by Kristin Bair
“Hi there, Interloper person.”
Too familiar.
“Howdy, Interloper.”
Too western.
“Hi.”
Too meek.
“Hello, Ms. Interloper.”
Too formal.
Screw it. She revs Coop’s engine, turns on her blinker, and pulls into traffic.
As she closes the distance between them, her heart bangs harder and louder than the Rocky beats. “Fear sharpens us,” she whispers. “Fear sharpens us.” When there are just two cars between her and the ne’er-do-well, the light turns red. The Interloper takes money from the car in the lead, plods past the next car whose window stays tightly sealed, and moves in Agatha’s direction. Agatha turns down the music.
She wants to wait and roll down the window, but how? How? This is too much. She is too scared. What was she thinking? When the young woman is right there, right outside her window, Agatha freezes with terror. The greasy hair, the chafed cheeks, the dim eyes. What horror is this monster about to unleash on Wallingford? Images of death and destruction whip through Agatha’s mind: a plague of locusts, an all-consuming fire, a nuclear bomb, a swarm of killer bees, catastrophic flooding, a bomb, poisoned water sources, rabid dogs, the reintroduction of dinosaurs. The irrational possibilities are endless.
Just as she is about to pass out, the light turns green and Agatha drives right past the Interloper, the dollar still gripped in her hand. She is so distraught she forgets to go straight and accidentally turns onto the highway heading north. “The highway! The highway! The highway!” her brain screams.
Agatha never turns onto the highway heading north. She is terrified of that highway. She is terrified of any highway. All highways. Those heading north. Those heading south. Heading west? Nope. East? No way. The speed. The blur. The trucks. As an eighteen-wheeler roars past, she swerves toward the barrier and thankfully away just before slamming into it, then she slows to a dangerous crawl, and creeps off the highway a mile down the road at the next exit. A bevy of cars tries to beep her to death.
By the time she pulls into her driveway and puts the car in park, she is soaked with sweat. “The Interloper almost killed me,” she thinks. “I could have died just now.”
She pulls Bear from his spot on the dashboard and presses him to her cheek. “Bear,” she groans, “what kind of nonsense are you selling me? Fear sharpens us? Fear sharpens us?” She shakes her head and lifts him to eye level so he can see how wrecked she is. “Fear does not sharpen us,” she says. “Fear weakens us. Plain and simple. Fear reduces us to the smallest reduction of the smallest reduction of the smallest reduction of ourselves.” She plucks a speck of dust from the cup holder and holds it up for him to see. “You see this, Bear Grylls? You see this speck? This wee speck is now bigger than me.”
She picks up the tissue box from the passenger seat and stuffs Bear headfirst through the slot. Only his brown-booted feet poke out. One boot forever marked by her teeth.
* * *
The next morning Agatha wakes to the beeping of her phone. It’s Balderdash. He was spotted crossing the road near town center last night. Unfortunately, Priya Devi reports, by the time she got stopped and out of her car, he was gone. On another day, in another week, in another year, this might have gone differently, but, Priya says, she’s hobbled by a surgical boot and a knee walker. Bunion surgery. The Moms sigh, grumble, offer condolences for the bunions, then cheer. Sure, Balderdash is still missing, but there’s hope. What was it badass Emily Dickinson wrote? “Hope is the thing with feathers.” In this case, it’s a hideous pup with drool and a single patch of fur, but still, hope. Balderdash is alive.
Agatha clicks through to the picture of Dustin and Jason lined up at the ice cream truck, right behind the Sheridan boys. It’s a good shot, taken just a few weeks ago, a shot that captures their essence, their verve, their humanness. Sure, they’re sweaty and goofing and Jason is pointing at the picture of the ridiculously gross-tasting SpongeBob popsicle, his favorite, but Agatha can also see their hearts, their joy. She remembers the moment she snapped it, then the moment she texted it to Dax. He’d sent back two red hearts, one for each boy.
