Though her eyes remained playful, I didn’t
doubt her words for a second. She was truly neutral to my coming
into her life. I could see it clearly. Her love would be
conditional. I’d never be able to work my charm on her as I would
others. I guessed that she didn’t really want the extra
responsibility. I don’t think it was even personal, but she seemed
to see through my mask so quickly and perhaps was afraid I was a
bad person. Or maybe she had a bad premonition of what my arrival
meant, of the calamities that would unfold.
I seriously thought about refusing it, but
with the dream and everything, how could I? I put away the smile
and hung my head. “I’ll be a good son to you, Mr. Tappet,” I
promised.
This got everything going and even Una
agreed it could be fun. When they left, I dressed into clothes Mrs.
Abbibas had brought from Carling Street. In the washroom, I peeled
back the bandages and was surprised to see that my head held twenty
or so stitches, but it didn’t look as bad as it felt. Mr. Drury
waited out in the hall, having agreed to take me back to pack up
and sign some papers.
“Are you ready?” he asked when I stepped out
into the corridor. I could see some of the anguish in his eyes had
been alleviated by my good fortune. I felt fine and kept up to him
with no problem. Looking back, I saw I had stayed in North Jersey
General. It was a huge complex bordered by busy streets. Since
Snowball had been killed by a speeding car, I’d become extremely
annoyed with traffic in general. Mr. Drury owned a new navy-blue
Grand Prix, and on his car-radio on the way to Carling Street, a
song played, People Got to be Free, which I thought was very
true.
For an eight-year-old, every path seems
blocked. No liberty exists, only endless numbers of mysterious
adult rules, and especially, the perplexing laws of life. But now I
was happy and that was almost like being free. Mr. Drury rubbed my
shoulder. “It’s a hard story to believe,” he said slowly. “It’s the
darnedest thing, really. One of the richest families along these
parts is going to adopt you, and all because you were stealing
their flowers and their gardener clobbered you.” He chuckled to
himself. “Who would believe it? But I’m happy for you, Christian.
You’re a good boy and you deserve a nice family.”
I’d tears at these words. It was one of the
nicest things anyone had ever said to me. I wished I had thanked
him for it, but I was too emotional. A chance in a million had come
to me. It was a miracle really. Lloyd came over to help pack up my
things, but gathering it up was the simplest thing in the world. My
clothes fit into a small duffle bag with room left for that much
again. I’d no cards, music, glasses, radios, watches, jewelry,
belts, sports stuff, toys, stuffed animals, or anything else like
that, just a few old rags, my toothbrush, and an old black plastic
comb.
“Will I be able to come over to your new
home and see you?” he asked.
I shook my head and certainly hoped not. He
hugged me, and though I tried with all my will to return it, I
couldn’t.
“I love you,” he whispered in my ear.
“I’ll see you some time,” I said, breaking
away.
His unshaped face took on a forlorn-look,
but I felt no pity. What I owed him for protection, I’d paid in
full, and then some.
“Mr. Tappet is waiting,” Mr. Drury said,
knocking on the door.
I shook a few hands, signed some papers, and
in a minute, found myself out on the street standing in front of a
huge black stretch limousine, which back in 1968 was quite an
uncommon sight.
“This isn’t ours, my full-grown child,” Una
said coming from the front passenger seat to let me in. “We rented
it, so don’t go getting highfalutin. This is Mary’s idea of
welcoming you into our family.”
I sat beside Sally in the backseat straight
across from Stan and Mary Tappet. Enough room remained between the
seats to stretch my legs but everybody sat up and so did I. Sally
had her blond hair in a pony tail and her narrow face looked
wonderful with her clear shining eyes. For the first time, probably
because Una had stripped me of my power, I was nervous and couldn’t
speak.
“You look much improved,” Mary said. “You
must have so many questions in your head.”
I did, but could hardly ask them why they
were going to adopt me, why anyone on earth would bother? I’d once
overheard Mr. Drury say that after you’re eight-years-old it is
pretty much a done deal for an orphaned boy, and I believed it. All
the teenage orphans I’d met, long ago had given up any hope of it.
I nodded but said nothing.
