A Time-Worn Masterpiece

She ushers the young boy into the kitchen, wiry arm draped across his heaving shoulders. “Hush now, baby,” she whispers and gestures to the chair. He sits, still shaken from his ordeal. The tears have dried up yet the pain is still there.

Rummaging through the freezer, she brings him a bag of frozen peas. He stares at it blankly. She smiles despite the seething rage boiling under the surface of her motherly serenity. “Put it on that lip, honey. It’ll help with the swelling.”

He takes it and follows her instructions, hissing when the package contacts his bruised and bloody lip. “It’s cold.” His voice is small, raw from the crying.

“That’s why it’ll help with the swelling.” She turns her back to him, returning to the cake she’d pulled from the oven not ten minutes ago. It’s cool enough now to add the icing. But finishing it is far from her mind. Hers is focused on the little punks that terrorized her boy.

Doing her best to maintain control over the burgeoning rage, she opens the jar of chocolate icing and, in quick, efficient strokes, adds it to the cake. Chocolate-on-chocolate; a favorite of her grandmother. A masterpiece of ingredients, Mema used to say, that’ll stand the test of time.

“Why do they keep hurting me?”

The pain and confusion in his voice nearly breaks her. On instinct she squeezes the knife in her hand and the metal biting into her palm is a salve. What can she tell him? That some people are just assholes? That, no matter the age, race, sex or any other identity checkbox, there are those who, rather through their own pain or the joy of seeing others suffer, behave in a way that’s foreign to even the most savage of beasts?

He’s nine, she thinks to herself. He needs to know this. She could tell him that, verbatim. How would he react? As sweet as her little boy is, he’s sensitive. Sensitive in a way she herself, even as his mother, is uncomfortable with. Her fear is that the shitty world they live in will stamp, kick, punch, bite, and claw his gentle soul to the point that, when it is done with him, there will be nothing left.

And how much of that is because of you? Because of what you and his…his father were?

Panic slams into her at the thought of him discovering that particular truth. He can’t ever know that. Not even when he’s older. There aren’t many things more painful than realizing the truth about your parents; despite the pedestal a child may put them on, parents are still human. Human with so many faults and demons. She shivers at her own awakening long ago; it put her on a path of near destruction. For herself and so many others. Telling him is not an option.

Taking three measured breaths, she sets the knife down before walking over and squatting in front of him. Her smile is brittle, a façade to cover the wince from her bruised ribs. She brushes a stray tuft of his hair before putting a hand on his muddied jeans and the other on his pudgy cheek. She locks eyes with his and the soulfulness of his gaze is something to behold. For a moment, the pain of loss threatens to overwhelm her. The boy is the spitting image of his father. The same eyes and lashes most women would kill for. Black bushy eyebrows that seemed two shades darker than the head of hair whose unruly curls, along with the softest maple complexion emphasize his mixed-race heritage. Her heart aches at the unfairness of it all but before her mind dives into that rabbit hole, she re-focuses on her world.

“I’m sorry, baby,” she murmurs. “People can be mean for so many reasons. And many times, for no reason at all. It’s not even worth it trying to understand them.” Did she really just say that to him? Mother-of-the-Year material right there. Let him learn to channel my anger and cynicism.

But there is none of that in his wide, blinking eyes. All she sees in those depths are love and trust, an unending well of goodness. Despite her faults and fuck-ups, this little human before her is everything she could have hoped for. More, in fact.

“Why are you crying?” She’s startled at his question and she brings a hand to her face. Damn it, she didn’t even realize she was…or why.

Yes, you do.

The voice is weary and bitter.

“It hurts me when you get hurt, baby.” Though, instead of this heartfelt emotion, she’s more inclined to violence as an initial reaction. Still, it’s technically true.

He stares at her for several seconds and the lines that marring his perfect face disappear. He nods but something about it draws a frown from her. She smooths her own features and offers him the warmest smile she can. “How’s the lip?”

He glances down at the now thawed bag of peas and shrugs. “Cold. And numb I guess.” She holds her hand out and he drops the bag into her hand. She tosses it in the sink and returns to her original task. “Hey,” she calls over her shoulder, “why don’t you go read or—” she turns to him and winks conspiratorially, “—play one of your games. I know you’ve been wanting to.”

“Yeah, maybe.” It comes out as a mumble. Everything about it screams of a person whose mind is preoccupied by something too big to fully grasp. But she won’t push. He’ll be better off working through it on his own than her interfering. You’ve done enough of that already.

