I Almost Forgot About You (11 page)

She wraps a colorful beach towel around her and rolls and tucks it across her chest. That's when she sees me through the kitchen window. She waves and walks in through the patio door.

“Hey, Mom,” she says, and bends over to kiss me on my right cheek. She's inches taller. “I'm going to miss that pool. Won't you?”

“I'm going to miss a lot of things. How're you feeling today?”

“Refreshed. Clearheaded.”

She sits on a stool at the end of the island and puts both elbows on the counter. “So I spoke to Dad.”

“How'd you manage that?”

“He's out.”

“I thought he was supposed to be in there for five years?”

“It's
been
five years,” she says.

Really? “So where is he?”

“He lives fifteen minutes from here, right around the corner from Aunt Wanda and Uncle Nelson.”

“You've got to be kidding me.”

“Off Skyline.”

“So should I be jumping for joy or what?”

“He's offered to let me live with him and his wife.”

“What wife?”

“Where've you been for the last eight years, Mom? He got married way after you guys got divorced.”

“What do you call ‘way after'?”

“A year.”

“Anyhow, I haven't exactly kept him on my radar all these years, but I don't like the idea of your even considering living with your ex-convict father and his wife.”

“It was a white-collar crime, Mom.”

“Oh, my bad,” I say with intentional hip-hop sarcasm.

“Just because you don't like him, that doesn't mean I shouldn't.”

“I've never suggested that you not like him, Frankie. He's your father. I just thought you hadn't been in touch with him that much.”

“Stelle and I figured out a long time ago that it was best not to mention our dads, because when we did, your mood always took a nosedive.”

“Well, thank you both for sparing me, but you didn't have to lie.”

“I didn't lie. I just withheld the truth. Anyway, he's picking me up sometime this afternoon so I can meet Allegra and see their home. They have a tiny guesthouse, too, which is where he said I could stay for a while.”

“Exactly how long has he been out?”

“Almost a year now.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? And why didn't you ask if I minded if he came over here?”

“What's the big deal? He used to live here, and it used to be his house, too. It's not like he's going to start stalking you, Mom.”

Right now I'm glad I only have two ex-husbands, because they both seem to have been reincarnated and are coming back to haunt me.

“I don't want to see him. At least not today.”

“Oh, so you want him to honk? I thought you were an adult. But my bad!” And she storms past me and runs up the stairs.

I follow her.

She slams the door.

I use the L-shaped key to unlock it and barge in. She has the nerve to put her hands on her hips before she flops down on the foot of her platform bed.

“Let's be clear about something, Frankie. You need to understand that in two days you've sprung quite a lot on me, and now you're telling me your dad's out of prison and you might go live with him and his wife? And what—I'm supposed to feel warm and fuzzy? It's not always about you, Frankie.”

“I know that, Mom. I'm sorry for inconveniencing you and getting you so worked up.”

“It's what kids do even when they're twenty-two, I suppose. Anyway, as an FYI, your Aunt Wanda and Uncle Nelson said you're welcome to stay in their guesthouse if you want to.”

“Thanks, but no thanks. I'm not crazy about Aunt Wanda. Wait. That's not true. I just find her and Uncle Nelson boring as can be, and she's also nosy. Now, if it were Aunt Violet, I'd sleep in her garage.”

“Carport. What makes you think you can live under the wing of your estranged father after not having seen him in six years?”

“What makes you think I haven't seen him?”

“So this is one more thing you've kept from me.”

“You divorced him, Mom. I didn't.”

“You mean you visited him in prison?”

“Yes.”

“When? How? And why didn't you tell me? I wouldn't have tried to stop you from seeing him, Frankie. Come on.”

“What difference does it make now, Mom? He didn't kill anybody. And he didn't rob a bank. As far as I'm concerned, he went to prison for his stupidity and arrogance, which doesn't make him like a dangerous criminal. He's paid for his mistakes. I wish you would let it go and stop indicting him.”

