But for the first time, I wasn’t thinking about me. I mean my son being here was a punishment for what I done. I understood that then. I recognized that I had sewed the wind and I was reaping the whirlwind. But when my boy told me about the life he couldn’t even imagine… I realized that I wasn’t the only one paying for what I done. I wasn’t even the one paying the biggest price. I had given my son a nothing hand. He played it badly, but there wasn’t no option to fold. All he could do was try his best with what I gave him. He got cleaned out.
Guilt. I ain’t never felt guilt like that before in my life. For the first time ever, I really thought about that man. The one at the convenience store who got killed. I thought about my son standing there, while his friend shot the man. I pictured myself, standing next to Tyler, seeing the closed circuit video in my head and putting myself right there. I wondered what I would have said then, to get Tyler to leave. To get him to stop this terrible thing he was doing. But I knew that I hadn’t been there. I hadn’t really been there. And I hadn’t been in Tyler’s head that day either, telling him what to do. That’s a mama’s job, to give her son the tools to do right and wrong. I didn’t do that.
I thought back to all the other times that I should’ve been there. All the times I should’ve been guiding my boy so that he couldn’t ever end up in a place like this. I wanted so bad to go back in time then. Just like Tyler said he’d done. I wanted to yell at myself to do what was right. To give myself the things I needed to be the mama that Tyler deserved. But I couldn’t do that now. It was too late. I’d shortchanged my boy his entire life. And now they were going to take it away. And it was all my fault. I was responsible for every evil that had happened that led to that moment.
If I hadn’t promised, right that second I would’ve dropped down onto my knees on the floor of that prison cell and just cried. Not cried for myself, for the pain I felt. I’d cried enough of those tears in seven years. I was going to cry for the wrong I done, for the chaos I left in my wake. But I’d let Tyler down enough for one life time. My eyes prickled and the back of my throat itched, but I didn’t cry. I got a hold of myself and I looked at my son again.
“This is all my fault Tyler,” I said quietly, the words feeling like ice water down my back. He looked up, a little bit confused and shook his head.
“What’re talking about mama? You told me to get another lawyer…”
“Not just that, Tyler,” I said, “I mean everything,” I waved my hands around the room, “I was a terrible mother to you…”
“No!”
“I ain’t fishin’ for you to try to make me feel better. I am telling the truth, you listen,” I said in a firm voice. Tyler quietly obeyed. I breathed deeply, “I was a bad mother. I ain’t never give you the things you should have. And I am sorry. I wish I could go back and give you those things now. Give you the time I didn’t when you were a boy. Do the mother things that I should’ve done so you wouldn’t be here,” I said. Tyler didn’t move.
“It’s okay mama,” he said wistfully and I realized that he was disappointed in me too, he just didn’t want to say it. My heart broke again. Desperate, I tried to search for something, anything I could do to make it up to him.
“What do you need now? For this next month. I know I can’t make up all the years to you. But I can be what you need me to be now, at the…” I almost said ‘end’ but couldn’t get that word to come out. Tyler looked at me blank for minute and then shrugged.
“You’re here mama,” he said quietly, “You’re always here. You’ve always done everything I’ve needed since I ended up here. You don’t need to do anything else.”
“There has to be something!” I said sort of flailing. What I was doing already wasn’t good enough, “What is that you never got in your life because you’re in here? Maybe I can figure out some way to make it happen,” I said. I don’t know what I was thinking of. A birthday party I never threw or something. I didn’t have any plan. I just wanted to do something to drown out just a little bit of the guilt.
“Like what?” he asked confused.
“Anything,” I said.
Tyler looked at me again and shrugged. He looked a little uncomfortable, like he was afraid I was going to cry. After a moment, he furrowed his brow for just a second. Then a little half smile crossed his lips for a second and he shook his head. He remained silent. But I could tell he’d been thinking of something. I grasped at it.
“What?” I asked sharply. Tyler’s eyes focused. He looked at me and that half-smile happened again and he shook his head.
“Nothing,” he responded.
“It was something Tyler, you tell me what it was,” I said.
“Well…” he said and I realized I was onto something, “Nothing you can help with mama.” He said. So there was something! I wasn’t going to let it go that easy. If there was something I could do… I was going to make it happen.