Chapter 24: Terri and the Monolith

I'm EIGHT now. I had the most wonderful birthday in my whole life! And it was a total surprise. I can read a calendar, okay, so I knew what my real birthday was. I thought that we'd have the normal thing, you know, a cake, maybe a special dinner at a restaurant of my choice. I was thinking that there's this pizza place that has an arcade. I've been there with Cindy and her Dan.

Instead I was herded into the back door to Dad's office and everybody was there yelling 'Surprise" and I was genuinely surprised. Nobody had leaked a bit, and that's unusual with Tina and her sisters. They, uh, make that WE, like to talk. If it's happy, we share and get happy with each other. And if it's something stressful or sad, then we get together and have a way to share the burden.

Like Cindy's mom sent her a letter a week ago. Cindy got upset when she read it. I was there. She works with me on math and writing, so I'm over there quite a bit. She knew the letter was coming because her foster mom called her and told her it was being mailed.

I watched Cindy open it. My Cindy, that almost always smiles. And when she started reading, her face sort of caved in.

"What's wrong, Cindy?" I asked.

"Oh, Terri, it's my mom, just being my mom, like she's always been."

"I'm sorry, Cindy," I said. "Is it stuff I'm not supposed to know about?"

"Oh, Terri," she said, her eyes sort of wet, "Most of the world is stuff you're not supposed to know about. But you do."

"Stuff I'm not supposed to talk about?" I said, changing the angle.

"Kinda. Mom is not really good with guys. She doesn't do healthy relationships."

"Ooo-oooh," I said. "Kinda like Tina's mom?"

"Kinda," Cindy said.

I knew about Tina's mom being in jail. Tina had explained to me why I'd never met her mom. Dad's parents are dead, so I was hoping to pick up a grandparent. "Mom wasn't the 'parent' type. I don't think she'll be much for being a grandparent, either," Tina told me.

"Tina's written to her mom, but her mom never wrote back," I said. "So at least your mom writes."

Cindy sort of looked at me. "I hadn't thought of that. You're right. She writes."

"It's something," I said. "So she wrote something that upsets you."

Cindy nodded. I have pretty aunts. Tina's pretty. They're all pretty. Not like the women you see on the magazine covers in the supermarket. Those women are like kids' toys. Exaggerations, chosen for effect. My family is not that kind of pretty. They're the kind of pretty that's natural and it starts on the inside and works its way out and it's got clean and fresh and young and happy and natural. I don't mean to put anybody down, but I think Cindy's the most remarkable of the group. Red hair and green eyes sort of do things. A sad Cindy is a bad thing, because it's rare, and it takes away something I like. That's her smile.

"Yes, it's just the same stuff she's been doing since I was old enough to remember," Cindy said. "I keep hoping she'll straighten out."

"Sometimes they don't," I said. "I dunno about Mom."

"But you're talking about an illness, sweetie," Cindy replied.

"Doesn't really matter if it means you can't stand to be around 'em, does it? Or if they don't want you around. Either way."

"I guess," Cindy said. "Hug me, smart child."

"Okay, smart child," I said. I hugged her. In some families we'd be sisters, I would be the youngest, she'd be the oldest. Tina says we're a blended family, her and me and Dad. I point out the rest of the group and tell her that it's a whole lot bigger and richer blend. I blended in aunts, adopted Susan's mom and dad as grandparents, at least while we were living in Tennessee. I read Cindy's social studies presentation about the nuclear family and how things in society change. A lot of changes aren't good, but sometimes out of the mess something good happens. Like us.

"I'm sorry for you, Cindy," I said. I kissed her cheek. Sometimes that works.

It did, at least a little bit. She got some of her smile back.

That's good, too. Because when I saw the cake at my birthday party, it was in the shape of one of those little pony things you see advertised on the kids' channels on TV. I am NOT a fan. Everybody knows I am not a fan, the person who knows it best is Cindy, so I blamed her. It was good cake. So delicious and moist.

And yes, Cindy was the push behind the pony cake. That means she loves me and pays attention. And the fact that a well-constructed pony cake actually showed up? That means that Dad and Tina love me. And everybody else? Okay. I feel the love.

So I announced it to Dad. Sitting on his lap. "Dad," I said, "this is kind of like Terri paradise."

"How so?"

"Every time I turn around, there's somebody loving me. Taking care of me. Letting me do things that are good to do, helping me learn stuff. D'ya know that Susan made me a button?"

"A button?"

"Yeah. Look!" I showed him a brass button Susan had machined for me. "Metal lathe. 'Brass machines easy, ' Susan says. And she drilled the holes on a drill press with an x-y table."

"You understand why they call it x-y?"

"Axes, Dad," I said. "Horizontal. Vertical. And there's a Z axis, too, but we didn't use that to make buttons.'

"You did. You just didn't know it," Dad said. "The drill bit runs perpendicular to both the x and y axis."

"Then we knew it, because we used it."

"You didn't give it a numerical value. You just lowered the bit until you completed the hole."

