Part 3

At eight-thirty on the morning of Cinco de Mayo, Shirley came into the living room and poked around gently among the wadded blankets and quilts on the couch and love seat.  Thad and Cleo had burrowed themselves in deeply along with the television remote, a Betty Spaghetti doll, Thad’s Game Boy, and a leaky bag of pulverized Fritos.

By nine-thirty, the children were tousle-haired but sitting up, watching cartoons and eating Fruity Pebbles.  At ten o’clock, when Barbara’s Honda Odyssey van pulled up, there was a last-minute scramble but Shirley did get teeth brushed and shoes tied and extracted promises of “please” and “thank you” where needed.  Once they were all out in the driveway, lugging four bags of essentials just for Cleo, they found that Barbara’s granddaughter Jocelyn preferred to keep her special seat.  Thad might have stuck his tongue out at her as he clambered around Jocelyn to the seat in the back, but if he did he was so quick that Shirley couldn’t reprimand him.  Cleo liked the back seat and immediately began singing a song about Fruity Pebbles, roller-skating, and “all the giraffes at the zoo.”  Thad and Jocelyn turned around to look at her, which made Cleo sing louder.

Barbara found a parking space for the big van on Central, and as soon as the side door slid open, in rushed the harmonized blare of mariachi horns.  Whistle-blowing police officers stood at the barricaded intersections along the parade route.  Competing with the long and short whistle blasts were the souped-up roars of low-rider engines, snatches of merry-go-round music, the sizzle of chopped meat and butter-soaked ears of corn on portable grill tables, and an group of Guatemalan musicians playing amplified Pan flutes.

At the edge of the festival site, Shirley’s little group was broken up.  Barbara, dragged forward by her granddaughter toward a display of lace fans, said she would meet Shirley and her kids at the Main Stage at noon.  Shirley called “Okay!  See you at noon!” as she and her kids were being sucked into the crowd.  Dozens of people, some in costumes but most in tee shirts and chino shorts, pushed forward into the swirling colors at the center of the celebration.

The first thing Shirley needed to do was take away Thad’s Game Boy, and the second thing was to offer to buy her son a Mexican hat as a bribe, so he would put himself into a tolerable mood.  Thad glared at the huge floppy sombreros with their floral designs and painted cactuses, and  -- with less disdain – he glanced the pointed-crown Frito Bandito straw hats, but he settled on a woven cowboy hat with a suede buckled band.  When Thad smiled after settling the hat at the back of his head, Shirley gladly paid out eighteen dollars and then watched as the seller reached across the table to tip Thad’s new hat forward.  “Okay, you’re a charro now,” said the man behind the table, and he made a lasso-twirling motion.  Thad, pleased, hooked his thumbs in his belt and instantly affected a cowpoke slouch.  The hat-seller, also pleased, grabbed a red-and-green bandana from his display and tossed it to Thad, then indicated his own shirt collar, where a similar bandana was tied.

“Gracias,” said Thad, and now Shirley was the pleased one.  She would have gladly paid double for the hat.

Events took a brief downturn when Cleo got lost for a couple of minutes in the crowd around the Kids’ Stage, where four pre-teen girls dressed in red blouses and striped skirts and wearing enormous white floral headpieces, did a dance full of heel taps and skirt-swishing.  Shirley lost sight of Cleo when her daughter stooped down to the pavement to gather the flower petals which had fallen from the performers’ headdresses.  Shirley and Thad  had just begun calling “Cleo! Cleo!” when they literally ran into a heavy man dressed in a black suit with a cape over his shoulders and a stovepipe hat jammed on his head.  The man had his palm resting gently on one of Cleo’s shoulders.  Cleo did not notice her mother or brother, as she was busy counting the petal treasures cupped in her small hand.

