“A little
late in the game, Molly.”
 “Maybe this
business about the lady judge . . .” Forte had briefed them and
given them a less than optimistic view. From the beginning, he had hoped to be
heard before one of the older judges. Yet, she had actually been encouraged by
this new prospect. A woman would understand, she told herself. But then she had
never been widowed. She looked at Charlie, and the thought chilled her.
 “No turning
back now,” Charlie shrugged. “Win, lose, or draw.”
 “It's
justӉshe made a great effort to soften her words, fearing that she might set
off new explosions inside him that were too dangerous to contemplateâ“just that
nothing's been the same since all this began.”
 “We didn't
start it, Molly. We're the victims.”
 “Maybe that's
what I don't like,” she sighed.
 “And it began
long before we saw a lawyer. The lawyer was a last resort, remember?” He got up
from the chair, walked toward the outside door, hesitated, then started toward
the den. Then he turned to face her again. It was as if he were acting out
their entrapment, the absence of escape. His arm shot out, and he pointed a
finger at her.
 “It all
started with that woman. If it wasn't for her, we would still have our Chuck.
And Tray.” He waved the finger, unable to get the words out. When they came,
they seemed to sputter on his tongue. “It was you who was the soft one, letting
it happen. I could have talked him out of her. I know I could. You were the one
who let it happen. He had no business marrying that woman, no business at all.
I made the one big mistake of my life. I let you lead me, like a damned
donkey.” His voice started to rise, reaching a pitch that she had never heard
before. He seemed to be changing into another person before her eyes, as if all
the bitterness inside had erupted and the acid was eating away his protective
covering. “You defended her, always defended her, when it was Chuck we should
have been looking after. Chuckie.” His voice broke, became a gargle, then found
its full timbre again. Wrapping her arms around herself, she lowered her eyes.
It was excruciating enough just to hear his words without seeing the distortion
in his features. “You didn't love him enough. That was it from the beginning,
right? You didn't love him enough. Not me either. And not Tray. You were glad
to see her come along and break us up. And it was you who said she'd come
around one day after she took Tray away. Like a damned dummy, I listened to
you.” She wished she could shut out the words. “So now you wish you hadn't
started it. I say shit to that, woman.” She heard banging and, lifting her
eyes, saw him swinging his fist against the wall. The sound of his fury boomed through
the house. “No. No. No,” he cried. In her heart, she knew what his fists were
pounding, and she got up and gripped him from behind, hugging him to her.
 “You mustn't,
Charlie. Please.”
 He stopped,
finally, laying his head against the wall, sobbing quietly.
 “If it was
me, I'm sorry,” she whispered. Against her, his body lurched and shivered with
the tremors of his agony.
 “I just want
my grandson. Is that so much to ask?” he said, after he had quieted.
 “No, it is
not, my darling.” She continued to hold him. “Our grandson,” she whispered,
tears rolling over her cheeks. After a while, he turned and they stood leaning
against the wall, locked in an embrace, holding each other as if to let go
would be the end of life itself.
 “I am so
sorry, babe. So sorry sorry sorry sorry.” She felt the breeze of his words
against her ear. “How can I blame you? It's terrible. Me blaming you.”
 “There's only
us, kiddo,” she whispered after a while.
 “I nearly
blew that.”
 “Never,
Charlie. Never that.”
 “I know,
babe.”
 “It's got us
crazy.”
 “I lost
control. It scares me. I didn't mean it, Molly. You know that.”
 “Better to
get it out like that than keep it in.”
 He gathered
her closer.
 “As long as I
have you, I'll be okay.”
 “Then you'll
be okay.”
 “How does an
old bastard like me say I love you?”
 “Same way he
always did.”
 “I love you,
Molly.”
 She lifted
one hand and stroked the back of his head.
 “And I love
you.” The tears continued to roll over her cheeks, but she did not sob.
 “No matter
what, we'll still have each other, right, Molly?”
