Camping Night

I knew it was coming before it happened.

I was sitting on my bed sorting through overdue bills when the whole house groaned and fell into darkness. The twins, in the living room watching some Pixar movie, shrieked with glee and came running to my room. Ellie burst through the door first. She was clutching her stuffed rabbit, and her big blue eyes were wide with excitement. Her brother, Daniel, was grinning widely in the doorway, his tongue poking through his missing two front teeth.

“Is it a camping night, mommy?” she asked, though she already knew the answer. I nodded, smiling, and they raced down the hallway to go grab the tent and sleeping bags from the hall closet. I slowly gathered the bills and shoved them into the drawer on my bedside table.

Camping night was a ruse I came up with long ago. This wasn’t the first time that the power company shut off our lights. The first time it happened, Daniel and Ellie had been about three years old. We were sitting down to dinner in the small breakfast nook, and they both screamed and cried when the house collapsed into darkness. At 21-years old, I felt like joining them. I realized what would happen when I didn’t pay the power bill, but the unceremonious consequences still startled me.

Desperate to get the kids to stop crying, I told them that this was a special surprise called camping night. On camping night, we were allowed to camp out in the backyard, eat smores and tell campfire stories all night. They quickly grabbed hold of the idea, and it had become a tradition of sorts. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that it was because their mother, only 18 when they were born, needed to triage the monthly funds at times. Sometimes power didn’t make the cut.

The kids had already piled the camping equipment and several couch cushions by the backdoor. Daniel and I started carrying them out to the backyard while Ellie rummaged through the pantry looking for smores supplies. I was thankful for the warm summer evening as Daniel and I started setting up the tent. The cicadas sang wildly in the trees, and the full moon provided enough light for us to thread the poles through the tent and secure it to the ground.

As Daniel and I started piling pillows and sleeping bags into the tent, Ellie appeared on the back porch with my cell phone in her hand.

“Mommy,” she called, “Your phone was ringing, and I answered. It’s daddy.”

Shit.

“Ok sweetie,” I called, trying to conceal the unease in my voice. “Why don’t you come help build the fort while I talk to daddy?”

Ellie beamed and skipped across the yard to hand me the phone. I walked back up the steps of the porch and into the house, sliding the door behind me. Daniel and Ellie had already jumped into the tent to layout our sleeping arrangements for the night. I waited until they were both inside before I walked into the kitchen and leaned on the counter.

“Hey, Dave,” I said tentatively.

“Seriously Sara?” his voice barely concealed his judgement. “Another outage?”

“Ellie told you?” I asked, watching the kids chase each other around the tent in fits of laughter.

“Yeah, she said you guys were having another camping night,” he said. “That’s the third one this year, Sara. What is going on? Did you lose your job or something?”

I pressed my palm into my forehead and sighed. “No, it’s just… They cut my hours at work, and I’ve been trying to juggle that and classes. It’s been a lot, and I’ve needed to move some things around while I look for something to supplement my lost hours.” I took a deep breath. “I know how it looks, Dave, but Ellie and Daniel are taken care of. That’s always been my priority.”

“How do you expect to still take classes if you can’t even pay for power? Are you going to study in the dark?” He had a point, but the semester had already been paid for. There was no turning back, so I would need to ride out the next few months and get the credits to make this count.

As I explained this to him, his silence through the line screamed at me that I am a terrible mother. That I am failing at my oath to protect and provide for them. That even though I am making decisions in their favor, I am still choosing wrong. I will always choose wrong.

“Sara…” He was trying to be patient. It made me feel even worse. “I know you are trying to get a degree to get a better job and do good by them. But what they need is a little stability in their lives right now. I know that, as their mom, you want them there with you most of the time. But I’m just concerned that things are going to get overlooked.”

“They’re not getting overlooked!” I insisted, “As soon as I find some supplemental work or a new job, this will be fixed. I just need you to be patient and believe in me, Dave.”

We were both silent for several moments before he finally spoke. “They can come stay with me for the week while you look for something new. But this can’t keep happening, Sara. It’s not fair to them.”

“I know,” I whispered. I didn’t trust my voice not to break.

I heard the back door slide open and Ellie’s voice calling my name drifted into the house. I immediately straightened and tried to soften my expression. She turned the corner into the kitchen, her freckled face flushed from the summer night.

