Crazy 8's

Quinten Knight closed the door to his mother’s bedroom , setting a fresh pitcher of ice water on her nightstand. His mother, Rachel, lay on the bed; her favorite green robe bright and cheerful against the paleness of her skin. The most important thing now, however, was that Quinten had three cards left, and he knew his mother was cheating.

They started playing Crazy 8’s on Sunday mornings for fun. Micah, Quinten's dad, and Quinten's four younger brothers went to Sunday morning services. Rachel's health the last few months prevented her from going, and Quinten stayed to keep her company. She had taught her oldest son to play card games when he was little and he took to it well. She was still better than him at it though, so she didn’t need to cheat. That is what got under Quinten’s skin the most.

“Cheater,” he mumbled, making sure his mother had a fresh ice chip. He had propped her up against the pillows, believing she looked as if she felt better this morning.

Rachel huffed. “Watch your mouth, I am still your mother. Besides, how do you know that I’m cheating?”

“Because you only look that innocent when you are doing something wrong. Where do you think Judah gets it from?”

Rachel gave a genuine laugh. “From your father. Or you. "

Quinten ignored that. “You drew two cards."

Rachel blinked innocently from her pillow. “Did I?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Well, maybe I forgot.” She seemed to intensely study the cards fanned out in her thin hand.

Quinten rolled his eyes. “You didn’t forget.”

“Chemotherapy does affect memory, my sweet boy.”

Quinten was silent for a beat. “Not selective memory. Not in forgetting how many cards you take.”

Rachel’s mouth twitched. "So suspicious. You've been watching too many detective shows."

“I saw you just now look at the top card. For shame, mama.” Quinten chided her gently. 

“I did no such thing.” Rachel coughed then, and Quinten was at her side with a glass of water.

“Hmm,” Quinten said as he sat down. “If you say so.”

“I do,” Rachel smiled.

Quinten laid down the seven of clubs.

Rachel’s eyes took on a mischievous glow before slapping a black eight on top of it.

“Spades,” she said.

“Ha! I knew you looked,” Quinten called out.

“Quinten Micah Knight. I raised you to respect your elders. ”

“I knew you looked, ma'am." Quinten deadpanned.

Rachel laughed then, and it was a balm to Quinten’s heart. Her laugh was weaker than normal, but still one of his favorite sounds. He looked down at his cards before she caught him staring at her. Rachel leaned over as much as she could, inhaling the scent of the fresh cut red roses his father had brought in this morning before he left. Micah had planted dozens of rose bushes- Rachel's favorite flower- all over their property.

Micah worried about Quinten missing Sunday school and youth service. Rachel understood, but that morning Rachel had asked that Quinten stay with her one more Sunday. “He can go next week, Micah. Leave me with my oldest boy again today, please. I get lonely”.

Quinten knew part of the reason was that she couldn’t get out of bed on her own that morning.

Rachel spoke up again, as she eyed her hand. 

“The navy-blue dress. With the gray trim and collar. It’s in the back of my closet.”

Quinten’s fingers tightened around his cards. “Mama.”

“Not the burgundy duster your Aunt Naomi gave me. I’ll look like a curtain. And no big hat.”

“You don’t wear hats, anyway.” Quinten pretended to be fascinated by the cards in his hand.

“People get weird ideas when someone dies, baby,” Rachel said.

Quinten said nothing.

Rachel laid down the four of spades. “Your turn.”

Quinten laid down a card that made no sense. Rachel tutted.

“I don’t want them singing sad songs, either.”

“What?” Quinten’s mind had started to drift.

“At the funeral. No sad songs.”

Quinten bit the inside of his cheek and tried to make his mind go to a happier place.

Like a baseball field, when he was nine, and hit a home run right over the fence.

His mother had been the first on her feet. “That’s my BABY!” She shouted.

Did you see that, Mama? Quint honey, everybody in three counties saw that. I did good, didn’t I? Yes, baby, you did really good.

“Quinten.” Rachel was calling him back, looking at him.

“I don’t want it to be gloomy. It’s a celebration. Okay?” Rachel asked.

Quinten huffed. “Not something to celebrate.”

“You know what I mean,” Rachel said, choosing another card.

For a while, they played without talking. Quinten pretended not to notice the tremor in her hands. He won that round and they started a new one.

There was another mutter of “cheater” from Quinten and Rachel ignored him. “Your daddy needs help,” Rachel said.

Quinten drew another card.

“I am serious. Your daddy will need help. I am counting on you. Listen to me,” his mother put her sharpness back in her voice. She sounded like she did before she got sick, and Quinten was thrown momentarily.

“I don’t want to listen to you,” Quinten said. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

Rachel closed her eyes, sighing, and Quinten got up and got her another ice chip. 

“I can’t be their dad,” Quinten said as he sat back down.

“I’m not asking you to be.”

“I’m sixteen.” Quinten looked at her.

 Rachel’s eyes filled. “Baby, I know. It’s not fair. None of this is fair. "

“I want to be a kid for a while. I don’t want to take care of everybody.”

There. He had said it. The selfish thing. The bad thing. The thing that had been sitting inside his chest for months, growing until he felt he would burst.

Rachel was quiet. Quinten’s eyes burned.

“I don’t mean-” Quinten started.

“I know.”

“I love them,” Quinten whispered.

“I know.”

“I just...want you to stay. I want it to be you, too. All of us. Why can’t it be all of us?”

“It just can’t, baby. I’m sorry.”

