I think that she’ll think very differently if the news of my impending scandal hits social media before I’m able to impart whatever knowledge I may have to her students.
My stomach growls. Roasted pumpkin seeds only last so long.
She smiles, like my discomfort may give her an edge. “We have a wonderful vegan restaurant near campus. Have you heard of Almost Normals?” Without waiting for my reply, she turns and starts walking toward a blue Prius, one of the few cars in the parking lot.
She’s got me. I’m starved. “Let’s talk through the details as we eat,” I say.
I tag along like a hungry stray. The truth in the phrase is so real, so tangible. I should skip dinner and march down the street to the tattoo parlor. Hungry Stray. I can see it stamped across my flesh. Identification. It’s freeing, the thought. The real truth of who I am out there for everyone to see. No more hiding, trying to be someone I can’t. No more putting on a show as if I’m really to be listened to. It’s just me. The hungry stray.
Whether it’s the hunger or the familiarity of this town, somehow I’m so vulnerable the breeze on my skin stings. I’m raw and ragged, and I don’t know if I can go another step without collapsing.
“Dr. Jayne?”
My chin snaps up. How long have I been standing in front of the open hatch of her car, my bag pulling down my right shoulder? “I’m sorry. The trip drained me.”
“We’ll get you dinner, then I’ll take you to the hotel. I think you’ll like it. It’s right down the street from Emery House.”
I nod. She’s taking me home. The only home my life can claim. And though I didn’t think I’d ever come back, I realize this is the one place for me right now. This is where I can find myself again. Where I can ask forgiveness for my life …
Before it’s completely wiped away.
Chapter 2
JENNA SAVAGE
Every bite of my second cinnamon roll stretches my stomach, but I keep shoveling in one forkful after another. The sticky frosting I lick from my lips doesn’t have the same sweet-as-heaven flavor as it did when I began this feast.
The fork clanks on the plate as I slide it onto the coffee table.
Andy Griffith plays on the television. His deep southern drawl washes over me like my father’s once did. Maybe that’s why I never miss this show. Or it could be the fact that everything works out in Mayberry. And it only takes thirty minutes. Less if you don’t count the commercials. But Andy had more than Opie. He was the sheriff. When Opie left the show, life went on.
A door clicks at the end of the hall and footsteps approach. I fluff the knit blanket draped over my legs, sending crumbs flying through the air and landing in the carpet.
“Smells like the first day of school.” Mark enters the kitchen. He stops at the counter and stares down at the pan of cinnamon rolls. “Couldn’t you cut down this recipe? There’s no way the two of us can eat the whole pan.” He’s smart enough not to mention the two missing rolls.
“I suppose I could have done that, but I don’t even have a pan that small.” There’s a sharp edge to my voice I wish I could reach out and soften.
“It’ll just take some adjustment. We’ll figure it out.”
We. From where I sit, I see a man who’s moved on with life as though our triplets were never here. As though the last eighteen years were a dream, and he’s awoken to just another day in his satisfying life.
He pulls a roll from the pan and drops it onto a plate. Melted frosting dives off the sides of the steaming bread. “What are your plans today?”
Right now, my plan is to have another cinnamon roll, but that’s not the answer he’s looking for, or the one I’m willing to give. “I’ll take Scoop for his walk, then make cookies for the care packages.”
“Didn’t you just send them boxes last week? Calvin won’t even get his until basic training is over.” He pushes his plate aside, a chunk of roll still sitting in a puddle of goo. “We’ve got to be careful about the budget. Shipping is expensive.”
“So were children, but you never complained about feeding and clothing them.”
“You know what I mean. I’m trying to make sure we have enough to help out where we can.”
“And making sure they remember that we’re here and we love them is not help?”
He steps around the counter and walks the three strides into the family room to where I lay. “Maybe you should talk to someone about what you’re going through.”
I push myself off the couch. “What exactly am I going through?”
