She Has Your Eyes (17 page)

I held up my hand and made a V with my fingers. “Two weeks,” I said, and smiled bravely.

“Two weeks,” she echoed.

“If you need anything—
anything
—even just to talk, call me, OK?”

“OK.”

The choice to hug Mom at that moment was a no-brainer, but I knew what she was thinking—she didn’t want to be treated any differently. Our hugs in the past had always been obligatory. But hadn’t
that
been the false gesture rather than the hug I
wanted
to give her now? The one she finally seemed willing to accept, and even reciprocate? Wasn’t now the time for us to treat each other differently, like the mother and daughter we should’ve been? So cancer was the catalyst for that change. So we shouldn’t have waited for it to come to this. Nevertheless, it had.

“Thank you for coming, Andrea.” She said the words formally, as if she were thanking a business associate for meeting with her, but I could see what was behind them. “Today was a good day.”

“Yes, it was. Thank you for telling all of us together, Mom. I really appreciate you doing that.”

She hugged me, and it didn’t feel like all the others. No, this was an
embrace
. Willing. Accepting. The little girl in me who had longed for her mother to hug her like that all these years wanted to cling.

“Thank you, Mommy,” I heard myself say in a sob. It was the little girl’s voice.

“I’ll see you soon, dear,” she said. Never in her life had she ever used a term like that for me. In fact, I’d never heard her call anyone “dear” except my father.

I sat on the deck for the entire duration of the ferry ride back to New London; that “dear” warmed me the whole time. I felt as if Sam and my father were sitting on each side of me. And yet, I also felt horribly alone.

chapter twenty-two

The house was dark except for the light in the stairwell and the bedroom. David was sitting on the bed, back against the headboard, reading. He looked up when I entered the room, luggage in hand, and he peered over his reading glasses at me.

“Dev,” I said. And with that, the dam broke; I dropped the bags at my feet and erupted in tears. The strength to move had drained from me.

David hopped off the bed and rushed to console me. “What is it?”

I threw my arms around him, shoving aside the resentment I’d been harboring for the last twenty-four hours. “She has cancer,” I cried. “My mother is going to die of cancer.”

He sucked in a breath, followed by a remorseful groan. “Oh, Andi. Oh,
cara
, I am so sorry,” he said as he stroked my hair and kissed my head. “I am so, so sorry.” He pulled me even tighter to him. He was perhaps the only person who understood how I felt. The nature of David’s relationship with his father had been similar to mine with my mother—he could do no right in his father’s eyes; his father berated and even bullied him, disapproved of his interests and lifestyle. Only when his
father got cancer did they make amends with each other—not that everything was suddenly all sewn up, but they’d finally reached a mutual understanding. They’d finally been able to
see
each other. And they’d come to realize that despite everything, they loved each other.

He was still Devin back then. Still the escort. In fact, the first time we ever slept together was the night of his father’s funeral, when he’d been at his most vulnerable state, and I held him and rocked him and comforted him and we made love. It was the first time I’d made love, with him or anyone else. I’d had a lot of firsts with Devin.

“I’m sorry,” he said yet again, softly, gently, and I knew it was for more than just my news. He’d been doing the same as I—sulking, being mad at me for not being there to support him, not seeing things his way. And maybe he was thinking of his own father at that moment. Thinking about the wasted years, feeling the pain of wanting so desperately to be loved and accepted by someone, and then losing him when he finally had been.

I don’t know how long we stood in the middle of the room, me weeping and him holding me. I hadn’t cried like that in a long time. Just as my knees were about to give out, David moved me to the bed and sat me down. He dabbed the tears from my face with his thumb. I gazed at his eyes—his magical, sienna eyes—and felt myself jumping into them, desperate to get lost inside. I could see every part of his wounded self: the lonely child, forgotten son, brokenhearted spirit. They were greeted by my own inner wounds. Next thing I knew I was kissing him, and we were pulling each other’s clothes off and panting heavily, moving in rhythm to our breathing, my legs coiled around him, his arms cradling me,
our moist lips moving across our skin, and our moaning, calling out, releasing, giving in, giving over, and collapsing into each other’s arms.

“I love you,” I whispered in the dark, succumbing to the heaviness of my eyelids, the exhaustion of my muscles.

“I love you too,” he whispered back.

chapter twenty-three

“So tell me all about your day with Wylie,” I said the following morning as I loaded up the blender with assorted fruit for a smoothie. We’d lingered in bed and then taken a shower together, and I finally felt ready to face reality again, determined to be supportive of David and put our fight behind us.

“You sure you want to talk about this?” he asked. “There’s a lot to discuss regarding your mother.”

“We’ll get to it,” I assured him. “First, Wylie. Did you have a good time? Did she?”

“It was slow going at first, but I think we finally got into a groove. She’s a really good kid, Andi. She’s spunky, smart, inquisitive. Reminds me of you in some ways.”

I grinned in gratitude. “What else?”

