Educating Simon

by Robin Reardon

  I was breathing hard through my nose, all those things I’d been dying to say strewn about the floor.

  He blinked again, that soft gesture. “Have you said all this to her? Those alternatives?”

  “Oh, trust me, there’s nothing left unmentioned.”

  “And what did she tell you were the reasons?”

  “All she said was that we’re doing it. There are no reasons. ‘Because, ’ that’s why.”

  “You’re sure?” Something in his voice told me this was not a surprise to him, that he was merely verifying the information.

  “Look, I don’t know where you’re going with this—”

  “I think you deserve to understand what’s behind our decisions. I know your mother’s been reluctant to tell you, and she has her reasons, but I think you need to hear everything.” He gestured towards the stairs. “Please. Let’s go where we can talk together, all three of us.”

  He had my attention; that was certain. He seemed to think there were things I didn’t know about this horror show, things I needed to know, things Mum had kept from me. That is, more things she’d kept from me. Wary though I was, curiosity got the better of me. I followed him downstairs to the sitting room and settled into my favourite chair, a big, overstuffed thing that we will no doubt leave behind. Legs tucked under me, huddled into this giant lap for comfort and protection, I waited whilst BM went to fetch Mum from the kitchen. I heard a teacup settle onto its saucer, and then a short, nearly whispered conversation.

  “Em, it’s time. We need to let him know the whole story.”

  “Brian—”

  “Em.” His calm voice took on—not an edge, exactly. It was a tone of finality.

  “No, listen. I was going to tell him. That’s why I followed him upstairs earlier.”

  “Then let’s tell him now.”

  When Mum appeared, she looked almost meek. I couldn’t make any sense out of it. They sat side by side on the couch, and BM took Mum’s hand. It was an odd moment for this, but I took a good look at her for the first time in quite a while. She had more grey than I remembered, shot through her wavy auburn hair. It was pulled back rather severely at the moment, but at more relaxed times it flowed about her shoulders. As it was now, it exposed and perhaps even exaggerated small wrinkles I hadn’t noticed. I’ve always known she was older than my dad, but only by four years. She’s forty-six now, and my guess is that BM is about the same age.

  I watched, and waited, whilst they settled. He looked at her, like it was her job to tell me the “whole story,” but she kept her eyes on their clasped hands. So he turned to me.

  “You know that I’m divorced.” I nodded. “What you don’t know is why. It has to do with my daughter. Persie has Asperger syndrome, which is a form of autism. I encourage you to look it up so you can understand more about it.”

  He stopped, no doubt to see if I had any questions. What was going through my mind was that this explained the way Persie looked in the photo I had seen.

  “My ex-wife had a very hard time dealing with it. A very hard time. She decided to leave me, and Persie, two years ago. Persie . . . well, she needs a lot of care. She is not what they call high-functioning, although a lot of people with AS manage to deal well with the rest of society. I can afford to provide her with the care she needs, but moving her anywhere would probably send her into a catatonic state. People with AS and related issues usually don’t handle change well. So that explains why she and I can’t move to London.”

  This was definitely news to me. But Mum must have known. I risked a glance at her, but she was still staring down at her hands, and what I could see of her face told me that something about what BM had said was upsetting for her, which puzzled me. I mean, sure, it’s a sad thing to have your child be like that (whatever “that” means; I will look this thing up), but it’s not her child.

  I looked at BM, since he was the one with all the answers. “Why is this the first I’m hearing about this?”

  BM glanced towards Mum. “Em, I think you should explain about Clive.”

  I couldn’t help asking. “Who’s Clive?”

  It was obvious, even to me, that it took a huge effort, but Mum sat up straight. She looked at me and said, “My younger brother. You never knew him. You never knew of him, even. I wasn’t planning to have any children, because I was afraid of having a child like him. A child with autism. It’s more common in boys, and when I found out you were a boy, I was terrified. I didn’t want you to be like him.”

  She took another half-minute or so to collect herself, and I used the time to try and wrap my mind around what she was telling me. She’d said he was her brother. “What happened to him?”

  Her answer was more of a story, and she ploughed forwards with it as though a pause would make it impossible for her to continue.

  “He was three years younger than I was. Because of his autism, he was a burden to my parents and an embarrassment to me. I didn’t want to have friends over, and I loathed being seen in public with him. I never understood how to act around him, and it seemed like every day I’d do or say something to set him off. One day when I was thirteen, our parents went out together for maybe half an hour, leaving him in my care. Something upset him, as usual. He locked himself in his room, and I just left him in there, relieved not to have to deal with him. When my parents came home, my father had to break down the locked door. Clive was facedown on his bed, nose buried in his pillow. He’d stopped breathing, or he’d suffocated. He was dead.” Her breath caught, and it was several seconds before she could finish. “I remember feeling incredibly relieved.”

  BM handed her a tissue, and she blew her nose. “I didn’t tell your father about Clive before we married. It wasn’t until I was pregnant with you and found out you were a boy that it all came out, because I was so afraid for you. And I was so very ashamed.”

