“Come on, Dumpster, you can do it.” Josh spoke in calm tones, while Tommy yelled, “Jump, Dumpie. Jump!”
Then, to Luke’s astonished eyes, the rabbit took a flying leap over both boys and landed on the floor next to them. They got up and clapped.
“Wanna see what else he can do, Luke?”
“Sure, if it doesn’t take too long.” Luke thought about the deck. He’d planned to have it staked before dark. Before babysitting duty. He was taking care of Chloe’s kids. That fact should bother him, but it didn’t. Not even a little.
“We always play with Dumpster when we come home from school. Mom says he doesn’t like being away from us for so long, so we have to give him some tension.”
Luke figured out Tommy’s word for attention. “Well, okay, one more trick.”
The boys conferred about which trick to show him.
“He can poop in a litter box, but he only does that when he has to go,” Josh said.
“I know. Put him on his back!” Tommy vibrated with excitement.
Josh gently handled the rabbit, petting him on his head between his ears with two calm fingers and whispering something to the furry beast. Then he lay the rabbit down on his back. The rabbit lay there stock still, frozen in space, all of his fur and legs and arms tucked in like a yoga master. The bunny held absolutely still, seemingly floating on his spine without a care in the world.
For once, the boys were silent, too.
After a minute or two, Josh said “Okay, buddy,” and the rabbit flipped over and scampered to a litter box in the corner, where he dug furiously, scattering litter across the rug.
The boys sat on the floor, legs crossed, beaming at Luke.
“That’s one special bunny you boys have,” Luke said.
“He’s really smart. He’s my bunny, but I let Josh share him,” Tommy said.
“I used to have a hamster, but he died,” Josh said, solemnly.
“I’m sorry.” Luke began to form a dangerous rapport with this little guys.
“Yeah. He’s buried under the tree in the front yard.”
“We had a cross made out of Popsicle sticks, but something happened to it during the snow storm.”
“I gotta get Dumpy his carrot, and then we can go help you make the fence for Grandma,” Tommy said, leaving the room at his usual speed of light.
Josh cuddled the rabbit, who had hopped into his lap. Luke could actually feel each brick in the wall he’d built around his heart begin to loosen, one at a time.
****
Chloe threw clothes in her weekend bag, happy to leave the hotel a day early. She’d ordered room service, watched movies, shopped the outlet stores, bought a purse, read a book. She’d been bored out of her mind. Luke’s call a welcome relief. Not because of Luke, she couldn’t care less about him, but she needed to be there for her boys, whose dad had let them down. Again. She made a mental note to call Bettina, who didn’t like the fact that Spence sometimes acted sixteen instead of thirty-six, either.
She drove ten over the speed limit all the way home, then went in the front door. She headed straight for her room where she dropped her laptop and kicked off her shoes. The house was quiet. Luke and the boys must be out back.
She pulled her curtain back and peeked. Her two little guys held a deck post. They had wide smiles on their faces at something Luke said as he cemented the post in place. They looked so cute in their oversized gloves. They glowed with pleasure. Her phone buzzed, and she pulled it out of her pocket.
A text from Spence. “R okay, but have to skip game. Gave J tix.”
Chloe, never a fan of baseball, basketball, hockey, or any other team sport, went along with the hoopla for the boys. The closest she got to a team sport was the occasional yoga class. But of course she’d have to take them to the game. No question. They’d been anticipating this for weeks. That jerk Spence.
“Hey.” She walked into the kitchen and opened the patio door.
All three faces turned toward her.
“Hi, Mommy. We’re helping Luke.”
“Thanks, team, I got it from here.” Luke wiggled the post a fraction, testing the hardening cement. He kept his eyes on the ground. Tommy ran up and hugged her. Although the temperature stayed a coolish 60-something or other, he radiated heat.
“We’re doing a project!”
“I see that,” she said. Josh joined his family at the door and Luke, finally satisfied with the cement, came over to where Chloe stood with the boys. “I hope it’s okay that I put these guys to work.”
“Sure. It’s fine. But I think it’s time for dinner now.”
“Can we get pizza?” Tommy asked.
“We really worked up an appetite,” Josh added.
“I’ll run up to Little Tony’s.”
“I’ll go,” Luke said.
