Say the Word

by Jeannine Garsee

  Trancelike, she asks, “Is that what you think of me?”

  Honestly? I don’t know what to think of her. Her or anyone else in this house.

  All I know is, in the past four months, my life has changed so much it hurts to breathe.

  78

  It takes me a couple of days to pry Schmule out of his room and away from his Wii. Yes, he’s speaking to me. But not to anyone else.

  Unsurprisingly, he’s being a pill.

  “I don’t want to go that stupid school and wear that stupid uniform.” He drills his red plastic spoon into his Dairy Queen sundae with the chocolate syrup and peanuts and a truckload of whipped cream. “Why can’t I stay at my old school? I was just getting used to it.”

  Because it’s a Hebrew school and Dad won’t stand for it? “You’ll get used to this one, too,” I promise lamely.

  “No, I won’t. It’s too late to make friends. I bet nobody talks to me.” He adds in an undertone, “You guys suck.”

  I wish I could say what I’m secretly thinking. That yes, we suck. That he has every right to be mad at us.

  Louder, he asks, “Why can’t I go to the same school as you?”

  “Because the waiting list is too long.” Six months to a year for the lower school. The fact that I, myself, have been there for twelve years didn’t cut any ice with the dean.

  I watch him duck his newly clipped head and slurp noisily from the dish. I’d like to take those clippers to the throat of that barber who whacked Schmule’s long, gorgeous curls right down to his scalp. I’m only surprised Schmule didn’t put up more of a fight when Dad insisted he get a decent haircut for his first day of school tomorrow.

  He sucks on a peanut, then spits it into the bowl. “Who’s gonna take me to school?”

  “Me. Klara will pick you up after.” For a hefty raise, of course.

  “I’m not wearing that crappy shirt,” he warns again.

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “Stripes are for prisoners. It looks like an Auschwitz uniform.”

  “Don’t say that in front of Klara. She lost relatives in the Holocaust.”

  A spark of interest. “Is she Jewish?”

  “No. But it wasn’t only Jews who died, you know.”

  “Reeeally?” Schmule drawls. “Duh. Who knew?”

  This is so not going the way I’d intended.

  “Are you finished?” I ask as he flicks a spoonful of soupy ice cream in my general direction. “Or do you just want to hang around and make a bigger mess?”

  Schmule drops the spoon on the floor and cracks it under the heel of his brand-new sneakers. “I want to go home.”

  “Well, let’s go, then.”

  By the time I realize what he means by “home,” it’s too late. Schmule, dodging tables, flies outside. I see him pound madly cross the street, against the light, and disappear in a flash.

  Damn, damn! Do I call 911? Dad? Julie? Who?

  I grab his coat, rush to my car, and circle the block frantically. Where the hell did he go? I can’t find him anywhere. Without a coat, he’ll probably freeze to death.

  The Dairy Queen is closer to Fran’s street than it is to mine. I cruise nervously past Rina’s house, terrified Fran will spot me and race after my car with a chain saw. I know he couldn’t have made it this far already. But what if Fran met him somewhere? What if they’d planned this whole thing? Whose idea had it been to go to DQ in the first place?

  Yours, you idiot.

  Swearing, I drive up and down nearby streets for twenty minutes. Finally I head home with a sense of dread, knowing Dad’ll find a way to blame me for whatever happens.

  I find Schmule, shivering at the back door.

  He came back! Why, when he had the chance to escape? He easily could’ve done it.

  Because he knows, I think grimly, we’d set the hounds on him in a second.

  “I don’t have a k-key,” he chatters through bluish lips.

  “That’s okay,” I say, limp with relief, though I’d like to choke his skinny neck. “I have an extra one you can have.”

  I unlock the door and hold out the key. Schmule flips it sharply out of my hand and it lands in the snowy bushes.

  “Keep it!” he snarls, and pushes ahead of me inside.

  79

  I jiggle on one foot as Schmule toys with the buttons of his shirt. “Do you want to be late again?”

  His fingers slow deliberately. “Ask me if I care.”

  It’s been exactly two weeks since Schmule Goodman officially became Samuel Gallagher.

