“Is this Mrs. Robinson?”

  Dawg, why did she rush to this telephone? Most of her friends and family called on her cell phone. She should have known a bill collector would call this phone. Should have checked the caller ID. Now she was stuck. “Yes, it is. Can I help you?”

  “This is Tiffany with Duke Energy. I’m calling about your utility bill.”

  “I know it’s late. We will be paying it next week.”

  “I have to inform you that your electricity is scheduled to be cut off this week if we don’t receive a two-hundred-dollar payment by tomorrow at five.”

  “Can you give me a little more time?” Trish did not want to ask her parents for any more money. This whole situation was embarrassing and degrading.

  “We extended the time for you last month, and you did not complete the agreed-upon payment arrangement.”

  She felt like she was constantly begging for help. “I know we missed that payment arrangement, but we did pay as much as we could. I just need a little bit more grace here. We can pay the bill next Friday.”

  Tiffany was quiet for just a moment too long. Trish thought the girl was going to cut the electricity while they were on the phone. Then she said, “We can make the payment arrangement for next Friday, but it must be paid no later than 5:00 p.m.”

  “Thank you.” Trish hung up the phone, went to her bedroom, and opened her computer. She googled “work from home jobs.” She needed to bring some money into this house. Things were getting too drastic.

  “Hey, Ma!” Jon-Jon called out from his room.

  “Yeah?”

  “Can I get a turkey sandwich?”

  Trish closed her laptop and went into the kitchen to make Jon-Jon a sandwich. She stirred the crockpot meal, then headed back to her son’s room. As she handed him the sandwich, she asked, “Have you done any of the stretching exercises your physical therapist showed you?”

  Taking a bite of his sandwich, Jon-Jon shook his head. “What’s the point?”

  Trish wasn’t into meditation, but she had to do something to stay sane around this I-just-wanna-give-up child. She wasn’t used to this behavior from Jon-Jon. He had been an all As and Bs student who lettered in track, got a football scholarship to the college of his choice, and even played volleyball just for fun.

  Breathe in, breathe out . . . Breathe in, breathe out. “You have a physical therapy appointment next week. You at least want to show him that you’ve been trying. All the man asked you to do was arm stretches.”

  “Nobody gave me the resistance bands. What am I supposed to do? Walk around this room and find them myself?”

  Trish was taken aback when Jon-Jon acted like such a little snot because he had always been a respectful child. Even his teenage years hadn’t brought much drama to the household. That had been a welcome surprise to Trish because she hadn’t just given her parents headaches during her years of puberty; she’d caused so much tension that they kept telling her their dome was about to explode.

  Jon-Jon didn’t get in trouble much, so he wasn’t acquainted with the types of whoopings her mother put on her. But, oh, how she wanted to knock him upside his head right now. She took another deep breath and pointed at the end table next to his bed. “Boy, those resistance bands are in that drawer. I told you I was putting them in there when he gave them to you three weeks ago.”

  “I must have forgotten,” was all he said.

  Trish folded her arms and stood there like a mannequin posing in the women’s section of Macy’s department store.

  Giving in, Jon-Jon said, “All right, already. You don’t have to stare me down like that.”

  “And you don’t have to lay up in here acting all lazy, because I know you’re not.”

  He pointed at her. “You got mad at Dad when he tried to call me lazy. How is it okay for you?”

  “I said ‘acting lazy.’ I know that you are far from lazy.” She opened the nightstand drawer and took out the bands. “You can do those resistance bands, Jon-Jon, so don’t cheat yourself.”

  He finished his sandwich. Trish picked up the glass of ice water his father had placed on his nightstand earlier and handed it to him while still holding onto the resistance bands.

  “Thanks, Mom.” Jon-Jon drank from the glass and then handed it back to his mother rather than leaning over and placing it on the nightstand. He then took the bands out of her outstretched hand. “Okay, I’ll tell you what. If you play a game of Scrabble with me, then I’ll workout with the resistance bands.”

  “You know I hate Scrabble. I was a teacher, and I can never think of enough words to win. How bad is that?”

  “Mom, you taught math. Nobody expects you to know as many words as an English teacher.”

