The Jigsaw Jungle
Page 18
She shrugs.
MOM (CONT’D)
I see it differently now.
CLAUDIA
It’s not your fault, Mom.
MOM
I know. And it’s not your job to worry about me.
She gives Claudia a quick, sudsy hug.
MOM (CONT’D)
So it’s my turn now?
CLAUDIA
Yep.
MOM
Any question I want?
CLAUDIA
Go for it.
MOM
What’s the hardest part of all this for you?
Claudia scrubs at an already clean plate.
CLAUDIA
How surprising it all was. I always thought we had a great family.
MOM
We do have a great family!
CLAUDIA
Yeah. But now it’s . . . different.
MOM
Different doesn’t have to be bad.
CLAUDIA
I know.
MOM
I’m sorry, Claudia. I know how difficult it must be for you. Being twelve is hard enough without having to think about your parents’ sexuality.
CLAUDIA
Lalala! Not listening.
Mom laughs.
MOM
But you know, I think there was an underlying tension and dissatisfaction in our family that I didn’t see until Dad moved out and it went away.
CLAUDIA
Yeah. You seem . . . happier now. More at ease.
MOM
I think I am.
They scrub in comfortable silence for a moment.
MOM (CONT’D)
You know, if you ever liked someone—boy or girl—I’d want you to feel comfortable talking to me about it.
CLAUDIA
Gosh, Mom, that would never be comfortable!
Mom smiles.
CLAUDIA (CONT’D)
But I would.
MOM
Good. Because I don’t want you to ever feel as alone as your dad did.
CLAUDIA
I’d talk to you, Mom. But . . . I’m pretty sure I’m not gay.
MOM
Really?
Claudia blushes.
CLAUDIA
Well, Luis kissed me before we came home. And I liked it.
Mom stops washing dishes.
MOM
Really?!
CLAUDIA
Embarrassing alert! Embarrassing alert!
Mom grins.
MOM
He seems like a nice boy.
CLAUDIA
Very nice. Let us never speak of him again.
Mom laughs and goes back to washing dishes.
MOM
You know, something good has already come out of all this.
CLAUDIA
What?
Mom studies her soapy sponge.
MOM
We never talked like this before.
CLAUDIA
No, we didn’t.
MOM
I like it.
CLAUDIA
Me too.
NOTE TO READER
I NEED TO ASK for a camera like Luis’s for Christmas. Because the audio quality on my phone really is terrible.
But the quality of the conversations with my parents, well, that’s gotten a whole lot better.
TEXT MESSAGE
Claudia Dalton’s Cell Phone | Saturday, August 22, 2015, 4:55 p.m.
LUIS
Did you get out yet?
Movie just finished
What’d you think?
It was great!
I know!! Best Jurassic Park movie since the original
Yup
Chris Pratt is so cute!!
Haha
I like the red-haired girl myself
But who tries to run from a T-Rex in heels?!
I know!
I was yelling at the screen for her to take them off
Me too!
This was fun, Luis
Watching a movie in different states
Texting before and after
Let’s do it again
Inside Out next time?
Sounds like a plan
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
EXT. DAD’S NEW APARTMENT—DAY
A nondescript door. Labeled 3A. A hand comes into the frame and knocks.
DAD (O.S.)
Come in!
Claudia opens the door and walks inside.
INT. DAD’S NEW APARTMENT—CONTINUOUS
It’s an older two-bedroom apartment, but large and sunny. There’s a couch in one corner. It’s the one that used to be in Papa’s attic, next to the puzzles.
DAD
Hi, sweetie!
He’s setting the table for lunch on a round dinette table at the other end of the room. He still has the beard and is wearing a T-shirt, but has traded the shorts for jeans.
DAD (CONT’D)
Do you like the place?!
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
Very nice.
Dad turns around. His shirt has a picture of a triangle, a hippo, and the formula a2 + b2 = c2. Dad points to his shirt.
DAD
Look! The longest side of a triangle. Instead of “hypotenuse,” it’s “hippotenuse.” Get it?!
Claudia laughs.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
Math humor. Yes, I like that look!
Dad grins.
DAD
Your bedroom’s off to the right.
