A Different Kind of Normal (6 page)

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Authors: Cathy Lamb

BOOK: A Different Kind of Normal
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“Hey, Boss Mom, look at this!” Tate pointed to a counter on his blog, a golden red harvest moon hanging right outside his window. “Says I had twenty-five people read my blog. Twenty-five, twenty-five! And a bunch of them answered the question about why some people are crappy. Look!”
I could tell he was tickled to death that people were actually writing to him. I read the answers. Some were touching, some thoughtful, others a rant on mean people. “This is excellent. You’ll be famous in no time.”
“It’s starting, it’s all starting.” He sighed heavily, grinning at me. “I don’t know how I’m going to handle all these lusty women coming after me when fame hits, I don’t know how I’m going to manage my experiments and continue my study of the frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal lobes with women fighting for my delectable body and my hand in marriage. . . .”
“I’m sure you’ll manage.”
“It’s going to take all I have to keep my purity.” He clutched his chest, head back, the drama king. “My virginity, my innocence.”
“Use restraint, my dear, control those hormones.”
“I’ll try, Boss Mom, but these women with their libidos, once they read my blog they’ll barely be able to control their passions and seductive natures. It’ll be a battle of epic proportions.”
“Battle politely with the women, then. Good night, Tate.” I ruffled those curls.
“Love you, Boss Mom.” He turned back to the blog, then said, “I hope I’m here in the morning. There’s probably women lurking outside my bedroom window right now propping a ladder against the house to sneak me away, plotting a way to get me alone and naked. . . .”
Tate has always been incredibly funny.
It has definitely helped him through the not-so-funny stuff.
 
“He said you intentionally killed his father.”
It felt like a dead rhino had been dropped on my heart. “You’re kidding.”
“No.” Sydney Grants peered at me over the rim of her red-framed glasses, her elbows on the table in her office.
Sydney’s parents moved here from Ghana when she was three. She wears super-bright colors and prints, she’s as tough as a redwood, and her kindness and graciousness is unending. As the manager of our hospice unit, and a hospice nurse for fifteen years before that, she knows it all.
“Why is Dirk Hassells saying I intentionally killed his father?”
“He says that not enough was done to save his father’s life, he thinks we didn’t try all available treatments, his father was railroaded into hospice, he had more time to live, and, my favorite ludicrous comment—you overdosed him with morphine in the weeks before he died on purpose and that’s what killed him.”
I felt outrage wrap tight around my body. I’d been up for much of the night with another patient, had her settled and cared for, rushed home, and sent Tate off to school. And now this. On no sleep.
“Dirk’s threatening legal action.” Sydney swirled a pen in her hand. “Says he’s going to hire an attorney.”
“Sydney, you know that Mr. Hassells, Senior, had liver cancer. It had spread over his whole body. It was as if he had a piranha inside his gut. The doctors, specifically Dr. Baharri, said there was nothing that could be done.” I drummed my nails on her desk and tapped my leather boot. Today I was wearing a burgundy-colored loose blouse and jeans. “Dirk is saying I overdosed Mr. Hassells on morphine? That’s ripe.”
“Yes. The baboon obviously doesn’t know how we use morphine. He says he was not informed of his father’s true condition, that he was given hope that he would live, that had he known death was imminent, he would have visited more often, that you were neglectful in your duties not to tell him.”
“Dr. Baharri told him. I told him. The sister, Beatrice, the one who’s a teacher, divorced, five kids, the one caring for her dad all the time, told him, too. He told me he didn’t believe his sister because she was always, and I quote, ‘hormonal, emotional, whiny, the weaker sex has a hard time dealing with this kind of stuff.’ He also told Beatrice, ‘I’m busy, I don’t have the easy career of a teacher and I can’t drop my clients, my important responsibilities, and come now. He’ll be fine.’ ”
Sydney said, “We have the son on the white horse charging in.”
“We sure do.”
