“I thought you said you didn’t know if you’d done anything.”
“Well, I do know I’ve made mistakes, and I don’t want to go on making them.”
“But what makes you feel you were responsible for Michele’s weaknesses?”
“In one way or another children are the by-product of their parents—”
“True, but parents aren’t quite that omnipotent, they’re not totally responsible for the way their children turn out. And it isn’t just one parent who forms a child either. Michele also has a father, who, I’ve observed, is a very kind man. But during some of the discussions we’ve had, I’ve found that he has some weaknesses. In fact, Mrs. Levin, I believe he leans on you too. But that’s getting off the track. The point is that you can’t continue to let Michele lean on you. The best thing you can do is to allow—encourage—Michele to take up her life. Never mind who’s responsible for what…she needs to get on with being a mother. Let’s all of us watch her grow.”
“What happens if there’s an SOS?”
“You’ll have to deal with that if and when. You used the word overprotective, and I think it was apt. Now it’s time for Michele to have her chance to try to make it on her own. If we find that she can’t, we’ll both be there. And let me add that I think Michele is very fortunate to have a mother like you. In my line of work, I don’t get to say that too often.”
Doris brought Michele home the next day. The reunion with Steven was very strained. He was so like Eliot that she could hardly embrace him. Even after seven years of therapy, seeing him brought back all the painful reminders. And his reaction to her was subdued hostility. They greeted each other like civilized strangers, and Doris could only hope that when the two of them were living alone there would eventually be a coming together of mother and child.
During the next week Doris and Michele looked for an apartment and found a two-bedroom one on Leavenworth and Clay streets. Michele cried bitterly the night before she was to move. If only she could go on living here at home, where she felt safe, as if she belonged…
After a sleepless night she and Doris went to the apartment and waited for Steven to come home from school. When he came in he merely acknowledged them, then went to his room and turned up the stereo full blast. Doris wonder whether she should have them home for dinner that night, but then she remembered what Dr. Weingarten had said. At a quarter of five she got up as casually as she could and put on her coat to leave. “Well, darling, I think I’d better go home and get something for your father’s dinner.”
Michele stood there, trembling inside, and calling on what she’d learned from her therapy sessions. The time had come. The umbilical cord had to be cut. She was Steven’s mother, and that was the role Dr. Weingarten had been preparing her for, that she’d been trying to prepare herself for.
But after her mother had shut the door, Michele was left with all kinds of conflicting thoughts…She and Steven were unknown quantities to each other; she hadn’t been a mother in seven years. She remembered the day Eliot had first tried to teach her to ride and had made her get back on the horse every time she’d fallen off. But how did she get back on without him? She heard his voice…Lady, you’re going to have to do it on your own this time. I’m sorry I’m not around to help, but hang in there, lady. You’ll make it…
Unsteadily, she went to Steven’s door and knocked.
“Yeah.”
“Steven, may I speak to you?”
“What about?” he called through the closed door.
“I’d just like to speak to you.”
“Okay—”
When she opened the door he was sprawled on the bed, looking much older and taller than a boy going on fourteen.
“Steven, you and I have never really talked together…I want you to know how much I love you and have missed you—”
Glaring at her he said, “Yeah, I’ll bet…”
The trembling started. “Steven, I want us to have a good life together and I hope you’ll help me—”
“You didn’t help me after my dad died.”
“Steven, don’t you
still
understand what happened to me?”
“No, the only thing I understand is that you were feeling so sorry for yourself after dad died that you didn’t even have time to think about what was going to happen to me.”
“Steven, I didn’t deliberately leave you. There were many things in my life you know nothing about, and losing your father…well, it was just too much for me. I know how you feel, but as time goes on and you grow older I hope you’ll understand what happened to me and—”
“What do you think happened to me? I never felt that living with your mother and father was my home. I wanted to stay with gramps. In fact, I’d like to go home to him right now.”
“This is your home and I’m your mother.”
“This is
not
my home, and as far as I’m concerned you’re someone I don’t even know.”
