Tyler was right behind her.
They both hurled themselves into my arms, hugging me so hard I almost lost my balance.Air Travel
“I missed you so much,” Emma said, crying into my shirt.
“We thought you didn’t love us anymore,” Tyler said.
I knelt down on the porch and held both of them.
“I never stopped loving you,” I said. “Not for one second. I was angry with your
parents, but I always loved you.”
“Can we come back?” Emma asked, her eyes searching mine. “Please?”
“Yes,” I said. “You can come back every Sunday if you want.”
“Every Sunday?” Tyler repeated.
“Every Sunday,” I said.
They hugged me again.
I looked up and saw Kevin watching us from the car, tears streaming down his face.
Our eyes met for just a moment.
Then I stood, took my grandchildren inside, and closed the door.
Kevin stayed on the other side, where he belonged.
That was eight months ago.
I’m sixty-eight now.
Tyler and Emma come every Sunday without fail.
We bake cookies in my Chicago kitchen, the oven warming the whole first floor even in winter. We play board games at the dining room table. We walk to the park down the street when the weather cooperates, the kids running ahead past brick townhomes and old shade trees.Search Homes
They
tell me about their new school, which they actually love more than the expensive private school. They tell me about their friends, their teachers, the science fair. They show me drawings and test papers and stories they’ve written.
I get to be their grandmother again.Family
But on my terms.
Kevin brings them and picks them up. We exchange maybe ten words each time.
“Thank you for bringing them,” I’ll say.
“They had a good time,” he’ll reply.
Nothing more.
I haven’t seen Jessica since the airport.
According to Tyler, she works at a department store now and is always tired and grumpy.Air Travel
According to Emma, “Mommy and Daddy fight about money a lot.”
I feel no guilt about this.
They made their choices.
My estate is still leaving everything to charity. Five-point-eight million dollars that Kevin will never see.
That probably bothers him every single day.
Good.
I’m thriving in Education
other ways, too.
The Paris trip was incredible. Two weeks of museums and cafés, of walking along the Seine at sunset, of wandering through the Musée d’Orsay without worrying about nap schedules or meltdowns. I took a river cruise, ate too many pastries, and sat in a little café near the Sorbonne reading French novels badly but enthusiastically.Aviation Industry
Since then, I’ve been on three more dates with Robert. We’re taking things slowly, but I enjoy his company. He brings me books he thinks I’ll like and listens when I talk about the years I spent at Chicago Memorial. He never once makes me feel like an obligation.
I’ve lost fifteen pounds, not from stress but from relief and regular exercise. I’ve read thirty-four books this year. I’ve taken up oil painting. I’ve reconnected with colleagues I’d lost touch with. I’ve lived more fully in the past eight months than I
did in the previous eight years, because I’m not spending all my energy being the perfect mother and grandmother anymore.
I’m just being Margaret.Plan Family Trips
Last Sunday, while we were making chocolate chip cookies, Emma asked me a question.
“Grandma, are you still mad at Daddy?” she said as she rolled dough between her small hands.Book Flights
I thought about how to answer that.
