Just Like Other Daughters Read Online Free PDF Page B

around 48. She’s not a smart girl. But that doesn’t mean she’s not intuitive. Particularly when it pertains to me.
    “I don’t want you to come,” she says. Her brow creases. “Don’t come.”
    It’s cold out. The wind is blowing off the Chesapeake Bay and cuts through my dark green fleece jacket. My office hours start in half an hour. I have a student coming in. I have to scoot. But I can’t help myself. If this Thomas whom Chloe has been babbling about is here, I want to meet him. “I just want to say ‘hi.’” I walk around the front of the Honda, keys in my hand.
    Chloe looks at me and slams the door, making no bones about her annoyance with me. There are days when she begs me to walk her to the door. Now, suddenly, she’s Miss Independent. I’m not sure if I like it. I mean, we’ve been working for years on her being comfortable doing things, going places, talking to people, all without me, but the idea that she doesn’t want me to be here hurts my feelings a little. Dr. Tamara, our therapist, says I’m as dependent on Chloe as she is on me. Damn if maybe Dr. Tamara isn’t right.
    I hit the remote on my key ring, the car beeps, and I walk up the sidewalk toward Minnie’s front door. After a minute, I hear Chloe tromping behind me. She has a particular gait, sort of a side-to-side lope that is probably a by-product of the way she carries her weight on her small frame. I’d recognize her footsteps anywhere.
    I take the steps. Chloe bangs up the metal wheelchair ramp that runs beside the steps.
    “I don’t want you to come,” she repeats. “I don’t,” she whispers under her breath angrily.
    The door opens and a young man stands in the doorway. He’s very tall, compared to Chloe. Maybe five-foot-nine or five-foot-ten. He has shaggy blond hair and bright blue eyes that are framed with glasses. Which sit crooked on his face. Very Scandinavian looking. He doesn’t have the physical characteristics of Trisomy 21, but I can see by his features that he’s mentally challenged.
    He spots Chloe and starts to jump up and down and clap. All one hundred and ninety pounds of him. “Ko-ey!” he cries.
    Chloe runs up the ramp, pushing past me, her canvas bag from the public library swinging on her chubby arm.
    It’s not hard to guess who this is.
    Chloe throws herself into his arms and he hugs her, lifting her tiny sneakered feet off the ground.
    It’s on my tongue to remind her that we don’t hug strangers, but obviously this isn’t a stranger.
    “N . . . Knock, n . . . knock,” the young man says.
    Chloe looks at me. “You’re supposed to say ‘who’s there?’ ” She looks at him. “Who’s there?” she hollers.
    “B . . . banana.”
    Again she turns to me. “You say ‘banana, who?’ ” She looks up at him. “Banana, who?”
    Thomas bursts out laughing and then Chloe laughs.
    No punch line? I smile. “Are you Thomas?” I ask. “I’m Chloe’s mom.”
    “K . . . koey’s mom,” he repeats. He speaks fairly clearly, despite his stutter, in a hoarse voice. He’s a nice-looking young man, but his eyes are too close together and his mouth hangs open. There’s a little drool in one corner of his mouth.
    When Chloe was growing up, I was very diligent about teaching her how to keep her mouth closed. I knew my daughter would always look different from the other girls her age, but I felt there were certain ways she could fit in better socially. I taught her no burping or farting in public . . . and no drooling.
    Thomas still has his big hands around my Chloe, though he’s at least put her down. She’s resting her cheek on his plaid flannel shirt. The look on her face startles me. She looks so . . . so . . . enamored.
    “Alicia.” Minnie appears in the doorway and smiles. “Good to see you.” She looks at my daughter in this man’s arms. “Chloe, we’ve been waiting for you. We’re starting art class in the sunroom.” Minnie looks back at me.
    She’s as tall as I am, a