Cracks in the Sidewalk (26 page)

“That’s all?”

“Unh-huh,” JT nodded. “Just that and a business message for me.”

“Read me the business message.”

“Nope, little boys don’t need to hear grown-up messages.” JT turned David around and gave him a pat on the behind. “Now scoot. Christian was up half the night, so let me sleep a while longer.”

“Okay,” David answered. He ran into Kimberly’s room hollering about how he’d gotten a special letter from Grandpa.

Once the boy had left, JT opened the note again.

“Jeffrey,” it read, “Either you answer the telephone this afternoon and allow Elizabeth to talk to her children, or we will be headed right back to court. I also expect you to deliver all three children to our house for a visit with their mother this coming Sunday at precisely nine o’clock—not one minute later. This is the one and only warning I will give you. If you cause my daughter another minute of unnecessary anguish, I will notify Judge Brill that you are in defiance of his court order and we can take it from there.

Charles Francis McDermott.”

~ ~ ~

T
here was no longer any chance of sleep for JT. He stood and paced the room for several minutes thinking of how to handle this. When he heard Kelsey’s car pull into the garage, he tore the note into tiny pieces and flushed it down the toilet.

“Okay, Charlie,” he grumbled. “Start threatening me, and we’ll see who wins.” As far as JT was concerned nothing would louse up his relationship with Kelsey—including spending Sundays with Liz. He pulled on a pair of jeans and headed downstairs.

Kelsey stood in the kitchen pouring milk over a bowl of Cheerios. The expression on JT’s face softened as soon as he saw her. He crossed the room and folded her into his arms. This was the sort of woman he needed, a woman full of life, who stood straight and tall, a woman with the face of an angel and the lithe body of a teenager. He pressed his face into the nape of her neck and breathed in the scent of jasmine.

Before JT could take full advantage of the moment, David ran into the kitchen. “Bobby won’t give me back my race car!”

“So what?” JT said. “Let him play with it for a while.”

“But it’s mine.”

“Enough!” JT snapped. “Sit down and eat your breakfast.”

“Bobby’s not eating.”

“He will,” Kelsey cooed. “Come on, dumpling, it’s time for breakfast.”

Bobby did bear a strong resemblance to a dumpling in that he was squat, round, and dimpled. He came as a package with Kelsey. She might have looked like a teenager, but she was actually a twenty-one-year-old single mom struggling to make ends meet since she’d lost track of dumpling’s daddy.

~ ~ ~

“D
on’t worry,” JT had assured her. “After Liz dies, we’ll get married.”

“Why not now?”

“Because a divorce costs. If I divorce Liz, she gets half of everything. If I wait for her to die, I keep it all.”

That conversation had taken place weeks ago, but Kelsey had little patience and kept asking how much longer it would take. Jeffrey didn’t want to lose Kelsey, so he’d gone to great lengths to placate her. First he’d given her Liz’s sapphire ring, then it was the Rolex, and after that a bracelet embellished with three solid gold Spanish doubloons.

~ ~ ~

W
ith the bright red race car still clutched in his chubby little hand, Bobby scooted himself onto the chair closest to Kelsey and began stuffing Cheerios into his mouth. David, glowering at the car, snorted, “This ain’t fair.”

“Get used to it,” Kelsey said when JT went upstairs. “Bobby’s gonna be your brother.”

When JT returned with Kimberly and Christian, David asked, “Is it true, Daddy? Is Bobby gonna be my brother?”

“Well, yes, I suppose so,” JT answered nervously, “sooner or later.”

“It had better be sooner,” Kelsey said.

~ ~ ~

L
ater that morning, when Bobby and Christian had gone down for a nap, Kimberly and David were watching cartoons, and Kelsey was deep into the October issue of
Vogue
, JT slipped away. He went into his study, closed the door, and dialed Noreen Sarnoff’s number. The telephone rang six times, and eventually a recording answered.

“This is Jeffrey Caruthers,” he said after the beep. “I’ve got a problem. Call me back.”      

~ ~ ~

W
hen Noreen heard JT’s message later that afternoon, she cringed. She’d thought with the trial over and the court order executed, she’d heard the last of Jeffrey Caruthers. But he was back again with the sound of urgency in his voice.

JT’s name came at the top of the list of clients Noreen disliked. She debated about calling him or simply erasing the message. In the end her sense of ethics won out, and she dialed his number.

