Objects of My Affection (9 page)

He didn't glance up from his game. “Jordan's dad dropped me off—he forgot they had to go to his grandma's tonight.”

“It was probably pretty upsetting to walk in and see me with a man, especially one you've never met. Especially one that's not your dad.”

“Reeeeeally don't want to talk about it.” His thumbs flew over the controller, his attention on the monitor. I could see the muscles in his jaw tighten, reminding me of how he was on the cusp of being a man, even though he was still my baby.

“Sweetie, we need to talk about it.”

“Nooooooooo, we don't.”

I was searching for the words to make this less—well, icky—when Daniel walked in the room. “Hey, I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you're Ash.”

“Yeah.”

“I'm Daniel. I'm your mom's boyfriend.”

“Okay.”

“I've been wanting to meet you. She talks about you all the time.”

“Mmm-hmm.” Ash didn't so much as glance up.

“Here's the deal. I love your mom. I'm crazy stupid in love with her. Like I can't believe I'm so lucky to have her in my life, so I hope to hang around.” Daniel leaned against the doorframe, hands in his pockets. “You up for putt-putt golf? I'm thinking—and I say this man-to-man—that there could be an ass-whooping in store for you.”

For a moment, there was nothing but the clackity-clack of thumbs on a controller. Then Ash said, “You
think.
”

“What? You got skills?”

“Mad skills.”

Throughout a game of miniature golf that I found utterly exasperating—they'd devised a scorekeeping system that rewarded banking the ball rather than getting it in the hole—I found myself pondering less what Ash may have seen and more what Daniel had said.

He'd never before told me he loved me. He was
crazy
about me. I was so
beautiful.
So
amazing.
So
lovable.
But never
I love you.

By the time he dropped Ash and me off at home, I'd assumed that by unspoken agreement we were sweeping the earlier part of the
evening forever from our memories. “Thanks,” I said, opening my car door to get out. “That was fun.”

Ash was already halfway up the front walk, but took a few strides backward to say, “Daniel, you coming in?”

“Nah.” Daniel leaned over so he could see Ash through the open passenger door. “I'm going to go home and practice working a door lock. In the meantime, maybe your mom can sign you up for knocking lessons. I believe we can make this work.”

Ash laughed and then trotted the rest of the way into the house.

I turned to Daniel. “Despite an absolutely mortifying start, I think he likes you.”

“Good. I like him, too.” Daniel brushed a strand of my hair back from my face. “And I love his mom.”

Smiling, I pulled him toward me in a kiss. “She loves you, too.”

D
aniel and I didn't start living together right away. His spare toothbrush moved in first. Then the brand of shampoo he likes. Followed by enough clothes that I had to designate a drawer, then part of the closet. Then came the bike. Within a year he followed his stuff and gave up his old apartment.

We were already entrenched by the time I realized my mistake.

I'd let myself picture us as a family—the three of us.

Daniel, for his part, conspired in the lie: having the occasional “boys' night out” with Ash, seeming as relaxed with my son around as he did when it was he and I alone.

That's why it hurt so badly when Daniel eventually issued the ultimatum. When he said, “I can't take living here with Ash anymore. His drug problem is more than I can deal with. You have to choose—it's either him or me.” He couldn't have cut me any deeper.

I chose my son. Of course I chose my son.

Owning a library of beautifully bound books doesn't make you a well-read person. You have to read them.

—Things Are Not People

A
fter a weekend of hanging out with Heather's family, I'm glad to get back to work Monday. I'm exhausted. Ash was into LEGOs as a kid, whereas Abigail is all about imaginary play—and, may I add, bossily so. (“No, Aunt Lucy, you have to wear the pink. The pink! The
pink
!”) Still, I gave it my all playing with her, and I insisted on babysitting so Heather and Hank could go on a date Saturday night. They've been so generous letting me stay with them. I do what I can to pitch in.

The morning is pleasantly sunny and warm. I've talked Marva into having her cigarette on the front porch so I can drag boxes out to present her choices to her there. Not exactly efficient, but I want to keep this job moving. If that means letting Marva sit like the queen while I bow before her, so be it.

“It's a heavy one,” I say, sliding a box in front of her and opening the flaps.

Hmm. Books, mostly of the coffee-table variety I notice as I sift through the box. “Yard sale?” I ask hopefully, gesturing as if I'm moving the box as a whole to the side.

She gives me a withering look.

I stifle a groan. Book by book it is.

It's soon apparent the challenge I'm facing. Tucked in with books that could go for a dollar each at a yard sale are signed first editions. There's an art-house book on the history of the Barbie doll marked $500 retail. (Even I get sucked into sitting down and thumbing through that one.) There's also a brooch, one earring, and a $50 bill.

It's going to be like this through the whole house. Treasures mixed in with trash. I can't simply chuck a box into the bin unless I want to accidentally throw away a Picasso.

I start to panic at the thought of touching each and every object in Marva's house—of knowing that I'll eventually open the box or drawer or closet that contains the earring that matches the first one I found. That's how thorough I need to be. I'm not just looking for a needle in the haystack.

I'm also sorting the hay.

W
ill pulls in behind me when I arrive Tuesday morning. “Stopping by to give you your paycheck and see how things are going,” he says, as we let ourselves in through the front door.

I wait nervously for his reaction. It's been a week, and even I have to admit the progress is less than spectacular.

“Is anything gone?” he says, gazing around the room. “In fact, is it worse? Did the two of you spend the week shopping?”

Yeah, and then we got our nails done and had lunch at the Ritz.
I swear, he's such a jerk. “The mudroom is completely finished,” I say, trying not to sound as peeved as I am, and not entirely succeeding.

