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With a hand on my elbow, he leads me around the corner. “What’s wrong?”
His quiet concern threatens to break me, and I cover my face with my hands. I’m about to insist that it’s nothing, but it’s not nothing, and I need to tell one other person. One person who won’t insist that it’s my fault, the way Jeremy and my mom will.
“The school wants me to get Henry evaluated. They said it was for reading, but I’m worried there will be other things too and—” Saying it aloud makes it so much more daunting. I’ve known there was something different about Henry’s development, about the way he interacts with people. I’ve known it for years. But Jeremy told me it was that I coddled him too much, and the pediatrician blew me off and oh, God,whydid I listen to them? Was it because I wanted them to be right? Because I didn’t want to know?What kind of mother just lets it go?“I’ve been worried for a while, and I should have pushed harder to figure it all out.” My voice breaks at the end and I have to stop.
“Lucie,” he whispers, desperation in his voice, his hands on my biceps. “He’s a great kid and it’s going to be okay. No matter what you find out, he’s the same little guy who left the house this morning. All that will change is that you’ll have a name for it and can make plans.”
God, I hope he’s right. And God, I wish I’d marriedsomeone who would tell me things were going to be okay, even when they’re not.
“I have to pull myself together,” I whisper, forcing myself to step back though I really don’t want to, wiping my face with my hands. “If the kids see I’m upset, they’ll know something’s wrong.”
“Go home and get it out of your system. I’ll order a pizza and keep them here as long as you need.” He turns me toward the house, and I’m too broken to resist.
I stumble home and start calling the specialists on Mrs. Doherty’s list. Most of them have a long wait, and while a part of me thinksyes, yes, let’s wait as long as possible, it’s not in Henry’s best interest. Every week that slips by without us figuring out what’s going on with him is a week he’s not learning as well as he could be. I take the first opening I find, months and months from now, and there’s nothing left to do… but tell Jeremy.
The head of school says she wants us to get Henry evaluated for learning disabilities. I can’t find anyone to do it until late August.
JEREMY
Gee, you decide you want to break up the family and work full time and Henry starts having problems. Who could have predicted that?
I’m almost too numb right now for it to bother me. Almost. But if I hadn’t left, would Henry be keeping up better than he is? Could this all have flown under the radar?
I rise from the couch to change clothes and splash cold water on my face. Though I’m still spent and want to sleep for a hundred hours, I can hold it together a bit longer. What Caleb said was right: nothing has changed. Who Henry is remains the same. I already suspected he would struggle, that he wouldn’tmake friends as effortlessly as Sophie and wouldn’t have the same life she would. No matter what the tests find, he’ll always have me and he’ll always have his sister, and he’s the same kid who left our home this morning.
I cross the yard and tap lightly on the door before entering Caleb’s house for the first time—though it barely qualifies as a home at present. Half the drywall is down, and the other half is water-stained beyond recognition. Why on earth did he take this on? He already works the equivalent of two full-time jobs, and this equals a third.
Then I notice the twins. “Do you have my six-year-oldsstacking drywall?”
“I’m paying them,” he argues. “They love it. Although your daughter talked me into an hourly rate which is, frankly, exorbitant.”
The doorbell rings. “That’s the pizza,” he says. “Do you mind grabbing drinks from the basement?”
I nod and head downstairs, expecting another demolished room. Instead, it’s so crammed he couldn’t fix it up if he wanted to. Boxes and furniture are stacked high on every wall. And a whole section is labeledKate. Kate-books, Kate-closet, Kate-bathroom. This girl left her whole life behind, and Caleb’s spent the better part of a year simply hoping she’d reclaim it.
I move toward the fridge but then stop and look at her belongings again. At the crisp white frame leaning against the wall behind the boxes.
It’s a crib. Anewcrib. I step closer and spy a rocking chair beside it and a folded-up changing table just to the left.
He and Kate bought these things. And they’re nothing you’d buy unless you were really certain you’d need them.
Kate’s drug addiction, the personal stuff Kayleigh alluded to...did it all begin here, with a crib and chair and changing table Caleb now has no intention of using? I grab drinks andclimb the stairs slowly, wondering how I can ask. Wondering if he’ll tell me the truth.
Upstairs, Caleb’s grabbing paper plates and napkins. “I’ve only got two chairs,” he says. “So should we sit outside?”
It’s probably for the best: if we were all around his table, it would feel a lot like playing family.
Which is something it seems he might have wanted, once upon a time.
“Sure.” My voice is slightly too cheerful, but he doesn’t notice.
We get down to the beach and the twins take their paper plates to the shore while Caleb and I sit in the Adirondack chairs. When he’s been down here with us before, watching the kids’ antics…did it hurt? Have I been rubbing something in his face I didn’t even think hewanted?
Sophie comes up to him and starts speaking gibberish. “Oooh, blah, blah, la, la, oh lay.”
He raises a brow, waiting for her to explain, his mouth softening.
“That was French,” she announces.
