by Jay McLean
When I’m done, I take my camera back upstairs, but before I look at the images, I send a text to Josh.
Becca: How come you didn’t tell me how bad things were with Grams?
Josh: Because they’re not…?
Becca: She’s in a hospital bed, Josh. She needs help going to the bathroom. You never mentioned those things.
Josh: I guess I just didn’t see it as such a big deal because they were progressive. It’s not like it happened overnight. I’m sorry. I should’ve told you. She was really excited to see you. Did she recognize you?
Becca: Yeah.
Josh: So that’s a good thing, right?
Becca: I guess, but I feel like I should be doing more. You’re taking on so much of this and it isn’t fair to you. I want to be here with her. I think I’m going to drop out and move in.
I don’t know why I said it, but before I get a chance to rethink it, I’ve already hit send. Truth is, I was toying with the idea even before I saw Grams. Spending that time with Josh was like a slow, sweet form of torture. I know it’s dumb, wrong, stupid, pathetic—all the possible words to describe a girl who’d give up everything just to be closer to the boy she loves… and I’m not going to do it. Like I said, I was just toying with the idea.
Right?
Right.
Josh: Shut up, idiot.
I smile at his response, half amused and half relieved.
Becca: What? I could be serious?!
Josh: Even if you were, I wouldn’t let you.
Becca: Why not?
Josh: For a plethora of reasons.
Becca: Give me two.
Josh: Reason one… It’s not as if it’s *just* college in St. Louis. You have friends there. You have Say Something. You have the school paper. Internships. And most importantly, you have all your therapy there. You can’t just up and move and forget all that exists.
Wow. Seems like I’m not the only one who’s thought about it.
Josh: Reason two: I love you and I won’t let you.
Becca: I love you, too.
Josh: You won’t be saying that in ten years when I’m retired and have a beer gut and receding hairline and mangled bones and scarred skin and walk with a limp because I’ve snapped my ankle eleventy-three billion times.
Becca: I’ll be saying it always, Josh, even if you’re not around to hear it.
Josh: You do insane things to my heart, Becca Owens.
Warming at his response, I lie down on the bed, the lack of sleep from the past few days catching up with me.
Becca: What am I supposed to do about Grams?
Josh: You hope for a better tomorrow.
Becca: And if it doesn’t come?
Josh: Then you cherish a greater yesterday.
* * *
Sadie knocking on my door jerks me awake the next morning. I rush to answer it, panic pumping through my veins. “Hey,” she says, smiling wide. “Josh is on TV. Thought you might want to watch him.”
Relieved, I shrug on a sweater and make my way downstairs where Grams is sitting up in her bed glued to the television. “There he is,” she says, pointing to the screen. “There’s my Joshua. Isn’t he handsome, Sadie?” she calls out, glancing at me quickly. Her face falls and she looks behind me. “Who are you? Where’s Sadie?”
“I’m here,” Sadie answers, walking into the room with two coffees in hand. She hands me one before sitting on an armchair on the other side of the bed.
Grams is still looking at me, her head cocked, gaze blank. It’s not until Josh’s voice fills the room that she tears her eyes away from me. Josh and his teammates all take up spots on a large couch, a huge screen television behind them showing a highlight clip of them skating. “Sorry,” Josh says, phone in hand.
“You texting?” the male host asks.
“Yeah. I apologize. This is really rude of me.” Josh shoves the phone in his pocket while his team laughs.
“I bet it’s a girl,” the female host says.
“Or twenty,” replies the male one.
The woman on the screen giggles.
The guy adds, “What’s that like for you? Fame and no-doubt fortune, plus that adorable son of yours… Boys want to be you, and the girls… well, you must have them hounding at you.”
Reece chuckles.
“Just one girl,” Josh says, shaking his head. “And she barely tolerates me. Believe me.”
Grams laughs, a sound that brings back memories of easy summer days. “He’s talking about Becca,” she mumbles. “All he has to do is see the way Becca looks at him. She adores him. Stupid boy.”