“Let me explain the best I can,” she
continued. “For sometime after Sally was born, we tried to have
another child and weren’t successful. The business needed my full
attention in the last three years so I couldn’t afford to get
pregnant. By default. Do you know what that word means?” I lied
with a nod. “By default,” she continued, “we decided Sally would be
an only child and that she would learn to live with it, but she
herself complained about this and has asked many times about a
sibling. When Bryce clobbered you and we found out that you were an
orphan, Una said it was a sign.”
I turned around to look at Una who sat
watching from the front seat. She nodded her head but said nothing.
“We have to talk to you about our family,” Mary added, “our rules,
and your obligations. Sally is a gifted student and we’ll get you a
tutor to get you up to speed in that department. Are you willing to
try to catch up to Sally so that you can enter the same school as
her in September?” I nodded. “Good,” she continued. “We saw your
truancy reports. We hope it isn’t reflective of your attitude
toward school.”
“My teacher was boring,” I said with another
lie.
“We’ll make sure that doesn’t happen again,”
Mary said with a smile. “This is your number one obligation in our
family, just as it is Sally’s. If you do well in school and listen
to Una, you may have whatever you wish, but school comes first on
all fronts. We’ve had the week to prepare a room for you which we
hope you’ll like. Stan says you look chipper and he picked out the
design. I don’t know what that means, but he feels you’ll fit in
just fine.”
“Besides expressing himself well,” Una piped
in, “Mr. Stan has many talents. He’s an airplane pilot and collects
dinky-toy airplanes. Wait until you see your room. You’ll beg to be
returned at once to Carling Street.”
Both Stan and Mary laughed at this, so I
joined in, although I didn’t understand the joke and thought it was
a bit much from a servant. However, that pretty much defined their
relationship. I heard Una make fun of Mary only a few times in my
whole life, but Stan got it every day.
“Would you like to learn to fly airplanes?”
she asked me further. Again I nodded. “You’re very cooperative,”
she added, making fun of me. “Let’s see how far you’ll go to please
us. Sally has a fine collection of Barbie dolls, maybe a dozen or
so. Will you play Barbie with her?”
I blushed and hoped she wouldn’t wait for an
answer. I didn’t know what to say and I didn’t want to disappoint
Sally. A silence ensued so that I knew I couldn’t ignore the
question. Una’s power over them seemed supernatural, but the
thought of playing Barbie at that age naturally repulsed me, as it
should any boy. “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I don’t think I could
play with dolls.”
“A man of principle,” Una said with a laugh
and turned around.
This seemed to satisfy everyone, even Sally.
I was bewildered.
“Una is quite insane,” Stan whispered with a
smile, “there’s no cure.”
He put his fingers to his lips to signal to
keep it to myself and winked. I held his daughter’s hand and waited
to arrive at the mansion where I’d stolen flowers for my mother.
When we drove up the driveway, a feeling of being lost in a dream
overwhelmed me.
“Why are you crying?” Sally whispered, her
voice so full of conspiratorial love that more tears came still.
The limousine drove up the wide extended driveway which ran along
the back of the house. Gold and orange colored bricks lay
interlocked in a shimmering circular design and made up the drive
and walkways. Flourishing climbing-roses and tall potted grafted
azaleas bordered the lavish cement archways. Red maples and
flowering African vine trees lined the driveway, interspersed with
bright blooming flower beds and sculptures of fawns and naked
children. It was beautiful and I caught my breath several
times.
Sally continued to hold onto my hand and we
walked up a stone pathway to a partially hidden door. This led to
the kitchen which had a large center island with a sunroom and
eating room to the right, facing west, then it fell out onto a
large dining room. It was freshly painted with pristine-white, and
held huge white appliances which sparkled in the bright room: two
fridges, a stove, dishwasher, and others I didn’t even know at the
time existed, like rotary grill-cookers, toaster-ovens, microwaves,
stand up freezers, and so forth.
They all carried the Factory-Bright label,
the Tappet trade name, but of course, I didn’t know that at the
time either. Pictures of Una standing in the front yard of small
restaurants surrounded by tall palm trees, all in different places,
adorned the walls in the kitchen.
