Long Bright River(53)

When I do, I find that I’ve underestimated Mrs. Mahon. She was correct: Cecily Tynan is predicting six to twelve inches of snow overnight, and more to the north and west of the city.

—No, I say softly. There are no snow days when you’re a police officer. And—more thanks to Bethany—I have no more sick or personal days to expend.

—Mom, says Thomas, and I wait to be interrogated. Thomas is very perceptive, and I have no doubt that he can sense that something is awry.

But he doesn’t say anything for a while, and instead sits down next to me on the couch. He has his head down.

—What’s the matter? I say. What’s wrong, Thomas?

I put an arm around him. His skin is warm. His hair is corn silk. He sinks into my side, and I think for just an instant of lying back with him, pulling him toward me as I did when he was an infant, his cheek to my sternum. Is there any more pleasant feeling than the weight of a baby on one’s chest? But he is adamant, these days, about being big, a big kid, and I have no doubt that he would quickly squirm away.

—I’m lucky to have you, I say to him quietly. Do you know that?

Saying it aloud—even acknowledging my gratefulness for Thomas too frequently in my thoughts—seems to me to be a kind of jinx, an invitation, an open window through which some creature might come in the night and spirit him away.

—Thomas? I say again, and he finally looks at me.

—When’s my birthday? he says.

—You know the answer to that, I say. When’s your birthday?

—December third, he says. But how long is that from now?

I blink, realizing. One week from now, I say. Why do you ask?

Thomas looks down again. Bethany was talking about birthdays today, he says, and she asked me when mine was. And I told her. And then she asked me if I was having a party.

Every year prior, Simon has taken him to do something special on or around his birthday: for his fourth, they went to the movies; for his third, they went to the Franklin Institute; for his second, which he of course doesn’t remember, they went to the Please Touch Museum. This year, I figured I’d take up the mantle. We’d do something similar, just the two of us. But Thomas is looking up at me hopefully. And I suppose it wouldn’t be out of the question to arrange a small party with friends.

—Guess what, I say finally. If you wanted a birthday party, we could probably put one together. Maybe we could even invite a few friends from your old school.

He grins.

—No promises, I say. It depends on who’s available.

He nods.

—Who would you like to invite? I say.

—Carlotta and Lila, he says, without hesitating. He’s bouncing in his seat on the sofa now, his legs straight out before him.

—Okay, I say. I’ll call their parents, all right? What do you want to do with them?

—Go to McDonald’s, he says, unswervingly. With the playground.

I pause for just the smallest beat. Then I say, Sounds great.

He’s talking about the one in South Philadelphia, the one Simon used to take him to, the one that has an indoor play space. He hasn’t been there in over a year. I’m surprised he still remembers it.

He clasps his hands together tightly, bringing them up beneath his chin, the way he does whenever he can’t contain his excitement.

—McDonald’s, he says again. And I can get whatever I want, right?

—Within reason, I say.



* * *



—

He falls asleep on the sofa not long after that, and I carry him to his bed, laying him down there.

I’ve always been strict with Thomas about where he sleeps. He had terrible colic when he was a baby, and often cried and cried inconsolably, and hearing those sounds nearly tore me in half. There has always been a part of me—animal, feral, governed by some force that seems to be trying to claw its way out of my abdomen—that hungers for Thomas, that physically longs for him, that threatens, each time he wakes in the night, to undo all the work I did over the course of his infancy. But the sleep-training manuals I read were always very clear on one point: never let your child sleep in a bed with you, they said; not only will this imperil the life of your child, but the habit will be next to impossible to break, and will ultimately result in a child who lacks confidence and independence, a child who is not capable of soothing himself, and who is not well positioned to function in the world.

Therefore, from the time he was a few months old, Thomas has had his room, and I have had mine. When we lived in Port Richmond, this worked well. His colic subsided, as I knew it would, and soon he became a good, sound sleeper, and both of us woke each day rested and refreshed.

When we moved into this apartment, though, things changed. Now, with increasing frequency, Thomas has been begging to sleep in my room. Sometimes I even find him curled into a ball at the foot of my bed, having snuck in very quietly while I sleep. When I notice he has done this, or on the occasions when I catch him in the act, I am firm with him, and bring him back to his race car bed, and reassure him that he’ll be fine, and turn on the night-light that I purchased for him for further comfort.

In general, I feel quite confident that I am correct on this point. Only one recent episode makes me waver in my certainty. It happened several weeks ago: I woke in the early hours of the morning to the sound of a whimpering the likes of which I had never heard. It was coming from the foot of the bed, and it sounded more like a puppy than a boy. And then a small voice began to chant one word aloud, over and over again: Daddy, the voice was saying, Daddy, Daddy.