Those Children Are Ours Read online

  They had been living in the garage apartment in Atlanta, a couple of blocks from the university where Thomas, her husband, was completing his dissertation on some obscure English poet. Thomas wanted to be an English professor and an author. He had already published his first novel. He needed the PhD before a college would offer him a job.

  The day that she left she had been out of bed rather early for her, at ten o’clock, and she had taken her first sip of whiskey by ten-ten. Thomas had been in the kitchen, cleaning up after cooking breakfast. He had saved a plate for her.

  Jennie frowned. There had been an argument, although she couldn’t recall what it was about. She had stormed onto the porch, screaming at one of the girls, Alexis she thought. Thomas had followed. She remembered screaming at him too, a string of obscenities, before stomping into the bedroom, throwing clothes into a duffle, and marching through the door. Both girls had been crying and Jennie’s head had been pounding. She had just wanted them to be quiet. As she had reached her ninety-six Honda, she had tossed the bag in the back, gunned the engine, and roared away, never looking back. She had shacked up with Jeff, one of her favorites from the Rusty Anchor.

  She had been beloved at the Rusty Anchor. She had flirted with the guys, laughed at their dirty jokes and, on occasion, drank them under the table. She had listened to the sad stories they told, consoled them when they were down, called their wives when they were too drunk to drive, and she had done whatever she deemed necessary to keep them happy.

  Her temper, though, had been legendary, flaring without warning. Woe to the cheapskate who believed in a ten-percent tip. Woe to the guy who talked trash about his wife or the one who idealized his wife, depending on Jennie’s frame of mind. Woe to the customer who made a pass at her, unless the pass was welcomed. One newcomer had patted her backside and had quickly found himself lying on the floor with a fork pressing against his neck. Regular customers knew to tread carefully, knowing that her mood could change on a dime.

  But life goes on. Things change.

  Jennie smiled as she thought about Preacher, how he had wandered into the bar one afternoon looking for something to eat. If not for him, she’d still be waiting tables, sleeping around, and drinking like a fish. She still wrote to him occasionally, and she wanted him to be proud of her. She would not want him to know that she had not seen her children in over a decade.

  Jennie shivered and crossed her arms, gazing absently at the white clouds that now scudded across the sky.

  Dr. Wilson and Jennie had been talking about her children for over a year, discussing Jennie’s wish that somehow she could be reunited with them. On Monday Dr. Wilson had suggested that her delay in making some decision about whether to proceed with a petition in family court might reflect an attempt to avoid facing the pain she had caused to people she had loved.

  They had made a list: Thomas, Alexis, and Christa, were at the top. There were her parents and Thomas’s mother. And there was Jeff. Dr. Wilson had raised an eyebrow when she’d added his name.

  “Jeff?”

  “I did hurt Jeff.” Jennie had nodded. “I didn’t love him. I used him for support and for pleasure, but I let him think I was his forever.”

  She had left Dr. Wilson’s office no closer to knowing what she should do than she had been when she had arrived.

  Jennie looked down at her grandmother’s marker. “Jennifer Williams Bateman,” she read aloud, her voice catching on the first name. She had been named after her grandmother, and the two of them had always been close, closer even than a mother and a daughter. When she was a child, it was her grandmother to whom Jennie had turned for counsel, and she still sought her out, driving to the church to talk with her and to ask her advice whenever life left her confused or fearful. She had driven from Atlanta when she wanted to stop drinking. She had talked with her before the first session with her counselor. She had come when she was afraid of going back to school.

  She brushed a tear from her eye. She should have talked with Grandmom before walking out on her husband and her two daughters. She had thought of it, but she was so messed up at the time—drinking, cheating on her husband, neglecting her children—that she was afraid her grandmother would be ashamed of her, so she had stayed away.

  She didn’t believe in communing with the dead—to Jennie, her grandmother was not dead, just living somewhere else. She was not sure whether her grandmother actually gave her advice or whether talking with her simply helped her to think clearly. In any case, after telling Grandmom her problems, she always had some direction.

  “What should I do, Grandmom?” she whispered. “I want to see my girls. I want to know they are all right. I want to make sure that they don’t turn out like I did.”

  She sat in silence for almost ten minutes, chills spreading across her arms, as a hawk wheeled in the sky above her. She watched as it made several passes over the churchyard, and she felt, again, the cold wind blowing across the cemetery, heard the faraway sound of a locomotive.

  Feeling her grandmother’s presence, she began speaking again. “I’ll have to go to court, Grandmom, and a lot of people are going to be angry. A lot of people may be hurt. My girls may end up hating me.” She wiped away a tear. “I want them to know that I love them.”

  Finally, she bent and caressed her grandmother’s marker. “I miss you so much. I remember how I could talk to you about, well, about anything, ask you anything, and you never led me in the wrong direction. I love you, Grandmom. I want my daughters to feel the same way about me.”

  Jennie stood and walked back toward the church. Should she do it, she wondered, or should she not? She leaned against the car and gazed at the sky. Smiling, she felt her body relax, the tension draining away much as it did when she slipped into a warm bath. She still was not sure which road to take, but she felt certain that Grandmom would show her the way.

