So Much More(4)

Because.

Divorce.

How can a word so benign become uglier every time I turn it over in my head? It’s just a word, seven little letters. Letters that should be harmless. But those seven letters have ganged up on me and every time I think about them, it feels like an attack. An attack on my heart. An attack on my children. An attack on my pride. An attack that’s muddied my soul.

Thank God for my kids. They’re my life. They’re my purpose. They’re my everything.

“Daddy, hurry up. I gotta pee.” It’s the pained, ‘I’m not lying’ whine of a little girl in dire need of a bathroom. My five-year-old, Kira, is standing at the top of the flight of stairs with her legs crossed, holding her brother’s hand. She looks so much like her mother: curly caramel colored hair, almond shaped eyes the color of the sky on a stormy day, and lips that form the shape of a heart when they’re resting one atop the other.

“I’m coming, darlin’.” The walk up the stairs is slow. My legs don’t work like they should, especially when I’m carrying a heavy box.

“Throw me the keys, Dad. I’ll get her inside.” Kai to the rescue. Again. He’s always been incredibly mature, but his mother leaving has aged him. A boy of eleven shouldn’t be expected to fill the parental void. He does though. And never complains about it. Maybe he saw our marriage falling apart before we did. Certainly before I did.

We were never perfect, but I didn’t suspect the affair.

I was in shock when the papers were served.

I was in denial during the entire court proceeding.

And I still half expected her to be there when I came home. Weeks after she moved to Seattle to be with him.

Him.

My downfall. The man who not only stole my wife, but who stole my kids’ mom.

Did that sound bitter?

Yes?

Good, because I am. I serve up my bitter with a heaping side of bitter.

I set the box down on the fourth or fifth step and dig in my pocket for the apartment key and toss it up to him. Apartment three, our new home. The throw is too hard, and it hits the door behind him with a tink and falls to the ground next to his feet. As he picks it up, I hear him whisper to his sister, “Come on, Kira, race you inside.”

She giggles and her feet start bouncing off the pavement as if she’s warming up for a sprint. I can’t help but smile at these two.

As I pick up the box again, I look at the front windows of the apartments just below ours—apartment one and apartment two. The curtains are drawn on both. For a moment, I wonder who’s inside. Families? Maybe there are kids for my kids to play with living there? The thought disappears as my toe catches the front edge of the stair three from the top. It’s not a violent, painful fall because the box I’m carrying breaks it for the most part. I’m embarrassed more than anything. The fact that my legs don’t always cooperate is embarrassing.

I glance behind me, down the stairs to the sidewalk and parking spaces below. No witnesses. The realization brings with it relief I didn’t know I needed. My heartbeat begins to slow, and I let out the breath I was holding; a strained breath that attempts to grasp at straws, better known as dignity. Maybe I should’ve looked for a first-floor apartment, but my stubborn side wouldn’t allow me to consider it.

As I stand, righting the box with both hands, Kai comes out. “You need some help with that box, Dad? Or should I just grab the other one from the car?”

“I’ve got this one. Why don’t you grab the other one, buddy? And see if you can coax Rory out of the car,” I ask Kai, brushing off my current exasperation.

Rory is my nine-year-old. He’s not happy about our move. Or with his mom and he’s not shy about letting her know. He scornfully addresses her as Miranda.

Kai lopes down the stairs, taking them two at a time. He’s tall for his age at five feet five inches, and athletic. He’s pretty much a mirror image of me when I was eleven. A carbon, genetic copy with dark hair and eyes, golden brown skin, wide-set shoulders, and long, gangly limbs.

When I walk into the apartment, Kira is perched on the arm of the couch. Her stuffed cat, Pickles, is in one hand, and the TV remote is in the other. She’s flipping through channels at breakneck speed.

“Can I help you with anything, Kira?”

She responds without taking her eyes off of the screen of flashing images, “No, Daddy. I’ve got it all under control.”

I smile and shake my head realizing she’s heard me say that one too many times if she’s worked it into her vernacular. When I say it, it’s mental coaching to prompt self-assurance; when she says it, it’s confidence. I love her confidence.

“Knock knock,” a singsong voice calls from the landing outside the open door.

I set the box I’m carrying on the couch next to Kira and turn to see our landlady, Mrs. Lipokowski, standing on the worn, faded welcome mat. All of the letters are worn away except the W and E that bookend the word. The mat, like everything else in the furnished apartment, is old and worn. I’m not complaining, there’s character and an almost identifiable charming essence encapsulated in this time capsule my family will call home for the next year.

Mrs. Lipokowski and her husband have owned this small brick building since it was built in 1972. It houses a deli that they run, two tiny apartments on the first floor and two larger apartments on the second floor, one of which the Lipokowski’s live in. It’s three blocks from the beach, and two blocks from John F. Kennedy High School, where I’m a counselor. The location is ideal.