She presses her hand to her chest and assesses the status of her own heart.
Still beating?
Yes.
Still aching?
Oh yes.
Still in there?
Just barely.
How long has it been since the shed incident? Two hours? Two weeks? Two years? Two decades? Two lifetimes?
* * *
The boys shove through the basement door. Each is holding one side of the enormous clock that Agatha had hidden behind the old coal furnace.
“Mom? What’s this doing downstairs?”
Agatha sighs. “What are you doing down behind the old furnace?”
“Playing hide and seek.”
“Well, don’t.” She glances at the large wall behind them. It’s weirdly empty.
They glance, too.
“Why did you take it down? You love this clock.”
Tick tock.
“I do not. It’s too loud. Listen to it.”
“Since when?” Dustin says.
“Since I decided it was too loud.”
Tick tock.
“Dad gave you this clock,” Jason says. “Remember? He said it was because you guys always have the time of your life together.”
“Dad isn’t here anymore.”
The three of them look at the clock, and the boys turn back to the basement door as if they’d figured out a great mystery. “Oh,” Dustin says. “I get it. Come on, Jason.” He opens the door and they wrestle the beast back down the stairs.
* * *
In an eensy-weensy garden in her brain, Agatha Arch is not afraid of anything. In this garden, she is Bear Grylls. Brave, ballsy, strong-jawed, covered with dirt, and not giving a shit. In this garden, she cartwheels through life with gusto and laughs off the FB Moms who invite her to play Candy Crush instead of taking them to task. In this garden, Agatha Arch jaywalks and speeds and sleeps at night without the lights on. She drives on the highway for miles and miles in any direction with the windows down. For Big Papi’s sake, she doesn’t even wash grapes before eating them. When she walks down the street, people, even HP Poston, gawk, point, and growl, “Fearless, that one. Look at her go.”
But Agatha lives in the world, the real world, so when a 2 AM infomercial ignites an obsession about what to do if she ever plunges her car into a lake, pond, ocean, or, god forbid, humongous puddle left on the side of the road by a nor’easter, she does what anyone would do. She buys three of those special hammers that will slice her seat belt and shatter her car windows.
“I’m prepping for any and all disasters,” she tells Shrinky-Dink at her next appointment. Remembering how quickly Shrinky-Dink pulled the sewing kit from the drawer to help remove her splinters, she’s sure she’ll be impressed. “Do you have one of these in your car?” As if they’d agreed to a game of show-and-tell, she pulls one of the hammers from the pocket of her spy pants and holds it up.
“No,” Shrinky-Dink says. “I don’t.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“The likelihood of ever needing one is too infinitesimal for me to worry about.”
Agatha glares at Shrinky-Dink’s bravado, shoots disdain and envy at her with her eyeballs. “Well, this one is the best of the best.”
“What makes it the best of the best?”
“It has dual steel hammerheads that can shatter side and rear windows with a quick bang-bang.” She whips the hammer back and forth to demonstrate.
“I see.”
“And if you shut off the light, I will show you that this pin right here,” she points to a pin in the center of the hammer, “actually glows in the dark. I’ll be able to find this thing even if I plunge to the bottom of the ocean.” Agatha reaches for the light switch.
Shrinky-Dink shakes her hea
d.
Agatha shrugs and drops her hand. “Take my word for it. It glows.”
“Does it fix broken hearts?”
“Excuse me?” Agatha will not meet Shrinky-Dink’s eyes.
“Broken hearts. Does this particular model fix them?”
“The literature doesn’t mention it.”
“Does it mention how to actually deal with fear as opposed to spending money on objects you’ll never be able to operate at the bottom of the ocean?”
“It assuages fear.”
“Really?”
Agatha grunts and cradles the hammer in her lap. She and Shrinky-Dink sit in silence for the remaining three minutes of the session.
