34
HENRY SAYS THERE IS
SOMETHING DIFFERENT
ABOUT HIS MOTHER
When she heard the front door open, Cassy dropped the lid of the pot and ran out to the front hall. Henry put his bags down and grinned. “Hi, Mom.” Was this her Henry? Deeply tanned, his hair streaked with blond, and with the stubble of a week’s beard, the image of Cassy’s own father flashed through her mind. But no, it was Henry. Taller, his shoulders perceptively bigger, this lean and rugged young man were her son.
She threw herself at him and was surprised by the strength, the sheer size of his embrace as he stooped to receive her. “Sweetheart,” she said, smelling Ivory Soap in his hair. She stepped back, holding his hands.”Look at you,” she murmured, shaking her head. “Just look at you!”
He grinned again, teeth flashing against the brown of his skin.
“Oh, Henry, come on!” Cassy said, pulling him by the hand to the den. She closed the door and pushed him back against it. “I knew it” she cried, lunging for a pencil on Michael’s desk. “You’re taller than your father now. Here, stand up straight, sweetheart.” She marked off his height and pulled him away from the door to look at it.
“Huh,” Henry said, grinning.
Cassy got a ruler out of Michael’s desk. “Let’s see,” she said, holding it up to the door, “if Michael’s six one and three quarters, then you’re... Six foot three? Henry—”how dare you grow so tall!” she said, hugging him around the waist, pressing the side of her face against his chest. “How can my baby be six foot three?” She leaned back to look up at him. “I’m going to have a hell of a time trying to spank you now.”
After Henry took his stuff to his room, he rejoined his mother in the kitchen.”Mom, where did the bench press come from?”
She turned away from the stove. “Is it the right kind?”
“Yeah, but where did it come from?”
She smiled. “Well, I was in Herman’s the other day...”
Henry sat on a stool and talked to Cassy while she cooked dinner. When, she wondered, had Henry learned to talk so freely? Surely he hadn’t talked this much before; her son was suddenly a veritable chatterbox. And such news!
—Henry had saved a thirteen-year-old camper’s life. The kid had fallen out of the raft in the rapids and nearly drowned. Henry dove in and dragged him to safety—”but not without injury. (“Got it on a rock,” he said proudly, showing his mother a horrendous, though fading, slash mark across his chest.) (His hairy chest.)
—Henry had saved over one thousand dollars from his salary.
—Henry wanted to try to get into Yale. That was where his boss, Evan Scott, had gone.
—Henry had a girl friend named Jennifer. (If Cassy was wide-eyed at this announcement, she was even more so when he told her she was a year older than he was.
“She’s going to be a freshman at Sarah Lawrence.”
“How convenient,” Cassy said, wondering if Henry remembered their talk last year about birth control. (Condoms. Good Lord.)
“Her parents live in Greenwich. I said I’d call her tonight at eleven.”
(Saving money, making decisions, needing condoms, calling girls on the telephone at eleven o’clock at night? Whatever happened to trading baseball cards with Skipper?)
He talked straight through dinner, elaborating. Cassy listened to everything but was continually distracted, fascinated by this young man who claimed to be her son. He was so... so grown up. And he was so much a Littlefield! She saw her father’s forehead, eyebrows and nose; she saw her mother’s hair and ears; she saw her own eyes looking back at her, and she saw her own mouth and skin. The only trace of Michael she could see was in Henry’s jaw and hands. In the middle of dessert, savoring his ice cream sundae, Henry gave his mother a very strange look.
“What?”Cassy asked him, eyebrows high.
He swallowed. “You look different.”
“I do?”
He nodded, eyes still on her, shoveling another spoonful of ice cream into his mouth. He pointed the spoon at her (a Michael gesture), swallowed, and said, “Did you do something with your hair or something?”
“No.” He frowned and Cassy laughed. “Well, do I look better or worse?”
“I don’t know—just different. Younger maybe.”
Cassy threw her head back and laughed.
Henry grinned. “Yeah, that’s it. You look younger.”
Cassy laughed again. “Well, I’m hardly going to argue with that opinion. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Who is this man? Cassy wondered. Well, whoever he was, he was welcome here. In his room, while he unpacked and Cassy watched from on top of his bed, they got around to the subject of his father.
“He’s in Connecticut, at the house,” Henry said, pulling clothes out of a duffel bag and throwing them in a pile on the floor.
“I know,” Cassy said. “We’ve talked.”
“That’s what he said.” Henry glanced at his mother. “Are you still going to that place with Mr. Wyatt?”
“Uh-huh,” Cassy nodded. Henry was finished with that bag and tackled another.
“Do you think I could go with you one night?”
Cassy was surprised. “Sure,” she said. “I’d love it.”
“He came out again. To camp, I mean,” Henry said without looking at her. “He was in pretty bad shape.” He dragged the bag over to his stereo and started transferring cassettes into a storage rack. Evan talked to me about it afterward. About Dad’s drinking, I mean.”
Cassy started to say something but didn’t.
“Evan’s father had a problem too.” Pause. “He’s dead now.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Cassy murmured, “I don’t think it’s going to come to that.”