“It's a preexisting condition.”

“Mom.”

“What?”

“Do you have a life? I mean, are you seeing anyone?”

“No.”

“I didn't think so. I wish you'd find someone. You seem so testy, or maybe you're just lonely. And I can understand why you don't want to live in this big house by yourself, I really do.”

“I'm not selling this house because I'm lonely.”

She just looks at me. “I really hope it's not too late for you to find love, Mom.”

“What would make you think that?”

“Well, because you're old. No offense intended.”

“And what do you call ‘old'?”

“Over fifty.” She looks at me again as if she might have gone too far.

“Well, let me say this, Miss Forever Twenty-Two. Love doesn't have an age limit, and it can find you at any time in your life. It can also just as soon leave you in a ditch. Look what it's already done to you.”

“But how do you meet old men, Mom? You don't go on those dating sites, I hope.”

“I really don't feel like having this conversation with you right now, Frankie. But let me also say this. You can be a woman and be happy without a man and without love. Of course your life has more octane when you have someone to share it with. But I am not lonely. Well, that's a lie. I
am
lonely, but I'm not miserable. This is just one more reason I'm getting the hell out of this house and why I'm leaving my dull-ass career and taking a train ride and might even go back to school.”

This time her eyes are bulging, but it's accompanied by a smile, and then she holds up her right hand so her palm comes near me, and I slap mine against hers.

“This gives me hope, Mom.”

“What does?”

“That changing the direction of my life isn't crazy if you're still willing to do it at your age.”

“I'm not even almost old, Frankie. Now, what time is the ex-meteorologist coming to pick you up, so I can make sure I'm not here?”

“C'mon, Mom.”

I put my hands on my hips, look out the window, then back at her.

“Look. I'm deliriously happy for him, Frankie, and I won't run and hide. Maybe we could even catch up. Find out what happened during those lost years. Find out how much fun prison was. What time should we expect Father of the Year?”

“In about an hour,” she says. “I didn't know you still had so much anger toward him, Mom. That's sad.”

“I'm not angry.”

“Maybe he can just say hello at the front door.”

“Lord, no! Now I want to see him. And not to worry. I'll be the nicest ex-wife he's ever seen,” I say, and head back downstairs.

It started in my chair. Niles came in for a complete examination because his vision had suddenly become blurry. I've always been professional with patients, even good-looking men who aren't wearing wedding bands. I had to admit he was handsome in an offbeat kind of way. I assumed he was probably mixed-race, because his nose was broad, his lips full, and his eyes were light brown even though his skin was dark. The color and texture of his hair were contradictory. I wasn't studying him; I was just noticing who was standing in front of me.

“Hello, Mr. Boro,” I said, motioning him to “Have a seat.”

“I would prefer to stand, if you don't mind,” he said, and then chuckled.

“Please be seated, Mr. Boro,” I said in my best good-natured-but-professional voice.

He sat. “Please, call me Niles.”

I just looked at him as if to ask,
Who do you think you are, coming into my office and getting personal? This isn't a blind date.
He smiled and crossed his legs. He was dressed like he'd just stepped off a page from
GQ.
Even his cuff links had his initials on them: NB. His shoes looked satiny, as if he never walked anywhere they might get dusty. And he smelled like chocolate. He was already a problem.

“So, Mr. Boro, you're complaining about eyestrain and blurriness.”

“That's an understatement. But it's my fault, because I haven't had my eyes checked in two years.”

“Why not?”

“Pure laziness. And I don't trust doctors.”

I just looked down at him.

“Only kidding.”

“So you're a meteorologist?”

“I am. But you haven't seen me on the six-o'clock news.”

He didn't stop talking as I performed each of the various tests, and right before I was about to dilate his pupils, he felt compelled to tell me his life story. He was from Boston. His father was Nigerian, his mother Norwegian. He got his master's from the University of Massachusetts, was divorced after three years of marriage, had a five-year-old son who lived with his mother in the Berkeley Hills. For some reason he felt it important that I knew they parted ways amicably, but I would later find out this was a lie. His son's name was Homer. Like Homer Simpson.