When Agatha gets to her car, she pulls the product pamphlet from the glove box. “Once your seat belt is cut and your car window is shattered,” she reads out loud, “you can slip out the window, and, like a mermaid, swim to safety.” The pamphlet actually says “like a mermaid.” Three words that manage to transform the terrifying experience of plunging to the depths into something magical. And these three words are the real and true reason she bought this particular hammer.
“Like a mermaid.”
She didn’t buy it for the dual steel hammerheads or the glow-in-the-dark pin. Not really. She bought it because by using it, she has been promised that she might momentarily be as carefree and intrepid as a mermaid. For someone who fears the world, this seems like a lovely option.
Chapter Twelve
Agatha jams her right foot on the first step. “Go up!” she commands. “Go up!” There’s no one to hear her. She smacks her own arm. “Now!” She makes it to the second step.
The boys are at school. Dax is fluffing about somewhere with his new hussy, probably wearing a shirt with ducklings on it.
She reads the note on the blue sticky. FEAR SHARPENS US. She chants the line over and over. “Fear sharpens us. Fear sharpens us. Fear sharpens us.” If she repeats it a million times, will it work? Will she be sharper? Fearless?
Repetition hasn’t worked with the boys.
Pick up your underwear.
Clean your room.
Comb your hair.
Flush the toilet.
Close the door behind you.
Don’t pee on the floor.
Say thank you.
Drink more milk.
Get the mail.
If you pee on the floor, wipe it up.
Eat your grapes.
Don’t hit your brother on the head with your shoe.
Do your homework.
Read a book.
Don’t hit your brother with the bat.
If you pee on the floor and wipe it up, throw the tissue in the trash.
Over and over she delivers these lines, these bits of wisdom, these lessons of life, yet the boys do none of these things, despite her efforts, despite the repetition.
She studies the red door eleven steps up. She’d painted it herself. Welcome, a red door says. You are safe here. Bye-bye, evil spirits.
Who is she kidding? She knows she’ll never be sharp. Fearless. She’ll never again make it up those stairs to that red door, to the desk that Dax built. It will gather dust for decades, centuries, millennia, then disintegrate. Perhaps, if luck is a real thing, its bones will be discovered by the same archaeological team that discovers the mammoth clock behind the old coal furnace in the basement.
Yet she tries.
“Fear sharpens us.” She says it in a British accent.
Then a Russian accent.
Then Texan. Yee ha!
She tries it as an Irish lass.
Aussie.
Boston.
Godfather gangster.
Indian.
Scottish.
Frenchie.
She raises her left foot to the third step, but lowers it again. She can’t. She lifts Bear from his perch on the step until they’re at eye level. “I’m unworthy,” she whispers. Then she tucks him back into her pocket. He shouldn’t have to witness such cowardice.
* * *
The boys are home when the UPS guy delivers the Etsy package, and while they chuckle at his nerdy way-too-high brown socks, Agatha hides the package on a shelf in the kitchen and goes the whole day nervous and excited about opening it. When they finally tumble into bed, fresh and soap-smelling from the commanded bath and still guffawing about who knows what, it’s 9 PM, and Agatha cherishes a thank-god-they’re-asleep-but-what-marvelous-boys moment, retrieves the package, then, with hands shaking, peels back the plain brown paper, unties a black silk bow, then rips through the hot-pink tissue paper with black handheld mirrors stamped all over it. Inside the box, the reflection dolls look astonishingly like Agatha’s estranged husband and his lover. Dax’s hair, or lack of hair, is precise, as are the shape of his head, his ears, and the unusual way in which his nostrils ripple. His belly is a bit smaller than in person, but that depends on the week. His mouth is curled in the “I care, I really do” expression that she’d believed in all those years. It hurts to look at him. The GDOG doll is as beautiful as the real thing, blond hair pulled into a messy bun, a sweet nub of nose, and the longest eyelashes ever seen on a human being. The buttocks don’t quite compare, but, to be fair, the glorious grapefruits weren’t featured in the photo.
