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when, two weeks after being hired, I locked myself out of my classroom, and Ren came along and helped me break in with a credit card. He whispered that one should never underestimate how handy some basic criminal skills are in this day and age. He advised that I look into crime as a possible auxiliary career, as he had.
She was brilliant, but she had no aptitude for mothering. It’s possible that when she gave birth to me, the hospital didn’t fully explain that I would now be her child forever and ever.
“I don’t want a big, wonderful life,” I say. “I want Ren.” “Do you hear yourself?” she says. “If he’s not going to bring you a big, wonderful life, then you don’t need him.”
“Maybe it’s time you waited something out without pushing the panic button.”
No one has called me back. Which is fine. I love the dependability of cooking; it’s way better than depending on human beings.
Standing there at the window . . . all I can think of is, What the actual hell is my life about? Am I really going to just live here in New Haven, alone with cooking projects, waiting to be employed? Am I going to always be looking out the window at other people having real lives, real love?
“Jesus, Jamie. That’s the kind of nice that can kill you if you’re not careful.”
“I don’t believe getting all these people under one roof is quite advisable, my dear.” “But why not?” “I somehow don’t think they all . . . fit together. Like, what would they have to say to each other?” “But that’s the way family gets made,” I say. “You mush people all together, and it turns out to be interesting and exciting . . . and sometimes real love and feeling bloom right there in front of you.”
And also I came to tell you that I love you,” I say, which is very brave of me because he didn’t say it first, and all my life I’ve been waiting for a man to say it first. All this guy ever said was that he was terrified that he might love me, and I think he may have even rescinded that at some point in our history.
And what is it that my heart truly yearned for? Chaos, upheaval, little children telling me poop jokes, and lying on a mattress surrounded by a bunch of toddlers and their peanut butter breath and their fat little hands holding on to mine, looking seriously into my eyes while serving me a bowl of rocks for lunch. And Jamie and Alice. Always Jamie and Alice.
I went over to Denise, not having the slightest idea what I could say to make this better for her, but then I took her hands in mine, because I understood something I didn’t know before—how grief and love can show up in the same moment and be quite comfortable together.