I hear humming off the kitchen, coming from the laundry room.
I head over with Will to see that there's a woman in there, stuffing clothes into the washing machine—which means she had to have spent at least ten minutes moving boxes to get to it. “Finally, the housekeeper!” I say to Will. “I haven't had a chance to meet her yet.” Although she comes by every day to deliver Marva's meals, she's in with the food and out with the previous day's containers before I show up in the mornings.

“She cleans Tuesdays,” Will says, thumbing through a stack of mail on the countertop. “Name's Mei-Hua. Been with the family forever.”

Mei-Hua glances up and nods in our direction. She can't be more than four feet seven, and while I can tell she's older than me, she could be anywhere between fifty and ninety. The massive 1970s-era headphones and oversize glasses she's wearing make her look more like a giant bug than a tiny lady.

“Hi!” I call out, giving a wave. “I'm Lucy! Nice to meet you! I've been hired to clear out the house, so I guess you and I will need to chat! So we can coordinate on what needs to be cleaned once it's emptied!”

She shakes her head and points at the headphones, so as to indicate she can't hear me.

Oh, for crying out loud. Are they nailed to her head? She can't take them off for a second? I'm obviously talking here! It's bad enough my own son ignores me—still no call, no letter—and now I don't even qualify for common courtesy from the housekeeper?

Will chuckles, clearly amused by my being snubbed, although he doesn't glance up from the mail.

“I'll discuss it with her later,” I say with great authority in my voice. “I don't want to disrupt her work.”

“Good idea. Seems you've got enough work of your own to worry about.”

Jerk.

Over the next several days, Marva and I establish a routine. She goes where she wants and does what she wants. I follow her around
like a spurned lover begging for attention. It's chipping at what little dignity I have left, but I don't have any better ideas.

It seems to be working at least. By Thursday afternoon, I feel I've done enough to bring Niko in.

“That's great!” he says when I call him. I'm in the bungalow, taking a break to catch up on calls and eat the sandwich and Fritos I packed for lunch—which I'd been looking forward to until I saw the shepherd's pie Marva was warming up for hers.

“Not your whole crew,” I say. “You and one other guy with a truck. A small truck.”

“I knew you could do it.” He's so excited for me, I allow myself to feel a tinge of pride, and, hmm, perhaps even the vague stirrings of a crush. It's rather refreshing to have a man seem to think I'm doing everything right.

Before I make my next call, I have to take a few deep breaths. I chug a glass of water. I use the bathroom. I freshen my lipstick, brush my hair, and clean out my purse. Then I hurriedly press the number stored on my phone before I can come up with any other ways to stall.

When the receptionist answers, I ask for Dr. Paul. “Hold on while I transfer you,” she says. There's no soothing music while I wait. Just an occasional beep, beep, beep that informs me I'm still on the line.

“Dr. Paul,” he answers, his voice, as always, slightly raspy. I've never met him in person, but I read his profile on the Willows' website. He's quite young. Nonetheless, I picture Sigmund Freud when I'm talking to him.

“Hi, this is Lucy Bloom. Ash's mom? I'm calling to see how Ash is doing. And if he got my letter? Since he hasn't responded, maybe he never got it?”

“Ah, yes, the letter.” He hesitates. I imagine him thoughtfully stroking his beard. “I gave it to him in our last session.”

When Dr. Paul doesn't elaborate—probably writing on his pad the way the therapists always do on TV—I give him a prod. “So what did he say?”

“He chose not to read it. But don't worry. That doesn't mean—”

“He didn't read it?” I flop back on the couch. It's as if someone let the air out of me. It's all I can do to keep the phone to my ear, I'm so deflated.

“Not yet … no.”

“It was only one page. How much must he hate me to not bother reading it?” I picture Ash glancing at the envelope, seeing my handwriting on the outside, and sneering. Hating the cream-colored stationery I used. Hating the swirls of my penmanship and the way I folded the paper into three parts. Hating me.

“It's not that he didn't bother. And he doesn't hate you.”

“Then why is he writing to some girl, but he won't even open a letter from his own mother? What did he say when you gave it to him?”

“I can't tell you what Ash and I discuss in therapy. But …” I hear him sigh. The sigh is a good thing. It means he's about to violate the therapists' code of confidentiality or whatever it is they swear to and spill dirt. I sit back up. “He was afraid you were going to be angry. Even when I told him it was a friendly letter—and that I was here to help him if anything you wrote bothered him—he said he didn't want to deal with it.”

“He said that? He doesn't want to
deal
with me?”

“
It.
He didn't want to deal with
it.
The letter.”

“Same thing,” I say morosely.

I suppose in some ways I can't blame Ash for his avoidance. The last time he had a letter from me, it was the one I read to him at his intervention. That letter wasn't quite so upbeat—it wasn't supposed to be.

I'd worked on it for days, following the instructions e-mailed to me by the interventionist I'd hired (and I suspect if I'd done the number of rewrites on my book that I did on that one letter, I'd probably have had a bestseller). The first part of the letter was easy enough, where I was to confront Ash with the ways his drug habit was affecting both him and me. It felt downright cathartic to scribble down how the fallout from his drug use had progressed—from his dropping out of
classes at the community college to lately where I didn't dare leave the house for fear he'd be in trouble and need me.

But the part of the letter where I was supposed to let Ash know what he means to me had me stuck for the longest time. Maybe it was because I was actually sitting on a chair looking at Ash passed out on the couch as I wrote it. The grief settled into my bones so deep it felt as if I were penning his eulogy. As if I were being visited by the ghosts of Ashes past as I remembered little moments … how he'd build these intricate waterways for hours in the sandbox in our backyard … the sheer joy on his face the first time he mastered a two-wheeler bike … his determination to learn to make the perfect grilled cheese sandwich … the time he unself-consciously hugged me good-bye in front of all his friends before leaving for the eighth-grade overnight trip.