  She climbed into her car, drove down the long curving road, and bumped across the railroad tracks, pausing as she reached the highway. Whitesburg, her home, lay to the left. To the right, the highway ran to Carrollton, where she had an appointment to talk with an attorney.

  It would be so easy to turn left, go home, take that warm bath, sit in front of the fire with a cup of hot chocolate…

  Who was she trying to fool? Those girls had no clue who she was, she thought. No way they would ever love her like she loved Grandmom.

  As she turned the wheels toward home an old Chevy, just like one her father used to drive, crept down the highway and turned onto the road to Saint Paul’s. The driver waved as he passed, and Jennie waved back.

  In her mind, she saw herself as a child, sitting next to her grandmother in the back seat of her father’s car. At the time, Jennie didn’t know where they were, but the car was stopped at a traffic light in front of a college. She had looked through the tall metal arch standing at the entrance to the campus. She saw the white buildings and the huge yard, covered in thick, green grass. Two students, a boy and a girl, walked through the arch, hand in hand.

  “I’m going to school there one day,” she had said. Her father had laughed until he had cried, but Grandmom had put an arm around her and hugged her.

  “Don’t mind him,” she had said. “If you really want something, then you go after it. You may not always get what you want, but you certainly won’t get it if you don’t try.”

  A man in a blue pickup rolled in behind her and tooted his horn. Jennie took a deep breath and turned right.

  Chapter Two

  Alice Green had been a partner in a South Carolina law firm for ten years, she told Jennie, specializing in family law. When her husband had been offered a position at what was then West Georgia College, they had moved to Carrollton, and Alice had opened her own practice, working part time while her three children were small. She was sixty years old, plump, with graying hair, and she appeared to be the grandmother that she was. Looking behind her, on a credenza, Jennie saw photographs of Alice’s husband, three children, and four grandch
ildren. She named each one for Jennie, pride in her voice, love in her eyes.

  She would understand her feelings, Jennie thought, and she told her pretty much everything—her husband, their marriage, their children, her craziness, the alcohol, the other men, and, finally, her attempts to straighten out her life.

  “I left my family twelve years ago. The only contact I’ve had since then was when Thomas filed for a divorce two years later.”

  “Two years?’ Alice frowned. “Why did he wait so long? You said he moved to South Carolina, to teach at the College of Charleston. He could have charged you with desertion six months later.”

  Jennie shrugged. “I didn’t pay attention to the grounds. I just signed the papers and mailed them the next morning.”

  “You began to clean up your act right after the divorce.”

  Jennie nodded.

  “Cause and effect?”

  “Perhaps.” Jennie paused, thinking, then shook her head. “I don’t know. It just seemed like the right thing to do.” She looked into Alice’s eyes. “I left Jeff, the man with whom I was living. I went cold turkey with the alcohol and I haven’t touched it in almost ten years. I moved home with my parents, went back to school, and I’ve been teaching at Carrollton Elementary for six years. I entered therapy, I haven’t had a date in years, and I go to church almost every Sunday.” She bit her lower lip and glanced down at her hands. “I’m so different from what I was like when I left my husband…my children.”

  “You could have gone to court any time during the past decade to seek visitation, shared custody, full custody, whatever. You didn’t. Why now?”

  “My therapist and I have talked about it for months.” Jennie continued to study her hands, not raising her eyes to make contact. “Thomas is an author, as well as an English professor. His most recent novel, Time and Time Again, was published last year.”

  She glanced up as Alice nodded.

  “I’ve read it. I’ve read all of his books actually.” Alice glanced toward a bookcase beside Jennie. “He’s one of my favorite authors.”

  “Last year I was in Atlanta, shopping at Lenox Square,” Jennie said. “Thomas was signing copies of the book.” She shook her head. “I didn’t know he would be there, hadn’t kept up with him. I didn’t even know that he still wrote. A table had been set up near the front door of Macy’s. He was sitting there, and a line of people, all holding copies of his book, stretched the length of the mall.” She brushed a strand of hair out of her face. “I bought a copy and joined the line. It was late and there were just a few people behind me.”

  She took a deep breath and grasped the arm of her chair to stop her hand from shaking. “My hands were trembling…like they are now. Anyway, I reached the table and handed him my copy and asked him to make it out to Jennie—” Her voice broke. “I’m sorry. I was so nervous that I almost left the book lying on the table in front of him and ran. He looked up at me, there was a flicker of recognition, followed by a puzzled frown, as if I looked familiar but he could not exactly place me.”

  “He didn’t recognize his former wife?”

  “In fairness, like I told you, he hadn’t seen me in over a decade. When I left him, I weighed forty pounds more than I do now, my hair was bleached platinum blond and reached my waist. I wore torn jeans, t-shirts and halter tops…” She shook her head. “He didn’t recognize me.”

  She bit her bottom lip. “After he signed my copy, I strolled over to the kiosk for some coffee and I studied him. He looked just as I remembered, maybe a little gray at the temples. He had spoken so nicely to everyone in line. He had even stayed late so that no one was disappointed. He was the Thomas I had known.” She swallowed hard against the emotions whelming in her throat.