  A really nasty thought occurred to me at this point. I ground my teeth to try and keep it from escaping, but it got out anyway. “So you married him,” I tilted my head towards BM, “out of guilt?”

  Suddenly she was all composure. “Since you have raised this question, I married Brian because I love him, because he loves me. I am no longer the confused girl who couldn’t face her brother’s condition. In fact, now I know that not only can I face this challenge, but I actually welcome it.”

  “You still get freaked out by locked doors. Do you really think being Persie’s stepmum will make up for Clive? And even if it can, this purging pilgrimage can’t wait a year? You’re dragging me into this mess right now because . . . ?”

  BM’s voice surprised me. “That’s quite a sharp tongue you have, Simon.”

  Quick as a flash, I said, “It is. And the worse my life gets, the sharper it will be. Get used to it, or let me stay where I belong.”

  For the first time since I’d met him, I saw a flash of anger on BM’s face. And he was not the only one struck by what I’d said. It’s true, I’ve always had a bit of an acerbic quality to my personality, but the last few things I’d said were over the top, even for me. It came from desperation. There was a headiness about it that made me feel a little dizzy.

  Mum leaned forwards. “Simon, I’m sorry I waited so long to tell you about Clive and about Persie’s situation. It’s just that you were already so angry with me that I was trying to ration out how many things I told you at once. And not having told you about Persie, I tried to find a way to explain about Tink that would give me a little more time.”

  It would have been decidedly unwise to say anything that smacked of intolerance for dear Persie, but I decided to play a certain card one more time. “You haven’t answered my question. Why now?”

  BM interjected. “Your mother and I can’t spend the next year travelling back and forth to visit with each other, for two reasons. First, it upsets Persie immensely when I’m not home on a regular schedule. But it’s not only Persie who has trouble dealing with my absence. I don’t have the luxury of taking a week or two away every
now and then. Exceptions can be made for emergencies or planned vacations, of course, but not for constant interruptions just because my wife and I live in different countries. In fact, I’ve already lost two clients in the past several months because they felt I wasn’t available enough. Second, until your mother takes up residence with me, Persie won’t have a chance to become accustomed to her. She can’t adjust to irregular comings and goings. So either we live together, your mother and I, or we see each other once or twice a year for short periods of time. I’m sure you can see that only one of these options is acceptable.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest and tried not to let my lower lip stick out in an obvious sulk. “So your business, and Persie’s problems, and the fact that you can’t live without each other for one year all add up to outweigh—oh, I don’t know, the rest of my life.” I turned towards Mum. “It’s like you set me up to have a great opportunity and then snatched it away right in front of me, as soon as I was ready to take hold of it!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I sat up straight suddenly, as though struck by lightning. “Oxford! Good God, Mother, how many times do I have to say it? You know that only the best marks, the best preparation, the best résumé will get me in! And it’s much harder for students outside the UK!”

  She sat back dramatically. “Are you still worried about that?” Speechless, I made some kind of wild gesture with my arms. “Simon, how many times have we had this conversation? You know very well that all you need to do is to have a good year anywhere. It doesn’t need to be at Swithin. St. Boniface is a very prestigious Anglican—”

  “Episcopalian,” BM interrupted.

  “Episcopalian public school—”

  “Private school, Em. Public school in the US means government school.”

  She let out an irritated breath. “A very prestigious International Baccalaureate school, right in Boston, a very cultural city with lots of serious music and literature and art going on. And New York City is not very far away. And you don’t need to give up your citizenship, which means you can apply to Oxford as a British citizen. Besides, you might even be of more interest to them, having lived in the US.”

  I’d already taken these things into account. I just don’t want to leave. It’s as simple as that. True, I placed a lot of emphasis on Oxford, tried multiple times to play that card because of Swithin’s reputation, but that’s because it’s something concrete. My feelings? Well, they might be figuratively concrete to me, but it appears they are not important to anyone else.

  I had only one card left, other than Graeme; I expected he wouldn’t mean anything to her. “What about Tink?”

  Mum looked wary. “What about her?”

  “Is Persie really allergic? Even though you didn’t tell me about that syndrome, you could have told me about her allergy. But you didn’t. So is that another lie?”

  Mum closed her eyes, and BM answered.

  “You haven’t seen yet what it’s like to live with someone who has Persie’s condition. She doesn’t understand a lot of the rules you and I live by. I’m afraid she would not react well to a cat, and the cat could attack her, and if that situation got bad we’d have to get rid of the cat anyway. This, after transporting the poor thing all the way to the US. Tink is attached to you; it’s true. But more, she’s attached to her environment. She’ll have to leave this house; that will be bad enough. Don’t force her to endure international travel, probable torment by someone who doesn’t know any better, and almost certain relocation yet again, to yet another home and another family. If we could even find one to take her. And anyway, when you go off to Oxford, you’d be leaving her alone in Boston. There is a quarantine from the US to Britain.”

  I ignored the comment about Oxford; it didn’t fit into my sulk. What I heard was that Tink would be put to death if she dared put one tiny little scratch mark in the pink flesh of his handicapped daughter.

