Page 93 of Xavier

“There’s one in the closet in the hallway,” Xavier calls after me.

“How did you even know I fell, honey?” Denise’s voice follows me as I leave the room.

“Michael called me. He said he was on the phone with you, but then you yelled and he heard a big crash and then he said you just said you had to go and hung up.”

“Oh geez, I didn’t realize I raised a bunch of drama queens. I was fine. I just didn’t want him hearing me swear as I hobbled over to the couch. You know, in case he overreacted and called you or something,” she scoffs.

“He did the right thing, Mom. Are you sure you’re okay, did you want me to call the doctor?” Xavier says as I come back into the room with the mop and dustpan in my hand.

“Will you tell my son I’m fine, Malynda?” she says, and I almost drop the mop in surprise at her directly addressing me.

“Well, um, I’m not sure I can tell your son anything he doesn’t want to hear.”

This makes her laugh, and I feel a little more relaxed as she seems to warm to me.

Xavier fusses over her while I help him pick up the debris, mopping up the water and gathering up the broken glass. He teases her and she returns the jabs two-fold, and I realize how strange it is to see the relationship in person.

It isn’t how I envisioned her.

I remember him telling me how tired she always was, how drained, how she resembled a wrung-out dishrag, alternating between long days at work, and restless nights worrying about money.

Whoever that was, it seems to be a distant memory.

This woman is full of life. She gets up from her seat and hobbles around after Xavier, moving things that he touches, telling him off when he tries to help her back to the couch.

“I can do it myself, Xavier!”

“I know, mom, we’re just helping, geez. Who knew you liked sweeping so much. Maybe I should get you one of those miniature Japanese zen gardens for you to rake back and forth.”

“No way, I’d fling that across the room in a minute.”

“Well, then you could sweep up the sand from that as well.” She rolls her eyes and sinks into a recliner with a moan. “Mom?”

“It’s fine. That was an old lady moan, not a broken bone moan.”

He looks over at me and makes a show of throwing his hands in the air and sighing.

“She’s unbelievable!”

“So I see… where you get it from.”

“Hey!” They both yell in unison and we all fail in not bursting into laughter.

Xavier’s phone rings and cuts through the laughter. He pulls it out of his pocket and glances at the screen before excusing himself and disappearing down the hallway.

“Malynda? Why don’t you come sit over here,” Denise says, and I put the dustpan down and settle on the couch next to her.

She turns to me, her eyes boring into me again. Those eyes, they must be made from some sort of alien space rock. They’re unnerving. Bottomless.

“So, you’re the girl,” she finally says, and the shiver up my spine comes back.

“I’m sorry?”

“You’re the girl, the reason. The reason he left Maine. The reason he almost died.”

I feel my face freeze. She says it so matter-of-factly. Like it’s nothing. Or, like it’s something she’s had a decade to process. But for me, it’s all new.

“You broke his heart. He went from the happiest I ever saw him that summer, to a shell of a human. It was you, wasn’t it? He never told me your name. But a mother knows. Only love could’ve made him that happy. And only the loss of that love could break a boy like Xavier.”