  “As I watched, two teenaged girls came running across the mall. They threw their arms around him, hugged him, and began to pull clothes from their shopping bags for him to see. Both were tall, brown-eyed. They were the most beautiful girls I had ever seen. Then it struck me—they were my daughters.”

  She gazed up at Alice. “I thought how nice it would be to be a family again. I know that won’t happen, but maybe, at least, I could see my girls. Visit with them. Get to know them.” She held the contact with Alice’s eyes. “I really messed up my life, but that was in the past. I’m ready to be their mother again.”

  They sat in silence for a moment.

  “Do you think I can? Be their mother again?”

  “I’m not sure.” Alice tapped her pen on the desk. “Ordinarily, I could not conceive of your not being able to have visitation rights.” She took a deep breath. “But this case is hardly ordinary—the ages of the children, the lack of contact for so many years, the distance. Your daughters will have no idea who you are. Visitation will disrupt their lives.”

  “Those children are mine,” Jennie said. “I want to try. I need to try. Will you represent me?”

  They talked for another half hour. Alice agreed to represent Jennie as she filed a petition for visitation rights.

  “One thing before you go.” Alice pulled a novel from the bookcase. “Ordinarily the fact that your former husband is an author would be of little consequence. However, Thomas Lindsay is a well-known one.” She held the book out to Jennie. “He published this book about ten years ago, right after your divorce. It is the book that established him as a major author.”

  Jennie took it and looked at the cover. On it, a young woman was striding down a flight of steps, a duffle bag slung across one shoulder. Two young children stood at the top of the stairs, crying.

  “She Walked Away,” she read the title.

  “It tells the story of a man whose wife abandons him and their two children.”

  Jennie looked up. “No, he…”

  “Although he has denied it, the book is generally accepted as being autobiographical. Should the case become public, you will be identified with the man’s wife. She is not treated sympathetically, as you might imagine.” Alice pointed at the book. “You need to read it.”

  ***

  “You’ve made your decision. Good for you.” Elizabeth Wilson, Jennie’s therapist, crossed her legs and sipped her tea.

  Jennie nodded. “I’m going to do it. Notice of my petition will be served this week.”

  “Shared custody?”

  “Visitation, at least at first. Weekends each month. A couple of months in the summer. We’ll see how it goes.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “Excited, nervous…afraid.”

  “Afraid?” Dr. Wilson placed her cup on the desk and folded her hands. “Why afraid?”

  “Afraid what Thomas will say about me in court, afraid the judge will see me as a terrible person and deny my petition…afraid my children will hate me.”

  “We talked about your marriage when you first entered therapy, but that was a while ago. I find that our perceptions change over time. So, refresh my memory. How did you and Thomas meet?”

  “We met in college—first day, first class.” She smiled. “It was really rather funny.”

  “Tell me.”

  “English one-oh-one. I found myself sitting next to him in the front row. It was eight o’clock in the morning and I was half asleep, but he was so good looking.” She laughed. “I didn’t hear a word the teacher said. Good thing there was a written syllabus.”

  Jennie shifted her position. “Class ended. As he stood up, I pushed my books—I had five or six with me—onto the floor in front of him. Everyone turned to look. A couple of guys laughed, but Thomas simply knelt down and helped me pick them up. I thanked him, and I asked if he could help me find my next class.”

  She stared out of the window, picturing the scene. “I thought I was being so cool. I handed him my schedule.” She sighed. “I’d felt like a complete fool when he walked me twenty feet down the hall to the next room. I’ll bet my face turned purple. I managed to thank him, and he just smiled and told me he was happy to help me.”

  Dr. Wilson laughed. “I can i
magine. I’d have felt embarrassed too.”

  “After class, I went back to the dorm. As I opened the door, the telephone was ringing. It was Thomas. He said that he had inadvertently ended up with one of my books. I checked quickly, and I was short one, a little thin book that I had not noticed was missing. He offered to return it—when he picked me up for dinner.”

  “He worked fast.”

  “I met him at six. I was wearing a top that was just high enough and a skirt that was just long enough to keep me from being arrested.” She laughed. “There would have been blood on the ground if my father had seen me in either one of them. We spent two hours at dinner and another two hours making out in the car afterwards. I felt so excited. I thought I was going to go all of the way on my first day in college.”

  “Good first date.”

  “The best ever. We were inseparable after that. We married the summer following graduation.”

  “Did you tell me that your father liked Thomas?”

  “You’re joking. He couldn’t stand Thomas.” She paused, thinking. “Thomas was everything Daddy was not. Daddy dropped out of high school. Thomas was going for his PhD. Thomas’s family had money. Daddy’s was dirt poor. Daddy enjoys hunting and fishing, drinking beer at the Blue Belle Café. Thomas liked photography, boating, and red wine before dinner at home.”

  She stood and strolled around the office, absently reading the titles of books on a nearby shelf. “After a while, I was no longer the little country girl I had been when I set out for college, but Daddy didn’t realize that I had changed, so he could see nothing that Thomas and I had in common. He concluded that Thomas only wanted my body, and every time I went home after my sophomore year he interrogated me, demanding to know if we were sleeping together.”