Watching, always watching, I’m reminded of a conversation I had with Meg about whether to become a stay-at-homer. It was what Brady wanted. Of his buddies from Harvard, he was the only one with a working wife. I admired his brain while we dated; it wasn’t until Eve arrived that I understood it was powerful enough to put me out of a job. I never intended to march in the footsteps of a mother I pitied at best, but Brady’s success and Eve’s neediness beat the ambition right out of me. I was certain I could avoid my mother’s weaknesses. Depression never had a grip on me, and alcohol was like a fun cousin I visited once in a while but never planned a trip around. That its tentacles are often invisible until it’s too late never crossed my mind.
Part of my hem and haw was that people counted on my effort to hit the annual number. Without me, my team wouldn’t get a bonus. My sister in her I-can’t-believe-I’m-younger-than-you voice said, “I find that arrogant, Maddy. Everyone is replaceable. People are, by nature, resourceful and resilient.” She was right. I left Viking, and yet people still found their way to stores across New England to buy over-priced refrigerators and ovens.
I wish the truth of her wisdom would show itself once again, but replacing a sales manager is different from replacing a primary parent. Brady is a bulldozer; he sees only what’s directly in front of him. For the past two months, with my persuasion, that’s been Eve, but now he’s craving a release, something of his own, and his attention has shifted to qualifying for the Boston Marathon. My ability to influence is waning. He’s a man obsessed. He has retreated inward, at the expense of our daughter who was just starting to come around.
As he runs, he vacillates between being angry with me for abandoning the privileged life he provided and being at war with himself for not being more present while I was there. He’s as astounded my priority wasn’t ultimately them as he is horrified to realize his priority was never us. His internal battle is ironic because in death I have finally found clarity on the subject: Brady attempted to engage at home; I’m the one who pushed him away.
When we first married, Brady did little things to help like set the table, stop at the grocery store on his way home, or comically chop onions wearing sunglasses for protection. On several occasions he offered to cook, simple things like burgers or salad, but still, he offered. I always found fault in his approach. In my mind, I could have done it better, faster, cheaper, and so I did. Eventually, he settled for a few simple household duties like putting on music, taking out trash, and lighting winter fires. We joked they were safe chores. Brady-proof, he called them.
I encouraged this self-deprecation. I hadn’t intended to be a stay-at-home-mom, but as soon as I walked down that path my domestic instincts took over. I bartered to only be a homemaker if I could be some kind of holy matriarch, the homemaker of homemakers. My mother had approached her days with the detachment of a minimum-wage employee denied overtime. I was going to prove motherhood was more than that. In my lofty execution of creating an emotionally sound, intellectually stimulating, health-conscious home, I left my husband very little room to prove himself. To an unwholesome degree, it was important to me he be inferior at home. He had enough to hang his hat on at the office. I needed a stage.
What I’m saying is, Brady had no training for the pool he’s been tossed into. He’s selfish because, as Eve got older, he became an outlier in the household. The two of us lovingly, but relentlessly, teased him. We didn’t mean anything by it. He was a chief executive at a Fortune 500 company! He was living the life I’d sacrificed, or at least that’s often how it felt. I didn’t understand that our needling had worked its way into his core and convinced him of his domestic incompetence.
I continue trying to build his self-confidence with Eve through positive interactions, but that strategy is slow going and my surges upward continue. Time is limited. I need Rory to step in before I ascend too high to help.
*
It’s Rory and Eve’s first session since Linda’s funeral, and chapter four looks to be as boring as chapters one through three. About halfway through they break for a soda. Rory notices the whiteboard Brady hastily hung to document phone calls and whereabouts after learning Eve attended a random funeral. Today it reads: Insurance guy called to say our house is no longer covered and no one is returning his calls. Brady read it on his way out this morning with a grunt. I managed that stuff. It was a detail I always threw out at holiday parties because his colleagues found it entertaining that the CFO didn’t manage his own finances. From Brady’s perspective, he dealt with that shit all day and deserved a break. From my perspective … well … no one ever asked my perspective, and once you take on an undesirable marital job it’s yours till death do you part. A small part of me will enjoy watching him get quotes today. He’ll have no idea whether we live in a flood zone, if the foundation is a slab, the year the house was built, or any of the other random tidbits he’ll need. On certain matters I’ll always be missed.
“Did you get to the practice problems?” Rory asks, recapturing my attention.
“Un-huh,” Eve says. Your tattoo, I remind her. She takes a bag of chips from the pantry. “Oh, so I took your advice and did something symbolic to celebrate my mom.”
Rory smiles. “Wonderful. What?”
“I got a tattoo.”
Rory puts her Pepsi down (I love that she doesn’t drink diet) and studies Eve’s expression to gauge whether she’s serious. “Well, for heaven’s sake, Eve, that’s not what I meant.”
“My mom didn’t like ballroom dancing.”
Rory snorts. “But she was into permanent body art?”
“The tattoo is symbolic of her. See?” Eve lifts the corner of her shirt. Rory reads her stomach, reluctantly fascinated.
“Hmm. That’s a beautiful saying.”
“Isn’t it?” Eve’s posture inflates with the compliment.
“Where did you come across it?”
“My mom,” she says without further explanation.
Rory wonders if I wrote it in a suicide note. “That’s going to inflate funny when you’re pregnant,” she points out.
“What is it with old people and obsessing about pregnancy?”
Rory laughs. “Gee, thanks. Can I ask what other ‘old people’ you’re clumping me in with?”
“Just my dad.”
She winces. “Oh, dear. What’d he say about the tattoo?”
“That a tattoo wasn’t what you meant.”
Rory’s eyes expand. “You told your father I told you to do it?”
“No, of course not. You didn’t. I just told him about our conversation, and-and that it … well … inspired me. Anyway, he called to say he’s getting off work early, so he can finally meet you in person this afternoon.”
Of course, after all my effort, it’s Eve’s tattoo that sparks their introduction.
“What?” Rory looks alarmed.
“He’s not mad. I mean, he doesn’t blame you or anything. I think he was a little weirded out I went to your mom’s funeral, and I guess he wants to introduce himself since I talk about you sometimes.”
Rory sighs, reaching back for the calculus book. “I haven’t had to meet a parent who thinks I’m a bad influence in a long time. Could we at least finish this chapter so I can attempt to rebuild my reputation.”