“Mommy, can we watch a movie on your computer tonight?” I considered saying no, but it would give them something to do until bedtime. I would need the computer tomorrow for schoolwork and job hunting, but I could go to a coffeeshop and charge it there. I told her yes, and she ran off to grab it and a DVD from the living room.

“I’ll come get them tomorrow around nine,” Dave said. “Just… use this week to think about what’s best for them.” My heart broke at those words. I nodded and told him ok, that I’d have them pack a bag in the morning.

After I hung up, I stared through the dark into the house across the street. Through a bay window, a family was seated to a modest dinner. They were older, their children in their early high school years. I watched their attentive interactions, as they smiled and laughed with one another. I wondered if this family, this loving complete family, had ever camped in the living room when the power went out. I doubted they had ever eaten stovetop ramen out of plastic bowls in the dark. Envy bloomed in my chest before it was extinguished by sorrow. More than anything, I wondered if, even after the lights came back on, some part of me would still feel as though it were feeling around hopelessly in the dark.

…

Ellie had chosen Frozen as our movie for the night. We all huddled inside the tent, leaning on pillows and wrapped in blankets. Even though they had seen this movie countless times before, Ellie and Daniel stilled squealed with delight at their favorite scenes and sat entranced during the dramatic ones.

I couldn’t concentrate on the movie. Instead, I watched their faces, lit up by the glow from the laptop screen. Their profiles echoed one another from the curve of their nose to their wide blue eyes. My mother often remarked how similar Ellie looked to me and Daniel to Dave. To me, they were a pair that was inseparable from each other. A league entirely of their own.

 When I had first learned I was pregnant, I didn’t have a clear idea of what I was going to do. At 18 years old, I was at the cusp of adulthood, and a baby would steer my life inevitably one way or the other. I often feel guilty about my indecision at that time. About how utterly blank my mind was as I stared at the two pink lines. About how my knees wobbled as I announced the news to my parent. About how I had cried with my mother as she buried her face in her hands.

Dave had immediately proposed when I told him. We had gone down to the courthouse that Sunday and were married amongst apathetic city employees and impatient adults filing petitions and permits. We lived in an idealistic world thinking that we might beat the odds stacked against us – until we heard two heartbeats at my 10-week checkup. After that, our outlook turned fearful, and the color seemed to drain from our relationship. One baby was one thing…

I didn’t realize the movie was over until Daniel clicked a button on the laptop to pause the credits. I told them it was time for bed; you have to be up early to go to your dad’s house. They offered little resistance as the crawled into their sleeping bags. I lay back on my own and stared through the mesh ceiling of the tent, thankful for a clear sky. Still lost in my reverie, I didn’t feel like sleeping quite yet.

“Mommy,” Daniel murmured quietly in the darkness. “Why don’t other kids have camping night?”

In that moment, the barrier I had kept up all night broke. Tears rolled down my cheeks, and I stifled sobs. My sniffs must have given me away because I felt a small hand slip into mine and give a gentle squeeze. They were both quiet and waiting for an answer.

“Well,” I began through a tight throat, “our family is different than most. Other kids have parents that are older than me and your dad. We have certain challenges – certain choices – that they don’t.”

“What kind of challenges?” Ellie asked.

I sighed. “It’s nothing that you two need to worry about. Get some rest.”

“Is it us?” Daniel whispered.

I couldn’t let my mind think the honest answer. Instead, I sat up, and Ellie and Daniel sat up too. I scooted closer and grabbed Daniel’s hand in addition to Ellie’s. I looked both of them in the eyes, their gaze innocent and expectant. “I have never for one moment regretted having you two. Not for a single moment.”

It was the truth. Despite the challenges of being a young single mother, I never regretted the choice I made. Admittedly, my life would look entirely different if I had chosen differently. I might be out at a bar with some friends after a long work week instead of sitting in a tent in the backyard. I would be going to friends’ houses for Bachelor watching parties instead of watching Disney movies. I won’t pretend that I am not curious about how my life might have turned out. But I never regretted choosing to become a mother – even when it felt like navigating through the dark.

We sat like that for several moments before I tucked them into their sleeping bags and kissed them each on the forehead. “You are the best decision I ever made.” I murmured, giving their hands one last squeeze before I laid back down. I stared back up at the night sky and was struck by the clarity I felt. For a moment, all the stars above seemed gathered in clusters of three.