  “I’m ready!” he screams in my ear. Charles wakes up in his wicker bed with a startled yip. Schmule pats his thigh, a signal for Charles to come. “C’mon, Charles! Go for a ride? Go for a ride?”

  “Stop teasing him,” I say as Charles dances excitedly. “I thought you liked Charles.”

  “I hate that ugly dog.”

  He saunters to the door. I grind my teeth. I have a huge, huge exam this morning on the vascular system. Twohig will not be happy if I fly in late yet again.

  Ten blocks from home, Schmule decides to mention, “I forgot my books.”

  “Well, you’ll just have to do without them.”

  “I can’t! Mr. Gorski will kill me!”

  “Schmule, I have a test”

  “I don’t care. Turn arou-ound!”

  Okay, deep breath. Hold it. Count to ten and slo-owly release. Executing a U-turn with amazing aplomb, I’m gunned down by flashing lights thirty seconds later. Here’s your ticket, thank you, have a good day, drive carefully.

  “Hee-hee,” Schmule titters as we pull back into traffic.

  “It’s not funny, Schmoo.”

  He giggles harder. My nerves are shot by the time I drop him off. Too shell-shocked to speed, I meander to school, park, and race to A&P. I’ve barely touched my trusty mechanical pencil to the paper when my cell phone vibrates. I ignore it at first—nobody calls me at school—but it buzzes and buzzes. When a perturbed Mary Therese Montgomery gives me a dirty look, I break down and peek under the table: Dad’s office.

  I raise my hand. “Can I be excused?”

  Displeased, Mr. Twohig asks, “Running on warp speed today, are we? Did you finish the test?”

  “No, but it’s an emergency.”

  “Are you ill?”

  “No, but—”

  “Finish your exam and then you may be excused.”

  Ignoring Devon’s infantile snicker, I scribble through the exam, praying I’m right about the differences between lymphocytes and erythrocytes. What if Nonny had a heart attack dragging Poppy to the toilet? I fling my test at Mr. Twohig, duck into a restroom, and punch in Dad’s number.

  His secretary answers. “What took you so long?”

  “I’m in school!”

  “Well, your father needs you to pick your brother up.”

  “Why? I just dropped him off.”

  “I don’t know, but it’s an emergency. Your father’s tied up.”

  I explain at the school office. Of course they let me go. I, Shawna Gallagher, would never skip out without a good reason.

  At Schmule’s school, I find him in the principal’s office. He sits quietly in a chair, hands folded on his navy blue Dockers. Blood splatters the front of his Auschwitz shirt.

  “What happened?” I shriek.

  The principal, with gray goatee and furry black toupee, asks for ID. “I’m his sister,” I say as I hand him my driver’s license.

  “No, she’s not.” Schmule, unhelpfully, addresses the wall.

  “Sam,” the principal says, “you may wait outside.” Schmule, with a poisonous glare in my direction, slides off the bench and marches out.

  If I were in a better mood, I’d laugh at the principal’s name: Mr. Dickerhoof. “Did he get into a fight?”

  He studies me over laced fingers. “Not exactly. What started all this is that Sam referred to his teacher as a Nazi. In fact, he repeated it several times.”

  Maybe
it’s the shirt? Maybe he’s role-playing? “Why?”

  “I have no idea. According to Mr. Gorski it was completely unprovoked.”

  “Then who hit him in the nose?”

  “Sam did that to himself.”

  The word “bullshit” nearly escapes my lips.

  “When Mr. Gorski confronted him, Sam deliberately slammed his face into his desk.”

  “Why?” I ask around my bucking esophagus.

  “Good question. I’m very concerned. I do understand the circumstances, however. And I know it’s a difficult time for Sam. So, for that reason, I won’t be taking any disciplinary action at this time.”

  “Disciplinary action for what? For smashing his own face?”

  His furry black toupee quivers. “No, for what he said to Mr. Gorski. Now, you may take him home today to give him a bit of a break. But I’ll need your father to contact me personally.”

  Good luck, Dickerhoof.

  In the car, I face Schmule. “Okay, I give up. Why’d you call him a Nazi?”

  Schmule kicks the glove compartment. I remember Arye doing the same thing. “I didn’t call him a Nazi.”

  “Your principal said you did.”

  “So who you gonna believe, me or him?”