 “That was
never in doubt,” she whispered, feeling the crush of his strong arms,
remembering earlier moments. It had been a long time since they had embraced
like this. She felt suddenly the old sense of abandon when they were first
married and would indulge in spontaneous, uninhibited lovemaking whenever and
wherever in the house the spirit seized them. She felt a line of kisses along
her wet cheeks reaching her lips. The years fell away. When he hesitated, she
helped him, insistently.
 “Here in the
kitchen?” he asked, sounding and feeling, to her, much like the young, golden
warrior of her old dreams.
 “It's ours.
And we are married, you know.”
 That night
they lay in bed, energized and alert, not wishing to sleep. Molly understood
what it meant to both of them, prolonging and savoring this moment of
connection. On the night of the day when they had learned that Chuck had died,
they had held each other all night long, sobbing and hysterical. Since hope was
dead, there seemed little to do except to curse fate and confront their
helplessness, like beasts caught in a jungle trap. Somehow it was different
now, as if the time had come to rid themselves of remorse and prepare to look
the future square in the eye.
 “In the end
you wind up with only each other,” Charlie said, as if it were the conclusion
of what he had been saying. He had been going on about his trip to Crisfield
and how it had all changed, and she had listened quietly as he described it,
knowing that somehow it had been good for him to get it out, to get everything
out.
 “Not true,
Charlie,” she said playfully, knuckling his stomach, which, despite everything,
was still tight and hard. He was still lean, still her handsome prince. “In the
end, it's only you yourself that they lower down into the pit.”
 “I don't
count that.”
 “Neither do
I.”
 “I count
this. Us. Together all these years.”
 “An old broad
and an old goat.”
 “Still
getting it on, as the kids say. For a moment there, I felt like twenty.”
 “And acted
like it.”
 “A man needs
to have that. I have to tell you, babe. It may sound like kid's stuff. But it
made me feel likeâlike a somebody. I haven't been feeling much like a somebody
these days.”
 “That's not
prepubescent kid's stuff. It'sâwellâadolescent.” She kissed him on the ear to
tell him she was just playing. She couldn't remember when they had last played
together like this.
 “I'm
serious.”
 “You're too
serious.”
 “And if this
thing with Tray doesn't work out, hell, we've still got each other.”
 “And they'll
never be able to take away the piece of us and Chuck that Tray has.”
 He grew
silent, and looking over at him in the darkness, she saw that his eyes were
still open. To show him that they were still engaged, she traced his features
with her fingers.
 “I know she
thinks I'm a sonofabitch. Maybe from her point of view she's right. After all,
I didn't approve of her marriage with Chuck. I fought it. You can't deny that.”
 “I won't
try.”
 “He wasn't
ready is all. It had nothing to do with her.”
 She pinched
his nose.
 “Come on,
Charlie. Truth time. You didn't want to share him with anybody. Sometimes, not
even with me.”
 She held her
breath and felt her heartbeat accelerate, hoping she would not change his mood.
 “Maybe she has
a point.” Charlie sighed. “I never did warm up to her. Not like you.”
 “No matter.
We're both the enemy now.”
 “People are
damned stupid. Us, too.” He paused, and she could hear him sucking air between
his teeth. “You really think we should walk away?”
 She
hesitated. Then he raised himself on one arm and looked into her eyes.
 “Tell me
true, Molly. Is it worth all the pain and money? I mean it, babe. I'm not a
fool. I know what it's doing to me. To us. Is it worth it? Will it amount to a
hill of beans if we see the kid or not? Maybe Frances is right. Maybe it will
hurt the kid, confuse him, disrupt his growing up. The thing about being a
parent, or a grandparent, is that we never know what our effect really is on
kids until it's too late. You know what I mean?”
 Pressed to
answer, she had to assimilate all the thoughts she had had on the subject.
First her misgivings, then her consent, then her hesitation and her worries
about Charlie. And now herself. It wasn't just for Charlie any longer.
