Who Do I Lean On? (6 page)

Monday already
. It should have been a good weekend, except Philip's stupid comment about Mabel's nephew had upset me to no end. What if Mabel had overheard? Or Jermaine? Sure, the boy was a bit effeminate, but that didn't mean anything. Not at fourteen—did it? So what if he had a passion for music instead of football! I thought it was neat that Paul had found a kid who shared his creative genius, even if Jermaine was a couple of years older. Couldn't Philip see that?

I should talk with my boys about this, before Philip's mind-set poisoned their attitudes too.

Still, the welcome-home-birthday-party combo on Saturday had been fun . . . well, if I hadn't been so distracted by Philip inviting himself in when he brought the boys back. And ruining my birthday surprise for P.J. by buying similar stuff at the Sports Authority. At least Paul had been ecstatic about the Casio keyboard. A splurge on my part. Had nearly wiped out my last check from Manna House. But the life insurance money from my mother should arrive any day now. She would've approved of the keyboard for Paul.

Sunday was good too. I thought the boys had enjoyed their first visit to SouledOut Community Church.
“Start now, baby,”
Estelle had told me.
“Take 'em to church every Sunday. Tell 'em it's part of the package. They'll get used to it
.” I hoped so. We'd been sporadic attenders at best back in Virginia, mostly for Christmas, Easter, weddings, and funerals. It helped that the boys already knew some of the folks at SouledOut, since half the people who had come to their party were members there. Well, maybe Mr. Bentley wasn't a member, but he'd been pretty regular since he'd started romancing Estelle Williams. Such beautiful people at SouledOut, a lovely mix of brown and black and white and tan. And even one redhead lately. Me.

Now it was Monday. P.J. started cross-country practice at Lane Tech today. Had to get him there by nine and pick him up at ten thirty—which meant I had to leave staff meeting a little early. I had a rental car for now until I could buy a car, but he'd have to learn how to take the bus sooner or later. The kids still had three weeks until school started, but fall sports practices started early. Lacrosse was a spring sport, so P.J. had signed up for cross-country to help him stay in condition. But, oh, Lord, I was so lucky to get the boys registered for school last week! Lane Tech College Prep for P.J.—just a day school, praise God—and Sunnyside Magnet School for Paul, a K-through-eight school right in our neighborhood. No, not luck. An answer to a lot of prayer.
Thank You, thank You, Lord .
. .

Getting the boys in school had been first on my agenda when their grandfather arrived in Chicago a week ago with the boys. After P.J.'s summer lacrosse camp was over at the end of July, Mike Fairbanks had decided to drive their big Suburban from Petersburg, Virginia, in order to bring the boys' bikes too. Over Nana Marlene's protests, no doubt. Philip's mother still clung to the belief that P.J. and Paul were returning—
must
return—to George Washington College Prep boarding school in the fall because, well, that's what the Virginia Fairbanks males
did
. In fact, Philip had left the boys' bikes with his parents when we'd moved to Chicago last spring, assuming the same thing.
“They'll need them when they go back to school, Gabrielle
.”

But now the bikes were here, courtesy of Philip's father. Locked in the basement of this six-flat. A symbolic reality that Chicago was now home for P.J. and Paul too.
Bless Mike Fairbanks, God
. Why was it only now, when my marriage with Philip was falling apart, that his father had become my advocate?

I refilled my coffee cup and let the hot liquid do its magic on my recalcitrant brain cells.
Staff meeting
. . . Should I bring up the idea about buying this six-flat and turning it into second-stage housing for homeless moms like Precious and Tanya? So far I'd only mentioned my crazy idea to Mabel. And my lawyer. Barely. But I needed some idea of what I was going to do when that check from my mother's insurance arrived—

“Mom?” Paul's sleepy voice made me jump. My twelve-year-old stood in the kitchen doorway in his pajama bottoms and skinny, bare torso.

“Hey, kiddo. What are you doing up? I was going to let you sleep in a bit longer.”

“I'm thirsty.”

“Okay. You want water or some O.J.?”

“Just water.” Paul plopped into a kitchen chair, elbows on the table, chin in his hands. “Mom, how come you gave Grandma's dog to that old bag lady—Lucy what's-her-face? It's not fair. Dandy's like family!” He stuck out his lip, ignoring the glass of water I put in front of him.