Tears blinding her eyes, Michele turned and went to her room and called Doris. “Mama, this isn’t going to work. I can’t reach Steven. I don’t know how to handle it. I don’t know how to get through to him…”
Against her better judgment Doris said, “I’ll be right over.”
As Doris got into her coat she said, “To hell with Dr. Weingarten. I’m not going to stand by and watch my child disintegrate.”
When she arrived at the apartment she found Michele almost incoherent. The first thing she did was get Michele into bed. Then, without knocking, she walked into Steven’s room and sat down. “Now you listen to me and listen carefully, Steven. Grandpa and I have given what we could to you. We could have left you with gramps, but he didn’t think that was good for you. But we didn’t have to take you. We could have said, ‘What do we need with the responsibility of raising a child at our age?’ We didn’t do that, because we agreed with your gramps that you needed a change. And now, whether you like it or not, you’re going to live with your mother. And I’m not going to allow you to blame her for something that wasn’t her fault. She didn’t do anything to you any more than if she’d had had a bad heart or some other serious physical illness. You have a problem? Sure you do. We all do, but you’re so angry at the whole world you’d like to use your mother to hit back at it. But I’m not going to allow you to do that, Steven. You treat her the way your father would have wanted you to. Do I make myself clear?”
Steven didn’t answer. He heard her, even half understood, but mostly he didn’t, wouldn’t, and in the anger and confusion he was now feeling he wondered if his father hadn’t in some way let him down too…
O
VER THE NEXT YEARS
Michele was truly put to the test. Steven’s resentment only seemed to grow. He fought with her over even the smallest differences, he found fault with her and angrily shut himself up in his room after slamming the door. There seemed no way Michele could get through to him.
The year he turned sixteen, Ben managed to have him spend the summer on the ranch. Though it wore Ben out, it was the best and happiest time Steven had known since he was six, but when he returned to Michele he not only returned to his old ways but became more impossible than ever. He stayed out until all hours of the morning and often refused to get up for school. The strain was becoming so great on Michele that the only way she could cope—forget—was by drinking. But when Steven would return and find her in a stupor, it only added to his resentment. The two were bringing out the worst in each other…Michele was at the breaking point. Seeing all the signs, Doris once again tried to talk with Steven, with the old results.
Finally one night Michele received a phone call from the police saying that Steven had been picked up for possession of marijuana. By now, Michele knew that Ben was the only one who could handle Steven at all, so she called him, and he promptly took the first available plane to San Francisco.
When he saw Steven walking out of the door of the detention hall, he almost wished he had his whip with him. No, sir, he wasn’t going to put up with Steven’s nonsense anymore. None of them had this coming to them, especially not Eliot.
When Steven was seated across from his grandfather, he kept his eyes on the floor as he listened to the angry voice. “Maybe your tantrums and your play-acting are going to work with your other grandparents. But I have news for you, laddie. I think you’ve gone just about as far as I’m going to take. You’re going to shape up or ship out. Now, I’ve asked you this before, and I’m going to ask you again. What have you decided you want to do—
if
you should ever get out of high school?”
“I want to go home—”
“I thought home was with your mother. That’s what every kid wants, but by God,
my
mother would have beaten the hell out of me if I’d done a lot less than you. Now you said you wanted to go home, right? Okay, you’re going to go home…you’d better believe you are. But you’re not going to live in the big house, buddy, and you’re not going to live with me, either. You’re going to bunk up with the rest of the boys and get paid what they do. And I’m going to see that Mac works your ass off. Now, is that enough home for you?”
Steven smiled for almost the first time in many years, but Ben went on even more forcefully. “When I get through with you, buddy boy, you’ll be lucky if you’ve got a smile left in you. Now let me get you out of this place, and after we get you bathed and shaved the whole family’s going to have a pow-wow. And damn it, you’re going to beg your mother to forgive you and you’d better mean it. You’re also going to tell your grandmother and grandfather how much you appreciate what they’ve done for you. They’ve sacrificed a hell of a lot for you, we’ve all taken as much bull from you as we’re going to.”
