I read the revised document twice that evening.
The first time, I concentrated on the words.
The second time, I concentrated on what Graham had said about them.
Those were not always the same thing.
I had placed the envelope beside my notebook, and every few minutes I returned to it to check a detail.
The house was quiet.
The kitchen clock ticked in the distance, and a car passed outside every now and then.
I had always liked evenings.
They were the part of the day when I could finally stop doing things for other people.
Lately, though, the quiet had become a place where my thoughts gathered.
I kept returning to the same question.
Why was Graham so anxious for me to agree?
I didn't believe he wanted to hurt me.
That was important to remember.
He was my son, and I knew him better than most people did.
I knew how he looked when he was tired.
I knew the way he pressed his lips together when he was trying not to show frustration.
I knew that he sometimes spoke too quickly when he believed a problem needed to be solved.
I had seen those habits since he was a boy.
But knowing someone for a long time did not mean understanding every decision they made.
I had learned that the hard way.
I placed the document on the table and went to bed.
The next morning, I woke early.
I made coffee, opened the curtains, and sat down with the papers again.
I wanted to see whether anything felt different after a night's sleep.
Some sections seemed clearer.
Others still bothered me.
I marked the places where I needed more information.
Then I put the document away.
I had decided not to spend the entire day thinking about it.
I had a life beyond those pages, even if I had forgotten that for a while.
I went to the grocery store.
I bought bread, milk, apples, and a small bunch of flowers for the kitchen.
At the checkout, the cashier asked whether I was preparing for a special occasion.
I told her I simply wanted something cheerful on the table.
She smiled and placed the flowers carefully in the bag.
When I returned home, I cut the stems and arranged them in a glass jar.
The flowers were ordinary.
Nothing expensive.
But the kitchen looked different with them there.
I stood back and admired them.
Then I laughed at myself.
I had spent days waiting for my son to make me feel remembered.
I could at least remember myself.
That afternoon, I called a friend.
We spoke about ordinary things at first.
She told me about a problem with her washing machine.
I told her about the flowers.
We laughed about how quickly household problems appeared once you thought you had everything under control.
For a while, I forgot about the document.
Then she asked whether I had heard from Graham.
I told her we had been discussing some paperwork.
She asked whether everything was all right.
I nearly said yes.
The answer was already waiting on my tongue.
Instead, I told her that I wasn't sure.
She didn't press me for details.
She simply said that I should take my time and make sure I understood whatever I was being asked to sign.
I thanked her.
After the call, I sat quietly for a moment.
It was strange how much easier it was to accept sensible advice from someone who had no stake in the decision.
My friend wasn't asking me to hurry.
She wasn't asking me to trust her.
She wasn't asking me to prove that I was a good mother.
She was simply reminding me that the decision belonged to me.
I returned to the table and opened my notebook.
I wrote down the questions I still had.
Then I added one more.
What was I afraid would happen if I said no?
The answer came quickly.
I was afraid Graham would become angry.
I was afraid he would stop calling.
I was afraid Vanessa would decide I was impossible to deal with.
Most of all, I was afraid that refusing to agree would confirm something I had been trying not to believe.
That our relationship had become dependent on my willingness to make things easy for him.
I stared at the sentence for a long time.
It was a painful thought.
But pain did not make it untrue.
I closed the notebook.
Later that evening, Graham called.
He asked whether I had read the revised papers.
"I have."
"And?"
"I still have some questions."
He was quiet for a moment.
"How many?"
"Several."
He sighed.
I could picture him standing somewhere with his phone in his hand, rubbing his forehead.
"Mother, I thought we'd covered most of this."
"We covered some of it."
"What is it that you still don't understand?"
I opened the notebook.
I read him the first question.
He answered it.
I read the second.
He answered that one, too.
The third took longer.
I listened carefully and asked him to clarify one part.
He did.
Then I moved to the next question.
After a while, he interrupted me.
"Are these all new concerns?"
"No. They're the things I wrote down while reading the document."
He went quiet.
I waited.
Finally, he said, "I didn't realize you were still worried about so much."
"I'm not worried about everything. I'm trying to understand what I'm agreeing to."
"Those are almost the same thing."
"No, Graham. They aren't."
I hadn't meant to sound sharp.
But I didn't take the words back.
He exhaled.
"All right."
We continued the conversation.
He answered what he could.
For the questions that required more information, he said he would check the details.
I wrote that down.
When we finished, he asked whether I was satisfied.
I looked at the page.
"Some of the questions are answered. Others aren't."
He sounded disappointed.
"I suppose that's progress."
"It is."
There was a pause.
Then he asked how I had been feeling.
The question caught me off guard.
"Fine," I said.
He waited.
I realized he was giving me a chance to say more.
So I did.
"I've been sad about all this."
He didn't answer immediately.
"I don't like having to question everything," I continued. "I don't like feeling as though I have to prepare for every conversation with you."
"Mother, I don't want you to feel that way."
"I know you don't want me to feel it. But I do."
He was silent for several seconds.
Then he said, "I'm sorry."
It was a small apology.
It didn't settle the matter.
But I accepted it.
"Thank you."
We spoke a little longer.
Before hanging up, he said he would get back to me about the remaining questions.
I told him I would wait to hear from him.
After the call, I sat at the table and looked at the flowers.
Their petals had begun to open.
I thought about how many times I had accepted an apology simply because I wanted the unpleasantness to end.
This time, I wanted the apology to mean something.
Not because Graham needed to suffer.
Because I wanted us to have a relationship in which neither of us had to pretend.
I could forgive him for being impatient.
I could forgive him for making mistakes.
What I couldn't do was make his decisions for him or pretend his behavior didn't affect me.
That evening, I put the document back into the folder.
I placed the folder in the drawer beside my notebook.
Then I turned off the kitchen light.
I wasn't ready to decide.
But I was finally willing to admit that my fear of losing Graham had been shaping too many of my answers.
I loved him.
I always would.
That did not mean I had to sign away my right to think.
Click here to continue reading: PART 10: When Graham Came Back to Discuss the Questions He Had Left Unanswered, I Discovered How Much We Had Both Been Avoiding
I Thought Spending Mother’s Day Alone Would Be the Hardest Part, Until My Son Made Me Feel Like a Stranger
Part 9 of 20
