Denise shook her head, fascinated.
“I’m not surprised. Michael was kind of a bad boy, not exactly the kind of guy you want to remember way longer than you have to. He didn’t have the greatest reputation, if you know what I mean, but a lot of girls found him attractive. I guess they thought him exciting and dangerous. Same old story, even today. Well, your mother followed him to Atlanta right after she graduated.”
“But she told me she moved to Atlanta to go to college.”
“Oh, that may have been somewhere in the back of her mind, but the real reason was Michael. He had some kind of hold on her, that’s for sure. He was also the reason she didn’t come back here to visit.”
“How so?”
“Well, her mom and dad—your grandparents—they just couldn’t forgive her for running off that way. They saw Michael for what he was and said that if she didn’t come home right away, she wasn’t welcome here anymore. They were from the old school, as stubborn as can be, and your mom was just the same. It was like a couple of bulls staring at each other, waiting for the other one to give in. But neither of them ever did, even after Michael went by the wayside for someone else.”
“My father?”
Judy shook her head. “No . . . someone else—your father came along after I lost contact with her.”
“So you didn’t know him at all?”
“No. But I do remember your grandparents heading off to the wedding and being a little hurt that your mother hadn’t sent me an invitation. Not that I could have gone, of course. I was married by then, and like a lot of young couples, my husband and I were struggling financially, and with the new baby—well, it just would have been impossible to make it.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
Judy set her glass of tea on the table. “Nothing to be sorry for. It wasn’t you, and in some way, it wasn’t even your mom anymore—or at least the one I used to know. Your father came from a very respectable family in Atlanta, and by that point in her life, I think your mom was a little embarrassed about where she’d come from. Not that your father minded, obviously, since he married her. But I remember that your grandparents didn’t say much after they returned from the wedding. I think they were a little embarrassed, too, even though they shouldn’t have been. They were great people, but I think they knew they didn’t fit into their daughter’s world anymore, even after your father passed away.”
“That’s terrible.”
“It’s sad, but like I said, it went both ways. They were stubborn, your mom was stubborn. And little by little, they sort of drifted apart.”
“I knew Mom wasn’t close to her parents, but she never told me any of this.”
“No, I wouldn’t expect that she did. But please don’t think poorly of your mother. I certainly don’t. She was always so full of life, so passionate—she was exciting to be around. And she had the heart of an angel, she really did. She was as sweet a person as I ever knew.”
Judy turned to face her. “I see a lot of her in you.”
Denise tried to digest this new information about her mother as Judy took another sip of her tea. Then, as if knowing she’d said too much, Judy added, “But listen to me, droning on like some senile old woman. You must think I’m two steps from an old folks’ home. Let’s talk about you for a while.”
“Me? There’s not much to tell.”
“Then why not start with the obvious? Why did you move to Edenton?”
Denise watched Kyle playing with his trucks, wondering what he was thinking.
“There’s a couple of reasons.”
Judy leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “Man trouble? Some psycho stalker like you see on America’s Most Wanted?”
Denise giggled. “No, nothing that dramatic.” She stopped, her brow furrowing slightly.
“If it’s too personal, you don’t have to tell me. It’s none of my business anyway.”
Denise shook her head. “I don’t mind talking about it—it’s just tough to know where to start.” Judy stayed silent, and Denise sighed, collecting her thoughts. “I guess mainly it has to do with Kyle. I think I told you he has trouble speaking, right?”
Judy nodded.
“Did I tell you why?”
“No.”
Denise looked in Kyle’s direction. “Well, right now they say he has an auditory processing problem, specifically expressive and receptive language delay. Basically, it means that for some reason—no one knows why—understanding language and learning to speak is hard for him. I guess the best analogy is that it’s like dyslexia, only instead of processing visual signals, it has to do with processing sounds. For some reason, the sounds seem to get all mixed up—it’s like he’s hearing Chinese one second, German the next, nonsense chatter after that. Whether the problem’s in the connection between the ear and the brain or within the brain itself no one knows. But in the beginning, they weren’t sure how to diagnose him, and, well . . .”
Denise ran her hand through her hair and faced Judy again. “Are you sure you want to hear all of this? It’s kind of a long story.”
Judy reached over and patted Denise on the knee. “Only if you feel like telling me.”
Judy’s earnest expression suddenly reminded Denise of her mother. Strangely, it felt good to tell her about it, and she hesitated only briefly before going on.
“Well, at first the doctors thought he was deaf. I spent weeks taking Kyle to appointments with audiologists and ENTs—you know, ear, nose, and throat specialists—before they found out that he could hear. Then, they thought he was autistic. That diagnosis lasted for about a year—probably the most stressful year of my life. After that came PDD, or pervasive development disorder, which is sort of like autism, only less severe. That too lasted a few months until they’d run more tests on him. Then, they said he was retarded, with ADD—attention deficit disorder—thrown in for good measure. It wasn’t until maybe nine months ago that they finally settled on this diagnosis.”
“It must have been so hard on you. . . .”
“You can’t imagine how hard it was. They tell you something awful about your child, and you go through all these stages—disbelief, anger, grief, and finally acceptance. You learn everything you can about it—you research and read and talk to whoever you can—and just when you’re ready to confront it head-on, they change their minds and the whole thing starts all over again.”
“Where was the father during all of this?”
Denise shrugged, an almost guilty expression on her face. “The father wasn’t around. Suffice it to say, I hadn’t expected to get pregnant. Kyle was an ‘oops,’ if you know what I mean.”
She paused again, and the two of them watched Kyle in silence. Judy seemed neither surprised nor shocked by the revelation, nor did her expression register any judgment. Denise cleared her throat.
