“Mom.” Lola skips alongside the stroller. “What’s Daddy doing here?”
“Daddy’s not here. Daddy’s at work.” Darby is power walking to make up for her jumpy stomach.
“No, he’s right there.” Lola drags on Darby’s arm. “Mom, right there. I promise. See!”
Despite herself, Darby follows her daughter’s finger across the campus to a nook on the side of the church sanctuary where, to her surprise, Griff—tall, dark, lean, unfairly defined rear end—is standing with his back to them, talking to a woman dressed in all black.
“You’re right,” Darby says, amazed. “That is Daddy.”
“I told you.” Lola pouts. “I don’t tell you guys things because you never believe me but I wasn’t lying about my nice new water bottle and I wasn’t lying about this.”
“We do believe you. We always believe you.” Darby isn’t paying enough attention to sound convincing about it. “What’s Daddy doing?” She weaves her head, trying for a better angle.
He could do drop-off. She would gladly let him. It’d be more convenient for her anyway. She might actually log on to work on time for once. So, fine, if he’s so keen to come to school, have at it.
Griff turns to gesture. Only Griff’s not Griff. He’s tall like Griff and dark haired like Griff and lean and from the back anyone, even his wife, could easily mistake him for Griff, but that’s not Griff.
THIRTY-SIX
Beneath the safety of her cool, linen sheets, Rhea curls herself into a ball on top of her mattress and thinks about what she’s become: the most hated woman in America. Or at least this zip code.
She worried she might have forgotten how to wallow—like, who is this person in her pajamas at 2:00 P.M.? Twenty-three-year-old Rhea would know. But it’s coming back to her. Hour by hour, the longer she stays put.
She feels herself coming undone, moving backward through time. Into the dark again, to the moments before she was put to sleep, and this time it feels like she wakes up in reverse, childless, not a mother. Who would she be? Who would she become without Bodhi?
She once read that as early as the second week of pregnancy, there is a two-way flow of cells and DNA between the fetus and the mother. Having a baby literally changes who you are at the most basic level, but not always for the better. Gather all the famous mothers—fairy godmothers and Mother Earth and Mother Teresa—and you might think those baby cells have some sort of magical powers that transform women into benevolent entities instead of regular bag-of-bones people with the same reserves of patience and honesty and self-control as everybody else.
Alone without her son, Rhea must come face-to-face with all the ways motherhood has brought out the worst in her. Nobody likes that story.
Seconds, minutes, or hours later, Rhea doesn’t kick off the covers when the lock on the front door turns and she hears, “Rhea! Rhea, it’s just us, Marcus and Bodhi. Don’t shoot.”
She rolls her eyes as Marcus laughs at his own joke. Over in the kitchen, she hears the refrigerator door crack open. “What are you still doing in bed? Don’t you have work to do?” Marcus leans against the doorframe wearing real pants and a real shirt like he’s trying to rub it in.
“What are you doing in my bedroom?” She keeps her head on the pillow.
“You weren’t answering your door. Or your phone. And I’ve got a spare key, remember?” He holds it up with a big grin. She rolls over. She doesn’t even know where her phone is. Last time she saw it there were six missed calls from her investment advisor, not to mention a couple texts—a phony, a fraud, untrustworthy, false pretenses, pulling letters of intent, not all but some—and that was enough for her to go off the grid. Little Academy parents sure do talk quick. “Come on,” he groans. “You’re better than this, Rhea.”
“Actually, Marcus.” She listens to Bodhi rummage around the kitchen for snacks. Can she even pretend to care what he gets into anymore? “Maybe I’m not. Maybe I kind of suck.”
She knows she must be in it bad because she lets Marcus, her ex-nothing, sit on her mattress and rest his hand over the lump of her feet.
“Bodhi isn’t a bloodsucking little biter. That’s a good thing, whichever way you slice it.”
Speaking of which, that slice on her arm? It’s angry, red, and infected, so who knows when was the last time the school had bothered to sanitize. Not to mention the nasty bite on her right tricep that still feels tender and swollen to the touch.
She flips onto her back and stares up at the ceiling. “That’s not really the point.”
“I don’t know why you hold yourself to these crazy standards, Rhea. You’re doing just fine.”
She knew what it would mean sending her son to a school like Little Academy. She wouldn’t just have to keep up with the Joneses, she’d have to beat them. A philosophy like free-range parenting is all well and progressive when it’s adopted by parents with money, but for people like her, that same logic can look negligent. So she played their game and whose fault is that?
“Do you know,” Rhea says, ignoring Marcus, “that Jessica Alba turned her natural lifestyle brand into a billion-dollar company and she’s got three kids. How’d she do that?”
He sighs. It’s dark in here. The last time the two of them were together in a dark room, they made Bodhi. “I don’t know if I’d go modeling your professional business off the Honest Company right now.”
Rhea takes the pillow from the other side of the bed and whacks him over the head with it. He makes a big thing out of ducking for cover. He would.
“What’s really going on?” he asks, turning serious. “Is Terrene underwater, is that it?”
“Why do you have to go there?” She folds her arms over her chest, which probably does not have the intended effect from her horizontal position. She feels like a kid.
He strokes the stubble on his chin. “Those documents you showed me at coffee the other day, all the money flowing out, not enough in, they didn’t add up and I thought—I thought maybe that’s what you needed to talk to me about, but you chickened out.” He gives her a mischievous side-eye.
With great effort, she heaves herself up to a sitting position. “Why are you doing this?” She tilts her head. “Acting like we’re friends.”
“We are friends, Rhea. You’re my best friend.” He stares at her with those deep brown eyes, the ones her son inherited, if she’s being honest, and reaches in to pluck at her heartstrings. She can’t help it. She busts out laughing, shooting spit every which way, probably.
“What?” He throws up his big hands. “We made a little man together. I see you at least four times a week, more than I see anybody else, and I look forward to it. When I come get Bodhi, I always think, Oh good, I get to see Rhea, too.”
She quits her giggling and wipes her eyes where tiny tears have gathered at the corners. He shakes his head like he always knew she was nuts. She shakes hers right back at him and says, “God. You know what, I think you’re right.”
She and Marcus make a pretty good team and here she’s been acting like she’s been doing it all alone. She may be a single mom, but she’s got people.