the window.
“You’re not getting out?” I say, even though I already know the answer.
“My flight leaves Kansas City in three hours.” My flight. Not our flight. “I came to give you that,” he says, nodding at the envelope.
“Long way to come to deliver a letter,” I say. The rain has started again. Fat drops fall on the label, smearing my name, blurring me. I tuck the envelope inside my coat before the name on it has a chance to disappear completely.
“It’s quicker this way, Elena.”
“How’s Anne?”
“I need to go.”
I say it again. “How’s my daughter?”
Smug is the best word I can think of to describe him right now. Smug and superior and severe and every other goddamned S word. When Malcolm shakes his head this time, there’s no smile, no parental mock-impatience, nothing.
“Elena,” he says, “you’re not fit to be Anne’s mother. You’re not fit to be anyone’s mother.”
The taxi drives away, throwing back gravel and flecks of mud onto my shoes. I don’t see it make the turn toward the main gate, and I can’t tell whether the rain has blinded me or whether I’m unable to see through my tears.
FORTY-EIGHT
THEN:
When I was pregnant with Anne, I’d waddle through the aisles of Safeway, filling my cart with every kind of forbidden food that would fit. I didn’t even bother looking at the calorie labels; at seven months, the only thing that mattered was the hungry baby in my belly, what she wanted.
The store wasn’t too crowded on Saturday mornings, if I went early enough, and today there were the usual suspects: working moms, working singles, early-morning joggers who had stopped in for protein bars and Gatorade before running home. I was in the olive aisle because today Anne decided she was in an olive kind of mood.
“Mommy,” a small voice said behind me.
“Not now, sweetie. Mommy’s on the phone.” A larger voice, also behind me.
“Mommy.”
“I said be quiet, Cheryl.”
“MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY!”
I think I heard the slap before I saw it. When I turned around, the chubby toddler strapped into the grocery cart, little legs kicking air, stared at the back of her hand. I saw now she was in dirty leggings and a dirtier top, both splotched with blobs of dried baby food. Peas on one side, carrots or squash on the other, all held together with a full-body smear of something that might have been oatmeal. I didn’t want to think what else it might be.
“Maybe you should dress her in clean clothes instead of slapping her,” I said. “What kind of a mother are you?” It was bold, even for me, and I blamed my outburst on late-pregnancy brain. Or I told myself that was my excuse.
The woman looked more girl than woman, a baby-mama, and she had no ring on her left hand. She came back at me there in the middle of olives and pickles and condiments. “Who the hell are you? The kid police?”
I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I said the first thing that popped into my mind. “I hope someone makes you get a license before you can have another one.” And I walked off, away from baby-mama and her wailing toddler, forgetting the olives.
FORTY-NINE
If I had a list of rain-soaked states, Kansas would not be on it. Maybe they’ve saved up all their precipitation for today, when I need it the least. Maybe the heavens sense my distress and are crying with me, sharing my pain.
Two pairs of Tweedledum and Tweedledee eyes follow me as I push through the main door of the faculty building and cross the small entryway toward the double doors. They take in my uniform code violation, start to say something, and then go back to being disinterested when they see the suitcase. It’s a short walk, a walk that should take only moments, but time does enjoy playing tricks, turning short walks into long ones. We’ve all been there: the nervous bride promenading down an aisle, hundreds of faces turned her way; the college girl picking a path back to