I gave him a prescription, told him to pick out a pair of frames and that a tech would fit him.

“Can you help me choose a frame?”

“That's not what I do,” I said.

And then he looked right through me. “Have you ever dated a patient?”

This threw me for a loop. “No. Never.”

“Could I be the first?”

“I said never.”

“I'll make a liar out of you, Dr. Young,” he said with too much confidence. This is when I should've known. He'd already put some kind of spell on me, because right after he walked out with his prescription, I heard a sound coming from my chest. It was me: purring.

He sent me a dozen peonies the next day.

The note with them said, “I was blind, but thanks to you, now I see.”

I don't know how this whole love thing happens, but I wish that—in addition to white light—a red one would come on to warn you that the white light is only temporary. That it's meant to blind you, but of course it's too late because you're already sinking and not thinking, which is when you find yourself wanting to scream, “Oh, Lord, not again!” Just when you think you're dead, some stranger comes out of nowhere and resuscitates you. When you find yourself giggling, not laughing but giggling. You're lighter, even though you weigh the same. Yes. You have fallen off that cliff into the sea of lust, the first cousin of love, and the two strongest drugs on earth.

In a matter of weeks, I found myself singing in elevators.

I couldn't walk. I had to skip.

I was Snow Black.

Estelle, who was twelve, said, “Mom, whatever it is you're drinking, keep drinking it!”

We both laughed.

“What's his name, and when can I meet him?” Wanda asked.

“Niles. And I don't know.”

“Ask him if he has a brother,” Violet said.

At first he did everything right.

He called me baby.

“Good morning, baby.”

“How you doing today, baby?”

“Good night, baby.”

“I love you, baby.”

“Will you always be my baby?”

“Aww, baby.”

“Oooh, baby.”

“Give it all to me, baby.”

“You make me feel so good, baby.”

“I miss you, baby.”

“Do you miss me, baby?”

“I've been thinking about you all day, baby.”

“I need a hug, baby.”

“I need me some you, baby.”

“Come to Daddy, baby.”

“I'm sorry, baby.”

“I don't like him,” Ma said right after she met him. And then, after a few more meals, “If you marry this one, you'll be making a big mistake.”

“How can you say that, Ma? He's been nice to you. And good to me and Estelle.”

“He's phony as hell. He's too perfect. Wait until you find out he expects the same from you.”

“Why didn't you warn me about Michael?”

“This is different. Something is missing in Niles. Something I don't think you see.”

Always listen to the parent who doesn't like who you love. They can smell a mistake. Of course, you don't find this out until you realize that the person you fell in love with is different from the person you married. Some men are good at fooling you.

After Michael I had no intention of getting married again. I told Niles that if he cheated on me, I would definitely kill him. He thought that was funny. I also told him I didn't want to have another baby. He said that was fine, because he already had a son. But he changed his mind. When your husband says he wants you to have his child, you're supposed to be flattered. We had, of course, just finished making love, if that's what you'd call it. At first Niles was an active participant for a solid half hour, but then he started dropping down to twenty minutes and then fifteen, and even then I found myself doing most of the work. I pretended not to hear him.

“Say something, Georgia.”

“I heard you.”

“I love Estelle, believe me, I do. But I really want us to have a child of our own.”

“I thought we agreed we were both happy the way things were.”

“I don't remember saying that. So don't go putting words in my mouth.”

“What made you change your mind?”

“You. Me. I want it to be us.”

He was as full of shit as a Christmas turkey.

“Estelle is part of us.”

“Figuratively, yes. But she doesn't have my blood in her veins.”

I wanted to bitch-slap him for saying that, but instead I took the high road.

“It would've made more sense five years ago, Niles.”

“I didn't know you five years ago.”

“I know.”

“A lot of women are having children in their forties. I'm begging you, Georgia.”