“She’s like me in the museum. You know, totally loses track of time, enters a painting and doesn’t wanna come out.…”

I chuckled. “Yeah, I know.”

“You’d think being a teenager she’d be bored or impatient, but not a bit. I’m turning her on to the Impressionists.”

I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of jealousy. Going to museums had always been something David and I did with each
other, as far back as when he was an escort and we were spending time together despite our arrangement specifying that we weren’t supposed to outside of our tutorials. And although I had developed an aesthetic appreciation, both for the art and David’s passion for it, I’d never gotten to his level. That he could now fully share this with Wylie, a natural, jabbed at me.

David rambled on. “The drive back to Hartford was especially great. We talked about so much—growing up, school, friends… all the things I missed. The time just flew. She’s thinking about becoming an art major,” he said. “You have no idea what that means to me.”

“I do, actually.”

His face softened into a smile as he looked at me lovingly. “Yeah, you do. You’re the only one who does. Anyway, we’re going to try to work out a schedule where we can meet on weekends, alternate between who visits whom, and we’ll Skype a couple of days a week too.”

“That’s good,” I said, “but we’ll need to coordinate
our
schedules too. I’ll be driving to Long Island more frequently in the coming weeks. Joey, Tony, and I are going to take turns taking Mom to chemotherapy.”

“What about your classes?”

“I’m meeting with Jeff today to discuss it. Mom’s chemo is on Wednesdays, which, selfishly speaking, couldn’t suck more regarding my Monday–Wednesday–Friday teaching schedule. I’ll have to drive down on Tuesday, stay the Wednesday, then drive back up on Thursday and resume class on Friday. It’ll be a roller coaster. To say nothing of the fact that if she has an adverse reaction, I can’t leave her.”

“Semester’s almost half over. Maybe you can get someone to cover for you for the remainder and then take next semester off.”

I cringed as my mind flashed to memories of when Sam died and I had to take emergency leaves of absence, first in the fall just after the accident, and again in the spring after I went back too soon and had a colossal meltdown in front of my students. The very thought sent shivers down my spine, and I shuddered.

“We’ll see,” I said. “I’ll talk to Jeff and see what he thinks.” As chair of the English Department at NU, my good friend Jeff Baxter had been super-supportive when Sam died. I knew he wouldn’t want a repeat of my behavior from back then—I sure as hell didn’t—but I also knew he’d want what was best not only for my students but for me.

“Don’t forget about your promise to tutor Wylie,” he reminded me. He sounded like a parent rather than a lover.

“Of course I haven’t forgotten,” I said.

As David and I were both getting ready to leave for our respective appointments, I said, “You know, we still haven’t set up a schedule for our lessons. Remember, painting in exchange for pizzas?”

He looked at me apologetically. “Kinda got sidetracked, huh.”

“Yeah.”

“Still wanna do it?” he asked.

“I do.”

He put his phone in his pocket and grabbed his keys. “OK. Tonight we’ll sit down and plan everything out—Wylie, Genevieve, painting, and pizza.”

“Oh, and there’s one other thing,” I said, remembering my mother’s special request. “I’ll bring it up later.”

We walked to our cars; David opened my door for me and gave me a kiss good-bye before letting me slide inside.

“Hey, Dev, do you ever miss your escort days?”

The question came out of the blue, and surprised me just as much as it did him.

“I don’t know,” he said, scratching his head. “Not really. Maybe once in a blue moon. I can’t explain it. Why?”

“I don’t know. I guess I was just wondering if there was anything you miss about it. Maybe I was thinking of us—you know, the way we were back then.”

“Do
you
miss it?” he asked.

I pondered the question. “I really don’t know.”

He kissed me again. “See you later?”

I nodded and kissed him back. “I’ll likely be at Perch later if you’re free,” I said. “I haven’t looked at my manuscript in ages.” And with that I stepped into my car and strapped myself in. David closed the door for me and followed me out of the driveway and down the street in his own car.

Jeff and I sat in the campus dining hall and caught up on small talk and department gossip before I eased into my news. But before I could, he beat me to the punch.

“So is that an engagement ring on your finger?” he asked.

“Oh,” I said, reflexively holding up my hand. “It is, yeah.”

He grinned. “Congratulations. Sorry, did I just steal your thunder? Is that what we’re here for?”

“I wish it were, but no. There’s something else. Work-related.”

“What’s up, kid?”

I took in a breath and spilled it out: “I got some bad news this weekend. My mother has cancer.”

Saying it out loud only seemed to get harder.

“Shit, Andi. I’m so sorry.”

I swallowed the impulse to start blubbering. “Thanks, Jeff. It came as a shock. Thing is, I want to help take care of her. Take her to chemo, and whatnot. Her appointments are on Wednesdays, which means—”

“Yeah, you’ve got a Monday–Wednesday–Friday rotation. Are you asking to be let off for the remainder of the academic year?”

“No, I was thinking more along the lines of going home once a month and just getting you or someone else to cover the Wednesdays.”