Mom's the Word (11 page)

By the time Dyanne had read it aloud the third time, the tears were flowing again. Ryan kept editing, but snatched a tissue from the box on her desk and handed it to her.

“Thank you. Thank you so much. You wrote that, Ryan?”

“No. My mom did. It's based on Psalm 46. She's done tons of those. That one's for emergencies. I figured you might need it so I brought it along.”

This kid was going to make somebody a killer husband. “You knew?”

He nodded. “I always know. Nobody listens to me, though. I get that. It's part of being a kid. It'd save a lot of time if they listened. I tried to warn Dad about this Mom thing for months. It's because of Faith the Second—my grandmother—you met her. Mom is always like this after she leaves. Miss Hope was usually over to our house double the usual time for the week after.” He passed a stack of pages to Dyanne. “Here. These are done. I'm going downstairs for a snack before we start on the book covers. Hungry?”

Dyanne found her voice. “Starving.”

Folded into myself, looking for

What You alone possess, I

Can only find the corpses of my

Long, lost dreams. Their

Beauty faded, allure lost,

They wait in the abandoned corners

Of my soul, waiting for another

Chance to ensnare me.

You are waiting, too, pierced

And poised, arms wide-open.

No case to make, no questions

To match my answers.

Only true or false instead

Of good, better, best. Only

Here and there and everywhere.

Nowhere to hide from Your love.

 

—Karol, day 5

H
aving time alone wasn't as easy as it seemed. The last time Karol and Rob had gotten a sitter, they'd gone to buy a microwave before dinner. They'd promised not to talk about the kids, but somehow Ryan came up during their hurried meal. She'd fallen asleep during the movie after seeing the ending from afar off. These afternoon times seemed much the same, so much bigger than Karol knew how to fill. She'd started with the gym, surprised to discover that their membership had not expired. Her courage, however, was in serious decline.

“Good afternoon,” the receptionist said, looking at Karol over a fringe of spidery lashes that looked meticulously applied. Her body had the same wispy falseness, but the men in the room didn't seem to mind.

What am I doing here?

Karol had asked herself the same question on the first day, when she had become painfully aware that her penchant for spandex and step classes had gone the way of the dinosaur. There was spinning, Latin dance, Pilates and all sorts of other stretchy limber things that Karol could never quite manage.

She wasn't giving up, though. Three times a week, she came here for an hour. Afterward, Karol had walked at the lake, gone to the library, taken a short-lived painting class, knit a baby blanket and gone to the pool, all by herself, and dived into the deep end. She'd had lunch with some of her old colleagues from Florida State, many of them now mothers themselves. She'd attended afternoon prayer at the church and visited new moms from the congregation who'd just given birth. Karol prayed more, praised more and pulled herself from place to place frantically trying to outrun the words swelling inside her, screaming to be written down. Trying to outrun her destiny.

“Hey! There you are. I wondered if you'd make it,” a woman from the Latin dance class said, waving at Karol.

Karol smiled and caught up with the lady, who she recognized from church. Had she been in that class the last time, when Karol made a fool of herself trying to swivel her hips like the exercise instructor?

“I'm so glad you came back. It's a blast. You looked like you were having a ball the other day, but you left before I could say hello.”

Yep. She'd seen it all.

Salsa music boomed from the stereo system as they entered the workout room. In the last class, Karol had been in the front row and come in early. She'd never looked back to see who was in the room. Now as she took in all the smiling faces and waving hands, she wanted to run back to her car. Almost the whole women's ministry was here! And not the mom-kind, either. The pretty, poised church ladies who had sitters for everything, even their weekly hair appointments.

“Got out from under those kids, I see,” a slim blonde said, clapping Karol on the back. “It's about time. You'll love it here. And we'd love to get to know you better. You and Hope were always so close. There was no getting between the two of you! Oh, class is starting.”

As the music rose and their bodies dipped, Karol stared at the mirror. The woman in the back row, tall and brown, had her own face, but Karol wondered if she really knew that woman at all.

