Chapter 47 - Robert's First Birthday Card
Lydia turned thirty.
Robert spent two hours choosing a birthday card.
Then threw away six.
Adrian found him standing in a pharmacy aisle.
“This is pathetic.”
Robert glared.
“You've been here thirty minutes.”
“How do you know?”
“I've been watching.”
“That is more pathetic.”
Adrian took the card from his hand.
It said:
TO A WONDERFUL DAUGHTER.
He put it back.
“Absolutely not.”
Robert looked wounded.
“Why?”
“Because you have been her father for eleven months.”
“I've been her biological father for thirty years.”
“And absent for twenty-nine.”
Robert winced.
Adrian picked another.
Simple.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
Blank inside.
“This.”
“What do I write?”
“The truth.”
“What truth?”
Adrian looked at him.
“That you're glad she was born.”
Robert's eyes filled.
Adrian sighed.
“Do not cry in CVS.”
“I am not crying.”
“You are aggressively crying.”
Robert bought the card.
Inside he wrote:
Lydia,
I am glad you were born.
I am sorry I took so long to become brave enough to know you.
You do not owe me a relationship.
Thank you for the parts of one you have chosen to give me.
Robert.
He mailed it.
No flowers.
No jewelry.
No check.
Lydia called two days later.
“Thank you.”
Robert gripped the phone.
“You're welcome.”
A pause.
Then:
“I'm having dinner Friday.”
Robert stopped breathing.
“Okay.”
“Adrian's coming.”
“Okay.”
“Noah too.”
“Okay.”
“You can come.”
Robert covered his eyes.
“Okay.”
Lydia laughed.
“You know other words.”
“I've forgotten them.”
At dinner, nobody called it a family dinner.
That would have been too much.
They met at a small Italian restaurant.
Lydia chose it.
Robert arrived early.
Adrian arrived late.
Noah arrived exactly on time.
Daniel was not invited.
He was delighted.
“Progress,” he told Noah.
“What?”
“A Carter gathering where I am unnecessary.”
“You're taking this disturbingly well.”
“I've had practice.”
At dinner, Lydia asked Adrian about childhood.
He told embarrassing stories about Robert attempting to teach him tennis.
Robert corrected every detail.
Noah watched.
For a few hours, Lydia learned a family through small things.
Robert hated olives.
Adrian could not whistle on command even though he did it constantly when nervous.
Henry once fell asleep during a board presentation and denied it despite snoring.
Margaret hated dogs because a poodle bit her when she was eight.
Lydia laughed so hard at that she cried.
Then became quiet.
“What was she like before?”
Nobody needed to ask who.
Margaret.
Robert looked down.
“Funny.”
Lydia blinked.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Generous sometimes.”
“Terrifying often.”
“Competitive about everything.”
Adrian smiled faintly.
“She cheated at cards.”
Robert looked offended.
“She did not.”
“She absolutely did.”
Noah laughed.
The conversation felt strange.
Margaret existed in Noah's mind as criminal, grandmother, threat, warning.
Lydia had known her only as a name connected to her mother's fear.
Now they were talking about a child bitten by a poodle.
Humanizing Margaret did not excuse her.
That was the strange thing.
A person could be funny and cruel.
Generous and controlling.
Loved and dangerous.
People did not become innocent because someone once laughed with them.
Noah thought that might be one of adulthood's worst lessons.
After dinner Lydia walked with Robert toward the parking lot.
He did not touch her.
She reached for his arm when crossing the street.
Only for balance.
Maybe nothing.
Robert's face changed anyway.
He did not make it bigger.
He simply walked beside her.
May you like
Show up.
Then show up again.
