Space-Time Story 33.

Sabine was right. I haven’t really thought about where I would put Davey, so the extra room suits my needs perfectly. I didn’t want to make her to stay when it didn’t feel right to play a role of a substitute mother. I couldn’t force her into things she didn’t want.

In the afternoon mum and I drove to a big shopping center and targeted all furniture stores. I have to make David’s room ready and furnish it properly. I already called painters and arranged for them to come tomorrow early in the morning so that everything is done before Davey´s arrival. I don´t have a children’s seat in my car either and without mom’s help these practical kind of things wouldn’t even occur to me. I don´t know if Davey would bring his own clothes with him or not, so we better visit a store with children’s clothes too.

After browsing the store for a good fifteen minutes, a helpful shop assistant approaches us with a professional smile: „How old is the child it’s for, ladies?“ We both burst into mad giggles. When mom finally manages to calm down a bit, she tells her Davis‘ age and the girl looks at us with a surprised expression, showing us to a completely different section of the store with cloths in David’s size.

I can see on my mom’s face that she enjoys all of this, and while we are waiting at the register, she suddenly looks at me with a smile and whispers to me so that no one can hear us: „I feel a bit as if I was shopping for baby´s outfits with my pregnant daughter.“

„Mom…?“ I smile at her but I am surprised. When we were small, she used to complain from time to time, saying that she would have rather wanted to have two sweet princesses instead of two wild boys, but none of us took it too seriously. We knew that she loved us even if we acted sometimes like two little devils.

„Well… your hair is halfway down your back again and you have a perfect figure, so you shouldn’t feel surprised when people mistake you for a young lady. But you look good, you look actually younger like this,“ my mother calms down my worries kissing me lightly on the cheek.

I really love shopping, but this is something entirely different. I’m used to buying clothes for myself and now I have to think of someone else. It´s actually a very nice feeling. Everybody has always blamed me for being a selfish person but it looks like I won’t be able to indulge in such a self-absorbed behavior anymore. Throughout all these years, openly confessing of devotedly loving my own brother could have never been an option, so sheer joy of being able to say out loud that I love my son is going to feel double as good. The only thing that spoils my joy is my own constant worry about Tom and how he is going to react to all of this; is he going to be annoyed? I don´t know how much jealousy is within him, but right now it’s pointless to ponder all possible scenarios.

We have learned that Tom is being solitary in our parents‘ house and he barely leaves his room. Mom called Gordon yesterday and asked him to keep an eye on Tom, watching out for him, taking care of him as much as Tom allows.

The rest of the day we spend by cleaning the house, tidying up and carrying out old stuff from David´s future room. Mom knows this place definitely better than I and she shows me a small empty room right next to the studio, where we intend to store all old rubbish from Sabine’s old room.

When the evening comes we both collapse into the sofa in front of the TV exhausted and the future grandma falls asleep after a while. I cover her with a blanket so that she won´t catch a cold and I let her sleep.

I keep sitting in the sofa in front of TV and a recollection of what happened yesterday flashes in front of my eyes. A new flood of tears starts to run down my face once again and I feel so sad and regretful because I didn’t even try to stop him, I simply watched him run away from me. I was in such a desperate state that I wasn’t able to do anything. He must have thought I didn’t care enough anymore. I did nothing when he shut the doors closed behind him, I didn’t try to talk to him, I didn’t come upstairs to explain, to make him listen… I let him leave instead.

He has to know that I miss him, but I don´t have courage to call him. He wouldn’t pick up anyway, I´m sure of it. I decide to write him a text message instead. He might want to read what I have to say… or at least I would hope so. I am thinking hard for a while of what to write, deciding finally on a short and clear message. ‚I LOVE YOU, COME BACK TO ME MY LOVE. YOUR BILL.‘ After a short hesitation I send the text. After a minute I get a confirmation that it was delivered to the recipient, but if he read it or not… that I won´t know.

There should be TV news coming soon and my afternoon press conference is to be expected to be a part of it. I watch the news from the world for a while but I am not able to absorb any of it. It’s all violence, wars, disasters, traffic accidents. I don’t need to see any of that. My own misery is more than enough.

When the segment about the press conference finally starts, I feel terribly hungry. I wait impatiently until it’s all over, seeing with satisfaction that everything went okay with this one and I warm up a frozen pizza. I´m too lazy to make anything more intricate than that. I´m also exhausted and I watch as my mom sleeps contently. Even the smell of the food didn’t wake her up.

When I wake up, I am still sitting in the living room, I feel cold and it’s almost midnight. When I find out that mom is still sleeping next to me on the sofa, I cover her properly and go to my bedroom.