Now I need to get somebody to show me a computer numerical control machine because Dad explained to me how they use the x, y and z axes. Dad and I were working on a computer screen showing the three dimensions when Tina came in from the campus.

"Look, Tina! This is a neat way to see things!"

The next day I talked with Susan about it. "Wow, Terri! That IS neat!"

"Do you know about CNC machines?" I asked her.

"No, cutie," she said. "I know about our tools because that's what Dad had in the shop. A CNC machine is for a production environment."

"Oh," I said. I understand that money gets in the way. "I would still like to see one at work," I said.

"We'll see what we can find," Susan said. "They might have one somewhere on campus on one of the research projects."

"Okay," I said. "How was school?"

"My head hurts," Susan said. "They did me another math today. But I think I'm done with math. We sort of agree that I've reached the limit for Susan Ellerbee's math skills without some classroom time."

"Why'n'cha get Cindy or Nikki to tutor you?"

"Because they're in the middle of their own issues right now," Susan said.

"Busy," I said. "I know. Tina tells me to be careful not to hog too much time. That's why I've been spending so much time with Rachel."

"Rache's a sweet girl," Susan said.

"She is, but that's not the point."

"What's the point, Mini-me?" Susan said.

I like it when she calls me that. "The point is that Susan has bogged down in math and we're trying to pull her out of it."

She hugged me. "Oh, Terri-bug! You can't rescue everybody. Let me sort of back off of math for a while. I can knock out some of the electives, I think."

"But don't give up on math."

"I'm not giving up. I'm resting. Terri-bug, I'm eighteen and I'm done with my sophomore year math. I'm two years ahead of schedule and I haven't sat in the first classroom since I got here."

Okay, she's right. And Cindy says that I must be careful about pushing people. "Okay, Aunt Susan," I said. "But remember, you want to be sitting in the same office as Jason when this is all over. And I don't mean as his secretary."

"Ooooo," Susan squealed. "That's a horrible thought." She smiled at me. "Besides, your turn's coming. The people at the college want to meet you."

"Me?" I squealed.

Alan's Turn:

I'm up to my eyeballs in this stuff, you know. Business is going well. I flew to Houston to meet with a one of the big engineering houses. They want to farm out some project work. We can handle it quite well. It's a good mix for our gang. Control things, mostly, a little electrical power, and between me and two Dans and Jason, we can do this. Put some money in the company coffers. Give the girls something to see and maybe participate in. I'm looking at the programming for some of it and I know that Nikki and Cindy can handle a lot of it, if (big IF) they don't get bored.

And let's see, my beautiful young wife is a week and a half away from turning eighteen, and she's also about eight or ninety percent of a college sophomore. Okay, that's a huge surprise for a guy who, this time a year ago, was decidedly alone, probably for a looong time.

A guy who thought he'd never be able to be a dad to his daughter. Now I had a wife. And my daughter.

Daughter. Just turned eight daughter who, by the rumblings coming from the university, might well be in some parallel universe in intellectual capacity. Boy, was that a genetic dice roll. Okay, I will bow my head and admit to being of above average intelligence. I'm an engineer, after all. High side of the IQ distribution. But my ex-wife, Terri's mom, she was not noticeably above average, not that I could see. Yet here is our offspring, and my sweet little blond daughter is, as somebody said, scary smart.

College knows about Terri because they're already working with some stiff intellects from this group. I'm proud as hell over Tina, a high school dropout when I met her, who skipped a year of high school to graduate this year, And her friend Susan, equally impressive, third in her high school class. But the college is also dealing with the wives of the two Dans, Richards and Granger, and Cindy and Nikki blew past high school entirely. And the four of them told stories of Terri.

Tina walked in one afternoon. "Baby, they want to see Terri at school."

"Huh?"

"They want to see Terri. AT school. That psychologist that interviewed Cindy and Nikki. He specializes in gifted students. He wants to see Terri."

"I don't want our daughter being treated like a lab specimen," I said.

"The guy's okay. I talked to both Nikki and Cindy and they said that he's not nutso."

"Not nutso," I laughed. "I love it when you talk technical."

"He talks to them. That's all."

"Well, if he talked with Cindy and his brain didn't explode..." I thought about some conversations with Cindy and Nikki and MY head almost exploded.

"So let me set this up," she said. "I'll make an appointment."

"I worry." After all, this was my daughter, and oddly, Tina's daughter, too. I recounted in my mind the fears I'd had when Tina and I first connected, stories of friction and outright warfare between the stepmom and the stepkid with dad in the middle. Wasn't that way. Terri was Tina's long-lost daughter or sister or appendage or whatever. The only thing that keeps the two from being inseparable was that Terri was equally part of the lives of Nikki, Cindy and Susan.

I give up. I wouldn't have married Tina if I thought she was a flake, and Terri's her daughter, too.

Friday morning I found myself, Tina, and Terri in the truck headed onto the campus. We parked and the three of us walked up the steps and into the building. We checked in with the receptionist.