A Different Kind of Normal

  My sister was abandoning her son. I was sickened, but I knew I was talking to the drugs, not Brooke, and the drugs were nasty and cruel and dishonest. You might as well be talking to the devil himself.

  “Yeah, I have some cash, Austin. Do you? Why the hell don’t you have any money? Why is it that I always have to get the money? You’re getting it from who? When? Yeah, I’ll go. Then we’re outta here. Arizona is fine. I need some sun.” She hung up.

  I held Tate closer to me and planted a kiss on his forehead. He couldn’t understand what she was saying, but I wanted to protect him anyhow. I swear he smiled. They say it is impossible for a baby that young to smile. They are wrong. I know he smiled. It was my first inkling of his shiny brilliance.

  “I’m sorry, Jaden.” She leaned over Tate.

  “God, Brooke—” She had been beautiful once, but she was battered to bits now.

  For a second the veil lifted and I saw sheer, raw pain in her eyes. Two of her tears landed on Tate’s cheeks, and slid down, as if Tate was crying, as if he was mourning the loss of his mother, the one person who should have protected and loved him above everyone else.

  “Bye, Jaden. Bye, Tate. I love you.”

  The phone rang again, she swore, picked it up, and shouted, “What the fuck is it now, Austin?”

  It was the drugs. A sober Brooke never would have spoken to anyone like that. It was only a few years ago that I would have told you that Brooke was the kindest person I had ever met in my whole life.

  Brooke wobbled on out as her tears slid down Tate’s face.

  “I love you,” I whispered to him, broken. My sister was on drugs and would probably end up dead. She had left her son, who was born with a big head. He was mine now, and I loved him. “I love you, Tate.”

  He smiled again, yes, he did, don’t you doubt it, then he slept.

  I walked to the windows. In a minute, I could see my sister’s auburn hair, the exact color as mine, floating in the wind. She stopped and looked up at the windows and waved. She couldn’t see in, but I knew she was waving at me, at Tate. A car pulled up alongside her and she climbed in. The car sped away. She was gone. Gone again. Pain rippled through my body.

  I could not predict Tate’s future then. I knew it would be hard. I had no idea how crushingly hard, but what I did know was this: I was Tate’s mother. My sister gave birth to him, but he was my son.

  I was nineteen.

  Would my sister have allowed Tate to play basketball even with his medical issue? Sure. Why the hell not? The kid would have been running loose and taking care of himself from the moment she left the hospital with him. He would often have been hungry, cold, scared, neglected, abused, and completely alone because his mother would have been high or chasing down her next fix—if he had even lived through his first year with his medical issues, which was highly improbable.

  That’s how drug addicts “parent.”

  In fact the words drug addicts and parent, together, at best, are an oxymoron.

  I am Tate’s mother. I will do what I believe is right.

  That means no basketball.

  TATE’S AWESOME PIGSKIN BLOG

  I am going to post a picture of myself soon. Real soon.

  I want to hide longer because then you can get to know me without my head in the way. But keep sending me your stories about yourselves! I’m posting all the ones that people want posted, and there’s tons to look at, dudes and dudettes. We have people being real—so read ’em!

  Did you know that Africa has 11.7 million square miles? How many lions does that work out to be? I wonder.

  Did you also know that an adult’s intestines are about twenty-five feet long? Man, if I could take my intestines out, I could use them as ropes. Maybe I could rope cattle with them, or I could use them to swing from one tall building to the next in a city, or to make ladders. You know, an intestinal ladder.

  Did you also know that Trang’s farts smell like the devil burning his tail? He has the worst farts. I think something died in him.

  Did you know I really, really want to try out for the basketball team, but my mom said no? I know!! Insane!!

  Also I am listening to Max of Grunge Punge. He is so chill it’s sick.

  I think part of the reason I’m writing this blog is because I’m trying to get enough courage to get out there, you know, “out there in the world,” because I live in a small town now, and I figure if I get my face floating into the universe now, and I don’t freak that many people out, then it’ll give me some courage to leave here.

