Should Have Known Better

The room was dimly lit by a lamp beside the bed. A single candle was burning on the dresser.

“It was under Cheyenne’s pillow,” she said. “I went in a minute ago to put a little stuffed Hawk I got for her at the game on her dresser. I went to give her a goodnight kiss and there it was.”

“That book was in Cheyenne’s room?”

“Yeah. Come have a look.” She patted on a space beside her in the bed.

“Sasha, I came in here to ask you why you—”

“Girl, you better come over here,” she said, stopping me. “Look at you”—she pointed to one of the pictures and smiled—“you looked so beautiful.”

My shoulders fell a little as my purpose for confronting Sasha waned. I could see my full, pregnant stomach poking out over the cover.

I went over to the bed and sat on the edge a few reluctant inches from where Sasha had suggested I sit.

She turned the book to me. Cheyenne and R. J. were bundled up in a single bassinet at the hospital. Cheyenne’s eyes were still closed. R. J.’s little hand was wide open and over his mouth.

“She didn’t open her eyes for the whole first day,” I said. “I asked the nurses if something was wrong and they said sometimes it just takes time. R. J. didn’t cry. Not once.”

“They have to be the cutest things I’ve ever seen,” Sasha said. “You’re so blessed.” She handed the book to me and I flipped through some of the pages. Reginald holding R. J. up in a little Falcons jersey that hardly hung onto his shoulders. Cheyenne dressed up like an elf for their first Christmas. She slept the entire day.

“When did you find out about R. J.?” Sasha asked. “You know, about the autism. I’ve always wanted to ask, but I didn’t want you to think—”

“It’s fine,” I said. “You’d be surprised how many people never ask. Never ask me anything about him or it. They try to pretend he’s not there. Or not different. He is.” I leaned back against the wooden headboard and told Sasha about R. J. and his autism. I told her about my nights of crying. About how sometimes R. J.’s silence could kill me. And how other times when he said just three words together and looked me in the eyes, I felt like it was all worth it.

“It must be hard,” she said, “dealing with everything.”

“R. J.’s autism isn’t as hard as people dealing with R. J.’s autism. The looks. The comments. One day I was in the grocery store, trying to check out, and R. J. was having a meltdown. He was just hollering for his father and then Skittles, and then whatever else he could get his hands on. He was three, but so strong, and I couldn’t keep him calm. Cheyenne was standing there, holding on to the cart, watching. I kept trying to keep him still and soon a crowd was watching. They were looking at us like he was some out of control toddler and I was a bad mother. One man said, ‘Get it together, lady. Control your child.’ ” I wiped a tear from my eye and closed the book. “I felt Cheyenne disappear. She was so embarrassed. I wanted to do the same, but I had to be there. I had to fix it. And the thing about R. J. is that he can feel when I’m upset and it just makes things worse.”

“You don’t go out much anymore, huh?” Sasha asked.

“No. We can’t. I can’t.”

“Whew, child,” she said, wiping her own fresh tear. “I don’t know about you, but I need a glass of wine.”

She rolled over and got out of the bed.

“Wine? It’s almost four in the morning.”

“And?”

I was sleep-deprived. I was hungover. I was annoyed. I was eager to prove that I was none of these things. So, just three hours after I drank two bottles of wine with Sasha in her bedroom and cried so hard my eyes were as puffy as poached eggs, I sat at the breakfast table and stuffed three whole banana honey pancakes into my mouth. I listened to Reginald and Sasha go on about the Hawks game and Joe Johnson, and the play-offs and how cute it was to see R. J. cheering in the crowd with the other little boys. He even danced at the game. He got up on a chair and did the wave. Reginald couldn’t stop laughing. R. J. wouldn’t reenact the scene, so Reginald got up to demonstrate. Cheyenne held her little Hawk in her arms and smiled at her father. He’d gotten Joe Johnson to autograph a T-shirt. She’d stashed it in her book bag to take it to school.

I kept repeating how wonderful all of this was—it was all I could say without each of my symptoms being read by everyone at the table. But inside I was at war. I hated how I was feeling and I hated everyone for me feeling that way. And I can’t explain how each of them became a part of that war in my mind, but I guess that was because I couldn’t say what the war was. Was it about Sasha? Was it about Cheyenne? Was it about Reginald? Or R. J.? What was it? Or was there anything? Did I just need to go back to bed? Or did I need to get out of that house?

Sasha had just finished telling a joke about a penguin named Topsie who could juggle. She dropped another pancake onto my plate. I thanked her with a pleasant smile.

“Wonderful,” I said.

“These are so good, Auntie Sasha,” Cheyenne said, finishing her pancake.

“Thank you, baby girl,” Sasha purred, reaching across the table to pinch Cheyenne’s cheek and revealing a completely muscular and mysteriously tanned arm.

I rolled my eyes, but quickly changed my face to a smile when I saw Reginald looking at me.

“Yeah, it is,” Reginald added firmly to spite me. “I would never have thought that honey would taste good on pancakes. It’s amazing. Isn’t it, Dawn?” He set his eyes on me

the way I looked at Cheyenne when she wasn’t behaving quite appropriately.