Steven went to Ben and put his arms around him as he unashamedly let the tears pour down.
As Ben predicted, Mac worked the butt off him, and the hard work was beginning to make him take a good look at himself. Ben didn’t fool around. Sunday afternoon was the only day in the week Steven had dinner with Ben and Juanita. No, sir, Ben wasn’t going to indulge him with a lot of fancy food and all the comforts of home. He was going to eat the same grub that the rest of the guys did…
During the next two years Steven had a good deal of time to think about his life, and what he discovered was that he not only loved his mother, but even
missed
her. He couldn’t just turn off the love he had felt for her as a child, and he was beginning to feel guilty for only having made things rougher for her. There wasn’t a week that passed that he didn’t phone or write to Michele, and he was just as conscientious with Doris and Henry…
Just before his eighteenth birthday he called Michele. “Mom, I’d like you to come up with grandma and grandpa. You think you could make it?”
Michele thought she’d never hear Steven say that to her. It broke her up. “Of course, darling.”
“You want to tell grandma and grandpa or do you want me to call?”
“What do you feel is right?”
“I guess I’d better call. Now don’t forget, you’re going to come up and spend a week with me, right?”
“Damn right.”
That week brought the greatest happiness Michele had known in years.
When the plane landed, Juanita, Ben and Steven watched his mother and grandparents come across the field. Steven was shocked. His mother was just as beautiful as ever, but there were silver streaks in her hair that he hadn’t noticed two years ago. He knew very well he’d been responsible for putting them there.
His greeting was so affectionate that Michele was immediately at ease. The one worry she had was driving back to the ranch. But once again, Ben deliberately bypassed the big house…
One day Michele took Ben’s car and drove up to the house. She sat behind the steering wheel for a long time, reliving the memories that house had stored away in its walls. When she felt up to it she got out of the car, walked slowly up the stone path to the double doors and stood in front of them as she thought of the first time Eliot had brought her here. She knew if she ever was going to recover she would have to walk over that threshold again, and this time she had to do it on her own.
Slowly she turned the heavy brass knob and walked into the enormous foyer.
Chang Lee had heard her footsteps in the hall and appeared immediately. His usual Oriental composure was forgotten in the excitement of seeing Michele…“Miss Michele, I’m so happy to see you.”
“It’s been a long time, Chang.”
“Yes, a very long time.” He smiled and excused himself, sensing that she wanted to be alone.
She retraced her steps, trying to remember every moment. First she went to the enormous drawingroom, sat in the exact spot she had sat that first night…This is not my favorite drinking room, he had said. She got up and walked into the den. The first thing she saw was the gun cabinet. She quickly looked away to the stone fireplace, vividly remembered the dancing flames, the dim lights…She could almost see him standing at the bar, going through the careful ceremony of mixing the martinis. She felt as though she were being carried up the stairs to Eliot’s room…I want to marry you, lady…But we don’t know each other…If you knew me a hundred years, I’d be the same…She looked at the bed where they’d shared so much love. It was where both Steven and Eliot were conceived, and where Eliot had died…She walked down the hall to what had once been the nursery, and saw herself sitting in the rocker with Steven at her breast, Eliot in the wing chair with his arms folded about his legs stretched out in front, watching and smiling…She wandered slowly now, from room to room, then went back down the winding staircase and crossed to the front door. Without looking back, she opened it and let herself out.
As she sat behind the wheel of Ben’s car she asked herself, Now that you’ve made that trip into the past, do you think you can make it to the east acres? And she thought that Eliot would be damn proud if she could…
She started the car and set off into the countryside. How different it looked on this beautiful spring morning. What was it her mother had said about spring? She recalled now the renewal, the promise…the beginning.
She got out of the car and walked up the incline to Steven’s tree. It had grown a great deal since she’d last seen it, and was no longer dwarfed by the trees that surrounded it. She lay down on the very spot where Eliot had fallen. As though embracing him, she said, “I’ve done it, Eliot, I’ve been able to do it. Thank you, darling, for your strength.”