Mrs. Perfect

I close my eyes, take a breath, and another, trying to keep from losing my cool. How can this be my family? How can these be my children? How can they be so horrible?

“I’m home,” I shout wearily, stepping out of one high-heeled pump and then the other.

The girls don’t even hear me. They’re still screaming mean things, and now Jemma’s shouting at the top of her lungs: “Well, Mom and Dad never even wanted you. You’re a mistake!”

Suddenly I don’t have it in me to yell. I don’t have words for anything. I’m just sick of the screaming and sick of the worrying and sick of trying to do it all by myself.

I grab two lids from the pots and pans cabinet and clang them together as hard as I can. It’s like cymbals crashing. It’s loud. Really loud, and worse, I can’t stop banging the tops to the pans.

Suddenly Annika and the three girls are on the stairs, staring down at me. Annika’s aghast. She’s Finnish, never loud, always civilized. Whatever.

My girls stare at me as though I’m mad. I am. So there. Dropping the lids onto the counter, I face the girls. “There’s no mistake in this family. Each of you was deliberately made, and each of you was very wanted. There were more of you planned, and more of you wanted, but life doesn’t always turn out the way we plan or we want. So, get down here, pick up your toys, and help me make dinner.”

I glance at Annika. “And Annika, as the Wicked Witch is home, you’re now free to go.”

Chapter Nineteen

Thursday afternoon, I hand over a check to Mr. Oberon, the owner of the rental house. It’s for $5,900, the first two months of rent, the last, and the cleaning deposit. I know he didn’t need the extra month’s rent, but I do it for my peace of mind, not his. This way, no matter what happens, the girls and I have a home until January 31.

Last Monday night after signing the lease agreement, Mr. Oberon handed me the keys to the house and let me know I could start moving in any time.

Now on Thursday I stand in the middle of the horrid little house that will soon be home and realize I can’t move the kids in, not with the house in this condition.

I’ll paint the walls. Rip up the stained carpet and have it hauled away. Maybe the floor beneath isn’t so bad. Maybe I’ll splurge and get us some new remnant carpeting.

Maybe I should have found a different place.

Friday, Marta closes the office at eleven-thirty. I head to Home Depot and buy gallons of white paint. White paint covers a multitude of sins.

At the very least, it’ll hide the stains, mildew, and grime.

I spend all Friday painting, and after arranging playdates with Patti’s kids (I called Kate as Brooke wanted to play with Elly but haven’t gotten a call back), I spend Saturday painting, too.

By the time I pick up the kids from Patti’s, my arms, face, and hair are covered in tiny paint freckles.

Sunday, Lucy has the girls over and I return to the rental house for another painting marathon.

I know we’re going to be in the rental house for only six to twelve months, but I can’t stand the faded paint, the walls a drab gray and dirty beige that makes leaving our beautiful sunny house even more depressing. I won’t be depressed. I refuse to be depressed, so little by little I work my way through the house with a paintbrush, roller, and cans of off-white paint.

The only negative with painting is that it gives me way too much time to think. I find myself thinking about everything. I think about Nathan. I think about his family. I think about my family. I think about those Christian music tapes I found and Matthew’s baby box.

I haven’t painted a room, much less a house, since before Matthew was born. But then I haven’t sewn, either, and I used to sew all the time. I designed and sewed my own clothes, curtains, slipcovers, baby clothes. I made Jemma’s entire layette. But I stopped sewing after losing Matthew. I don’t know why I didn’t sew again other than it hurt whenever I thought about fabric or patterns. It hurt because I could remember Matthew’s room and the crib that was already furnished and ready. I remember the padded bumper and the soft quilt that I hung over the rocking chair.

I remember the cheerful sailboat valances, the little throw pillow I’d embroidered his name on.

Matthew Young. Matt Young. It sounded like a quarterback’s name. My son was going to grow up and be like his father.

After Matthew, Nathan wanted me to get pregnant right away. He thought it would make the grief better. I couldn’t. I couldn’t even bear for Nathan to touch me. I hurt too badly.

It was around that time that I began sketching, putting together all my ideas into a dream house. Nathan loved the sketches. He got excited about having a big house on the water, a house we’d fill with more children, little boys and girls, and we’d be this all-American family. We both got so excited by the idea of what we could be that, looking back, I see we lost who we were.