Her patience is rewarded several minutes later—seconds after the icing is completed.

“Why don’t we ever talk about my father?” She hangs her head at the question. Not ‘dad’ or ‘daddy’ but ‘father’. It’s so formal; a child should never see his parents in such a disconnecting light. My fault. So afraid he’d become like his father, I ignored telling him all the good that man had once done.

She busies herself for a brief minute by placing two slices of cake small plates. She grabs two forks from the drawer, setting them and the plates on the table.

“Milk?” he asks. His earnestness in that moment warms her. This is what she wants from him, to keep him as the sweet, thoughtful, innocent little boy he is. But he can’t stay that way. No one can. Especially not him.

She nods in affirmation and pours them both a glass of milk before returning to the table. He grabs the cup with both hands and takes a short swig. He always does this. ‘It makes it better,’ he said when she asked him about it once. ‘If I don’t, it’s like getting a spoonful of cereal without milk’. She may not agree with his ritual—she’d rather down the milk last—but, this one time, joins him.

Midway through their cake-eating, she puts down her fork and he follows suit. She wants to tell him to keep eating. To enjoy it. She understands, more than most, how quickly childhood can end. One act of violence, or a betrayal by a trusted friend or—worse—a parent, and the innocence is gone; unable to ever be recovered.

“Your father,” she begins, “was…complicated man. We were only a few years older than you are when we first met. We, ah, didn’t like each other that much back then.”

“Why?”

“Because, we were kids. And a lot of times kids don’t like other kids. For your father and I, it was because we were competing in a…” She fumbles for the words. How can she be honest with him yet preserve a semblance of his childhood? Two more years, she thinks. He has at least two more years before he must partake in that hellacious crucible.

“We were competitors. In a game at the camp our parents put us in.”

Most kids would have asked ‘What game? What camp?’. But he doesn’t. He just nods and says, “like Adrian and the others don’t like me because I’m smarter than they are.”

She smiles at his straightforward delivery and, for a moment, it lifts the cloud hanging over her. “But you don’t have to hurt people just because you want to win.” Though he tries hiding it, his voice wavers and the cloud comes roaring back over her. The responsibility of raising this precious child alone. The mistakes of her past. Losing her soulmate and so many others. Her fault and hers alone. And this little human before her; she’s responsible not only for teaching him about the world but preparing him for a truth that no man, woman, or child should be burdened to carry. This world is so fucking unfair.

You knew that already.

“Kids aren’t too different than grown-ups, honey. They tend to copy what they see from their parents or siblings. And that’s not always a good thing.”

“And my father?”

She sighs, then breathes in the familiar scent of chocolate still wafting through the kitchen. “He was a good man. He…he put himself at risk to keep us safe. He gave everything for it. I don’t talk about him because it hurts.” So damn much.

“And talking about him when you have to see me every day as a reminder of him would only make it worse.” His mouth twists with indecision before firming with certainty. “It’s why you’re always so sad.”

She gasps as his words knock the air from her lungs and overpowers her with a wave of nausea. It’s ten seconds before she centers herself enough to respond. “Honey, honey, honey,” she says, taking him by his thin shoulders. She stares into eyes unmarked by the horrors of the life that, as his father’s son, he will be forced to live. Another part of her crumbles into dust at the sacrifice she will have to make.

“You,” she continues, “are a beautiful reminder of what your father and I shared. It fills me with joy.”

“And sadness,” he adds. A single tear escapes. The lump in her throat makes it hard to breathe. It takes a minute for her to realize that she is crying. Not just a single tear like her boy but rivulets racing down sunken cheeks.

She collects herself before answering. “A little. But not because anything you did. I’m sad for us because you never got the chance to meet him.” She ignores the flashes of what he became. Thankfully she had gotten them far away from him by then.

He sniffs, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. “Okay,” he whispers. “Okay.”

She stands up and her body crackles in protest, another reminder to the three generations of pain crammed into forty years in the world. She welcomes the discomfort; it is a testament to the truth that life is worth fighting for. Like her small treasure born in violence, death, and uncertainty, yet conceived in love.

She wants to share so many things with him—about his father, about his given names. But as the pull to unburden herself presses her forward, the sound of swinging feet and satisfied hums of a child stuffing his face with chocolate cake eases the tension in her soul. Maybe one day she’ll tell him the truth; that a name has power. And the power of his name, like his father before him, can create life and shatter worlds.

One day. One day she’ll tell him.

But not today.

Not today.