“You know.” He has the decency to retreat two paces. “Empty-nest syndrome.”
Is he kidding me? No way he just said that. Next he’ll be attributing my moods to PMS or menopause. “I’m a mother, Mark, not some crazy plumbing problem. I’m not going to talk to a professional about the fact that I miss my children. They are my children. What kind of mother wouldn’t?”
“I think maybe this has gone beyond the typical missing. You barely get out of bed.”
“Do I look like I’m in bed right now?” I glance down at my pajama pants and nearly-worn-through slippers. Ugh. I’ve been bested.
“All right. Listen. Tomorrow is our anniversary. Let’s take the chance to enjoy being just the two of us again.” He steps closer and rubs the fabric of my worn t-shirt. “Please.”
I nod, keeping my gaze on the carpet.
He hooks his fingers in mine and leads me to the front door.
What started as an act of love has become a twenty-year-old ritual.
I step outside with my husband and tip up on my toes to kiss his cheek. This has been my routine every day of the school year since he started teaching. I walk him out the door to his truck and wave as he leaves. It used to make me feel like Lucy Ricardo saying goodbye to Ricky. Now it’s just habit. But this tradition is about the only thing in my life that hasn’t left me in the last few weeks.
“I love you,” he says.
Before I can tell him I really do love him too, he hops into his pickup and backs out of the driveway. His red and rust tailgate disappears around the corner, and he’s gone. Today marks what will be his twentieth year teaching science at the high school in our small Northern California community. And one day away from our twenty-fourth anniversary.
Even after all this time, and even with my heart now splintered and cracked open, I still love him. And I think he loves me too. But I’m not really sure why. I don’t bring much to our marriage.
Empty-nest syndrome. That shows just how little he really understands. My emptiness can’t be mended with a diagnostic Band-Aid. The simple dismissal with those three words bring me further down until I plop onto the porch. The same porch where I posed my long-prayed-for triplets each fall from toddlerhood, through homeschool, and before each first day of high school.
Here, with the jasmine climbing up the trellis, the sweet scent floating over me, I can still see their matching smiles as they packed up the most essential of their belongings and, for the first time, moved to places other than this house. Three separate places. Calvin, the last to leave, started basic training for the Air Force only a couple weeks ago. Carrie’s been gone for a month to college in Washington State, and Caroline, she left a week after her sister, but to school in Southern California.
Never has the length of our state seemed so unbearable. It would take me a full day to get to either one of my girls, and even longer to reach Calvin. What if they need me? What if one of them gets sick or injured? How can I stop being their mom in the way I have been since the day the doctor confirmed their beginnings? It’s unnatural.
Behind our cherry-red front door, the kids’ Airedale terrier whines. Scoop understands. He’s the only other creature who seems to realize how vacant our home is without the triplets.
I pull myself up and open the door. At the same time, a gray squirrel darts across the lawn.
The Airedale’s ears lift and his back straightens.
I loop my fingers into his collar
as he lunges forward. For a few awkward strides, I stay with him, then it’s too much for my stubby legs, and my knees collide with the freshly watered lawn.
Scoop runs free.
“Scoop. No. Scoop!” Water soaks into my pajama pants and slippers. My shoulders slump, and I give up, falling back onto the grass. The scent of earth and bark mulch rolls over me. A single cloud floats through the blue-as-the-ocean sky. “Scoop.”
This time the plea comes out with no real urgency. He’ll come when he’s ready. And not a moment earlier. Ten years with this dog, I know the only thing to be gained by screaming his name are odd looks from people who wonder what kind of a person would name their dog Scoop.
The kids begged me to get the beast. And my response, for as long as I could hold out, was, “Who’s going to scoop all that poop?” Maybe I’d said it too many times.
Closing my eyes, I let the fact that I’m lying in the front yard in full view of the neighborhood, with wetness seeping into my clothes and hair, while my dog runs free after an uncatchable squirrel, slip away. This is another type of Lucy moment. Not the kind I want to dwell on.
