The kid was watching me. Studying me. His eyes telling me he was amazed at what he saw.
Even though I was pissed because I’d hit only five of the six shots, part of me smiled.
I cleared my throat. “Were you living with someone before Catherine?”
“We lived different places.”
“Yes, but do you remember a time when you lived with someone else?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Do you ever remember having . . . having another mother?”
“Another mother?”
“Before Catherine, did you live with someone before . . . did you have another mother?”
“What do you mean?”
He didn’t understand my concerns. So I let them go. Decided to do what I was planning to do anyway. This felt like a fool’s move, like a betrayal, but I had been lied to since I left my mother’s womb.
And my heart told me the same had happened with the kid, that his life was built on lies.
He asked, “Are we going to throw knives?”
“Not today. No knife throwing today.”
“Next time?”
I nodded.
He asked, “Will you show me some more fight moves?”
“Next time.”
“When is next time?”
“Soon.”
“When is soon?”
“Soon is soon.”
No, with the kid I wasn’t the best conversationalist in the world.
He said, “I ran two miles.”
“When?”
“On Saturday morning. While Mum walks at Piedmont Park, I run in front of her.”
“Two miles?”
“Without stopping.” He smiled. “My mum couldn’t catch me.”
Most of the time his accent was very European. I rubbed his head, smiled too.
He said, “Then we ate breakfast at Thumbs Up.”
“I like their biscuits.”
“Me too. My mum likes the catfish and eggs.”
When we were done we loaded up what we had left. I had the kid come to the trunk of the car. Inside was a box, a kit I had bought. Three kits were in my possession. Opening the kit, I was trying to convince myself to change my mind. Everything was perfect. This was his Montreal. This was the kid’s chance at peace and normalcy. I didn’t want to mess that up for him. He had what I never had. But I had to be sure that the kid was supposed to be here, that no one out there was missing a son.
I had the kid open his mouth. I opened the DNA kit and took out the cotton swabs, ran one on the inside of his left cheek, then did the same on the right. I sealed his DNA in the container enclosed.
The kid didn’t ask what that was about.
The kid never asked too many questions. He just answered questions the best he could, English still being his second language and the ways of North America foreign to whatever he was used to.
But I had so many questions that had never been answered, not to my satisfaction.
He asked, “Can we play soccer for a few minutes?”
I smiled. “Sure.”
We messed around in the open field, first doing ankle dribbling and toe touches, then spent some time kicking the ball back and forth, switching between being goalkeeper and field player.
We played and laughed and sweated.
As I drove back toward Powder Springs, one question was burning a hole in my guts.
I took a deep breath, swallowed before I asked the kid, “Have you ever shot anyone?”
He answered without hesitating.
Catherine had cooked dinner, had set the table, and was waiting for us to get back. Baked chicken. Macaroni and cheese. Greens. Apple pie. I didn’t remember her cooking for me when I was a kid, not like this. But our life was so different. I used a guest bedroom and showered, put on dress pants and a nice shirt I had bought, looked presentable. In the mirror I saw a decent man named Jean-Claude.
We sat at the table and Catherine said grace. We ate together. Like family.
The kid said, “I want a dog.”
Catherine shook her head. “No dog.”
“Please?”
“We have had this conversation, Steven.”
I said, “Every boy should have a dog.”
Catherine frowned at me.
I backed down.
She looked at the kid and shook her head. “No dog. I have allergies.”
“But, Mum, I can get a dog that does not have long hair.”
“No dog.”
“I looked them up on the Internet. I can get a Chihuahua mix.”
“No.”
“What about a pug?”
“No.”
“A Japanese chin?”
“How will you take care of a dog? You don’t clean your room two days in a row.”
“I’ll keep my room clean.”
“I am tired of cleaning up behind you. Now you want me to clean up after a dog?”
“I promise to take good care of the dog.”
“No.”
“I’ll walk it every day. You said you need to walk more so we could walk with you every day.”
“Please stop asking me about a dog.”
“I want somebody to play with. I get bored. I promise to take care of the dog.”
“Do not go to anyone else when I tell you something, do you understand?”
“Yes, Mum.”
When I was homeless in Montreal, on Sainte-Catherine East, I remembered seeing a homeless man who had several dogs. Back then I had wanted to have a home and buy a dog.
I said, “I never had a dog either.”
The boy looked at me. So did Catherine. I didn’t look at either of them.
I said, “But I used to have a horse.”
“Did you?”
“Sure did. When I had a home in California. Had a horse.”
“Where is your horse?”
“Sold it. Had to sell everything.”
After dinner was done I almost let it go, but I couldn’t.
The house was so clean, so well put together. She had painted every room, earth-tone colors that replaced blandness with life, knickknacks from discount stores, paintings and sculptures; things that made a house look like a home were all over. I had no idea Catherine could paint and decorate that way.
The kid asked, “Can we go in the basement and hit the boxing bag?”
Catherine told him, “Not today. You have responsibilities, young man.”
“Okay, Mum.”
Mum. Not Mother, not Momma, but Mum. Like the British.
While the kid loaded the dishwasher, I pulled Catherine to the side. She had a broad smile, looked happy. But that smile went away when I showed her the box with the DNA test.
She asked, “What is this, Jean-Claude?”
“I need you to do this.”
“Why?”
“The kid . . .”
“What about my son?”
“I have to be sure he is yours.”
“Are you serious?”
My answer was etched in my face. This had troubled me for too long.
Tears formed in her eyes.
I said, “I have to make sure he is your son, that you’re his mother.”
“I am his mother.”
“Where were you pregnant?”
“What are you asking?”
“Who saw you pregnant?”
