The Golden Couple(48)
The reply to her mother is easy; Marissa shoots back a row of hearts. Polly is more complicated. Marissa finally suggests a coffee before the store opens tomorrow. Now that Marissa is no longer going to Pinnacle, her mornings have more give. Polly responds immediately: Of course! See you then! Marissa considers asking Polly if she is sleeping at the store again, but decides to let it go. The last thing Marissa wants is to spark a long exchange.
Marissa turns her attention back to the most important message, Matthew’s, trying to glean the subtext. He didn’t respond that he loved her, too, but neither was he curt, and he did write, Sorry, babe.
She thinks about telling him she’ll wait up for him, or asking him to check in with Bennett, who has migrated to the family room. But in the end, she simply writes, Ok. Good luck!
Marissa sets down her phone and pours herself a glass of Sancerre. She closes her eyes and takes a sip, thinking that the first taste of morning coffee and the first one of evening wine have to rank up there with the world’s greatest pleasures.
She unwraps the block of cheese and begins to grate it. Her chest feels tight, and she tries to match her inhalations and exhalations to the back-and-forth motion of her hand.
She has almost filled the small bowl when Bennett shrieks, “Mom!”
Marissa’s knuckle scrapes against the grater. “Shit,” she mutters. A tiny drop of blood is on her finger, but at least Bennett isn’t there to remind her about the curse jar.
“Mom!” Bennett yells again. “I can’t find my Cub Scout rope!”
Cub Scout rope? She has no idea what he’s talking about. Then it comes to her—at the last meeting, all the Cubs were sent home with a white, foot-long length of rope to practice their knots.
“Isn’t it in one of the baskets by the TV?” Marissa calls back.
She remembers Bennett attempting to tie square knots in the family room, chewing on the inside of his cheek the way he always does when he is concentrating.
Even now she can still hear the instructions he’d memorized:
Loop on top, rabbit runs up through the hole, back around the tree, down the hole again.
“No! I looked!”
“Sweetie, I’m making dinner, so—”
“I need it now!” Bennett’s voice hitches.
Marissa hurries into the family room and sees Bennett sitting in the middle of the rug, all of his toy bins emptied around him.
“It isn’t anywhere!” Bennett is on the verge of tears.
Marissa sinks to her knees and sorts through the puzzles, Marvel action figures, Star Wars lightsabers, and board games. She and Bennett peer under the chairs and the couch that Marissa deliberately stained. They even remove all of the cushions. But the rope is nowhere.
Finally Marissa says, “We’ll have to get another one.”
“But my test is tomorrow!” Bennett begins to cry, his face reddening.
“Honey—”
Bennett’s wail drowns her out. He throws a Harry Potter wand across the room, barely missing a lamp.
“Bennett!” Marissa can’t recall her mild-mannered son having a tantrum like this since he was a toddler and grew overtired at the Sesame Place Theme Park.
She reaches over and enfolds him in her arms, feeling his body shudder with sobs.
“I was supposed to be practicing. I’m going to fail.”
“Oh, sweetie, it’s okay.” She repeats the words as she rocks her son, attempting to soothe herself along with Bennett. She has tried so hard to conceal from her son the turbulent emotions she has been feeling, but clearly he’s absorbing some of the stress swirling inside their home.
She wishes Matthew were here, to join in their hug and then maybe run out to Home Depot to pick up another rope.
But Matthew will hardly see Bennett this week. Marissa will be the one to take Bennett to Cub Scouts again, and while some moms are always at the meetings and events, most of the boys are there with their fathers.
Bennett has never complained about this; still, Marissa wonders if it could be contributing to his pain.
Matthew made it to the pinewood derby last year, but it was the scoutmaster who’d helped Bennett build his little wooden race car. Matthew simply doesn’t have the time to take Bennett to Nationals games or nature centers or attend every school conference. Bennett must be missing a feeling of connection to Matthew, too.
Maybe fractures exist not only in her marriage, but in their family.
Instead of trying to put on a happy facade—the equivalent of a curated Instagram post—she should be more real with her son. That’s what Avery would recommend.
“I’ve been a little stressed lately, too.… You know how sometimes you and Charlie get into arguments, and then you make up?”
Bennett nods. “Yeah, like when he tried to feed Sam a Froot Loop, which could have been really dangerous.”
“Yes. Well, Dad and I have been arguing a little, but we’re doing better now.”
Bennett grows perfectly still, and Marissa wonders for a moment whether she’s made a mistake. Maybe this is too much information.
Then, in a small voice, Bennett asks, “Is that why he was sleeping in the elephant room?” It’s Bennett’s nickname for the guest room, which has a big painting of a majestic elephant on the wall.
“Yes.”
“Are you going to get divorced like Olivia’s parents?”