Sixty days and counting - Kim Stanley Robinson [19]
But that wasn’t the life Charlie had been leading. Along with the child care and the shopping and the housework had been his “real” work as a senatorial aide, which, even though it had been no more than a few phone conversations a day, had bolstered the “unreal” work of Mr. Momhood in a curious dual action. Eventually which work was “real” had become a moot point; the upshot was that he felt fulfilled, and the lucky and accidental recipient of a full life. Maybe even overfull! But that was what happened when Freud’s short list of the important things in life—work and love—were all in play.
He had had it all. And so change be damned! Charlie wanted to live on in this life forever. Or if not forever, then as long as the stars. And he feared change, as being the probable degradation of a situation that couldn’t be bettered.
But here it was anyway, and there was no avoiding it. All the repetitions in the pattern were superficial; the moment was always new. It had to be lived, and then the next moment embraced as it arrived. This was what the Khembalis were always saying; it was one of the Buddhist basics. And now Charlie had to try to believe it.
So, the day came when he got up, and Anna left for work, then Nick for school; then it was Joe and Da’s time, the whole day spread before them like a big green park. But on this day, Charlie prepped them both to leave, while talking up the change in the routine. “Big day, Joe! We’re off to school and work, to the White House! They have a great daycare center there, it’ll be like Gymboree!”
Joe looked up. “Gymboree?”
“Yes, like Gymboree, but not it exactly.” Charlie’s mood plummeted as he considered the differences—not one hour but five, or six, or eight, or twelve—and not parents and children together, but the child alone in a crowd of strangers. And he had never even liked Gymboree!
More and more depressed, he strapped Joe into his stroller and pushed him down to the Metro. The tunnel walls were still discolored or even wet in places, and Joe checked everything out as on any other trip. This was one of their routines.
Phil himself was not installed in the White House yet, but the arrangements had been made for Joe to join the daycare there, after which Charlie would leave and walk over to the senate offices in the old Joiner’s Union building. Up and out of the Metro, into warm air, under low windy clouds. People scudded underneath them, hurrying from one shelter to the next before rain hit.
Charlie had gotten out at Smithsonian, and the Mall was almost empty, only a few runners in sight. He pushed Joe along faster and faster, feeling more and more desolate—unreasonably so, almost to the point of despair—especially as Joe continued to babble on happily, energized by the Mall and the brewing storm, no doubt expecting something like their usual picnic and play session. Hours that no matter how tedious they had seemed at the time were now revealed as precious islands in eternity, as paradises lost. And it was impossible to convey to Joe that today was going to be different. “Joe, I’m going to drop you off at the daycare center here at the White House. You’re going to get to play with the other kids and the teachers and you have to do what the teachers say for a long time.”
“Cool Dad. Play!”
“Yeah that’s right. Maybe you’ll love it.”
It was at least possible. Vivid in Charlie’s mind was Anna’s story about taking Nick to daycare for the first time, and seeing Nick’s expression of stoic resignation, which had pierced her so; Charlie had seen the look himself, taking Nick in those first few times. But Joe was no stoic, and would never resign himself to anything. Charlie was anticipating something more like chaos and disorder, perhaps even mayhem, Joe moving