Yeah. Stupid boy.
Sadie matches Grams’s laugh, but her eyes are on me.
I take a chance and hold Grams’s hand. Her eyes snap to mine. “Sweetheart,” she practically squeals. “When did you get here?”
* * *
Sadie tells me that Tommy will be around later that evening so I have the day to spend with Grams if I want to. She also tells me that today is a good day. Grams woke up somewhat alert and with more energy than she normally does, which means she’ll want to go for a walk through the park—the same park the police found her in the night all this started for her. It’s only two blocks away, but Grams needs a lot of help and can’t be out long because of her deteriorating immune system. Normally, Sadie drives there and pushes Grams’s wheelchair from one end of the park to the other and back again.
We go the park with Grams huddled under layers of blankets. I push her chair while Sadie follows a few steps behind with a paper bag full of groceries. Apparently, Grams has been doing this most of her life since she moved into her house—going to the park and handing out food to the few homeless. Strange I wasn’t made aware of it during the almost eight or so months I spent with her, but then again, she’d disappear for hours at a time, telling me she had errands to run and I chose not to tag along, finding it more important to dwell on my past or, later, spend time with Tommy. It dawns on me that I know very little about my grandmother. Besides the fact she goes to church and had my father at sixteen, I don’t really know her at all. And now, it might be too late to ask.
“Stop, Sadie,” Grams says. I don’t correct her. She points over at a couple of people sitting in front of a bush, their few possessions in a garbage bag settled next to them. Grams waves and shouts, “Good morning, Johnny!”
I wheel her over to them while Johnny smiles at her. “Our angel of hope,” he sings.
Sadie hands them a loaf of bread, a large bottle of water, and jars of peanut butter and jelly. Grams spends a good fifteen minutes with them, talking about anything and everything. She asks the same questions a couple of times, but the couple continues to smile, repeating the same words already spoken. They seem to understand Grams’s illness. Heck, they probably understand it more than I do. And if what Sadie said is right—that Grams has been doing this a while—they probably see her decline as “progressive” just like Josh said. The couple pushes aside the worn-out blanket covering their legs so they can stand and hug Grams goodbye, and when they do I notice the plastic bags surrounding their feet. Grams must see it, too, because she gasps. “What happened to your shoes?” she says, her voice laced with sympathy.
Johnny shrugs. “No big deal, angel,” he says, waving a hand in front of him. “Someone obviously needed them more than we do.”
My heart tightens at his words.
The lady with Johnny must see my reaction because she smiles and pats my arm. “It’s okay, sweetie,” she coos.
I pull my phone out of my pocket, type out a message and have Cordy say, “Grams… you know who has a garage full of shoes?”
28
—Becca—
Grams goes back to sleep after our outing, and I go back to my room. I’m in the middle of editing the photographs I’d taken last night and earlier today when I hear a knock on my door that has my breath halting and my stomach flipping. The knocking sounds again, fast and light, letting me know exactly who it is even befor
e I answer it.
Tommy’s grin is all consuming. I fall to my knees, my arms wide and ready for him. He barrels into me, holding my neck tight to his chest as he sways from side to side. “I missed you,” he whispers, and I swear, my heart physically expands, escapes from my chest and falls right into his little hands.
He pulls back, his eyes on mine. “Nanni’s at Dad’s making dinner. You want to come over and play with me?”
I nod, standing slowly and taking his hand.
“We have to be really quiet. Ma’am’s sleeping.”
“Okay,” I mouth.
“Follow me.” Tommy releases my hand so he can tiptoe down the stairs, using the rail to help him. As soon as he’s off the steps, he lays flat on his stomach and looks up at me, holding a finger to his mouth. After I nod, he waves for me to join him on the floor, and I do, because who the hell can say no to a Warden boy?
