“No,” he said, and then he added, “My dad is Nathan. Why?”
“Do you know Duke Templeton?”
“Yeah, he’s my grandfather,” he said. And he did not ask why.
That is when I knew all I needed to know, so I let him out of the bathroom, turned, and went back to my class.
“I don’t get it,” Nellie says, which she does not need to because it is obvious. “River is a weird name for a boy.”
“Not River.” Kyle R. looks and sounds scrunched-up which means exasperated. “Templeton. Like Duke Templeton.”
Nellie’s face stills shows confused.
Nellie is usually confused—that would be rude for me to say out loud, but it is okay for me to think because it is just a true fact—so she might not be smart enough to know who Duke Templeton is, but she might also never have been told. Lots of Bourne parents do not tell their children what happened because it is hard to say to your baby girl, “Baby girl, you are real dumb. It is not your fault, but it also cannot be changed,” and it is also hard to say to your baby girl, “We needed the jobs so we did not mind for a while that we were all being poisoned.” A lot of parents never told their children what happened. They did not want them to know, or maybe they just did not want to talk about it.
As a contrast, my mother has talked about it every day for the sixteen years I have known her which is my whole life. She has shown me and my sisters her notes for the lawsuit so many times that when the grandson of Duke Templeton walks out of the boys’ bathroom at Bourne Memorial High School seventeen years after what happened happened, I recognize him in the blink of an eye without even meeting his.
My mother calls Duke Templeton the AIC of Belsum Chemical which stands for Asshole in Chief, and this is probably accurate but technically wrong because really Duke Templeton is the president and CEO.
“You know that abandoned plant on the other side of Bluebell Park?” I say to Nellie.
She shakes her head no even though it is the biggest building in all of Bourne, and she has driven by it at least 11,680 times which is twice a day for sixteen years, and since her birthday was in May, that is an underestimate.
“There is an abandoned plant on the other side of Bluebell Park,” I begin again. “It belongs to Belsum Chemical. They turned the water smelly and brown and said it was still okay to drink, and then they turned the water very bright green and said it was not okay to drink after all or even use or even be near, but by then it was too late.”
“Wow,” Nellie says, “I don’t remember that.”
“Because you were not born yet.”
“Oh.” She frowns. “Did they say sorry?”
“They said sorry like when you punch your sister, and she yelps, and you are glad it hurt her because she is annoying, but your mom says say sorry, so you say sorry, but you do not really care, and she knows it.”
“I don’t have a sister,” Nellie says.
“They said sorry, but they did not mean sorry,” I clarify.
“How do you know?”
“I know they did not mean sorry because they did not do anything to make it better.”
“What did they do?” Nellie asks.
“They left,” I say. “They did not do anything.”
She thinks about it. “Except send you their grandson.”
Nellie probably does not understand what she means, but this is a good point. Mab said who he was, but Mab did not say the most important things which are what is River Templeton doing at Bourne Memorial High School and why is he living in my library. It does not seem possible that Belsum Chemical sent their grandson to live with us. But I cannot think of a thing which does seem possible instead.
* * *
After-school tutoring is canceled because, Mrs. Radcliffe says, “What with everything.” I do not know what her words mean, but what her actions mean is Mab can leave school with me. On the way home, we stop at her friend Pooh Lewis’s apartment because even though Pooh Lewis’s eyes work, her legs do not, which means it is not accurate to say she cannot read without a reader (Mab), but it is accurate to say she cannot read without a librarian (me) because Pooh can read but only if there is a book already in her home.
I have chosen for her a book about King Philip II of Spain because King Philip II of Spain had a wheelchair, even though it was the 1590s and even though really he could walk if he wanted to, and that makes him a good subject for Pooh who also uses a wheelchair and also was born a long time ago and also can read without help but pretends she cannot.
But before I can give the good news about the book, Mab opens Pooh’s front door and calls in, very loud and happy about it, “You were wrong.”
“So what else is new?” says Pooh Lewis. I look at her face to see if she is mad or sad about being called wrong, but she does not look like she minds. “About what?”
Mab tells her about the moving vans at my library and how there was a new student at school and how that new student’s name is River Templeton.
Pooh Lewis says, “Oh!” She claps her hand over her mouth which means surprise or shock, but I can see under her hand that she is smiling which means happy which is weird. When she stops smiling and holding her mouth, I think she will ask what is he doing here or what does it mean that River Templeton has moved to Bourne or what happened when he was introduced at school. But instead she says, “So! What does he look like?”
“That’s what you were wrong about.” Mab is bouncing a little bit. “When you said real life isn’t like the movies anywhere? He looks just like a movie star. It is exactly like the movies out there.”
Pooh Lewis makes a noise like a squeal and claps her hands. “That handsome?”
“Not handsome. More like…” Mab does not finish saying what she is saying.
“What? What?” Pooh is very impatient. I know how she feels.
Mab says, “Well lit.”
Pooh says, “Well lit?” because she does not understand what Mab means which makes me feel better because I also do not understand what Mab means.
“Glowing like,” Mab says. “Shiny.”
“Greasy?” Pooh is guessing because Mab does not make sense. “Radioactive?”