Ah. Dandy
. Knew I'd have to answer for that sooner or later. “You really want a dog, don't you, bud.” A stall, I knew.

“Yeah. But we already had a dog . . . well, kinda. When Grandma—” The corner of his mouth curled into a small smile. “Did the homeless people at the shelter really call her ‘Gramma Shep'?”

I smiled. “Sure did.”

He sighed. “Cool. Anyway, when Grandma died, I thought Dandy would come live with us! I would've taken care of him.”

I laid a hand on his arm. “I know you would, bud. But your dad, well, he didn't want a dog in the penthouse, you know that.”

“Yeah, but . . . since you guys . . . I mean, since you . . .”

Suddenly Paul's face took on the stricken look of a child who had just backed into the elephant in the middle of the room. His lip trembled. Before I could say anything, he tore out of the kitchen, tipping the chair over in the process, and slammed the door of his bedroom. I grabbed the glass of water before it tipped over too, waited thirty long seconds, and then padded quietly to his bedroom and opened the door.

Paul was sprawled on his bottom bunk, face in the pillow, shoulders shaking. “Aw, honey . . .” I sat on the edge of the bed and gathered him into my arms. “I know, kiddo, I know. It hurts.”

We sat that way for several minutes, while he cried in my lap. Then he sniffed and sat up, glaring at me reproachfully. “Why do you guys want to get divorced anyway? What about P.J. and me?”

Divorce
. Had Philip used that word around the boys? I swallowed. “I . . . we haven't said anything about divorce, honey. Just . . . we need some time apart right now. To work things out.”
Oh, God. Am I getting his hopes up? After what Philip did, do I even want to work things out? Help me, Lord. I don't know what to say!

There I was again, jumping right into the “help me!” prayers. But sometimes that's all I knew what to pray.

I drove the gray Nissan I'd rented into the parking lot of Lane Tech. The high school campus sprawled on the southwest corner of Addison and Western Avenue. Wide front lawn, classic brick building with several wings, athletic field, outdoor stadium, surrounded by city on all sides. Definitely a change from George Washington Prep, with its white-pillared campus tucked into the rolling countryside around Petersburg.

No uniforms or blazers here. Instead, the kids spilling out of other cars with their gym bags looked like a regular United Nations. Unlike other neighborhood high schools, Lane Tech College Prep took applications from all over the city and had a long waiting list. Fortunately, P.J.'s lacrosse camp this summer had helped shoehorn him into the list this fall. Lane Tech had an up-and-coming lacrosse team.

“Do you know where to go, kiddo? Want me to go with you?”

“No, Mom! I'll find it.” P.J. piled out of the Nissan with his gym bag, wearing running shoes, shorts, and a T-shirt. Where did he get that confidence? New city. New school. Didn't know a soul. First year of high school, no less. When I'd started high school in Minot, North Dakota, I knew half the kids already from middle school.

Must be his dad's genes
. Well.

I rolled down the passenger side window. “P.J., wait! Remember, I've got a ten o'clock staff meeting. I'll leave early, but it might be eleven by the time I get here. Meet me right here in the lot, okay?”

“I'll be fine, Mom. See ya.” P.J. trotted off, gym bag over his shoulder.

A voice piped up from the backseat. “Can I ride up front with you, Mom? I'm twelve now.”

I glanced at Paul in the rearview. “Sorry, bud. I checked it out. Backseat for
twelve and under
, not
under twelve
.”

Scowling, Paul flipped his seat belt buckle and slid over behind me, where I couldn't see him. “Seat belt,” I reminded, waiting until I heard it click before jockeying the car out of the lot. I'd given my just-twelve-year-old the choice of staying at the apartment and playing with his keyboard until I got home at two, or coming with me to the shelter. To my relief, he chose to come. And the shelter had a rec room with a Ping-Pong table, a TV, and games.

We rode in silence for a mile or so as traffic moved in starts and stops along Addison. Suddenly Paul said, “Hey! Is that Wrigley Field? Where we went that time to see the Cubs?”

