My Year of Casual Acquaintances (South Bay #1)

14.

About two weeks into my babysitting gig, I’m sorry to say the honeymoon between little Connor and me is over. The trouble begins in the kitchen, where he now rejects all his previous lunchtime favorites. The usual tour of the freezer, fridge, and pantry yields no requests, just repeated head shakes as he says, “No, no, no” to every item on offer.

He finally agrees to buttered pasta. I boil the macaroni and toss it in butter, but then I make the amateur mistake of sprinkling in a handful of parsley flakes for color. “I hate spinach,” he says, pushing the bowl away in protest.

“It isn’t spinach. It’s a green called parsley, to make it look nice.”

“Not nice. I hate green.”

“Connor, please try it. You won’t even taste the parsley.”

“No. I don’t want to eat that. I want charcuterie,” he says, pronouncing it perfectly.

“Well, we don’t have any.” This elicits a loud whine from him, to which I respond, “Don’t blame me, buddy. I’m the sitter in this house, not the shopper.”

I talk him into cinnamon toast, but I screw that up as well. He wrinkles his nose after the first bite and says, “Too spicy.” I have failed to dilute the cinnamon with an adequate measure of sugar. I shrug and push a box of Goldfish crackers across the counter. At least I can always count on Connor to gobble up the fish-shaped cheddar treats and a generous helping of fresh berries.

At playtime, he now finds fault with everything I do. When he asks me to help him build a house using his new Lego set, he criticizes my design skills. “Mommy makes nicer houses.” He won’t let me read to him, nor will he read aloud to me, looking at his books alone in silent protest and shaking his head “no” if I try to join him in the activity. And outside, the single game he will agree to is Jail, where I’m placed in solitary confinement and not permitted to speak or move as he rolls around the patio in his various ride-on vehicles.

Though Connor may be a precocious little imp, he’s a poor substitute for Benny. Spending so much time with another young child now feels disloyal, which in turn makes me miss Benny even more. When Cheryl returns a few minutes past four, she asks if everything has gone all right.

I sigh. “Well enough,” I say, not wanting to divulge the part about my failed culinary attempts. “Connor seems a little bored with the lunch selections. Maybe you could talk to him about it or restock the freezer.”

Cheryl finds this adorable. “Oh, that’s Connor for you. He always wants something new and different. He’s so discriminating for a young child, isn’t he?”

I hope my smile doesn’t come across as phony.

She snaps her fingers. “I almost forgot. I have something for you,” she says.

“You do? For me?”

“Well, for your grandson. What’s his name again?”

“Benny.”

“Right. Hold on a sec.” She runs out of the room, then returns a few minutes later carrying a large cardboard carton. “These are some toys and books Connor has outgrown. They’re all in excellent condition. I thought Benny might enjoy them.”

“Cheryl, that is so nice of you.” I peer into the box to examine the choice collection of goodies. “Wow, this stuff is great . . . he’ll love it. Thank you very much.”

As I walk out to the car to stash the carton in the back of my Prius, an idea occurs to me. This boxful of hand-me-downs provides the perfect excuse to stop by Michael’s house and attempt to patch things up. If he’s home, I’ll do it today.

Walking on the beach, I call Michael from my cellphone. Fingers crossed he’s not away on a business trip.

After several rings, when I expect the call to go to voicemail, he picks up. “Hi, Mom.” He does not exude warmth or enthusiasm, but at least he’s taken my call.

“Michael, I’m glad you answered. Are you traveling or in town?”

“No, I’m at the office.”

“Could I stop by your house in a couple of hours? I have a few fun things to deliver to Benny.”

“Heather’s home all afternoon, so you could swing by anytime. Just call or text her before you come.”

“Actually, I was hoping to come by when you’re at home. I—I need to talk to you about something.”

He pauses, then says, “Will it take long?”

“No, not long.” We agree on a time. Before stuffing the cellphone back into my pocket, I glance through my emails to see if there’s anything important in the inbox. A new message from my neighbor Nancy Ostrowski is there, with the subject line “My News.”

Margaret, dear, I hate leaving this kind of message in an email, but I tried reaching you by phone and never could get through. I’m sure you’re busy with that magazine job of yours. Anyway, I wanted to tell you that John (Mr. Ostrowski) passed away in February. He was only ill a short time. I thought you’d want to know. Sincerely, Nancy Ostrowski.

John Ostrowski died back in February? Shit. Here I am thinking my neighbor has been trying to reach me for three weeks, while it’s been more like three months. And all that time, I’ve ignored and trivialized her messages. That hot, fluttery sensation of guilt stirs once again in my gut.

