After dinner, while the kids did their homework, I put the freshly dried sheets on the beds and loaded the washer with our towels for the last load of the day. It would help, I realized, if I was able to spread out these chores over the rest of the week, but that never seemed to work well for me.
I was more than ready to sit down and relax when Sarah asked me to read her a story before she went to bed. It’d been a long time since I’d read my daughter to sleep, seeing that she was reading at a fourth-grade level herself all on her own.
Sitting on the edge of her bed, she surprised me by crawling onto my lap and laying her head against my shoulder. This, too, was out of the norm and left me wondering if she was coming down with something. I never felt more inadequate than when one of the kids was sick.
“You not feeling well?” I asked. This clinging little girl wasn’t like my take-charge nine-year-old daughter.
“No,” she answered, her voice so low I had to strain to hear her. “I’m sad.”
I kissed the top of her head. “What are you sad about?” I asked, thinking something must have happened at school.
She turned and buried her face in my chest.
“What is it, pumpkin?” I asked, using the pet name I had for her.
Sarah released a wobbly breath as if struggling to hold back tears. “I heard Mrs. Gallon tell another teacher that I was a motherless child.”
I stiffened. “Mrs. Gallon is wrong.”
Sarah cocked her head so she could look at me, her eyes wide and questioning. “My mommy died, though.”
“Yes, she did, but you have a mother, Sarah, one who loved you very much. She just isn’t here any longer.” My words hung in the air between us as my daughter absorbed them.
“I’m not motherless?”
“No, you most certainly are not.”
The tightness around her eyes relaxed. “I remember her,” Sarah whispered.
Katie’s photograph sat on Sarah’s dresser. The picture was taken shortly after Sarah’s birth. Katie held our infant daughter and smiled into the camera. I’d always loved that photo of my wife, and looking at it now, I felt more than a pang of loneliness.
“She used to read me stories and sing to me.”
My arms tightened briefly as I remembered Katie singing in the shower and as she moved about the house. It seemed she was filled with song. “Your mother had a beautiful voice.”
“Was she in the choir?”
“Oh yes.” To my mind, the choir had never sounded the same without Katie.
“I don’t remember what her voice sounded like,” Sarah whispered, and again it seemed as if she was close to tears.
I kissed the top of Sarah’s head and sighed. I hadn’t thought to record Katie’s voice before she died. The cancer had claimed her far too quickly, even though she’d battled valiantly. When she’d been told she had only a few months to live I’d been in shock and denial, refusing to believe she would die. Talk about someone burying his head in the sand! I didn’t want to believe, let alone accept, that I was about to lose my soulmate.
“All you need to remember,” I advised my daughter, “is how much your mother loved you.”
“And I’m not a motherless child,” Sarah stated emphatically.
“Right,” I assured her.
Sarah covered her mouth as she yawned.
“Do you still want me to read you a good-night story?”
She nodded. “Please.”
Forty minutes later I crept out of Sarah’s bedroom and decided to check on Mark. My son was a quiet boy and hadn’t been as open in dealing with his feelings when it came to the loss of his mother.
Mark sat at the kitchen table, an algebra book open in front of him. Both Mark and Sarah were intelligent children. I never had to worry about their grades. “How’s it going, buddy?” I asked, coming to stand behind him. I rested my hand on his shoulder.
“Okay.”
He almost always answered questions with one word. I’d learned the key to communicating with him was to ask questions that required thought on his part.
Pulling out the chair, I sat down next to him and looked over the problems. Mathematics had never been my strong suit. Mark was already working equations that were above my skill level. I didn’t volunteer to help should he need it, which, thankfully he didn’t.
“So what do you think about getting braces?” I asked.
He shrugged. “It’s all right, I guess.”
It would mean a lot of dentist appointments, not to mention the expense. That reminded me I needed to check our dental coverage to see how much of the cost would be covered by the plan…if the plan even included braces.
“How about a bowl of ice cream?”
Mark glanced up and paused as if he needed to clear his head before he considered the offer. “We have ice cream?”
“I got groceries today.” Scooting back the chair, I headed over to the refrigerator and opened the freezer. “You want some?” I asked, pulling out the container.
“What flavor?”
“Vanilla.”
“No thanks.” Mark slouched his shoulders forward as he bent over his math homework.
Really, what kid refused ice cream? “You don’t like vanilla?”
“It’s okay. I’m not in the mood.”
“How about a banana?” Fruit never lasted long at our house.
“No thanks.”
I’d noticed he hadn’t had much of an appetite lately, and that didn’t seem right. If this continued, I’d make a doctor appointment.
“Mark,” I argued. “You’re a growing boy. You need to eat more.”
My son slapped his pencil down on the table with such force that it shocked me.
“That’s the problem, Dad, I’m not growing. I’m the shortest boy in my class and I hate it.”
So that was it. Well, this was an area I knew well. “Hey, kiddo, I was short at your age, too, and look at me now.” I was proud of every inch of my six feet. Setting the ice cream back in the freezer, I joined Mark at the table. “I didn’t like being short when I was your age, either.”
Mark held on to the pencil with both hands with such force that I was convinced it was about to snap in two.
“When did you start to grow?”
My son wouldn’t want to hear this, so I fudged a bit. “High school.”
This was a white lie, although there is no such thing. A lie is a lie. I didn’t get my height until the summer after I’d graduated. The growth streak hit just before I left for college.
“High school.” Mark groaned and, bending forward, pressed his forehead against the tabletop. “I have to wait that long?”
Offering sympathy, I patted his back. “I’m sorry, son, but most likely you will.”
It went without saying this wasn’t what he wanted to hear. Like Mark, I’d been as skinny as a beanpole, too. Short, skinny, and something of a nerd. Unlike Mark, my grades weren’t anything to write home about. Thankfully, in that area our son took after Katie, who had always earned top grades. In fact, we’d met in college when I’d needed a math tutor.
“Isn’t there anything I can do to grow quicker?” Mark pleaded. “Aren’t there growing pills I can take?”
“Not that I know of.” There probably were, but I wasn’t about to mention that to my son.
Mark closed his eyes, shook his head, and then slammed his textbook closed. “I’m going to bed.”
Hesitating, I wasn’t sure if I should follow and try to encourage him, or not. Until now I hadn’t had much success in offering him reassurances. He didn’t want reality and I didn’t blame him.
At his age I’d been impatient, too. I was a senior in high school before I’d asked a girl out on a date, and the main reason was because nearly every girl in my class was taller than me.
The house was quiet when I sat down in front of the television with a bowl of ice cream. I liked to watch the late news for the weather report so I’d know how best to help the kids dress in the morning. Mark didn’t need help as much as Sarah. If it was up to her, Sarah would wear a summer dress every day. She was a girly girl who liked dresses and her hair done up fancy.