Chapter 14 - Glen Did Not Call Her Mom
Clara moved out.
That shocked Dad more than any lawyer.
For fifteen years, he had treated their marriage as proof that the past had been absorbed.
Clara no longer agreed.
She started therapy.
So did Dad.
Separately.
Glen waited three weeks before agreeing to meet Clara alone.
They chose a coffee shop.
Public.
Two exits.
Glen told me later that he picked the seat facing the door without thinking.
That bothered him.
'I'm not afraid she's going to hurt me,' he said.
'No.'
'I'm afraid I'll feel something I don't want to feel.'
That was the first time I understood that reunion stories can make emotion sound mandatory. Love. Rage. Relief. Something cinematic.
Glen wanted the right to feel almost nothing if almost nothing was what arrived.
Clara arrived early.
Glen arrived exactly on time.
She did not hug him.
"Thank you for coming."
He sat.
For ten minutes they talked about nothing.
Weather.
Ariel.
Coffee.
Then Glen asked:
"Did you want me?"
Clara started crying.
"Yes."
"Before I was born?"
"Yes."
"After?"
"Every day."
Glen looked out the window.
"I had a good childhood."
Clara nodded.
"I'm glad."
"That doesn't make what happened okay."
"I know."
"Margaret is my mother."
Clara's face tightened.
Then she said, "I know."
That answer mattered more than the tears.
Glen continued.
"I don't know what you are to me yet."
"Okay."
"I may never call you Mom."
Clara swallowed.
"Okay."
"And I need you to stop acting like Rachel stole something from you."
Clara closed her eyes.
"I know."
"No. Say it."
Clara looked at him.
"Rachel did not take my son."
Glen nodded.
"Good."
When he came home, I asked how it went.
"Hard."
"Do you want to talk?"
"Not yet."
I said okay.
Three months earlier, I would have filled the silence because uncertainty terrified me.
Now I let him own it.
Ariel climbed into his lap.
"Did you see Grandma Clara?"
Glen froze.
I did too.
We had never called Clara Grandma in front of Ariel.
She had picked it up from cousins.
Glen looked at me.
Then at Ariel.
"Yes."
"Is she your mommy?"
There it was.
No lawyer could prepare a man for a three-year-old.
Glen answered carefully.
"She gave birth to me. Grandma Margaret raised me."
Ariel thought.
"So you have two?"
"Sort of."
"That's a lot."
Glen laughed.
"Yes."
Ariel slid off his lap.
"Can I have juice?"
The identity crisis ended because a toddler was thirsty.
Glen looked at me.
"I needed that."
Then his phone buzzed.
Margaret.
One message.
I THINK CLARA AND I SHOULD TALK.
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