Part Three - A Tearfully Acceptable Time

Previously, from A Wind in a Painfully Adolescent Doorway

"Wild nights are my glory," the unearthly stranger told them. "I just got caught in a downdraft and blown off course. Let me sit down for a moment, and then I'll be on my way. Speaking of ways, by the way, there is such a thing as a tesseract…..”

Terry gasped a deep throaty sigh and bit his lip. Confusion seemed to reign supreme in the boyish girl/girlish boy’s life from moment to moment. That night was no exception as his worst fears and her greatest hopes met together at the doorway as Nadia Callahan opened her arms for a hug.

Terry pulled back and looked at Terrence Sr.; eyes begged for either an answer or at least permission to go to his room. His father offered neither, and instead used his hand to motion for Terry to accept his mother’s proffered embrace. The boy stepped forward and awkwardly hugged his mother, and was quickly joined by Libbie. The girl ran to her mother and hugged her around the waist.

“I just knew you’d come back!” She shouted as tears streamed down her cheeks. Nadia Callahan shook her head and turned to her husband…a husband whom she had not held in several years. He nodded and half-smiled; an odd bit of communication from someone who had been abandoned in favor of another man. Nadia bit her lip and her eyes welled with tears. She pushed the her two children aside and ran past Terrence Sr. and down the hall, slamming the bedroom door behind her.

“Well….I think that went rather well, don’t you?” He turned to his two other sons. Danny and Dale stood in the archway between the kitchen and living room, gazing down the hallway to where their mother had just retreated.

“Hey Dad? Do you have a twenty? They’ve got that fundraiser for the Stop the Slavery in Sudan thing Hannah’s sister runs.” Danny looked down the hallway again while his brother continued.

“Yeah…they had an assembly today.” Terrence Sr. seemed completely unfazed; both by his now ‘un-estranged’ wife’s behavior and his sons’ non-reaction…as if he expected both. Terry wasn’t so calm about the moment however.

“Are you serious? She just waltzes in here after all the crap she’s pulled and you…This isn’t right.” He looked down and saw that Libbie had begun to cry again, but they weren’t at all happy tears.

“I’m sorry, Lib…you just don’t know.” He looked down the hall and continued.

“You were too little when she left. It’s not right!” He felt the need to justify his emotions. Having them was entirely understandable. Expressing them in front of his little sister not so much. She shook her head no and it actually felt like her sad stare pierced his heart. He began to shrink…at least inside, since he felt very small in his family’s eyes. Getting down on one knee, he faced her.

“I’m sorry, Lib. That was wrong.” He was overwhelmed; too many things to deal with and it wasn’t fair at all. A confusion about who he was or even if he was a he at all. And a mother who returned after being absent in this turmoil without an apology or even an acknowledgement that she had been gone; as if she had been living right next door and available the whole time. But that wasn’t too far from what the truth really was. And Terry was going to find out that his mother’s return was just in time to save the family.

“Euripedes. Nothing is hopeless; we must hope for everything.”

The following day...

“Hey, Ter…. You think Mom ran off because she got fed up with us?” Dale looked at his brother, and the stare wasn’t lost at all on Terry. He put his head down.

“Fuck…” Danny punched his twin-like sibling before turning to the oldest of the Callahan children.

“He didn’t mean it.” Danny pointed to Libbie, who was sitting on the stairs. Dale shrugged and shook his head.

“I meant ALL of us, you stupid…” He was going to continue but Libbie frowned. She had heard the word enough to know what might follow, and really; the boys really needed to watch their language. Still, Terry couldn’t help but feel he was to blame along with some inexcusable but nebulous offense by Terrence Sr.; something so bad as to send the kid’s mother into the arms of another guy. He knew it wasn’t his father’s fault, so it must have been his.

He looked down at his clothes and sighed. He and Callie had gravitated more toward cute and sassy after a brief foray into Goth. But cute and sassy boyfriend and girlfriend was one thing. A pair of quasi-lesbians didn’t fly well at school, and home wasn’t much better.

“You wanna hold my doll, Terry?” Libbie said, pointing to the doll on the couch. Terry smiled and would have said no, but a voice came from behind them out of the kitchen.

“I think that’s such a nice thing to do. Much nicer that your mommy would ever do for her child.” The embarrassed, near monotone words sent an eerie feeling through the living room as Nadia spoke. She put her head down; that feeling of being unworthy even of the least bit of attention after her protracted and, as yet, unexplained absence.

“You did what you had to do, Nadia,” Terrence Sr. said as he hugged her tentatively from behind.

“What she had to do?” The words came in thought to each Callahan child, but only one spoke up, and not in protest, oddly enough.

“What did Mommy have to do?” Libbie said as she got off the stairs. She walked to the couch and grabbed the doll, which she promptly delivered to Terry.

“Oh yeah….Terry’s a girl now, Mommy, okay?” Nadia seemed completely unfazed and nodded with a wry smile.

“You owe me a twenty, O heart of hearts,” she joked, putting her hand out to Terrence Sr. Without an argument, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. Reaching in, he pulled out two bills; both twenty dollars each.

“Inflation.” He laughed softly, but Terry didn’t get the joke. Nadia had been absent from the family for months on end. He frowned and would have spoken, but his mother spoke first.

