Summer Snow (15 page)

As I surveyed the landscape before me, there was an unexpected swelling beneath my collarbone, a full and happy ache that made me think of prayer. I fought to ignore the compulsion. In my mind, prayer was a habitual thing, a matter of necessity, not beauty. And the loveliness of this morning—the watercolor spring sky, the almost-warm southern breeze, the child dancing inside me—left no room for the tedium of “Our Father, who art in heaven.”

But I didn't want to say,
Our Father, who art in heaven
. I wanted to say,
thank You
. For moments alone; for the dark, loamy scent of earth being tilled; for letting me feel her touch me inside. When I thought I would burst, when this thing that filled my chest to overflowing and threatened to pull me apart bone by bone became too much to bear, I said it out loud. “Thank You.”

It wasn't that I had ceased trying to chase God and trap Him in some darkened corner where I could hold Him under a careful magnifying glass. I still sought Him. I still believed in Him. I probably always had. But I didn't know how to translate that belief into more than a stoic acceptance of something greater than myself. How did that differ from anybody else? How did that connect me to a God who was as important, as dear, to my grandmother as every measure of breath she inhaled moment by moment?

For now, the irrepressible prayer was enough. The reality of my daughter quickly left room for nothing else in my heart and mind. I wanted to run into the house and throw my arms around Grandma and tell her what I had just experienced. But the thought of what waited inside dampened my spirits a bit, and instead I went to sit at the bottom of the steps.

As soon as the snow had melted and the weather turned, I had become an early riser. The house was too laden with unmet expectations, unresolved hurts. I felt isolated and alone, even though it was my own choice to be so. And, thankfully, things had been tenuously calm. No, not calm. Passive. As though we were all breathing shallowly, afraid that even the smallest exhalation could shatter whatever unspoken agreement we had come to. We were polite to each other, like solicitous but uncomfortable strangers, and though I knew I had the power to change everything, I did nothing.

The anger that had carried me for weeks after Simon's impulsive—though I could now admit
un
intentional—disclosure had faded somewhat with time. I rolled that term around in my mind for many days before finally deciding that
faded
was actually a very good word to use in relation to how I felt about my mother and her son. They drained me, drew me out of myself, made me feel less of everything that I wanted to be. And though the coarse, viscous resentment that I felt toward Janice in particular had thinned and dulled with each day that I woke with her in my home, the color of my unforgiveness was still raw and red, maybe just a little less intense. Instead of fighting, I drew away. Instead of enduring the burden of our dissatisfying togetherness, I became an entity unto myself. The sole survivor in my own empty universe.

The porch became a retreat of sorts, a place where no one would bother me in the minutes before breakfast. We sat down together for meals, and though we went our separate ways the instant the last dish was tucked away in its proper cupboard, I found that I still needed time to prepare for the presence of Janice and Simon at my table. No one bothered me or tried to join me when I slipped out the door early every morning. Sometimes Grandma even wordlessly handed me a cup of coffee as I left the house.

I wished for one now, a celebratory cup of something as dark and black as the earth being turned.

Almost as if I had made the wish aloud, the door opened behind me. I didn't turn around because I knew it was Grandma, and I smiled softly to myself, glad that she had come. In the last weeks, I had hoped often for some sort of compromise to be made. I wanted to reconcile with her after the trauma of the day my pregnancy became public knowledge. Though we had not outwardly fought, we had not resolved the argument of that afternoon when she had tried to talk me into forgiveness, and I longed to go back to the way we were. I missed the unity of our relationship when we were of one accord, two strings plucked in harmony. Quite simply, I missed my grandmother. But I also needed her to know where I stood. I was tolerating Janice and Simon because I had to, not because I wanted to. I was past the point of even contemplating forgiving my mother, and Grandma and I could not patch up the damage that had been done between us until she fully understood and accepted that fact.