The huge ballpark loomed in the distance like a poignant memory.
Memorial Day weekend. Our first weekend together as a family after picking the boys up from school in Virginia. Still full of hopes and dreams for our new life in Chicago
. “That's it. That was a fun day, wasn't it?”

No answer. But I turned my head just enough to catch his face pressed against the window behind me, watching the curved walls of Wrigley Field slide past as I turned the corner by the Addison El station and headed north. I knew what was going on in his mind.
Would we ever have a fun day like that again, all of us together
?

A few blocks north of the ballpark, the Manna House shelter was tucked into a neighborhood known as Wrigleyville North. I parked on a side street, leaving plenty of exit room between me and the next parked car. I'd gotten blocked in once when I drove Philip's Lexus to work and had to leave it on the street overnight.

Another one of my so-called sins that contributed to the downfall of my marriage. Well, maybe not, but it didn't help.

“How come the shelter looks so much like a church?” Paul gazed up at the building as we waited at the top of the wide steps to be buzzed in. The brick building was less than a year old, and at its peak the wooden beams of a cross stretched top to bottom and side to side inside a circular stained-glass window.

“Because the old church that used to house the shelter burned down, so they rebuilt it along the lines of the original building— oh! Here we go.” As the buzzer sounded, I pulled open the big oak door. “Hi, Angela!” I waved at the young receptionist in the glassed-in cubicle as we crossed the foyer. “Will you sign me in? And you remember my son Paul, don't you? He's here with me today.”

“Sure! Hi, Paul. Nice to have a man about the place.” The pretty olive-skinned girl winked at Paul beneath her sleek black bangs, then grabbed the phone as it rang.

Huh
. I pulled open the double doors into the multipurpose room.
She doesn't have to worry about some ol' fly making a nest in that straight silky hair
. A distinct advantage of Asian parentage.

The multipurpose room was abuzz, not untypical for Monday morning. “Sarge,” the shelter's no-nonsense night manager, was still on site, arguing with Wanda, a rather verbose Jamaican woman—one of the few who managed to stand up to Sarge's Italian toughness. Someone was sleeping on one of the couches with a jacket over her head, couldn't tell who. A couple of unfamiliar faces glanced our way as we came in and looked away, just sitting, not doing anything. Must have come in over the weekend. Sheila, a heavy-chested black woman who usually kept to herself, was vacuuming the various rugs that carpeted the room in a patchwork, one of the many chores residents did daily. I still didn't know her very well, even though I'd been a resident here myself for several weeks this summer. I really should— “Paul!” A childish voice greeted us from across the large open room. Sammy came running. “I didn't know you was gonna come with your mom today. You wanna play with me an' Keisha? We just started Monopoly, but it's funner with more.”

Paul shrugged. “I guess. Okay, Mom?”

“Sure. I'll be downstairs in my office if you need me.”
Perfect
. Keisha was ten, the oldest of the few children currently at the shelter—well, not counting sixteen-year-old Sabrina, who qualified as a “child” because she was here with her mother. Keisha's grandmother, Celia, a vacant-eyed woman in her fifties, seemed to be her guardian, though I didn't know their story. Thank goodness Paul didn't mind playing with younger kids. Monopoly would keep him busy until staff meeting was over at least, if the kids didn't end up fighting.

Manna House was designed for homeless women, not families, and didn't have enough kids to develop a full-blown youth program, but the shelter occasionally took in moms with young children if there was bed space. And residents like Precious McGill and Tanya—I didn't even know her last name—felt it keenly, not being able to make a home for their kids.

Which was exactly why my “House of Hope” idea stuck like peanut butter to the roof of my spirit.

I scurried downstairs to the lower level, which housed the shelter's dining room, kitchen, laundry facilities, rec room— and my office. A former broom closet. Still, I got a rush every time I unlocked the door with the nameplate: Gabby Fairbanks, Program Director.

Except—the door was already unlocked. And a ribbon of light shone from beneath the door of the windowless room.
What
? Had I left it unlocked all weekend, and the light on too? Or . . .

I tentatively pushed the door open, unsure what I'd find.

A yellow furball explosion nearly knocked me over. As I protected myself from the excited wriggling dog, I saw a familiar craggy face under a cap of thinning gray hair grinning at me from my desk chair.

Lucy!