Page 77 of Years in the Making

“Cool, cool, good to know.” The whole cocky guy aura Tanner has been glowing with fades, and he looks almost relieved.

“Hey Dad?” Devon says, sitting down beside Tanner.

“What’s up, bud?”

“Catelyn said Mom’s getting us at the end of the summer, is that true?”

Tanner looks over at Midge. “Mom?”

Midge shrugs. “News to me, kid.”

“Can you go find your sister and you two can meet me inside in a few minutes?”

Devon nods, and Tanner begins cleaning up his half-eaten dinner, his appetite seemingly snuffed out by talk of his wife. “If I don’t see you before you folks head out, thanks for doing this library thing. The town needed some excitement.” He smiles sadly at me before making his way into the house.

“He’s not a terrible guy,” Midge says, her eyes on her son. “He’s just unsure of himself, and because of that, he can be a bit too forward, a bit too much for some. I think he took my criticisms about him not fighting for his wife as advice to jump into every possible new relationship with gusto.”

“Overcorrection.” I nod and look back toward the garden to see Teddy walking up the slope towards us. “I know what that’s like.”

“That garden is spectacular,” Teddy gushes, sitting down where Tanner had just been, although he leaves more space between us than Tanner had.

Midge’s eyes seem to register the distance, but her attention is quickly pulled to her left as Florence sits down. “It wasn’t until this one,” she says, wrapping her arm around her granddaughter’s body and pulling her in. “I have no idea where she got her green thumb from, but we sure are glad she’s willing to share it with us.”

“I’m afraid of what’s going to happen to the garden when I go away to school,” Florence frets from behind a curtain of hair. She’s certainly not as comfortable outside of the garden.

“What are you going to school for?” I ask, leaning into Teddy’s heat.

“Plant science, and then I want to come back up here and use that to create more sustainable growing habits for a more northern climate.”

I’m impressed. I don’t know what I had expected, but it wasn’t a group of kids so driven. Although, with Midge leading the way, it’s not all that surprising. “That’s really interesting,” I say and hope she knows I’m being serious.

“That’s only the second nerdiest major at this table.” Teddy bumps my arm.

“By a long shot,” I agree.

Midge bats us away when we try to help clean, and Teddy and I are left alone at the table in the fading light.

“I thought Bennett’s was peaceful, but this place…It’s on a whole other level.” Teddy sighs, tipping his head back and breathing deeply.

I watch as his chest inflates and deflates and fight the urge to lay my head on it. “I’m sure the dogs have something to do with it.” I look under the table to where Kevin is sprawled on his side and sound asleep. “That being said, seven kids is a lot.”

“I don’t know how Midge does it.”

“Love, probably. That, and she spent so many years in classrooms, seven probably seems like nothing.”

“Except at the end of the day they don’t go home to their parents, they stay.” Teddy stretches and then we sit in silence. An owl hoots from somewhere off in the trees and a tree groans, and still we sit, absorbing the silence as if we are drawing strength from it.

“My mom was a teacher,” he says suddenly. “Her career was cut short, obviously, but she lived and breathed teaching. For a while, I thought about becoming one, but I just didn’t like kids the way she did.”

“You’d never guess it by the way you’ve been today. I bet she’d be proud to see how you are with them.”

“I didn’t say I hated kids, Nellie.” He smiles over at me, and the silence somehow becomes even quieter. “I just don’t lovethem the way she did.” Those pale blues watch me for a few seconds. “You still on the no-kid track?”

I’d told him I didn’t want kids that summer. We had been hanging out after one of his baseball games, and one of his teammates was trying to comfort his son who was having a meltdown about being given the wrong ball, even though it looked identical to all the others. It just came out of my mouth. “Ugh, I could never do that.”

“Do what?” he’d asked.

“The kid thing.”

---