Another nice surprise. First, Luke being so sweet to the boys. Now offering to get dinner. Next, he’d be sitting down at the table with them.
When Luke returned with a large pizza, plus bread sticks and an antipasto salad, she thanked stars she’d set four places instead of three because he opened the pizza, took it out of the box, sat it right down in the center of the table, and grabbed a slice and a seat at the same time. He took his first bite before his butt hit the chair.
Chloe caught Josh watching Luke load up his salad bowl and did the same. Josh never ate salad. Chloe kept her mouth shut. Too much to hope both boys would turn into salad eaters at the same time. Tommy went right for a bread stick, dipping it in the plastic tub of accompanying sauce.
Tomato sauce counted as a vegetable, didn’t it?
“Luke, Grandma got us Tiger shirts for the game tomorrow!” Tommy said.
“And she got us baseball hats with a capital orange D on them!”
Both boys were already wearing their caps. Just like Luke. Before they’d met him, they hadn’t been keen on ball caps.
“Are we going with you and Luke now, Mommy? Because we didn’t do our homework yet.” Josh looked from Luke to Chloe.
The boys and her mom had watched every game the Tigers played since opening day back in April, and were excited with their team tied for first place in the division. They had begged to wear their orange T-shirts with the tiger leaping through the gothic navy blue D so often that they were already soft from washing.
“Yeah, Luke! You should come! They got cool rides and cotton candy and and…” Tommy shot out the words so fast Chloe didn’t have a chance to slow down this plan the boys spontaneously hatched.
“Here’s the tickets, Mommy.” Josh pulled four bent tickets from the back pocket of his blue jeans. “And we’ll do our homework right after dinner.”
“Right,” Tommy said, pulling a slice of pizza from the cardboard tray and stuffing his mouth so full Chloe wasn’t sure how he could chew.
“Sorry, dudes, I gotta work,” Luke said.
“Aw, man. Mommy, can’t Luke have a day off?”
Chloe couldn’t finish the piece of pizza on her plate. Her anger at Spence warred with sadness that Luke shot the kids down. Not that she wanted his company at the game. But the boys would love it. It might take their minds off their absent father.
“It’s fine,” she said. She smiled so brightly she thought her face would break. “The three of us will have a great time!”
“You hate baseball,” Josh said.
“Who hates baseball?” Luke asked.
Instead of answering, Chloe got up and threw the rest of her pizza away. Then she rinsed the dish. The three males at the table ate in silence for a while, but, one by one, they brought their plates to Chloe for rinsing. Luke went down to his lair. She cleared the table, and the boys brought out their homework. She sat down to help them.
After homework, Chloe let them watch Sponge Bob while she returned a call that had come in earlier from Kristy.
“Hey, Kristy. It’s Chloe.”
“Yeah, hi, just checking in. You home from the no-tell motel?”
“Yeah. Not as sexy as it sounds. Outlets are overrated.”
“You sound funny. Everything okay?”
Chloe told Kristy about Spence’s latest stunt.
“So the hunky landscaper isn’t a sports fan?”
“I think he kinda is,” Chloe said. Then she changed the subject and asked Kristy if she’d chosen her wedding gown yet. The wedding, more than a year away, yet super-organized Kristy already checked things off her to-do list.
“Yes. I feel like a princess.”
Chloe remembered the feeling well from her own wedding. She smiled, realized Kristy couldn’t see her, forced out a lame chuckle. Then she sighed.
“You’ve got a crush, girl.”
“Who, me? No. It’s not that.”
But her traitor heart had gone soft watching the boys and Luke work together. She owed him big for babysitting duty. And being so nice to her sons. A huge improvement over loser Spence.
Chapter Five
Spence texted Chloe. He felt terrible for lying, for using Bettina as an excuse for his own purposes. He’d taken a pill the minute they left, but it took awhile for pills to work, so he got out the whiskey and poured a straight one, drinking the entire glass in one long continuous chug. Still, his mind wouldn’t get off the guilt train. He was a bad dad. But it wasn’t his fault. He hated being a part-time zoo daddy. Chloe didn’t realize that he skipped so much visitation because it hurt too much to be with them for a short time and then let them go. Easier just not to see them. No, it wasn’t. Nothing easy about this. And he saw no way it would ever get better. He loved them, but they’d be better off without him. And he had to figure out how to be a better dad to not only Josh and Tommy, but to his new child, too.