As silently as possible, we army crawl past the kitchen, into the living room, and toward the front door. Tommy points to the doorknob above us, and I reach up and turn it as slowly as possible. Once outside Tommy says, his voice back to normal, “Ma’am sleeps a lot now. She doesn’t play like she used to.” He picks up a skateboard leaning against the house, flies down the porch steps, jumps on the board and kicks, then pushes, off the ground. He rolls the ten feet toward the bottom of the apartment stairs before jumping off and turning back to me. “You coming?” he asks.
I realize I’m still standing on the porch, too fascinated with watching him that I haven’t even began to move. I put one foot in front of the other, my movements slow, my fascination increasing. Tommy waits at the bottom of the stairs, holding the skateboard under his arm. He’s wearing a backwards cap, a gray Globe shirt, dark skinny jeans and a pair of Globe shoes that look way too big for his feet.
He looks so much like Josh it’s scary.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
I shake my head, and he starts to move again.
He even climbs the stairs like Josh.
Opens the front door like Josh.
Slips off his shoes like Josh.
Throws his skateboard on the couch like Josh.
“He’s changed a lot the last couple of months,” Ella says, catching me staring at her grandson. “He thinks he’s all grown up.” She wipes her hands on a dishtowel as she walks toward me. As soon as she’s close enough, she hugs me gently.
There’s something safe, yet completely unfamiliar about being in her arms. My stomach flips as she looks down at me, her eyes seeming to hold a secret only she knows. “It’s so good to see you,” she says, pulling back and settling her hand on my cheek. “Did you have a good time with Josh?”
I nod, afraid to make eye contact in case she can somehow see my secrets.
“And you liked Portland?”
Another nod.
“Are you hungry?”
I chew my lip and glance at her quickly. Then offer another nod.
“Becs and I are going to play in my room,” Tommy says, taking my hand and dragging me away.
Even his room has changed.
There are no longer posters of trains and Pixar characters covering his walls. In fact, there’s nothing on his walls but the chipped blue paint Josh told me Tommy had picked out himself just before his second birthday.
Tommy sits on his bed, leans against the wall and starts tapping on his iPad. He’s not actually doing anything, just tapping away, opening and closing apps. “Daddy loves you, right? That’s why he asked you to meet him in Poland.”
With a smile, I have Cordy say, “Portland?”
“Daddy didn’t ask me,” he says through a sigh. His eyes lift, eyes full of sadness and confusion. “I don’t think daddy loves me anymore. Not like he used to.”
My mouth opens, a thousand words spinning in my mind. “No,” I mouth, shaking my head and sitting next to him. “Your daddy loves you so much,” Cordy says for me.
Tommy shrugs. “Mommy’s coming home soon and her and Justin are getting married, so he’ll be my new daddy like last time.”
A knock on Tommy’s door saves me from responding. Which is good, because I don’t think I have one in me.
“Dinner’s ready,” Ella says.
“Little trees?” Tommy asks.
Ella laughs. “Yes, little trees. And carrot stick logs and—”
“Pea sea!” Tommy jumps off the bed and pulls me up by my hand, his heartbreaking confession already forgotten. “You want to be a T-Rex with me?”
* * *
Going by Tommy’s expression, I’m the best damn vegetable artist in the world, something I can now add to my list of small achievements. Our vegetable land goes beyond his plate, onto the table, through the bowl of fruit in the middle, and ends on a cookie tray. I make little cavemen from tater tots joined together with tiny slices of carrots, and even make their clothes from green beans. I realize the food’s cold, but I don’t care, and neither does Tommy. “It’s past his bedtime,” Ella says, but I can see she’s enjoying this as much as we are.
“Five more one minutes,” Tommy tells her, his tongue out, concentrating on placing the peas in a pile to create a wave in his “Pea sea.”
Fifteen minutes later, we’re all standing around the table (Tommy on a chair) with our hands close to our chests pretending to be T-Rexes. “Ready?” Tommy whispers.
Ella and I nod.
“Free. Two. Ready. Set. One. Go!”