“Mom, let me show him his room,” Sally
urged.
“Okay, Sweetie,” Mary said. “We’ll give you
a five minute head start.”
Sally opened a door to a dark room on the
left, and turned on the light. In front of my eyes stood what look
like a grocery store, a pantry so loaded with food that it seemed
impossible that a house could hold it. Giant coffin-freezers and
two huge silver-colored fridges took up the wall in the middle. At
the back of it, stood a wide carpeted spiral-staircase and she led
me in a rush up to the top floor.
She took me down a hallway so wide it could
have been a room. Three corridors broke out from it. Still holding
my hand, she led me to my new room. My first impression of it was
that it was the size of a small dormitory. It had two enormous bay
windows. Below one window sat a desk so large that it had two
chairs on wheels. The bed on the other hand, differed little in
size from what I slept in at Carling Street, however, it had a
comforter which matched the sheets, pillow cases, and curtains.
This I thought was quite ingenious.
The walls were papered in a light design of
airplane sketches, all kinds of planes, from the earliest to the
most modern, and the multiple shelves attached to them held either
model airplanes or books; dozens of both. A wind-chime of
helicopters hung from the ceiling in one of the corners. A sizable
television-set sat on a wooden stand and there was a large radio on
my desk. Above it on a shelf, a new leather-bound edition of a huge
set of books was all aligned in perfect order.
“What is that?” I asked pointing to the
books.
“Colliers’ Encyclopedia,” Sally said. “We
have four sets now.”
I’d never heard of an encyclopedia, but
didn’t want to show my ignorance so said nothing. Sally took one
book down and turned to a picture of a Polar Bear. “It lists
everything alphabetically. You can use it for school.”
“What’s that?” I said, pointing next to what
looked like a small typewriter.
“It’s a calculator. Mom and Dad make
them.”
“What do you think?” Stan asked and entered
the room with a light knock on the door. Mary came in behind
him.
“Thank you,” I said.
What else could I say? Mary walked up to the
encyclopedia, and put her hand on it. “You’re probably one of a
very few eight-year-olds who have their own encyclopedia,” she
said. “Our tutor for you, Mr. Vontd, is proficient in their use and
will show you more when the time comes. I’m sorry to inform you
that if you want to start school with Sally in September, your
private classes will have to start at once. Are you willing to give
up part of your summer?”
I could see she intended in treating me like
an adult. The problem with answering these kinds of straightforward
questions for me or any eight-year-old was that one didn’t know the
sacrifice it would take to fulfill the obligation.
I nodded solemnly, and for the first time in
my presence, she smiled. “Una’s right about you,” she added. “You
catch on fast. But you should understand that this isn’t a game or
test. We have adopted you and this is your home. We aren’t going to
toss you back if you don’t get A’s in school. Some boys will learn
how to fly, others to swim. Do you swim?” I shook my head. “Well,
then,” she continued, “let’s go swimming. I’ll give you your first
lesson and we’ll try not to get your stitches wet.”
Sally whooped in joy. I hadn’t missed the
importance of the words from Mary about not being tossed back, but
my mind leapt from one surprise to another. Mary went to a dresser
and in the third drawer down pulled-out brand-new bathing-suits and
beach towels.
Left alone, I changed and stepped out into
the hall, where I stood solitarily before a mammoth spotless
hall-mirror, a skinny pale youngster, a stranger onto myself. Many
times in my life, I would feel the same way looking at myself in a
mirror and not recognizing the reflection.
The walls were laid out with gigantic
pictures of places and events that I knew nothing about. The
swimming-suit was tight so that it exaggerated my thinness. Sally
came out from a room near mine in a skin-tight two-piece. She was
as skinny as me. She hadn’t developed even the hint of hips or
breasts.
“What are you doing?” she asked and came
close, looking at my reflection in the mirror and placing her hand
on my lower back.
“It’s so strange,” I whispered. “Yesterday I
was in one life, and I’m in another completely different one
today.”
She took my hand and dragged me away from
the mirror. “Come on,” she said, “put on some socks. You can skate
downstairs.”