“Mom?”
She didn’t turn around.
He put pushed clothes in a suitcase.
“Mom… what are you doing?”
“I can’t do this anymore, Aaron.”
I laughed nervously.
“It’s okay. So don’t do whatever this is.”
He stopped packing enough to look at me.
His cheeks were dry, his look sharp as the flint.
That scared me more.
“I’ve spent my life raising a child.”
I passed a hand to my face.
“What?”
“I’m not going to start over with three more,” she said.
From the baby room came another burst of crying.
Mom grabbed a sweater.
“I want to live while I still can.”
I stared at her.
“That’s your daughters, Mom. They have three months.”
“I know.” I stopped breathing.
“Then stop packing.”
He closed the zipper of the suitcase.
I followed her downstairs.
“Mom, you are exhausted. Sleep. I’ll take care of it tonight.”
“No.”
“One night.”
“Aaron.”
“One day, then,” he pleaded. “We will call someone tomorrow. We will solve it.”
He came to the front door.
I stood in front of her.
“Mom, please… I need you.”
His hand was pressed around the handle of the suitcase.
For a strange second, he stopped.
He looked up at the ladder.
Then to me.
I remember thinking I was about to change my mind.
For 20 years, I recorded that pause as the last piece of my mother that almost stayed.
Then he looked away.
“I’m sorry.”
He came out.
I stayed in the driveway until his car disappeared.
Behind me, three babies were still crying.
***
Chicago stopped importing before I even closed the door.
The next morning, I called the company.
The human resources woman sounded stunned.
“It hasn’t even started.”
“Lose.”
“We can delay your start date.”
“I can’t move.”
“Is there an emergency?”
I looked at the room.
Three Moses. I stopped breathing.
Three bottles cooling on the counter.
A baby screaming because apparently the other two had taken a suspiciously long break.
“Yes.” Saliva I swallowed. “The hay.”
That was the end of Chicago.
People loved the phrase “he gave up.”
They said it constantly.
Nothing about becoming a father happened in an orderly manner.
There were social workers.
Temporary arrangements.
Background checks.
Cut dates.
One woman gently asked, “Aaron, do you understand what he will ask to raise three babies?”
Behind her, Grace spit out formula for my shirt.