  “Well, what did you say?”

  Schmule blows out a mouthful of air and picks at a bloodstain on his shirt. “Okay, so like, the whole class is acting up, right? And Gorski goes, ‘You guys start behaving or you’re all staying after school!’ And I go, ‘You can’t do that, that’s a Nazi tactic.’ He’s like, huh? So I tell him about prisoners in the death camps. Like when they did something, like refused to work, the guards would beat up a whole bunch of ’em. And that’s true,” he adds defiantly.

  “I’m not arguing, Schmoo. But why’d you hit your nose?”

  “Because Mr. Gorski says you can’t compare school to a Nazi death camp. And I’m like, well, pain is pain, right? And it’s not fair to make people suffer for what other people do. So he goes, ‘This isn’t pain, this is school. You guys are, like, ten years old. Wait’ll you grow up, blah, blah, and find out what real pain is.’ So that’s when I rammed my face into my desk. To show him I already do.”

  I’d like to turn this car around, march back to that school, and slam Mr. Gorski into a desk.

  Instead, I say, with caution, “Schmule, you can’t do stuff like that. People’ll think you’re . ..”

  “Yeah, I know. Crazy.” He scratches harder at the dried blood dotting his shirt, then blows on his fingertips. “You know what they did to crazy people during the Holocaust?”

  “Yes, they murdered them.”

  Schmule nods. “Maybe they had the right idea.”

  80

  I barge into Dad’s office after Schmule goes to bed, to talk to him about Schmule and how worried I am—and Dad says, barely tearing his eyes from his computer, “I’m on it, Shawna. I spoke to his principal this afternoon.”

  “You’re on it?”

  “I am. I made an appointment for him for tomorrow morning.”

  “What appointment?”

  “A psychiatrist. Isn’t that what you’re getting at?”

  Half-relieved, half-outraged, I ask, “Oh, do you want me to cut school tomorrow and take him to that, too?”

  “No. I have it covered.”

  “I was in the middle of an exam when your secretary called me.”

  “And I was in the middle of monitoring a very sick patient! Am I supposed to drop what I’m doing every time my child acts up in school?” Dad swings around in his enormous leather chair to lacerate me with a glare. “In case you haven’t noticed, our family has changed. The universe no longer revolves entirely around you.”

  “No,” I spit out. “It revolves around you and Schmule.” I dare him to argue.

  All he says, quite calmly, is, “Jealousy doesn’t become you,” and wheels back to his keyboard. “I said I have it covered, and I do. Now, do you mind?” Tap, tap, tap. “I need to finish something here.”

  That J word again. Well, why not? I mean, Dad does a lot of things for Schmule that he’s never done for me. Gifts. Outings. Extravagant spending sprees. Dad’s never bought me a present for no reason in my life. He never suggests we go anywhere, not even out to dinner. Unless something needs to be done, or I screw up somehow, he pays no attention to me.

  But when Schmule walks into a room, Dad falls all over himself.

  Am I jealous? Maybe a bit. But one thing I know—I’d never change places with Schmule.

  “He misses Fran,” I tell him.

  “I’m sure he does.” Tap, tap, tap-tap-tap. . .

  “So, maybe we could let him visit her sometime?” Tap, tap. “Dad?”

  The tapping slows almost imperceptibly. “I heard you, Shawna.”

  “I mean, did the judge, or whoever, order visits or something? You know, so Schmule can keep in touch with them—”

  Chair wheels grind savagely into the carpet. “Are you out of your mind? That woman has no legal right to my son what-so-ev-er.” Each syllable splinters the air. “Of course she asked for visitation. I said no, Weiss said no, and the judge agreed. She’s free to appeal. End of story.”

  “But don’t you think it’d be better if Schmule could see her?”

  “Don’t be stupid, Shawna. Sa-am”—he deliberately draws out the name to remind me—”is better off without her. He’ll be fine. Now drop it!”

  You know that expression “I was so mad I saw red”?

  I see it now. Pure red, burning and visceral, like buckets of fresh blood splashed across my vision. “I am so—sick—of you calling me stupid all the time!”

  The chair spins, but I’m gone before he leaps up. I rush upstairs on thundering soles, imagining the heat of his fury scorching my back. I slam my door as hard as humanly possible.