Long pause. “So, Mom,” Henry said, dragging the bag back to the pile, “what happens now? Dad said he doesn’t want to come home right now.” He shook the remaining clothes out of the bag and dropped it, turning around to look at her. “Or won’t you let him?”
“Both, “Cassy said. “I want him to get help to stop drinking,” she said, lowering her head, “and he doesn’t want to. So...”
“But if he does—get help, I mean—he can come home, right?”
Cassy hesitated. Finally she nodded. “If he stops.”
“Good,” Henry said, walking over to the bench press in the corner, “that’s what I told him.” He straddled the bench and lowered himself down onto it. “This is really great, Mom. Thanks.”
Cassy smiled.
Henry sighed, looking up at the ceiling. “Evan said he wished his mother had thrown his father out. He said that maybe if she had his father might have stopped.” He sat up suddenly, turning to look at Cassy. “You love him, Mom, don’t you?”
“Yes,” she said.
He bit his lip and then lay back down. After a moment, “I love him too. But, “he paused, “I almost hated him when he came out to Colorado.” He paused again. It was awful, Mom. And in front of everyone.”
Cassy closed her eyes.
“Evan and I had to carry him into his motel room.”
“I’m sorry,” Cassy said quietly.
Silence.
“Evan says it’s a disease. Do you think that’s true?”
Cassy opened her eyes. “Yes,” she said. Whoever you are, Evan, she thought, thank you for helping my son.
“Mom, it’s for you!” Henry called from the kitchen. “It’s Alexandra Waring.”
Cassy came in from the living room. She started to say that she’d pick up in the bedroom, but stopped herself, thinking, Don’t do anything different. And so she sat on a stool in the kitchen, picked up the phone, and watched Henry fix himself a snack.
“Hello?”
“Hi.” Alexandra’s voice was in that low, rushing tone that Cassy had recently become so familiar with.
“Hi.”
“How’s it going?”
“Great.”
“Mom—sorry. Do we have any mustard?”
“If there isn’t any in the door of the refrigerator, look in the pantry. Second shelf.” Back into the phone, “Hi. Sorry.”
Alexandra was laughing. “It’s so strange to hear you in your mother voice again.”
“Again?”
“That’s the way you used to talk to me.”
“Oh, boy,” Cassy sighed, smiling. Henry came back, holding the mustard up.
“You can’t talk, can you?”
“That’s right,” Cassy said, overly cheerful.
Alexandra laughed again. “This is going to be something to get used to.”
“Right,” Cassy said.
“He sounds great,” Alexandra said. “How does he look?”
“He’s six foot three now,” Cassy said, smiling at Henry. He flexed his muscles for her benefit. “And as strong as an ox.”
“Yeah,” Henry growled, going back to building his sandwich.
“How was your meeting today?”Cassy asked her.
“Great! We’re moving to nine o’clock the week after next.”
“Hey, that’s terrific,” Cassy said, holding the phone under her chin and moving over to Henry. Alexandra related some details of the meeting while Cassy nibbled on the cold cuts Henry had out on the counter.
“You’re gonna get fat,” Henry whispered.
“Never,” Cassy mouthed, tossing a piece of liverwurst in her mouth with a wink.
“Cassy?”
“Yes?”
“I know this isn’t a good time,” Alexandra said.
“Well,” Cassy said.
“When can I see you?”
Cassy moved away from Henry and slipped back up on the stool. “I’m not sure.”
“Friday?”
“Can’t.”
“Saturday night?”
“Um, I think so. Henry,” Cassy said.
“What?”
“I’m invited to a dinner party Saturday night. Would you mind?”
Henry shrugged. “No. Skipper’s probably coming over.”
“Saturday’s fine,” Cassy said into the phone.
“Terrific,” Alexandra said. “Now I have something to look forward to.”
Cassy laughed.
“I know you can’t say anything,” Alexandra said, “so I’ll just say it. I love you.”
“Yes,” Cassy said brightly—shaking her head, “no,” to Henry, who was holding ham out to her.
“Yes, she says,” Alexandra said, laughing. “This is going to take some getting used to. All right, I’ve got to get back to work. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Yes.”
“Sleep well.”
“You too.”
“I love you.”
“Yes. I’ll see you Saturday. Bye-bye.” Cassy hung up the phone. “Think you’ve got enough food there? You won’t starve?”
“Yeah.” He cut the sandwich in half, no easy feat since it was nearly six inches high. “So you guys are friends now?”
“Who?”
“You and Alexandra.”
“Uh, yes,” Cassy said, coming over to start clearing the counter.
“I’ll do that,” Henry said.
“No, sweetheart, I’ll do it. It’s your first night home.”
“Dad really likes her.”
“I know,” Cassy said.
“She isn’t mad at him or anything, is she? I mean, he didn’t do anything—”
“No, Henry,” Cassy said, stretching up to kiss him on the cheek. “Alexandra thinks a lot of your father.”
Henry picked up a half of his sandwich with both hands. “I’ll tell him that,” he said, taking a bite.