“You lose something?” said the stovepipe-hat man.  He lifted his hand from Cleo’s shoulder, smiled at Shirley, then turned to go back inside his vendor’s booth full of display cell phones.  Shirley opened her mouth to say “Thank you,” but the phone booth man had disappeared into the tent and she found herself talking to a vinyl banner proclaiming “Mensjeria Illimitada!”

About quarter to twelve, after Cleo had been given a lace shawl and a miniature ceramic tea set so she would  stop complaining about her brother’s new hat and bandana, Shirley guided her son and daughter to the Main Stage.  A huge tent, striped in green sheltered the wooden stage, where workers busily arranged microphones and music stands.  Facing the stage were two sets of bleachers with a center aisle between them.  Each set of bleachers had five rows of metal bench seats in alternating rows of tomato red and creamy white.

While the crew continued its work on the stage, a perspiring man in a tan sport jacket moved to a shiny floor mike and began, in Spanish, to address the few people scattered along the rows of bleachers.  Two other men and a woman, all in blue business attire, emerged from the wings to stand near the man at the microphone.  The business-suited people clapped each time the speaker paused for breath.  Down in front of the stage, a smiling woman with masses of dark curly hair moved through the seated audience and then among those who stood or walked in the aisles in front of the stage.  She carried a stack of cardboard political signs decorated with saving banners and crisp white stars on a blue background.  She offered the signs to each person she encountered.  Several people accepted signs, but then just let them hang down, or used them as impromptu visors or as insulation against the hot metal of bleacher seats in the noonday soon.

Just as the political speech seemed to be winding up, there was a tremendous boom from behind the bleachers, followed by a cheer.  Shirley, Thad, and Cleo all turned around to see a shiny cannon on wheels, white smoke pouring from its mouth, being pulled by a burro up the center aisle between the sets of bleachers.  The animal was festooned with flowers decorating its ears and harness straps.  

“Wow!” both Cleo and Thad said, and Shirley knew they hoped the cannon would boom again.  But the burro clopped on, pulling the still-smoking cannon into the front aisle, past the right corner of the stage, and away.

Everyone in the bleacher seats turned back to face the politician onstage, who smiled tensely at the interruption.  He indicated. with open palm, the rear of the retreating cannon, and said something that made the audience laugh.  A grandmotherly woman sitting at Shirley’s right leaned over and said, “He wants one of those to take to city council meetings.”  Shirley smiled.

The perspiring man stepped away from the microphone, and his onstage entourage applauded.  One of the blue-suited assistants came to the microphone to say in English how pleased First National Savings was to be a sponsor of this event, and then waited for the other people in business suits to clap.  No one did, so the woman from First National waved and left the stage.  

Barbara and Jocelyn, each holding paper plates drooping under the weight of tamales and roasted ears of corn, found Shirley and her kids and came to sit in the bleacher row behind them.

“What’s that stuff?” demanded Theo, pointing to Jocelyn’s plate.

“Theo!” said Shirley.

“Corn,” said Jocelyn.  “Don’t you know what corn is?”

“The other stuff,” said Theo, glowering under the brim of his woven cowboy hat.  “With the sauce.”

“Tamales!” said Barbara, leaning  toward Theo. “They’re very good.”  She used the side of her fork to separate the end of a tamale on her own plate, then speared it and held out the plastic fork to Theo.

“No thank you,” said Theo, leaning back and tipping the brim of his straw hat over his eyes.

Shirley turned to Cleo.  “What do you want to eat, honey?”

“Can I have tacos?” said Cleo.who licked a flower petal from the tiny pile in her palm, licked it, and stuck it to her cheek.  

“Yes,” said Shirley.  She turned to Thad, who was already speaking plaintively.  “I want our kind of food, like what we have at Dad’s.”  He looked at Shirley’s face and added quickly, “or like you make.”

Barbara finished her tamale, put down her paper plate, and wiped her fingers with a towelette.  “Shirley, I can stay with everybody if you want to go get him a cheeseburger or whatever he wants.  Jocelyn and I like to look at the costumes and all this.”  She looked at Thad and Cleo.  “Do you?”  The kids nodded.