Is there a gene for empathy – and if so, is it absent from my DNA owing to some rare chromosomal disorder? Maybe my son is right to be critical. I find Mrs. Ostrowski in my contacts and am about to hit the call button when I think better of it. Nancy is the sort of woman who talks a blue streak, and I predict the call will take an hour if it takes a minute.

There I go again, putting my own selfish impulses above poor Mrs. Ostrowski’s grief. My guilty conscience kicks in, igniting a fresh burst of fluttery flames in my stomach. But if I call her now, I’ll be late getting to Michael’s house, and he’s certain to be cross with me. So instead of calling, I hit “reply” and send off a quick response to her email message:

Dear Mrs. Ostrowski,

I am so sorry about Mr. Ostrowski and also sorry I wasn’t available to respond to your messages before now. Please accept my sympathy. I hope you’re doing OK. I’ll call you soon.

Best regards,

Mar (Margaret) Meyer

I spend the rest of the walk practicing what I will say to Michael when I see him. The news about his father’s behavior will be upsetting, and I need to break it to him gently. If I do this right and take care in choosing my words, perhaps he’ll regard me with a little more kindness.

Perhaps it will bring us closer together, after all these months.

When I arrive with the box for Benny, he jumps into my arms, thrilled to be reunited with his GrandMar. I’d like to say, “See?” – affirming that I’ve done nothing to traumatize the boy. But I swoop him up in a big hug, return him to the floor, and give Michael a kiss on the cheek.

He nods and murmurs, “Hi.”

Meanwhile, Benny tears through the box like a tiger devouring its prey. “Wow.” He pulls out a shiny police car. “Cool.” Now he’s examining a plastic shed filled with barnyard animals, wagons, and farmers in coveralls.

My eyes search the room. “Where’s Heather?”

“She had to run an errand. What did you need to talk to me about?”

All business, my son. No “How are you, Mom?” or “Can I pour you a nice glass of wine?” Though the latter is wishful thinking.

“I think it’s important for you to know something that happened—” I start. But then I’m caught short by his expression – a mix of impatience, intolerance, and can-we-please-get-this-over-with?

“What?” he asks.

I pause, uncertain how to proceed. “Something that—that happened when I was working with an organizational consultant a couple of months ago.”

“What is it?”

“Oh, well, we found a box of your old stuff in the mini-storage unit. It’s all your sports trophies, and souvenirs from trips, mementos from your school days—things like that.”

“Okay, so what’s the problem?”

“Well . . . I need you to decide whether you want to keep all that stuff or throw it away. Because I can’t keep storing it. I mean, I don’t need to know right away—”

“When, then? What’s the deadline?”

I take out my phone and scroll through the calendar. “August.”

“August? That’s three months from now.”

“Right. I wanted to make sure you had time to think about it. I can lend you the key to the storage unit, or we could go over together . . .”

“Can’t you bring the box here?”

“It’s kind of heavy.”

He sighs. “Look, I’ll go with you sometime, but I’m really busy this month. Summer will be better, all right?”

“Sure.” I force a cheerful smile.

“This is the important thing you needed to talk to me about?”

“I—like I said, I wanted to give you time to decide.” Although I haven’t scored any points with this little charade, at least I’ve saved myself from confessing his father’s sins – a confession which, I now acknowledge, would have been disastrous. Because if I were to tell Michael the truth, he’d shoot the messenger. It would drive an even deeper wedge between us. Thank goodness I lost my nerve.

As I turn to leave, he says, “You didn’t tell me where the toys came from. Is there somebody we should thank?”

“They’re from a friend at Seaside Fitness. Her son is a little older than Benny. I’ll tell her you said thanks.”

“Yeah, please do that.”

I choose not to disclose that the “friend” from the gym is my new employer. Michael still doesn’t know I’ve resigned from Powder World. I assume he considers me the least qualified babysitter in Los Angeles County, so the news that I’ve quit my editorial job to pursue employment in childcare is likely to provoke harsh disapproval. I haven’t told Mum either. I can imagine her shrill laughter over the phone.

As I’m getting ready for bed that night, it occurs to me I forgot to tell Michael about John Ostrowski. It’s too late to call him now, so I consider phoning him in the morning with the news. Better not. He’s apt to say, “You interrupted me at work to tell me this?” I forward Mrs. Ostrowski’s email to him instead, but all Michael writes in response is:

I hadn’t heard.