* * *
—————
INT. CLAUDIA’S NEW BEDROOM—DAY
Claudia opens the door. On the bed are the old Charlie Brown sheets. And on the wall behind is the Star Wars poster.
DAD
You can get new sheets and posters, of course. Those are just so it wouldn’t be totally empty.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
I like them!
DAD
You do?
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
Yeah. For now.
DAD
Good.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
I brought you a housewarming gift.
DAD
You did?
Claudia fumbles in her overnight bag and pulls out a wrapped box. The contents shift as she hands it to her father, the sound of pieces being jostled.
DAD (CONT’D)
I think I know what this is.
He grins and rips the paper off. It’s a puzzle, of course. There’s a gay pride rainbow flag on the front. He can’t speak for a moment.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
You like it?
DAD
I love it.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
Did I see a coffee table in the living room?
DAD
Yes.
CLAUDIA (O.S.)
Perfect for a puzzle.
DAD
Well, then. Let’s get started.
NOTE TO READER
AND SO WE did. We all got started on our new lives. Mom filed for divorce and Dad started being honest about who he was and I got used to two houses. (It wasn’t as bad as I expected.) And Kate learned to be a big sister, and Luis edited his movie, and I started seventh grade.
Dad and I don’t hang upside down on the monkey bars anymore, but we still work puzzles, when I’m not hanging out with my friends. I asked him to start putting notes in my lunch again too—who cares what Billy Peterson thinks! I guess I see Dad more now, not as the perfect father who was always so much fun, but as a person. I understand that he sometimes screws up, often does okay, and always does the best he can.
Occasionally, I hear Mom crying in the shower. I pretend not to notice, not because I don’t care, but because I understand why she’s upset. Sometimes I feel like I should be mad at hi
m for her, but like she always says, that’s her problem, not mine, and I can love them both. Mom’s dyed her hair and got new glasses and took up salsa dancing, which is SUPER embarrassing . . . and kinda cool too.
And get this . . . Papa was the first one to start dating! A real nice widow moved in with her daughter down the street. I don’t know if Mom or Dad is dating yet—and I’m glad I don’t know.
The three of us are going to drive up to Papa’s for Thanksgiving and meet Papa’s new girlfriend. Luis and his family are coming too. It’s gonna be a little awkward, and Mom keeps telling me it’s just for this one year. We probably won’t do it next year. But that’s okay. This year we are.
And me? I made this binder because I needed to figure things out. Needed to understand how my family could be both great and broken, all at the same time. Needed to tell my own story.
As I said in the beginning, I used to think that life was like a puzzle. And if I worked hard enough, it would look just like it did on the box. But I don’t believe that anymore. I still think life is like a puzzle, but there’s no box. The only picture is in your head, and it might be wrong, might not be the puzzle you’re actually doing at all.
Sometimes, pieces from different puzzles get mixed together, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t get them to fit. Even if you force a piece into place, eventually you realize your mistake, take it out, and go on. I guess that’s what happened to Mom and Dad. Both good puzzles. Both good stories. For a while, they thought they went together, and now they don’t.
But that’s okay. I realized something else when I was doing all those puzzles this past summer. We don’t do puzzles to see the picture. The fun of puzzles is in the pieces, putting them in and taking them out, trying new ones, and finally figuring out where the old ones go. It’s celebrating getting all the red pieces together and not getting too upset that all the green ones are still a jumbled mess. It’s completing the frame, and then having someone accidentally swipe it onto the floor and having to start all over again.
I used to think that happiness was knowing where all the pieces went. Having them all laid out in perfect order. But now I think I just might be wrong about that. Maybe the joy in life is in the jumble.
At least that’s my theory. Your story might be a different one. I say grab a binder. If you want, I’ve got some extra notebook tabs to share.
Claudia Dalton
November 2015
AUTHOR’S NOTE
WHILE THE JIGSAW JUNGLE is a work of fiction, it was, like my other books, inspired by actual events. In August 2012, my husband of thirteen years acknowledged he was gay. He moved out a month later and our divorce was finalized in December 2013.