“After Kyle was born, I took a leave of absence from the school where I was teaching. My mom had died, and I wanted to spend the first year or so with the baby. But after all this started happening, I couldn’t go back to work. I was shuttling him all day long to doctors and evaluation centers and therapists until I finally came up with a therapy program that we could do at home. None of that left me with enough time for a full-time job. Working with Kyle is full-time. I’d inherited this house, but I couldn’t sell it, and eventually the money just ran out.”
She glanced at Judy, a rueful expression on her face.
“So I guess the short answer to your question is that I had to move here out of necessity, so that I could keep working with Kyle.”
When she finished, Judy stared at her before finally patting her on the knee again. “Pardon the expression, but you’re a helluva mother. Not many people would make those kinds of sacrifices.”
Denise watched her son play in the dirt. “I just want him to get better.”
“From what you’ve told me, he sounds like he already has.” She let that sink in before leaning back in her chair and continuing. “You know, I remember watching Kyle when you were using the computer in the library, but never once did the thought occur to me that he was having any problems at all. He seemed like every other little boy there, except that he was probably better behaved.”
“But he still has trouble speaking.”
“So did Einstein and Teller, but they turned out to be the greatest physicists in history.”
“How would you know about their speech problems?” Though Denise knew (she’d read nearly everything on the subject), she was surprised—and impressed—that Judy knew it as well.
“Oh, you’d be amazed at the amount of trivia I’ve picked up over the years. I’m like a vacuum cleaner with that stuff, don’t ask me why.”
“You should go on Jeopardy!”
“I would, but that Alex Trebek is so cute, I’d probably forget everything I know as soon as he said hello. I’d just stare at him the whole time, trying to figure out a way to get him to kiss me, like that Richard Dawson did on Family Feud.”
“What would your husband think if he knew you’d said that?”
“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.” Her voice sobered slightly. “He passed away a long time ago.”
“I’m sorry,” Denise began, “I didn’t know.”
“It’s okay.”
In the sudden quiet, Denise fidgeted with her hands. “So . . . you never remarried?”
Judy shook her head. “No. I just didn’t seem to have time to meet someone. Taylor was a handful—it was all I could do to keep up with him.”
“Boy, does that sound familiar. It seems like all I do is work with Kyle and work at the diner.”
“You work at Eights? With Ray Toler?”
“Uh-huh. I got the job when I moved here.”
“Has he told you about his kids?”
“Only a dozen times or so,” Denise answered.
From there, the conversation drifted easily to Denise’s job and the endless projects that seemed to occupy Judy’s time. The rhythm of conversation was something Denise hadn’t experienced in a while, and she found it unexpectedly soothing. A half hour later Kyle tired of playing with his trucks, and he put them under the porch (without being asked, Judy couldn’t help but notice) before wandering up to his mother. His face was red from the heat, his bangs plastered against his forehead. “Can I have some macaroni and cheese?” (Ca-ah haf son concor cheese?)
“Macaroni and cheese?”
“Yes.”
“Sure, sweetie. Let me go make some.”
Denise and Judy stood and went into the kitchen, Kyle leaving dusty footprints on the floor. He went to the table and sat while Denise opened up the cupboard.
“Would you like to stay for lunch? I can throw together a couple of sandwiches.”
Judy checked her watch. “I’d love to, but I can’t. I have a meeting downtown about the festival this weekend. We still have some last-minute details we’ve got to iron out.”
Denise was filling the saucepan with hot water and looked over her shoulder. “Festival?”
“Yeah, this weekend. It’s an annual event and sort of gets everyone in the mood for summer. I hope you’re going.”
Denise set the pan on the burner, and the gas range clicked to life. “I hadn’t planned on it.”
“Why not?”
“Well, for one thing, I hadn’t even heard about it.”
“You really are out of the loop.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“You should go, then—Kyle would love it. They have food and crafts, contests, a carnival is in town—there’s something for everyone.”
Denise’s mind immediately leapt to the costs involved.
“I don’t know if we can,” she finally said, thinking of an excuse. “I have to work Saturday night.”
“Oh, you don’t have to stay long—just come by during the day if you’d like. But it is a lot of fun, and if you want, I could introduce you to some people your own age.”
Denise didn’t respond right away, and Judy sensed her hesitation.
“Just think about it, okay?”
Judy picked up her purse from the counter, and Denise checked the water—not boiling yet—before they walked toward the front door and stepped out on the porch again.
Denise ran her hand through her hair, adjusting a few loose strands that had fallen in her face.
“Thanks for coming by. It was nice to have an adult conversation for a change.”
“I enjoyed it,” Judy said, leaning in to give her an impulsive hug. “Thanks for inviting me.”
As Judy turned to leave, Denise realized what she’d forgotten to mention.
“Oh, by the way, I didn’t tell you that I ran into Taylor yesterday at the store.”
“I know. I talked to him last night.”
After a beat of awkward silence, Judy adjusted her purse strap. “Let’s do this again sometime, okay?”
“I’d like that.”
Denise watched as Judy made her way down the steps and onto the gravel walkway. When Judy reached her car she turned to face Denise again.
“You know, Taylor’s gonna be at the festival this weekend with the rest of the fire department,” Judy called out conversationally. “Their softball team plays at three.”
“Oh?” was all Denise could think to say.
“Well, just in case you do come by, that’s where I’ll be.”
A moment later Judy opened her car door. Denise stood in the doorway and waved as Judy slipped behind the seat and cranked the engine to life, the faint outlines of a smile playing softly on her lips.