May We Be Forgiven

whip-stitched together, my initials hand-tooled on the front. Ashley has constructed a shadow box that looks like a TV with a small painted portrait of her mother on the screen. Nate brings remains of animals he found in the woods around his camp—the skull of a squirrel, the skin of a snake—and a dozen owl pellets, which he cracks open, showing us how to identify what animal the owl has eaten.

    T here are only two weekends left before school starts. I gather the children and tell them about Avery.
    “Would you like to meet her?”
    “Yes,” they say unequivocally.
    “So,” Ashley asks, pushing for further clarification, “is she like a new mom?”
    “No,” I say.
    “A stepmom?” she tries again.
    “Not so much.”
    “A transplant mom?”
    “How about she’s just a lady from Ohio,” Nate says. “She’s not related to us.”
    “But she has Mom’s heart and lungs—don’t you think that changes who she is? I mean, now she’s more like Mom than anyone, except us.”
    Nate shrugs. “You know what, Ashley? She can be whatever you want her to be.”
    “Thanks,” Ashley says.

    I explain it to the children, and then I try and explain it to Cy and Madeline, who don’t quite follow—the best they can manage is to understand that this woman, Avery, was bequeathed something precious that used to belong to Jane.
    Cy seems nervous. “I just sold the insurances,” he says repeatedly. “I didn’t deal with technicalities. When they died, they didn’t usually come back. Isn’t this more of a trusts-and-estates issue?”
    “She’s just coming to say thank you,” I say.
    “Why didn’t my mother get to give her organs away?” Ricardo asks me privately that evening. “Is that something only rich white people can do?”
    “No,” I say, “anyone can do it—but you have to plan ahead, and you have to die in a way that preserves your organs, so they are viable.”
    “What does ‘viable’ mean?”
    “Your mother died on the scene after a car accident; Jane died in a hospital, where they could keep giving her body oxygen, making sure her organs stayed healthy, and then they removed them as quickly as possible.”
    “Do you have to be dead to give your organs?” Ricardo asks.
    “Usually,” I say. “There are certain organs that you have two of, like your kidneys, that you can give even if you’re alive.”
    “I want to give an organ,” Ricardo says.
    I nod. “That’s a lovely idea,” I say. “But you can’t give any organs away until you’re a grown-up.”
    “Fine,” he says, “but as soon as I’m grown-up, I’m giving it all away.”

    O n Saturday at noon, we meet Avery and her fiancé, at the hamburger pub in town. It’s a place George used to like to go, because they knew him and always seated him so he could see both of the TVs simultaneously. I’ve always hated it, because it seemed to be the place where miserable husbands went when they ran away from home—even if only for an hour—to soak themselves in the comfort of other bastards and beer.
    Avery and Mark, her fiancé, are already there; I see them nervously pawing through the crème mints by the register when we walk in.
    She is small, with short close-cropped hair, like a Jean Seberg or Mia Farrow.
    “You must be Avery,” I say as we approach.
    “Wow,” she says. “Look how many of you there are.”
    “I’m Ashley,” Ashley says, extending her hand.
    “Nate,” Nate says, hanging back, just giving a wave.
    “Ricardo,” he says, shaking hands with both Avery and Mark.
    I introduce Cy and Madeline and suggest that we take a table.
    “This feels good,” she says, “very familiar. It’s almost like I’ve been here before.”
    “It’s a hamburger joint,” Mark says. “They’re pretty much all the same.”
    “I like this one,” Avery says.
    When the waitress takes our order, Avery asks for a burger well done, and Ashley comments that that’s the way her mother used to like them too. Avery smiles.
    “So how come you needed the transplant—is that an okay question to ask?” Nate wants to know. “I mean, it’s fine if you don’t want to answer, if it’s too personal.”
    “It’s fine,” Avery says. “I have a congenital syndrome. It got worse when I became a teenager. I couldn’t go out in the summer because I wasn’t supposed to sweat; I couldn’t do any sports, no salt, lots of diuretics, Lasix, Digoxin, iron, vitamins. Sudden death was always a threat. I would leave the house