Mom's the Word

by Marilynn Griffith

  “Humph. Yes you are. You’re both babies,” Ryan said before starting out of the room. He was in rare form today. Or maybe it was just the hormones that Karol kept forgetting he was getting to the age for.

  “Okay, enough!” Karol sat Mia on the cushion next to her and swung her arms like an umpire. “You can watch the movie or not, but the fighting has to stop. And the yelling. I’ve tried very hard not to raise my voice at you the past few days, now I need you to do the same.”

  A tear wet the corner of Karol’s eye as Ryan shrugged and stormed upstairs. Having to leave Mia in the van alone this morning and dash through the traffic and now this—all simple things, but difficult, too—had taken Karol to the breaking point. And the thought of the same group of young mothers who used to cluster around Hope waiting for her had really taken her past the point of no return.

  Wonder what they’d think of me if they could see this scene?

  Rob stood and started helping the smaller children up the stairs. “Okay, you all have upset your mother. Time for a nap. Mom and I might take one, too. You all did so well at lunch today. I need you to act that way at home, too. Ryan, I’ll deal with you later, okay, son?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Karol wiped her eyes, and helped her husband lead the kids upstairs and into their beds despite their pouting and complaining. Could they take a Sunday-afternoon nap without their friends next door to keep an eye out in case the children woke up?

  Mia and Judah had always known that if they woke up before their parents, they could wander over to Miss Hope’s for a hug and an afternoon snack. She and Hope had even staggered their naptimes to look out for one another. After the monster truck showed up next door to remove every kid-related thing in the yard, Karol was fairly sure their new neighbors wouldn’t be any good for nap coverage. Still, she only had time to blow Rob a kiss before sleep overtook her.

  “We’ve got company,” Neal said as he entered the house with a little girl in a pink bathing suit a size too small. Despite her ill-fitting outfit, she held her head as if balancing a crown. The little girl’s hair, two long braids in front and a giant afro puff in back, made Dyanne long to dig her fingers into it.

  On another day, she might have done just that, but it was Sunday, her catching-up day. Even if she was out of the office, she still needed to stay on top of things. With authors like Fallon on her list, she had to. Not to mention that ton of books for the new line. There was just too much to do to be dealing with someone else’s kids.

  “You run along now, okay, sweetie?” Dyanne said, before shooting her husband a glare. He knew what she was up against. Why had he brought the child inside?

  Watch it. He might be warming up to the baby thing. Be nice.

  She was about to tell the little girl how cute she was when the wild thing ran and flung herself against the wall. “The tree! You took the treeeeeeee….”

  Neal wiped his brow on the towel around his neck. He was ahead of her on scouting out a jog trail, it seemed. “Calm down, honey. Your friends’ tree was beautiful, but we live here now so we have to start over.” He walked toward her and crouched down to eye level.

  The little girl paused, bringing a finger to her chin. “So you’re gonna make your own tree? With her?”

  Dyanne, who hadn’t moved since the girl attacked her new wallpaper, almost leaped across the room and hugged her. She was starting to love this kid more by the minute.

  Neal’s eyes told her to wait. He gave the girl one of his best smiles. “I don’t know if we’ll have a tree exactly, but yes, that’s my wife, Miss Dyanne and we are…thinking about starting a family.”

  The child looked confused for a moment.

  He rebalanced his weight on his heels before simplifying his words. “We might have a baby. Maybe.”

  Joy flooded out of the girl as if they’d unstopped a dam. “A baby! Girl or boy? Oh, I hope it’s a girl. I’ll show her stuff and make her a dress and give her my doll and—”

  She stopped, eyeing Dyanne carefully. “Are you sure she can have a baby? She’s awful skinny. Don’t look like a Mommy at all. No booty.” She patted the back of her bathing suit, more filled out than Dyanne’s would ever be.

  Neal laughed so hard that he fell back on his own rear. He recovered quickly, hoping he hadn’t hurt his wife’s feelings too much. The child had caught him off guard. “I think we’ve got, um, all the equipment we need, sweetie. There are all different kinds of mommies.”