 

After dance class, Karol joined the ladies for lunch, but she left long before they set out for the mall and the grocery store. She missed her children, her home. The very things she'd wanted to escape called to her now, blurring the words of these women who seemed so different from herself. But she tried to listen. She smiled as much as possible, knowing that something had changed and that no matter how hard she tried to swim back to the shore where she'd felt safe, she could never reach it because it no longer existed. With her own words, she'd washed it away.

More than anything, Karol wished that she could take it all back. Every thought of running away, every feeling that being a mother was somehow not enough. Her heart broke thinking about how her children tiptoed around her now as though she were one of the china dishes so often broken in her own childhood home.

The fear in their eyes scared her, too. She'd been so afraid that losing Hope had somehow meant losing herself, her ability to be a mother. Now Karol realized that her concerns had been misplaced. It was her own family that she needed to worry about. Rob was frazzled around the edges and quickly coming undone. And the only person she could discuss it with was ten years old and he was more than a little bit overwrought himself.

Ryan was changing, his slim frame filling with muscle and wind, his angular, thoughtful face rounding with manhood. He'd even started growing his hair out into an Afro. Rob hated it at first, but they both had to admit it suited Ryan, who, like his mother, always seemed to thrive when going against the grain.

That night, long after dinner and the reading of too many stories, Karol tiptoed to the kitchen to save the unwashed dishes left behind in Rob's brilliant reenactment of the battle of Jericho during Bible time. When she entered, her son was already there, smiling shyly and running water.

Karol grabbed a dish towel. The boy didn't give his usual protest. It'd been a while since they'd been able to talk, just the two of them.

She spoke first. “It's too much for him, isn't it? All this running around your dad is doing trying to take care of you kids, the house, his job…” Karol asked Ryan in the dim kitchen. Ryan had probably agreed to do the dishes tonight, but Karol figured he could use a little help. It didn't hurt that it was keeping her sane, as well.

Ryan yawned. “It's too much but he'd never admit it. You started this. It's going to have to play out to the end.”

Karol tightened the belt of her robe and dried another dish. Her son was right and she knew it. Talking to him like this wasn't something she'd done much before. She wasn't sure it was the right idea now. Hope had warned about trying to be too chummy with your children. She was usually right about those kinds of things, but Karol didn't know what else to do.

“I wish that Hope was here,” she said into the darkness.

“I'm glad she isn't,” Ryan answered back.

Karol almost dropped the dish in her hands. “What did you say?”

She could see him shrug in the evening light coming through the window. “Look, Mom. I love Miss Hope. Mr. Singh, too. It's just that, well, they've learned what works for their family. We need to do the same thing.” He turned off the water and kissed his mother on the cheek. “I'm kind of glad to be able to just be myself. It'd be great if you and Dad would catch on.”

Her heart pounded as she put down the dish and towel and gave her son a crushing hug. “Who are you and where have you been all my life?” she asked with a laugh in her throat.

“I've been right here, Mom. All the time. You just didn't see me,” Ryan whispered, returning his mother's hug just as his father walked into the kitchen.

“Well, look at this. Kitchen elves and a group hug. I think I'll join in.”

As Rob wrapped his arms around them, the truth in her son's words pierced Karol's heart. She'd been so busy trying to be the perfect mother and wife that she'd forgotten that sometimes people—especially children—just need to know that someone sees them.

I see you Ryan Andrew Simon. And God sees you, too.

 

Things had been tense between Karol and Hope since Karol admitted that Rob had something to do with her friend moving away. Singh had had a part in it, too, but Hope didn't seem to see it that way. Though her friend never said it directly, Hope seemed to be bearing a bit of a grudge against Rob, maybe Karol, too. In time, Karol thought that it would blow over, die down.

She couldn't have been more wrong.

“So how long are you going to let this go on?” Hope sounded a little irritated on the other end of the phone.

Karol tried to hide her surprise at her friend's tone. “Until the twenty-one days are up, I guess. I've tried to get Rob to forget about it, but he won't. He says that I have to fulfill my end of the bargain and find something I love to do.”

Hope groaned. “Oh, please. You have lots to do—laundry, dishes, shopping, cleaning…Are you all doing that unit study I suggested? The one on insects?”

