Who do i talk to, p.16
Who Do I Talk To?, page 16
“But where’s Lucy?” My mother’s face fell as she looked around the room. “I told Lucy I’d be back in a few days. Maybe she’s downstairs seeing the nurse.”
Carolyn caught my eye and gave a quick shake of her head.
“Come on, Mom,” I said, steering my mother to a comfortable armchair near an end table. “Let Hannah give you a manicure. You have some time before the knitting club starts.”
I was grateful for Hannah’s offer, because I wanted to get some work done before heading out the door to make my eleven o’clock at Legal Aid. By the time I signed out and caught the southbound El for my appointment, I had a proposal on Mabel’s desk to purchase a list of basic supplies to give manicures and pedicures to the residents of Manna House, using the words of Precious McGill: “Homeless women need to feel like women too.” It wouldn’t be the spa treatment, but hey, we’d do what we could do.
I arrived at the Legal Aid office on Diversey, a storefront along a strip of stores and small businesses—a medical and dental clinic, a resale shop, a real estate office, a pizza joint—with two minutes to spare, but then had to wait fifteen minutes to be called. I smoothed the wrinkles out of my cream-colored slacks and picked some stray lint off my pale green cotton knit top with the crocheted scoop neck. Did I look all right? I should’ve repaired my makeup before I left the shelter. Maybe they had a restroom here—
A woman with pale bug-eyes and wispy hair dyed an odd burgundy stormed out of the doorway leading to the offices, throwing dagger glances at everyone in the waiting room as she passed. “Tell me I don’t got a case,” she muttered. “They’re gonna be sorry. Yessir, they’re gonna be sorry. That woman owes me—”
She jerked the front door open and disappeared.
The African-American receptionist didn’t even look up from her computer screen. “Fairbanks. You’re next.”
Down the hall, Lee Boyer’s door was half-open. “Sorry about that,” the lawyer said, running a hand through his brown, salty hair, then pulling off his wire rims and cleaning them with a man’s handkerchief he pulled out of his desk drawer. “Please, sit down . . . May I call you Gabby?”
I sat. “Please. ‘Mrs. Fairbanks’ sounds like my mother-in-law, and I’m not too happy with her at the moment.”
The man laughed. “Got it. Gabby it is.”
Was Lee Boyer this good-looking the last time I was here? Not Philip’s kind of suave, Double-O Seven good looks that turned heads when he walked into a room. But pleasant. Open. Warm. I watched as he threw the handkerchief back into the drawer and hooked the wire rims behind his ears. “Okay, Gabby, let’s get started. Let’s see . . .” He studied an open folder. “Do you have the power of attorney forms?”
I pulled a business envelope out of my shoulder bag and pushed it across the desk. “Signed, sealed, and delivered.”
“Excellent.” He pulled out the forms and skimmed them. “We’ll make copies for your files and keep these here.” He then handed me a set of papers he’d drawn up to file for unlawful eviction and to regain custody of my children, which needed my signature. My skin prickled as I read, “Plaintiff—Gabrielle Fairbanks . . . Defendant—Philip Fairbanks . . .” Oh God, is this really happening?
But I signed.
Lee Boyer clipped the affidavits to the file folder and leaned back. “Now, anything I should know on your end? Besides you turning up on the TV news.” He grinned mischievously.
I told him about the phone call with my father-in-law and the difficult decision I’d made to leave the boys where they were until I found an apartment. I didn’t tell him about my ill-fated visit to Philip’s office. Did it matter? But I hated looking like a fool in front of this man.
“. . . know that was a hard decision,” he was saying. “But all the more reason to find an apartment so we can get the boys back here with you before school starts. Have you found anything yet?”
He said we. “Uh, apartment . . . no. I haven’t had time to look. The break-in at the shelter kind of kicked dust in my eyes. We’re staying with some, uh, friends till Saturday, and then we have to come back to the shelter. With taking care of Mom and her injured dog, it’s been a bit hectic. But maybe this weekend . . .”
Lee Boyer leaned forward, hands clasped on his desk. “Gabby. I understand that things are tough on you right now. But I can’t emphasize enough that you need to find an apartment so your sons can come live with you, or this case could very well be thrown out. No judge is going to take two young boys out of their grandparents’ home and put them in a women’s shelter.”