The son on the white horse charging in is a now-and-then occurrence in hospice circles. Basically, the wife, or the daughters, or the long-term daughters-in-law, in most cases, do all the work of tending to a dying patient.
The son is “too busy.” The son will not take the time out of his day to help the dying family member. The son will not take a leave from work as his sisters do. The son will not lose sleep, do housework at the parent’s house, manage the medicine, the doctor visits, the treatments, the post-care, arrange for help, handle the bills, stay up all night, and arrange for hospice.
No, the women do all that.
And when the health of the patient starts to deteriorate, out the son will come, flag waving, armor on, charging in. He’ll save the day! Ta-da! Bring in the hero! Bring in the genius! He’ll insist on care that is ridiculous to insist on.
Dirk was,
sort of,
the son on a white horse charging in. He was a short man with a permanent smirk who had a vengeful, personal agenda behind all of this.
Sydney read my mind. “I think, though, this is mostly about you, Jaden.”
“Yep. It is.”
Why? Because designer suit–clad Dirk, he of the slicked-back hair, hit on me each time he was at his father’s house, and I rejected him. At first, Beatrice told me, he rarely came to visit his father. But one time, a few months before Mr. Hassells died, he met me.
He was not married, no kids, but he dated women a lot. I know, because he told me. “I have a high sex drive.” He asked me out, asked me to go upstairs alone with him, asked me to his home and tried to have sexually charged conversations with me, as in, “I gotta have sex every day . . . let’s tell each other the best time we ever did it . . . this one time, in San Francisco, I met this woman in a bar and I. . . .”
I put up a hand and said, “I don’t want to hear it, Dirk.”
He smirked. “You don’t?”
“No.”
“Jealous, Jaden? Don’t be. We can make our own memories. It’s a hot story, though. You’re hot.” His eyes wandered down my body, as if this would be a turn-on. “One bright blue eye, one bright green eye. Red hair. You’re two women in one, we could have a three-way.”
“No, we could never do that,” I told him. “That would disgust me.”
And it began. When he knew I was coming, he’d show up.
One time he stood in front of me, blocking my way to his father’s bedroom. “I think you and I would be good together, Jaden. Don’t play hard to get, it’s a waste of time.”
I said, “I’m not playing hard to get, but I see that you are the kind of man who will insist on believing it because you won’t be able to accept that I’m not the slightest bit interested in you. This is the time for you to take with your father.”
“Want to take a ride in my Porsche? You can feel my engine.”
“That’s the stupidest pickup line I’ve ever heard, and no. No, I don’t want to go for a ride in your car that is a reflection of your tiny penis, with fancy wheels that are obviously a reflection of your balls. Now get in there and pay attention to your dad.”
He was furious with me. He was a sick, controlling man who did not take rejection well. In the four weeks before Mr. Hassells died, Dirk visited once.
Sydney sighed as we talked about Dirk. She had been well aware of what I was dealing with. She had offered to replace me, but Mr. Hassells senior, Beatrice, her kids, and I were already bonded and I couldn’t abandon them.
“We have a man who is ticked off you wouldn’t sleep with him so he accuses us of poor medical care and you of killing his father. What a shark.”
I held my head in my hands. I was infuriated, the anger that always bobs close to the surface of my life exploding like a firecracker. I didn’t sleep with Dirk—he accuses me of murder.
“We’ll meet with Dirk as a group here. If he calls in the attorneys, we’ll meet again . . . blah blah blah. You know how it goes.”
“Yes, I know.” I was exhausted thinking about it.
“Jaden, I will stand behind you, a soldier with a loaded gun, only my loaded gun will be my mouth, you know that.” She reached across her desk and patted my hand. “Don’t worry.”
“I’ll worry.”
It’s always a bad day when you’re accused of murder.