Not this again. The two families had always studied things together in summer. But this time, it just wasn't meant to be. They were doing a unit study on love, written by God Himself. “No. We're not doing that, Hope. God has us doing His unit study right now. Mia's having a ball with Neal. Judah is learning to be a gourmet vegan chef from a bestselling author and Ryan is basically doing a publishing internship with one of the top publicists in the country. I couldn't have planned it any better if I'd tried.”

The tension Karol thought she'd imagined became real and stretched thin. “I just don't think it's wise, Karol. The Thorntons are nice enough. I mean, we sold our house to them. You don't know those people, though. Not really. And that Fallon Gray? She's questionable theologically. Have you read any of her books? They're self-help, I've heard—”

“She's a believer, Hope. Better than that, she's a friend. She's even asked to take a look at some of my writing. I doubt that I'll show it to her, but it's nice that she's interested.”

The conversation went on like that, back and forth with Hope expressing concern that Karol was losing her foundations, both as a Christian and a mother and Karol countering that the opposite was happening—she was being rooted and grounded all over again.

“None of this sounds like you, that's all I'm saying. It's not just me saying it, either. Everyone says so.”

Tires squealed in Karol's mind. “Everyone? Who is everyone? Are you talking to people about me behind my back?”

Hope cleared her throat. “I'm just concerned for you, okay? I made a few calls after people contacted me asking if things were all right. They said you all have missed a few services and that you're hanging out with a different crowd, wearing a lot of makeup…? They say that Ryan is changing his behavior, his hair. Dressing differently. Reading different books—”

“And that's a crime?” This was rich, really rich. This wasn't their first disagreement, but Hope had never seemed so…controlling.

“No, it's not a crime, but it can lead to so many dangerous things. Look at all the other couples in the church who divorced, the children who have gone astray. You don't want that, Karol, I know you don't.”

She didn't want that, but she certainly didn't want a house full of robots. Karol wanted her children to have a living, active faith that could endure the real world, a faith that belonged to them instead of being borrowed from her. “I don't want any of those things, Hope. You're right about that. I'm scared to death that my marriage might fail or my kids might grow up and make bad choices, but you know what? More and more I'm coming to see that life isn't safe. Even life in Christ.

“And for the record, I'd appreciate if you or any other anonymous people who care so much about me, would let me know your concerns directly instead of holding a powwow about the spiritual condition of my family.”

“That's what I'm trying to do now, Karol, come to you. That's why I called. I thought that this might have been tied to, you know, that problem you and Rob were having a while back. Since I'm not there for us to talk about it, I thought maybe you'd let it get the best of you again. Brent Waverly is counseling anyone at the church for free now. I talked to him a little about the situation and he said—”

“What?” Karol felt faint. Rob played golf with Brent Waverly. He and his wife had been to their house for dinner.

“Oh, it's fine. He said that Internet pornography is a huge problem. He's seeing half the families in the church about it.”

Karol swallowed. Hard. “Hope, I love you, but you were totally out of line. I still don't know that Rob ever looked at anything. The site I saw was an Internet pornography addiction support site for Christian men. Rob said that he was there on an accountability thread for a friend—”

“Come on, Karol. Don't be obtuse.”

Since when was this a geometry lesson? “I'm not being obtuse. Or concave or whatever else you think. I asked my husband about it and that's what he said. Yes, I let my fears run away with me, for a long time. I can see now that it's affected every part of my relationships with my family. That was my fault. In the end, there's nothing I can do but trust God. Rob is a grown man. If something was going on, at least he was getting some help,” Karol said, her heart racing. Though her words came out articulate and confident, she was anything but. This conversation brought all her old insecurities crashing down on her again.

“I'm praying for you, Karol. I'm sorry that you're angry at me. Maybe I did go too far—”

“You did.”

“Right, well I'm sorry.”

“I'm sorry, too. I'm sorry that this changes things between us much more than your moving did. I guess Ryan was right.”

“About what?”

It's time for us to figure out what works for our family.

“Nothing. I'll talk to you soon, Hope.”