  Dyanne wasn’t laughing. She took her neighbor’s daughter by the hand and stepped around her husband, collapsed in a fit of chuckles at her expense. She had a lot on her list for today but being humiliated wasn’t among the choices. “What’s your name, honey?”

  “Mia. You can call me Mi-Mi, though. Everybody over here used to. Now nobody does,” the little girl said, looking at Dyanne’s hand as if it were poison.

  “I don’t like nicknames.” Having to endure her father calling her Dee Dee was enough to make Dyanne not want to call the little girl anything other than her name. Worse yet, Neal had picked up the habit of calling her that, too. It seemed a lot nicer when he said it, but she still didn’t like nicknames.

  At any rate, little Mia had come along just in time. Today’s run-in would serve as a bridge to discuss the toy explosion in their neighbors’ backyard and ways for the couple next door to keep their kids at home. What were they doing anyway?

  Dyanne mused over the possibilities as she covered the distance between the two houses. As she and Mia stepped up onto the porch, she looked through the open window and knew exactly why no one had come looking for little girl. John Boy and Chaka Khan were on opposite ends of the couch…fast asleep.

  For now anyway.

  Dyanne was about to give them a wake-up call.

  Jesus, Be a Fence

  Once pressed flat under

  My feet, the land grows

  sharp and steep, cutting

  through all pretense.

  Fences break through my

  cool-soiled dreams,

  a haven for my sorrow.

  Providence makes no allowance

  For rough-timbered tears.

  Inquisition mocks from frosted,

  Lips. A mouth fresh like new

  Money and untried love.

  One day, her flint will come,

  Carrying a fun house mirror. Until then,

  Some angel, soul aflame and wings

  Outstretched must walk the line

  Between us, whispering love songs

  Long into the night.

  —Karol

  After the neighbors brought Mia home

  Chapter Four

  “Lose something?”

  Dyanne’s city voice grated against Karol’s ears, though she was still half-asleep.

  “Pardon me?” she said, rubbing the corners of her eyes to see her neighbor clearly. “Can I help you with something?”

  Dyanne stepped through the unlocked screen door. Mia was holding her hand.

  Karol’s breath caught in her throat. “Mia?”

  Rob, now quite awake, gave his wife a weary look. “Did she come over to your place? We’re so sorry.”

  Karol nodded in agreement but she was more embarrassed than sorry. Mia had on a swimsuit from the giveaway bag and her hair was tumbling down from the braids Karol had secured so well this morning.

  Neal, Dyanne’s husband, made a quiet entrance and shook Rob’s hand. “I found her on the porch, so I brought her inside. She was fine with that until she realized we’d gotten rid of the tree your neighbors had painted on the wall. You all were really close, weren’t you?”

  “You have no idea how close,” Rob said as he stood and walked to the front porch with Neal.

  The two women stayed where they were, with Karol keeping one hand—and both eyes—on Mia. “Again, we are very, very sorry. When the people before you lived there—”

  “You know what? I am so sick of this ‘when the people before you lived he
re’ business. You need to get a handle on your kids. This is ridiculous. I don’t know what kind of skinny-dipping kid co-op you all had going, but could you have some respect for other people? I’m supposed to be working today. I don’t have time for this,” Dyanne fumed.

  A look came over Karol’s face that both surprised and annoyed Dyanne. Was that anger? It couldn’t be. What did Karol have to be mad about? It wasn’t as if she and Neal had done anything to the Simons.

  “Look, I apologize for what has been going on. I admit it’s been a lot to take. I can only hope that if and when you have children the people around you will be just as understanding when your little ones go through challenging stages.”

  Touché, Dyanne thought.

  Still, she couldn’t bring herself to excuse it. “I hear you, okay? But the key word there was ‘stages’. Stages have to end sometime, right? I’m really hoping that whatever stage your daughter is in will be over soon. And for the record, trust me, I will have my children under control.”

  Karol whispered something in Mia’s ear. The little girl ran up the stairs, sniffling as she went. When Karol heard the door close above them, she turned back to her neighbor and smiled her best smile.