“Healthy,” Mab says. “Whole.”
“Ahh,” Pooh says to show she understands. “Well, sure. He must be rich.”
Which makes me feel glad to have something to contribute to the conversation. “It is not accurate to ascribe a correlative relationship between being rich and being pretty,” I inform them. Mr. Beechman is very big on the difference between correlation and causation.
“I don’t know what that means, honey,” Pooh Lewis says, “but being rich has everything to do with being pretty.”
“There are many ugly rich people,” I point out.
“Name one,” Pooh Lewis says.
I cannot name one, but I cannot name any rich people, ugly or pretty.
Pooh Lewis says, “If you have money, you can get your hair curled or straightened, darkened or bleached, thickened or removed. You can get the fat taken off your ass to fill in your wrinkles. You can get your teeth pushed in if they’re pushing out, straightened if they’re crooked, whitened if they’re beige. Clothes, nails, shoes, jewelry.” She waves all up and down herself. “You can replace the whole damn thing if you have enough money.”
This is a weird thing to think about. I do not have any money. But if I did, there are a lot of other things I would do with it.
But Mab is not thinking about that. “He’s sixteen,” she says.
Pooh Lewis snorts like a horse. “You’d be surprised what rich people let their kids do.”
But Mab is shaking her head no. “It’s more like he’s been … I don’t know—”
And Pooh Lewis fills in the end of her sentence. “Drinking clean water?”
I do not know what this has to do with being rich or being pretty or being River Templeton, but Mab’s eyes get big and Mab’s cheeks get red and Mab whispers a whisper and her whisper i
s this: “That’s it, Pooh. That’s what it is. That’s it exactly.”
I look at my sister’s face, but I cannot say if she is happy or surprised or mad. Mrs. Radcliffe says these are very different emotions, and it is easy to tell them apart if you remember to look. And even though happy, surprised, and mad are like the points of an equilateral triangle—all far apart from one another—I think Mab might be all three.
Three
“I’m never going to get to sleep.”
I knew she was awake still—Monday too—but I’m relieved to hear Mab’s voice in the dark.
“Muh,” I say. Me neither.
“It is not accurate to say you are never going to get to sleep,” Monday says, “because people who do not sleep go insane or die, and you are not insane or dead.”
“Not until they stop sleeping.” I don’t know why Mab bothers arguing with her. “So the fact that we are sane and alive now just means that we’ve slept in the past, not that we will in the future.”
This is the kind of logic Monday usually likes, but now it sends her into a panic.
“You cannot be insane or dead! How will I survive alone?”
Mab sighs. “One night’s not going to kill us.”
But Monday can’t take that chance. “Hush little baby do not you cry,” she sings. “Two is going to buy you a hook and eye.”
“That’s not right.” My Voice has that one saved because it applies in so many conversations.
“Please stop,” Mab begs, but she’s laughing, maybe at Monday for concluding all that stands between us and madness is a good night’s sleep and all that stands between us and a good night’s sleep is a lullaby. Or maybe at herself for imagining she can head off this lullaby before three more verses at least.
“And if that hook and eye will not hook, Two is going to let you borrow a book,” Monday sings in the third person. Actually, come to think of it, that song is always in the third person.
“It’s okay to be worried”—my Voice has this one saved as well—“but there is no immediate cause for concern.”
“And if that book is overdue, Two is going to hit you with her shoe.”
“And angry,” Mab adds. “It’s okay to be worried and angry—when we have such good reason to be worried and angry—without having our ears assaulted.”
“Because keeping books beyond their due date is not nice, therefore when you do you have to pay the price.”
“Truth or dare?” my Voice says, and Monday stops mid-inhale.
“I’m too tired,” Mab whines.
“Lie!” Monday declares. We have upped the Truth or Dare stakes by merging it with Two Truths and a Lie. “You just said you could not sleep.”
“Just because you can’t sleep doesn’t mean you’re not tired. When you can’t sleep you’re more tired.”
“Truth or dare, Mab?” my Voice clarifies.
We play this game like comfort food, like other sisters drink mugs of cocoa or gorge themselves on mac and cheese and chocolate-chip cookies.
“Dare,” Mab tries, pointlessly.
“I dare you to stick your foot in the toilet.” My Voice has had that saved for years.
“Germs!” Monday shrieks. Every time. “I dare you to wash your feet in the bathtub with warm water and soap for at least one hundred and twenty seconds and then wash your hands that washed your feet for another one hundred and twenty seconds.”
So, “Truth.” Mab changes her mind. As she always must.
I type. “What did you think of River?”
“Asshole,” Mab says instantly.
I would like to say “asshole.” Saying “asshole” seems like it would make you feel better. Whereas typing it—or tapping the folder of curse words I’ve saved and titled “I Swear”—is completely unsatisfying. My Voice is such an asshole.
“Lie,” Monday pronounces.
“Truth,” my Voice insists.
“You did not even meet him, Three. He was nice.”
“Yeah, right,” says Mab.
“He was. He was polite. He was not angry I was blocking his way out of the bathroom even though there are many germs there. I would become alarmed if someone tried to trap me in a bathroom.”
