The Dark Side Read online

  Constance and George enjoyed seeing all of their grandchildren in one room, and George joined his grandsons at the TV and teased them about their haircuts and baggy pants, and asked even six-year-old Seth about his girlfriend, which made him laugh.

  Brad talked to George for a few minutes when he could tear himself away from the TV after a touchdown. He enjoyed talking to Constance, who was an intelligent, elegant woman, down-to-earth and pleasant. She and Pam had a great deal in common, with Pam’s therapy practice as a marriage, family, and child counselor. She was still in practice with the same partners in Santa Barbara twenty-three years after they’d moved there.

  Zoe’s sisters-in-law, and she and Cathy, hovered around Jaime, and brought out the birthday cake that looked like the face of a doll. They took pictures while Jaime blew out her candles, and Constance watched, and almost stepped forward as Jaime’s long dark hair hung near the flames. Connie was afraid her hair would catch fire, which Zoe didn’t seem to notice. But Fiona was standing closer and pulled her hair back for her as she blew the candles out and then laughed happily. She had a big vocabulary for a two-year-old and enjoyed her party. She got pink icing all over her face. There were no children there other than her cousins, because she had no real friends yet, except the children she played with at the park. She had another year before she would start preschool. Zoe was applying to all the best ones, and talking to her sisters-in-law at the party about how hard it was to get in, and how extensive the applications were.

  “It was easier to get in to Yale, and medical school at Duke, than applying to preschool,” she said, they all laughed and agreed that it was true.

  “I had to prostitute myself for reference letters for us. No one cared about Tommy. They wanted our tax returns and a bank statement. They hit us up for a donation the minute he got into the school, and they haven’t stopped asking us for money ever since,” Amelia said.

  After the cake had been served, Zoe’s father came up and put an arm around her. He loved seeing her happy, and Austin had been telling him about the work she was doing at the shelter and how much she had accomplished. And then she and Pam chatted for a while. She was relieved to see Zoe happy too. She had been so dark and depressed as a teenager that Pam had worried about her for years. But she had blossomed into a beautiful, content woman, and it was obvious how happy she was with Austin and their little girl. She was a woman fulfilled after her lonely youth.

  After she disappeared for a few minutes, Zoe came back and scolded the men in the group. “Who left the toilet lid open?” She asked as though she expected a full confession, but didn’t get one. “That’s the most dangerous thing you can do with a toddler in the house,” she informed them, and they looked startled. “A two-year-old can fall in the toilet headfirst, since they’re top-heavy, and suffer a ‘near drowning,’ and when they get stuck head down in the water, they drown. I learned that in the Red Cross first-aid class I took last year. So the message is, ‘Next time, gentlemen, put down the lid, so Jaime can’t fall in.’ ” It was an unnerving announcement that stunned everyone into silence, and Austin lightened the moment by teasing her that the apartment was so thoroughly childproofed that he couldn’t get into a cupboard or a drawer.

  “I call her the safety warden,” he said, and everyone laughed as he gave them humorous examples. A few minutes later, Seth, the youngest grandson, spilled his ginger ale, and Constance went out to the kitchen to get something to mop it up. She looked under the sink when she saw the cabinet open, with no child lock, and found all the household poisons and chemicals there, within easy reach for Jaime. There was no lock on the door at all, and she was stunned by how dangerous the products were, in sharp contrast to how careful Austin had just said Zoe was. There was always a strange contradiction between her theories about safety and the reality of Jaime getting hurt so frequently.

  Connie grabbed a handful of kitchen towels and a sponge and went back to the living room to clean up the ginger ale her grandson had spilled. But what she had seen in the kitchen made her wonder just how childproof their home actually was, and how careful Zoe really was. It all sounded good, but what was the truth? If Jaime ever got in to the cabinet under their kitchen sink and ingested any of it, she’d be dead. And there was no gate on the kitchen door either to keep her out.