“What now?” she asked when he answered on the very first ring.

“Liz’s father is threatening me,” JT said. “Isn’t that illegal?”

“Threatening you?”

“Yeah, he says he’s gonna take me back to court.”

“For what?”

“Because I didn’t answer the telephone when Liz called.”

Noreen started putting the pieces together. “Exactly how many times did you not answer?”

“I don’t know exactly—”

“More than five?”

“Probably.”

“More than ten?”

“Maybe.”

“Did she leave messages?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you return her calls?”

“No, and I’m not going to.”

“Judge Brill’s ruling stated that you had to permit your wife to speak to the children three times a week. If you don’t, you’re in defiance of his order and Charles McDermott has every right to ask the court for sanctions.”

“What happens then?”

“You could be fined, spend time in jail, maybe even lose custody of the children.”

“That’s stupid,” JT said.

“No,” Noreen replied, “
you’re
stupid for defying the judge’s order.”

“So what do I have to do?”

“As soon as we hang up, call your wife and let her talk to those kids. And make certain you get them over there Sunday morning.”

“I don’t have anybody to bring them.”

“Oh, pleeese,” Noreen groaned. “If there’s no family member available to take them, go yourself!”

“And sit there for three hours watching Liz die?” JT asked, but Noreen had hung up.

“Some lawyer,” he grumbled.

~ ~ ~

JT
didn’t call Liz when he hung up. Instead, he unplugged the telephone and waited until seven o’clock that evening to return her calls. When he finally did, Elizabeth’s father answered the telephone.

“Is Liz there?” JT said. “David wants to talk to her.”

“Hold on please,” Charles answered, his voice cold but civil.

Moments later, Liz picked up the phone.

“Jeffrey,” she said, trying to sound healthier than she felt. “Thanks for calling me back.”

Without acknowledging her words, JT handed the receiver to his son. “Hi, Mommy,” David said.

Elizabeth had waited so long to hear those two words. She opened her mouth and a sigh escaped, carrying away the anguish of lost time. “David, honey,” she said, “Mommy’s missed you so very, very much.” 

“I miss you too, Mommy. Are you in heaven?”

“No, honey, Mommy is at Grandma’s house.” Elizabeth started to ask why he thought that, but she heard David’s voice recede slightly.

“Daddy,” the boy yelled. “Mommy’s not in heaven, she’s at Grandma’s house!”

A stab pierced her heart, but she moved on. “Would you like to come and see Mommy?”

“Unh-huh. Can Kimberly come too?”

“She sure can. You can come and Kimmie can come, and Christian can come too. We’ll have a party with milk and cookies. And guess what else? Stories! Mommy’s got three new story books, and I’ll read each of you a special story. Would you like that?”

“Are they Robin Hood books?”

“Robin Hood?” Liz said, feigning surprise. “Why, I thought Peter Rabbit was your favorite.”

“Peter Rabbit is for babies,” he said indignantly. “I like Robin Hood.”

“Well, then,” she laughed, “it’s a good thing I got a new Robin Hood book.”

“Robin Hood is Christian’s favorite too, so you have to read two stories.”

“Two stories!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “Don’t you think maybe Christian would rather hear a Peter Rabbit story?”

“No, he likes Robin Hood.”

“Did he tell you that?”

David giggled. “Silly, Christian doesn’t know how to talk. He’s a baby. He says Daddy and milk, that’s all.”

David’s first word was Mommy, as was Kimberly’s, but Christian was a child who had never known a mother. Elizabeth choked back the urge to cry.

“Well, then,” she said, moving past the momentary sadness. “How do you know Christian doesn’t like Peter Rabbit?”

“I know,” David said with the guile of a six-year-old, “because when I show him both books, he points to Robin Hood.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth said. “Well, then, I guess I’ll just have to read two Robin Hood stories.”

“Hooray! Can we come to Grandma’s house tomorrow?”

“Not tomorrow, but Daddy’s going to bring all three of you to see me on Sunday. Sunday’s only two more days after tomorrow.”

“Daddy,” David called out. “Are we going to see Mommy on Sunday?”

Elizabeth heard Jeffrey answer, “We’ll see. Now hang up and come take your bath!”

“Daddy said I’ve gotta hang up,” David reported.