  “Got the perfect child planned, have you? Those are always the best, you know. I hope you stick around long enough for all of us to see how that experiment turns out. In the meantime, I assure you that my children will be instructed to stay as far away from you and your property as possible.”

  Neal, who had been laughing at something Rob said on the porch, changed his demeanor upon reentering the room. He’d caught the last of the ladies’ exchange and wasn’t at all happy with what he’d heard.

  “Dee? Is everything all right? You and Karol don’t sound too happy in here. Maybe you should have come out onto the porch with me and Rob. We had a great talk.”

  Dyanne looked at her husband and sighed. He was such a goody-goody sometimes. Sure, Dyanne did her share of brown-nosing, too, but only when the object of her attention deserved it. What was the point of him trying to be pals with Rob Simon? They were nothing alike. It was a waste of time. And that was something Dyanne couldn’t afford. “We had a great talk, too. Or at least I hope so. We’re clear, right, Karol?”

  Oh, yeah. They were clear. “Crystal.” The lady of the house didn’t crack a smile.

  Both husbands looked a little embarrassed, but the women seemed comfortable behind the lines they’d drawn in the sand, even if it meant they were losing ground by staying behind them.

  The men shared a short goodbye before the wives turned their backs to one another. Dyanne’s mind was turning in every direction as she stormed down the porch stairs. So much so that she almost missed the older woman walking up Karol’s steps.

  “Hello,” the lady said. “Who are you?”

  “Dyanne, the new neighbor,” she answered, taking in the older woman’s appearance. Couture clothes, quality jewelry, but nothing flashy, handcrafted shoes, a great haircut and manicured but natural nails rounded out the lady’s package. She was, as Dyanne’s mother would say, un punto. On point.

  And she seemed very pleased by Dyanne’s news. “How wonderful! I’m so glad someone new has moved in.”

  Dyanne wasn’t sure if the woman should get too happy. The way things had been going lately, she might not be Karol’s neighbor for long. “And you are?”

  The woman shrugged as if there was no way to explain what she was about to say. “I’m Faith, Karol’s…” She paused as if looking for another suitable answer. Evidently she could find none. “Mother. I’m Karol’s mother.”

  Dyanne stared at the woman so long that Neal gave her elbow a nudge. She moved on, but only down the next step on the stairs. Maybe Karol was right. Maybe you really couldn’t control how your children turned out. For a moment, Dyanne allowed the thought to form in her mind, before ruthlessly forcing it away.

  “I know,” the woman said. “I know. We’re quite different, Karol and I, but if you get to know her, you’ll find she’s an amazing woman. My daughter just takes great effort to hide that fact. Don’t give up on her.”

  “Right,” Dyanne said before finally following Neal, who’d given a friendly bow, introduced himself and proceeded down the stairs. She didn’t mean it, though, what she’d told Karol’s mother about getting to know her neighbor. She had a lot to do and trying to figure out the housewife next door wasn’t high on her list of priorities.

  “I think you could have handled that a little better, don’t you?” Neal asked, as their own screen door slapped shut.

  “Maybe,” Dyanne said, recounting her conversation with Karol. She’d expected for the woman to fold and retreat as most people did when she called them on the carpet about their behavior. Instead, Karol had insinuated that Dyanne might end up with a disobedient child, too. That wasn’t what she or Neal needed to hear right now.

  “I just hope she keeps her word and tells her kids to stay away from here.”

  Neal scratched his head. “That could be a problem. I told Rob the kids were welcome to come over whenever they wanted. During daylight hours, anyway.”

  “She was sunning herself on the neighbors’ porch. Like some kind of animal. Yes, my thoughts exactly. I’ll have to schedule another flight. Karol must be having some kind of breakdown—I will not quiet down. Someone has to say it. I like the girl next door. Just the thing for Karol. Spunky. No, no need for that. You stay there, Pops. I’ll whip her into shape.”

  Karol didn’t even look up or bother to say what she was thinking—there was no need for that. She was as whipped as she could be. Between her mother banging on the door with a handful of suitcases unannounced as always and the neighbors bringing home the child she’d left sleeping upstairs, things just couldn’t get much worse.

