Chapter 25: Sibling Rivalry

Part IV: Maria Davis’s Story

MARIA:

“It seems that everyone who has touched this place has been blessed,” I said softly.

“We’re so glad you’ve finally moved down here to be with us,” Anna said. “It took you so long. Our namesake is twelve years old already. She needs to be near her grandma.”

“Anna Marie is the reason we’re here. We just had loose ends to tie up before we could move down here. You know how it goes when you have other children clamoring for attention.”

“Oh, don’t I just,” Marilyn laughed. “I thought Betts would kill her brother before I could get her out of the house.”

“Our problem is that I never really succeeded in getting Roxie out of the house. I’m still… worried about her,” I confessed.

“It’s not fair! Why do you have to move all the way to Bloomington? What’s Dad even going to do? Become a farmer, like his son? Why does Rose get all the attention all the time?”

“Roxie, that’s enough! For Pete’s sake! We have a life, too. I have a twelve-year-old granddaughter down there and I have every right to live nearer so I can enjoy her growing up.”

“You have three grandkids up here!”

“And we have stayed right here until they were all over eighteen. They don’t need us taking care of them now. And neither do you. Step up to the plate and be there for your own kids!”

“Where? Where are we going to live? You’re selling this place. It’s the only home I’ve ever known.”

“You’ve been married three times and have a child from each husband. This is not the only home you’ve known,” I sighed. What a difference between my two daughters. One, an example of bad decision after bad decision. I’d finally told her she didn’t have to marry every man she slept with. The other daughter, president of a nationally recognized media conglomerate, mother of a delightful daughter, and part of a fifteen-member harem. Well, two out of three…

I’d certainly never anticipated my younger daughter’s chosen lifestyle. Nor that of my son. When Rose went to junior high school, I thought she’d probably follow in her sister’s footsteps. Both girls were overly endowed. I blame the hormones in chicken breasts. I assumed I’d be struggling to keep her home before she reached eighth grade.

But she fell in with a crowd that took life seriously. Not that there was never any questionable activity, but by ninth grade they had solidified into a unit. They even created an agreement to govern their dating. I was impressed. It was the first sign I’d seen that the second child had more sense than the first.

“Brian Frost?” Rex had said. “Is that Hayden and Marilyn’s son? Hard workers. Good honest people from what I can tell. I’ve only had one occasion to work with them, but I was impressed. They were among the first clients I had when I was just getting started in real estate law. Rose is involved with their son?”

“Well, not just with Brian. They’ve created a group. Look at this agreement.” I handed him the copy Marilyn had given me. “You know the Frosts organized the Labor Day swim at Crystal Lake the past couple of years. Marilyn and I had a long chat about kids growing up when we were there. I certainly never expected this, though. She’s organizing a calling tree so the kids all have a safety net.”

“Now that’s a good idea,” my husband said. “I don’t see any problems with this, as far as it goes. For heaven’s sake, Maria, after Roxie, I never expected Rose to last this long as a virgin. She signed this? I think we should do everything we can to encourage it.”

And so we did. We offered to drive when kids wanted to go out together. We put our phone number on the call list. Rex even advised them legally on occasion. By that time Roxie had gone off across the country to Carnegie Mellon to study art. I wasn’t confident in her artistic ability based on the drawings I’d seen, but the school either saw her talent or our checkbook. I suspected she thought it would be the easiest subject she could study while she partied.

The complaints started almost immediately. “You never let me…” The truth was, we never had a chance to give her permission. She was a sneak. By comparison, giving Rose permission to attend an all-night mixed party chaperoned by the Frosts was an easy decision.

About that time, Ross got involved with a group, as well. He’d met a boy in junior high. And a girl. I admit that I gave very little consideration to what my apparently stable middle child was up to while I attempted to understand my son and deal with the issues of my oldest daughter.

“Ross, have you and your friends considered entering an agreement like Rose’s group did?” I asked after a party for a dozen kids in the late spring. We’d taken the group out on the pontoon boat to celebrate the end of the school year. Rose, of course, was at a party at a cheerleader’s home. Everything I saw while we were on the boat and while the kids were eating and playing games was just what you’d expect from a bunch of newly-minted teenagers. I thought, in fact, that they were extremely well-behaved. Then, as parents came to pick up their children after the party, I happened to glance down the hall and saw Ross give another boy a kiss. It wasn’t deep and passionate, but you just didn’t see boys kiss each other in our day and age. I felt I needed to talk to him.

“Oh. Yeah. We’ve got one,” he said. “Rose and Samantha got us together back in January—remember when we all went to the JV basketball game? Well, right after the game, they gave us a copy of their agreement. It had a lot of blanks on it and they said that if we were going to pal around like they did that we needed to decide what was acceptable behavior. Most of what was on the list, we just said ‘yuck, no’ to and scratched, but they said we could always revise it as we got older as long as we remembered it only set the limits of what we could do and not a list of requirements we had to do. We’re cool.”

“And does it apply equally to… um… behavior… between boys as well as between boys and girls?” There I’d said it. I opened the door to accepting his possible homosexual relationship with the other boy. “You know, it’s okay if you are… uh…”

“Relax, Mom. Remember that book I read last fall? Silverback? Science fiction where humans encounter an alien race and start a big civil war among the natives who want to accept the humans and those who want to reject them. Pretty cool stuff.”

“What does this have to do with…?”

“I’m getting there. Science fiction explores concepts of social interaction that are considered deviant in our society by setting them in alien societies. In this one, the young actually choose their gender at puberty. So, childhood and pre-puberty are kept completely non-sexual as the Silverbacks explore what it means to become male or female and then make the choice. I suspect there were other choices besides male and female, too. Well, right now, I’m like one of those Silverbacks. I know I can’t just choose to be a girl instead of a boy… At least not without a bunch of chemicals and surgery. But I’m exploring what I am in relationship to gender. Either way, Mom, the agreement still holds.”

“Ross, where are you getting all this from? This is not the thinking of a thirteen-year-old boy.”

“I read a lot. I think a lot. In fact, I think one day I want to become a philosopher. You wouldn’t mind if I grew a bushy beard and smoked a pipe, would you?”

“Just… uh… not in the house.”

“I’m such a failure!” Roxie moaned. “I don’t deserve to live. I should just kill myself.”

“Roxanne! You’re fifty years old. It’s simply time to grow up!” I was near the edge of my wits in dealing with my eldest. The ‘For Sale’ sign had gone up in our yard a month ago and as far as I knew, she’d yet to decide on a place to live. Our new retirement home in Corazón was slated to be completed in two weeks. Sold or not sold, this house was going to be empty. “You’ve had the longest time as a teenager known to mankind. This house is going to be sold. It’s too much for your father and me to keep up and you are no help. Pack your room. You’ve looked at three apartments that are all within your budget. Choose one and move out!”

“Richard asked me to move in with him,” she sighed.

“He asked you or you convinced him?”

“Yeah. He’s not a bad guy. Maybe he’s not rich but he’s not mean either. I think I could be happy there. I wish he lived on the river.”