  When Constance came back from leaving the wet towels in the kitchen, she saw Jaime winding the long strings from the balloons around her neck. Fiona was in the kitchen putting away the cake. And Zoe was deep in conversation with Cathy Clark about whether or not vaccines really caused autism, and how dangerous was it not to get children vaccinated at all, but then you couldn’t get them into a school. And could they really force you to vaccinate your child? Meanwhile, Jaime was continuing to wind the sturdy ribbons from the balloons round and round her neck, and Connie walked across the room and stopped her, and unwound them before she could strangle herself. No one had been watching her at all, until Austin saw his mother intervene, and walked over to thank her.

  “She can get in to mischief faster than anyone I know,” he said, looking sheepish. “She put peas in her ears last week, and we had to take her to Cathy to get them out.” Cathy overheard him say it, and turned to Constance with a grin.

  “Ah yes, the great pea caper. I had another patient who put them up his nose. Children can be very creative with food.” They laughed about it, but Constance didn’t think that peas could kill Jaime, ribbons wrapped around her neck and household bleach could. There was a strange dichotomy between what they said and what they did. It made Constance uneasy, and in a quiet moment when no one else was paying attention, Constance said something to Zoe about the toxic household products under the sink.

  “I wasn’t snooping, I was looking for some cloths and a sponge to clean up the mess Seth made,” Constance said in a soft voice no one else could hear. “And I found all your really dangerous cleaning products there. You need to childproof the cabinet or put a lock on it, before Jaime gets in to it.” That would be a tragedy, not just another trip to the ER, they both knew.

  “She has to learn what’s dangerous, and where she can’t go. It’s about respecting boundaries,” Zoe said, as Constance stared at her in disbelief. “I respect her intelligence. She has to know I trust her. We can’t lock everything up. She could fall into the toilet by accident, but she would have to choose to open those bottles. She knows she’s not supposed to do that, and she respects my rules on that.”

  “I wouldn’t trust a two-year-old to make that choice,” Constance said firmly, feeling panic rise in her throat. What were they thinking, to trust a two-year-old to respect their rules and learn boundaries, with poisons within easy reach? She wondered if Austin was just as foolish as Zoe about it. She hoped not. They needed to empty that cabinet in the kitchen immediately. She wanted to do it herself, but she didn’t dare interfere in their home. She felt as though her granddaughter was living with a time bomb waiting to go off. What if she played with any of those toxic substances? Constance wanted to cry as she thought of it. “But thank you for your advice, Connie,” Zoe said and walked away as Austin approached.

  “What was that about?” he asked his mother in an under voice. He could see that Zoe was annoyed. She covered it well, but she looked furious at her mother-in-law.

  “I just discovered that you keep all your toxic household products under the sink without a lock. I told her she needs to put a child lock on the cabinet or move them somewhere out of reach.”

  “I know, she thinks Jaime has to learn to respect what’s dangerous and stay away from it. It makes me nervous too,” he admitted, feeling awkward and as though he was betraying his wife. “Maybe she’s right. Jaime doesn’t go near it. Zoe told her that she can’t.”

  “She hasn’t gone near it yet. You can’t trust a two-year-old with rules like that. Hell, you can’t trust a fifteen-year-old with them. You and your brothers got into our li
quor cabinet every chance you got. But bourbon wasn’t going to kill you. Rat poison and bleach would. Austin, be sensible for heaven’s sake. She’s an adventurous kid, and she’s only two. Move that stuff.” Connie looked at her son with fear in her eyes.

  “I will. I promise. I’ve been meaning to.” He had intended to move all of it, but Zoe had made such an issue of it, so he didn’t. But he knew his mother was right. Zoe had blind spots about some things, and respect, even of a two-year-old, was all important to her. It was a theory he didn’t espouse, like not having gates on the stairs, which had led to a broken arm.

  “Thank you,” Constance said quietly, and went back to talking to Pam.