  She shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. You and your dad shouldn’t be able to beat me so bad. Let’s play Sequence. That’s a game we’re both good at.”

  He nodded. “Sequence it is.”

  Trish opened the hall closet to get the Sequence box. It had been a while since Jon-Jon had asked to play one of the board games. She was thrilled because she held out hope that this would put an end to his anti-social, just-leave-me-alone, hostile ’tude he’d had for a while now.

  Before Dwayne lost the job he’d been on for fifteen years, his health insurance paid for two surgeries and Jon-Jon’s electric hospital bed. She used the remote control to put him in a sitting position. Insurance had also paid for the kind of rollaway table hospitals use for their patients’ mealtimes. Trish was grateful for these items because it made things a bit easier for Jon-Jon. She just wished Dwayne hadn’t lost his job before Jon-Jon got the final surgery he needed, because the insurance provided through Dwayne’s new job considered Jon-Jon’s final surgery elective. How was removing spinal fluid a medical elective? She didn’t get it but was going to keep praying. God would make a way.

  Putting the Sequence game board on Jon-Jon’s table, Trish then rolled it over to his bed and pulled up a chair. She counted out seven cards for Jon-Jon and seven for herself. Jon-Jon took the blue chips, and she took the green chips. Green had become her favorite color of late. Not money green, which might explain why they didn’t have much of that. But sage green. The color felt calming, soothing to her. “Let’s see what you got, young man.”

  “Oh, you know I’m gon’ bring it. I just hope you can take losing in Sequence since you can’t seem to take losing at Scrabble.”

  “You got all that mouth. Let’s see if you can handle what I’m about to do.” They loved teasing each other during game time. Trish and Jon-Jon were very competitive, but Dwayne was the worst. He once turned over a game board and let all the pieces fly after Trish beat him, like he stole something and the police were at the front door waiting to take him into custody.

  He’d accused her of cheating, and she laughed her head off at how bad he was at losing. Later that night he admitted that she won fair, but then he asked for a rematch. Jon-Jon was just like his father. No sooner than she beat him in the first game of Sequence, he’d asked for a rematch.

  Trish put her rice in the rice cooker and, as she came back to set the board back up for their next game, the doorbell rang. Shaking her head, she told Jon-Jon, “You got me all caught up in this game and you never practiced with those resistance bands.”

  “It’s okay, Mom. I didn’t want to do it anyway.”

  Scrunching her face, she pointed an angry finger at him. “I don’t like that Jon-Jon.” She took the bands off the table and handed them to him again. “You are a Robinson, boy. We don’t give up, and we don’t quit.”

  Jon-Jon mumbled something as she headed toward the front door, but Trish couldn’t make out what he said and she chose not to concern herself with it. He was going to work with those resistance bands today and that was it. Period.

  Trish looked through the peephole. A young woman with a milk-chocolate complexion, long lashes, purple lipstick, and sad eyes stood on her front porch with a baby on her hip. She opened the door. “Can I help you?”

  “Hi, I’m Marquita.” The young woman nervously cleared her throat and shifted the baby from one hip to the other. “I brought my baby to see his daddy.”

  Chapter 10

  “Look what I brought you today.” Alexis handed the jar containing the chocolate-cookie crunch trifle to her mother as she sat in the recliner in front of her television. Alexis then sat down in the other recliner. A round table was between them.

  Vivian’s eyes lit up. She took her spoon and dug in. “Mmmm. I haven’t had one of these in such a long time.” Then a strange look spread across Vivian’s face. She sat the dessert down on the table. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I did, but I shouldn’t have done it.”

  Vivian started tapping her scrawny hand on the table. Thick, green veins made pathways from her wrist to her fingers as if they were trying to find a way out of this place, just as her mother had tried to escape so many of the nursing homes she had been placed in.

  Alexis took her mother’s hand in hers. “You didn’t do anything, Mom. I wanted to make dessert for Michael’s business associates, and I remembered how you and I used to make this delicious dessert.”

  Vivian picked her dessert back up. “I bet they hated it. Our kind of desserts might be too cheap for Michael’s fancy friends.”

