Waiting at the Curb

My mother drove me to school that day.  I am going to St. Edward Catholic High School and at the time, I think I am a sophomore.  I hate this school.  I hate this school and I hate these kids and I hate dressing up and wearing these goddamn cloth neckties every day.  I don't look right in these clothes and I don't say too much about it to my parents, but I hate it more than anything else I can think of.  And the kids make fun of me.  But there is something I hate more than the clothes. 

These fuckers. 

I hate these fuckers. 

She pulls up and it is just me because my brother is still at the junior high school.  She sits there for a minute and I go to grab the handle and get out, and she says my name. 

She never says my name when I get out of the car. 

She just lets me go. 

She always just lets me go. 

I look at her and she asks me how I would feel if she were to leave her husband, my step-father.  She tells me she has been thinking about it for some time now, that she is not happy, and that Lisa, my step-sister, is old enough now to understand divorce.  

I just look at her.  

I've been through this before, although I was pretty young and don't remember all of the details of my mom and dad divorcing.  It was a good number of years ago.  I look at her still, not really believing that she is saying this to me, that Lisa is old enough to understand divorce. 

Understand divorce? 

Really? 

What's there to understand? 

That you're not willing to try anymore?  That you're actually willing to take that risk to allow your children with only one parent, when everything tells you that two is better than one; when you know for a fact, without a shadow of a doubt, that one and one is two?  

But maybe, I tell myself, maybe I am wrong.  Maybe I am wrong to want my parents to stay together if they just don't love each other anymore.  Of course!  For fuck's sake! Of course!

I look at her still and I know she is waiting for an answer.  Her face is wrinkled, deep lines like a crumpled piece of paper run over her cheeks, make creases at the corners of her eyes. 

Crow's Feet. 

They call them Crow's Feet. 

She looks old to me and I do not answer her, only shake my head and leave her there at the curb, watching me go and I remember that this is not the first time I left her waiting.  Back in freshman year, waiting at the front door and leaning forward to grab a kiss goodbye.  

Only I couldn't.  

The carpool had just pulled up and Becky and Joey D. were in there with Becky's mom and I could just hear the shit I would get if they knew I still kissed my mother goodbye.  Is this where it started?  

Is this the point, the crucial point where she began to pull away from me?  

Would she really think it was me pulling away? 

Shouldn't she know that this is only teenage stuff? 

That what she really needs to do at this point is hang on and never let go?

Force me to talk to her?

Force my brother and I to get along no matter how much we told her we hated each other? 

Force this goddamned family back together again? 

Couldn't she make that happen? 

Couldn't she?