I took Kit out for a root beer float tonight and some talk. It was his idea but I didn't imagine he'd be a lively conversationalist. He's been having a tough month and this week is no exception. He's completely baffled by his mom's disappearance. All he can think about is how angry it makes him. He can't understand it because he's only 10, and he can't even express what he feels, except outrage and anger. He thinks that she never really wanted kids. Which, of course, means that he doesn't think she wanted him.
What he wanted to talk about most was what happened when and how Marcia left Tio. You see, here in our little soap opera we have not one mother running from her children but two. Marcia left when Tio was six. Her world was full of trouble and she couldn't cope. She said her goodbyes and left Tio in Buddy and Debbie's care. Tio knew she'd moved to Arizona and that was it. Because Tio was younger than Kit and had only a part time relationship with his mom and had known Debbie all his life, it didn't smack his so hard and fast. Which didn't mean it didn't cut him deep and leave lasting anger and doubt in his life. He just assimilates easier.
Kit's close attachment, unhealthy at times, to Debbie leaves him exposed to his own raw fear and doubt that could scar him for life. He trusted her of all people to have his back and, while time to time he saw holes in her armor, it wasn't until this month that he has lost faith in her completely. He knows, and has said as much, that he'll never be able to trust her again because even if she does come back, how could he believe she'd stay.
Which brings us back to Marcia who has returned and assures us she has every intention of staying. Six years was a long time to be away and it will take time for Tio to accept that she's back for keeps, assuming she is. Kit may be thinking her to be a bellwether to gauge his own mother by. But the two moms are completely different.
I always imagined my kids would grow up, maybe go to college, but at least find a career, a partner, and have children in a typical middle class world. I could never have possibly written this plot - even for a movie. But here we are living it.