Thad had to settle for hot dogs with mustard, but he was very happy with the Cherry Coke he got.  Cleo got a Cherry Coke too because Shirley hadn’t been able to find any drinks without caffeine in them.  At least the tacos had lettuce in them, Shirley thought, as she gave Cleo the paper plate filled with food.

After the kids were settled in with their plates, Shirley went once more into the hot, crowded fairway to find some food for herself.  She had no idea what was good.  She looked around.  Most of the crowd was Anglo, but Shirley found a booth where everyone in line was speaking Spanish.  That must be where the best food was.  When her turn came up, Shirley realized that the menu, hand-written on a paper plate, was, naturally, in Spanish.   She quickly found something which cost $6.99 and pointed at that.  She received a plate filled with fried meat, onions, peppers, and a mystery ingredient, all heaped in the middle of a warm flour tortilla, plus a small clear plastic up of rough-cut salsa.  The food, whatever it was called, was very good and Shirley had eaten about half of it by the time she’d walked back to the bleachers in front of the Main Stage.

She made Cleo move over a seat so she could sit between the kids and call truce on the poking battle which had flared up in her absence.  Up onstage, musicians dressed in Western wear stood holding their instruments while a slender man and a tall woman, both in black tee shirts and black pants, adjusted the floor mikes to their correct heights, one by one.

Barbara, seated behind Shirley, leaned forward and pointed with her white plastic fork at the stage.  “See, Shirley?  That’s one of those little accordions I was talking about.”

The stage crew finished its work and exited left.  The musician holding a bajo texto stepped up to his microphone and said, “Hello, and thank you for joining us this afternoon.  We are Entereza Tejano, and the first song we’re going to do today was made famous by Don Santiago Jimenez.  Anybody here ever heard of Don Santiago?”

A couple of people in the bleachers clapped and said “Yeah!”  Most of the crowd, though, was eating busily.

“Flaco’s dad,” the acoustic guitar player said into his microphone.   “I know you know Flaco and his brother Santiago Junior!”

More people in the audience clapped, and a few smiled and nodded.  The bandleader said, “Okay, this tune is a polka.  La Barranca!”  He stepped back and and the band began the cheerful polka.  Shirley found that she liked the sound of the button accordion, played by a woman wearing a light-gray cowgirl hat with a cheetah-print hatband.  The reeds, Shirley noticed, were tuned differently than those on her piano accordion.   She thought the sound seemed happy-sad, but energetic.  Both her kids were tapping their feet as they ate.  In the bleacher seats behind her, Barbara and Jocelyn, who had finished their food, swayed with the music.  

Shirley studied the accordion player’s fingers as they moved.  The tune went around and around, repeating the melody line, but each time the accordionist was making little changes – rhythm shifts, triplets, holding notes for a measure.   The tune was moderately fast but it seemed faster because of the extra button taps that filled the empty  spots completely.  The polka whirled around one more time, and then the group drew out the last few notes.  There was applause from the bleachers and from audience members carrying their food-stained paper plates to the oil-drum trash barrels.   

The man with the tiny guitar stepped up to the center microphone again.   “Now we’ve got a fast one for you dancers.  Anybody out there like to dance?”

During the polka number, the audience had gotten much bigger, and there was a loud cheer.  People standing in the center aisle between the sets of bleachers clapped enthusiastically.

“Okay, then, you ready?” the bajo sexto player asked the other musicians.  They nodded.  The guitarist looked out toward the bleachers.  This song is called ‘No Me Estorbes,’ you know what that means?  ‘Don’t bug me, man!’”  He stepped back, and with his hard-soled boot, he stomped a quick count on the wood floor of the outdoor stage.  The band jumped in on the first beat.

Shirley’s gaze was fixed on the woman with the gray cowgirl hat, whose fingers danced on the three rows of accordion buttons.  The movements were smooth, without rushing.  Shirley found herself thinking Hey, I could play like that.  I’d have to start out slow, and then as I learned the patterns, I could speed up.  I wonder where you get those button accordions. . .

