It had been a tense morning. I was hard on him last night, I knew that. More than hard on him. I'd totally lost my cool, my temper, my patience. It was just so difficult sometimes, dealing with him disregarding my rules, his way of blowing everything off like it didn't matter. Well, things mattered.
He came downstairs in the morning and I watched him for signs of being hurt. I felt flushed with shame thinking of how I had thrown him to that hard floor, kicked him. Lost in my rage. There was no excuse for it. So I watched him, watched his movements. He seemed okay.
"You okay?" I said, pouring myself coffee, buttering him toast. He sat down, and did I imagine he sat down slow and carefully? Maybe I imagined it.
"Yeah. I'm fine," he said, not looking at me. I handed him his toast. Rules were important, respect was important, but I'd gone too far. I had to make it up to him.
In the car, driving him to school. I hated this feeling. This feeling that I had screwed up beyond repair. This feeling that what I'd done, I couldn't take back. What was done was done. And I saw the fear in his eyes, the slow way he moved, how he held his side when he thought I wasn't looking. I loved him more than anything. That was the truth. More than I'd ever loved anything. It was staggering to me, how important he was to me. I wanted everything for him. Wanted to be able to give him everything, wanted him to reach his full potential.
Silence. He wasn't talking to me. He would respond when spoken to. That wasn't the same thing. He looked nervous, his eyes shifting from one thing to the next. He was fidgety. There were so many things I was regretting. He didn't have a mother, I knew that was negatively impacting him. It was one thing when she left us, that two timing bitch. But she was still in his life, in some fractured fashion. Now she was completely gone. I was not around as much as I wished to be to make up for her absence. I couldn't be. My job required a certain amount of time and attention that could not be deferred. And Craig suffered for that.
I was doing the best I could do, being a single parent, having a stressful job. I knew material things could not make up for other things that were lacking, like time and attention. I knew my patience ran thin. I knew that he angered me beyond what made sense. I loved him like no one else but he made me angry like no one else. I would see red. I nearly couldn't think. And that's when I'd lose my cool.
Pulling up to the school, and Craig's head was down. I looked at him and felt the overwhelming love I'd felt for him since the day he was born. It would all be better now. I'd be better. I wouldn't lose my patience again.
"Craig, wait a minute," I said, and pulled out the money I'd set aside for him to buy that digital camera he wanted. I thought of the camera I broke. His camera, the shattered lens, the darkroom with the chemicals running out of their containers, all the photos exposed to light and ruined. But I had found that photo album and looked at picture after picture of Joey and Angela and Craig and I'd just lost it.
I handed him the money, saw his eyes light up, and he looked at me for the first time that whole morning.
"Thank you," he said, and he meant it. I remembered hitting him with the photo album, remembered the way he put his hands up when I did that, remembered the look on his face. I didn't care. I was so angry. I'd tried all these months and years without his mother to raise him, to provide everything for him and that's what he does?
"Get that camera you wanted, the digital one," I said, and he smiled at me. Something inside of me eased. Maybe things could be okay. But that veiled look came down again, the almost blank look in his eyes and when he went to get out of the car I saw him wince in pain. Maybe he hated me.
"No hard feelings?" I said.
"Right," he said, but he wouldn't look at me. He stared at the money I'd given him, "no hard feelings,"