  He walked out to the kitchen then, looked under the sink, and realized that his mother was right. He hadn’t checked it in a while and there were products in easy reach and plain sight that could kill a grown man, let alone a two-year-old. He didn’t hear Zoe come up behind him, and she was glowering at him when he stood up and turned around.

  “Did your mother complain about me to you? She told me to move the products under the sink. Jaime never goes near them. She knows she’s not supposed to.”

  “Come on, sweetheart. She’s only two. This is like the gate on the stairs. I understand how much you love and respect her, but some of those theories are downright dangerous and just don’t make sense, like this one. Let’s not take the chance.”

  “Fine. Do whatever you want,” Zoe said, and walked out of the kitchen in a huff. But the way she did it and her icy look spoiled the party for him then and there. They went through the motions after that until all the guests left. And then he went out to the kitchen and put it all on a high shelf. He had noticed that Zoe was chilly with his mother when his parents left.

  Zoe saw what he was doing and didn’t comment as she got Jaime’s dinner ready.

  “You don’t need to be mad at me,” he said gently. “My mom was right on this one.”

  “She doesn’t like me, that’s what this is about. She never has.”

  “That’s not true,” he defended his mother, hating the position he was in between the two. “She loves you, but she’s the original safety warden, and she’s old school, and so am I. The new theories are fine when they deal with how you handle bedtime, or discipline your children, not when dangerous substances are involved. I always stick up for you and your theories, Zoe. But this isn’t about nursing or preschool, these are poisons.”

  “And Jaime’s never gone near them, has she? She understands.”

  “And what if she doesn’t, or forgets? This is a crazy conversation and it makes no sense. Don’t make me the bad guy here, or my mom, it’s common sense. You’re worried about the goddamn toilet lid, this is just as dangerous. Why can’t you see that?”

  “I respect my daughter’s intelligence. You don’t.”

  “Then leave the toilet lid open and tell her not to put her head in it,” Austin said, raising his voice. He hated their fights, but it was crazy talking to her about issues like this, especially with their daughter’s safety on the line. He didn’t usually disagree with her, but this time he did.

  “If she winds up headfirst in the toilet, it will be because she fell in, not because she decided to put her head in the toilet.”

  “Do you realize how crazy this sounds?” he said, frustrated beyond belief. “You gave a beautiful birthday party for her,” he said, changing the subject and she looked at him, still angry at his mother for causing the problem by bringing it to his attention.

  “Thank you,” she said icily. “I thought so too, and I enjoyed it, until all this came up.”

  “Why don’t we just let it go? The stuff is put away. That’s good enough.” He tried to be pleasant about it to calm her down.

  “Good enough for who? Your mother? Is she coming back to check?” Zoe was being nasty about it, which she often did when she was wrong.

  “No, good enough for me, Zoe. If that matters to you.” He sounded so sad as he said it that she felt bad, and walked out of the room. She looked unhappy too. They had left Jaime alone the whole time they were arguing, and they went to look for her and found her in her room, playing with her toys. She looked like a dark-haired cherub as she gazed innocently up at them.

  “Did you like your birthday party?” Austin asked her as she nodded with a smile.

  “Cake…blow…I’m two.” She held up two fingers then, to show how old she was. She was irresistible, she was so cute, and even her five male cousins had thought so. They didn’t see her often, but they liked her.

  One of his brothers lived in New Jersey, and the other in Connecticut, in the suburbs. He and Zoe had agreed that they wanted to live in town, even with a child. It was more stimulating for them, and would be for Jaime one day. They lived in an apartment on Charles Street instead of a house out of the city, but they didn’t need more than that with only one child. Having only one was a decision they had stuck with and were glad they’d made. They both knew they couldn’t have handled more, and didn’t want to try. Jaime was enough for them. He had started later than his brothers. Austin had just turned forty-four, and Zoe was thirty-six, and didn’t want to be pregnant again or go through the early months with a newborn and all that it entailed. Jaime was easy now.