“Mom?” said Theo.  Shirley, startled from her accordion thoughts, looked at her son.  “Can we go over there?”  He pointed to a row of carnival game booths lined up to the left of the Main Stage area.

“Keep Cleo with you,”  said Shirley.  She took out her wallet and pulled out six dollar bills.  “Give three to your sister.  Once this is gone, that’s it, okay?  And stay where you can always see me.  If you can see me,  I can see you.”

Thad, followed closely by Cleo, ran to a booth where players tossed bean bags into a row of holes cut into a plywood backboard.  Each hole was encircled by a faded, peeling painted target.

After playing three more spirited numbers, Entereza Tejano left the stage.  Cleo and Thad were still having fun at the carnival game booths.  Theo, his cowboy hat tipped back, was watching Cleo, in her lace shawl, throw blue plastic rings toward a collection of glass bowls filled with swimming goldfish.  Oh dear, thought Shirley, I hope they don’t win those.  She turned back toward the stage.  She saw members of Entereza Tejano  near the steps to the performance area.  Shirley turned to Barbara.  “I’m going to step over there,” she said, noddlng toward the edge of the stage.  “I can still see my kids from there.  I’ll be right back.”

Shirley shyly approached the woman in the light-gray cowgirl hat with the leopard-print hatband.  She gave a quick glance over his shoulder toward the carnival games, where Thad and Cleo seemed to be working out which booth to visit next.  She turned to the woman with the button accordion.  “Hi.  I really enjoyed the performance.”

“Hi,” said the woman, smiling.  She snapped one of the bellows straps closed on her accordion.

“I play the other kind,” said Shirley.  “You know, with the piano keys.”  She looked back again toward the game booths, panicked for a moment when she couldn’t spot Thad or Cleo, then saw that they’d returned to the beanbag toss booth.  

“Those your kids?” asked the accordion player.

“Yes,” said Shirley.  “I don’t want them to get lost in this crowd.”  She looked at the button accordion again.  “If I wanted to get one of those, where would I go?”

The woman pointed to a yellow-striped tent near a table where small children were making flowers out of layered tissue paper.  “See that yellow one?  Near the paper-flower thing?  That’s my aunt and uncle’s music store tent.  They’ve got all kinds of instruments.  Mostly the little flutes and things are out in the display because of the sun, you know.   But in the shady part in the back, they have bajo sexto guitars, and they have charangos, you know those real little guitars?  And they have have some Mexican accordions, with the three rows, like this.  I think they have a couple of the tunings, but for you, you should start with the GCF.  Then you can hear the songs in the key you know.  Later on, you can switch to another tuning that’s more advanced.  But you can keep the same fingering.  You know what I mean?  The same pattern –“  she hopped her first two fingers up and down the treble keyboard, moving in diagonal pairs –  “but then it will just be a different key.  Anyway, don’t worry about that to start.  Just stop in at the yellow tent and tell them Luisa said they should fix you up. “

Shirley thanked Luisa and came back to the bleachers where Barbara and Jocelyn were sitting with Thad and Cleo, who were dividing up their carnival loot.  Thad was holding three miniature squirt guns, in green, purple, and orange.  Cleo had a fistful of beaded necklaces.  Jocelyn, sitting next to her grandmother, was sneaking looks at the bits of bright plastic.  As Shirley approached, she saw Thad poke Jocelyn in the upper arm with his forefinger, and she was about to call out some long-distance scolding when she was amazed to see Thad display the three water pistols on his open palms, offering Jocelyn her choice.  The girl did not hesitate, selecting the purple immediately, and Cleo frowned as Jocelyn smiled.  Thad leaned close to Cleo and murmured, and Cleo carefully extracted two purple bead necklaces from her stash, setting those on the bleacher seat on the other side from Jocelyn before offering the remaining strands to the other girl.  Jocelyn smiled and quickly chose a pink-and-yellow strand, and Cleo looked relieved as Shirley saw Jocelyn’s lips form the words “Thank you.”  The girl showed her grandmother her gifts, and Barbara turned to smile at Thad and Cleo.