  “Now, how far is it from here to the mall, again, sweetie? You know I can’t abide all these trees for long. Rob likes to chop wood so much, you should get him to cut down some of them.” Karol’s mother, Faith Antonia Ware the Second—long story—flipped through the Tallahassee Yellow Pages with a troubled look. “What happened to the beauty salon I went to last time I was here? I don’t see it listed.”

  With a shrug, Karol shook her head. “I don’t know, Mom.” She trimmed her own hair and usually wore it tied back with a bright scarf or picked out in its full glory. Today it was blown out and braided down the center of her head with a ribbon that provided an annoying tickle.

  Karol pretended not to feel it. She didn’t want to feel anything but the warmth of Mia’s back resting against her knees. The little girl had cried at first from all the scolding and Faith the Second’s fierce looks, but Karol’s only daughter had eventually taken refuge in her mother’s arms and fallen asleep.

  If only she could do the same. Karol knew better than to even try. Faith would likely hit her upside the head with the phone book. Some people had mamas. Others had mothers. Karol had Faith.

  If only Daddy had come.

  But Karol’s father hadn’t come, nor would he ever come without calling first. He’d probably never come without being invited. Though his house was always open to Karol and her family, her dad was never one for imposing. Unlike his wife.

  “I’m going to ask the girl next door where she goes to get her hair done. Her perm was going, but well-done. High-end. She’ll know where to go. I’m so glad she moved in over there. Better than what’s her name?”

  “Hope.”

  Karol’s mother gritted her teeth, giving a sharp nod to a snapshot on the wall of herself, Karol and Hope taken at Ryan’s birthday party the previous summer. Faith, Hope and Love the three of them were not. Nor would they ever be. Extreme dislike was the only word she could think of to describe her mother’s feelings for her old friends. The thought of them twisted her mouth in ways Karol hadn’t seen since…her mother’s last visit. The funny thing was that Hope’s mother felt the same way about Karol and Rob. Karol never told Faith that, though. She had enough ammunition.


  “All those children! And that big ole dog. Oh, it was just crazy over there. I don’t know how you stood it as long as you did. You always say that God answers prayers. Well, He must have answered some of mine, ’cause, honey—”

  “Mom. Please. Don’t, okay?”

  It was Faith’s turn to shrug, with an added warning look to remind Karol that she’d called her Mom. More than once. “Suit yourself, but I say that young couple is going to bring some life back into you. No hard feelings against the Waltons or anything. They treated the kids real good and God knows you needed a friend out in this godforsaken—”

  “Mom!” Karol was crying now, only she didn’t realize it until she tasted the salt on her tongue and felt Rob’s thumb trail the tears across her cheeks. He would have kissed her if they’d been alone, but she doubted he’d do it with Faith looking on. Outside of their wedding kiss thirteen years before, he never did.

  Until now.

  And not just on the cheek, either.

  Faith let out a disgusted sigh, but amusement danced in her eyes. “Go upstairs, for God’s sake, you two. So crass, I tell you.”

  Karol bit her lip, trying hard not to say all the things that came to mind. Rob saved her by reaching over and taking Faith’s face in his hands and kissing her on the cheek.

  She dropped the phone book.

  On Mia’s head. The little girl shrieked in response.

  “See what you’ve done!” Faith swept back her bottle-blond pageboy with one hand and reached for Mia with the other. “Come on to Number Two. Come on, sweetie.”

  Mia rubbed her head, then she rubbed her eyes, which widened quite a bit at the sight of Faith and her extended fingers, a French manicure half an inch from her eye.

  All Karol could do was gather Mia up and wonder if her mother’s madness was hereditary. She was beginning to fear that it was. All her life, she’d thought it insane that her mother insisted on being called Faith instead of Mom and Number Two instead of Grandma—especially when they’d called her father Pops forever. And yet, when she thought about it, her mother had remained Faith somehow, a person, something beyond a mother or grandmother, someone who people know better than to call to make cupcakes or drive in the car pool. Someone who mattered.