The Distance Is Quite Simply Far Too Much for Me to Row

I thought about his words. The words of this random, wounded boy whose name I
didn’t even know. I thought about lying, but how do you lie to the only family that you have
left? You just can’t. Then again, you can’t just come out and tell a seven year old that their
father is dead—they just won’t understand. The word has no definition to them.

I thought about the blue eyed boy’s words. I thought about how strong what he
said was. But lie? I hadn’t lied since I was ten. I wasn’t a liar. I needed to learn how,
though. I needed to take the boy’s advice and lie to Morgan and Caleb. That was the only
way.

“Aleks!” Caleb yelled, trying to regain my attention. I looked up quickly and forced a
smile for the small boy. “Can we go to the park? It stopped raining.” I looked out the
window. It had stopped raining. I had had them in doors for what seemed like forever. I
nodded because right now all words seemed to escape me. “We can go?”

“Yes, Caleb, we can go to the park. Go get a sweater,” I instructed him. “And grab
Morgan’s sweater while you’re upstairs.” I stood slowly from the wooden table. I had spent
a better portion of the last two hours gripping the edge of the oak table with all of my
strength. It’s like I was holding on for dear life, and if you think about it, I was. I was lost. I
was drowning. I couldn’t do this. My mother was crazy. I was sixteen.

My eyelids were heavy and I was full of aches and pains. I had hardly slept in the last
two weeks. I had taken over as mom, dad and big sister to Morgan and Cal. Who would be
my mom, or dad, or older sibling? Who the hell was left to take care of me?

“Ale, I’m ready,” he said softly. I turned to Caleb, smiling at his attempt to button his
sweater. “Look, I did the buttons myself,” he grinned widely, a gap where his front tooth had
fallen out the week before. I nodded with a smile. “I did Morgan’s too.” I let a small laugh
escape my throat and I walked into the living room. Morgan’s sweater was buttoned so
incorrectly that I almost wanted to leave it for when Mom or Dad came home from work.

But neither of them were coming home. That’s when, again, it all hit me like a ton of bricks.
That’s when the river behind my eyes broke through the dam and flooded my vision. “Oh
my God,” I sighed. “Oh God.” I slid down against the wall in the archway between the living
room and kitchen.

I couldn’t do this. I wasn’t strong enough.

“Aleks?” Caleb asked. He was watching me worriedly. The expression plastered on
his small features made him look years older and wiser. I wished he was. “Ale, are you
okay?” I forced a small smile and a nod.

“Yeah, honey, I’m okay.” I motioned for him to come closer, “Come here, let me fix your
sweater.” He approached me cautiously, his arms outstretched to hug me. “Come on, it’s
okay,” I whispered. He closed the gap between us and flung himself into my arms, a sob
escaping his small body. “Honey, what’s wrong?” I whispered, tears clouding my vision
and making my voice shake.

He shivered and wound his arms around my neck. “I miss Mommy!” he cried. I rubbed
his back and smoothed his hair. “I miss Daddy! I want them to come home, Ale. I want
them to come back!” he screamed, causing Morgan to burst into tears. “Make them come
back!” I cried softly along with them, unsure of how else to go about handling this situation.
“Make Mommy come home! Make Daddy come home! Call them!”

“Honey,” I whispered, “I can’t call them,” I exhaled, “they’re really busy.” I held him
close to me even though he squirmed. I stopped him from running across the house
yelling. I just kept him where he was.

“If you call them, they’ll come home.” No they won’t, I wanted to say. I wanted to tell him
that they weren’t coming home. I wanted to tell him that she gave up; that it was all too
much for her. I wanted desperately to explain to him why Daddy couldn’t come home. I
wanted to make him understand. “Call Mommy!” he shrieked. “Make her come back!”

I shook my head, but he couldn’t tell. I blinked away more tears, but he didn’t see that. I
inhaled sharply, but he didn’t know. He didn’t know what this was doing to me. He didn’t
realize that I was the closest thing he had to a parent now. He didn’t realize he’d be stuck
with my crappy cooking until he was old enough to move out. He had no idea how close to
killing me he’d come if he left and never came back when he turned eighteen.

Morgan toddled over, pacifier stuck between his lips and hope on his innocent, sweet face.
His turquoise eyes were bright and wide. None of this fazed him, and why should it? He
didn’t know the difference one way or another.

“Come on Cal,” I whispered, “come on. Let’s go to the park.” I pulled him off of me,
trying to ignore his tear stained face, flushed cheeks, and bloodshot eyes. I tried to ignore
how young he really looked. “Come on. Let me fix the buttons on your sweater.” I reached
for the hem of the bright blue cotton sweater and he pulled away.

“No! My buttons!” He crawled behind the worn out, brown suede couch. “No!” I
sighed, realizing this would be harder than I expected.

