I sense a similar acknowledgement pass through Rose. We stand directly on the same page of the same story in the same book.
I ask Ben, “Would you like us to help you pack?”
His mouth opens, surprised.
“It is what you want, isn’t it?”
Ben hesitates and then nods.
Stilted but fiery, Rose tells him, “You can’t forget your toothbrush. I don’t care if you refuse to brush, but at least pack it in your bag. Do I need to make you a list?”
Ben thinks harder. “…I’d like a list but with pictures.”
“Then pictures it will be,” Rose says so affectionately that she might as well be hugging our son.
“Would you like a map?” I question. “What else do you need from us?” We would give you the world if we could.
“I have a map. I drew one yesterday, and I’m walking, so I don’t need much.”
Eliot and Tom snicker, not meaning to be cruel, but by laughing they unknowingly disregard his opinions.
Ben rotates to his brother that teeters on the frame of a chair and the other who slouches beside him. “I’m serious!!” he yells from his core, his neck beet-red. “I’m leaving! I’m leaving and never coming back!!”
Their faces fall. Understanding in this moment the true meaning and gravity of his words. It does not matter whether he can leave. It matters that he feels like he should.
“Pippy?” Jane calls out.
“Ben?” Eliot and Tom say together.
When Ben crosses his thin arms and turns his back to the table, our children fall into hushed whispers.
Rose and I guide our son towards a teacart, close to the door. He breathes heavily, frustrated tears welling. We crouch to his height. Rose dabs his cheeks with a clean cloth napkin. I whisper a few soothing sentiments in French while he catches his breath.
Ben wants to be heard.
We hear him and listen to him every day. He may believe tonight we’ve shot down his ideas, but I’m not drowning each one. I’m challenging them, and he has every right to stand by his convictions. However outlandish and fantastical they may be. Rose and I would still be here, with him, no matter what he thought in the way that he thought.
I take his opinions seriously, even if they’re grounded in fantasy. I never call them nonsense. I never label him as absurd. He’s my idealistic son that dreams in undiscovered colors.
That is fact.
He sniffs, cheeks dried and breathing more at ease.
And I tell him, “If your motive is to truly leave, we’ll help you.”
Rose combats tears as she says, “Our hearts would break every step of the way, but we’d help you.”
Ben rubs at his watery eyes, dismayed.
“You have choices,” I say gently. “You will always have choices. We respect yours, and it will pain us to watch you leave. We would let you go because that’s your desire. Is that what you truly want?”
There’s a fear that he will say yes. I can tell myself that realistically and logically he will never run away, but walking through the illusion will be excruciating. I can’t separate the sentiments, and I don’t try to convince myself that I can.
I know that I can’t. He’s my son. He’s a piece of this family.
He’s not expendable.
And we’ll go as far as packing his bags. We’ll watch him roll his suitcase down the stairs, down the street. We will pretend our son has left us until he recognizes his ideas live in neon castles and clouds.
If he didn’t reach that point before he reached the neighborhood gate, we wouldn’t let him leave. We’ll play into desires for as long as we can, but we’ll never risk his safety.
All so he feels heard. So he feels understood. We’d do this out of love.
Ben wavers, face splotched red.
“What is it?” I whisper.
His head hangs. “I don’t fit in here.”
With hot passion, Rose says, “Yes, you do. Ben Pirrip Cobalt—you fit in at the table. You fit in my heart.” She clutches his hands and tears drip down his cheeks with an entirely new sentiment. “You fit in this family. I promise you my skin and bones, you do.”
Ben rubs his nose with the back of his hand.
I awaken at her fervor, choked with real emotion. My throat is closed. I wait a second to process, and then with these feelings trembling beneath, I tell my son, “You’re necessary in our lives.”
Ben takes a short breath.
“I love you,” I say without a shadow of a doubt. “We all love you. For your differences, for your similarities, for who you are.”
“We, too, brother,” Eliot says, drawing our attention to the table. Rose and I straighten to a stance, and Ben slips around our legs to see what we see.
All of our children rise. Not only to their feet. They rise to the table, pushing dishes aside, goblets tipping over, but their eyes are only on Ben. Staring down at him, as though he is the only one who matters. He matters above a dish. Above a chair. Above a glass, above themselves.
Charlie is the one who extends his hand. “We, too, love you, Ben.”
Rose is a fortress of love and loyalty, her yellow-green eyes glassed at the sight of our future that’s no longer future.
It is present moment.
And we are living inside of it.
I clasp her hand. My heart—a heart that cared for logic and practicalities and selfish pursuits—that heart is on fire.
Ben takes his brother’s hand, and Charlie helps him stand on the table. Every child meets our eyes, smiling as though they’ve obtained knowledge and secrets of the world.
Each individually unique.
Each with a mind of their own.
Each proud and in love with who they are.
I expected no less.
Jane looks between Rose and me, and very strongly, she says, “Ensemble.”
“Ensemble,” our children then exclaim at once.
My lips pull upward into a blinding grin. Rose is moved, fingers to her own lips, and her fiery yellow-green eyes meet my calm deep blue. I skim the base of her neck with my hand.
We draw our gazes to our children. Fire and water upon them. We tell all seven the one word that has breathed inside of us from the moment we met.
We say, “Ensemble.”
Together.
April 2028
Zoo
Utah
DAISY MEADOWS
For many, many years, we’ve strayed from any and all zoos. The one time we did visit, way before we had Sulli, the experience ended with crowds pressed up against us. Snapping photos, yelling our names. We never considered putting our girls through that mayhem.
Not even as Winona begged for the past year. “Let’s see all the elephants and the turtles and the zebras and the unicorns!”
“Fucking unicorns,” Ryke muttered, shadow of a smile peeking.
I explained that unicorns live in majestic meadows off in majestic lands, not zoos.
“Let’s take a boat there!” Winona exclaimed.
We have not taken a boat to a majestic land with majestic meadows, but we finally planned a trip with a zoo pit stop. Only because this particular zoo let us slip inside on a closed for employees only day. No crowds. Not many people. Just some zoo attendants, animals, and us.
“Let me know if you want anything, I’ll open the register,” Bethany, our really nice zoo guide tells us. She first leads us into the gift store, saving the exhibits for later.
As our kids enter ahead of us, I come up behind Ryke, hugging him around the waist. I playfully try to ground his stride, but he easily walks forward, just with me in tow. I catch him eyeing my flower crown, and I playfully bite his arm.
Then our energetic four-year-old giraffe races into the depths of the store. Hopping up and down like this is heaven on earth. She lands at the towering wall of stuffed animals. Winona Briar Meadows is a giraffe, not just in spirit but in costume. I helped her put on an orange an
d white giraffe onesie this morning, hood concealing her messy brown hair.
Our ten-year-old daughter darts in the opposite direction, towards a bucket of silver pendants and rope jewelry.
I gasp. “Our brood has separated. Where will we go? What will we do?”
Ryke ruffles my blonde hair, my flower crown at a tilt. Then he faces me while I rock on the heels of my feet, my palms on his firm chest, lean muscle beneath his gray shirt. I’d steal his green baseball hat off his head, but flower crowns it is today.
Sulli wears an identical one, and she asked if I would wear mine with her.
My wolf stares down at me, his brown eyes flitting to my yellow shirt every few minutes. It says here comes the sun.
Ryke tells me, “Wherever you go, I’ll go.”
I smile tenfold and place my hands on his unshaven jaw, rough beneath my palms. I just stay here, liking how I’m in direct line with someone mighty and strong, daring and dangerous, and most of all—kind and caring.