He was “less than” in every way, not just as a dad, but as a husband, as an expectant father, as a wage earner, as a human. Lowest of the low. God, when he got like this only smoking his pipe helped. He poured another drink and went down to the basement, which is where Bettina insisted he smoke. Like a teenager hiding from mom. His brain didn’t stop: lazy, living off his wife, pot-head, deadbeat, no will power. Subhuman. Until he lit his pipe. The pill kicked in, too. And the whiskey put a pretty sheen over all his problems.
By the time Bettina returned from her errands, he lay prone, ensconced on the sofa, his favorite pillow under his head, content in the moment of his pleasant buzz.
Bettina could always tell when he was high. He knew she didn’t like it, but she put up with it. Until today. “Spence, you have to promise me you’ll stop smoking pot when the baby comes.”
“I have a prescription!” Fake, but she didn’t need to know that.
“I saw an empty whiskey bottle in the kitchen. So thoughtful of you to leave it out for recycling.”
Women could be such buzz kills. He needed another pill, the ones that put him to sleep. He tried to rise from the sofa and got dizzy, falling back down, half on the cushions and half on the floor.
“Oh God. Listen to me. You are not in any shape to care for an infant. Your drug use, the alcohol, it’s escalating. Why? Are you anxious about the baby? Because I sure am.” As she spoke, she helped him sit up.
“I feel like shit.”
“You should. You’re missing the game with your boys.”
“I can’t handle it.”
“What about them? Do you even care? Do you want to see them before they move out of the state? Why would you let Chloe take them away?”
He heard her words, but the questions got mixed up in his mind. “I’ll be right back,” he said. He propped himself up and walked upstairs to his office. Where he used to work. Where he’d sold million dollar houses. The walls were full of plaques and citations for his selling. All that gone now. Now he worked on staying alive another day. He found the right pill and gulped it down without water.
Bettina had followed him upstairs. “You stink.” She stood in the doorway, blocking his exit.
“So I’ll shower. Then I need to go to bed. You have no idea what I’m going through.”
“Like hell I don’t. I’m going through it too, and it’s breaking my heart, damn you.”
He stumbled into the shower and stood under the water for a few minutes. He picked up the soap and immediately dropped it. He turned off the water and went to bed without even drying himself off.
Bettina feared Spence’s addictions were roaring back. Worse, she had begun to think of the baby as
hers
, not
theirs
. That scared her the most. Distancing herself from Spence in case Chloe had been right about him all along.
Spence snored, passed out cold as she searched online for an Al-Anon meeting. These, Chloe had told her, were for spouses and families of addicts. That’s who she had become. She had to face it. Denial doesn’t just affect addicts. It runs in their families, too. Spence didn’t seem to have any friends, and she had, without even realizing it, distanced herself from friends and coworkers so she would not have to be embarrassed when Spence had “one too many.”
While the search engine ran, she rubbed her belly and looked out the window. Just twilight, and her husband out for the night, nothing like a family dinner even dimly in view. She sighed; she’d heard that even inside the womb, a baby could sense its mother’s distress. It impacted the child, made them more prone to anxiety. Well, that was one theory. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She hoped that study proved wrong, but she had to stay as calm as possible just in case.
She seemed to be making a lot of “just in case” plans. That scared her, too. She scrolled through the hits her search brought up. Stopped at a meeting held in a nearby church. They had literature about living with an addict. Better yet, they had an open meeting in thirty minutes. Spence would not even know she’d gone.
She got up from the chair slowly, her hand on her back, which seemed to be chronically cramped these days. She locked the door on her way out of the house even though a part of her that wished someone would come and steal her husband. That would solve all her problems.
The drive to the church meeting made her feel lonelier. It wasn’t a religious meeting. There was no prayer she had left unsaid. Spence’s demons were his own, nothing to do with her. She knew that much going in. This meeting consisted of a simple nuts and bolts approach to dealing with an addict. How to stop enabling. Had she been doing that? What was it, exactly? She parked her car, walked toward the church, every step filled with anxiety and guilt. If she was an enabler, then the things happening with Spence were partly her fault, right?