Free Helen of Pasadena by Lian Dolan Page B

here?” Aiden said, climbing into my Audi wagon in the carpool line. “And why are you dressed like that?”
    I had to hand it to him. He could be very observant when he wanted to be, just not when looking for his backpack or water polo gear.
    “I am here to pick you up. It’s time for me to get back into the world,” I declared, slowly pulling away from the curb, grateful that I didn’t bash into the SUV in front of me that suddenly stopped. “And I have just come from my first career counseling session.”
    “What career?”
    “Yes, exactly, what career? I believe you are more qualified to get a job than I am. At least you have your lifeguarding certification.” I looked over at Aiden, who was smiling for the first time in three weeks. I went with it. “Would you mind dropping out of school and lifeguarding to support us?’
    “No problem. As long as I get to drive Dad’s BMW to the pool.” And we both laughed, really laughed, together for the first time since Merritt’s death.
    Then, Aiden asked me the question that I’d been preparing to answer every night when I lay in bed and prayed for guidance.
    “Mom, are we going to be okay?”
    I stared straight ahead, watching the road and my words. “Aiden, we will be okay, but there will have to be a lot of changes. You know about the house, but besides that, we just won’t have as much money as we’re used to. We’ll sell the house, I’ll get a job, and we’ll be okay. But life will be different.”
    He nodded, his brown hair falling into his eyes. “We’re kinda broke, right?”
    Surprised, I snapped, “What do you mean?’
    “I heard you talking to Candy and Tina, um, Ms. McKenna and Mrs. Chau-Swenson,” Aiden corrected himself. Pasadena was a “last names for grown-ups” kind of town. “It sounded kinda bad.”
    I bit the bullet, trying to remember that he was my son, not my partner. “It is kinda bad now, but it will get better.”
    “I don’t have go to Ignatius. There are public schools. And I can get a job. I can help.”
    “Don’t worry. We can handle tuition, and your priority should be school, okay?”
    “Yeah. I love you, Mom.” Aiden was never embarrassed to say that to me. He rarely said it to Merritt, who wasn’t a big fan of expressing emotions, not even in the ‘I love ya, buddy’ way that men use as a default. Merritt used to pat him on the head and say, “Good boy.” Like he was a Lab.
    “I love you, too, Aiden,” I returned, squeezing his hand, then to ease the emotion, “Do you like my scarf? Do I look younger?”
    “You look like a dorky French girl.”
    “ Merci .”

    I figured it out. It was that vacation to Mexico about five years ago that was the beginning of the end for Merritt and me. Lying in the dark night after night, unable to sleep, I became obsessed with pinpointing the Incident That Changed It All. Figure that out, I convinced myself, and the rest of this mess would begin to make sense.
    I settled on the Mexico trip.
    “You make the plans,” Merritt had tossed out at me one morning in January before he headed into downtown L.A. to build his empire. “Wherever you want to go! Surprise me!” I think he’d even kissed me on the way out the door.
    So I had, because I am a planner. Good at details, long-range calendarizing, airline reservations, packing lists, transportation supervision, weather charts, day trips, travel documents and shot records. “Good planning makes for good fun” was a needlepoint pillow credo that I lived by. I’d plunged into my new task. I was an early adapter to Internet vacation planning; it made me feel like I was back in school doing research. I thought Spring Break 2003 would be a high point in Fairchild family vacation lore. And in our sex life.
    We’d spent the previous six years trying to have a second child, to no avail, despite the specialists and the fertility drugs and the planned-to-the-minute, medically inspired intercourse. Really, it’s a stretch to