Nathan and I never were about things in the beginning. We were about us. About love. About making our way through life together.

My eyes sting as I paint, and I tell myself it’s the fumes, but I know better.

I know I’m incredibly, deeply hurt. And incredibly, deeply confused. I could never love any man the way I love Nathan. He and I just work. We fit.

By the time I’m finished, it’s dinnertime and pitch dark outside and I hurt all over. My back, shoulders, and neck ache as I wash out the paintbrushes in the hideous kitchen sink, but at least I’ve got the living room, dining alcove, laundry area, and kitchen done.

I think I could have picked a better white paint, as this one looks a little chalky, but it’s not as if I can’t repaint some of the walls later. The hall to the bedrooms would look nice in a crisp green, and the kitchen would be far brighter and cheerier if the walls were more buttery or maybe lemon.

At home, I let the girls order a DirecTV movie and they all climb onto my bed with microwave popcorn to watch. I’m so tired that I fall asleep before the movie ends. And when I wake up, the TV’s off and the house is dark except for a light in the upstairs hall.

I go into Tori’s room, and her bed is empty. I check Brooke’s room, and her bed is empty, too. I hurry into Jemma’s, and there they all are, sleeping on the ground with Jemma’s blankets and comforters as if they’re having a slumber party.

They put themselves to bed.

I stand in the doorway a moment and watch them sleep before heading downstairs to lock the doors.

The doors are all locked. The lights are all off.

They even put their popcorn bowl in the dishwasher and wiped off the counters.

Maybe my girls aren’t so horrid.

Monday, Marta lets me leave work at four so I can show the girls the house. I’m nervous about their reaction but want them to see the house and help pick out the paint colors for their rooms.

When I go home to get the girls, Annika asks if she could talk to me. In private.

What cruel thing has one of my daughters said now?

Turns out none of them have said cruel things. Annika’s just ready to move on to another family, a family that’s more stable and can offer better hours.

I ask if she needs a reference and she says no, she has a job lined up already. She just needs to give me a week’s notice, but because it’s Thanksgiving this week, Wednesday, just two days from now, will be her last day.

After Annika leaves, I drive the girls to the rental house. Holding my breath, I wait for their opinion.

The girls don’t hate the house completely. Tori likes the green “fur” on the roof, says it looks like Turtwig, the green Pokémon with a little leaf on its head.

Brooke gives me a pointed look. “That’s a bad thing, Mom.”

Yeah, I got it.

Walking through the house, the kids want to know which are going to be their bedrooms. I show them the two at the end of the hall. The rooms are tiny, and the windows are up too high. Great for placement of furniture, but bad if you want light.

Jemma announces she wants her

own room (no surprise there), which means Brooke and Tori will share the other. Brooke starts to throw a fit, but I snap my fingers and give them my new, improved don’t-or-you’ll-die look.

That silences the fighting. Now we just have to decide on bedroom wall color. Jemma wants lavender. Brooke wants lavender. Tori wants pink.

Jemma denounces Brooke for picking her color. Brooke shouts that lavender doesn’t belong to Jemma. Jemma didn’t make it or buy it, so she can’t own it.

Tori wants pretty pink.

Jemma laughs because Brooke—who hates pink—is going to have a pink bedroom.

Tori wants ballerinas.

Brooke wants soccer balls.

Jemma rolls on the ground, laughing, saying that maybe we can find wallpaper where pink ballerinas are playing soccer.

Brooke slugs Jemma. Tori cries because she doesn’t want her ballerinas to play soccer. Jemma cries because Brooke hit too hard and she hates everything to do with our family.

I’d like to cry, too, but at this point, it seems a tad redundant.

Time is passing quickly, so quickly that I realize I haven’t thought about the auction once, nor have I been sending out my weekly e-mails to the various chairs and committees, checking on progress and giving everyone updates.

Tuesday I use my lunch to send everyone a brief e-mail letting them know that we won’t be meeting until after Thanksgiving weekend (how could we meet before? I have to get us moved), but please feel free to e-mail me with any questions, suggestions, or problems.