As soon as Shirley got close to the bleachers, Cleo ran up and gave her mother an abrupt, breathless hug.  She was draped in a tangle of beads and lace shawl, and she smelled like taco meat and corn tortilla.  Cleo’s eyes sparkled in a way that suggested to Shirley that the Cherry Coke might have been a bad idea.

“Can we go do that?” asked Cleo, pointing to the flower-making booth.  

“I’m not sure your brother would want to,” said Shirley.  

Barbara, followed by Jocelyn, came to join the conversation.  “He might like to make an Ojo de Dios.”

“What’s that?” called Thad from under his woven cowboy hat, as he held his cup of Cherry Coke and examined the fill hole at the back of his water pistol.

“Thad!  Don’t put soda in that!” called Shirley.  

“I wasn’t!”  said Thad, putting the cup down on the bleacher seat next to him and pushing the plastic stopper back into the fill hole.  “It’s just melted ice anyway.”

Barbara waited for a moment, then said, “Thad, it’s an Eye of God.  It’s a cool design.  Keeps away the evil eye.”

“No thank you,” said Thad.

“Or we can see if they’re making prayer arrows,” said Barbara.  

Thad’s eyes brightened, and he slid off the bleacher seat to come join the group.

Shirley turned to Barbara.  “Would you mind taking the kids over there for just a couple minutes?” she said.  “I just want to run over to that yellow tent next to the craft table.”

“Glad to,” said Barbara, and she turned to flourish her hand at the litter of paper plates, cups, and napkins the young people had left in the bleachers.  The girls hurried to do clean-up, but Thad, in his cowboy hat and bandana, just slouched until his mother said “Thad.”  He moseyed over and picked up a single napkin and then handed it to Jocelyn.

Shirley started to speak, but Barbara said, “You can go on ahead and we’ll meet you in the craft area.”

Grateful, Shirley hurried toward the yellow-striped tent to meet Luisa’s aunt and uncle.  Fifteen minutes later she emerged holding a square black case trimmed in shiny metal.  She brought this into the craft area, where Thad was winding yard around crossed popsicle sticks.  A wooden twig and a scattering of  blue, green, and red faux feathers lay discarded on the table next to him.  

“It wasn’t a real arrow,” said Thad.  “Just a stick with feathers, no point or anything.  So I am making this evil eye thing.”  He used his forefinger to hold the upper popsicle stick straight as he tightly wound a length of yellow yarn around it.  Then he eyed the case in Shirley’s hand.  “That’s not another accordion, is it?”

“Your mom plays the accordion?” Jocelyn asked Cleo, as they twirled their paper flowers back and forth, adjusting the folds.  

“I think,” said Cleo, fluffing out a piece of pink paper leaf.  “She has an accordion, anyway.  It’s kind of cool.  It’s gold.”

“Not real gold,” said Thad, bringing his yarn creation over to show Barbara.  “A real gold one would weigh, like, a thousand pounds.”  He pretended to stagger under the burden of a solid-gold instrument, eyes bugged out and cheeks puffed full of air.

Barbara turned to Shirley.  “You about ready?”

“About ready to cry if I don’t get off my feet,” said Shirley, and laughed.  

Jocelyn, Thad, and Cleo all looked ready to resist the idea of leaving the festival.  Barbara suggested they stop at Dairy Queen on the way home, and Thad was so happy he offered to carry his mother’s new accordion case to the van.  Cleo and Jocelyn, waving their paper flowers, skipped along the sidewalk chanting “Dilly bar, dilly bar.”