“Caleb,” I whispered, crawling over and sitting next to him. “Cal,” I sighed, “let’s go to
the park. You can swing on the swings,” I faked a smile, nudging him slightly. “You can go
down the slide and swing across on the monkey bars.” He looked up from his tiny palms
to my face. I sensed that I was breaking through. “Come on, what do you say?” He stared
hopefully. “I’ll get coffee, we can go to the park, we’ll get ice cream for dinner.” He smiled a
little bit, the corners of his lips pulling upward. “We can come home and watch a movie.
How does that sound?”

“It’s good, I guess,” he sighed. “I just want Mommy to come back,” he whispered. I
rubbed his back and stood up, pulling him by the hand and up with me. “Is she coming
back?”

I shrugged and bent down to fix the misaligned buttons and holes. “Someday.”

♥♥♥♥♥

“Coffee is gross!” Caleb exclaimed in the car on the way to Seven Eleven. “Why aren’t
we going where you went yesterday?” I shrugged, glancing at him in the rearview mirror.

“Why, did you want me to go there?” He looked up, making eye contact through the
mirror. He shrugged and then bent to pick up the pacifier that Morgan dropped. “Starbucks
it is,” I declared switching on my directional and heading in the opposite direction. Maybe
the boy would be working again and I could apologize for earlier. I had burdened him with
way too much. He didn’t need to deal with my bullshit on top of his own. He’d just lost his
mother; he didn’t need some strange girl’s problems too.

I heard a laugh escape Caleb’s lips as he took note of where we were going. “You like the
boy who works behind the counter.” I rolled my eyes and looked at his small smirk.

“Define like?” I joked. I like the boy, yes. He seemed very pleasant. A little strange and a
little too out going for diffident little me, but he seemed nice. Did I like, like the boy? I didn’t
think so. Our conversations were limited to arguments over the cost of a cup of coffee and
discussions about how the universe had royally screwed us over.

“You wanna kiss him,” he laughed. “You want his babies.” I laughed, gasping slightly at
his response. I rolled my eyes, turning into the parking lot. “You do! You do!” I smiled at
his enthusiasm and shook my head.

“No, honey, I don’t like him like that,” I laughed. “I don’t even know his name.” He smiled
brightly and started bouncing in his seat, ready to speak again.

“His name is Martin.” I turned quickly, taking in his gap-toothed smile. I shook my head
and took the key out of the ignition, and noticing that Morgan was fast asleep.

“How would you know, you little creeper,” I laughed. He bounced up and down in the
backseat again.

“I read his name tag yesterday,” he grinned. “Aren’t you proud of me?”

“We’ll see,” I laughed, “we’ll see.”

♥♥♥♥♥

The line was as long as a small street—maybe longer. Caleb stood obediently at my side
holding my hand while Morgan slept peacefully on my shoulder. Occasionally the line
would move forward slightly. It happened often enough to keep Caleb entertained and
prevent him from getting antsy and impatient. “Look,” he pointed as we neared the front.
“He’s working again,” he whispered like it was some big secret. I smiled and shook my
head at his antics.

“Next,” a monotone, bored, worn out voice called. I approached the register and opened my
mouth ready to order, when Caleb chimed in.

“Do you remember us? Do you remember me?” he smiled brightly—it was probably as
bright as a Manhattan night. “We were here yesterday!” he added excitedly. I mouthed an
‘I’m sorry’ and warned Caleb to be quiet and respectful.

“I remember,” the boy behind the counter, whose name tag did in fact read “MARTIN”,
replied. “Let’s see, are you Caleb or Morgan?” he smiled. I was slightly taken aback by the
fact that he remembered the names I’d told him.

“I’m Caleb,” he smiled. “Morgan’s the one who’s sleeping. And that’s my sister, Aleks,” he
added pointing to me. I smiled and blushed a little bit. “She likes you.” I rolled my eyes
and looked down at him.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “For Caleb, and for earlier. I shouldn’t have bothered you with my
problems.” He shrugged, implying that he wasn’t bothered and there was no need to
apologize.

“No problem,” he laughed. “Same as yesterday? Grande coffee?” he asked. I nodded and
placed a five dollar bill on the counter. He shook his head and walked away to fill the paper
cup with the highly caffeinated beverage that I so longed for.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, pushing the money toward him at the same time that he tried to push
it back. “Martin, you have to let me pay. This isn’t right.” He laughed and gave the money
back to me.

“Really, Aleks, it isn’t a big deal. It’s a cup of coffee. It’s the cheapest thing we sell,” he
laughed, and then his expression turned more serious. “And after what you told me earlier,
it sounds like you’re gonna have a hard time with everything as it is.” I sighed heavily and
shoved the green paper that adorned Abe Lincoln’s face back into my jeans pocket.

“Thank you,” I whispered. He simply smiled again and called ‘next,’ waving a quick
goodbye before waiting on the next customer.

“See,” Caleb whined. I rolled my eyes and laughed, holding the door open for him to walk
outside into the cool Boston air. “You like him.” I pushed him along to the car.

“No, honey, not the way you think I like him,” I laughed. “Now buckle yourself in, silly
goose.” He nodded and obliged while I strapped the still-sleeping Morgan into the car seat
with a smile. I didn’t like Martin the way my brother though I did, but he could turn out to be
exactly what I need in a friend.