Chương 10
“To me?”
“No.”
“Then don’t say it to me.”
Margaret looked up.
“What do you want?”
“I want you to understand that an apology does not buy access.”
“I understand.”
“I don’t think you do.”
“What would prove it?”
“Nothing.”
Margaret stared at her.
“Not today,” Elena said. “There is no thing you can do today.”
Margaret’s shoulders lowered.
It was the first time Elena had ever seen her accept a situation she could not organize.
Daniel spoke.
“That’s what you did to me.”
Margaret turned.
“What?”
“You thought if you found the right action, you could make uncertainty disappear.”
He held up the hospital papers.
“You declined. You chose. You closed the door.”
Margaret looked toward Claire’s front hallway.
Daniel said, “Now you want Elena to tell you the correct action so you can complete it and be forgiven.”
Margaret’s expression hardened briefly.
Then softened again.
“What am I supposed to do?”
Daniel shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
The answer frustrated her.
That was probably why it mattered.
Margaret left twenty minutes later.
She did not ask Elena to bring Noah.
She did not ask Robert to come home.
She did not touch Daniel.
At the door she looked at him.
“Are you going to contact Thomas’s daughters?”
“I don’t know.”
“If you do…”
He waited.
Margaret swallowed.
“Be gentle.”
Daniel’s face changed.
“I will.”
Three days later, Margaret mailed Noah a letter.
Elena recognized the handwriting.
She did not open it.
She placed it on top of the refrigerator.
For six days she left it there.
Then she called Margaret.
“I got the letter.”
Margaret was quiet.
“Thank you for telling me.”
“I haven’t given it to him.”
“I understand.”
“What does it say?”
“You can open it.”
“No. Tell me.”
Margaret took a breath.
“I apologized.”
“For what?”
“For throwing his food. For tearing his crown. For calling him a cruel name. For frightening him.”
“Did you explain why?”
“I said I was angry about things that had nothing to do with him and behaved badly.”
Elena waited.
“That’s it?”
“I told him he did nothing wrong.”
Elena looked toward the refrigerator.
“Did you ask to see him?”
“No.”
“Did you mention the trust?”
“No.”
“DNA?”
“No.”
“Blood?”
Margaret was silent for a moment.
“I told him I was wrong about what makes someone family.”
Elena closed her eyes.
“That’s a lot for a five-year-old.”
“I know.”
“No, I mean literally. He loses interest halfway through cereal instructions.”
A soft sound came through the phone.
Margaret might have laughed.
“I tried to keep it short.”
Elena looked toward Noah’s room.
He was building a blanket fort.
“I’ll read it first.”
“Of course.”
“If I think it puts pressure on him, he doesn’t get it.”
“Okay.”
“And if he wants nothing to do with you, that’s where it ends.”
A longer silence.
“Okay.”
Elena almost distrusted the absence of argument.
“Margaret.”
“Yes?”
“Why aren’t you fighting me?”
Margaret answered slowly.
“Because I’m beginning to suspect fighting you has not gone particularly well.”
Elena laughed before she could stop herself.
It was dry.
Brief.
Human.
Margaret laughed too.
Then neither knew what to do with that.
“I’ll let you know,” Elena said.
“All right.”
The letter was four paragraphs.
No excuses.
No mention of biology.
Margaret wrote that adults could be wrong in ways that frightened children. She wrote that Noah had done nothing wrong by sitting at her table, eating her food, wearing his birthday crown, or being Michael’s son.
The final line said:
You never have to forgive me to know I am sorry.
Elena read it twice.
Then she gave it to Noah.
He was still learning to read, so she read it aloud.
He listened from inside his blanket fort.
When she finished, he said, “Okay.”
Elena waited.
“That’s all?”
He crawled out.
“Can I have a snack?”
She stared at him.
Then laughed.
“Yes.”
Children occasionally granted adults the mercy of refusing to perform the emotional scene expected of them.
Two days later Noah asked whether he could draw Margaret a picture.
Elena said yes.
He drew a shark.
Margaret received it in the mail with no note.
She framed it.
Daniel found out because Robert sent him a picture of the framed shark sitting on Margaret’s kitchen counter.
Daniel forwarded it to Elena.
She stared at the photograph.
Margaret had placed it beside a silver vase.
The shark had purple teeth.
Six weeks passed before Noah saw Margaret again.
It happened at a public park.
Elena chose the place.
Claire came too.
Margaret arrived five minutes early and sat on a bench.
No cream silk.
No gold pendant.
She wore khaki pants and a pale-blue sweater.
Elena noticed the absence of armor and immediately disliked herself for reading symbolism into clothing.
Maybe the blouse was at the dry cleaner.
Noah saw Margaret from twenty yards away.
He stopped.
Elena crouched beside him.
“You do not have to go over.”
He considered her.
“Can we leave if I want?”
“Yes.”
“Right away?”
“Yes.”
“Even if she’s sad?”
“Yes.”
He nodded.
Then walked toward the bench.
Margaret stood.
Her hands remained at her sides.
“Hello, Noah.”
“Hi.”
“I liked your shark.”
“He has sixty-two teeth.”
“I counted sixty-one.”
“You missed one.”
“I probably did.”
Noah studied her.
Margaret waited.
Finally he said, “Why did you break my crown?”
Her face tightened.
Elena saw the instinct to explain move through her.
Margaret resisted it.
“Because I was angry and I did something mean.”
“At me?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“You hadn’t done anything wrong.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No.”
Margaret’s eyes filled.
“It doesn’t.”
Noah looked toward Elena.
She stayed where she was.
He turned back.
“Are you going to do it again?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
Margaret took a breath.
May you like
“Because if I get angry again, I can leave the room. Or stop talking. Or ask someone to help me calm down. Breaking your things is not something I’m allowed to do.”
Noah considered that.