4
I
live outside Tillamina, Oregon, in a white, two-story house with a wraparound front porch, built in the late 1800s by Faith and her husband, Jack. They built the home as their country home . . . and as a place for Faith and Grace to hide, if need be, from two dangerous men, who they thought might hunt them down later.
Faith named the home and surrounding land London Gardens because she missed her family in London and knew, because of the witch hunt, that she could never return. She and Jack planted the maples that line the driveway up to the house. Faith also planted thyme, sage, rosemary, parsley, oregano, lavender, Canterbury bells, hollyhocks, lilies, irises, sweet peas, cosmos, red poppies, peonies, and rows and rows of roses, as her mother and grandmother had in England.
She later gave London Gardens to their oldest daughter. It’s been handed down to the oldest daughter ever since, which is how Grandma Violet came to own it.
Tillamina is in the middle of Oregon wine country with a view of the purplish coastal mountain range in the distance. We have ten acres with the same flowers and herbs Faith planted, a huge field filled with red poppies, an old apple orchard, pine and fir trees.
My mother was raised in this country house until she hopped on a Greyhound bus for Hollywood at eighteen to become an actress, her sights on bright lights, her dreams on the stage.
I was born in Los Angeles, but we visited Grandma Violet and Grandpa Pete each summer. We moved to London Gardens permanently when Brooke, Caden, and I were teenagers after many terrible nights, and one horrendously terrible night, but before the terrible night to end all terrible nights.
My mother’s father, my grandpa Pete, was a police officer and a farmer who had moved to Oregon from Arkansas, wanting to get out of the heat and humidity and the poverty his family was stuck in.
He met his wife, Violet, my grandma, when she was dancing topless in a forest near here, her auburn curls flying in the wind. Unfortunately a bunch of kids saw my half-naked grandma and the kids’ mothers called the police. She was dancing topless because that’s what her witchly spell required for romance.
Grandpa Pete was the arresting officer called out to investigate the topless lady.
“He was a handsome fellow. I was happy to have my shirt off, Jaden. I wanted him to see the full package. And him standing there in his uniform with his gun.” Grandma Violet chuckled, her blue eyes sparkling. “I thought it was magical. My spell for a man worked! I used a bit of lavender, the thimble and needle, a pinch of thyme and rosemary, and the love chant the women of our family have always used, back down to our royal lineage. It was prophetic, spiritual, the wind blowing right by, ruffling his hair. He blushed, that man with the handcuffs blushed, and he was polite about my heavenly nudity. . . .” She sighed. “I knew I would marry him.”
There was a bit of a scandal with their relationship, because of the nudity part, and some hushed rumors about the witch stuff, but it was Oregon, liberal even then, and no one paid too much mind, especially because Grandma Violet had several brothers, loggers, who threatened to “log some heads together if you peoples don’t shut up.” Plus, Grandma Violet, even as a young woman, was “the healer,” whom people went to for help with their aches, pains, and “diseases and demons of the emotional mind.”
London Gardens was medium-sized when it was built, grand for the time, but my mother added a second family room, with a woodstove, and almost wall-to-wall windows and French doors about twenty years ago. We also gutted the kitchen ten years ago, since it had been twenty years, and pushed it out fifteen feet to create a nook for eating.
My country-style kitchen is white, blue, and yellow. White cabinets line the walls, as does open shelving. A huge butcher-block island stretches down the middle of the kitchen with two red lights in the shape of roses centered above it. The counters are granite and the tiles on the backsplash have been painted with pictures of oregano, thyme, rosemary, parsley, chives, and red poppies by an artist friend of mine.
Our home has high ceilings, wood floors, three fireplaces, and wide white trim. The walls are painted light blue, light green, and light yellow, the colors flowing into each other. We have a creaky staircase, an attic with a pitched ceiling, and a secret room.
Upstairs, there are four large bedrooms, three of which have four poster beds, two of which have grand fireplaces. The fourth bedroom is called Tate’s Experiment Room.
I love that my family has lived here for well over a hundred years.
