Jennifer Greene - Yours, Mine & Ours

Amanda winced.

“Well. We’ll try not to be pigs for you,” Mike told her. “What would you kids like to drink?”

“Root beer,” his son answered, where Molly said, “Iced tea with a little sugar and a little lemon and two small ice cubes. But not too big a glass because I could spill it. And I can’t spill it because I’m being extra polite today. Thank you. Oh. I mean, please. Right, Mommy?”

Amanda glanced under the table. Nope, no room to hide there.

Teddy said to his dad, “What’s wrong with her?”

“Nothing’s wrong with anyone,” Mike said firmly, and stopped choking long enough to deliver drinks. Everyone but her suddenly impossibly fussy daughter were easily pleased by having only to pop a top.

For a short stretch, food captured everyone’s attention. Molly sat next to her, crossing her legs exactly as Amanda did. Teddy looked at them both across the table as if they were as fascinating-almost-as dead animals. He started a steady round of kicking, only once in a while kicking Amanda-which was far, far better, she thought, than the Armageddon that would follow if he accidentally kicked Molly.

But those few moments of good luck just couldn’t hold. She’d never seen anyone eat as much as Mike-easy proof he was nuts for lasagna. Both kids gained red stains on their clothes, but that was to be expected. One drink spilled. A nearby bee made Molly shriek. Their golden cat with the scary eyes attempted several times to leap on the table.

But it was almost over-and nothing too terrible had happened-until the subject of sex came up.

It wasn’t exactly Mike’s fault. Everybody was shoveling in food, and Mike took the occasion of quiet to murmur sotto voce, “So…did you have the chance to call your vet?”

She answered carefully. “Yes. At least, I reached her office. She’s not in for the next few days. The receptionist said there’s a type of morning-after pill. I’m not sure if it applies. We’ll see.”

“I told you I’d pay.”

“Not necessary,” Amanda started to say, but hearing the words we’ll see triggered a knee-jerk response in her daughter.

“Yeah. You know what we’ll see means. It means we’ll talk about it later. That’s what Mom said about what your dog was doing to our dog.”

“Now, Molly, I didn’t-”

Molly had hunched forward, was looking both male Conroys in the eye with her drama-queen face on. “I don’t get it. Why your dog would hurt my Darling. My dog is sweet and wonderful. I can’t believe you’d let your dog be so mean.”

“Honey,” Amanda said again, but she was drowned out by Teddy’s voice.

“My dog isn’t mean. My dog is the best dog in the whole world. Your dog must have done something,” Teddy informed her.

“My dog didn’t do anything. That’s why I named her Darling. Because she’s a darling. And your dog was hurting her.”

“He was not!”

“Kids,” Amanda said, “Neither dog was hurting the other. Molly, we talked about this.”

“No, we didn’t. You just said the dogs were playing. They weren’t playing. I don’t know why you’re not telling me the truth, but I know what the truth is this time,” Molly said, and turned again to Teddy. “I saw it. I saw your dog on top of my dog. I think your dog should say he’s sorry!”

“Hold it, both of you,” Mike said firmly. “Neither dog was being mean. Neither dog was hurting the other. What was going on was…”

He glanced at Amanda, as if asking permission. But as much as she wanted to make the situation better, right then, she was busy wiping up lasagna spots from the table.

So Mike said, “Listen up. That’s just what a boy and girl dog do when they really, really like each other.”

“Why?” Teddy asked.

“Yeah, why?” Molly echoed.

Again Mike looked at Amanda, this time more desperately. She reached for a spoonful of fruit salad. “Okay,” he said, “but you owe me for this.” And to the kids, he continued, “Because that’s how dogs express when they love each other and want to have puppies.”

“But I love puppies,” Molly said.

“Everybody loves puppies.”

“But you and Mommy were all upset. Why were you all upset if we were going to get puppies!”

“Because,” he said, and almost for sure Amanda felt a big bare hairy foot tapping her ankle, “your dog is very young. And we adults felt that maybe she was too young to have puppies quite yet. That it wouldn’t be good for her until she was a little older.”

“I know what you’re talking about now,” Teddy piped in. “It’s sex. I know all about it,” he informed Molly. “I’ve got a book and everything. I can’t read yet, but it’s got pictures of frog babies and duck babies and stuff. I’m probably going to learn to read next year.”

“I don’t care about sex and reading! I care about puppies!” Molly said.