  It’s not that I want to leave here, Tillamina’s cool. We’re close to the beach and skiing, we’re out in the country, but I know I have to leave someday. I mean, I can’t hide because of my head, right? How am I going to go to college and study cellular neurophysiology, cognitive information processing, the Renaissance, Italian art? How am I going to study my favorite subject: the brain? How am I going to figure out how to bottle up cow’s farts for energy? How will I see Venezuela or Machu Picchu or study how Venice was built on water? Can’t do that if I hide, right?

  And I want to do all that. I can’t let my head get in the way.

  So I’m writing the blog.

  Who’s out there today? What do you want to do with your life?

  “Guess what, Boss Mom?”

  “What?”

  “Look at this. I wrote: Who’s out there today? And a whole bunch of people are. Some of them are kids at school, one is Nana Bird, four are people from Foster’s Village, including the current bad boy villain that she lusts after, and Uncle Caden wrote, ‘I love your head, don’t knock it, my boy.’ Damini wrote that she is ‘out there’ and would I quit bugging her, I am a pain in her keester. A couple of my teachers wrote, too, and a bunch of people I don’t know. They’re all talking about what they want to do with their lives, where they want to go, who they want to be, what’s holding them back, their worries.”

  “This is amazing.” I read the comments. I was impressed with the frankness, the dialogue, the sharing, the encouragement.

  “This is chill.” Tate laughed.

  The blog was giving him a voice. A voice without people reacting first to his head. A voice that could show his personality, his humor, and his character, which then allowed him to talk with others honestly and with respect. I reached down and hugged him. “I love you with my whole heart, son.”

  “Me, too, Boss Mom. And I know you’ll change your mind about basketball. You know, the guys are practicing, getting together. I can do that, too. Carefully. I’ll be careful.”

  “No.”

  “You’re gonna give in, Boss Mom.” He rubbed his neck. “Hey! Maybe the Other Mother might see my blog. Then she can get to know me.”

  It felt as if I’d been hit in the gut with a car. “I already know you, Tate, so does Nana Bird and Caden and his kids and we love you in a monster-sized way.” That was the way I told him I loved him when he was a kid and he loved monsters.

  “Yeah, me, too, Boss Mom.”

  “This is a bad idea,” I told my mother the morning of the raft outing with Ethan, scurrying around the kitchen getting the club sandwiches slammed together with the warmed-up crumbled blue cheese dressings and adding extra powdered-sugar frosting to the cinnamon rolls I’d slaved over.

  “Here’s a list of adverbs to explain how I’m feeling. Ready? Stupendously, colossally, jarringly awkward.”

  “Awkward is an adjective and this is a spleeennnndid idea.” My mother was wearing what she thought was fashionable gear for river rafting: pink, all pink, including a shiny pink jacket with gold buckles, and her gold bangles and dangly diamond earrings. Initially, she was wearing pink stilettos with a shiny white heel.

  “Mother, really?” I pulled my hair into a ponytail, the crystals from Tate hanging to my shoulders. “Pink heels?”

  “Nana Bird, you’re gonna puncture the raft,” Tate said. He was eating his fourth bowl of cereal in the nook.

  “I’ll keep my heels up or I??
?ll take them off.” She brought her leg up to hip height and twisted her ankle. She had flown in last night, after telling me, there was “no way in the world I would miss out on your first official date with Ethan!”

  She had then called my brother, Caden, and told him, Damini, and the triplets to get ready for “Jaden’s Raft Date with the Sex Doctor, Ethan.” I’d had to call the raft company to add another raft. My brother’s family had all arrived early at my doorstep.

  “Lucky me to be here on your first date with Ethan,” Caden said, winking at me. “I’m a witness to love. That’s why I’m wearing my red T-shirt. For love.”

  “Yeah, a date, date, date,” Damini said, then giggled. “Jaden’s Raft Date with the Sex Doctor, Ethan.”

  “Did you need to say that to Damini, Mother? She’s a young innocent.”

  “Yep. Young and innocent,” Damini said. “I’m corrupted now.”

  “It’s all titillating, if you ask me,” my mother said, twirling a diamond earring. “I’m hopeful for you.”

  “What’s a tit-a-lating?” Damini asked.