I have kept my ancestors’ antiques, including armoires, a roll-top desk, and a hutch in the kitchen to display four generations of pretty, flowered plates and teacups. I also have a hundred-year-old rocking chair in my living room that I was sitting on when he said, “It’s time,” and not long after that she killed him.
On the walls I have hung a collection of quilts made by the women of the family. A painting of our barn by Grandpa Pete hangs in a hallway, near framed photographs by Grandma Violet of red poppies and Canterbury bells. I have repainted an old white picket fence and hung it across one wall of the dining room. I’ve used old doors for tables, and a weather vane with a horse that fell off the roof is now hanging in a corner.
I like thinking of Faith’s or Grace’s hand on the same stair rail as me, or their faces, their auburn hair, like mine I’m told, reflected in a window I look out of today. Faith had blue eyes, and Grace had green. In an odd coincidence, I have one of each.
I like wondering what my ancestors were daydreaming about as they lay on the steel daybed. I like thinking about what treasures they stored in the nine-drawer dressers. I like reading through the collection of old books we have and wondering which were their favorites. I like that I have used the old sink in the kitchen to plant daffodil bulbs and that the old brick chimney that fell down was used to create a brick walkway to the house. I like looking at the same scenes of our property out my windows, hung with white, wispy lace curtains, that they did.
But what caught your eye in all that description? It was the secret room part, right?
There’s an area between Tate’s Experiment Room and the stairwell. It’s walled-off space. It’s odd, a quirk in the house. I asked my grandparents about it about a year before Grandpa Pete died and they laughed, their eyes crinkling, their weathered hands flying up in merriment.
“It’s where we keep our ancestors.” Grandpa Pete laughed, always loving a good joke. “Maybe I’ll end up in there, too!”
“The family secrets are all written down in there!” Grandma Violet whispered. “It’s where we keep the magic wands and the skeletons!”
“And the thimble,” my mother sang out.
“The original lace handkerchief is there, too.” Grandma Violet giggled.
“Don’t forget the needle and the gold timepiece,” my mother said.
“Maybe even Faith’s necklace with the cross, heart, and star charm.” Grandpa Pete wiggled his eyebrows. His own wife wore cross, heart, and star charms on a necklace, the same as my mother, Brooke, and I, the same as all our women ancestors.
“I’m hoping that the knife with the
P
on it from Faith’s brother that she used for the killing is there, too. Now there’s a piece of history!” Grandma Violet gushed. “And the book with the black cover.”
When the laughter settled down, Grandma Violet explained that the secret room was a “family story, family lore,” and I took it to mean it was a joke. There were
definitely
no skeletons in the secret room she told me. “Only the beginning of our witchly history . . . at least that’s what my grandma told me and her grandma told her!”
 
“Basketball tryouts are coming up, Boss Mom.”
“No.”
“Pleeeasssee—”
“Tate, stop. We’ve had this discussion.” I was making Mighty Taco Soup for dinner and dumping the whole thing in the Crock-Pot. Mighty Taco Soup has many ingredients including green onions, sour cream, regular onions, avocado slices, cheddar cheese, tortilla chips, chili beans, etc. I serve it in giant blue mugs with a hunk of bread and butter.
“Let’s have the discussion again, Boss Mom. I crave the discussion, I live for it. If you discuss basketball with me, I’ll discuss the history of herbs and spices in India with you. One of your most boring topics.” He muttered that last part, then spun two basketballs, one in each hand. He was still sweating from practicing outside for two hours. He’d shot, he’d dodged imaginary opponents, and he’d run lines, back and forth, back and forth. I’d heard him announcing his own fictional game. “Folks, Tate Bruxelle has the ball, three seconds left, he’s at half court, is he going to shoot? He is! Can he make it? Tate Bruxelle, three points! Wins the gaaaammmee! The crowd goes wild! It’s insane in here!”
Tate practices basketball daily, for hours. And hours. For years he’s done this.