  I felt decidedly trapped. I’d played every card I had by now, or any card that might have influenced where I spent next year. In my mind was an image of poor Tink, cornered in a strange house by one little girl or another, hunched into a prickly ball of teeth and claws, ears back and eyes wide with fear and fury. I identify with this image; this is me. Maybe that’s what made me lash out with my last card, which wasn’t a card but a handful of information I hoped would sting.

  As though it were a blade, I flung this at them: “I hope you realise that I’m gay.”

  From my hunched position, teeth and claws still bared, I watched their faces. I couldn’t quite identify anything specific. I expected shock, distaste, anger, confusion, something definite. Mostly, though, Mum just looked blank, and BM looked bland.

  He spoke first. “So . . . ?” His tone was not challenging; it was his usual calm voice.

  So?!? How very Welsh of him, not to take that announcement seriously. But I had to believe he was bluffing, that he was really horrified or at least worried about his image or his friends or his family or something. He just didn’t want me to know I’d landed a hit. I decided to ignore him and looked at Mum. I could almost smell the wood burning inside her head, asking: How should I respond to this?

  I watched as her expression moved slowly towards sadness. If she’d said something like, “You can’t be serious,” or “What utter nonsense,” it would’ve led to a knock-down, drag-out battle that might have provided some chance of . . . I don’t know, something to stop this train to hell moving forwards. But still she didn’t say anything. So I sat up in the chair, strong and proud now, and dropped another bomb.

  “I have a boyfriend.”

  “Oh, Simon!” The sadness was obvious now. Of course, to me, this said that I’d dealt her a terrible blow. Her precious boy, her only child, is a deviant, a pariah. If she’d been embarrassed by Clive, what would this do to her? I couldn’t recall that she’d ever said anything negative about gay people, but neither had she said anything in support. So it had to have been a blow. I wanted it to be a blow. She stood and moved to stare out the window.

  “You seem pretty unhappy about it.” My tone was almost gloating.

  She turned to face me. “Am I sorry to hear this? Of course I am. Your life will be much more difficult, I don’t understand homosexuality at all, and instead of telling me at a time when we could have a genuine conversation, you have just thrown this news at me in the middle of the discussion about other things to muddy the waters and try and make me feel guilty—”

  I rose out of my defensive ball in the chair to stand in front of her, wishing she weren’t just a hair taller than I am. “Oh, Mum, I really don’t need to do that. You should feel so bloody guilty already—”

  “Enough!” BM’s voice shocked us both into silence. I’d never heard him raise his voice, or seen him do anything to take control before today.

  He stood near Mum and me, but sort of opposed to us. He looked at me. “Do you have any idea how lucky you are? How good you have it? No money worries, no health problems, a mind well into the genius category, and a future brighter than most people could reasonably expect. You have a mother who adores you and a stepfather who would like to get to know you—yes, gay or not, that makes no difference to me—and provide you with even more opportunities. I don’t want to make light of your leaving your boyfriend, but you’re smart enough to know you haven’t yet met anyone you want to spend the rest of your life with. And despite all these advantages, what do you do? How do you react? If your charmed life means so little to you that you’d destroy it with hatred and verbal brutality, then let’s find a way to turn it over to me so that I can give it to the little girl waiting at home for me.”

  He took a few audible breaths and turned to Mum. “Em, I know you’re sensitive to what Simon’s going through. And yet you let him push your buttons, and you push his, and you end up in an argument with him every time you talk. He’s a young man, not a child, and he deserves to know the full truth of what’s happening and why. No more secrets. No
more half-truths.”

  Back to me again. “I will help you prepare for this move any way I can, and once you’re in Boston I’ll do everything I can to make sure you’re as comfortable as possible. It will be up to you to make sure you’re happy. No one expects you to make your mother happy, but you have it in your power to make her miserable. I hope you’re better than that.”

  I’d been waiting for him to take a breath, and I pounced. “If I’m not a child, then I should be able to—”

  “If you’re not a child, you’re old enough to understand that making others miserable will make you miserable as well. This is an extremely difficult move for you; I know that. And it’s not your choice. Your success in life will depend on how good you are at finding opportunity when life changes unexpectedly. If you’re smart enough and brave enough, you’ll take advantage of these openings. Because if there’s one thing we can be sure of in life, it’s change.”

  No one said anything for about five seconds. BM broke the silence, his voice calm again but still assertive. “So. I think we might go out for dinner. It’s rather late, and I doubt anyone feels like cooking. Any objection?”

  Perhaps as a conciliatory gesture, Mum suggested one of my favourite places where she knew they’d give her a table despite the late notice. But it had been a long time since I enjoyed doing anything like going out to dinner, and I knew I wouldn’t enjoy this little outing. Especially after having just been told off by BM, who seemed to have found a backbone suddenly. Inconveniently. I said something along the lines of “I’m not hungry.” But BM, in his newfound voice, said, “Everyone’s going for dinner. No discussion.”

  He took control during the dinner conversation, too. I, of course, was trying to say as little as possible, but BM seemed determined to get to know me, as he’d said during his castigation earlier.