 “Like you,
Charlie, I can only go by instinct. I won't talk about the pros and cons of our
bringing up Chuck. We did the best we could, and not for one moment did he ever
doubt we loved him. And that's something damned precious.” She felt suddenly
militant, and her hand strayed to his bicep, which she gripped. “Lord knows,
there isn't that much of it to go around. Maybe there is a little selfishness
connected with it. To give love isn't such a bad idea either, and it's as good
for the giver as the getter. I'm not going to analyze the mysterious ties of
blood and family and possession that make us love and long for Tray. Maybe it's
an ego thing. I'm not smart enough to understand what it all means. All I know
is that we, you and I, can't hurt that child by giving him our love and
interest and understanding, and we surely can't hurt ourselves by it either.”
She slapped his upper arm. “It may sound confused, Charlie. But what's wrong
with letting Tray know that we fought to be with him, that we fought with all
our heart and soul? So, if we lose it will hurt like hell. And that's what
worries me. I don't want you to go off the deep end if we do. Scares the hell
out of me. I think I'm prepared for it, but I'm not sure. Even if we win,
there's a lot of lingering bitterness to contend with. But at least our
grandchild will know that we fought for him, that we loved him enough to fight
for him. At least he'll have that.”
 She saw him
nod and stir in the darkness, and he leaned over and kissed her on the
forehead, then on the eyes and the lips.
 “Now I see
what it means.”
 “What what
means?”
 “I wish I
could talk like you do when you get wound up.” He cleared his throat. “Give me
a minute.”
 “You got it,
kiddo,” she said, looking up, her hand caressing his face. In the semidarkness,
the shadows filled in the wrinkles, and he looked younger, which meant she did
as well.
 “What I'm
trying to say is that I really think I got lucky once and that's in getting
youâ”
 She started
to say something, but he gently put his palm over her lips.
 “And the
need . . . me needing you . . . grows stronger as
I grow older. You know what I mean?”
 “What an
egotist you are, Charlie.”
 “Me?” He
seemed genuinely confused.
 “Always
looking at things through such a narrow keyhole. Always you and your needs.
What about mine?”
 “What about
yours?”
 “Shut up and
drink your beer.”
 She pulled
his face down and kissed him deeply. His response was clearly evident.
 “Again?” she
whispered. “What a man.”
 Charlie
picked her up at the school the next afternoon, and they drove downtown to see
the lawyer. He had been gone when she had awakened that morning, and she was
concerned that his brief high might dissipate during his idle morning alone.
Miraculously, hers hadn't. She had tackled her classroom chores with her old
zealousness, including a strong rebuke to students whose attention was
wandering. As she walked down the corridor, she had passed Miss Parsons and
offered a wide smile and squared shoulders, feeling not the slightest bit of
guilt at leaving early. Hadn't she earned her privileges?
 He greeted
her with a peck on the cheek and twinkling wink and was neatly turned out in
his good navy blue suit, red and blue tie, and striped shirt. She also noted
that his shoes were shined and he smelled of cologne.
 “Smell good?”
he asked through a wide smile.
 “Not bad.”
 “It's that
old stuff you gave me once for my birthday. I forget which. It had never been
opened.”
 He started to
whistle, watching her peripherally.
 “You and me,
babe,” he said, making a clicking sound with his tongue.
 “Me and you.”
 “And Tray if
we can do it. Right, kiddo?”
 “Right.”
 But an old
echo shook her momentarily. He used to say “the three of us,” meaning them and
Chuck, back in the old days, a kind of solidarity cheer. The memory rolled back
to take the edge off the high. In a car, moving with the freedom of the road,
Chuck sitting beside them, first in his car chair, then on the seat itself,
Charlie would sing out his happiness in that self-contained world of theirs.
“Us three against 'em all.” Since their son's ages merged in her mind, Chuck's
voice responding “One for all and all for one” spoke for all of them, child,
woman, and man. And she had added, “The three mosquiters.” Even the old
laughter echoed with unbearable clarity.