I was in a generous mood on such a lovely morning, and when Grandma sat down next to me, I planned to put my arm around her and tell her that I loved her. It would be a start. A place we could move forward from.

But the footsteps on the porch were wrong.

Surprised, I whipped my head around and found Simon making his way across the knotty boards to me. He was wearing his pajama bottoms—rainbow-colored dinosaurs against a blue backdrop—and a slick, green coat with a drawstring hood, unzipped over his bare, narrow chest. The air was easily fifty degrees, even in the shade, and I had to prevent myself from telling him to zip up. That was Janice's job, not mine. Simon clutched a mug filled to the brim with steaming coffee, and his eyes were so trained on it I was worried he would trip.

I scrambled up the steps to him. “Careful,” I warned. “You're going to drop that.”

“That's what I was afraid of,” he said when I eased the mug out of his hands. He looked at me thankfully for a moment before his eyes glazed over with the guardedness that reminded me nothing had changed between us. However, instead of going back into the house as I expected, he started distractedly toward the steps and plopped himself down where I had just been sitting.

Grandma would have been welcome this morning, but I wasn't much in the mood for Simon. Then again, he had brought me coffee, and I wasn't yet willing to give up the morning and go inside. I sighed a little and plodded heavily down the steps to join him.

We sat in silence, me with my back propped against one banister and Simon as far away from me as he could get against the other. At first I considered my hands warming around the mug of coffee. Then I turned my attention to the sun slowly climbing the sky. When I had followed the path of the John Deere until it crowned a distant hill and continued out of sight, I ended up stealing a peek at Simon. He was watching me.

“Why do you get up so early?” Simon asked, looking quickly away. He picked at a sliver of white paint that was curling beside his knee.

“Why do
you
get up so early?” I replied. Though I was often awake by six and out the door in time for the light show around six thirty, Simon was usually on the couch by the time I made it downstairs. He never turned the TV on—even though I knew he had a fondness for early morning cartoons—but instead sat cross-legged with a pile of library books stacked in his lap. I watched him once when he didn't know I was there, and I was astounded at how long he could study a single page. Simon's eyes swept over every square inch of the paper, taking in the minutest detail of the illustrations and carefully examining the words, though I knew he couldn't read.

When I turned the question around, Simon chewed his bottom lip and considered the rutted field on the horizon before looking at me. “Can you keep a secret?”

I didn't really want to like him, to become attached to him so he could leave with Janice someday and break my heart, but his earnestness made me smile in spite of my efforts otherwise. “Yes, I can keep a secret.”

Simon glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one had slipped out of the house to hear his proclamation. Satisfied that the coast was clear, he leaned in close and whispered, “I'm learning how to read.”

“You are?” I said, trying not to sound amused.

“Yes, but you can't tell my mom. I want to surprise her. When I go to kindergarten next year, I want to be the smartest kid in the class.”

“I'm sure you will be,” I assured him with all the condescension of a seasoned adult. I didn't believe he could teach himself to read, but I was instantly embarrassed by my own disdain and his innocent acceptance of my phony approval. Simon was looking at me so sweetly—shy eyes behind long lashes and a small, tight-lipped smile—and I was being a jerk. He thought we were making friends. I was surviving his presence. It made me sick with myself, and all at once I was repentant. I blurted out without thinking, “I'll teach you how to read. I think I remember that you were going to help me with my funny faces and I was going to help you with your reading.”

If it was possible for his eyes to get any bigger, they did. “Really? Are you really going to teach me how to read?”

Trapped. What in the world was I thinking? “You bet,” I said benevolently, but in my mind I yelled,
You idiot!
I laughed nervously, and Simon mistook it for glee at our little conspiracy.

“It's going to be so cool!” he cheered, warming to me as though nothing had happened between us. As though I hadn't been distant and miserable for over a month. He put out his hand for me to slap and waited to see how I would respond.

I gave him a high five and then followed his small hand through a few more hits before he punched me excitedly on the shoulder.

