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The judge steps forward, takes my arm. "I know you want to talk to her, Sara, but I need to talk to her." He walks forward, extending his hand. "Hi, Kate. I'm Judge DeSalvo. I was wondering if I could maybe speak to you for a few minutes? Alone," he adds, and one by one, everyone else leaves the room.
I am the last to go. I watch Kate lean back against the pillows, suddenly exhausted again. "I had a feeling you'd come," she tells the judge.
"Why?"
"Because," Kate says, "it always comes back to me."
About five years ago a new family bought the house across the street and knocked it down, wanting to rebuild something different. A single bulldozer and a half-dozen waste bins were all it took; in less than a morning this structure, which we'd seen every time we walked outside, was reduced to a pile of rubble. You'd think a house would last forever, but the truth is a strong wind or a wrecking ball can devastate it. The family inside is not so different. Nowadays I can hardly remember what that old house looked like. I walk out the front door and never recall the stretch of months that the gaping lot stood out, conspicuous in its absence, like a lost tooth. It took some time, you know, but the new owners? They did rebuild.
When Judge DeSalvo comes outside, grim and troubled, Campbell, Brian, and I get to our feet. "Tomorrow," he says. "Closing's at nine A.M." With a nod to Vern to follow, he walks down the hallway.
"Come on," Julia tells Campbell. "You're at the mercy of my chaperonage."
"That's not a real word." But instead of following her, he walks toward me. "Sara," he says simply, "I'm sorry." He gives me one more gift: "You'll take A
The minute they leave, A
We go inside, just our family, and A
A
Jesse sits down on the other side. The three of them in one spot; it makes me think of the Christmas card photo we would take each October, balancing them in height order in the wings of a maple tree or on a stone wall, one frozen moment for everyone to remember them by.
"Alf or Mr. Ed," Jesse says.
The corners of Kate's mouth turn up. "Horse. Eighth round."
"You're on."
Finally Brian leans down, kisses Kate's forehead. "Baby, you get a good night's sleep." As A
And then, when they are all gone, I sit down beside my daughter. Her arms are so thin I can see the bones shifting as she moves; her eyes seem older than mine.
"I guess you have questions," Kate says.
"Maybe later," I answer, surprising myself. I climb up onto the bed and fold her into my embrace.
I realize then that we never have children, we receive them. And sometimes it's not for quite as long as we would have expected or hoped. But it is still far better than never having had those children at all. "Kate," I confess, "I'm so sorry."
She pushes back from me, until she can look me in the eye. "Don't be," she says fiercely. "Because I'm not." She tries to smile, tries so damn hard. "It was a good one, Mom, wasn't it?"
I bite my lip, feel the heaviness of tears. "It was the best," I answer.
THURSDAY
One fire burns out another's burning,
One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish.
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Romeo and Juliet
CAMPBELL
IT'S RAINING.
When I come out to the living room, Judge has his nose pressed against the plate glass wall that makes up one whole side of the apartment. He whines at the drops that zigzag past him. "You can't get them," I say, patting him on the head. "You can't get to the other side."
I sit down on the rug beside him, knowing I need to get up and get dressed and go to court; knowing that I ought to be reviewing my closing argument again and not sitting here idle. But there is something mesmerizing about this weather. I used to sit in the front seat of my father's Jag, watching the raindrops run their kamikaze suicide missions from one edge of the windshield to the wiper blade. He liked to leave the wipers on intermittent, so that the world went ru
"You want the shower first?"
Julia stands in the open doorway of the bedroom, wearing one of my T-shirts. It hits her at mid-thigh. She curls her toes into the carpet.
"You go ahead," I tell her. "I could always just step out on the balcony instead."
She notices the weather. "Awful out, isn't it?"
"Good day to be stuck in court," I answer, but without any great conviction. I don't want to face Judge DeSalvo's decision today, and for once it has nothing to do with fear of losing this case. I've done the best I could, given what A
The truth is, as A
Instead of heading back to the bathroom, Julia approaches. She sits down cross-legged beside me and touches her fingers to the plate of glass. "Campbell," she says, "I don't know how to tell you this."
Everything inside me goes still. "Fast," I suggest.
"I hate your apartment."
I follow her eyes from the gray carpet to the black couch, to the mirrored wall and the lacquered bookshelves. It is full of sharp edges and expensive art. It has the most advanced electronic gadgets and bells and whistles. It is a dream residence, but it is nobody's home.
"You know," I say. "I hate it, too."
JESSE
IT'S RAINING.
I go outside, and start walking. I head down the street and past the elementary school and through two intersections. I am soaked to the bone in about five minutes flat. That's when I start to run. I run so fast that my lungs start to ache and my legs burn, and finally when I ca
Once, I took acid here during a thunderstorm like this one. I lay down and watched the sky fall. I imagined the raindrops melting away my skin. I waited for the one stroke of lightning that would arrow through my heart, and make me feel one hundred percent alive for the first time in my whole sorry existence.
The lightning, it had its chance, and it didn't come that day. It doesn't come this morning, either.
So I get up, wipe my hair out of my eyes, and try to come up with a better plan.