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The day of the custody hearing, the rain started before dawn and stayed steady all morning.  Shirley’s hair got more and more damp as she stood in the driveway fumbling with her keys.  She’d wanted to get to work early, and she was already running a minute or two late.  Normally, her fingers found the car key automatically without Shirley needing to look, but she was anxious and tired, having slept only four hours.  Her hands trembled, and she closed her eyes and took a calming breath, exhaling slowly.  She needed to be steady and centered at the custody hearing.  One more slow breath, which looked like steam in the cool misty morning air, and the car key came to the top of the ring.  She unlocked the driver’s door and got behind the wheel.

The rain fell harder as Shirley drove toward Wilbur Manor.  Through the rain-spotted windshield, the city streets looked peaceful, clean, and friendly.  It was going to feel so good to have Thad and Cleo in the back seat again as she drove through town.  Shirley blinked back tears, and she turned the windshield wipers up to the High setting so she could peer at the road through the misted glass.

All the cars in the Wilbur Manor lot were beaded with rain, and the wet yellow parking stripes contrasted sharply against the gritty black asphalt.  Shirley saw someone at the Employee Entrance fold up a dripping umbrella just before ducking into the building.  

The row of coats and jackets hanging from the wall pegs in the time-clock hallway sagged with wetness, and she noticed as she took down her badge lanyard and hung her rain jacket in its place that someone had put down white terry towels along the wall under the coat pegs to catch the drips.  Barbara?  No, she realized, it had to have been someone else as it was Barbara’s day off today.

Shirley was nervous, and between duty rounds, she hurried through the side halls to ease open the exit doors for a quick peek at the drizzle bouncing off the yellow-striped pavement of the parking lot.  The weather wasn’t really a portent, she thought, yet she hoped that if rain made a wedding lucky, maybe it would do the same for her custody hearing.

She set up the volleyball net in Area 2, and made her announcement over the P.A. system, but the only players to show up were Donald and Ruthie, which didn’t surprise Shirley.  Rainy days always meant low turnout.  Donald and Ruthie volleyed around for a bit, with Shirley joining in to make various combinations of two against one, but the match, such as it was, ended early and by 10:30, Shirley had furled the net around the end post and scooted the post-buckets into the corner.  

She was supposed to meet with Ms. Burge at the courthouse a half-hour before her hearing at one o’clock.  Her time-off slip was already filled out to say she’d leave at 11:45, so she decided to do paperwork at the North Wing medical station for an hour, then skip out a few minutes early.

She had collated a pile of Medicare prescription plan benefits forms when she stopped with a sense that something was wrong.  You’re just nervous about the court thing, she told herself.  No, that wasn’t it.  Things were too calm at the North Wing desk.  Shirley looked at her watch.  Eleven-fifteen, and no rushing to get Madame Grumpetta’s foot check done before the accordion concert at half past the hour.  

It had been weeks since Shirley had thought of Madame Grumpetta.  She shouldn’t call her that.  Mrs. Grupetta.  Shirley realized how much she’d adjusted to life at Wilbur Manor since she’d met the old woman on the day Barbara had given Shirley the first tour of North Wing.  Shirley had only taken the job to get three months’ worth of pay slips before the custody hearing, and had intended to give notice the day the judge ruled one way or the other.  But in the meantime, she’d become with friends with Barbara, gotten more friendly with Ted and some of the other staff, and been invited to bring her accordion to the weekly “Down Memory Lane” sing-alongs.  Her mother’s gold lame Salenti piano accordion was just right for “Shine On Harvest Moon” and “Some Enchanted Evening.”  Maybe next Cinco de Mayo, she’d bring in the three-row button accordion she’d bought from Luisa’s aunt and uncle at the festival.

Shirley looked down at the prescription-plan forms, then her watch again.  Eleven-twenty.   She’d been wool-gathering.  She clipped together the finished forms, shut the Medicare folder, and went to the wall peg to hang up her employee badge lanyard and grab her rain jacket.  Damp jacket over her arm, she slipped down the hallway, past Mr. Quo’s room, where the loud combination of television game show and ventilator pump masked her early escape.