Shit. Damn. Fuck. Niles was adamant, and because I was 90 percent certain we were going to spend the rest of our lives together, I surrendered.

But I also learned. Don't assume anything.

He decided to name our daughter Francine, after his dead grandmother, and he decided how we should parent her, and before she could walk is when I realized that Niles had morphed into a man I didn't know and didn't like.

He was a control freak.

He was a clean freak. (Later I would drop something on the floor just to see if he would pick it up. Of course he did.)

The garage had to be carpeted.

Everything had to have order and symmetry.

He had no friends.

He was a workaholic.

He didn't like my two best friends, Wanda and Violet. They pretended to like him.

He rarely had anything nice to say about most people.

Everybody had a hidden agenda. Including his family.

He hated the IRS and did everything he could to pay as little in taxes as he could get away with. He hoarded his money, liked to pay cash for as many things as possible. He even insisted we file our taxes separately, and we did, which would ultimately be what saved me.

After eight years of marriage to Mr. My Way or No Way, I realized I didn't like Niles because he was unlikable. He lost his luster and that Mr. Nice Guy façade disappeared, which is when I started seeing neon signs that read
MAYBE I SHOULDN'T HAVE
. I hated knowing that this marriage wasn't going to last unless I did everything he wanted the way he wanted. But I couldn't. His love started to hurt. Because he had become my enemy.

“Wake up, Georgia.”

“Did you get my suit out of the cleaners?”

“I can't.”

“This house is never clean.”

“Are you deaf?”

“I'm tired.”

“I'm not interested in going.”

“Your friends bore me.”

“Turn over, would you?”

“Have you thought about how unattractive those extra pounds are?”

“Why don't you get a weave?”

“I think you should trade in your Lexus and get an SUV.”

“I'm not interested in politics.”

“You're not making any sense.”

“Your focus is much narrower than you think.”

“I don't like your mother, and I can't apologize for it.”

“I don't like that dress.”

I threw a whole roll of Bounty at him once. No: twice.

“I didn't know you were this rude, Niles.”

“I didn't know you were not a nice person.”

“I didn't know you were so selfish.”

“I also didn't know you were going to be so boring.”

“I work for a living, too, and I'm educated, too, you know,” I finally said.

“You don't have to remind me. It's hard for me to look into your eyes anymore. There's nothing in them.”

“Well, I'm tired of being married to someone who only talks about the fucking weather. From here on out, whenever the clouds turn gray I will probably always think of you.”

That was cruel. But it took me a long time to be as cruel to him as he had been to me.

One night he was drying dishes to make sure there were no hard-water stains.

“We need to talk,” I said.

“That's pretty much all you do, isn't it, Georgia?”

“You missed a spot,” I said, knowing he hadn't. The glass he was holding up to the light was immaculate.

“So we're done, then?”

“I believe we are.”

He moved out the next day. It felt like he'd been packed a long time. Of course he insisted I buy him out, which I did. The one good thing that our marriage produced was Frankie.

I get out of the shower and hear a series of knocks on my bedroom door. “Mom, open up!”

I grab a towel and wrap it around me, which unfortunately leaves no room for error, so I hold it together with my thumb and index finger and run to the door and open it. “Either he's early or not coming—which one is it?”

“He's not coming.”

“And why not?”

“His wife doesn't want me to stay in the guesthouse.”

“I know he's not listening to his wife, a woman, after all these years.”

Frankie rocks her weight to one flip-flopped foot and crosses her arms. “Apparently he's a kept man and has no power.”

“You don't know that, Frankie.”

“Well, she didn't bother discussing with him that she'd already promised her grandson he could stay in it.”

“Then why are you upset with him?”

“Because he said she doesn't have a grandson.”

“So when are you going to see him?”

“I don't know. I hung up on him.”

“You need to slow your roll, Frankie. It wasn't his fault, and he was trying to help you.”

“Well, he didn't. He's disappointed me too many times, and now I have a general idea why you divorced him.”