“Is it hard every year?”
“Yes.”
“It doesn’t get easier?”
“Yes, it’s easier, but if something starts out as the most difficult thing in the world and then gets progressively easier each year, it’s still pretty hard at the end, right?”
“I guess so. I hope I never find out.”
“Me, too.”
“I’m so sorry, Mom.” Frances drank her tea, and watched Jack the dog rolling in a patch of sunlight in the garden. Hopefully it was just sunlight. “I see him in Milo, you know. Milo has his hair, and his ears.”
“He does? Send me a picture.” There was a murmuring in the background. “Your dad is here, do you want to say hi?” More murmuring. “No, wait, he says we have to go. We have tickets to something.”
“OK, Mom. I love you.”
“I love you, too, Frances. Kiss everyone for me.”
“I will.” She hung up and sat and looked at the phone until Ava came in and asked about dinner. She surprised her daughter by pulling her onto her lap and hugging her, very tightly. After a moment, Ava relaxed, and for a blissful minute they just sat there, together.
Then they parted and Frances stood to get dinner ready.
Twenty-three.
It was late, easily past ten, as Charlie walked slowly upstairs to bed. He paused, hearing a noise. Then he turned at the top of the stairs and went into Theo’s room.
“Daddy?”
Charlie sat on his son’s bed, his weight tipping the child slightly toward him. Theo completed the small fall, curling around his dad and resting his head near Charlie’s legs. In public this boy was slightly standoffish, but in private he had always been a cuddle bug. Charlie rested his hand on Theo’s head, smoothing back his hair.
“Yes, buddy? Can’t you sleep? It’s really late, and you have school in the morning.”
“I know.” Such a small voice.
“What’s up?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“You promise you won’t get mad?”
Charlie nodded, and meant it. “I promise. Ask whatever you like, but then you should go to sleep.”
The little boy nodded. A beam of moonlight slid through a gap in his dinosaur curtains and illuminated one ear. Charlie looked at where he assumed his son’s eyes were, trying not to notice the similarity between Theo’s ear and his mom’s.
“Why isn’t Mom living here anymore? What really happened? Someone at school said she cheated on you.”
“Who said that?”
“I don’t remember,” lied Theo.
Charlie sighed. “Well, I’m afraid that’s kind of true. Your mom met someone else she liked more than me.”
There was a silence.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Charlie shrugged. “It’s hard to explain, chief. You know when you’ve had a toy a very long time and you get something new? For a while that new toy is so much better than the old one, right? It’s exciting, it’s shiny, it does new things . . .” He trailed off, wondering if Richard had done new things with Anne, things he’d never tried. Maybe he just had new jokes. Maybe he went to the gym more. Or at all. Maybe he loved different things about her than Charlie had loved. Still loved.
Theo wasn’t satisfied. “Yeah, I get that. But some toys are so good you never stop liking them, right?”
“Like?”
“Like Rotten Corner.” Rotten Corner was the name he’d given a piece of baby blanket he’d carried around since he was a toddler. “Does your blankie have a name?” Anne had asked, as he’d sat on her lap, sucking his thumb and curling and uncurling the piece of baby blanket, its blue and red stripes still bright from the hospital. He’d told her it was called Rotten Corner, two words she’d had no idea he even knew, and clearly the name had stuck. Now RC, as it was more familiarly known, was a pale piece of blanket about a foot square, all the color washed out, but the magic still intact. It was folded under Theo’s pillow now, just in case.
“Yeah, some things are like that.”
“You’re like that for me, Dad.” Theo reached as far as he could around his father and moved his head onto his dad’s lap. “I won’t ever want a newer dad.”
Charlie felt his throat tighten. What if Anne ended up marrying this asshole? What if he tried to be a dad to Charlie’s kids? For a moment he felt light-headed with a mix of anger and fear, then he unclenched his fist and spoke softly.
“Buddy, no one could love you and your sister more than I do. And your mom loves you both just as much as she ever did. The problems we’re having are between us, just grown-up stuff. It doesn’t mean anything about you guys, OK?”
Theo turned his head and looked up at his father. The moonbeam was now falling on the back of his neck, and Charlie could see the bones of his upper spine sticking up against his pajama top. “If she loves us so much,” he said in a voice as pale as a whisper, “she wouldn’t want to play with anyone else. We’d be like Rotten Corner, the best forever. The best because it’s old, not new.” He started to cry a little, and tried to cover it, pushing his voice through the lump in his throat so he’d seem tougher than his dad might think. “A new one might be shiny, but it wouldn’t know anything. RC knows everything about me, it’s been everywhere. Why doesn’t Mom care about that?” His hand tightened on Charlie’s leg. “Is she going to have new kids, too?”
From down the hall Kate cried out, and Charlie was saved from answering a question he didn’t have an answer to.
“Let me go see what’s up with Kate, OK? I’ll come back in a minute.”
Theo watched his father go, and reached under his pillow.
Kate had had a bad dream, and wanted to sleep with Charlie. He picked her up, her head already lolling on his shoulder and carried her into his bedroom. He had no idea nighttimes were so active in the house; he’d always been the one