“Why are you asking me that?”
“No one on Berwick Street saw you pregnant.”
“I was pregnant before I went to London. I told you. I was pregnant in Amsterdam. I was pregnant then . . . when you . . . when you came there . . . so angry . . . when you came to hurt me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me then?”
“You terrified me.”
“I terrified you.”
“And you still terrify me now.”
I took a breath, rubbed my eyes, shook my head, refused to back down.
“I have to make sure that no woman out there is dying because her kid is missing.” My voice trembled enough to make me pause. “And if you are not the kid’s mother, and if the kid’s mother is dead, then I have to make sure that there isn’t a man out there grieving and wondering where his son is.”
She trembled and whispered, “This is about Margaret. This is because of Margaret.”
“I don’t know Margaret.”
“She was your mother.”
“You were my mother.”
“I only did what I did—I took care of you for Margaret.”
Margaret. The woman who was supposed to be my mother. The woman I never knew.
Whatever warmth should have existed between me and her memory, Catherine had never nurtured that; she had lied, had never given me the truth, and now Margaret was but a name, but a word.
Margaret was but a faceless noun.
My throat tightened, cheeks felt flushed.
I nodded. “This is about me and you. This is about North Carolina. This is about what you did to me when you came into my room. Can’t let that happen again. Can’t let that happen to the kid.”
“Don’t do this, Jean-Claude. Everything is perfect. Everyone is happy for once.”
“I have to.”
“I am his mother.”
“Then you have nothing to worry about.”
She glanced toward the kitchen, toward the kid, then she looked around at her home, at the pastel walls, at the nice furniture, at the new life she had. Maybe she remembered London, living off Berwick Street, that red-light district that smelled of piss and paid-for sex.
She said, “What kind of horrible person do you think I am, Jean-Claude?”
“I knew you when you were Thelma.”
“That was a long time ago, another life.”
“I know what you’re capable of.”
“Look in my cabinets. Look everywhere. Do you see alcohol in this home?”
“This isn’t about alcohol.”
“Do you see men coming in and out of my door? Do you see any men here? Do you want to go ask the neighbors what they see? Would that put trust in your heart? Would that make you feel better?”
“I have no idea what you do, Catherine. I have no idea. This is about the kid, not you.”
She trembled, shook her head, sounded like she was begging me. “I’ve changed.”
“Have you?”
She closed her eyes, opened her mouth so I could swab the insides of her cheeks.
I swabbed her left cheek. More tears flowed as I swabbed the right cheek.
I said, “The results will come here. Do not open them.”
When I was done she walked away, her head down, crying, trying to not let the kid see her being upset, and headed up the stairs with a quickness, went inside her master bedroom, and closed the door.
Growing up, my world had been anything but five-star. It had been poverty and pain.
My early years were hand-to-mouth, always on the run, hardly with a roof over my head.
I would’ve killed a thousand people to have a resting place like the one they had now.
I would’ve killed to have been able to live in a place like Powder Springs.
I went to the kitchen, stared out into the darkness awhile before I told the kid good-bye.
Soccer ball in hand, he asked, “Will you come back soon?”
“I’ll come back soon. Real soon.”
“Can you take me some of the places you go?”
I smiled a false smile. “One day we’ll take a trip. We’ll go to Disneyland in California.”
“Me, you, and my mother?”
I hesitated. “We’ll see.”
His face didn’t smile, but there was a glow in his complexion and a shine in his eyes.
He began kneeing and chesting the ball, a lot better at it than when he was in London.
I said, “Not in the house. You might break something.”
He stopped right away and nodded. Then the kid said, “Jean-Claude?”
I looked at him. I’d never heard him call me by that name before. He’d never said my name.
He said, “You had a horse?”
“Sure did.”
“If you get another horse can I come ride it?”
“You sure can.”
“If you get a dog can I play with it?”
“Okay.”
He smiled at me. I ran my hand through his hair, then he walked me to the door.
He asked, “Did you tell my mum you were leaving?”
“She knows.”
“Where are you going?”
I paused. “Back to my hotel.”
“You could stay here. We have an extra bedroom.”
I smiled a heavy smile. “Maybe next time. Maybe.”
I reached into my pocket and took out a piece of paper, wrote down a phone number. Then I reached into another pocket and gave him a cellular phone and a phone charger. It was a throwaway phone that had a couple hundred dollars on a SIM card, enough to last awhile.
I told him, “If anything happens, if anybody comes around here and they look like bad people, I want you to use this phone and call this number. It’s my emergency number.”
“You mean like if bad guys come here, call your number?”
“Yeah. Bad guys. Or bad women too. Call this number.”
“Like calling a superhero.”
I smiled. Wanted to tell him I wasn’t a superhero. I wasn’t bred to be one of the good guys.
He asked, “Are you like the men in the comic book
Golgo 13
or
Batman
?”
I knew Batman but wasn’t familiar with
Golgo 13
. I’d seen him grab the manga at the bookstore but hadn’t paid any attention to what the comic was about; again, too many other issues on my mind.
Before I could leave he ran to his brand-new comics, came back, and gave me two. Said he wanted me to have something to read. When I got inside the car I saw that he had given me his
Golgo 13
and
Batman
comic books. Batman. The man whose mother and father had been murdered when he was a child. A man with more darkness inside him than the night.
The jacket for the other manga said that the Golgo 13 character was a hit man, his origin unknown, his attitude toward sex hard-core, as amoral as they come. The first part of Golgo 13’s name sounded like it had a religious origin, was probably related to Golgotha, the hill where Jesus Christ was crucified. Jesus had twelve disciples. With Jesus added, the number was thirteen.