Tears quietly fell down my cheek as Sonia continued to brush my hair as I wondered what my life had come to.
When I got up from the bed, Sonia gasped.
She didn’t have to say anything, I knew what she was thinking as she covered her mouth with her hand.
I looked over at my reflection at the mirror on my closet door. I could see my ribs. As the loss of Cedric ate away at me, I wasn’t eating and had dropped ten pounds. Thinner than I could ever remember being, I was starting to look like Olive Oil. My roommate’s frightened face was the wakeup call I needed.
***
By the second month A.C. (“After Cedric”), I had gained about five of the pounds back and was getting back into life a bit.
Bright Horizons had given me another autistic client, a child this time, a ten-year-old boy whom I worked with on Saturday mornings.
Gabriel was a sweetheart and I mostly took him out shopping and accompanied his family on other outings. I didn’t have to dress in costume for this one, nor was I dating his brother, so it was a fairly low-key, stress-free assignment. Gabriel liked to snuggle and sniff my hair and would occasionally pull a chunk of it out abruptly and stare at it proudly in his hands. I let him do it, because he was a good boy and a great distraction on otherwise lazy Saturday mornings when I had too much time to think about Cedric or rather the fact that Cedric had disappeared off the face of the Earth.
And I was still working with Callie, whose beautiful face continued to be a stark reminder of what I
lost.
One Tuesday afternoon at Bettina’s house, we were sitting down to dinner. I was holding the fork in Callie’s hand as she attempted to eat homemade macaroni and cheese. She knew how to use a fork, but liked to eat the pinwheel pasta with her hands, so my job was to deter her from doing that.
Bettina was watching me intently as I picked Callie’s pasta up one by one as the pieces fell off the fork and placed each piece back in the bowl, prompting her to use the fork.
Bettina then startled me with a question.
“Allison…my son won’t tell me…will you?” she asked.
My heart ached at the mere mention of Cedric. It was as if he were dead until his mother mentioned him, reminding me that he was out there somewhere. He was very much alive and not telling her anything either, apparently. I was surprised it took her so long to bring up the subject again, but was glad she hadn’t…until now.
I looked at her silently, and then cleared my throat.
“Bettina…I don’t know what happened and that’s the truth. Cedric and I…we dated for a short time, but I was really falling hard for your son. That’s all I can say. He ended it that night you walked in on us and I really don’t know why, but I am glad he did it when he did and didn’t let it drag on even further.” I was proud of my response.
Bettina shook her head and sighed. “Thank you for your answer. I know it’s none of my business. I’ve called him and asked him to tell me what happened a few times and he won’t tell me anything. He just shuts down and changes the subject. I am afraid I haven’t even seen him since that day either.”
The fact that Cedric hadn’t seen his mother in two months shocked me.
“He hasn’t come at all to see you…or Callie?” I asked.
“No, honey, I am afraid he hasn’t. Cedric has always been the closed off one. Caleb is an open book…but my Cedric is different. We keep in contact over the phone, so I know he is okay. But one thing I know for sure…whatever is going on with my son…it hasn’t been easy. Allison, aside from his father dying, I haven’t seen him that emotional in years, since he was a child, maybe. He had tears in his eyes that night, with you. That tells me that whatever happened between you two, it was hard for him and his feelings for you had to have been real.”
Nausea crept up on me at that statement; I hadn’t thought of it that way before. Cedric did have tears in his eyes when he told me he was seeing someone else. The thought of him with anyone else, doing the things he did with me, makes me sick and I honestly have to block it out almost immediately. It’s been the only way I have been able to function…as long as I don’t focus on that. I’d rather just think of him, as gone…dead.
I could feel the tears forming in my eyes now.
“Bettina, I really don’t want to talk about this anymore, okay? I said.
Bettina reached across the table and placed her hands on mine. “Okay, honey. I am sorry. We don’t have to talk about it.”
A teardrop fell down my cheek and I knew Bettina saw it. I immediately gathered Callie’s dish and we walked over to the sink to wash our hands.
“Allison,” Bettina called from across the kitchen.
“Yes?” I asked.
“Thank you,” she said.
She didn’t have to explain why.