Chapter 7 - ETHAN LEARNED HOW TO BE SIX
Ethan’s first supervised afternoon with Noah lasted ninety minutes.
He planned too much.
A private museum tour.
Lunch at a restaurant with a three-month waiting list.
A driver.
A gift.
I rejected all of it.
“We’re going to the park.”
“The park.”
“Yes.”
“In February?”
“Children survive weather.”
Ethan looked personally offended by public recreation.
But he showed up.
No charcoal suit.
Jeans.
Wool coat.
No driver.
No security visible.
Probably security three blocks away.
I chose not to ask.
Noah brought two toy dinosaurs.
One for himself.
One for Ethan.
“This is a Carnotaurus.”
Ethan examined it.
“Looks angry.”
“He has tiny arms.”
“That seems inefficient.”
Noah looked delighted.
For forty minutes, they played dinosaurs badly.
Ethan kept asking rules.
Noah kept changing them.
Eventually Ethan said:
“You cannot suddenly make my dinosaur fly.”
“He evolved.”
“That is not evolution.”
“You died.”
Ethan looked at me.
“Is he always like this?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Something shifted.
At the end, Noah asked:
“Are you rich?”
I nearly choked.
Ethan answered:
“Yes.”
“How rich?”
“Enough.”
“Grandpa says you build buildings.”
“Yes.”
“Can you build me a dinosaur house?”
Ethan looked at me.
I shook my head immediately.
“No dinosaur house.”
He turned back to Noah.
“Apparently not.”
“Why?”
“Your mother is powerful.”
Noah accepted this.
Then:
“Did you love Mom?”
The air changed.
I stared at the playground.
Ethan answered carefully.
“Yes.”
“Do you still?”
My entire body went still.
Ethan looked at me.
Then back at Noah.
“I care about your mom very much.”
Smart.
“But grown-up relationships are complicated.”
Noah frowned.
“That means yes.”
I covered my face.
Ethan laughed.
Then the laughter faded.
Noah asked:
“Why weren’t you there when I was a baby?”
We had prepared for this with the therapist.
Ethan crouched.
“Because I believed something that wasn’t true.”
“About Mom?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“That she didn’t want me to know.”
Noah looked at me.
“Mom wanted you?”
I answered:
“I wanted him to know you existed.”
“Did Grandma Eleanor stop it?”
Children hear more than adults think.
I nodded.
“She made choices that hurt all of us.”
Noah thought for a long time.
“Is she dead?”
“Yes.”
“Can you still be mad when someone is dead?”
Ethan and I looked at each other.
“Yes,” we answered together.
Noah smiled.
May you like
That was the first thing we had agreed on naturally in seven years.
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