Addison & Derek's child, first day of school, sad. Fatema's prompt.
Connections
They pick the Little West Side Schoolhouse because it seems the most nurturing and Holly - they named her Holly because she came a week before Christmas, smack in the middle of their season - is a little sensitive. Gentle. Like both her parents in some ways, like no one else in others. And Addison's unashamed to admit that her mother's disapproval confirmed she'd made the right choice. Can't they pick someplace more traditional, Bizzy wants to know, her voice chilly with judgment, and Addison fairly beams. She had enough tradition at Girls Academy and Derek from the less-than-tender mercies of half-frozen New England nuns. Holly's different anyway. Softer. Loved.
"It's normal," the counselor says gently, "for parents to make plans for their children. To have ideas about their future, to think about their first experiences."
Derek touches her hand lightly. "Addie?"
She looks up. "What? Oh." She tries to focus on the counselor, on her broad lined face. "Um. No, I never really thought about things like that."
They walk three blocks down Lexington before Derek stops, rests a gloved hand on her arm. "Are you hungry? We could-"
"Not really," she says before he can finish. "But if you're-"
"-then I'll just get back to work."
They look at each other. He leans forward, to kiss her perhaps, just as she turns her head. His lips land near her ear. How long have they been moving like this, so out of step that they're almost back instep?
He touches her cheek but the leather reminds her of surgical gloves, of the hands that pried her open and she shudders. "We're going to be okay," he says, too reminiscent of what they say to patients, so she lets a frozen smile serve as her reply until he's far away enough that he can't see her face.
Look at me, Mommy! Holly slaps her shiny shoes against the hardwood parlor floors. Addison can't help laughing as she snaps a picture. You're a real schoolgirl now, she tells her daughter, tucking a stray dark curl back under the blue satin headband. Holly fairly hops up and down with excitement as Addison loops the light but well-equipped backpack over her tiny shoulders. Look at you, Addison murmurs. We're going to take lots of pictures for Daddy because he has to work. But he wants to see everything from your first day of school. Like this, Holly giggles, sticking little fingers into her mouth and stretching it into a funny face. Click! Addison snaps it on her cell phone and emails it to Derek as they walk out the front door. You should have been here, she types.
New York City feels different when school starts again: quieter, calmer, with a sense of order lacking in the wilder summer months when small bodies and high-pitched voices spill out into the streets. This is something Addison has noticed over the last decade and this year is the same. Almost.
Her hands quiver. Slightly. Just enough that she lets the resident take over; fetal blood vessels are too delicate to take chances. She delivers a high-risk baby and for just a moment its lusty cry is enough to drown out her thoughts.
"Addie, you okay?" She stands at the window of Mark's nearly-bare loft that night while he hovers behind her. He takes bachelor pad to the extreme; it's stark and unwelcoming, but there's something about the cold glassiness that sucks her in. It's that combination of chill and warmth because he doesn't leave her alone, maybe still doesn't understand the things she won't answer.
So she turns, walks into his arms and lets him try, one last time, to claim her. His hips move with practiced ease; he frames her face in his hands, and she waits until he's gulping into the sensitive skin between neck and shoulder to whisper the words:
"I'm going to Seattle. I need to see Derek."
"Goddamn it," he says, but he doesn't sound angry, just tired. Resigned.
High school's a huge step. Not college-huge, but still huge and it looms large over their house. Holly's drawn to co-ed, Derek's pushing for all-girls, and Addison just wants to make sure boarding school isn't an option. She remembers all too well how her gawky fourteen-year-old self struggled to fit in far from home. Bradford Forbeses don't stay home for secondary school, not even when the secondary school is Girls Academy. Blame her dread on Archer; he wrote her from Deerfield to warn her that the opportunities to nick expensive liquor were practically nil compared to the Montgomery estate. Holly ends up at Brearley and Addison ends up taking pictures on the stoop despite the promises Holly extracted the night before. Mom, Holly chastens and she has the teenager's gift for adding extra syllables to that delicious word. Addison protests, reminds her that the first day of school comes only once a year and the first day of high school only once in a very long lifetime. You know how Mom feels about the first day of school, Derek said once, his tone indulgent and mild - I'll make it up to you both, he assured them when he missed the first day of kindergarten, and he has. I just want to remember it, Addison tells her daughter now. I just want to remember everything you do.
"Addison? I haven't heard from you in a while." Derek's voice is pleasantly mild. Neutral. She doesn't think she could upset him now if she tried.
