Irene Brand - Tender Love

“If you don’t mind, Alice, you can put the children to bed early. I don’t want them staying up until I come home.”

She prepared beef stew, Waldorf salad, and hot rolls for dinner, putting aside enough food for Mark in case he hadn’t eaten before he came home. The children were quieter than usual as they ate, and Kristin merely picked at her food. As Alice cleared the table and filled the dishwasher, the children dogged her steps—she couldn’t get a foot away from either one of them.

After her work was finished, she said, “Your father asked me to send you to bed early, for he didn’t know when he would be home.”

“Oh, Alice, please don’t make us go to bed before Daddy comes,” Kristin begged, and Eddie puckered up as if he would soon burst into tears.

“But he doesn’t know what time he’ll be here, and we leave for camp early in the morning.”

Kristin grabbed her hand, and Eddie tugged on Alice’s jeans. “But I won’t sleep until he comes. When he’s late, we’re always afraid he’s not coming home. Please, don’t send us to bed, Alice. Eddie will cry until he’s sick.”

Like a bolt from the blue, Alice suddenly realized that she’d misjudged the situation in this home. Her whole focus had been to discipline these children, Eddie in particular, and to build up their physical bodies with the right kind of foods and exercise. And while those things were necessary, suddenly she realized that, more than anything else, Kristin and Eddie needed love and security. They’d witnessed their mother’s slow death, and knowing that Mark was all they had left, their fear of losing him was overpowering.

She’d been listening to her head and not her heart. Her conscience smote her, and she put an arm around Kristin and ruffled Eddie’s hair.

“You can wait up for a while anyway. Why don’t you take your baths, get into your pj’s, and we’ll sit in the living room and wait for him? What do you and your father do in the evenings?”

A smile lit Kristin’s face, and Eddie hugged Alice’s legs. “We play games sometimes or sit on the couch and watch television.” She giggled. “We watch the programs, but Daddy sits with his arms around us and goes to sleep most of the time.”

“I should be able to handle that,” Alice said. “Up the stairs with you, then. I’ll help you with your bath-water, Eddie, and I’ll turn down your beds so you’ll be ready when your daddy comes home.”

“Will you tell him we got ready all by ourselves?” Eddie asked.

“If I don’t have to do too many things for you.”

While she waited for them to finish bathing, Alice tried to think of a game that would interest both of them. As soon as Mark helped her set up the computer, she could provide many educational and entertaining programs for them to watch, but that wouldn’t help her tonight.

Deciding there was a difference between spoiling and loving, she started downstairs. “Come down when you’re ready,” she called. She was mixing a pan of fresh apple muffins when they found her in the kitchen.

“I’m going to put these in the oven to bake, and we can have milk and muffins later on.”

“Oh, boy,” Kristin cried. “We’ll like that, won’t we, Eddie?”

He nodded happily and tugged on Alice’s hand. She knelt beside him and smoothed back his wet hair, and he threw his arms around her and kissed her. The caress had a strange effect on Alice, for it lighted an ember in her heart that had never been touched—she had the first glimmering of what a mother’s love entailed. Her voice quavered when she spoke.

“While the muffins bake, let’s play a game my sister and I used to enjoy. We’ll sit here at the table.” On the table, Alice laid a sheet of paper she’d brought from her room. “We’re going to draw creatures. I’ll start first.”

“But Eddie can’t draw,” Kristin said.

“Sure, he can. I’m going to draw the head of a dog, then you, Kristin, can add the body, and Eddie will draw the legs and feet of the dog.”

“That won’t be hard to do,” Kristin agreed. “I make good grades in art.”

“Ah, but there’s a catch to it,” Alice said. “Neither of you can look while I’m drawing the head, and I’ll fold over the top of the paper before I hand it to you. Eddie can’t watch while you’re shaping the body, and you’ll fold over what you’ve done before he draws the feet and legs.”

Kristin frowned. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Let’s try it anyway. Each of us will mark where the next part of the animal is supposed to be drawn. Cover your eyes.”

Alice quickly sketched an outline of what purported to be a poodle, although art wasn’t one of her strong points. She folded the paper so that only the edge of the neck was showing.

“Okay, Kristin, you can look now, but Eddie keeps his eyes covered.”

Kristin screwed up her eyes in concentration as she carefully drew the body of a dalmatian. Watching her, Alice deduced that she did have some artistic talent. When Eddie’s turn came, with his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth, he outlined four legs that could belong on no other dog except a dachshund.

As she watched Eddie’s tiny fingers painstakingly creating the legs and feet, Kristin smiled broadly, and when he finished and Alice unfolded the paper, Kristin laughed, shouting, “That’s the funniest looking dog I’ve ever seen.”

The head of an aristocratic poodle attached to the spotted, thin body of a dalmatian, supported by four short, sturdy legs was amusing.

Eddie giggled, saying, “But I did make nice legs, didn’t I, Alice?” He jumped up and down on the chair. “I want to draw a bird. Let me draw first this time.”

They’d made three more creatures by the time the muffins were ready, and the two children were more animated than Alice had seen them. She removed the muffins from the pan.

“Do you want to eat a muffin now or wait until they’ve cooled?”

“They smell so good, let’s have one now,” Kristin said, “and maybe we can have some more when Daddy comes home.”

“We need to share with Gran. Eddie, will you take her a muffin while I pour the milk?”

He jumped out of his chair. “I want to show her our pictures, too.” He tucked the images they’d drawn under his arm and took the muffin Alice placed in a plastic bowl. She watched him a bit anxiously for she hadn’t seen Eddie go up or down the stairs by himself, but neither he nor Kristin seemed to realize that his behavior was unusual. She waited with bated breath until he returned to the kitchen, and although his color was heightened and his breathing accelerated, soon after he sat down and started eating his muffin, his complexion and breathing were normal.

“I want to show Daddy the pictures, too,” he said.

“Fine. Help me rinse our glasses and plates, and we can leave them in the sink. We might have another snack with your father when he comes home, if it isn’t too late.”

“But you said we could wait up for him,” he said.

“Well, I didn’t exactly say that, but if you do get sleepy, I’ll stay upstairs with you until he’s home.”

When they went into the family room, before they turned on the television, Kristin said, “What’s another game you and your sister played?”

“We used to tell progressive stories. One of us would think of a subject and we’d make up a story about it. The first one would talk for a few minutes, then the other one would add on ideas. We’d switch back and forth, changing the story content to fit what the one before had said until we thought the story was finished. They were make-believe stories. Think you could do that?”

“I can do it,” Eddie said, “if Kristin can.”

“I want to start the story,” Kristin insisted.