As soon as the door closed behind him I started kissing him. He knew that I wasn’t in my right mind, and he was a decent guy. He kept saying, “Are you sure you want to do this?” I think he knew that it was all about Chris and not about sex—or about him. So maybe he was feeling a little used, the way we think only women do.
We lay down on the bed. He lifted my blouse and pulled aside my bra and began to suck on my nipple.
“Excuse me a minute,” I said. I went to the bathroom and got violently sick.
Frank wasn’t insulted or even upset. We were both grieving for Chris. He waited till I got into bed, and he tucked me in. He gave me his cell number and told me to call if I needed him. Or if I wanted to. We both knew I would never call.
I woke up with a blinding headache and a major case of self-loathing that hurt worse than the headache. Unconsciously, I realized, I had taken off my wedding ring and put it in my purse before Chris’s funeral. And my guilt got even more intense when I realized that I’d been so drunk the previous night—and so busy doing the totally wrong thing—that I’d forgotten to call Davis’s mom and make sure Miles was all right.
I made coffee in the pathetic in-room coffee machine with the chlorine-tasting water from the tap. I drank both cups of coffee, then made the decaf and drank that too. And then I threw up again.
I phoned Davis’s mom. No one answered. I knew something must be terribly wrong.
I called a cab and somehow managed to find the bar where my rental car was still in the parking lot. I drove to the Madison airport. I tried Davis’s mother again, and again no one picked up. I tried her landline. Nothing. It was all I could do to stave off my growing panic.
I have never been so sure that my plane was going to crash. I was positive that I would never see Miles again, and that this would be my punishment for what I had done the night before—my punishment for what I had done all those nights and days with Chris. I no longer knew what I believed in. But that day, as the plane took off, I prayed.
Please let me live to see my son, and I will never do anything like that again. Please let him be all right. I would exist only for Miles. I would swear off men. I would never again have risky, inappropriate sex with the wrong people. The only happiness that would matter to me was Miles’s happiness. I would give up everything else. Just let me make it home.
I picked Miles up at his grandma’s house in New Hampshire. I asked why she hadn’t answered the phone, and she told me that, in her grief and distraction, she’d let her cell phone run out of power and had forgotten to recharge it. And her landline went out every time it rained heavily, which it had last night. She apologized for how worried I must have been. I wondered why she hadn’t thought to call me. I’d always suspected that she never really liked me. And now that her son was dead she probably liked me even less.
Miles shrieked with joy when he saw me, and I hugged him so hard that he yelped. I was so relieved that my knees went weak, and I had to grab onto the arm of the sofa to keep from toppling over, or fainting. All the way back to our house in Connecticut, Miles stayed awake in his car seat, using the few words he knew to tell me (I think) that his grandma had taken him to see a pony.
I was so glad to be alive that it wasn’t until we walked in the door of our house that I remembered: Chris and Davis were dead.
I kept my promise. No more men. No more bad choices. It was all about Miles.
Until Emily disappeared and I got to know Sean.
Maybe loss unhinges me. Maybe grief sets loose some demon that would otherwise stay hidden deep inside me.
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Stephanie's Blog
An Update on . . . Various and Sundry Things
Hi, moms!
I’m sure you moms must think I’m the world’s worst blogger, not having posted for so long. But I’m back, with lots to tell you. So much has happened since you heard from me last.
I always believe that it’s better to be honest and open, even if there are some moms in our community who might have a problem with what I’m about to say. I’m asking them to soften their hearts and broaden their minds and hear me out—to try to understand before they judge me.
Sean and I have moved in together. Who is to say there is anything wrong when kindness and cooperation turns into love? And as we know, the heart wants what the heart wants.
Nothing will bring Emily back. Sean and Nicky and I will never get over our loss. But we help each other become other, better people. Sean and I and the boys can be a family. The children can be brothers. Neither of us wants to give up our house and the memories it holds, so we have decided to divide our time between our two homes. The boys’ school is closer to my house, so I do most of the dropping off and picking up.
The boys have their own rooms in both houses. They can bring what they want back and forth, and they have doubles of toothbrushes and socks and stuff. I know it seems wasteful, having two houses when so many people in the world don’t have one. But anything else would mean making a decision we can’t make right now. Though at some point, I will. We will.
Sometimes Sean and I spend nights apart. Sometimes alone, sometimes with both kids or just our own kid. I wasn’t sure I would like this way of living, but I do. I like being with Sean—and I like being alone with Miles.
It’s an unusual arrangement, but for now it feels right. We are doing our best to give two little boys the best childhoods they can have, under circumstances that no one would ever have chosen. Neither boy has to give up his own house or his alone time with his own parent.
Nicky’s therapist has been very helpful. Still, Nicky is sad, which he has every right to be.
If any of you moms out there want to share your story or have advice about how to talk to a child about death, please post a comment below.
After I drop the boys off at school, I drive Sean to the train. He’s gone back to the office part-time, which is great for everyone, especially Sean, though Nicky cried at first when he got home and his dad wasn’t there. The company has promised Sean that they’ll cut way back on the travel, and he’s promised me that I won’t often be left alone with Miles and Nicky.
After Sean leaves, I have to check the house for whatever act of mini-sabotage Nicky might have done. The toy fire truck thrown down the toilet. The TV remote at the bottom of the toy chest.
The dark looks that Nicky gives me now and then would turn anyone’s blood to ice. And he’s developed a series of finicky OCD-like habits. He’ll eat only with certain forks, or else there will be an hour of tears. Or he’ll only eat radishes. Or homemade french fries. He tells us what he wants, and he’ll starve before he eats anything else. He counts the steps up to his room and the steps from the front door to Sean’s car. His therapist has suggested that we put off medicating Nicky—Sean asked specifically—until he’s had a chance to work through the stages of grief.
I’m glad Nicky is seeing a therapist, but we don’t need a professional to remind us that the poor child’s mother is dead. I’ve been spending my precious spare time searching the web for useful sites offering help with the job of being a stepmom to a newly bereaved five-year-old.
I keep thinking that Emily would have known what to do. But I can’t even talk it over with Sean for fear of making him feel worse. He doesn’t need to know how many hostile things his son does. I’ve been trying to spare him. Is that wrong?
Which is why I’m asking you moms: Have any of you been in this situation? What did you learn that helped? Can you recommend a book about this? I’ll be grateful for advice in any form.
Thank you in advance, dear moms.
Love,
Stephanie
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Stephanie