“That’s just because you’re a girl and you’re stupid.”

“Stop right there!” Both parents said simultaneously. The potential for war simmered in the air, the kids glaring at each other nonstop…but then Teddy said he had to go to the bathroom.

“You’re not going to pee in the yard again, are you?” Molly asked with horror.

Teddy looked at his dad. “You told me I had to be nice. I been nice. I been totally nice. But I can’t be nice all the time.”

“Just go to the bathroom and we’ll talk about it later.”

When Teddy headed into the house, Amanda jumped up and started heaping dishes back in the picnic basket. Her daughter was trying to engage Mike in a further discussion of sex and puppies-Molly had a backbone of steel, and when she wanted something, such as puppies, she could be relentless.

There’d be another chance. Hopefully. Maybe. Conceivably. But right now, keeping the kids together any longer was like rubbing poison ivy on bare skin. The gathering tonight needed a fast curtailment. Amanda figured that the faster they got out of there, the better.

“So,” Molly continued to grill Mike, “how come people have babies? How come people can’t have puppies instead?”

A crash from just inside the house startled the three of them. Mike shot out of his seat, and Amanda was right behind him. Crashes and four-year-olds were never a good sign.

Amanda only had to step into Mike’s living room to grasp the big picture. Near the fireplace, a table lamp had fallen to the ground, its shade askew, its lightbulb and ceramic base in pieces. A tennis ball was in sight. And Teddy was standing in the bathroom doorway. The instant he heard his dad bang through the screen door, he started crying.

“It wasn’t me, Dad! I didn’t do it! It wasn’t me!”

Amanda watched Mike charge over to his son-initially, she was unsure whether he was angry or annoyed or frustrated. But his response conveyed none of those things. He just swiftly scooped up his son and lifted him away from the sharp shards.

Teddy heaved sobs in between extensive explanations to his dad.

“It was a woman who did it. She came in the front door. I said who are you and you’d better get out of here. But she picked up Slugger’s ball and threw it at the lamp just like that. I couldn’t stop her. I wasn’t strong enough. I said, I’m going to get my dad! But then she ran away! It wasn’t me, Dad! It was her! The woman!”

Mike set his son on a chair-firmly-with a glance at Amanda.

“Where’s your broom or vacuum?” she asked.

“I’ll take care of it.”

“I’m telling you the truth, Dad. She had yellow hair. And she was tall. And she had a big purse. And big, big, big earrings.”

“Teddy,” Mike said quietly, sternly. “Your mother was not here.”

“It wasn’t my mother. It was just a woman who looked like her. And had earrings like her. I told her and told her, go away and I’ll call my dad. But she still just picked up Slugger’s ball…”

Amanda figured it was an ideal time to tiptoe away. She grabbed Molly and the picnic basket and took off for home.

It was another four hours before she could call the day quits. All through the kitchen cleanup and story reads and putting Molly to bed, she kept thinking about Mike-about how he was with his son.

They both had their share of parenting challenges. But she liked how he’d handled Teddy with gentle, calm firmness. How his first thought was to rescue his son from potential harm, not to scold. And how Teddy showed no fear of his dad, only absolute, secure trust, even when the squirt had been inventing an incredibly wild story and had to know there’d be some punishment for throwing the ball in the house and breaking the lamp.

She folded the dish towel, poured a glass of sun tea, turned off lights and ambled outside. Instead of choosing a chair or the chaise, she perched on the deck steps.

The sun had just dropped out of sight, but there was still ample light to see the backyard and the plantings she’d done that morning. Robins pranced in the grass. A dove cooed from the shadows.

Slowly, the sky deepened, softened, darkened. She sipped her tea, set it down, stretched out her legs, relaxed. Stars popped into the sky, which was hardly a surprise on a cloudless night…but suddenly there seemed to be stars in the grass, as well. She sat up, confused, figuring the twinkling lights on the ground had to be some kind of optical illusion. The tiny lights switched on, off, one after the other, all through the yard. Five, then a dozen, then more.

It was crazy. She wandered into the yard, feeling the tickly brush of soft grass beneath her bare feet, and extended a hand…something touched her, then lit up. Another one of those impossible “stars.”

“Fireflies. Amazing, aren’t they?”

She whirled around, saw Mike’s shadow from his deck, and immediately felt her pulse kick up. It was because she wanted to talk to him, of course. It wasn’t chemistry. It was that debacle at dinner that she wanted to discuss.