  “Is there nothing that you think that doesn’t come out of your mouth, Mother?” I hoped Ethan found my cinnamon rolls mouthwatering.

  My mother winked a perfectly made-up eye at me. “No, sugar, there isn’t.”

  “Sex doctor!” Hazel yelled, brandishing her sword.

  “See what you’ve done,” I protested. “Hazel, don’t say that!”

  “Sex doctor!” Heloise giggled and Harvey said, “Ha ha ex!”

  I put my hands to my ears and groaned.

  The triplets were in their best river-rafting gear: Heloise was dressed as a ninja. Hazel was a pirate with a purple tutu and a sword, and Harvey was a princess in a sparkly white dress with an army helmet on.

  “Hazel is wearing the tutu because she had a fight with Heloise, who wanted to wear it with her ninja outfit.” Caden sighed. “Harvey is a princess because he saw a princess on TV last night who was magic.”

  “I magic now, Aunt Jaden,” Harvey said. He waved a star wand.

  “I fight!” Heloise said, karate-chopping in the air.

  “I a dance pirate,” Hazel said. “Dance pirate! I got a patch on my eye. You wanna patch, Aunt Jaden?”

  I hugged all three of them before they ran off to “hug” Slinky the lizard.

  “Mom, those heels are pretty,” Caden said, “but you can’t wear them or you’ll sink the raft. Wear your pink tennis shoes with the white stripes. They’ll still match with your outfit.”

  Caden is always helpful with clothes.

  My mother tapped her heels, prickly impatient with our silly fashion advice. “I won’t poke the raft, and changing will ruin the flow and pinkness of my outfit.”

  “But remember, Nana Bird,” Tate said, Damini sitting next to him. “Nothing can ruin your shining beauty.”

  That brought a smile to her face, and she kissed Tate and Damini, then scooted off to find her pink tennis shoes to match her pink pants, pink T-shirt, and shiny pink jacket with gold buckles.

  Damini said, “I can’t wait to hang out with your boyfriend.”

  I scowled at Caden. Caden coughed into his hand. “Now, Damini . . .”

  “What? Aunt Jaden has dreamed about marrying Dr. Robbins for years. But she can’t even date him because he’s Tate’s doctor, but she doesn’t know if he’s interested, anyhow. . . .” She eyed me. “You’re in lovey-dovey kiss kiss kiss with him, aren’t you? I can tell by the way you’re dressed.”

  “What about the way I’m dressed? He’s Tate’s doctor, Damini. I’m in jeans and a green T-shirt.”

  “Tight jeans,” she observed. “Tight T-shirt. You have big boobs, Aunt Jaden. Do you think I’ll have big boobs?”

  “I don’t think you’ll have any boobs,” Tate said. “I think you’re a sea monster. They don’t have boobs.”

  “Shut up, Tate,” Damini said, wrapping an arm around him.

  “I can’t shut up. I am destined to be a truth-speaker and you’re gonna be a no-boobed sea monster. Maybe you’re a boy. A boy Martian.”

  “I am not a boy Martian!”

  “I see that you didn’t deny being a sea monster, did you?” He scooted out of the nook to avoid Damini’s wrath.

  “You’re a pain in my keester, Tate!” She ran after him, both of them laughing.

  “You told her I wanted to marry him?” I hissed to Caden, who squirmed and pulled on his ponytail, which, today, was in a braid with a red ribbon as was Heloise’s, Hazel’s, and Damini’s hair. “Tell her not to say a thing to Ethan, not a word. I’d be so embarrassed.”

  Caden yelled to Damini, “Damini, don’t say a word to the doctor about how Aunt Jaden wants to marry him, you got that?”

  “Got it! I won’t say that Aunt Jaden wants to marry the sex doctor!”

  “If you do, Damini, I’m going to . . .” Caden paused, brow furrowed. “Your punishment will be . . .” His face scrunched up in concentration. “It’ll be something bad, Damini! Zip it, okay?”

  “Zip it!” She laughed. “I’m zipped.”

  “She’s zipped,” Tate yelled. “A zippered sea monster.”

