Baltimore

Down and back in the same day, and 4 hours with Maisie in between--enough to give a chick the kind of hangover you get with no alcohol.

Liam and I met Maisie's Dad and his girlfriend and their neighbors at the performance center. We'd stopped to pick up flowers and a bag stuffed with candy--flowers wilt, after all--and I couldn't find Maisie before the show; the organizers had anticipated unruly, distracting parents. So we stood in the lobby, and Maisie's Dad shepherded Liam around proudly as he never does in private, Mr. Social Progressive toting around the cute brown kid. Pissed me off, because Liam deserves the real deal, and wants it desperately from Maisie's Dad. Girlfriend introduced me to the neighbors--lovely people, older and literary--saying, "This is Maisie's mom," and all the eyes lit up--tasty eye gossip: the ex-and the girlfriend, the parsing and owning of little moments. And so when Maisie's Dad walked back to us with Liam and said to Girlfriend, "You look beautiful today," I plugged it into the mental map of How We Play Out to onlookers. These scenes exhaust me; I feel awkward breathing.

And then, blessedly, the lights went down and the kids climbed onto the stage, and Maisie spotted us and smiled, and I wondered if she was exploding inside like I remember doing when I spotted my own mother after having been away; all I wanted was to feel the knit balls of her Irish sweater against my cheek--to breathe in that wool, that scent of security. But Maisie's not that way; she keeps herself in check until later, in private, when she'll burst out with, "Mommy!" She performed perfectly as the Little Prince, and later sang in a quiet group tune that reduced me to tears; nothing sweeter than the warbly sounds of children's voices.

Afterwards we went out for Chinese food, and Maisie's Dad started to order for her--ribs and an egg roll. "Is that what you want?" I asked her. "No," she said, "I want garlic chicken and a spring roll," which she always orders when she's with me. So I ordered it for her, canceling the ribs and egg roll. "But you always want ribs here," her Dad said. "I just feel like something else today," she said, and he shrugged and got quiet, as if this was an act of betrayal. He tends to guilt her; he does it right in front of me, then denies later that's what he was doing. She looked utterly miserable, and I wondered if she even really liked garlic chicken and spring rolls, or if that was just the Mom-landscape order. Couldn't help but think of that Julia Roberts flick about the bride who didn't even know what kind of eggs she liked because she professed to like whatever her latest beau liked. Maisie mouthed, "Can't I come home?" and I mouthed back, "One more week, honey," and she turned and looked out the window, blinking fast. We said goodbye and she had The Smile locked in--I see her do it with her Dad when she's saying goodbye, and then she sobs when he's gone.

I can't make her life simpler. I just wish, given that, I could give her the courage to say who she is instead of pausing to wonder what the adults in front of her would prefer she be. (I think I was, oh, 35 before I summoned that kind of courage myself.) She worries constantly--even about choosing Chinese over Italian. "What would YOU like?" she kept asking me, then her Dad, then me again. "I'd like what YOU'd like," I kept saying, but she was near tears, so I chose the Chinese, thinking it was what she really wanted. Who knows? "The feelings of adults are not your responsibility," I keep telling her at home, watching her struggle with this. "Your feelings are important, and it's your job to pay attention to them. Grownups have to take care of their own feelings." She nods.

Miss the kid dreadfully.