  “Don’t say that, Mom. The ladies were very nice. I told them I got this recipe from you after they told me how much they loved it.”

  “Well, isn’t that just something.” Vivian leaned back in her seat and dug back into the pudding, taking special delight as she crunched on the Oreos in the dessert.

  Alexis turned the television on to a Western. Her mother loved old Westerns. She could sit and watch Marshal Matt Dillon and Miss Kitty all day long. Vivian once told Alexis that Miss Kitty stole her job and was constantly stealing the scenes she had rehearsed.

  Alexis was just a kid when her mother started telling her stuff like that. She and her mother would be sitting in their small living room watching Gunsmoke, and Miss Kitty would stroll into the salon, say one or two lines. Her mother’s eyes would get big as a cartoon character’s eyes when they popped out of their head. She would jab her finger at the television. “She’s doing it again! She stole my lines again.”

  Back then, Alexis had no idea that her mother suffered from delusions of grandeur. Alexis remembered being so mad at Miss Kitty. If it wasn’t for Miss Kitty stealing her mother’s lines all the time, they wouldn’t have had to move into so many trailer parks. They could be in a big, fancy house, like the one Alexis was sure Miss Kitty lived in.

  But at last she grew up and realized that Miss Kitty had nothing to do with their lot in life. After that realization, she was able to enjoy watching these old Westerns with her mother, but only when her mother was on her meds. If she skipped taking her medication, then Alexis refused to watch television with her.

  She and her mother had a really good day. Vivian was calm and wasn’t plotting her escape from the holding cell the Russians held her in, waterboarding her until she revealed all of the military secrets she learned from her years of dating General Jim Mattis.

  Of course, her mother had never even met the man, but ever since she heard about Mad Dog Mattis, Vivian told all her nurses that she was the reason the general never married.

  Alexis had asked Michael to pick the kids up from school so she could spend the day with her mother. As she was driving home in good spirits, thankful for a peaceful day spent with her mother, she thought about ordering pizza. The kids would love it, but Michael was not a fan.

  After the dinner party yesterday and then spending the day with her mother, Alexis was tired and didn’t feel like cooking. There was an Italian restaurant not far from the house. Michael loved their cheese tortellini, so she pulled into a parking lot, called the restaurant, and ordered salad, cheese tortellini, and a half-cheese, half-pepperoni pizza. Ella only ate cheese pizza and Ethan only ate pepperoni. They might be twins, but they were very different.

  Ethan was shy, and it was hard for him to make friends. Once he made a friend, though, he stuck by them and championed them. Ella needed a social calendar to keep up with all her friends and their activities. However, Alexis noticed that as Ella added new friends, old friends seemed to fade away. She had planned to have a talk with her daughter about that, but she didn’t want to be overly critical if there really wasn’t a problem. Alexis could just be looking for problems where there were none.

  Later, as she picked up the food order and loaded it into her car, her phone rang. It was Michael. She didn’t answer because she was just two blocks away from home and didn’t want to be driving and talking if it wasn’t necessary. She’d be home in five minutes and could discuss whatever was on his mind then.

  The phone rang again as she pulled onto her street. She hoped he wasn’t trying to get her to pick up anything at the grocery store because that wasn’t happening. Rounding the corner and about to hit the garage door button on the sun visor, Alexis saw an ambulance and fire truck in front of her house.

  The. Ambulance. Was. In. Front. Of. Her. House. “Oh, my God!” Alexis tried to hit the garage door button, but her hand kept missing the button. She yelled at the uncooperative button as she banged her fist against the sun visor.

  The phone rang again as she pulled into the driveway. She swiped right to answer the call. She was frantic. “Michael, what’s going on? Why is an ambulance at our house?”

  “Mommy, it’s me. Please come home. Something terrible has happened.”

  It was Ella, she was crying. “I’m here, baby.” Alexis tried to open the car door, but it was locked. Why was it locked? She snatched at the door handle several times before realizing that she hadn’t put the car in Park, nor turned it off.

  The walls in the car were closing in on her. Inhale. Exhale. She put the car in Park and turned it off. Getting out of the car, Alexis put her hand on her heart, taking deep breaths, trying to get control of her breathing. She then ran toward the house. The front door swung open, and Ella ran into her arms.