As embarrassed and traumatized as I was when this happened, I quickly realized I was not the only one to go through this experience. According to the Straight Spouse Network (SSN), an organization dedicated to supporting heterosexual spouses and partners of LGBTQ people, there are up to 2 million mixed-orientation couples. In 2017, the SSN averaged 173 support requests a month, coming from all fifty states. There’s even a hit series on Netflix, Grace and Frankie, that has Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin going through a similar predicament.
When a family changes, the task of creating a cohesive narrative of our lives—no matter what our sexual orientation—is difficult for everyone, but it seems especially hard on preteens/teens, who are just beginning to grapple with their own romantic feelings and sexuality. I wanted to write this book for them, for those kids who were caught up in a similar situation, so they might not feel so alone. As I wrote, I realized I was continuing a theme that shows up in all my books: that prejudice does not only hurt those being discriminated against. The fight to end injustice is important, not only because it is the right thing to do, but because it benefits us all.
As to my own story, six years later my kids are happy, healthy, do well in school, have friends, are sweet, kind, and loads of fun. In other words, they’re absolutely fine. In many ways, we were lucky—my ex never abandoned us; he was (and remains) a caring, loving, and involved father; our social and financial support systems remained strong. Our family doesn’t look like I imagined it would, the transition wasn’t easy or without pain, but the journey to honesty in our family was definitely worth it.
Here’s to a world where we can all be who we are!
Kristin Levine
Alexandria, Virginia
February 2018
RESOURCES:
STRAIGHT SPOUSE NETWORK: WWW.STRAIGHTSPOUSE.ORG
PFLAG: WWW.PFLAG.ORG
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
THERE ARE SO many people I need to thank for this book. First of all, I want to thank my editor, Stacey Barney, and my agent, Kathy Green, for their extreme patience as I worked my way through more drafts and revisions than I ever expected. This was our fourth book together—it’s a lovely thing to have colleagues you can trust and count on (and actually like as people—let’s hang out again soon!).
My writing group, Pamela Ehrenberg, Caroline Hickey, Tammar Stein, and Elizabeth Brokamp, offered support and encouragement, and helped me believe I would eventually find and finish this story.
And where would I be without all the people who helped me with research and notes as advance readers?! Jim McAlister, Deborah DiMarzio, William Dye, Monika Waclawski, Paula Ketchel, Cherrise Boucher, Suzy Carpenter, Kim Johnson, Tyler Johnson, Taylor Johnson, Kristin Carlsen Meek, Anna K. Meek, Riley Neubauer, Kenneth R. Hewitt, Jimmy Powers, Adam Levine (my ex-husband—sorry, music fans, not the singer), and Kimberly Brooks Mazella (and all the wonderful ladies I met through her group) generously shared their thoughts and comments. Among my dear friends who read early drafts are Debbie Gaydos, Jessie Auten, Marcos Bolaños (who first got me thinking about using jigsaw puzzles in the story), and Juan Carlos Perez-Tolentino, as well as the many others who routinely asked me, “How’s the book coming?” without fail for years.
The team at Putnam is always amazing. A special shout-out to Kate Meltzer, Kaitlin Kneafsey, Courtney Gilfillian, Cindy Howle and Ana Deboo for copyediting, Tony Sahara for the cover, and Eileen Savage for the design.
Thank you also to all the schools and libraries that have invited me to come speak over the past few years, as well as all the people who have taken the time to write and let me know that they have enjoyed my books. Writing can be a lonely profession—your belief, support, and enthusiasm have kept me going.
My parents, Marlene and Tom Walker, have supported my work since I took my first writing class. And when the kids get sick right before a deadline, well, who else can you call except the grandparents?! Thank you for nursing us all through any number of colds, flus, and bouts of strep throat. A big thank-you to my sister, Erika Knott, who recently discovered the joy of reading through audiobooks, for reading my manuscript and giving her thoughts and support as well.
Most of all, I want to thank my amazing daughters, Charlotte and Kara. There have been a lot of changes in our family in the past five years and you’ve weathered them all with grace, compassion, and resilience. Thank you for watching that extra hour of TV when I needed to get “just one more thing done,” texting me funny emojis when I’m on a business trip, and even giving me your own comments and thoughts on this manuscript. Whether we’re having family reading time while eating our bedtime snack or snuggling on the couch watching Doctor Who, I feel so lucky to have the honor and privilege of being your mother.
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