On our way to the water park the morning after his eighth birthday, my son Kyle gives us roles.
“I’ll pretend to be a boy called Jesse,” he says from the backseat. “And you pretend you’re not my mother.”
I cough to hide the sound that escapes my chest. I want today to be easy, for there not to be fighting. He’s always so mad. My mother blames the divorce, which means she blames me.
“Who’s mother am I?” I ask. We’re only a few miles away and I wonder if this was a good idea. My ex-husband laughed when I told him where we were going, and reminded me that I hate water parks. I reminded him this wasn’t about me, something he might want to remember when planning his weekends, and he reminded me it was none of my god-damned business what he planned on his weekends, and I reminded him he can go fuck himself when he’s done fucking Alicia, and he reminded me her name’s Alison, and then I grabbed Kyle’s hand and told him we were going to be late.
“You’re nobody’s mother,” Kyle says as the light turns green, and I bring one hand to my stomach. We used to play make-believe all the time. I was always a mother dinosaur, a mother dragon, a mother hedgehog.
“People who aren’t mothers don’t just go to water parks,” I say.
He takes a minute to think. “You used to be a mother,” he says. “But your family died. In a fire. And now you go to the water park because it’s where you used to go together.”
We’re quiet the rest of the ride.
The water park is crowded. As we work our way to the main pool, I try to hold Kyle’s hand, but he pulls away. I find a chair and tell him this is home base, that we meet here if either of us gets lost.
“I know you’re pretending you don’t know me,” I say, my hands on his shoulders, “but I need to know you understand.” I can feel the tension in my jaw, so I smile. “Just show me you understand.” He nods and I let him walk away, embarrassed how relieved I feel to be alone.
Kyle approaches a family standing in the shallow end and I wonder when he got so brave. We both used to be so timid, so content. There are three kids, all smaller than Kyle. The mother says something to him and he points across the pool to a young couple with a toddler. She tries to get their attention to make sure it’s okay, but they are so focused on each other and the child that they don’t look up. She smiles at Kyle, says something to him that I can’t hear, and then he’s in, tossing a ball to his pretend brother. “Jesse!” The woman yells to her husband over the sound of children screeching as she points to my son.
Jesse? I want to scream at her that his name is Kyle, that the stupid couple across the pool aren’t his parents, that I’m his parent, but instead, I take my book out of my bag and lean back in the chair.
“Anyone sitting here?” a woman asks, arms full of towels. I smile at her and shake my head.
“Those ones are mine,” she says, sitting down. “The red-headed kids. As if you couldn’t tell.” She touches her own hair. “Who belongs to you?”
I start to point out Kyle, but stop when I see my son’s make-believe mother bend down to say something to him. He smiles at her and helps one of the younger kids climb out of the pool. My throat is dry. I bring my water bottle to my lips and drink. I want to throw it, to jump in the pool and grab my son and tell this perfect family to back the fuck off.
“I’m here alone,” I say.
“Oh.” She touches her hair again, brings her hands to her lap. “Oh,” she says again and stands up. I know she’s judging me, imagining the kind of woman who comes alone to a water park.
“There was a fire,” I say quietly. “A terrible fire.”
As I watch Kyle and his pretend family in the pool, I tell her how we used to come here all the time, my husband and our child, how we’d toss our son through the air, how we’d laugh as he splashed down into the water, how we ate burgers next to the pool, our son refusing to eat anything yellow so my husband had to scrape the cheese off, how we wrapped his shivering little body in a too-big towel and hugged him to us, how I still wake up to the smell of chlorine and ketchup. I tell her when you’re young and in love and holding a baby in your arms, everything is possible. One minute you’re the dream family, making grocery lists and fighting over pick-up times and trying to have another baby, and the next, it’s all gone. In flames.
I’m sobbing. I clutch Kyle’s towel against my chest and snot runs down my lips and I gulp to catch my breath. I want to laugh, it feels so good. I don’t want to stop.
The woman hands me a napkin. “Oh my God,” she says. “I’m so sorry,” she says. And there’s no judgement in her words, no anger, no blame, just a deep and simple sadness for my loss.
For just an instant I want that loss, I wish for that loss, for its clarity.
“Go,” I tell her, nodding towards her kids. She doesn’t hesitate. I take a deep breath, and then another. I wipe my eyes and blow my nose.
The family in the pool laughs at something the father said. Kyle turns towards me and I wave at him and smile like I’m his mother.