It’s time to surrender. My life has become inconsequential and obsolete. I’m the outdated model of a mother with my only hope being the future possibility of revival as a grandmother.
A warm tongue slaps me across the mouth and I sit up, aware that my rounded middle makes bending less graceful than when I was young and active. I lift the neck of my shirt and wipe it across my face. “That’s nasty, Scoop.”
He flops down next to me and flings a mud-lined leg over my lap.
“Well, I hope you’re happy. That was your walk for the morning.”
He doesn’t answer, and I’m struck by the fact that the majority of my conversations are with this overgrown, breathing teddy bear. But I’m fine. I’ve had friends. They were an expensive investment and the loss of them hurt too bad.
“Come on, dog. Let’s get cleaned up.” I roll to my knees and heft myself to standing. Chunks of grass clippings cling to my skin and clothes. The back of my head is soaked, and the hair sticks to my scalp.
In an oddly obedient manner, Scoop follows me into the house where I wipe him down with the dog towel then flip my slippers off and head through the silent hall. On the way to the small bedroom I share with Mark, I pass two closed doors. If only I could go back. I’d enjoy every moment of craziness. I’d hear their music booming from their rooms and recognize the noise as a beautiful sign that my children were happy in our nest.
In my room, I peel off my wet clothes, throw them along the edge of the hamper, then yank on a pair of sweatpants I have to roll up to fit my stubby legs. I finish my housewife-chic ensemble with one of Mark’s t-shirts.
As I walk back through the hall, I touch Calvin’s door, then Carrie and Caroline’s. It’s become another of my rituals, a way to wish them well and pray for them when words are too heavy to speak.
On the television screen, Barney Fife pulls his trusty bullet from his pocket as I drop onto the computer chair. None of my eighty-four Facebook friends have updated their statuses since the last time I checked. I hit refresh again. Still nothing.
I lean back in my seat and twist around. This room is the reason we chose to buy the house. The family room is an extension of the kitchen. Here I was able to be part of my children’s everyday lives while I cooked the endless meals that three growing people required.
I loved it then. Now, not so much.
Tears prick my eyes. I can’t even think about the triplets without a waterfall of emotions flowing over my cheeks. What am I supposed to do with my life now? I scan their graduation pictures, hung evenly over the gas fireplace. Three individual shots of Carrie, Calvin, and Caroline, then under them a large print of the five of us together, the kids still in their black robes, gold tassels hanging to the side of stiff mortarboards and smiles stretched across our faces.
The photographs give no hint of what was to come when they went separate ways. There’s not even the smallest clue on my face that soon that mother would be alone in a vacated home day after day, with nothing to show for her life. Nothing to give her days value.
Where did I go wrong? My friend, Laura, her kids have all gone to the local college. Her oldest daughter was married a year ago and is now expecting Laura and Dan’s first grandbaby. They live less than a mile apart.
I can’t breathe. The loss suffocates me. I gave everything to have those three precious children. How could I have missed the fact that someday, a day that would come too quickly, they would all three leave me at nearly the same moment. That’s what people don’t understand, the plight of the mother of multiples. They all leave at once.
The light outside is dimming and the candle I’ve placed in the middle of the table has burned halfway down, but still no Mark. I scoot the chair back and sigh as it creaks with the relief of my weight. How could he be late on our anniversary?
I blow out the flame, leaving the room dark. In the silent house, the quiet tenses my muscles. Feeling my way to the couch, I let my body flop over the armrest and onto the cushions. My fingers graze the remote. Just as I’m about to click on some needed distraction, light cuts across the room.
The rumble of the engine dies and a door slams.
I roll off the sofa, my knees hitting the floor hard and the wind puffing from my lungs. With all I have, I scramble to my feet in a race to be upright before Mark switches on the hall light. The effort leaves me breathless and damp.