"I was, uh, just wondering how you were."
"We're doing fine." We. "Um. Caroline's walking now, and Ethan's starting kindergarten in-"
She hangs up the phone.
For all Addison's fears about boarding school, it's Holly - of course it's Holly - who begs to go. Her two closest friends have vacated the city for Andover and St. Paul's, respectively, and she's overflowing with ideas about international curricula and college prospects. She packs tennis rackets and lacrosse sticks; there's barely any sign in the hearty athlete she's become of the illness that touched her - briefly - in infancy. If anything, it's made her stronger. Addison and Derek stay until the first day of classes and then exchange hugs by the chapel. Holly's nearly sixteen and nearly as tall as Addison - but not so tall that Addison can't smell the sweet scent of her shampoo when she tucks her chin against her hair. Maybe she'll smell different after a semester in this place. She lets go, reluctantly, and Derek wraps his arm around her. She's not sad exactly, it's just that it's hard to let go. And she didn't know she'd be letting go this soon.
She doesn't call him again for two years.
"Addison, where are you?"
His number's the same.
"Cambridge. First day of school," she says, lips chattering slightly; it's cold for a late September night.
"School? What did you say?"
She doesn't answer.
"It's, uh, it's been a while, Addison, a couple of - I don't remember, are you teaching this year or something?"
"No." She pulls her coat closer around her ears as she walks along the Charles.
"Addison, is everything all right?"
She climbs halfway along the old stone bridge, studying the gently moving river below. It's calmer than she remembers from her trips up here: visiting Archer. Visiting friends.
Holly still sleeps in a battered old Yale shirt but in the end she chose crimson over blue - secretly, Addison is pleased because she wants her to make her own memories. Derek said he'd be happy with anything on the east coast. Holly is fiercely independent but sweet, all at once, walking companionably between them on the way to Convocation, dressed solemnly in a navy dress and her mother's pearls. She's Addison's height now, exactly. Some girls grow in college, Holly likes to tease. She's so sure she'll be taller one day that Addison thinks she won't even mind when it happens. They walk through the square one last time before saying good-bye. Their baby, almost all grown up. Ready? Derek asks Addison gently. She slips her hand into his, touched to see that his eyes are damp. Together, they watch Holly walk away, toward her dorm. Toward the rest of her life. Her dark hair moves in the slight breeze; everything smells like autumn. There she goes, Addison thinks, and as Derek squeezes her hand she thinks he probably would have chosen Columbia. She kisses his cheek, greying scruff against her lips. He's not good at letting go either.
"Addison?"
She remembers watching the sleek rowers punt down the surface every autumn, her bag heavy with books. The weight of paper, the smell of the inside of a classroom. She remembers things, in fits and starts. Stories she's heard, lessons she's learned. She rests her chin on her hands and thinks of Narcissus, bowed over the glassy water until he sank into his own reflection. She's down on the banks now, the bridge behind her. She squats in the damp grass, cold mud squelching between her feet. A breeze lifts her hair and a corresponding breeze moves the face reflected in the water. She knows the story, but maybe it was wrong. Maybe Narcissus wasn't in love; maybe he saw something else in his reflection, like she does in hers. Another face, another life, similar but so very different. Maybe that's all he wanted, to slip quietly into that other life just below the surface.
"Addison!"
His voice is sharp now.
No one answers.
Mom! Holly sees her across the square, disbelief lighting her face, and runs toward her, long legs carrying her fast across the grass. What are you doing here? Addison smiles broadly, drinks in her daughter's appearance. Surprising you, she says, and then Holly's in her arms, all angles and the itchy wool of her sweater and the sweet scent of her hair. It's only been a few months, but ... Addison hugs her again, holds her close and realizes with a start that Holly's taller than she is now. Just by a smidge, but she can feel it. A mother always knows. Did you miss me already? Holly teases. Her cheeks are warm and damp, her eyes bright and laughing. Alive. Every day, Addison whispers. I miss you every day.
"Derek? What's going on?" Meredith rests a hand on his knee, eyes crinkling with concern and he holds the phone out to her with something like wonder.
She takes it from his hand, holds it to her ear.
"There's no one there."
He nods without looking at her. There's pressure behind his eyes. A slight breeze moves the curtain. Quite possibly the conversation never happened at all.
"Derek? Did you lose the connection or something?"
"Yeah." He gives her a brief, forced smile and slaps the light switch off. In the dark, now that his wife can't see his face, he admits it: "I lost the connection."