They clasped hands then and Quinten bent his head over in her lap, like he had as a child, his mother threading her fingers through his hair.

“You’re crushing my cards, baby.” She said after a minute.

“I’m sorry.”

“You should be,” she grinned. “I have a great hand.”

They laughed then, the kind of laughter that seemed to bounce off the walls. Quinten snorted and Rachel held her side, laughing harder. She gasped for breath, but waved off Quinten's frown. When they stopped, Rachel wiped her eyes. “You’ve done enough for me,” she said. “Keeping me company, cleaning, feeding me. But your daddy is going to need you just as much. He won’t say it. It’s the Knight way to suffer in silence. But he’s going to need you later more than he ever has in your whole life.”

Quinten’s lips trembled. 

Rachel stroked his cheek. “You did good, baby. You might even be a better son than Toby McPherson, and everybody knows he’s the real one that parted the Red Sea, if his mama Rhonda tells the story.” She smiled again and laughed a little, letting her hand rest on his face.

Quinten sobbed out. “Mama, don’t leave. Please, just don’t leave.”

Rachel's mouth quivered. She laid back in bed and closed her eyes. Quinten jumped to his feet so fast the chair fell over.

“Mama, if you love us, stay and fight.” He was crying now and couldn’t stop.

Rachel opened her eyes, also wet with tears. “I have fought.”

“Then fight harder. I’ll fight with you. I’ll fight for you.”

“Quint.” 

“I’ll do whatever you need me to do,” he said, kneeling by her bedside now, clasping her hands.

“Quinten, your job for me is done,” Rachel said quietly.

Quinten stood up, biting the inside of his cheek. Trying to think of somewhere else, of anything else. But it wasn’t working. 

Rachel lay in bed and watched him. “Do you remember what I used to do for you when you were sick? “

Quinten wiped his face with both hands. “No.”

“Yes, you do.”

"No.”

“Liar,” Rachel challenged him.

Rachel cleared her throat. Her voice was small at first but grew stronger as she sang. “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine…”

Quinten shook his head.

“You make me happy, when skies are gray….”

She waited this time, looking at Quinten expectedly.

Quinten slowly made the hand motions his mother had taught him, the sign language to the song.

“You’ll never know dear, how much I love you,” he sang, his voice breaking halfway through.

They finished together, “please don’t take my sunshine away”, silence filling the room after the last note.

They squeezed each other’s hands, as Rachel looked down at the cards. “You played that three illegally,” she smiled.

Quinten laughed through his tears. “You are unbelievable.”

Rachel sighed. “Now. It’s almost noon. Your daddy and brothers will be back in about forty minutes. I want you to call Maxine’s Diner and order the chicken dinner with mashed potatoes, green beans, rolls, peach cobbler, and a separate order of corn fritters for me.”

“You going to eat a whole order?” Quinten asked.

“It might take me all day, but I’ll try,” Rachel smiled. “Now go, take my car, and by the time you get back, they should be driving up. Make sure she puts my fritters in a little bag by themselves. Oh, and get some slaw. Your brothers like it.”

“Why don’t I wait till Daddy gets home, or better yet, call him and have him pick it up?”

Rachel shook her head. “No.”

“Mama, it’ll save gas, and-”

“No. And cut me some pink roses as you come back in.”

Quinten felt a tingling along his spine. "Mama. Daddy just cut the red ones.”

“You can never have enough roses, baby.”

“Mama.”

Rachel focused on picking up her cards, the tremor back in her hand. She coughed.

“You’re sending me away,” Quinten whispered. Rachel’s fingers stilled just for a moment.

“No. I want corn fritters.”

“You don’t.”

“I really do.” Rachel smiled then, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Go on now, baby. You’ll be back before you know it.”

Quinten stared at the door. Something told him not to move, to stay right there.

“We can play another hand when you get back.” Rachel promised.

Quinten nodded. “Okay. ”

“Love you,” Rachel said, shuffling the cards with openly trembling hands.

Quinten made it to the bedroom door, stopped, and looked back. Rachel had closed her eyes.

“Mama?” Her eyes opened again. 

“Yes, baby?”

He wanted to ask her if she was sending him away because she knew. He wanted to say “I don’t need protecting from this."

He wanted to run back to the bed and let her run her hands through his hair again and listen to her sing again. Just one more time.

Instead, he said, “I’m getting an order of gizzards, too.”

Rachel laughed again. Quinten closed his eyes, trying to memorize the sound.

“Yuck. I will never understand why you and your daddy eat those things.”

“You are missing out, mama.” Quinten said, tossing the keys from hand to hand.

“ I think not." Rachel wrinkled her nose. "Now hurry up. I love you. Be careful."

Quinten stood there, watching his mother shuffle the cards again. The tingling along his spine came back, and he shrugged it off. " I love you more," he said, and shut her door behind him. Outside, the air was cool. 

He made it halfway down the drive in his mother’s car before almost turning around. The farmhouse waited in the rearview mirror.

Go back. He gripped the steering wheel. You’re being ridiculous. He stepped on the accelerator and headed down the gravel driveway.

He would ask Maxine to pack the biggest fritters and the fluffiest rolls.

His father and he would fight over the gizzards.

His mother would be able to eat at least some of the corn fritters.

He would pick the most gorgeous roses he could find.

He would bring back the food while it was still hot.

He and his mother would finish another game. And then another, if she wanted to.

Quinten kept telling himself that, as the farmhouse disappeared behind him.