  Zoe gave Jaime a bath after the party, and Austin read her a story and put her to bed. They ate leftover sandwiches from the birthday party, and Zoe was still chilly when they went to bed. His mother’s criticism and interference had rankled her, and she didn’t like Austin’s reaction to it. But neither of them brought it up again.

  They watched TV in bed for a while without speaking, and he finally put an arm around her and tried to pull her closer, but she resisted him. It always took her longer to get over their arguments. She viewed them as betrayals, particularly this time with his mother involved and Zoe’s policies in question.

  “I hate fighting with you,” he said gently, and she didn’t answer for a minute.

  “Then don’t.” It sounded simple but it wasn’t, and it always amazed him that he could love someone so much, respect her profoundly, and disagree with her so vehemently at times, particularly about their child. She had very different ideas than he did about freedom and respect and what to teach them, even though their fundamental values were the same about morality and honesty, and good and bad.

  “I like your dad a lot,” he said to change the subject.

  “He means well, although he made some tough decisions a long time ago, but they were right for him. It almost killed my mom when he left her, though. I think he was drowning with her. I can see now that Pam is better for him, although I didn’t see it then. They just up and left when they moved to Santa Barbara. They always invited me to come and visit, but my mom made it clear that if I went, I was betraying her, so I stopped going. My parents had a lot of baggage after Rose. She doesn’t talk about it, but I think my mom still does. I don’t think you ever get over losing a child. She didn’t, although I think she’s better now.” Austin nodded, not sure what to say. It was delicate ground for all of them, and a minefield of sorts, with some very old mines buried deep in the ground. “I like your father a lot too,” but not Austin’s mom. She smiled at him then, there was tension between them that was hard to explain. Austin knew his mother sensed something about Zoe that worried her, although she’d never fully put it into words. But it came through and Zoe felt it too, no matter how diplomatic Connie was. And she’d only worried about Zoe since Jaime was born.

  They watched TV together for a while, and Zoe fell asleep. He lay in bed and looked at her, loving her as he always had, more each year, but he knew that part of her would always be a mystery to him. No matter how much he loved her and tried to understand her, there was a part of her he could never reach.

  Chapter 8

  Two weeks after Jaime’s birthday, Austin had to go to the office on a Saturday to work
on one of the custody cases he was handling for Zoe. She took Jaime to the playground near their apartment, and allowed her to run around to let off steam and get some exercise. Jaime loved hanging around the big kids and watching them, and she ran as fast as she could to impress a group of older girls, who paid no attention to her. They had bigger things on their mind than a two-year-old in a pink down jacket. Jaime was fascinated by them, and Zoe didn’t tell her to slow down. She was having fun, as Zoe chatted with some of the mothers she saw there regularly. One of them had a brand new baby. It was his first time out and all the mothers were admiring him. He was a strapping ten-pound boy, her fourth. Zoe had no pangs of envy as she looked at him. All she could think of was that he would be a nightmare to nurse. Jaime had been hard enough with her reflux and apnea, falling asleep at the breast, and vomiting. She enjoyed Jaime at two a lot more than she had in the early days. Eventually, Jaime came over to look at the baby too. Jaime looked at her with wide eyes and pointed at him.

  “Baby, Mama? For Jaime?” Zoe laughed and shook her head. “No, you’re all I need. You’re my baby.” She walked her toward the swings then, but all the ones for babies and toddlers were taken. The only empty one was one of the big kid swings that someone had just vacated, and Jaime looked at it longingly.

  “Big girl swing?” she asked hopefully, and usually Zoe said no, but it looked like it was going to be a long wait, there were a lot of toddlers and mothers in line for the baby swings, so she relented.

  “You can go on the big girl swing, but you have to hold tight.” There was no way to attach her to it, and no safety belt, but Jaime had a good grip, and she knew how to pump, and there were interlocking rubber pads under it that fit together like a puzzle, so she wouldn’t get hurt if she fell.

  Zoe sat her on it and gave her a push, and Jaime squealed with delight, and pumped with her short toddler legs.