  “Come on, Mommy.” Ella grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the backyard.

  Alexis didn’t know what was going on. She didn’t know if Michael or Ethan was hurt, but the feeling in the pit of her stomach told her it wasn’t going to be good. “What happened, Ella?”

  Ella was crying so hard and was so focused on getting to the backyard that she didn’t answer. But the moment they entered the backyard, Alexis saw Michael standing next to the pool, wringing his hands like he didn’t know what to do.

  Firefighters were standing around while two paramedics were on the ground next to Ethan. Oh, God. Ethan. “Noooo!” Alexis yelled out.

  This. Couldn’t. Be. Happening. Alexis felt as if she was moving in slow motion as she ran over to them and tried to pull them off her son so she could get to him. Ethan needed her. She had to get to her son.

  Michael grabbed her by the waist and pulled her away from the firefighters. “They’re working on him, honey. I promise you. Ethan is going to be okay.”

  “Let me go, Michael!” She reached her hands out, trying to move closer to her son.

  “Calm down, Alexis. We can’t get in the way.”

  Ethan wasn’t moving. Alexis watched in horror as one of the paramedics breathed into Ethan’s mouth several times. Then the other paramedic with weight-lifting muscles pushed down on Ethan’s chest. Alexis wondered if her son’s pole thin body could handle the pressure from such strong arms. “Don’t hurt him!” she cried out. “Please don’t hurt him.”

  Ethan jerked and water spurted out of his mouth. The firefighters and paramedics seemed relieved as if something significant had occurred. Alexis didn’t understand why they seemed pleased because Ethan still wasn’t moving.

  His eyes darted this way and that. “What happened to my baby, Michael?”

  Sorrow etched across his face. “He tried to dive into the pool from the top of the stone structure.”

  “But he knows not to do that.” Alexis couldn’t think straight. She’d told Ethan on numerous occasions not to climb to the top of those stones. Michael was the only one who climbed to the top of that awful stone structure. Michael was the one who had it built onto the pool when she had warned against it.

  The paramedics lifted Ethan onto the gurney. Buckled him in and rolled him toward the front.

  “Where are they taking my baby?” She took off behind them.

  “We’ve got to go to the hospital, Alexis.” Michael grabbed her arm. “Come on. I’ll drive.”

  “No, no! I’m going with Ethan.” Rushing over to the ambulance with tears streaming down her face, Alexis called out to the paramedics, “I have to ride with him. You can’t take him without me.”

  “It’s okay, ma’am. Get in. You can ride with your son,” the paramedic told her. Then he turned to his coworker. “Let’s get a bandage for the back of his head. I see a gash there.”

  “He hit his head?” Alexis shut her eyes tight. Maybe, if she closed her eyes, she could block out all the wrong that was going on. Her son wouldn’t be unconscious, he wouldn’t have a gash on the back of his head, and he never would have dived in that pool.

  The other paramedic said, “Got it.”

  As they cleaned Ethan’s wound and bandaged the back of his head, Alexis opened her eyes.

  Putting her hand on Ethan’s arm, she leaned in close to her son. “I’m here, Ethan. Mommy is with you. I need you to open your eyes, son. Just open your eyes.”

  Sobbing uncontrollably, she put Ethan’s smaller hand inside her hand. “M-Mommy’s here, baby. Don’t be afraid. There’s nothing to be afraid of. You just had an accident. Y-you’ll be just fine. Your father said you’re going to be okay. He’s on his way to the hospital. He’ll meet us there.” She kept talking, hoping that if Ethan heard her voice, it would help him open his eyes.

  “He spit up a lot of water, ma’am. We just need to get him to the hospital so the doctor can take care of him.”

  Alexis looked over at the paramedic who had just spoken to her. He had red hair and the brightest blue eyes she’d ever seen. The name on his uniform was “Gerald.” The muscular man’s name tag read “Paul.” She realized she hadn’t thanked these men for what they did for her son. “Thank you. I’m so glad you were able to help Ethan, but why won’t he wake up?”