“Jenna? Are you here?” The light snaps on, and we’re staring at each other.
I wipe my hand over my forehead. “Dinner is cold.”
“I’m so sorry. I sent you a text. Didn’t you get it?”
I roll my eyes. So what if this expression of my emotion makes him furious? I haven’t even charged my cell phone since the last road trip. I use the land line. Why would I use my cell when I’m almost always right here, waiting?
“Listen. I told you I could be late. It was all I could do to get here this early. Tonight is the fall sports parents meetings. Ken was not thrilled I was having my assistant coach take over. I really thought he’d let me out of it.”
My shoulders slump. Ken may be a friend, but he’s still a harsh principal. Mark isn’t making anything up here. It was my own fault for expecting him to be home at six. But still, I can’t turn and let Mark off the hook. Something keeps my feet planted and my face turned away from him. I don’t want to be wrong—again.
He makes the effort and walks around to face me. “I have something for you.” His eyes twinkle as he reaches into his pocket and extracts a lavender envelope.
A card? He gets me a card every anniversary. Running my finger under the flap, I tear the top and pull out a Hallmark anniversary greeting. I think it’s the same one I got last year. As I open it, a folded piece of paper slips onto my palm.
Electricity runs over my nerves. I look up into his gaze and see excitement in his features.
“Come on,” he says.
Dropping the card and envelope onto the coffee table, I train my attention on the small print. It’s an airline itinerary. For one person. To Carrington, Oregon. How did he know?
“I heard about Emery House closing and the reunion. I thought this could be a great chance for you to reconnect. What do you think?” His palm warms my shoulder, and tension melts away from me as I lean into him.
“I’m scared.”
“Of what?” His arms encircle me, pinning my own to my sides.
“Of what everyone will think of me at the reunion. I’m not the same.”
He lifts my chin. “No one is the same after this many years. No one. I’m sure they’re all thinking similar things.”
“They have careers, lives. I have—I have a spare tire around my middle and no idea what to do with my time.” My forehead drops onto his chest.
“First of all, I think you look great. Secondly, it sounds like this is the perfect opportunity for you to take some time and
find your path. Maybe being at the university will inspire you. You know, you could take classes here at the community college or online. Instead of thinking about how much you miss the kids, how about looking at the life you have left to live? You can do almost anything.”
I’ve married a dreamer. In his mind, I still have time to do wild things like fly to the moon. But in reality, I’m a forty-six-year-old woman who hasn’t used her degree in almost twenty years.
Doesn’t he realize I still listen to eighties music? I have no idea what’s playing on the radio, and I have no desire to find out. My main source of entertainment is the oldies television stations, the more black-and-white, the better. I’m not the kind of woman who’s about to take a leap and do something new and unfamiliar. I love reruns. Even in my real life.
An overly dramatic moan weaves from my mouth. It’s like it hangs there and no matter how much I cringe at the immaturity of it, I can’t pull it back or make it drift way.
“I’m sorry. You’re right. I’ll give it a try.” The lie in my words sickens me. But I can’t have this talk again. Not tonight. It’s our anniversary.
Chapter 3
VICTORIA CAMBRIDGE
“Cori. Are you out there?” I lean over the smooth wood of my polished desk and scan what I can see of the reception area.
Jennifer appears in my doorway. She’s neatly groomed, but dressed like a woman of forty rather than a college intern. It’s like she’s mimicking me and mocking me all at once. Of course, fifty is closer to my age than forty, but no one needs to know that.
“Do you know where Cori is off to?” I tap one of my pink fingernails on the desktop.
“I’m not sure. She said she needed to step out for a minute. Should I be asking her where she’s going?” Jennifer’s eyelashes flutter. She’s got to slow down the coffee consumption.
“No. I’ll handle this. Could you get me a glass of iced tea?”
Jennifer clamps her hands together and nods, but it takes her a minute of wasted time before she turns away and gets to it.
If We Make It Home Page 2