*
Twenty-five minutes later, after Mindy sang increasingly loud and frantic renditions of “The First Noel,” “Hark: The Herald Angels Sing,” and “White Christmas”; and after Ethan tried to throw Grandpa Bear and then Red Bear and then Stinky Bear out the window; and after he yelled, “Shut. Up. Idiot,” a near-record twenty-eight straight times (note: thirty is the record); and after Ethan pinched Mindy hard; and after Mindy cried, “Fuck,” with so much pain and emotion that she made me think of Pavarotti; and after Ethan repeatedly asked Mindy, “Why. Mad? Why. Mad? Why. Mad?” while she closed her eyes and tried to ignore him; and after Mindy finally opened her eyes and pounded her seat while screaming, “I’m not fucking mad! I’m not fucking mad! I’m not fucking mad!” we pulled off at the small, hilly town of Homer’s Den and went to a park.
“Why. Mad?” I asked.
Mindy shook her head as she trudged alongside me. “God, that was nuts, just nuts.”
We made our way across a deserted baseball diamond toward the equally deserted playground, taking in the town along the way. The main street, which ran hard against the base of the hills, was made up of brightly colored, one-story businesses: drugstore, diner, bakery, post office. The buildings seemed to have been carved out of the bottom of the hills. I had never been in a place like this, a small town, a village crowded by rock.
“What are you looking at? What’s wrong?” Mindy asked me. Ethan started pulling on her hand.
“The town, the hills, it’s strange. But it’s beautiful,” I said.
Mindy had no time to respond, because Ethan had yanked her ahead. I slowly followed.
“You’re not having a stroke or anything, are you?” Mindy asked.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Your face, it went, like, slack.”
“We’re in an interesting place. I was absorbing it. Sponging it up.”
Mindy scanned the park, then the town. “Not much to sponge.”
“It’s different.”
“You don’t get out much, do you?”
“You know I don’t.”
Mindy considered me through a squint. “Okay, why don’t you sit down. I’ll push him.”
“He can swing by himself now.”
“He can?”
“Yes, he finally learned. Only took fifteen years.”
Mindy looked at Ethan, her pixie smirk replaced by genuine pixie surprise. “Wow. Ethan, you can really swing by yourself?”
He pulled hard on her hand. “Swing!”
“You have to get him started, though,” I said. “But he can do the rest.”
“Okay, let’s go then,” Mindy said.
“All right. I’ll call Karen.”
I sat on a bench and watched Mindy push Ethan. One of the things I always admired about my middle child was how she acted around Ethan in public. Never embarrassed. Even when she was young, she hugged him, laughed with him, teased him. Her naturalness and, of course, her humor, were infectious, disarming, and put other people at ease around Ethan. It was one of her best attributes, maybe what I loved about her the most.
Karen, the cheerleading, sorority girl, was much more self-conscious, checking to see who was looking at us at restaurants, walking ahead or behind us in stores. Her behavior was understandable, particularly during the teen years, when everyone in your family is a source of embarrassment. Mindy never went through that phase, though. I suspected that Ethan fit her worldview: wild, unexpected. At once hilarious and tragic.
“More!” Ethan yelled.
Mindy pushed harder, and Ethan, delight breaking out over his face, kicked his legs up as he soared into the air.
I fished my phone out of my pocket and tried to call Karen, but there was no service. So I sat back and allowed myself to relax. The park was a vibrant field, dark green grass ringed by tall fir trees, the weather somewhere between nice and beautiful. Overhead, the sun inched up to the tip of the hills.
Mindy came over and sat next to me. “You okay?”
“You can stop asking me that.”
“You’re in, like, a trance.”
“It’s called relaxing.”
She leaned over and made point of sniffing me. “I think it’s called Jim Beam.”
“I haven’t had a drink all day. I’ve been driving, remember?”
We sat in silence and watched Ethan swing, his feet pointing up to the sky. A few minutes later, a young boy in an oversize T-shirt and short pants crossed the road and cautiously approached the swings. When he got close, Ethan began shouting “Poo-poo, pee-pee, poo-poo, pee-pee,” so the boy stopped, perplexed.
“How old are you?” the boy shouted to Ethan.
“He’s only three!” Mindy yelled. “He’s really big, isn’t he?”
The boy glanced at Mindy, then studied Ethan one more time before turning back to town.
“I hope you and Karen patch things up,” I said.
“She’s the one who doesn’t talk to me anymore.”
“What caused this latest round? I can’t keep track.”
“I don’t know.”