“We don’t need to discuss basketball because my answer, miraculously, is the same.” I put down the cheddar cheese I was grating, my impatience rising. Outside the maple leaves, many bold colors blending in one leaf, were swirling around, a fall wind churning the tree branches.
“You’re afraid I’m going to get hurt. Like this.” He slammed the basketballs together as if they were two heads. I cringed.
“I know you’ll get hurt. It’s basketball. There are huge, rough kids out there—”
“Hello, Mom? Have you looked at me? I’m huge. I ate twelve tacos yesterday, six chocolate chip cookies, and a pop the size of my butt. I’ll be careful.”
“Well done, I’ve always wanted a kid who could eat twelve tacos, and do not compare pop to your butt. Do not say butt. Say buttocks.” I minced an onion. Onions and butter and garlic. Where would we all be without those three ingredients? “You can’t be careful in sports. Those guys are all-out for blood. They want to win.”
“I want to win, too. I can shoot, you’ve seen me. It’s my Road Runner eye, it’s bionic! Three-pointers. All the time. I’ve graphed it all, I’ve studied my own hands, studied NBA players’ hands, the arch, where the fingers are—”
He had. He had slowed down the shots on TV of NBA players and studied them down to the minutia, he had done some complicated graph, funneled a whole bunch of numbers into a computer program he designed, then applied it to himself across various spots on our outdoor basketball court. “I want to try out for the team—”
The onions made my eyes tear up. “My job as your mother is to love you and keep you safe as much as I can. You are not playing basketball because that ball could smash you in the head, or you could fall and hit your head, or run into a wall or the announcers’ table headfirst, or you could be hit so hard you smash your brain on the floor and then you’d have a problem with your shunt.”
“I can’t ever play basketball on the off chance that something might go wrong because I have a shunt? How is that living my life?”
“It’s
living
your life, carefully, that’s what it is.”
“That’s not the way I’m going to do it.” He bounced both basketballs hard on the floor, one time, his temper rising, too. “I don’t want to live carefully. That sounds boring, it sounds like a waste, it sounds like something someone old and scared would do. You have always done this, Mom, you hang over me. You’re Lurch.”
“Who is Lurch?”
“Lurch. You know, the cartoon character I used to draw who was green and always paying attention to everybody’s business and telling people to be careful? He worried about a thousand things and predicted bad things that would never, ever happen.”
“I always had a fondness for Lurch.”
“Mom, you’re a black cape over me and I can’t breathe.”
I knew he was miserable about my decision. I was miserable for him and I was miserable about being accused of killing someone. “I like capes. You can breathe. You’re breathing now. I can see it.”
“Mom. I have to be able to breathe on my own.” Tate slammed both basketballs together again. “Even if I die early, I have to live. It’s not just about basketball, it’s about taking the time I have and doing what I want, being what I want, and what I want to be is a basketball player.”
“Do not talk about dying early.” I shuddered.
“It’s my life.
Mine.
”
“It’s mine, too. You’re my son and I love you.” I was well aware that I smelled death in my greenhouse the other night when I crushed a few mint leaves in my hand. “Go to your experiment room and combine chemicals or build another giant model of the human brain with all the parts labeled. I have to make a couple of calls while I’m making your favorite soup.”
“I don’t want to do my experiments tonight. I want to talk about basketball—”
“Tate!” I yelled, slamming a wooden spoon on the butcher-block island. “No, no, no, a thousand times no.” I bent my head. “I’m sorry I yelled. I had a tough day.”
“Me, too, Mom. I keep having tough days because I’m being suffocated and can’t hang out with the other guys and be part of a team—”
“Off you go, son.”
“Mom—”
“Now!”
“Man!” He slammed the balls down again and stomped up the stairs while I fought against myself. I am not deaf to his reasoning or his pleadings. I turned back to my Mighty Taco Soup and added a pinch of parsley.

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