—You don’t worry.
She left Dante on the couch with me and went to the pile of papers on the table by the front door, junk mail and bills and notices I’d planned to look at after Leidy left, thinking I’d need them as clues. The fact that I’d thought about it in those terms made me feel ridiculous, though it had seemed like the right word considering how much I didn’t know.
—Do you think we can go find Mom? I said. Down the street?
Leidy returned with a manila envelope the size of half a sheet of paper.
—This came here for you, she said, handing it to me.
Mostly what came to the apartment for me was credit card offers, but this letter was from California, from UC Santa Barbara. Postmarked three days before spring break had started, the envelope was sliced open at the top, very clearly opened. In it were all the forms I needed to complete for the internship—waivers, IRS papers, travel preference sheets, checklists I was supposed to consult and retain for my records. There was also a typed note from someone writing on behalf of Professor Kaufmann stating that they hoped getting the forms to me at my home address over break would help expedite their return. A postage-paid envelope, it said, was enclosed for my convenience.
—Are you switching schools or what? Leidy said.
It was like I was Roly and I’d cheated on her and she’d caught me: that’s what her face made me feel. But now I understood why Professor Kaufmann had seemed baffled by me in lab since spring break—because I never returned these forms. I’d never even seen them, but in lying and telling her I’d been home for break, she thought I had.
—No, this was a job thing, I said. It’s nothing.
—But then why’s it from another college? You want to go even farther away?
—It was just for the summer, like a summer internship thing.
—So wait, you’re not gonna be here this summer? You’re not coming back?
I heard the panic, could sense beneath it all the times over the last few weeks she’d wanted to ask me this but hadn’t, thinking I was keeping something from her.
—It’s not happening anymore. Don’t worry, I said. I promise.
She stood stunned for a second, then let herself deflate, flopping on the couch next to me and Dante.
—Oh god, I thought I was gonna die, she said.
She pulled Dante onto her lap and squeezed him. He tried to worm away, more interested in the remote control.
—You swear though? she said. You swear you’re coming home?
I shoved the papers back in the envelope, some catching and creasing as they went in. I said it again, though I didn’t mean it for the reasons Leidy assumed: I swear. I promise.
She kissed Dante, a big wet smack on his cheek.
—Who wants to go to summer school anyways, she said to him.
She stuck her finger down the back of his pants and pulled them away from his body, peered down into his diaper. The elastic band thwacked back into place, and she said, Okay, let’s do what you want. Let’s go find Mom.
*
Dante’s stroller crunched ahead, his butt sinking into the cloth, the seatbelt harness too tight against his chest. He sat in a daze, eyes half closed in the sunlight. My eyes were partway shut, too—Leidy was smart enough to wear sunglasses—and through hazy slits, in the ring of black-clad bodies linked hand in hand in the street, I first saw my mom. Then, two women down in the circle, I spotted her again. The shape from behind of a third woman could’ve been her, too.
—I should warn you, Leidy said, she’s gonna be weird.
—No shit, I said.