Circumstances 29 

I did a lot of thinking, then got on the phone.  After that I went back downstairs.

“Mom?”

She looked up at me.  She didn’t smile, but then, she rarely did, at least not at me.  But I had her attention.

“Am I really grounded?”

She wrinkled her lips into a grimace, and I was afraid she was going to bark yes, but she just shook her head and looked back down at the table.  So I took a chance.  “You have a lot to worry about, and I’m just in your way.  Gary wants me to come back over there so we can finish a game we were playing.  If I can stay over there again tonight, you won’t have to worry about dinner for me or me disturbing you.  Is that OK?”

She didn’t even bother to look up. She just said, “Yeah, that’d be good, you getting out of here for awhile.  Good idea.  Go.”

Gary’s mom picked me up fifteen minutes later.  Gary wasn’t with her.  I got in, and she hugged me again.  I really needed that.  I don’t have any idea how she always knew.

“Where’s Gary?” I asked her when she’d let me go.

“I told him he had to do his laundry and change his sheets if you were coming over again,” she laughed.  “I knew I could get him to do it without an argument if I used you as my carrot.”  She grinned at me.

I tried to grin back at her.  I tried, and failed, and she saw it.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice low and warm and suddenly worried for me.

“I… I want to ask you something, but I can’t.  It’s too much, and I’d be taking advantage of how nice you are, and...”  Dammit!  My emotions overtook me again, and I felt tears starting.  I turned my face away from her.

She pulled the car over to the curb and stopped.  Then she turned to look at me.  I couldn’t look back at her.

“Keith?” she said.

I didn’t answer.

“Keith, what is it, honey?  You can ask me anything.  Anything at all.  Please, honey, I hate to see you all upset and worried.  Please, tell me.”  She turned to me and put a hand gently on my shoulder.

I turned and suddenly lunged toward her and she caught me in her arms.  She wrapped me up, and I snuggled into her.  She gave me something with her warmth that I was lacking, something I desperately needed, and I ate it up.  It gave me courage to ask her what I wanted to ask.  Something I’d never have been able to do without it.

She fried chicken for dinner, and Gary told her it wasn’t healthy, all that fat, and she told him she’d used canola oil but he probably shouldn’t take the risk of eating it anyway and she’d whip him up a liverwurst sandwich with onions and sauerkraut instead, and offered me both breasts since Gary wouldn't be eating one, and Gary said... well, he didn’t just let that go, he came back at her and I was doing as much laughing as eating.  His father was, too, and kept winking at me as if to let me know the two of us were sharing something, watching the two of them.  Watch them we did, and I forgot all about everything at home for the time being.

After dinner, Mrs. Jenks asked us all to come to the living room. Gary and I sat on the couch, and the other two in arm chairs.  When we were all seated, Mrs. Jenks said, “Keith has a problem at home.  The circumstances there have changed.  I think we can help him by offering him a place to stay for a few months.  This needs to be a family decision.  What do my two men have to say about it?”

Gary smiled so widely I wondered that his face didn’t split in two, and yelled, “Yeah!”  His father was a bit calmer, but said to me, “Of course you’re welcome here, Keith.  I’m so happy you came to us for help.  Not everyone would have done that.  It means you’re as comfortable with us as we are with you, and you don’t have a lot of false pride.  Asking for help when you need it is a mark of maturity.  Anyway, I like having you here.  It keeps Gary happy and out of my hair.”

I looked at them all, then dropped my eyes.  Why did I get so lucky as to find these people?  And then I realized, I didn’t.  Even if I had, I’d have been too shy to do anything about it.  They, or rather Gary, had found me.

I raised my head and said, “You guys are wonderful, and saying thanks isn’t enough, but it’s all I can say.  I know I’m imposing, but I didn’t know what else to do.  I had to find out if it was OK with you guys first before asking her.  Now, I have to find a way to suggest it to her so she’ll agree.”

Mrs. Jenks looked at her husband, then back at me.  “Why don’t’ you let me try, Keith?  If you ask her, she’ll probably automatically say no, for all those reasons we adults always have for something like this.  I can deflect those a whole lot better than you can.  In fact, I’ll do it right now.  No reason to put it off.”

And she got up and walked to the phone in the den. 

I couldn’t control my emotions, waiting.  I really didn’t want to leave here.  I’d finally found someone who wanted to be my friend, and perhaps just as important, I’d found two adults who cared about me.  I didn’t want to leave that.

There was something else that was bothering me, but I didn’t know how to talk about it, or who would be the person to unload my worries on.  My mother seemed to be… well, she was changing.  She’d warmed up to me after picking me up at school that day, but then had gone right back to how she’d been, and today had seemed much worse.  I couldn’t get the image out of my mind of her sitting at the kitchen table, not doing anything but stare at the wall.  I was beginning to wonder if she was OK, mentally. 

I got up and started pacing.  Gary watched, then got up himself and grabbed my arm and took me outside, onto the patio.  It was still warm, and he pushed me into a chair and plopped down into one himself.  “You all right?” he asked.

“No.  I’m scared.”  I could hear a tremble in my voice.

“That she’ll say no?”

“That, but it’s more.”  I stopped.  I didn’t want to talk about all my fears.  I’d sound like a little kid.  I didn’t know why he liked me, but whining and crying about my fears wouldn’t help.

“Keith, it helps to talk about things.  Let me in on what’s going on.  You’ll feel better.  And it’s what best friends are for.”

I dropped my head, but just being with him, sitting there, did make me feel better, and I knew telling him would help, too.

“I think my mom’s losing her job,” I started.  “She’ll be working in San Diego, and it’s temporary, and if she loses that, I’m not sure she can handle it.  I keep thinking, just when things seem to be looking up for me, they’re going downhill for her.  She’s all I have, and if she cracks up over this, what’ll happen to me?”

I jumped up suddenly.  I was going to cry, I knew it.  And I didn’t want him to see. 

I ran out into the backyard, wanting to be by myself.  I felt the tears start to fall.  I had my back turned to the patio.  Maybe he’d see I needed time alone.

Hah!  No chance of that at all, with Gary.  I started to shake, and then he was there, his arm around me.  I couldn’t stop crying, even with his arm there.  Then I turned, and was against his front, and he was holding me, and I was crying into his chest.

Which is where we were when his mother came out and called, “Keith, I need to talk to you.”  She sounded grim.