“You and everyone else.”
“Kids okay?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Why wouldn’t they be?”
“I don’t know,” he said, running his hand through his hair. “I just thought…” His voice trailed off.
“They’re fine,” I told him curtly.
“Good, good.”
I stood there for a minute, waiting for him to speak. He didn’t.
“Thornton, why are you here?” I asked. “You could’ve texted me if you were worried. Or, you know, called them and talked to them.”
“Right, right.”
I frowned. The double word talk had always driven me nuts.
“So…?” I prompted.
“I just thought I should check in on them.”
It wasn’t normal to hear him say things like that. He’d always been a bit disconnected from the kids. He rarely attended their activities and his work schedule had pretty much dictated that he didn’t spend much time with them. It wasn’t that he didn’t love them. I was pretty sure he did love them in his own way, even if he hadn’t been crazy about having them. But he could rarely see past his own nose and his wants had always come before mine or the kids’. So it always rubbed me the wrong to hear him express concern for the kids, even when I knew he meant well.
“Well, they’re fine.”
I turned to go but he reached out a hand to stop me.
“I know,” he said. “I…I just wondered if maybe they should come and stay with me for awhile. You know, with everything going on over there.”
He said the word ‘there’ like it was the hills of Afghanistan and there were hordes of Al Qaeda members waiting to take them out.
I gaped at him. “Are you serious?”
“Well, yeah.”
I took a deep breath and tried to maintain my cool. “They are fine.”
He stared at me for a minute and I shifted my gaze so I was looking at his shirt. It was one of about a thousand music T-shirts he owned. He’d grown up believing he’d be a bassist in some famous rock band. When that hadn’t panned out, he’d stayed in music, working for a large music retailer. He was now a manager and able to set his own schedule most of the time, which enabled him to still play gigs with his band. Unfortunately, their venues hadn’t moved past dive bars and the Elks Lodge. They hadn’t turned up on the marquee at the Legion next to our house but I was pretty sure it was only a matter of time.
“Are you sure?” he asked, brushing the brown locks away from his eyes. “I mean, that had to be pretty scary for them.”
Our custody arrangement was such that he saw them one weekend per month. That was his decision when we divorced, as he claimed he wasn’t sure what his schedule was going to look like. It pissed me off at the time, but I was also selfishly happy. I didn’t want to share my kids. And in the time we’d been divorced, he’d never asked to have them for more than that single weekend a month. So to have him asking if the kids should come stay with him for a while? It definitely raised my hackles.
“ Jake and I handled it,” I said. I couldn’t resist adding, “Like we always do.”
“Yeah, but if you’ve got the cops and stuff at your house, is that really the best place for them?” he asked.
I felt my blood begin to boil. “Are you questioning my parenting?”
“No, Daisy, I just—”
“Good, because that would be a huge mistake on your part,” I said. “Considering you have them for about 60 hours a month and don’t really have to do much parenting, I don’t think you’re in much of a position to be questioning me or how I’m handling their well-being.”
He held his hands up in surrender. “Alright, alright. I was just asking.” He pushed off the car and readjusted his hands in his pockets. “And, uh, there’s something else.”
I sighed. “Okay.”
He cleared his throat and stared at the sky. “I’ve, um, met someone,” he said.
I looked up, thinking maybe he’d found Jesus. He’d never been the religious type, either.
“And it’s serious,” he continued. He cleared his throat again. “She’s become very special to me.”
So he hadn’t renounced his atheist ways.
“Oh,” I said,not bothering to hide my surprise. “That’s…great.”
And it was. Despite my complete frustration with him as a husband, I didn’t want him to be alone or unhappy. We’d reached the point where we were semi-friends again and he was still the kids’ father, regardless of whether or not I agreed with how he played that role. He’d struggled mightily trying to find someone to date after we’d divorced and the kids were always reporting back about his bad luck.
“So I, um, just wanted you to know,” he said. “Because I’m going to introduce the kids to her next time I have them.”
“I’m sure they’ll be excited.” I tried to inject some enthusiasm into my voice. They’d never shown any excitement about his past attempts at finding companionship. “They worry about you being alone.”
“We’ll probably be moving in together soon,” he said. “She has kids, too. Twin boys.”
“Oh, nice,” I said, nodding. I just wanted our conversation to be over. “That’ll be fun for all of you.”
“It was actually her idea to come talk to you,” he said. “Babette’s.”
“Her name is Babette?”
His mouth turned upward in a lazy smile. “Babette Sherzer.”
“Okay,” I said. “Well, that was nice of her to think of letting me know before the kids showed up. I can tell them so they won’t be so surprised.”
The smile withered. “No. I meant it was her idea about maybe having them spend some time with me since you were having…uh, some trouble. She said it sounded like maybe things were a little out of control.”
My goodwill quickly evaporated. “Thornton, I’m genuinely happy for you. I hope it works out. But telling me your new girlfriend is questioning whether or not the kids should be with me is about a million times worse than your questioning it. Do you see that?”
He thought hard for a moment, like he was genuinely struggling with the question.
“Oh,” he said. “I guess so.”
I shook my head, my patience gone and my nose cold. “I need to get inside.”
He glanced at the watch on his wrist. “I need to get to practice, too. I’m in a new band.”
“Oh, yeah?” I tried to sound interested.
He nodded. “Yeah. We’re pretty good. I think this could be it.” He smiled. “Babette’s insane.”
I stared at him, confused by the sudden change in topic. “That doesn’t exactly make me want to let you have the kids around her,” I said tightly.
He looked confused for a moment, then shook his head. “No, no. That’s the name of our band. Babette’s Insane. She’s the lead singer.”
Of course.
THIRTY TWO
I went into the church and the 4-H meeting was just wrapping up. They’d gotten together for a community service project and the tables were littered with two hundred bird feeders made of various recycled materials. I knew they were planning to deliver them to the senior center in town during their next regular meeting.
The kids were milling around and didn’t look quite ready to go yet, so I took a seat and pulled out my phone. I was deleting all of the junk emails when Carol Vinford approached me.
“Hi Daisy,” she said. Her voice was high and thin, like she’d just swallowed a mouthful of helium. “How are you?”
I hadn’t spoken to her since the co-op sign-up day when everyone had avoided my class.
“I’m alright,” I said, tucking my phone away into my purse. “You?”
“Okay,” she said, still smiling. “I think the meeting is just about over.”
I glanced at the kids. “Yeah, looks that way.”
She looked around the room. I could tell she wanted to say something to me but I wasn’t going to make it any easier on her by asking.