologetically. “We’re very respectful of time in this group.”

  “I understand.” I set my laptop on a small table next to the podium as the women took their seats. “Thank you for having me,” I began, my voice squeaking. “This project is part of a community-health course I’m taking so I can become a nurse.” I could hear my body shaking. I paused, and some of the women in the front row smiled, encouraging me to go on. “I have some questions, and as you answer, I’m going to take notes on your responses. Is that okay?”

  They all mumbled assent.

  “Thank you. Okay. Let’s begin with state support of single mothers. Which programs have you—”

  I didn’t even get the question fully out before one woman began talking about the lack of quality subsidized education before she was interrupted by another who discussed how difficult it was to find a good allergist on the state insurance list, and yet another who’d discovered a government-sponsored program that helped provide single parents with children’s athletic equipment. Other women jumped in, and the spirited discussion careened off topic and back on again. I took copious notes as we segued to time-management skills, all the while realizing that, as time ticked away, Darryl was standing me up.

  Maybe he was in a car accident, I thought, but somehow I knew that wasn’t true. There were very few suitable excuses for not showing up. And there definitely wasn’t one for disrespecting these women. My anger made me bold, and as the discussion wound down, I asked a question that wasn’t on my list. “What’s the one thing about single motherhood you’d like people to know, but they wouldn’t necessarily like to hear?”

  “That it’s hard,” said a grandmotherly woman who’d adopted two teenagers. “That it’s fucking hard.”

  No one disagreed. They snickered, some laughing as they belatedly covered the ears of the children on their laps.

  Then the laughter abruptly stopped, all eyes shifting to the coffee cart in the middle of the room.

  An older woman was shuffling toward it. She resembled the corn right outside the window—faded, brittle, barely holding on. Dressed in pink running shoes, a hot-pink hoodie, and a pink bandanna stretched tightly over her bald head, she could have been a spokesperson for the Susan G. Komen foundation.

  The women stared at her, fear in their eyes. Getting sick was their worst nightmare as single parents. They said they worried about it every day. What if . . . , they said. What if . . .

  The woman waved at someone on the bridge side of the room and poured herself some coffee. She leaned against the buffet, facing us, hands curled around the warmth of the mug.

  “Are we done?” asked a woman in the back row, glancing uneasily at the cancer patient. “I have to pick up my kid from dance class.”

  The crowd rumbled with to-do lists.

  It was five to seven. I didn’t want to be done. I didn’t want to pack up my bag and drive away without giving Darryl every chance. I didn’t want to leave these women yet. I’d collected a lot of information for the project, but I never asked what I really wanted to know. And suddenly, I had to know.

  “I just have a few more questions . . .”

  “One question,” Eileen said. “We have time for one more.”

  The women settled down. One of the kids dropped his toy and let loose an earsplitting shriek, piercin
g the silence. Instinctively—protectively—I turned to the fragile woman in pink. Her tired eyes bored directly into mine. Then one side of her mouth quirked up, and she looked at me expectantly, like whatever I was going to say had better be good. For some reason, the thought of disappointing this stranger jangled my nerves, and I froze.

  Eileen cleared her throat. “Your question?”

  These women were waiting. They had places to go, kids to drop off and pick up, late dinners to make, wine to drink, and I couldn’t squeeze a single word from my throat. I swallowed. “Do you ever . . .” I swallowed again.

  “Do we what?” Eileen urged gently.

  “Do you ever . . .” My voice, my brain, my heart—everything failed me.

  “Go ahead and ask, Leona,” said the woman in pink, her voice surprisingly clear and strong. “Don’t be afraid of the answer.”

  It took me a moment to align what I saw and what I heard, but then, in one awful, hot-pink flash, I understood. No. Oh, God, please no.

  Blinking back tears, I turned back to the confused single mothers and asked the question I’d been too afraid to put on my list. “Do you ever wish your life was different?”

  The women shifted in their seats. Some looked at the floor, others at the ceiling, some turned to the kids playing boisterously in the corner of the room.

  “No,” came an emphatic voice from the edge of the group. It was Sara. She stood up so she could be heard more clearly. “Sometimes I’m tired as hell,” she continued, glancing at the little one glued to her hip. “And sometimes I wish I could have one of those Calgon moments and get swooped away to Tahiti, but at the end of the day, when I look at this sweet baby of mine, I think, how did someone like me ever get to be so lucky?”