Bedroom Diplomacy(17)
Rowena obviously did a fair share of reading. Wall-to-wall built-in bookcases crammed full of hardbacks, paperbacks and magazines bordered a picture window with a padded window seat, where he could just imagine her curled up with a book or reading Dylan a story. Everything about the room seemed to suit her somehow.
“Dylan’s room is this way,” she said, and he followed her down a short hall where nearly every square inch of the walls was covered with photos of her son. They started at birth—a time during which he clearly had serious health problems—and ranged to much more recent photos. In those, Dylan was always smiling, always looked happy.
Colin couldn’t help noticing, though, that in all the photos, something important was missing. Dylan’s father.
Had there been a bitter divorce? A falling-out? Or was he simply not a part of his son’s life?
Across the hall from Dylan’s room was what had to be Rowena’s bedroom. He could see through the open door that it was decorated in soft, warm colors, and he recognized the girly scents drifting out.
Rowena led him into Dylan’s room to his crib.
“At the risk of sounding like a novice, what’s routine when tucking in a child?” Colin asked her.
“Colin needs your help, Dylan,” she said. “Tell him what to do.”
“Hubs!” Dylan shrieked, wrapping his arms around Colin’s neck, giving him another one of those firm squeezes. He couldn’t remember ever being embraced with such enthusiasm or genuine affection in his whole life.
“Cwib.”
Colin lowered him into the crib and Dylan sat awkwardly, then lay back against the pillow. “Cubbers!”
Cubbers? Colin looked to Rowena for a translation.
She nodded to the blanket hanging over the side rail. Covers. Of course. Colin didn’t want to be responsible for the kid catching cold and maybe coming down with pneumonia.
He pulled the blanket down over Dylan. “How’s that?”
“Good!” Dylan said, but obviously not good enough, because as Rowena bent over to kiss him, she tucked the blanket even higher up under his chin.
“Does your boo-boo hurt?” she asked, and Dylan shook his head.
“Sawee, Mommy.”
“It’s okay, just go to sleep.”
They stepped out of Dylan’s room and Rowena shut the door behind her. She leaned against it and dropped her head in her hands, saying softly, “I’m a terrible mother.”
*
“You are not a terrible mother,” Colin said, but Rowena sure felt like one.
“My baby hurts himself, and the first thing I do when I see him is scold him? What kind of a parent does that?”
“Why don’t we go sit on the sofa so Dylan can sleep?”
She nodded and they walked into the living room. He sat down on the sofa, patting the cushion beside him, and when she sat, he took her hand. There was nothing suggestive or sexual about it, it was just very…comforting. And though she knew that the last thing he probably wanted was to sit there and listen to her silly insecurities, the words just sort of rolled off her tongue on their own. “I’m scared to death that Dylan will grow up to hate me.”
“No, he won’t. He obviously adores you.”
“But I made him feel even worse.”
“I’m sure that by the time he wakes up he’ll have forgotten all about it.”
She shook her head. “You don’t know Dylan. He remembers everything.”
“Well, then, he must have remembered that he wasn’t supposed to run. Right?”
“He’s just a little boy. I know that I’m too hard on him sometimes.”
“Rowena, listen to me. You were scared, and you overreacted a little. Kids are resilient. I know because I was one.”
Being a kid and having one relying on you for everything were two very different things. And sometimes it was so hard doing it all alone. But Colin was not the man she should be pouring her heart out to.
“I’m sorry to have dragged you into this.”
He looked confused. “Into what?”
“This whole—” she gestured randomly “—domestic scenario. I know that’s the last thing you want to be dealing with. I didn’t even intend to introduce you to Dylan.”
“Why? I’m happy to have met him. He seems like a very special boy.”
“Thank you for what you did.”
“Dylan obviously hates going to the hospital. I take it from the photos in the hall that he’s spent considerable time there.”
“He was born with cerebral palsy, and yes, he was in the hospital a lot when he was a baby. The doctors told me he might never walk, and that he would probably be mentally disabled. I didn’t listen. I made it my mission to prove them wrong. He’s light-years from where he was when he was first born, but that’s only because I work with him constantly. With his speech problems, people sometimes think he’s slow.”