“Duh,” I say, my one word you don’t need triplet-sense to understand.
“Plus he answered all of my questions.”
“Lie,” Mab says, and I giggle. “No one could ever answer all of your questions.”
“I am not playing right now,” Monday says. “I am making the point that River Templeton answered all my questions I asked him on the way out of the bathroom. And also he cannot be blamed because he was not even here when what happened happened because he was not alive yet.”
“Point,” I type.
“Exactly, Monday, that is the point. He wasn’t here. We were all here. We were all living with the consequences of what his family did. And where were they? Safely elsewhere. They protected themselves. They protected him. They kept their distance. And now look at him. He’s attractive, intelligent, fully mobile—”
“Truth or dare, Mab?” my Voice interrupts.
“It is my turn,” Monday says.
“Attractive?” my Voice presses Mab, but she ignores me.
Monday has turned on the light and is kneeling up in bed to look at herself in the mirror over the bureau. “I was born here, and I am attractive.”
“Lie.” The Voice is not great for comic timing, so it takes its opportunities when they come.
Monday knows she’s being teased, but Mab reassures her anyway. “It’s not that he’s attractive and we’re not. It’s that he’s whole.” And we’re not, she does not add. Does not need to add.
“Is the reason you said River Templeton is an asshole because he stole my library,” Monday asks, “and now I have to write a retraction postcard announcing that the library is not re-relocating to the library after all?”
I smile at Mab, and she smiles back. “Truth or dare?” she asks me.
“Truth.” It is my only option really.
“Is River Templeton an asshole because he stole Monday’s library”—Mab turns the light back off—“or is there another reason?”
I tap the picture of the adult woman. “Nora,” my Voice says but leaves the rest unspoken. What about her lawsuit? I shouldn’t say hers. She wouldn’t like it. It’s all of ours. It’s what she’s doing for us all, not “us all” her progeny, “us all” her entire town. This has been her obsession—you might say addiction—but also her solace for almost two decades. And though we don’t know what the Templetons’ reemergence into our lives means, we can be certain Nora will think it is very bad news.
We three lie in separate beds in the dark, considering our mother.
Finally Monday says, “Do me.”
“Truth or dare?” Mab asks, unnecessarily. Monday always chooses truth. For one thing, she’d rather die than stick her foot in a toilet. She might die if you tried to make her stick her foot in a toilet. But mostly, she thinks she’s incapable of telling a lie. This makes her feel like she’s winning the game.
“Truth.”
“What will we do when Mama finds out they’re back?”
“She cannot find out,” Monday says.
“Lie.” Mab sounds resigned, exhausted. “She’s going to find out.”
“It is not a lie, but it might be incorrect,” Monday admits. “It is more accurate to say we cannot be the ones to tell her.”
* * *
Monday tells her first thing the next morning. The coffee has not even cooled enough to sip before she blurts out, “We have a new student at school, and he is living in my library, and that means the library cannot move there, and that means my extra-large postcard was a lie, and his name is River Templeton, and his father is Nathan Templeton, and his grandfather is Duke Templeton, and it is not a different Duke Templeton but the exact same one.”
Nora’s expression passes from confusion to laughing because she’s sure she’s being teased to an
ger to horror, like a magician flipping over one card after another after another. She lands on the saddest face I’ve ever seen. “My Duke Templeton?” she whispers finally, the opposite of how Monday says “My library,” desperate to disavow ownership rather than claim it. She looks at Mab for confirmation because sometimes Monday doesn’t realize when someone’s kidding or lying or being sarcastic. Mab has to look away from our mother’s broken face, but she nods at her shoes.
Nora squeezes her earlobes for some reason then drops her hands to her chest. “Christ,” she says and doesn’t say anything more, and neither does anyone else until finally, what feels like an hour later, she says to, I guess, all of us, “Why?”
Mab shrugs, and Monday shrugs, and I make a motion with my hand that means what a shrug means. We do not know.
“They canceled tutoring” is all Mab can offer.
But Nora nods. “Like when someone dies.”
Mab and I exchange glances. It’s not that we don’t have the same question Nora does—Why?—it’s that that question is overwhelmed by the ones it presages. Nora is worried about what possible reason the Templetons have for being here. We are worried about our mother.
She sits, pale and not closing her mouth all the way. Her eyes are scary, somewhere else, like her mind is whirling away from us. She keeps shaking her head no, seeming about to speak, changing her mind. She leaves for work without another word.
But over scrambled eggs and summer squash for dinner, Nora is new, smile tight and bright, hopeful, which is not a thing we ever see her be, so it would be strange regardless. As it is, it’s alarming. Creepy. When she speaks, what she says, finally, beaming and to all three of us at once, is “You can find out.”
“What can we find out?” Monday asks, but I can see Mab feeling the same sinking feeling I am.
“The kid knows something,” Nora says. “Everything maybe. But maybe he doesn’t know he knows, or maybe he knows but he doesn’t know we don’t know, or he doesn’t know he isn’t supposed to know or isn’t supposed to tell.”
“I do not know,” Monday says. What our mother’s talking about, she means.
One Two Three Page 7