The attached card reads, “a reflection of those you love (or those you don’t).” There is no mention of jabbing a pin into your doll’s derriere, wrenching its arm, stepping on its shoulder, pulling individual hairs from its head, dropping it into a vat of boiling oil, or sticking grains of rice up its nostrils, but Agatha takes the reference to “those you don’t” as a subliminal nod to the possibilities.
She moves outside to the porch, a doll in each hand, and watches the moon, then counts the woodpecker’s roundish holes. Eight.
There, in the dark, the woodpecker is diligently starting a ninth.
Tap tap tippity-tap.
Do all woodpeckers peck at night?
“Fothermucking bird.” She sits, puts Dax and GDOG on her lap, then checks the Moms group on her phone.
Melody Whelan:
“Moms, I’m pulling together care bags for the young woman at Apple54. Let me know if you’d like to contribute.”
The Moms are on it. With summer over (thank god!), kids back in school, and time their own again, the Moms are up for a good charity case. Responses fly fast and furious, but only after a Wallingford dad airs his frustration.
David Watkins:
“Melody, you know very well there are fathers in this group, too. Wonderful, nurturing fathers. The exclusive address to ‘Moms’ is offensive.”
Oh, for Big Papi’s sake. Equity and inclusion. This is David’s life quest. Everyone has one. Everyone is born with one. Some forget theirs by the time they can walk; others by the time they start school; others by the first time they have sex. Some never know theirs; some, like David, never forget.
Agatha Arch:
“Go play on your own Ferris wheel, Davy Crockett.”
Melody Whelan:
“Apologies, David. I was distracted by the young woman at Apple54. I typed too quickly.”
David Watkins:
“Thanks, Melody. And, Agatha, this is my Ferris wheel. I’m pointing out—for the millionth time—this is a communal space for mothers and fathers.”
Agatha Arch:
David Watkins:
Agatha respects David’s prowess, as well as his willingness to go head to head with her, master of emoji war. She revs her thumbs and scrolls through her well-built collection.
Agatha Arch:
Take that.
The long pause before David’s response indicates he is searching an emoji database bigger than he is used to. He is stretching, growing for this exchange, and, once again, Agatha is impressed. Others would have folded and resorted to words. Or bowed out. Not David. He is a worthy opponent.
David Watkins:
Symbolism. Agatha nods approvingly. He’s good. So good that for a brief moment she t
hinks that maybe she should welcome him into the Moms group. Not all men, mind you. But David. That might be okay. “Maybe I should rally for a name change,” she thinks. “‘The Parents’ would be a shit name. No music at all. But ‘The Guardians’? Yes, yes, ‘The Guardians’ is kind of fun. Rather rock-bandish, if you will.”
She is running out of time. The longer she engages in an emoji war, the closer the Interloper gets to destroying the world. Agatha does what she has to do.
Agatha Arch:
This is it. David doesn’t fight back. He’s clearly a man who knows when he’s lost. He goes quiet. And then:
David Watkins:
The end. Agatha wins. And not once during this exchange does it cross her mind that she is a grown woman fighting a grown man with a series of wee cartoon pictures. Not once does she think, “Wow, this is classic preschool behavior.” She is so into the fight, she can’t even see the inanity.
Besides, she wins.
High Priestess Poston:
“Melody, if I can draw us back to the subject at hand, what kinds of items do you want in the bags?”
Melody Whelan:
“Self-care items. Nonperishable food (light-weight, as I’m not sure how far she has to carry the bag). Maybe a shirt or a pair of pants.”
Wanda Watson:
“Self-care items?”
Watson is not the brightest bulb on the string of chili pepper patio lights.
Melody Whelan:
“Soap. Shampoo. A washcloth. Deodorant. Small items that help you take care of yourself.”
Agatha Arch:
High Priestess:
“Should we drop the items at your house, Melody?”
Melody Whelan:
“Yes, Jane, please. If I’m not home, you can leave a bag at the door or, if small, in the mailbox. I live at 164 North Circle Street.”