Chaos reigned in every direction.
Elementary school children of all ages surged up and down the halls, shouting to one another and to their parents, "Hi Scotty!"
"C'mon Mom, hurry up!"
"Here's my room, let's go in!"
Harried parents, filled with a mixture of excitement and sensory overload, did their best to pretend they were in control of their kids. And I was right there with them, holding tight to the hand of my four-year-old as I watched my six-year-old's head bob and weave through the crowd on his way to his classroom.
I hadn't been to an event like this in the more than nine months since Sarah died. Sure, I'd been to the school for various conferences with my son's teachers, but I hadn't been able to bring myself to attend any of the community events like this Fall Festival. Mostly I just couldn't bear all the sympathetic smiles, the whispers, the well meaning expressions of sorrow:
"How are you holding up, Tom?"
"We all miss her."
"Let me know if there's anything I can do."
It was all just too hard to bear. Plus, it just pissed me off that their good intentions forced me to stifle my own feelings just so I could put up a brave front.
But this was a new school year and I'd sworn it would be a new start for me and my boys. So here I was, being a dad again, threading my way through the chaos. I had to admit it felt really good to be back doing something normal again.
In my son's classroom, all the kids and their parents were gathered around, eagerly checking out cubbys, reading charts and math workbooks. As I looked around me, I saw lots of familiar faces—parents I knew from last year or from the neighborhood. Being surrounded by all this happiness was a good thing. Good for me, good for the boys.
During the next half our or so, several of the mothers and fathers stopped by to shake my hand, hug me and the boys, or just pat me on the back to let me know there were glad to see me again. Most of the ones I knew were still just "Bobby's mom" or "Alison's dad," but a few of them I knew better and was glad to see. Then it was time to join in the madness out in the halls—games, treats, inflatable bouncing rooms, face painting, even a cake walk.
We dodged our way from one room to another, sampling all the fun. I was so focused on the boys and how much they were enjoying themselves, I only thought about Sarah a couple of times and the pangs were not nearly as bad as I had expected them to be. Finally, we ended up in the big room with the cake walk. A mixed crowd of kids and a few adults were pacing methodically around the room, stepping on numbers and waiting for the music to stop. Arranged around the outside walls were knots of parents, chit-chatting and halfway watching what was going on in the middle of the room.
As I scanned the room I saw that directly across from me was Marissa, Justin's mom. During the terrible first weeks after Sarah's death she'd been a huge help to me. More than once she'd taken the boys for a play date. Sometimes she would stop by in the late afternoon with a casserole or a pan of lasagna, and at my oldest's birthday party, she took charge when I started to lose it in the face of twelve happily screaming six year olds.
I'd thanked her profusely, of course, and at the end of the school year I sent her a big bouquet of flowers with a heartfelt thank you letter. You learn a lot about people from the way they cope with death—most try to avoid you because it reminds them of their own mortality, but a few, like Marissa, move closer and share themselves during your time of greatest need. When the summer began I kind of lost track of her—each family went its own way for vacations, summer camps and the like—so it was nice to see her again.
As usual, she was looking incredibly good. I had her pegged for about 10 years younger than me, meaning 33 or 34, although she had the body of someone much younger. She was tall—almost six feet in the boots she was wearing tonight—and slender, hair dirty blonde (although these days clearly dyed that way), and she still had the remnant of a tan from summer.
In addition to the boots, she was wearing black slacks that clung to her ass in a very nice way and an ice-blue satin blouse that was unbuttoned one more button than would have been modest. In her case, though, her breasts were very small—surprisingly so for a woman as tall as she was—and so there wasn't any cleavage bursting out to shock the other moms and excite the dads. Still, the dark area where the folds of her blouse overlapped held my gaze.
Suddenly I realized I was staring and pulled my eyes up to her face. Shit! She was looking right at me. Immediately I felt myself beginning to redden and I smiled weakly. Instead of scowling, she broke into a wide smile, waved across the cake walkers and mouthed—"Stay a minute," holding up one finger. I nodded, acutely aware that I'd been busted and that I had been staring at a woman with interest for the first time in, well, months and months. In fact, it was one of the first times I could remember doing that since everything fell apart so suddenly back in February.
Marissa wrapped up whatever it was she was saying to the two moms she was standing with, then bent over a desk to write something on a piece of paper. As she did, I couldn't help notice how nicely her slacks stretched across her butt cheeks. Clearly she was going to the gym, running, or something. Whatever it was, I approved.
Neither her two kids nor mine were having any luck in the cake walk. As they paced solemnly around the room, Marissa slipped through the crowd toward me. When she reached me she smiled again—God she had beautiful teeth—and gave me a big hug, pressing her chest against mine. The feel of her small and firm breasts against my chest caused a brief stirring in my pants. Fortunately, she broke the embrace quickly, or I'd have had to adjust myself.
"Tom. It is so good to see you again. The boys have grown about a foot since I saw them in June!" Her voice had a kind of a purr to it that always made it seem like she had spent the night before shouting or singing really loud, leaving her vocal chords just a bit ragged out.
"Yours do too," I retorted. "The summer was clearly good for us all. You look wonderful too."
"Thanks Tom. I noticed you noticing." At this I could feel the color rising in my neck again.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to be stare."
"Hey, no problem. I take it as a compliment," she said. "When a girl reaches a certain age, it's nice to know the guys are still staring once in a while." And then she laughed, breaking what might have become sexual tension. We were, after all, in a room full of second and third graders, not to mention their moms and dads. I had to laugh too, in part with relief that she wasn't pissed.