“I heard him. Baths are important, so do what Daddy said. Go take your bath. I’ll talk to Kimmie for a little while.”

“She can’t talk. She already went to bed.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth said, momentarily stumped. “Well, then—tell Daddy to please have Kimmie call me tomorrow.”

“Daddy gets mad if anybody calls her that. He said her name is Kimberly, not Kimmie.”

In the background Elizabeth heard JT shout, “One minute!”

“I can hear your daddy calling you, sweetheart, so you’d better go.”

Liz hesitated a second, then said, “I love you, David.” By then he was gone.

~ ~ ~

O
n Thursday there was no call from Kimberly, nor was there a call on Friday. Both days Elizabeth called the house any number of times, but the telephone rang without an answer. By Saturday morning Elizabeth grew quite discouraged and began to wonder if JT would ever allow her to talk to or see the children. She tried calling three times, but still no answer. On the fourth try Kimberly answered in her high-pitched little girl voice.

“Hi, Kimberly,” Elizabeth said, a swell of affection catching in her throat. “Do you know this is Mommy?”

“Yes,” Kimberly answered. She sounded far more grown-up than Liz remembered. “You’re at Grandma’s house, not in heaven.”

“Yes, I’m at Grandma’s. But that doesn’t mean I don’t think of you and miss you every day. Tomorrow is going to be very special. So special it will be almost like Christmas.”

“Why?”

“Because you and David and Christian are coming to see me!  Isn’t that wonderful?”

“Will you buy us toys?”

“What toys do you want?”

“A Baby Tears doll with her own baby carriage and a highchair, and a ball for Christian, and a race car for David and—”

“Whoa, isn’t that an awful lot to be asking for?” Elizabeth laughed. “Where would I get all that money?”

“From Grandpa.”

“What makes you think Grandpa has that much money?”

“Grandpa has a lot of money,” she said. “He stole Daddy’s money.”

Elizabeth stopped laughing. “What makes you think Grandpa stole Daddy’s money?”

“Daddy said so. He said he doesn’t have enough money to buy us toys because Grandpa stole it all.”

It took Elizabeth a moment to gather her thoughts. “Kimberly, sweetheart, I think you might have misunderstood what Daddy said. Grandpa would never ever steal anything, especially not from you or your daddy. Grandpa loves all of us, even your daddy. People don’t steal things from somebody they love.”  

“Then who stole Daddy’s money?”

“I don’t think anybody stole Daddy’s money, I think maybe he just lost it. Remember when you lost your red mittens?”

“Unh-huh.”

“Nobody stole them, you just lost them. They might have fallen out of your pocket or maybe you left them at the playground but they were lost, not stolen. And that’s probably what happened to Daddy’s money. It got lost.”

“Doesn’t Grandpa have enough money to buy us
one
toy?”

“We’ll see. I’ll try to get something special for when you come to visit. Would you like crayons and a Cinderella coloring book?”

“Yes, yes!” Kimberly shouted. “I love Cinderella. And don’t forget, Christian needs a ball ‘cause sometimes he takes David’s, and David gets mad.”

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?” Elizabeth teased.

They continued to talk for several minutes. Kimberly chattered on telling her mother stories of Christian—what made him laugh, how he was learning to walk, and how he could almost say her name. Listening to the way she spoke about her baby brother made Kimberly seem older, too adult for a child of her years.

“He’s the cutest baby ever,” she cooed, her words so motherly Liz was torn between laughter and tears. Her little girl, still a baby herself, had blossomed into a big sister with an abundance of love to share.

Before long, she heard JT calling for Kimberly to hang up, so Elizabeth told her daughter how very much she loved her then let her go. After that, Liz began to count the hours until all three of her babies would be with her.  

Waiting

A
s Elizabeth recalled the conversation with her daughter, thunder cracked so loud it caused her bones to rattle. Right behind the thunder came spears of lightning and after that a torrential downpour.

“A storm like this can’t possibly last for long,” she said optimistically.

“No telling,” Charlie answered as he watched a waterfall cascade off the roof and puddle on the front lawn. “You might want to consider staying in.”

“No way,” she replied. “I need to go shopping.”

“Make a list and I’ll go for you.”

Elizabeth smiled. “I know you would, but this is something I want to do. I’ve finally got a reason to buy books and toys. I don’t want to miss that.”