She turned quickly into the west hallway, slipping on her jacket as she went, made a face at the rain through the window in the exit door, and let herself out into the parking lot.  Her hair got wet again, and once she was in the driver’s seat she waited to turn the key until she combed her hair, using the rear-view mirror as a guide.

On her way downtown, she stopped for a loaded baked potato at Wendy’s, so she wouldn’t arrive too early for the hearing.  She got to the courthouse at ten minutes past the noon hour, and took a paperback romance out of her purse to keep busy until Ms. Burge arrived at half-past.

But there was no attorney at 12:30, or 12:35, or 12:40.  At 12:52, Ms. Burge and a woman Shirley thought looked Indian or Pakistani came rushing in, their raincoats dripping and their hair sparkling with water droplets.  “So sorry,” said Ms. Burge.  “But we’ll be fine.  Shirley, this is Doctor – “ Ms. Burge said the other woman’s name so quickly that Shirley didn’t catch it –“who is the psychologist appointed to your case by the Family Court.”

“Nice to meet you,” said Shirley.

“And you as well,” said the woman, who had a British accent.

“I am so nervous,” Shirley said, looking at the psychologist, then at Ms. Burge.  “I guess it’s really good that the kids weren’t supposed to be here.”  She shifted the strap of her purse over her forearm.  “If things go okay today, can the kids just come and stay when we have visitation next weekend?”

Ms. Burge set down her briefcase and slipped off her coat, folding the wet coat and draping it over the briefcase.  She smiled at Shirley.  “The best way to transition Cleo and Thad back into your home might be to build on the that three-week summer vacation period.  We talked about that the last time you came in, I think.”  She turned to the psychologist.   “The children would come in July, as scheduled, and then the new arrangement would segue right out of that.”

“I think that’s wise,” said the psychologist.  “It’s a strategy to avoid the boomerang effect, where you pay the price for the children’s stress as they adjust.”  She brushed some damp hair away from her face.  “Typically young people in this situation have a skewed view after the new arrangement is in place, and they remember the previous arrangement as, you know, the good old days.”

“Meaning they have no bedtime there, and he doesn’t care what they eat, and Steve takes Thad on motorcycle rides without a helmet,” said Shirley, looking down at the purse on her arm and wishing she was sitting down so she could arrange the D-rings on the handle into perfect alignment.

“Yes, and being children, they don’t know those things are bad,” said the psychologist.  “If you make them go to bed and eat a balanced diet, you’re being mean, to their way of thinking.”

“All this year I’ve laid in bed and worried,” said Shirley.  “I worry Steve won’t let me have them when the summer vacation starts.  But I know he will.  You know why?”  She moved her purse to her other arm, and adjusted the straps till they were comfortable.  “His new girlfriend wants to have a baby.  She doesn’t want any used kids around.”

“What happens today is not his decision, or yours,” said Ms. Burge.  “The judge will rule based on the court’s view on what is best for the children.”

“How will your work schedule mesh with child care once the children come to join you in July?” asked the psychologist, smiling gently at Shirley.

“Starting July first, my hours go down to just a few each week,” said Shirley.  “I’ll also be volunteering one evening a week to play some music for the ‘Down Memory Lane’ sing-alongs.  The kids can come with me to that.  It would be good for them to meet the residents, and a lot of the people at Wilbur Manor enjoy having children visit.”

“Oh, what do you play?” asked the psychologist.  “Piano, or -- ?”

“The accordion,” said Shirley.   “One time I brought it in for a staff get-together, and the facility manager asked if I would come in and play during ‘Down Memory Lane.’  I said I would if I could stop refereeing balloon volleyball.”

“Balloon volleyball?” said Ms. Burge.

“Don’t ask,” said Shirley.  

