for the baby.
“You’re not old,” Theresa says.
“Gram,” Mary says, her first words in at least a half hour.
Now you’ve upset them, my mother says, from beside Theresa.
She is right. My children and grandchildren are looking at me with expressions of discomfort on their faces. But they know I am old. They know I won’t be with them forever. How can this hurt them?
People don’t like to hear the truth, Mother says. It’s unkind.
But they need to be strong, I say. Stronger than this, anyway. How will they ever find happiness, ever move forward in their lives, if they aren’t strong enough to hear that their mother is old? I scan the faces in the room. How can they need me this much? My baby daughter cries now from a room in the back of the house, and Patrick walks past me holding the twins. I want to make my way out of this room. I want to breathe in the hot summer air. I want to leave them all behind, but at the same time I know that I can’t move.
“Would you like more iced tea?” Lila says.
“I think she’s getting tired,” I hear Angel say in a hushed voice. “Where’s that nurse?”
“I’m going to open the gift you brought the baby first, Gram,” Gracie says.
I can feel my grandchildren and children wanting, vying for my attention like a pull on my sleeve. There is laughter outside the window, and I know that if I cross the room, I will see the Ballen children tied to a massive oak tree in the center of the yard. I glance beside me, to make sure that Noreen is still there, grown, safe, and free. But she’s disappeared. Lila is in her place. I forget where Noreen’s gone, although I know she told me. It will come to me in a minute.
“You sure you’re okay?” Lila asks.
My mother says, Why are they all so careful of you, Catharine? They seem frightened of you. What did you do to them over the years? She shakes her head. I should have been allowed to see my grandchildren when they were small. You thought you could control everything, and make happy endings all on your own. You taught your children that that was what was expected of them. How could you do that? They thought they had to make their own lives right with no help or good luck or charity, and that if anything went wrong, it was their own fault. Look at all the guilty faces in this room. For heaven’s sakes. They all think they’ve failed you, and just plain failed life.
I wanted to teach my children to be strong. I wanted them to take care of themselves. I didn’t want them to hurt. I didn’t want them to die.
She says, You didn’t want them to act crazy like me.
I feel weak deep inside of my body. Did everything have to get so clear, so honest, at the end of my life? Now, when there is nothing I can do about it? Now, when it’s too late?
It’s never too late, my mother says. She has one hand on Theresa’s shoulder and the other is stroking Meggy’s knee. I got the chance to see my grandchildren, didn’t I? Anything is possible.
I remember who I’m talking to. I should not be listening to my mother. I shouldn’t let what she says matter. I say, You used to have conversations with dead people in our hotel suite. You hid in the hall closet during thunderstorms. You behaved so inappropriately that Father couldn’t bring you to business dinners.
You’re the one behaving inappropriately, my mother says. You’ve been looking forward to this party all week. You had a hard time falling asleep last night because you were so excited. You should be talking to Gracie and your daughters right now, not to me. Take care of them.
You’re right, I say. She is right about that much. I should concentrate on the present and stop listening for the cries of children who are grown or dead for fifty years. I turn to Gracie, who is unwrapping the gift that I made and that Noreen wrapped in bright blue paper. It is a two-part gift, and she unwraps the small box first.
It is a framed picture of Gracie and Lila as girls. They have their arms around each other’s shoulders. Gracie is smiling, Lila is not, but they look linked together, two Irish faces, bodies entwined, fitted like two pieces