Chapter 11
Bernice had taught Marina.
Marina taught Adam.
Each time she showed him something, he felt gratitude and shame in equal measure.
He also began understanding how much of those first weeks existed without him.
There were photographs on Marina’s phone.
Nell asleep under the yellow blanket.
Nell’s first bath.
Marina holding her in the pediatrician’s waiting room.
Bernice beside the stroller outside the hospital.
Rachel carrying grocery bags into the duplex.
Elise asleep in an armchair with a bottle warmer glowing beside her.
His mother, Carol, holding Nell while Marina showered.
Adam appeared in none of them.
One afternoon, his mother came while he was there.
Carol Bennett was sixty-four and rarely raised her voice.
She had raised two sons after Adam’s father died at fifty-three and possessed the particular calm of a woman who had long ago learned that panic solved nothing.
She kissed Nell.
Then she looked at Adam.
“I need a word.”
Marina immediately said, “You can use the kitchen.”
Adam followed his mother.
Carol folded her arms.
“Were you with that woman in Florida?”
Adam glanced toward the living room.
“Mom.”
“That’s a yes.”
“How do you know?”
“Marina told me nothing.”
He blinked.
“Then—”
“I have eyes.”
Adam leaned against the counter.
“I messed up.”
Carol’s mouth tightened.
“You left your wife one week after major surgery.”
“I had work.”
“Stop using your job as camouflage.”
His head lifted.
“I flew down there when your father was dying,” Carol said.
“What?”
“Cleveland. Remember?”
Adam did.
Barely.
He had been thirteen.
His father had been receiving treatment.
Carol had worked payroll for a manufacturing company.
“I went for a meeting that could have saved my position,” she said. “Your father told me to go. I spent four hours there and drove back the same night.”
“That’s not the same.”
“No. It isn’t.”
Her eyes hardened.
“I wasn’t sleeping with someone else.”
Adam looked away.
Carol lowered her voice.
“Marina called me from the emergency room.”
His head snapped back.
“She did?”
“She was embarrassed.”
“Embarrassed?”
“She apologized for bothering me.”
The words landed like stones.
“She said, ‘I know Adam is busy.’”
Carol shook her head.
“I wanted to break something.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“She asked me not to.”
“Why?”
“Because she had already called you five times.”
Adam closed his eyes.
His mother continued.
“She was lying in a hospital bed three weeks after giving birth to your daughter, and she was protecting you from the inconvenience of hearing how badly you had failed her.”