When You Were Mine

29

BETH

There is snow in New Hampshire, lots of it—pillowy drifts and houses frosted like birthday cakes, drooping boughs and buried fence posts edging the pure sweep of white fields. It’s like something out of a made-for-TV Christmas movie. All we need is the jingling soundtrack. So far, however, the trip up to my mother’s place has been silent.

I was frankly amazed when Susan agreed to my request that I be allowed to take Dylan to my mother’s house in New Hampshire for four entire days over Christmas. As surprised as when my mother made the invitation, when I called her and asked to talk.

We didn’t talk over the phone, not properly, but I told her, haltingly, about what had happened since October, and she expressed her sympathy and maybe even her regret—if “I wish you’d told me” can be construed as that—and then she ended the call by asking if I would come there for Christmas.

“It would be good to have you here, Beth,” she said. “And Dylan, if he’s allowed to come.”

She’s made these invitations before, but they’ve felt so half-hearted that usually I don’t even make a response; it’s a passing comment that goes by, ignored and unpursued. But this time felt different. This time I wanted to go, even if it meant missing Christmas with Mike and his family, as he’d already invited me over to his mom’s for Christmas Day. This felt more fundamental, more important. And so I said yes, and I asked Susan’s permission, and here we are, on December twenty-third, driving north.

I glance back at Dylan, who is staring out the window of the rental car I can’t really afford, his expression thoughtful and a little sad, but maybe that’s simply the way his eyes droop. I can’t read my little boy anymore, and it both saddens and terrifies me. But I am hoping and praying that these four days together provide us with a much-needed reset, because I know we can’t just go back to the way we were, yet I still don’t know what the future can look like for us.

The day didn’t start well—when I picked Dylan up this morning with the car already packed, explaining we were going away for a few days, he resisted. He ran to Ally and wrapped his arms around her waist, and for a second I felt like screaming the way he used to; I had to stop myself from marching over and pulling him away from her.

Ally tried to pry him off her, gently, telling him how much fun he was going to have, but she sounded like the mom and I felt like the mean babysitter. I should have told him before, prepared him for the change, but I was reluctant to because I knew I’d get the reaction I did, and it hurt so much I couldn’t breathe.

He was silent as we pulled away in the car, refusing to look at me, his face set in discontented lines. Already I felt frazzled and teary, and I had to pull myself back from the edge, never mind Dylan. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. And yet I could understand his anxiety, because we’d never done anything like this before, at least not in his memory. The last time I’d taken Dylan to my mother’s, he’d been three.

And so we drove, three hours north through barren brown fields and then through snow, to the small town on the Vermont border where my mother now lived with her husband Ron, a jovial man who has always seemed nervous around me, and whom I barely knew.

My mother comes to the door as I pull into the drive of the barn-red house with a wide front porch that stands at the edge of a wood, now under a canopy of snow.

I turn back to Dylan.

“It’s Grandma, Dylan. My mommy. Isn’t that funny?” I smile at him, and he stares at me with wide eyes. “Shall we go say hello?”

After a few silent seconds of staring, he nods.

I get out of the driver’s seat, giving my mother an uncertain wave before I open the back door for Dylan. Everything about this feels strange, like clothes that don’t fit. When did I last see my mother? Several years, at least. She came to visit after Marco left, but I don’t remember much about it. I can’t remember if I’ve seen her since then.

My mother takes a step forward, everything about her hesitant, the look on her face one of sudden, surprising yearning. I help Dylan out of the car.

“Hello, Dylan,” my mom calls out, her voice wavering a little. “It’s so good to see you.”

Dylan leans into me, which feels good, and I rest my hand on top of his head. The snow crunches under my feet.

My mother’s face crumples and then she collects her composure and manages a smile.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hello, Beth.” She strides towards me and then I am enveloped in her arms, and so is Dylan, and he doesn’t protest and neither do I; even though it feels so strange, something about it is incredibly right.

Of course, a hug doesn’t solve everything. In fact, it doesn’t solve anything. The moment my mother releases me, the tension is back—twanging between us, tig

htening in my chest. Why did you leave me? Of course I don’t ask that desperate question out loud. I never have. Yet while there might not be a solution, there is a beginning, and the three of us walk inside.

It isn’t until much later that my mother and I are able to talk, just the two of us—a conversation I’ve been both dreading and longing for since she first invited me here, or really, since she left nine years ago.

Dylan has finally settled to sleep after a restless hour, although since we’ve arrived he hasn’t screamed once, just been very quiet, a silence that feels deeper than usual, because I can’t read his emotions the way I used to be able to. I can’t keep from feeling he’s here on sufferance, but I tell myself that will change. It has to.

Ron has made himself scarce after an uneasy dinner where he kept jumping up to get things, his smile too wide, the look in his eyes a little panicked. I don’t think he knows what to do with me or Dylan, although he tries.

I find my mom in the kitchen, wiping down already clean counters, as if she is simply waiting for something. She turns as I come in, a smile popping onto her face like a button has been pushed.

“Dylan went down okay?”