  Your dad doesn’t listen to half of what he says. He’s bitter, Shawna. Bitter and unlovable.

  I try not to listen, but I can’t block out her voice.

  Lucky you. In a couple months you’ll graduate and then you’ll be out of that house. Med school, art school—it makes no difference. Just get the hell out of there and never go back.

  Like you did, Mom?

  No answer.

  “Did you love him?” I croak out loud.

  Do you? she asks.

  81

  The psychiatrist, Dr. Silverberg, says Schmule’s depressed. Give the dude an award for Most Brilliant Observation of the Millennium.

  Schmule barely eats. Klara can’t prepare his favorite foods because he won’t tell her what they are. Then I wonder if it’s the kosher thing, but there’s not much I can do about that.

  Aside from school, he spends every waking moment playing video games. He speaks when he’s spoken to. Sometimes not even then. He’s marginally polite to Nonny, outright rude to Aunt Colleen—can’t blame him for that—and barely civil to poor Uncle Dieter.

  He likes Poppy, though. When I take him along to babysit, he’ll sit with Poppy for hours watching history and science shows. Funny, but I swear they share a kind of mental telepathy. When Schmule gets up to leave, Poppy grows so agitated he rattles his whole wheelchair. When Schmule hugs him good-bye, he settles back down, but he won’t take his eyes off Schmule till the door closes behind us.

  Schmule’s shrink appointments are on Tuesday evenings. Because Dad never knows when he’ll have to work late, I’ve been elected to drive him there and back. Tonight Schmule storms out, red-faced, after his session. He won’t say what upset him. Neither will Dr. Silverberg, thanks to confidentially laws. I bet he’d tell Dad fast enough if he thought he might not get paid.

  “It’s private,” Schmule grumbles in the car. “It’s none of your business. And I’m not going back there.”

  “You have to go back. Dad’ll have a cow.”

  “Let him.” He blows an impressive five-second raspberry. “Maybe I’ll just run away.”

  “Don’t say that,” I say nervously. “I’d
be sad if you left.”

  This he ignores. “I could go to Jerusalem, maybe, and live with Arye’s dad.”

  “Arye’s dad’s in Jerusalem?” I know when Mom and Fran first moved in together, Arye lived with his dad. I never asked, or cared, how he ended up back with Fran.

  “Yeah, he’s writing a book or something.” Impatiently, Schmule persists, “I could do it, ya know. I know some Hebrew. Well, sayings and stuff.”

  “Really? Like what?”

  “Ein Somshin Al Haness.”

  “And that means—?”

  “‘Don’t hope for any miracles.’”

  To distract him from his running-away idea, not that I think he’ll get as far as Israel, I ask, “Do you want to stop at the mall and get some ice cream?”

  “I don’t care. Beats going back there.” Meaning home, of course.

  At the mall we load up with treats—a giant chocolate cone for Schmule, a soy mango shake for me—and sit on opposite ends of a bench. Schmule swirls ice cream with his tongue as he watches a group of kids line up for a chance to bungee jump, right in the center of the mall. Creamy brown rivulets drip through his fingers. He licks his messy hands, daring me to challenge his manners.

  “Gross” is my only comment.

  Schmule’s eyes widen. He gestures broadly with his cone. “Hey, look! There’s your friend.”

  LeeLee waves from her perch by the marble fountain. With her are Rosemary Wong, Jonas Dunn, and a couple people I don’t recognize. Definitely not from Wade Prep.

  She lopes over alone and rubs Schmule’s buzzed head. “Yo, chico. Remember me?”

  “You’re Tovah’s girlfriend.”

  I take a quick suck of my soy shake, cringing with brain freeze. I hope, someday soon, I’ll get used to hearing that.

  “So how ya doing, Schmoo?”

  Schmule studies what’s left of his dripping cone. “I’m clinically depressed. I might have a borderline personality disorder, too, with, um, suicide ideations. But no suicidal impulses.”

  I spit out my straw and shriek, “Did that doctor tell you that?”

  “Nah-h.” He stares longingly at the death-defying teenagers waiting their turn to be dropped from the ceiling. “Poppy and I watched a special on mental illness. I kinda diagnosed myself.”