JOANIE

We are responsible for the bad things that happen to us. My best friend during my two years of college, Mary Mucci, she used to say that all the time. Her boyfriend was a Christian Scientist—we all have our crosses to bear—and he talked like that. Her mother had a stroke, her little sister drank, and she developed this spinal thing, and the way they saw it, she wasn’t off the hook for any of it.

When I told my mother that Gary was history, the first thing she said was, Oh, my God, come over here, bring Todd, stay the night. The second thing she said was, What’d you do?

I took a week off at school. They understood. Nancy covered some of my classes. It was like maternity leave: abandonment leave. For a few weeks I was excused as lay reader at the church.

I talked to Father Cleary. My mother’s idea. I told him the same thing I told her. I had no idea, this woman’s name had never come up, things had been more or less fine between us. Shock to Joanie. Out of the blue. You think you know someone, etc.

The lies I told them are the lies I tell myself.

So now I sit at my desk and go through my address book. It’s not a pretty sight. Whole letters of the alphabet are empty. Not just Q’s and X’s, either. Where’re the F’s? Where’re the J’s? I don’t know anyone whose name begins with J? Some letters have, like, on a whole page, one uncle listed. I sit here with a new daily planner, amazed at the white space.

Shopping, sitting around, going to Mass, I feel pitiful. I should: I look pitiful. I’m heavier, got circles under my eyes. When I went back to school to finish the year, my kids knew. Every day was agony. I was being pitied by high school kids. Even now I get looks, like I’m walking around with a sign that says, I’m alone, I’m unhappy, don’t be mean to me.

Now it’s like people see me and say, What’s the opposite of envy?

I’ve gone out a little since. Though then I feel guilty: that’s even less time with Todd. He’s still a kid, and even on the best days he’s alone most of the time. I’m not the kind of mom to sit him down for a heart-to-heart over a plate of sugar cookies. Now he’s getting his father’s talent for shifting rooms to avoid people. Somebody comes over, he’s like a ghost: whatever room you’re in, he’s not. Sometimes I imagine a light like a little moon that won’t let us stray too far apart, a safety light he can carry in the dark when he’s alone.

What do I say to him that’ll help, that he can take with him, that’ll save him from trouble? What kind of advice that he wouldn’t formulate for himself?

What do I offer in place of his father?

Sometimes I want to get out and away from everything so much I think about a time Todd was playing outside and the dog couldn’t get to him, was stuck inside with me, and the way she stood there and would not give up, the way she gave me, over and over, that pure, insistent whine and that look at the door, like that was all she wanted.

I’m Catholic. I still have the little Nativity scenes and peekaboo Blessed Virgins from the spelling bees. When I don’t sin, I forget all about it. When I do, I remember.

The family’s helped. My mother, too, though she’s a pain in the ass. I feel bad for her. She keeps at it, keeps up her end, manages to have fun, even though the way she sees it, life’s a series of setups and disappointments. You can tell from the way she looks at things: the house, the addition they never put on, my father. Poor Nina’s family is too good-natured, pays its bills on time, never cuts corners, always grabs for the check, gets kicked in the ass for its trouble. Poor Nina just makes things worse for herself. And it’s true: it annoys her that she annoys people. She’s mostly sad, but her sadness reminds everybody else of hostility. When she says to me, Your father’s too good-hearted, it doesn’t sound anything like a compliment. I’m one of my mother’s disappointments, too, now. I’m just beginning to realize that.