He said it kindly, but tears sprang to my eyes. I reached for a tissue from the box on his desk. “I know,” I croaked. “But how can I afford—”
“Don’t worry about that. You find an apartment and let me know about it. Then we’ll see about supplemental funding until all this gets straightened out.” The lawyer leaned back in his desk chair and chewed on the end of a pen, as if thinking about something. But all he said was, “What’s the best way to get hold of you if I need to? Between meetings, I mean.”
“Oh.” I dug in my bag. “I have a cell phone now. A gift from my hosts.” I gave him the number.
“All right.” Lee Boyer consulted the calendar on his computer. “Next week? Same time good for you?” The man stood up and extended his hand. “I’ll call you if anything comes up, Gabby. You do the same.”
I shook his hand. To my surprise, he covered it with his other hand and held it for a nanosecond longer. Startled, I looked into his eyes—those warm, brown eyes. “It’s going to be all right, Gabby,” he said.
Somehow I made it out of there without blubbering. Lee Boyer wasn’t anything I expected from a Legal Aid lawyer. He actually seemed to care about what had happened to me, cared about getting my boys back . . . Was that normal for a lawyer? Didn’t lawyers just want their money?
Except this was Legal Aid. They didn’t do it for profit.
Well, whatever. Philip could sneer all he wanted that I’d gone to Legal Aid. I was lucky to get this lawyer.
And for some reason, as I settled into a seat on the next northbound El, almost empty at this time of day, that little “we” floated into my thoughts. “So we can get the boys back here . . .” Well, sure, as my lawyer.
But I tucked that little “we” into an empty corner of my heart.
chapter 23
Our stay at the Baxter household buoyed me up better than a week at a spa resort, a gentle oasis of ordinary family rhythms in the middle of the train wreck that was my actual life. Well, maybe not ordinary family rhythms, since we had no kid noses or bottoms needing to be wiped, though Dandy’s “functions” and my mother’s growing dependence came in a close second. Peanut—the black-and-white kitty—must have decided I was a member of the family, because he jumped into my lap whenever I sat down.
Jodi and I even played Scrabble on Thursday night after supper, just like normal people. Leslie Stuart, Estelle’s housemate, came downstairs and beat us both. “And you’re a teacher, Jodi!” she crowed, tossing that long, corn-silk hair back with glee.
“Yeah, but I teach third graders,” Jodi protested. “My brain is stuck on third-grade spelling words, like clean and could and cure.”
“And I’m a social worker, but you didn’t see me winning with words like caseworker and caseload and colleague. ”
“No,” I jumped in, “but changing cop to copacetic on a triple word score?! Who even knew that was a word?”
Stu chuckled. “Harry Bentley, that’s who—my erstwhile client, your friend, and Estelle’s boyfriend, if she’d ever admit it. He’s been mourning the loss of his copacetic life ever since his grandson moved in with him.” Which had left all three of us gasping with laughter.
But Saturday loomed when Mom and I would need to move back to the shelter. How Mabel had been able to hold beds for us, I wasn’t sure. New faces appeared at the shelter every few days, and I knew our beds had been assigned temporarily to someone else Wednesday night when a major thunderstorm rolled through the city, drenching the normal haunts of the homeless. But when I checked my e-mail at work on Friday, I had two e-mails from Mabel—one an announcement to all staff and available volunteers regarding a staff meeting on Monday, the other to me saying she’d put our names back on the bed list, same room, same bunks, starting Saturday night. I stopped in at her office just before I left for the day to thank her.
“Glad you stopped in, Gabby. Shut the door and sit a minute.” Mabel pulled out a file with my name on it. “Stephanie Cooper says she met with you yesterday about housing options.”
I nodded, pursing my lips. That had been a little weird. The housing programs Stephanie usually worked with—Theresa’s Place, Sanctuary Place, Deborah’s Place, and others—typically targeted specific people groups: ex-cons trying to reenter society, addicts going through recovery, alcoholics doing AA, or the mentally challenged, though she’d also given me a list of shelters for victims of domestic violence, several out in the burbs and a couple in Wisconsin.
