A throat cleared from my left. Deep. Almost deep. More of amy balls are still dropping,but I can cop an attitude. My attention drifted to the edge of the booth.
“Cason?” I popped up from the table and hugged the young man I hadn’t seen since his fourteenth birthday. Seeing a kid who said he had nothing to live for on the grind? It made the hum of the restaurant feel warmer. It made me want tolive again. “How are you? How was your birthday? It just passed, right?” Damn, I couldn’t match Washington’s knack for remembering the finer points.
I tried to release Cason, but the young man didn’t get the memo. He held on. Tight.
Another throat cleared. This time with some conviction.
Cason finally unhanded me and stepped back in tennies I could’ve sworn might’ve been white years ago. Okay, so he was a recovered five-finger discount specialist. That was good. He tilted his head at Washington. “So y’all divorced, huh?”
“Yes,” we declared in unison.
I tried to pretend that the force of us concurring didn’t dice my heart.
Cason’s narrowed eyes slipped between us. An uneasy silence filled the space. “Hey, I’m sorry y’all lost ya little guy.” He shifted in his shoes. “But if y’all divorced, why are y’all … together?”
I sank into the booth, drowning in the awkward moment.
“We’re still good friends, Cason,” Washington muttered. Damn, he always knew what to say.
A kid at the table across from us disrupted my smile when he lifted a toy airplane, mimicking the sounds of a small plane. He held the plastic toy high, and his innocent pride forced the oxygen from my chest.
Elijah …
The sputtering engine filled the air. The water had swallowed everything, and the screams were deafening. The chaos. My son cried our names:Mommy, Daddy!
Palms slick with sweat, I blinked and saw the glassy surface of the lake we had landed in. The memory of our small plane going down rushed through my mind like a tidal wave that I’d never be ready to process.
As I yanked my purse, I nearly knocked Cason over. I scrambled to my feet. My lungs clawed for air, each inhale a desperate, shallow gasp.
Glass shards sliced their way down my throat. My knees threatened to cave before I even cleared the front door.
“Maddy,” Washington called after me. “Madison!”
I didn’t respond. My legs carried me outside, my brain not even on the same playing field. The same galaxy. I rushed over the brick sidewalk. The laughter from the café behind me abated in the distance as I tried to navigate my way home. Every detail of the accident screamed its way over me. The rough impact caused the glass windows to crack. Water rushed in, flooded around my knees, and rose higher. And higher.
“Maddy!” Washington’s voice cut through the earthy, muddy taste of lake water that would forever cling to the back of my throat.
Tears blurred everything: the sunlight, the cars. Had I walked one block? Half a block? My fearful eyes darted around. Hell, I hadn’t even cleared the parking lot.
Washington caught up with me, his steps steady even though mine faltered. I wrapped myself in a hug, but Washington wouldn’t allow me to fill that void myself. He slipped my arms open and put himself, a rock-solid fortress, right there. Right where I shouldn’t need him.
“I see him, Washington.” The words tumbled out of me before I could reel them back. My voice broke, torn and ragged by the way my cheek lay flush against his stony chest. Rough, hard, yet the comfort I swore I didn’t need. “If I think too long. If I get too happy, I see him.”
His arms tightened around me. Lips brushed my temple, then my cheek, soft and reverent, as if he could wipe the grief away with the touch of his mouth against my current of tears.“Shhh. It’s okay to imagine our son, Madison. Lemme help you remember the best times.”
“You don’t understand.” My voice was a rasp. “I see him when I look into your eyes. But when I’m not, uh …” I glanced away, rubbing the heel of my palm into my achy chest. “When I’m not mean, we laugh and life’s good.”
“That makes sense, Madison. You and me. No matter what’s going on around us, life is good,bébé. All I want is for us to hold each other down.”
“No, Wash. Ihatewhen it’s good because he disappears.” The pain in my heart was so intense that the words barely hung on. “When I’m not with you, and I’m not happy, I see him. I see his face, his little hands. And he calls for me. And he reminds me to stay. That only a terrible mom would leave him.”
Washington pulled back enough to hold me at arm’s length; his thumb traced my cheek, his eyes wide with shock. “Nah, that ain’t my son. I don’t know what little demon is telling you to stay angry.”
“Wh-what?”
“Maddy, we don’t talk about him. That’s why the connection you feel to our son when I’m around disappears after we’re having a good time. That’s instinct warning that we need to have a conversation. Let’s go inside the restaurant and talk about our son.”
“No!” I sidestepped his attempt to take my hand.
