“No visiting hours. You can visit anytime, twenty-four-seven.”
“Oh. I’d like to visit Mr. Robert Dodd.”
“Bobby? Well, let me connect you to his room. Oh wait, it’s eight. He’ll be at exercise class. Bobby likes to keep in shape.”
“Is there a way I can make an appointment?”
“To visit?”
“Yes.”
“No need, just stop by.”
The drive would take her a little under two hours. It would be better than trying to explain over the phone, especially in light of the fact that she didn’t have a clue what she wanted to ask him about. The elderly are better in person anyway.
“Do you think he’ll be in this morning?”
“Oh sure. Bobby stopped driving two years ago. He’ll be here.”
“Thank you.”
“My pleasure.”
At the breakfast table, Max dug his hand deep into the box of Cap’n Crunch. The sight—her child going for the toy—made her pause. It was all so normal. Children sense things. Grace knew that. But sometimes, well, sometimes children are wonderfully oblivious. Right now she was grateful for that.
“You already got the toy out,” she said.
Max stopped. “I did?”
“So many boxes, so crummy a toy.”
“What?”
The truth was, she had done the same thing when she was a kid—digging to get the worthless prize. Come to think of it, with the same cereal. “Never mind.”
She sliced up a banana and mixed it in with the cereal. Grace always tried to be sneaky here, gradually adding more banana and less of the Cap’n. For a while she added Cheerios—less sugar—but Max quickly caught on.
“Emma! Get up now!”
A groan. Her daughter was too young to start with the trouble-getting-out-of-bed bit. Grace hadn’t pulled that until she was in high school. Okay, maybe middle school. But certainly, definitely, not when she was eight. She thought about her own parents, dead for so long now. Sometimes one of the kids did something that reminded Grace of her mother or father. Emma pursed her lips so much like Grace’s mom that Grace sometimes froze in place. Max’s smile was like her dad’s. You could see the genetic echo, and Grace never knew if it was a comfort or a painful reminder.
“Emma, now!”
A sound. Might have been a child getting out of bed.
Grace started making one lunch. Max liked to buy it at school and Grace was all for the ease of that. Making lunches in the morning was a pain in the ass. For a while Emma would buy the school lunch too, but something recently grossed her out, some indiscernible smell in the cafeteria that caused an aversion so strong Emma would gag. She ate outside, even in the cold, but the smell, she soon realized, was also in the food. Now she stayed in the cafeteria and brought a Batman lunchbox with her.
“Emma!”
“I’m here.”
Emma wore her standard gym-rat garb: maroon athletic shorts, blue high-top Converse all-stars, and a New Jersey Nets jersey. Total clash, which may have been the point. Emma wouldn’t wear anything the least bit feminine. Putting on a dress usually required a negotiation of Middle East sensitivity, with often an equally violent result.
“What would you like for lunch?” Grace asked.
“Peanut butter and jelly.”
Grace just stared at her.
Emma played innocent. “What?”
“You’ve been attending this school for how long now?”
“Huh?”
“Four years, right? One year of kindergarten. And now you’re in third grade. That’s four years.”
“So?”
“In all that time how many times have you asked me for peanut butter in school?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe a hundred?”
Shrug.
“And how many times have I told you that your school doesn’t allow peanut butter because some children might have an allergic reaction?”
“Oh yeah.”
“Oh yeah.” Grace checked the clock. She had a few Oscar Mayer “Lunchables,” a rather disgustingly processed premade lunch, that she kept around for emergencies—i.e., no time or desire to fix a lunch. The kids, of course, loved them. She asked Emma softly if she’d like one—softly because if Max heard, that would be the end of buying lunch. Emma graciously accepted it and jammed it into the Batman lunchbox.
They sat down to breakfast.
“Mom?”
It was Emma. “Yep.”
“When you and Dad got married.” She stopped.
“What about it?”
Emma started again. “When you and Dad got married—at the end, when the guy said now you may kiss the bride . . .”
“Right.”
“Well”—Emma cocked her head and closed one eye—“did you have to?”
“Kiss him?”
“Yeah.”
“Have to? No, I guess not. I wanted to.”
“But do you have to?” Emma insisted. “I mean, can’t you just high-five instead?”
“High-five?”
“Instead of kiss. You know, turn to each other and high-five.” She demonstrated.
“I guess. If that’s what you want.”
“That’s what I want,” Emma said firmly.
Grace took them to the bus stop. This time she did not follow the bus to school. She stayed in place and bit down on her lower lip. The calm façade was slipping off again. Now that Emma and Max were gone, that would be okay.
When she got back to the house, Cora was awake and at the computer and groaning.
“Can I get you something?” Grace asked.
“An anesthesiologist,” Cora said. “Straight preferred but not required.”
“I was thinking more like coffee.”
“Even better.” Cora’s fingers danced across the keyboard. Her eyes narrowed. She frowned. “Something’s wrong here.”
“You mean with the e-mails off our spam, right?”
“We’re not getting any replies.”
“I noticed that too.”
Cora sat back. Grace moved next to her and started biting a cuticle. After a few seconds, Cora leaned forward. “Let me try something.” She brought up an e-mail, typed something in, sent it.
“What was that all about?”
“I just sent an e-mail to our spam address. I want to see if it arrives.”
They waited. No e-mail appeared.
“Hmm.” Cora leaned back. “So either something is wrong with the mail system . . .”