We spend all of following morning by finishing Davey’s room and the final result is all worth it. He´s a boy, so his room’s walls are painted blue, with sweet, children print on it. The room is decorated with newly bought furniture and a bed with crisp, new bed sheets is waiting in its place too. We also bought a couple of basic toys but soon enough he would have surely more than plenty. He is going most definitely like it here, that I am positive about.

I haven’t heard from Tom since he left, he haven’t responded to any of my messages either, but I won´t give up. I send him another one. ‚TOM, I LOVE YOU MORE AND MORE AND I WILL NEVER GIVE UP ON LOVING YOU. I MISS YOU. YOUR MISERABLE BILL.‘ I will flood him with my messages until he responds. He can´t stop loving me that easily, it´s not in a human power. He must be suffering, exactly the same as I am, and one of us must give in first. I was the one who made a mistake, so it´s up to me I guess.

This time my mom makes lunch. I haven’t had her pasta in such a long time. In my past life we always used to visit our parents just for a briefest period of time, a day or so, because we used to travel so much but now it is going to change for sure. I have been already discussing with mom our upcoming tour in September and all arrangements around it and she promised me that she would take care of David while I would be gone. He´s still very small and needs his peace and steady routines. But before all of this can happen he needs to get used to his new grandma and grandpa which means we would need to visit them as much as possible in the nearest future.

When Mark finally calls me, it is already half past two in the afternoon. He will get the paperwork ready and be waiting for us in front of Ladybird. My celebrity status can get really on my nerves sometimes, like for instance right now. Two cars follow us all the way from my house and when we get to Ladybird, the first thing I see is a crowd of reporters. They’ve been there probably since this morning.

We greet Mark and without too much unnecessary talking we enter the building and head straight to the director’s room, with whom Mark had settled everything right before our arrival. She´s already waiting for us and for the third time I take a seat at the same worn-out sofa in her office. She has a professional smile on her face, but I can see a glint of surprise in her eyes when I greet her. She probably had no idea who the person coming for Davey actually was. She talks mainly with Mark not giving me too much attention. I keep my mouth shut, deciding on better not to join the conversation. We are asked to sign about ten different papers, but I have no energy to read them through. I just have to trust Mark that everything is as it should be.

The official meeting is almost over and we are ready to say our good-byes. Mandy, the psychologist, is already waiting for us behind the door, getting ready to bring us to David and provide us with some necessary instructions. I’m glad that mum is going to be listening to her as well so the burden of remembering everything in the smallest detail is not put on my shoulders only .

When mom and Mark start to walk down the corridor, I can´t help myself and turn around to face the director one last time. I have to explain to her at least the basics so that she wouldn’t think that I´m a liar. I stand in front of her feeling weirded out since she is one head smaller than me. She looks up at me knowingly, waiting.

I take a deep breath, swallow hard and start speaking. „I´m truly sorry. I didn’t mean to lie to you at first, but I had no other choice, I had to be careful because of the reporters and the court. My lawyer and I wanted to keep it a secret till the very end, but as you can see, we have been trying for nothing,“ I smile at her.

„You don’t need to apologize, I do understand. If you just knew what all sorts of pathetic lies parents sometimes feed me with, you would get used to it too. At least you had a good reason. Don´t worry about it. I wish you and your son all the best. He still doesn’t know you are here, because we were not sure of the exact time when you would be coming to pick him up, but you were faster than a flash.“ She shakes my hand and I accept it gratefully. I say good-bye to her and follow the others.

Mandy greets me with a nod of her head and a nice smile and we go down to the ground floor. She takes us to the same room I was in the last time when I was here and she summarizes again what David´s major problems are and how we should behave towards him and how we should treat him. Mom listens to her carefully but I stomp my feet impatiently not being able to concentrate. I can´t wait to see my son.

Finally she is done with her briefing and I’ve promised her that I would call her regularly and come and visit couple of times too to make sure she is informed about progress David would be doing. We are done here so we can move to the room, from which we can see a play room with all the children. There are about twenty of them there.

My eyes are skimming the room, searching frantically for a small boy with brown curls till I see him. He is clutching the Pooh bear to his body, sitting on a chair next to a window. He´s alone, the other children don´t pay any attention to him, but he doesn’t seem to care about them either. His little nose is buried into the teddy´s soft belly and he raises his eyes first when Mandy appears in the door.

I put my arm around my mom’s shoulders and point at the window where her grandson is sitting. Her eyes light up, and the moment David raises his eyes in our direction, I can see in her face how touched she is. „He looks just like you… he has your and Tom´s eyes,“ she sighs and rest her head against my shoulder.
I stroke her hair, feeling a deep sense of satisfaction and happiness. Deep inside I am grateful that Karin has given me all of this…