Sins of Innocence (52 page)

It was after dark when Susan returned to the cottage in Vermont. As she pulled down the street, she noticed the glow from a light in the living-room window.
Mark
, she thought. Her pulse quickened, her spirits soared.
Mark, thank God you’ve come home. I’m here for you, Mark. Please God, let it be him
. But as she turned into the driveway, reality flooded into her. It wasn’t Mark. He wasn’t coming home.
You must have left the light on this morning before you left for New York. You stupid fool
.

She turned off the ignition and got out of the car, slamming the door behind her. The comfort she’d gotten from Bubby quickly slipped away, and now she was back—dumpy, dowdy, indecisive Susan.
Get a grip on reality
, she commanded herself as she turned the key in the back door lock. She pushed open the door. Mark was standing there.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” he said.

She stood for a moment, frozen on the doorstep. She noticed his acne looked worse through the tears that were streaming down his cheeks.

“I wanted to know if it was okay for me to come home.”

She threw her arms around him and felt her own tears come. Her body trembled with disbelief, and with relief. She clung to him, one hand across his shoulders, one hand on his neck, stroking his head, crying into his hair.

“Of course,” she whimpered. “Of course.”

A moment passed, then another.

“Mom?” Mark spoke again.

“What?” she asked, still stroking his hair.

“Dad said he would get me away from you.”

“Not a chance.”

“That’s what I told him. I said I’d tell the judge there was no way I wanted to live with my father.”

Susan smiled at a picture of that—at a picture of Lawrence’s humiliation.

“Mom?”

“What, Mark?”

“Would you please let go? You’re breaking my neck.”

Susan laughed and pulled back from him. She wiped her tears, then his.

“Oh, Mark, are you all right?”

He half smiled. “I am now.”

“You’re just in time for dinner,” she said as she dumped her oversized pocketbook on the floor. “I don’t know what we’ll have … I haven’t been the greatest cook lately.”

“Oh, Mom.” He laughed. “Why don’t we order a pizza? I’m starving.”

“Sure, honey, sure. You go call. Then we can talk.”

He went into the living room, shedding his jacket as he walked. Susan turned to the sink and grasped the edge. She looked down at the porcelain, and new tears flowed again.
He is home. He is home
. She heard Bubby’s words:
He is afraid
. She steadied herself again.
Well, my son, there’s nothing to be afraid of any longer. You are home, and everything’s going to be fine
.

He came back into the kitchen, and Susan quickly wiped her tears and tossed her coat on a chair. Mark turned another chair around and sat down, his legs wrapped around the high back of oak spindles.

“Twenty minutes.”

“What?”

“Twenty minutes till the pizza comes.”

Susan turned and leaned against the counter, facing her son.

“I can’t believe you’re here.”

Mark shook his head and looked at the floor. “The Burgess School sucked.”

“That’s not what you wanted anyway, was it?”

“I wanted to be with Dad. I thought I did.”

Susan was silent.

“I never told you this, Mom, but his wife is a witch.”

“Your father loves her.” Susan almost choked out the words. Why did she suddenly feel it was important to defend Lawrence?

Mark looked up at her. “I can’t imagine why. She hates me, you know. She’s the one who made me go to Burgess.”

Susan carefully chewed a fingernail. “But he agreed.”

“Yeah,” Mark said, dropping his head again.

Susan squatted in front of him. “Mark, honey, I know this is hard for you. When parents are divorced, it’s always the kids who get the short end of the stick. But your father does love you. It’s just that he has a different life now. You’ll always be a part of it, though maybe not in the way you’d like.” She could see his tears drop onto the linoleum.

“I’m sorry for everything I said to you, Mom. I’m sorry for running away I’ll never do it again.”

She put her arm around him. “Sometimes the only way we can learn what it is we want is to let it go. And sometimes,” she continued, “once we’ve let it go, it’s too late to go back.” But now Susan wasn’t thinking about Mark as much as she was about David. For the thousandth time in twenty-five years, she wondered why she had ever let him go. Maybe Bubby was right.
It is only time that can free us from our pasts
. But how much time, Bubby? How much time?

“It’s not too late, is it, Mom?”

She held him more tightly. “No, of course not. We’ll get you back in school, and everything will be fine. You’ll see.” She kissed the top of his head. “Your friends will be glad you’re back. I’m sure they’ve missed you.”

He raised his head and pulled back from her. “Are you still going to go?”

For a moment Susan didn’t know what he was talking about.

“To that reunion. Are you going?”

She stood up and went back to the sink. “No, honey, I won’t go.”

“Why not?”

“It wouldn’t be fair to you. That’s in the past. You’re what matters now.”

She picked up a sponge and started wiping the already-clean counter.

“I think you should,” Mark said.

Susan thought she must have heard him wrong. She turned around and looked at him.

“Maybe you should, Mom. I was being pretty selfish. Hey, maybe I have a half-brother who’s cool. It wouldn’t be so bad. If I had a brother.”

“Mark, I don’t believe this.…”

He shrugged. “Hey, I’ve got a right to change my mind.”

“Did someone change it for you?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe? Like who?”

“Like Dad.”

“Your father told you I should go to the reunion? I find that a little hard to believe.”

He shook his head. “He said you were a ‘moral ingrate’ who didn’t give two shits about me.”