I understood it to mean I was forgiven. If only everything were that easy.

“Do you even know your alphabet?” I wondered, a little nervous now about following through with my promise. Simon was someone I tried to avoid, not someone I sought out time with. How could I make it through private study sessions with him? Besides, I had never taught anyone anything before. What could he possibly learn from me?

But Simon didn't pick up on my hesitance and frowned at me as though I had asked him the dumbest question ever. “Yes, I know my alphabet. I knew that when I was
three
.”

“Can you read letters?”

Simon tilted his head, slightly confused, before he figured out what I meant and exclaimed, “Oh yes! I know
M
looks like two mountains and
S
looks like a snake. And
S
is for Simon and
M
is for Mom.
O
is a circle. …” He put his finger in his mouth to think. “
J
is a hook,
Z
is a squiggly zigzag, and—”

“Good enough,” I interrupted him. “You know your letters.”

I turned away from him, but he wasn't done with me. “When can we start, Julia? Will you help me today?”

Moaning inwardly, I managed, “We'll start tomorrow, okay?”

“What time?”

I considered for a moment. “I'll come downstairs in the morning before Janice and Grandma get up.”

“It'll be our secret, right?”

“Right.”

Simon seemed thrilled with our minor intrigue, and I had to admit that it was nice to see him regard me with something other than caution. I still wasn't ecstatic to have him tangled in the already snarled web of my world, but he definitely was an adorable thing. He was looking out toward the low line of clouds in the east, and I was filled with the sudden urge to lean down and kiss the line of smooth, brown skin above the collar of his coat. I had never felt such a strong motherly—
sisterly
—impulse, and though I certainly didn't dare to follow through, I did lift my hand to ruffle his unkempt hair. Maybe reading lessons wouldn't be so bad. Maybe I could pretend he was just a cute little boy and I was just his tutor. Anything at all but his sister.

“Hey,” he started when I touched him, “now you have to tell me a secret.”

“I do?” I was not well versed in the rules of childhood etiquette, and had I known this disturbing tenet, I never would have allowed him to spill the beans about his reading scheme to me.

“Yup.” Simon stared at me expectantly.

I buried my nose in my coffee to buy a few seconds. What in the world could I possibly tell him? He had already proven himself to be a lousy confidant. A part of me wanted to point this out, but how can you reason with a five-year-old? He was waiting for me to pull him into my inner circle, to entrust him with something as precious to me as his reading lessons were to him.

And then I felt her like a hiccup buried within.

I smiled genuinely at him. What possible harm could come from him knowing this small thing? “All right,” I said. “But you can't tell anyone. Not yet.”

Simon nodded solemnly.

Taking a deep breath, I locked his eyes in mine and tried to give him the impression of gravity. “I felt the baby move this morning.”

“You did?” He bounced off the step in excitement before hopping back down to regard me with curious eyes. “What does that mean?”

I laughed. “Well, the baby is in my tummy, you know? And now that she's getting bigger, she likes to move around. And I can feel her moving.”

“You can?”

“Today, for the very first time, I can.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Not even a tiny bit. I love it.”

“You do? May I feel it?”

“No, I already tried. Only I can feel her right now. But I promise that when she starts kicking harder, I'll let you feel her whenever you want to.”

“Cool!”

“Very cool,” I agreed.

We fell into silence, a pair of conspirators, maybe even on the road to being friends.

The breeze shifted a bit and Simon stifled a shiver. Zipping up his coat with clumsy hands, he stood and turned toward the house. I was startled to find myself disappointed that he was leaving.

“I'm hungry,” he explained, though I had guessed as much. By the amount of food he put away, one would assume Simon had a hollow leg.

I almost laughed at my own thought, but he was hovering over me. He didn't move. “I'll be in soon,” I assured him.

I thought my dismissal would be enough, but he waited as if there was something more to say. I arched my eyebrows.