A bailiff opened the heavy wooden door to the hearing room, and Ms. Burge, though much shorter than Shirley, became surprisingly commanding and moved forward quickly.  Shirley and the psychologist, whose name Shirley wished she’d heard during the introduction, followed the attorney into the hearing room.

The hearing started at one o’clock on the dot.  Shirley was all nerves.  Even though she had Ms. Burge and the Family Court psychologist with her, she was intimidated by all the support Steve had on his side of the hearing room:  his parents, sister, and his attorney, who was very well-dressed and a foot taller than Ms. Burge.  It doesn’t matter if his lawyer is taller, Shirley told herself.  It’s not balloon volleyball, with the tip-off deciding who gets the kids.  But Shirley still felt anxious, and the baked potato lunch from Wendy’s wasn’t settling well.  The judge, a gray-haired man in oversize bifocals, never looked at Shirley once, which gave her a sinking feeling in her stomach.  But then, from the bench, she heard the judge’s voice say that the petition submitted by Counsel Burge on behalf of Shirley Nilsson was granted, and there was a tap of the gravel, and Ms. Burge put her hand over Shirley’s forearm, squeezed once, and smiled.

Shirley still did not fully understand until everyone rose to leave, and she saw Steve, his parents, and his sister all shooting daggers at her with their eyes.  I got the kids, she realized.  The judge saw it was right for the kids that they be with me.  

Shirley was reluctant to approach the heavy wooden door which opened from the hearing room into the main hallway.  She dreaded running the gauntlet of Steve’s family on her way out of the courthouse.

Ms. Burge, whose head was at the level of Shirley’s left shoulder, gently took her arm.  “Let’s use the Eleventh Street exit,” she said.  “It’s more convenient on a rainy day.  A shorter walk to your car.”

Shirley gave the attorney a look of gratitude.  They parted on the wet sidewalk, and Shirley offered her gratitude for all the help she’d received.  Ms. Burge patted Shirley’s upper arm, smiled, and moved quickly through the falling rain to a large black Buick LeSabre parked in a reserved space in the side lot.

Instead of driving directly home after the hearing, Shirley stopped at Applebee’s for an early dinner.   The dining room was nearly empty, and a server came to the booth as soon as Shirley had slipped out of her rain jacket.   “Can I bring you something to drink?” she asked.

Shirley nearly said, “I’ve got a year of sobriety and I can’t mess that up,” but just in time she thought to say “I’ll have a raspberry iced tea, please.”  When the young woman came back with the tea, Shirley realized she was tremendously hungry and before she knew it, she’d ordered two appetizers (onion peels and spinach-artichoke dip) and a Crispy Orange Chicken Skillet, plus a Maple Butter Blondie for dessert.  She ate some from each dish, and if she’d had her children with her, they could have finished everything.  

But she knew Ms. Burge and the psychologist  had been right about building a solid relationship starting with the summer vacation.  As she sat in the booth alone, spooning up Maple Blondie, she wondered if she could divide the slant-roofed upstairs of the Cape Cod into two rooms.  Or maybe she could just let Thad take that space, and give Cleo her own bedroom, and Shirley could sleep on the futon in the living room.  

“Can I get you anything else?” said the server, startling Shirley.  She put her hand on Shirley’s shoulder.  “So sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Oh, my mind was off somewhere else,” said Shirley.  “Thinking about my kids.”

“They’re a lot of work, aren’t they?” said the waitress, sliding the check tray onto the table.  “But I guess they’re worth it.”

“Oh, they’re worth it,” said Shirley.  She put down her spoon, defeated by the size of her dessert, and picked up her purse.  “I’d do about anything for my kids.”  She put some bills on the check tray.  The server said “Thank you,” smiled, and left.  Shirley scooted out of the booth, found her car keys in the pocket of her rain jacket, and realized that she was completely ready to go home and start getting things ready for all the big changes on the way.  And maybe spend a little time with her new button accordion while she still had the house to herself. 

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“Madame Grumpetta” by Garbo.  Cover design by Tova E. Seltzer