Mabel must have guessed my thoughts. “I know a case management meeting might feel a bit awkward, Gabby, since you’re also on staff here. But neither you nor I want you here for long, right? If you and your mother are on the bed list, Stephanie needs to help you set priorities and goals for getting back on your feet. You’ve got a job. Now get yourself on some housing lists.”
I sighed. “Yeah, I know. My lawyer is bugging me about getting an apartment, too, though he’s talking about a regular apartment, not the housing programs Stephanie deals with. I don’t even qualify for half of them, since I’m not an ex-con or a drug addict. And not that many take kids—just ask Tanya! The ones that do have lists from here to New York and back.”
Mabel nodded, eyes sympathetic. “I know, Gabby. Look, all of us will do whatever we—”
“Why doesn’t Manna House add an option like that for homeless single moms like Tanya—you know, a building with separate apartments, where women can make a real home for their kids, but with services that prepare them to make a go of it alone?” I stood up and started to pace. “Even Precious is about to lose her—”
“Gabby! Gabby.” Mabel’s tone pulled me up short. “That’s a wonderful idea, and one of these days—years—we’d love to do something like that when some philanthropic billionaire floats us a nice fat donation. But right now, your reality is looking for an apartment, okay?” She came around her desk and softened her words with a quick hug.
I returned the hug. “Okay. Thanks again for putting us back on the bed list. Dandy too, right? Denny Baxter said he’d drive us down tomorrow morning, so getting Mom and Dandy squared away might take most of the day. But I’ll hit the streets on Monday, I promise. After the staff meeting.”
I left her office and almost made it out the front doors when I heard, “Oh, Gabby! One more thing.” I turned, shaking my head and laughing.
Mabel was standing at her office door. “What?”
“Mabel. You always have ‘one more thing.’”
“Oh. Well, I do have one more thing. All that dog food and doggy stuff, remember? It’s got to go.”
I had talked my mother into staying at the house with Jodi Baxter the last two days, due to a recurrence of that nasty headache during the knitting club on Wednesday. Since I was out, Estelle had helped her lie down in the multipurpose room, where she’d slept again for several hours. And when I got back to the house Friday evening, dragging from the rising humidity, Jodi said my mom had had another one that afternoon, so bad it made her cry. She was still asleep.
“When was the last time your mom saw a doctor?” Jodi asked, handing me a cold iced tea as I collapsed on their back porch swing, then settling herself on the top step leading down into the postage-stamp yard. I nudged Dandy on his dog bed with my toe, but he just flopped his tail a few times. Too hot for woman and beast alike.
“Mm . . . don’t really know. She had a fall Mother’s Day weekend, and my aunt Mercy took her to the hospital to get her checked out. And another fall when the boys and I were visiting her in North Dakota earlier this month. She tripped over Dandy, and we had to ice a knot on her head, but she said she was fine.” I shrugged. “Have no idea when her last physical was.”
“You might think about getting her checked out.”
“Yeah, good idea, Jodi.” I heard the slight sarcasm in my tone but couldn’t stop. “I don’t even have a family doctor yet! And in case you haven’t noticed, my life has been a little crazy lately, what with getting thrown out of my house by my own husband, losing my sons overnight, and my mother and an injured dog dropped in my lap!” I threw up my hands, sloshing my iced tea. “When was I supposed to see a doctor?”
Jodi winced, but to her credit she didn’t walk back into the kitchen, leaving me to wallow in my own frustration. “I know. Just . . . when you can.”
We sat in silence for a long minute, with just the squeak squeak of the swing and the drone of traffic several streets over as background. Jodi picked up a stray nail and chipped at the loose paint on one of the railing posts. Finally I said, “Sorry, Jodi. I know you care. You and Denny have been super. Can’t thank you enough for hosting us this whole week and giving us a respite from the shelter. Even dog-sitting! Not many people would do that—especially when we were virtually strangers.”
Jodi glanced up through her brown bangs, looking girlish in her shoulder-length bob. “It’s been fun, Gabby—really. It gets a little lonely around here with the kids gone.”
“Well, but Amanda will be back tomorrow, right? And she’ll be here the rest of the summer, till it’s time to go back to college. She sounds like a neat kid.”