Swear there’s nothing funnier than watching Tommy demolish an entire table of vegetables with only his mouth and tiny little T-Rex arms.
Wait.
I was wrong.
There’s nothing funnier than watching Ella do the same thing.
“Come on, Becs!” Tommy yells, an entire caveman in his mouth.
“Neh Mecs!” Ella struggles to say, green beans and carrots falling form her lips.
In another world, another life, being with Josh and Tommy, even with Ella—belonging to a world I’d once desperately longed for—this would’ve been enough.
Maybe it still is.
I listen to Tommy’s cackle mixing with Ella’s giggles, and I take a mental photograph of the moment and store it safe in my heart, and I make a promise to myself to keep it there… even if I lose it all, I’ll cherish this moment as a greater yesterday.
* * *
With Tommy showered and clear of any food scraps, we crawl into his bed together so I can spend what little time I have here with him. Tomorrow morning, I’ll be gone again.
We start to video call Josh from Tommy’s iPad while Tommy tells me, “Daddy doesn’t answer too much.”
But Josh does answer this time—from what looks to be a crowded restaurant. Josh smiles when he sees us, two days’ worth of growth covering his jawline, his hair scruffy as always. “I was hoping you’d call,” he shouts, moving through the crowd until he finds a quieter spot. “You guys having fun?”
“Yep,” Tommy shouts. “Daddy, want to hear my new joke?”
“Go for it, buddy.”
“How do you make a tissue dance?”
“How?”
Tommy picks his nose then shows it to Josh. “Put a little boogy in it.”
“Dude, that’s gross.”
“But funny, right?” Tommy says, his body shifting with his laughter.
“And gross.”
“Becs made the best vegetable land!”
“She did, huh?” Josh says, eyes wide in mock surprise. “I guess I’m gonna have to step up my game when I get home.”
Tommy shrugs. “Becca can just stay here and then you don’t have to come home at all.”
“What?” Josh’s smile drops, uncertainty clouding his features. “You don’t want to see me?”
Another shrug for Tommy.
I can see the thousand questions fleeting through Josh’s mind, but before he gets a chance to respond, someone calls out his name. For a split second, Josh looks away from the camera, jerks his head at whomever, and then comes back
to us. “I’ll be home soon, okay?”
“That’s what you said last time,” Tommy says, but his voice is low, masking his hurt and I don’t think Josh hears it, or sees it, because he simply says, “I’ll call you later, bud.” And just like that, he’s gone.
Tommy stares at the blank screen. The longer he does, the more painful it becomes. Frustrated, he throws the iPad across the room, and crosses his arms over his chest. “Will you read me a story?” he murmurs, a scowl etched on his features.
It takes a moment for the shock of his actions to pass and when it does, I nod slowly, and select a book from the shelf built into his bed. I pull out my phone and start to type exactly what’s written in the book. Tommy’s hand covers my phone, his grip as tight as the tick in his precious little jaw. “I said read me a story.”
Shaking my head, I keep my eyes on his and, with a struggle, pull my phone from his grasp to type, “But you know I can’t speak. Right, Tommy?”
Arms crossed again, Tommy yells, “Yes you can!” He holds up three fingers between us. “See? Three fingers. That means we talk. One means we don’t. Two means we whisper. Three means talk. Now talk!”
“Tommy,” I mouth, tears pricking my eyes. He snatches my phone and throws it across the room, creating a dent in his wall.
My jaw drops and I look back at him—at nothing but the anger simmering in his eyes.
He inhales through his nose.
Exhales the same way.
“I hate you!” he screams.
I cover my head.
Ella enters the room. “What’s going on?”
“Becca won’t read me my book!” Tommy yells, standing in front of me. “I hate her.”
“Tommy!”
I wipe at my tears, tears that came on so quickly I had no idea they were there until I tasted them on my lips.
“You’re a stupid head!” Tommy yells.
I force myself to look at him.
“You’re never around and when you are, you won’t even talk to me! Daddy’s never home! Mommy’s never home!”