Forever Right Now

The Muni home was blessedly empty. I put my aching foot up on the seat beside me and fantasized about three Advil, my bed, and maybe a Sylvia Plath poem or two.

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; As I was making the arduous block-and-a-half trek to the Victorian, my phone rang with a number I didn’t recognize. I rested on someone else’s front stoop and answered.

“Hello?”

“Darlene Montgomery?” an older woman’s voice asked.

“Yes…?”

“This is Alice Abbott.”

I froze, a bolt of anger-laced fear ripping through me. “Yes? What is it? Is Livvie okay?”

“She’s…upset. She didn’t sleep well last night. Or at all, really.”

“Why not?”

A pause.

“She misses Sawyer. I wondered if we might come over to his place for a bit? So that she can play with her toys there and maybe sleep in her own bed.”

I pressed my lips together. The poor woman sounded tired and more than a little sad, though she tried to hide it. I was caught between wanting to comfort her and wanting to chew her out.

“Come over,” I said. “I think I can get a key from Elena.”

“Thank you, Darlene,” Alice said, and I heard Olivia’s plaintive cry in the background. “Thank you so much.”

Elena gave me Sawyer’s spare key, and I waited in his place. I scattered a few of Olivia’s blocks out on the floor in case she wanted to play with them.

Twenty minutes later, the door buzzed and I limped over to let them up. I left the door ajar, then started the journey back to the sofa. Footsteps, voices, and Olivia’s little cries stopped me. She pushed the door open first and my heart broke at her distraught expression and tear-stained cheeks.

“Where Daddy?” she cried, looking around her home. Her blue eyes, shining with tears, found mine. “Dareen. Where Daddy? Where Daddy?”

“Oh, honey, come here.”

She hurried to me, bypassing the blocks on the floor, and I picked her up and held her close. Her little body shuddered with sobs, and I glared daggers at the Abbotts coming in the door behind her.

But my anger burnt out with one glance at their kind faces. They both looked exhausted and worn out; identical defeated expressions of the best intentions gone awry.

“We didn’t know what else to do,” Alice said, and Gerald put his arm around her.

“She’s very…astute for such a young child,” Gerald said. “None of the diversions our supervisor told us to try have worked.”

“She doesn’t want a diversion,” I said in a low voice. “She wants her daddy.”

I limped to Sawyer’s chair at his desk and sat with Olivia against my chest.

“Where Daddy?” she sniffled against my neck. “Wan’ Daddy.”

“I know you do. He’ll be home soon, sweat pea. Soon.”

I rubbed her back and rocked her as best I could. The Abbotts sat at the kitchen table, watching me as if I were a lion-tamer or magician. Olivia’s crying tapered away to hiccupping sobs, and then she fell asleep.

“Should I put her down in her bed?” Alice whispered, rising from her chair.

“No, I want to hold her,” I said. “I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to.”