“I’m sorry, kids. Your dad didn’t tell you because I told him not to say anything.” Nadia sounded more lucid than the kids remembered, even if she was slow in speech. Terrence Sr. nodded and looked away; trying hard to mask the tears he shed. A smaller hand grabbed his and he looked down to see Libbie beaming at him. He smiled at her and put his hand on Nadia’s shoulder. Dale looked at Danny as if to say, ‘are you ready for this?’

“I was having a very hard time, and I left you all.” Danny looked back at Dale as if to ask, ‘can you believe this?’ Dale shook his head.

“I found someone who …. I left your Dad for some guy in my support group.” It almost begged a protest, which three out of the four Callahan kids were ready to provide, but Libbie shook her head.

“Listen to Mommy, you jerks!” It was more directed toward the middle two Callahans, but Terry nodded to Libbie.

“Anyway, it was the worst thing I ever did.” Her voice trailed off and the boys expected an excuse, but she continued.

“Roger was a nice guy and as f….as messed up as me, and we should never have done what we did…. Too many people were hurt. I hurt you, and I’m so sorry.” She choked back a sob; an entirely sincere and completely honest expression of remorse which she followed with,

“We broke up last year.” Dale looked at her and didn’t wait for her to finish.

“Where the fuck have you been since then?” The word was harsh but not entirely unexpected, even out of the mouth of her twelve-year-old. She blushed; more out of embarrassment over her own actions than the rebuke from her second oldest.

“I’ve been...” she faltered and began to cry. Shame and guilt can be a good combination for healing in their own way, but not for her. Terrence Sr. put his other hand on her shoulder and spoke.

“Your mom has been in a treatment facility to help with her problem. You know that she and Terry both take medication, right?” Terry winced at the words; nothing of a surprise, but he felt ashamed that he had a ‘condition.’

“It’s okay, Ter. We’re too much alike, I guess, but getting help for myself made me realize it’s not a shame to need someone or something to get us to where we need to be, right?” Terry nodded; at first reluctantly, but his mother’s candor helped him understand for the first time that he wasn’t alone.

“I guess you kids lucked out?” Nadia looked back and forth between Dale and Danny as she felt the reassuring squeeze of a gentle hand.

“It’s okay, Mommy. We love you.” She spoke; perhaps some might find almost presumptuous, especially for a nine year old. But she really was the heart and soul of the family, and she literally gave voice to what the others were either reluctant or unable to say.

“I’m seeing a doctor for this, and for the first time, I think things are going to be okay. I’ve been taking my meds and going to therapy, so …” Even the concrete reassurance provided by her steps to wholeness did nothing to erase the guilt she felt over what she had done to her family.

“I thought you hated me.” Terry put his head down and began to weep. Nadia hurried to her oldest child’s side and hugged him.

“Oh, God no…I’m so sorry.” She kissed his cheek as their tears mingled.

"I was so upset with myself for giving you this….” She pointed to her head and twirled her finger to indicate ‘crazy.’

“But what about this, Mom…. You said you were so proud of your son.” He looked at her, almost pleading for some explanation. Nadia was still struggling with her own self, and could hardly explain to Terry what was right or wrong or up or down. What she did do was to kiss his cheek once again.

“And now I’ll be proud of my daughter,” she said softly. A tug on her sweater gave her pause and she added,

“My other daughter...uh...both my daughters?” As much as she was able to express acceptance she was almost completely unable to accept acceptance, if that makes any sense. Terrence Sr. walked over to her and Terry and Libbie, resisting the urge to give a ‘group’ hug. He gently pried Nadia away from the kids and pulled her into a warm embrace.

“How can you love me after what I’ve done?” Nadia shook her head as the tears streamed down her cheeks.

“Because I never stopped in the first place,” he said with a playful laugh; a cute but earnest expression of just how much life they shared, and how it was and always would be enough to keep them going. He kissed her, not amorously, but as romantic a kiss as you might expect from a man who lived through his wife’s illness and infidelity by the power of unconditional love. She didn’t kiss back, but melted into his arms in heaving but healing sobs.

“Yeah, Mom….I guess I love you too,” Dale said. He did the ‘I’ve got dust in my eyes’ move to hid his own un-twelve-year-old-manly tears. Danny just laughed.

“Hell…I’m not going to be the only one here who doesn’t cry.” He wiped his face with his sleeve and smiled a silly smile at his brother. It almost begged for a Tiny-Tim like moment from Libbie, but she just said in the end,

“Can we call out for Chinese? I think Mommy forgot to put the oven on.”

A few weeks later...

“You really gonna walk in that?” Callie pointed to the clothes her best friend was modeling for the graduation ceremony fast approaching.

The taller girl looked at herself in the mirror.

“I’m not so sure,now…” Her voice trailed off. Even with the ‘approval’ of her family, she still felt out of place; a pair of jeans in a designer suit world, she felt. And ‘approval’ really didn’t come close to the support and encouragement she felt from her family; a family finally together after being blow apart by doubt and suspicion and guilt, but knitted tightly now by love.

“You look great. Almost as great as I will. And I’m going to be fighting all the boys off with a stick.” She laughed but Terry frowned and shoulders pulled up into a reflexive shrug.

“You like boys?” Terry said, frowning with head down. Callie reached over and lifted Terry’s chin.

“Well….just one. After all, some of my best girlfriends are boys.” Terry shot her a puzzled look and she spoke again.

“Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connait point. French. Pascal. The heart has its reasons, whereof reason knows nothing...."

"That's L'Engle, you know?"

She kissed Terry, and it felt like things had become much more than merely acceptable, which suited both of them just fine.

"Yes, I know...."

All quotes from A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle