This time she meant it. Hobbs avoided Vance after that confrontation. He was an addiction that required complete abstinence to make way for convalescence. But she also didn’t allow for anyone else to fill that gap. No one provided that same sense of thrill, that same fluttery feeling.
And then there was the question of love. Love was a word that was thrown around so often in the early days of every Steven Vance tryst. Love was what she was certain she felt for him, why she had stayed in a cycle of bad decisions, the stranglehold that choked her heart. And love was what had destroyed her – kept her from seeing things as they really were, had her believing in silly stories that would never actually happen.
If Hobbs needed to go to great lengths to avoid her former lover, she could do so. But she didn’t want to hear anyone sell her on the virtues of love. As far as she was concerned, love was a burning demon, a corrupt concept, and she could live her life without it.
Chapter Nineteen
January 11, 2010
Monday morning in Vetta Park was bitterly cold, a cloudy blanket settling in the air. Greta looked outside the window and marveled at the continuity from lawn to sky – everything a pale, crystal white. She met John at the front foyer area and then drove with him to St. Louis Investigations. She would have preferred to meet with Colt Bundy unaccompanied, but John’s winter break was long – a stretch of three weeks across December and January to allow for school building renovations.
Colt met them at the elevators. He shook Greta’s hand and then grinned widely when he saw John. “Well, hello John,” Colt said. “Nice to make your acquaintance.”
John smiled shyly and the trio walked down the hallway into Colt’s corner office. Greta and John settled into one of the leather sofas while Colt bent over behind his desk. When he emerged, he was holding a thin novel with a colorful cover. The Kidnapping at Busch Stadium.
“Here you go,” Colt said, offering the book to John. “It’s a book by a local author. When I was your age, I loved mysteries. May be why I got into the business.”
John took the book and leafed through it. Greta could see that there were no pictures to provide contextual support. The print was smaller than usual for him. It was also an exceptionally long novel for him – maybe one hundred pages longer than the longest book he’d ever read by himself.
“You can read that while I talk to your mom,” Colt added.
“Thanks,” John muttered. “The ki…the kin…the kindergarten at Busch Stadium.”
Years of special education hadn’t affected John’s strategy: Say the words he’d memorized with no hesitation, and guess wildly at the words he didn’t know based on the first letter.
“It’s not kindergarten, sweetheart,” Greta said softly. “The word is kidnapping.”
She didn’t want to seem punitive or critical – but she felt he needed correction. The word kidnapping was phonetically realizable if he just took the time to tap out the syllables.
“Oh, this book is probably not meant for his age,” Colt said. “It’s meant for fourth grade and up. What is he, eight, nine years old? I can see if I have something.”
“He’s eleven,” Greta said, and then an uncomfortable silence ensued, in which Colt nodded and looked down at his notepad, John closed the book and silently ran his fingers across the cover page, and Greta sat up straighter in her seat and said nothing.
It wasn’t Colt’s fault; John had a certain look that made his age difficult to pinpoint. For an eleven year old, he had a smaller stature and a skinny build – legs sinewy, arms gawky. He hadn’t yet approached puberty so his voice was still a shade higher than many of his classmates and he didn’t display so much as a shadow of facial hair.
But lately John had also started adopting some of the character traits endemic to adolescence. Activities that had once given him joy now made him sullen. Once chatty, he was now more often laconic and annoyed by the task of answering her questions. In prior years, when he came home from school, he would sit at the kitchen table and snack on carrots while replaying stories and jokes from the day. These days, he walked in the door and retreated upstairs to the sanctity and comfort of his own bedroom. When Greta knocked, she was told to leave him alone. Solitude was the only request he made of her.
So Greta forgave Colt for misjudging John’s age. John’s frame and inability to read the title of a book could confuse a well-meaning person. Unfortunately, it set the tone for an awkward meeting. John brought his legs up and hugged them – sulking while he stared at the floor. Colt blushed and apologized.
“I’m really sorry John,” he said. “I don’t have kids of my own so I get kids’ ages wrong all the time.”
It wasn’t really about the age, Greta knew. It was the inference based on his inability to properly read. These types of situations had been surfacing more and more as John got older.
“John will be fine,” Greta said, patting his knee. He lunged away from her to avoid her touch – a sharp jerk towards the edge of the couch. She hesitated for a moment and then chose to ignore it.
“John, can you step outside for a moment so I can talk with Mr. Bundy?” Greta asked.
John continued to sulk and ignore her. Greta had seen this type of behavior from him before, and it amazed her how different he was than his father. When Griffin was angry, he yelled and hurled objects, demanding, flinging and whirring – a theatrical tornado. When John was angry, he took refuge inside of his head. He coped by turning into a statue – mute and expressionless. Greta knew there was no chance John would listen to her so she requested that Colt speak with her in the hallway.
“I’m really sorry about that,” Colt repeated, once they were standing next to each other outside the office.
“Oh it’s fine. He’ll be all right. It’s just typical adolescence, you know?”
Colt smiled weakly. “So what can I do for you?” he asked.
“I came here because I wanted to thank you, first of all. The information you provided to me last time was really useful, and I was able to use it to get full custody of John.”
Colt smiled again – more genuine this time, and wide enough that Greta could see a few dark fillings in the corners of his mouth.
“I’m glad to hear,” he said.
“So I have just one more request of you. My ex-husband has a silent business partner for his real estate work and I need to know who that person is.”
“I see. When are you expected back in court?”
“No, no, it’s not about that.” Greta paused for a moment. “The financial and the custody stuff – that’s all settled. I just need to know because….because…” Greta waited for a few seconds while thinking of how to explain. There was no easy way to describe what she was thinking. While the court-related issues were all finalized, Greta still worried about her past folding into the present – someone she thought she’d said good-bye to exercising decision-making ability over her family. Like freeing oneself of a cult only to find the leader’s invisible hand shaping her future. She finally said, “I have a name in mind and I just want you to confirm whether I’m right.”
“Who’s that?”
“Steven Vance.”
“The real estate mogul philanthropist guy?”
Greta nodded. “That’s him.”
“Sure. I’ll see what I can find out.”
“Thanks.” Greta went back inside Colt’s office and found John sprawled across one of the couches, his head angled and eyes glazed as if half dreaming. The Kidnapping at Busch Stadium lay abandoned on the floor.
“C’mon John,” Greta said. “It’s time to go.”
***
John’s IEP case manager at the elementary school had been Brook Tremble, but that changed when he became a sixth grader. Tremble’s middle school counterpart was a small, dowdy, older woman named Sue Chambers.
A few days after her meeting with Colt Bundy, Greta sat at a desk in Sue’s office and waited for the meeting to begin. Sue hummed to herself while she arran
ged papers across the desk. It was a familiar melody – patriotic and puerile, maybe Yankee Doodle Dandy or I’ve Been Working on the Railroad.
Sue stopped arranging the papers and sat down at the other side of the desk with a sigh. Greta could tell that the sigh was an indictment – a preface of the unpleasant conversation that would follow.
“Thanks for meeting with me today,” Greta started. “I know John has only been at the middle school for a few months but I’m worried–”
“You should be worried!” Sue interrupted. Her voice heaved when she spoke – as though they were projected from a pulpit towards a congregation. “I hate to jump right into it like this, but Mrs. Brock, look at your son’s most recent assessment!” She pointed her index and middle fingers towards the various papers while she continued. “John can only correctly decode nine percent of two-syllable words! The intonation and expression is off. His written sentences are completely indecipherable; there are spelling errors, poor letter formation, no punctuation or capitalization, no spacing and many, many letter reversals. And finally, given a list of 20 words, John spelled only two of them correctly! Mrs. Brock, I have seen this type of result from a sixth-grader in the past, but never have I seen it from a child who’s been in the Special Education system for three years already!”
Sue Chambers sat back down in her seat. She took another deep breath and waited for Greta to respond. Greta had heard this about Sue from other parents – that she lacked a bedside manner, that she was blunt and pushy. But she’d also heard that Sue was passionate and demanding – that she could be an advocate for her students if she felt they weren’t getting what they needed.
To Greta, too much information had been thrown at her all at once for her to formulate a quick response. She almost felt like she was back in grade school again – perhaps in John’s seat, sitting numbly while the instructor bellowed names, numbers and statistics that had been tossed too quickly to be comprehended.
“I don’t…I don’t…” Greta stammered and then stopped herself. There was too much that she wanted to say…and each separate thought made coherence a tough objective. She knew that John was well behind where he should be…but wasn’t that why he was continuing to get Special Education services? Wasn’t it the school’s job to get him where he needed to be? Why was Sue Chambers spouting these scores at her as though she’d done something wrong?”
“Mrs. Brock…” Sue continued in a softer voice – her indignation now caked with a layer of sympathy. “John is very far behind where he needs to be and the gap between him and his peers is widening instead of narrowing, and that’s something we really need to be concerned with. If we don’t help him now, he could lose all interest in school and become – quite frankly – unreachable.”
Greta nodded. “What do you suggest?”
“He needs more, quite frankly – more than what the school is able to give him. I feel he could benefit from one-on-one instruction. We don’t have the resources to offer that at Edwardsville Middle…but maybe you could look into getting him outside tutoring to supplement the work that the school is doing?”
Greta thought about that conversation in Griffin’s foyer. Griffin’s voice – steady and vexed – insistent that the public schools were fine, that John just needed to work harder and that he didn’t need a tutor.
Greta frowned. “I’ve looked into it, and it’s too expensive.”
“Well, if tutoring isn’t going to work, I want you to consider something else. The Jefferson School is located in downtown St. Louis. Have you heard of it?”
Greta shook her head.
“It’s specifically designed for kids who are bright and smart – just like John – but who have profound learning disabilities. It’s a private school but they do offer financial aid.”
“You think John needs to attend a special school?” Greta asked.
“We’ve been doing everything we can, Mrs. Brock, but we’re bound by budgets and class sizes. I’m telling you this as a mom, because I know how much you care about your son. John is very smart but I’ve noticed his attitude has changed lately – even from the start of school. I worry that his esteem could suffer because he’s not making the progress we’d like to see, and kids this age are very attuned to what their classmates are saying about them. I haven’t heard anything specific said to or about John – and we wouldn’t tolerate any type of bullying at Edwardsville Middle School. But I’m thinking that he could benefit from being surrounded by peers who are going through the exact same thing as him. Do you understand? Eleven-year old boys are very vulnerable.”
“Okay,” Greta said softly. “Can you give me the details of the Admissions Director at Jefferson and I’ll set up a meeting?”
“Certainly,” Sue said. “I’ll give you the name of the Financial Aid officer too.” She then opened a drawer, took out a notepad and started writing down numbers.
Greta stared at the papers laid out on the desk in front of her while she waited. They were all words and low percentages, points on the low end of a curve, sloping lines that represented poor performance and sentence fragments about unmet goals.
When Sue finished, she handed Greta the sheet of paper and they shook hands and parted ways.
In the car, Greta dialed Griffin’s number. She hadn’t spoken to him since they’d agreed to cut all ties – not in any real way apart from pickup and drop-off times – but Greta knew she’d need his help for the Jefferson School to be a possibility. It was going to be a painful phone call, but Greta was determined to do or say whatever it took.
Sue’s words echoed in Greta’s mind while she waited for Griffin to pick up the call.
Eleven-year old boys are very vulnerable.
And John certainly was. He was a ship that had run aground – anchorless, rudderless and unique in its predicament. The other eleven year-olds certainly had their own issues, and Greta tried to remind herself of that whenever she saw another mother of an adolescent boy at the supermarket or post office. But the other boys had a foundation that could set their life’s course. They could read and write, and if their choices ever steered them off track, they could find their way back using the basics they had learned in elementary school.
John’s knowledge of the basics was nowhere. Perhaps he could continue to learn nothing at school and self-teach reading at a later time, like she had. But with each passing year, she grew more worried about the obstacles he faced. It was just as possible that his brain had a window for acquiring new information, and the more he waited, the harder it would be.
Teaching herself to read at age seventeen had been one of the most difficult pursuits she’d ever faced. It required an intense amount of daily discipline that she wasn’t sure John had. This is why she needed to act, and she needed to do it right away.
Chapter Twenty
February 1, 2010
Greta had never seen a school quite like The Jefferson School. It was constructed of glass, brick and stone – a long rectangle with a rotunda jutting up from behind. Next to the front entrance, Greta saw a garden – abandoned for the meantime but still demarcated with small pillars and obelisks.
She walked into the front entrance and saw children’s artwork in every direction: clay sculptures, drawings, paintings and chalk figures – all hanging from the ceiling or displayed on easels. The words of Thomas Jefferson were etched into stone next to a silhouette carving of his likeness: For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.
“Ms. Brock?” A voice said.
Greta spun around and saw a man and a woman. The man was lanky and grey-haired. The woman was the same height as Greta, pale and petite. She wore a red business suit and carried a file of papers. “Are you Greta Brock?” she repeated.
Greta smiled. “Yes, that’s me.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Joanne Flaherty – Admissions Director for The Jefferson School. This is J.J. Schwartz.”
&nb
sp; Schwartz smiled and held out his hand. “I’m Director of Financial Aid. Let’s have a seat in the corner conference room.”
Greta shook their hands and followed them past the front office and through a wide hallway. Everything gleamed and glistened. The rugs were perfectly clean; the ceilings were high and airy, artwork added dashes and pinches of color to every surface. When they reached a conference room, Greta noticed the corner was completely glass, offering a vista of different lime and pea-green gardens.
“Your building is just beautiful,” Greta said as they all took a seat around a conference room table. She didn’t want to make too much of the school’s aesthetics, didn’t want to portray herself as a philistine bumpkin from the southern hills of Missouri. And maybe it was just the difference between public and private schools. But every school Greta had seen up to this point was created in the style of pragmatics. The lines were neat and straight, the structures purely square or rectangular. At the Edwardsville schools, hallways were uninspiring, windows needed washing and decorations were sporadic. The Jefferson School seemed like a different breed of building.
“Thank you,” Joanne said sweetly. “I wanted to let you know the good news first – that we looked through John’s file and he meets the criteria for the school. He clearly has a very high I.Q. and quite a significant gap in reading and writing achievement. We also have space in the sixth grade class…so if you wanted to apply now, we could take him right away, or we could wait until seventh grade if you didn’t want to pull him out mid-year.”
Greta nodded and swallowed a burst of emotion. Her reaction was sudden and visceral – tears that flooded the ducts of her eyes, sobs that had to be swallowed. Here was a chance for John – the escape hatch she had been wishing for. Here was his chance to flee the path of illiteracy and low esteem – a loop that fed on itself and worsened every time he completed a circuit.
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