Moral ingrate? God, Lawrence, the arrogant asshole, called me a moral ingrate?
She bit back an answer and let Mark continue.

“I didn’t know what an ingrate was.” He smiled. “So I looked it up. I didn’t believe him. And I didn’t believe that you don’t give two shits about me.”

Susan sighed. “So that’s why you think I should go to the reunion?”

“Yeah. I’ve thought about it a lot over the past few weeks. I think if you want to go, you should. I guess there’s really no reason why I should feel threatened. He might have come into the world first, but this is my house.” His words sounded strong, but then he looked embarrassed. “Isn’t it?”

Susan laughed and bent to hug him again. “You bet it is,” she said, as the front doorbell rang. “And seeing as how this is your house, you can go let the pizza man in.”

“Got any money?”

Susan laughed again. “There’s a twenty in my bag.” She watched him prowl through her cluttered pocketbook, grab a twenty-dollar bill, and race to the front door.
We can only hope to guide our futures in the way God wants
, Bubby had said. Mark is my future, Susan thought. He is home. And maybe, just maybe, her other son would be a part of that future. Her other son. David’s son. Only ten more days.

And if he does show up
, she mused,
and only if he does—maybe then, maybe then, I will begin looking for David
.

But if he doesn’t … maybe I will be able to do as Jess said. I will be able to put the past to rest, and, at last, get on with my life
.

She leaned against the kitchen counter and closed her eyes. Until then, Susan thought, there is hope. Only ten more days.

P.J
.

Her mother had finally mastered the Krup’s coffeemaker. P.J. and Bob sat in the sunny breakfast room of her condominium, looking out over Central Park. On weekends Bob stayed over, sleeping on the sofa, far from the watchful eye of the guest-room occupant, Flora Davies. He came by every evening after work, bringing countless files for P.J. to pore over, trying to keep up her spirits by making her feel needed; and he came by every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning—chemo mornings. He claimed he enjoyed taking her for the treatments; he said it made him feel a part of helping her get well.
They hadn’t made love since her surgery, nor had P.J. even let him see her … scar. Not yet. Maybe never.

“It’s going to be a gorgeous day,” he said as he sipped strong coffee from a pottery mug.

“Indian summer,” P.J. commented, but was distracted. She was always distracted on chemo mornings.

The aroma of banana-nut bread wafted into the room.

“Flora!” Bob called to P.J.’s mother. “What on earth are you baking now? It smells great!”

“Hold your horses!” her mother’s voice called back from the kitchen. “It’s almost done.”

Bob laughed and turned to P.J. “She’s going to make both of us fat.”

“Me? Not hardly. Cancer has its own built-in diet, didn’t you know that?”

Bob reached across the table and took her hand. “Peej, I’m sorry, I was just trying to lighten the mood.”

She tried to smile. “No problem. I like being able to pig out once in a while. But to be honest, the taste of my mother’s cooking isn’t too good when I’ve barfed it after chemo.”

Bob pulled his hand away and made a playful disgusting face. “Touché,” he said.

P.J. laughed. “See? You have helped to lighten my mood.”

“Great,” he said with sarcasm. “I’m so happy. I’m sure you will be, too, when I tell your mother what you’ve said about her cooking.”

P.J. groaned.

“You two are getting along fairly well, aren’t you?”

She looked back out the window from her perch on the twenty-third floor, down onto the treetops, onto the winding paths and little people, walking, rushing, past.

“I’m surviving. She’s surviving.”

“I had kind of hoped this might give you a chance to patch up your differences.”

P.J. shrugged. “Then we’re as patched as best can be, I guess.”

“Have you told her yet?”

“Told her what?” P.J. asked, still staring out the window, away from Bob’s eyes, knowing perfectly well what he meant.

“About the reunion.”

“No.”

“Does that mean you’ve decided not to go?”

“It doesn’t mean anything. It only means I haven’t told her.”

“Are you planning to?”

“What? Am I planning to tell her, or am I planning to go?”

“Either. Both.”

She touched a fingertip to the glass and examined her perfect manicure. How easy it is, she thought, to keep your nails beautiful when you’ve nothing to do but lounge around and wait to be sick in between treatments that were supposed to be making you well.

“Please, Bob. Don’t pressure me,” she said.

“Jesus Christ, Peej,” he said, raising his voice. “It’s a week from tomorrow! When the hell are you going to decide?”

“What’s a week from tomorrow?”

Their heads both turned toward the doorway. Flora Davies stood, platter of fresh banana bread in hand. “What’s a week from tomorrow?” she repeated.

Bob looked at P.J. and took another sip from his mug. He was, clearly, waiting for her to speak.

“Nothing, Mother,” she replied. “Nothing that concerns you.”

“As long as I’m here, it concerns me,” her mother said. She set the platter on the table and smoothed her hands on her apron. “If you think you’re going to be well enough to go somewhere, I’ll need to know so I can get your things ready.”

“Mother, please …”

Flora sat in a chair between P.J. and Bob. “I think it’s a wonderful idea for you to get out. Is it going to be somewhere special?”

P.J. stared at Bob. She couldn’t believe he had caused
this. She couldn’t believe he’d had such a big mouth. Him. Bob. The guy who didn’t even want her to go in the first place. Maybe, she thought, it’s his way of convincing me not to go. He thinks if my mother finds out, there will be a big scene, and between the two of them, they can talk me out of it.