Part 15 (1/2)
Olivia senses something else familiar in Beth but can't quite put her finger on it. And then, there it is, like looking in a mirror. Loneliness. Olivia decides to wait with Beth until her daughters return with their dog.
The sky has completely clouded over now, and the sun is just about to set. The air is noticeably chillier than it was only five minutes ago. Beth grabs a sweats.h.i.+rt from her bag. As she's pulling it over her head, Olivia notices a marriage self-help book sitting faceup at the top of Beth's bag.
”That's my book,” says Olivia aloud instead of to herself as she'd intended.
”What?”
”I mean, I helped edit that book. I used to work at a publis.h.i.+ng house.”
”Oh. I haven't read it yet. It belongs to a friend.”
Both women stand in awkward silence. Beth turns and looks down the length of the beach. Her girls are three dots in the distance. She turns back and rakes her toes through the sand. ”So you used to work in publis.h.i.+ng?”
”Five years ago. Feels like even longer.”
”I know this is a little forward, but I'm writing a book. It's a series of related stories, or maybe it's a novel, I'm not really sure yet, but I'd love for someone professional to take a look at it.”
”Oh, I edited self-help, not fiction-”
”That's okay. I'd really appreciate your feedback, if you have the time.”
Outside of her job, Olivia's never offered to read anyone's anything. She's never wanted to be the one to tell someone not to quit her day job, to crush someone's dream. She looks down at Beth's bare feet, at her blue-painted toenails, at her copy of Mending Your Marriage, at the wedding and engagement rings she still wears on her finger, at the hopeful expression hung on her lonely face. She sighs. She has time.
”Sure. I'd be happy to take a look at it when you're done. Just let me know.”
”Thank you so much!” says Beth, her face lit up.
Olivia smiles. She adjusts the beach chair under her right armpit. It felt light when she first picked it up, but now it's feeling heavy and unwieldy. And the strap to her camera bag is digging into the bare skin on her shoulder. She didn't bring a sweats.h.i.+rt, and she's cold in her sleeveless sundress. She looks over Beth's shoulder.
”Here come your girls.”
Beth turns and sees her daughters and her dog walking toward her. ”Oh, okay. Thanks again. I knew there was a reason I picked you to do our pictures.”
Olivia extends her somewhat free hand to shake Beth's, but Beth maneuvers around this formal gesture, the camera bag, and the beach chair and gives Olivia a sincere hug. Chills run down Olivia's arms, but not because she's cold. It's been a long time since anyone has hugged her.
”You're welcome.”
The girls file in next to Beth. Sophie is holding a huge seagull feather in one hand and the dog's leash in the other, and Jessica is holding a bag of p.o.o.p.
”Mom! Look what I found for you!” yells Gracie, smiling, excited.
She holds out the palm of her hand, displaying the amber-colored exoskeleton of a baby horseshoe crab.
”Cool, sweetie,” says Beth.
”And this is for you,” says Gracie, extending her other palm toward Olivia.
Olivia offers her somewhat free hand to Gracie, and Gracie rolls a white, almost translucent, wet, oval pebble into Olivia's palm. Chills run down her arms again.
”It's a pearl,” says Gracie.
”Thank you,” says Olivia, her voice catching at the back of her throat. ”I love it.”
”Okay, we're off. Thanks again,” says Beth, and they all begin walking toward the parking lot.
”We'll talk in six weeks?” Beth asks at her car door.
”Six weeks,” says Olivia, even though it could easily be eight.
Beth waves, disappears into her car, and drives away.
Olivia tosses her camera bag and chair into the backseat of her Jeep and gets in. The warm air inside feels like a thick blanket wrapped around her bare skin. As she backs up, it begins to rain. She turns on her lights and wipers, relieved that the weather held for her portrait session. She pulls out of the parking lot, grateful for Gracie's gift still in her hand, smiling as she drives down Hummock Pond Road in the pouring rain.
When she gets home, she adds Gracie's rock to her growing collection in the gla.s.s bowl on the coffee table. She then connects her camera to her computer and retrieves one of her journals from the kitchen table. As the images from today's shoot are downloading onto her computer, she sits in her living-room chair and thinks about Beth and her three daughters, about her loneliness and her book. Olivia wonders what it's about.
Then she opens her journal and reads.
CHAPTER 21.
April 12, 2005 I spent today back in eighth grade. It started at the playground. We got there late morning, and Anthony ran straight to the swings, as usual. His body is way too big for the toddler bucket seats, but he refuses to even try the big-boy swings, so I hoisted him into one of the buckets and pushed my five-year-old next to another mother pus.h.i.+ng her two-year-old. She smiled nervously at me and said nothing.
It was finally warm out today, and the playground was crowded. There were lots of kids Anthony's age playing with each other. Two boys and a girl were chasing each other up and down the slides, laughing, having a blast. A line of four kids were playing Follow the Leader, moving across the field of gra.s.s next to the playground, all arms up, then down, all jumping, then crawling, then clapping. Another group of kids were playing under the jungle gym.
A couple of girls were selling wood-chip ice cream. The customer kids waited their turn at the ”ice cream stand,” placed their orders, paid with wood-chip money, and ”ate” their delicious treats. They went back for seconds and thirds. It would've been adorable to watch if it didn't make me want to sob.
Anthony is light-years away from any of this. Interactive play. Imaginative play.
Friends.
All these things that other kids do spontaneously and naturally would have to be broken down into discrete behavioral pieces, and Carlin would have to work on each one with Anthony for hours and weeks and months before he might learn to pretend that a wood chip is vanilla ice cream. But it wouldn't be for the pure, innocent joy of it. He'd do it to get the Pringles he wants or to get Carlin to stop bothering him about it, to be finally left alone already. Because that's what he wants. To be alone. That's what gives him joy.
All Anthony wants to do at the playground is swing. But I see these other kids playing, and my heart wants more, and I get bored just standing there, pus.h.i.+ng him over and over. I stopped his swing a bunch of times and asked him if he'd like to try the slide, if he'd like to play with the other kids, if he'd like to go over to the sandbox. He loves sand. But nothing rivals the swing, and he wouldn't budge. So we stayed there, swinging. I felt self-conscious and defeated.
Why can't I just be happy that he's happy alone on the swing? Why do I have to insist that happiness is doing what I want him to do? Because the world is full of people, Anthony, not swings, and I want you to be happy in the world and not just happy in a swing. Is that too much to want? Is it selfish to want this?
Because the other kids at the playground can play independently and don't stay on the swings all morning, the other moms were free to sit together at one of the picnic tables. I pushed Anthony on the swing and listened at a distance to these moms chatting and laughing, having a grand old time. I felt like I was in eighth grade all over again-the awkward outsider, not part of the ”in” crowd.
They say 1 in 110 kids have autism now, but I don't know any other mothers in town with an autistic kid. Where are they? I've been out of work entirely now for six months, and I miss adult company. Conversation. Morning meetings.
Friends.
Carlin and Rhia are over every day, but they're Anthony's therapists. They don't count. And David acts like I'm asking him to re-s.h.i.+ngle the roof every time I ask him the simplest question. I know I'm probably being sensitive because I've got my period, but I felt how lonely I am while I watched this group of moms. A group I won't ever be a part of. Like the popular girls in eighth grade with their perfect Farrah Fawcett hair and their fancy Jordache jeans. I hated them and wished I could be one of them in the same breath.