“Yeah, she is . . . when she’s not driving me crazy.” Jodi made a face. “She’s got this boyfriend, José, a really nice young man, but ’Manda can’t decide if he’s ‘just a friend’ or if she’s in love . . . oh wait! You know his mother. Delores Enriques, the nurse at Manna House. And she’s one of our Yada Yada sisters.”
Delores’s son? I grinned. It was fun getting “inside information” on the staff at Manna House. José and Amanda, hmm . . .
“Gabby.” Jodi suddenly sounded serious. “I feel awful thinking about you and your mom going back to a homeless shelter. It doesn’t feel . . . right. Don’t get me wrong. I love Manna House, I think they do a terrific job, and I’m enjoying teaching the typing class—all two weeks of it so far. But . . . I’d hate to be living there—in a bunk room, no less. Sheesh!”
I shrugged. “It’s better than some shelters I’ve heard about, where they’ve got one huge room housing thirty to sixty women, like Katrina victims wall to wall in the Superdome.”
Jodi glanced at Dandy, snoring peacefully in the dog bed. “It’s been nice having a dog around again. Dandy’s a sweetheart—right, buddy?” She reached over and gave Dandy’s ears a scratch.
He rewarded her with a few more tail thumps. “Mm. Wish Amanda could meet him. She’d go bonkers! You’d have to sneak him away when she wasn’t looking.”
Still scratching the dog’s ears, Jodi looked at me sideways. “It can’t be easy having a dog at the shelter—no yard to romp in, all those stairs to climb—and he’s still stiff from those stitches. What would you think about us keeping Dandy, at least until things settle down for you, you know, find a place of your own, get the boys back . . .”
I couldn’t believe my ears. In a heartbeat! Okay, God, where was this option when I really needed it, like before Philip got fed up with having Dandy underfoot? Don’t You have Your timing a little screwed up? But even now it would solve so many problems—like who was going to walk him if Lucy didn’t come back. And the problem of getting him up and down two flights of stairs each day . . . not to mention those media hounds who were sure to sniff him out once we got back to Manna House.
The Baxters would be a perfect family for Dandy!
But I reluctantly shook my head. “My mom wouldn’t hear of it. That dog means the world to her. She turned down a perfectly good retirement home I found here in Rogers Park because she couldn’t keep Dandy with her.”
Jodi’s eyes brightened. “Well . . . your mom could stay here too! I mean, even when Amanda comes back, we still have Josh’s old room. Really! She wouldn’t be alone, because I’m off for the summer. And Estelle lives right upstairs. She could take her on like one of her in-home-care seniors.”
I gaped at Jodi. “Are you serious?” I felt as if gold from heaven were pouring down into my lap. A safe place for my mom with people who like dogs . . . “Just until I find an apartment, though. Actually, she’s got some money. We could pay, you know, for room and board.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. She eats like a bird.”
I was so excited, I could hardly think straight. “Oh, Jodi. This is wonderful. It’s like the answers to all my prayers. Let me go talk to my mom. You think she’s awake yet?”
Martha Shepherd was packing, and Martha Shepherd wouldn’t budge. “No, Celeste. We have to go home. I promised Lucy that I’d be back.”
“Mom! The Baxters are inviting you and Dandy to stay here for a while. Isn’t that what you wanted? And it’s just until I find an apartment for us—or until your name comes up for assisted living back in Minot. Then you can go home.”
“The Baxters have been very nice, Celeste. But I promised Lu—”
Mom! Lucy isn’t at Manna House right now. She’s been gone “all week. Maybe she’s not coming back.” I hated to do it, but my mother was being totally unreasonable.
My mother calmly folded her nightgown and put it in the small suitcase. “She’ll be back. She said she’d look after Dandy. And besides, I promised . . . Hand me those underthings, would you, Celeste?”
chapter 24
I tossed all night, snatching bits of sleep here and there, but waking every hour or so, wound up in the sheet. The fact that it was hot and muggy and the Baxters didn’t have central air didn’t help either. But mainly I was angry. The perfect solution for my mom and Dandy had been handed to me on a silver platter—and my mom said no?!