  The triplets came thundering back in.

  Hazel raised Slinky the lizard in the air. “I hug Slinky!”

  Heloise jumped. “I ninja.”

  Harvey grabbed a spatula and yelled, “I a damn princess!”

  My mouth dropped. Caden groaned. “I said damn once and now he won’t quit saying it! Stop it, Harvey. Don’t say damn.”

  “But I a damn princess!”

  With much to-do and confusion, the lunch hauled out in bags, we finally clambered into Caden’s truck and my car and headed out to the river, the sun peeking over the horizon. When we were down the block, we realized we didn’t have Harvey and had to drive back to get him. He was waiting on the porch with Slinky the lizard. “Slinky lonely,” he told me.

  Driving to the river, I was so excited I could hardly sit still and I could not stop smiling.

  A whole day with Ethan!

  “Remember, dear family, I’m threatening you,” I yelled before we all left the second time. “Don’t embarrass me or I won’t cook for you again.”

  I heard Tate take a quick inhale.

  Damini turned to me, eyes bugging out of her head. “Are you serious, Aunt Jaden?”

  “Totally serious.”

  “That be bad!” Heloise the ninja said.

  “Bad!” Hazel echoed.

  “Damn bad,” Harvey said.

  “That’s a petticoats-on-fire problem,” Damini said.

  I heard my mother laugh. “Burn those petticoats!”

  “Okay, Aunt Jaden,” Damini said. “I’ll behave and keep my mouth in my control. I will. And your shirt is tight, but you look pretty and I hope I have knockers like that one day.”

  “Thank you. And whatever you do, Damini, don’t hit Dr. Robbins with your leg.”

  She grinned. “I probably won’t.”

  I have always treasured Damini’s grin. When she joined our family when she was four, she had one leg, huge, sad eyes, and seemed to be semi-checked out of this world, as if she wasn’t sure she wanted to rejoin it. She was scared of loud noises, crying, the dark, boxes, closets, being alone, anyone angry, and, oddly, men in hats. She had a habit of huddling in corners.

  She wouldn’t go to bed without an extra sack lunch she would eat in the middle of the night. She would sneak into Caden’s and Marla’s bedroom to sleep on the floor. Her favorite person next to Caden and Marla was Tate. She clung to him.

  She still clings to him.

  Damini didn’t smile for six months. Her first smile? Tate picked her up and showed her a butterfly. She didn’t speak for six months, either. When she did speak, she spoke English in short, but full sentences. Her first sentence? I love you.

  I have always, and will always, treasure Damini’s grin.

  “Dr. Robbins,” Tate yelled. “Dr. Robbins!”

  Ethan turned. Ins
tantly, he smiled.

  I about melted. I love that smile.

  Tate barreled into him and hugged him as usual, while all I could do was gape at Ethan, how tall he was, how broad, how the autumn sun glowed around him as if he were sporting a gold cloak. He was comfortable but sexy. Friendly but sexy. Smart but sexy. And he was happy to see me! He was! I saw it in that split second.

  Then I saw her.

  A woman. A woman with my Ethan.

  An evil, spidery, donkey woman.

  My mother’s red-lipsticked mouth twitched. “His face lit up like a drunken sailor’s when he saw you, witch daughter, but it appears he has a Barbie beside him.”

  I felt a green jealousy monster with fangs swell in my chest. He had brought his girlfriend! I didn’t even know he had a girlfriend. But of course he had a girlfriend. I had been daydreaming about our relationship for so long I was deluded. I had imagined he cared for me. He didn’t. He was Tate’s doctor, that’s it. He was kind.

  I fought off a flood of emotional doom as I studied Barbie. All done up. Wearing tight white jeans, white T-shirt, white coat. Lots of makeup. Lots of platinum hair. I would bet her oversized watermelon boobs were false. She was skinny in a way that said she did not believe in eating.

  Ethan introduced Tate to the woman and, as so often happens with people who do not make up “normal” in our society, who are different in one way or another, the woman reacted to Tate and to General Noggin with her most basic emotions: Disgust. Fear. Mortification.

  Disgust toward my boy, Tate.