Not that she remembered what his dad looked like.
Not that she knew who his dad was.
She smiled to herself. Omaha. There’d been a lot of guys back then.
Regular lovers as well as one-nighters. And she had never used any form of birth control. She hadn’t liked condoms or diaphragms, hadn’t liked any sort of barrier to contact, and she hadn’t been responsible enough to take birth-control pills on a regular basis. So she’d trusted to luck or fate or whatever, and had just accepted things as they came.
She was glad she’d gotten pregnant, though. She was glad she’d had Dion.
She didn’t know where she’d be today without him. Dead, she supposed.
Overdosed. Or carved up by a Mr. Goodbar.
He turned the mower, started back toward the house, saw her in the window, and waved. She waved back.
On the trip over, Dion had asked why they’d moved to Napa, and she hadn’t been able to answer him. Why had they come here? As he had pointed out, there was really no compelling reason for them to start over in this place. She had no friends or relatives in the region; her job was one she could have gotten in any mid-sized city or major metropolitan area in the country. She’d told him that it was as good as anywhere else, that it was far enough away that she wouldn’t be known, but the truth was that… She’d been Called.
Called. That was how she thought of it. It didn’t make any sort of logical sense, but emotionally it felt right. She’d seen an article on the Wine Country in the Arizona Republic’s Sunday magazine supplement, and had found herself drawn, pulled to the area. For two weeks the idea of moving had grown within her, making her nervous and anxious, growing from a desire to a necessity in her mind, intruding upon her daily thoughts until she thought she’d go crazy. It was as if something inside her was telling her that she had to move to Napa. She’d fought it at first, but she’d finally given in. She had always been one to trust her instincts.
Of course, whether they moved here or someplace else, they still would have had to move. She had no choice in the matter. She had not been laid off from the bank, as she’d told Dion. She’d been fired and threatened with prosecution. Dion probably suspected more than she’d told him and more than he let on, but she doubted that his ideas and suspicions were anywhere near as bad as the truth. The truth was that the boy had been sixteen and that he’d been seriously and permanently injured, and that if the bank manager hadn’t been involved as well, she would probably be in jail or on trial at this moment.
What was wrong with her? she wondered. Why did these sorts of things always happen to her? It wasn’t as though she didn’t try to live a normal life; it was just that this craziness kept intruding. As much as she tried to walk the straight and narrow, there was always someone or something waiting to tip her off balance. She wasn’t entirely blameless.
Much of it was, in fact, her own fault. But it just seemed like fate wasn’t doing her any favors.
All of that was over, though. This time things were going to be different. She was not going to fall back into her old habits, her old patterns. For the first time in her life, she was going to be the type of mother that Dion wanted. The type of mother that he deserved.
She finished one last sip of coffee, dumped the dregs in the sink, then walked into the bedroom to get dressed.
3
“First day!”
Dion nodded as he sat down to breakfast. On the table before him was a pitcher of orange juice, two slices of toast with peanut butter, and a choice of two cereals. He looked over at his mom, standing next to the sink and pouring herself a cup of coffee. She was obviously nervous. She only played Harriet Nelson when she was under extreme pressure or extremely worried—ordinarily, they ate breakfast in silence, fending for themselves.
Of course, this was the first day for both of them.
“Are you excited?” his mom asked.
“Not really.”
“Be honest.”
“More scared than excited.” He poured himself a glass of juice.
“You have nothing to be scared about. Everything’s going to be fine.”
He drank his juice. “You’re not nervous?”
“A little,” she admitted, sitting down in the chair next to him. He noticed that she was wearing a tight dress which clearly outlined the fact that she was wearing no bra. “But it’s only natural to be a little jittery at first. After the first ten minutes, though, it’s like you’ve been there all your life.”
For you maybe, Dion thought, but he said nothing. He wished he was a little bit more like his mom in social situations.
He wished she was a little bit more like him.
“Come on,” she said. “Hurry up and eat. I’ll drop you off at school.”
“That’s okay. I’ll walk.”
“You sure?” she asked.
He nodded.
“Embarrassed to have your mommy drop you off, huh?” She smiled. “I understand. But in that case you’d better eat even faster. It’s about a fifteen- or twenty-minute walk, I think.”
He poured himself a bowl of cereal. “Well, maybe you can drive me part of the way,” he said.
She laughed. “Deal.”
It was an old redbrick schoolhouse, the kind seldom seen outside of movies. Two stories with indoor hallways, the main building housed both classrooms and administration, stretching parallel to the football field. A tall clock tower topped the adjoining auditorium. The gym, set slightly apart from the other two buildings, was much newer and much uglier, constructed of plain gray cement.
Dion stood across the street from school, waiting for the bell to ring and dreading it at the same time. His mouth was dry, his palms wet, and he wished to God that they had never left Arizona.
