by Sarah Healy
As we approached his cage, Gordo had tried his very best to be still, but his seated haunches quivered with anticipation. Once the door was open, he bounded out, his whole body wagging with the force of a salmon trying to leap upstream. Rose wasn’t yet two and could barely speak, but she laughed at Gordo, the fat insides of her cheeks showing through the enormity of her smile. I scratched his head, and he looked at me like I was Jesus.
“Why hasn’t this guy been adopted?” I asked.
The woman from the shelter joined in by petting Gordo’s fur, which was a dull brown with gray patches. “It’s kind of a beauty contest with adoptions,” she said sadly. I grinned hard to fight the tears that were rimming my eyes as I jostled his ears. And instead of a goldfish, we left with Gordo.
“Gabby would love to have a dog,” said Bobby.
“She can play with Gordo anytime she wants,” I offered, as we approached my mother’s back deck. We took only a few more paces before I became aware of the shouting, the bursts of unintelligible words echoing through the neighborhood. My pace quickened as I heard them, and Bobby’s sped up to keep time with mine. We glanced at each other, silently communicating our confusion and concern as the girls trailed behind us. There were two voices. As I drew closer to Royal Court, I heard that—even in anger—my mother’s long, slow lapping vowels couldn’t be mistaken. I turned to Bobby. “Can you keep an eye on Rosie for a minute?” I asked. Then I broke into a jog, Gordo running next to me.
I hurried through the side yard, between Mom’s house and the Fitzpatricks’, past Warren’s car in the driveway, and my car in the street. Past the Dietzes’ and the Rignarellis’. Past a lawn sign with Lydia’s smiling face. The words were clearer as they rolled in from somewhere down the street, but I still couldn’t see my mother. Then I heard Warren’s name and wanted to reel back. The sound of it was like walking forcefully into a glass door. But I kept going, filling my lungs as the chilly air and anxiety brought cold heat to my cheeks. As soon as Squire Lane was in view, I saw Mom standing on the Castros’ front porch, illuminated by the floodlights overhead as if she were on a stage.
Mrs. Castro loomed in the doorway, her arms crossed over her chest, her face pressing forward as her shrill voice delivered its barbs. “He’s seventeen!” she yelled. “Of course he’s going to be upset that his crazy neighbor stole his mountain bike!”
“Warren did not steal his mountain bike!” shouted my mother. “He’s never stolen anything in his life!”
“Go tell that to the Doogans! They’re out eight hundred dollars!”
I stopped at the curb. Gordo continued down the street before realizing that I wasn’t next to him, then circled back around. Bounding toward me, he thought it was all a game, that we were going for a run.
“Mom!” I said desperately. She startled and looked back at me. Beth Castro straightened up, almost regally, and stood firmly in the entrance to her house. Looking at me for just a moment, she turned her attention back to my mother. “I just think that before you come over here, lobbing accusations at my son—”
“Accusations?” interrupted my mother. “You admitted that Zack beat up—”
But Beth Castro’s voice overrode Mom’s, her eyes bugging out as she spoke. “Priscilla,” she said, holding up one finger of warning, “you had better look at the whole picture.”
“Mom,” I called again. “Please.”
My mother let her head drop. “This cost my son his job,” she muttered back at Mrs. Castro, as she started for the steps.
“Delivering pizza,” said Mrs. Castro—her final blow.
Gordo trotted up the driveway to meet her, but I waited on the curb before I laid my hand on her back and walked silently with her toward her house, Gordo’s claws tapping on the pavement.
“Zack Castro was the one who beat up your brother, Jenna,” said my mother, her emotions too wild and unhinged for any particular one to dominate. She wasn’t just mad or sad or hurt or scared. She was all of them. “He thinks Warren stole his mountain bike.” She released a sputter that was somewhere between a laugh and a cry.
We walked silently back through the neighborhood, which seemed alert in its stillness, a village of murmurs and stares. Since I’d left the park, the sun had nearly sunk below the trees, leaving the sky an inky blue against which the houses glowed with an electric daylight. I held my arms tight across my chest as I watched my feet move over the black asphalt.
“Mom,” I said, picturing her standing on the Castros’ front porch, making her emotional, impulsive defense. “You shouldn’t have gone over there like that. It didn’t help Warren.” Those Parsonses, the neighbors were probably saying. Tut-tut. And though Mom didn’t respond, her body seemed to slow a bit, as if another weight had been added. We walked back through the side yard and from across the park, I saw Bobby holding the back door of his mother’s house open for Rose and Gabby.
“I’m just gonna . . . ,” I said, gesturing toward the Vannis’ house. “Can you take Gordo?”
Mom nodded. “Go ahead,” she said.
I jogged through the park, aware that Bobby needed to get to work. Through the glass back door, I could see that he was peeling off Rose’s jacket, while his mother tended to Gabby’s. Mr. Vanni was standing at the counter, his arm propped on its edge for support. I hurried up the steps and rapped lightly on the door.
Immediately, I had all the Vannis’ attention. Bobby reached for the knob. “Is everything okay?” he whispered as I entered the bright warmth of their kitchen. I could hear the TV blaring from the next room; Linda and Sal must have been watching the evening news.
I bit my lower lip and planted my hand on my hip, not knowing how to answer. Bobby’s eyes didn’t leave me even as I couldn’t find a spot for my own to settle. I glanced around the room. Sal was looking at me expectantly. “Hi, Mr. Vanni,” I said. I had always loved Bobby’s father.
“Jenna,” he said with a smile, leaning shakily forward to kiss my cheek. His movements were slow and pained. “Good to see you, hon.” I hadn’t seen Mr. Vanni in years, having left the block party before he was able to make his way out.
Rose leaned in front of me, her face turned up. “Why was Nana yelling?” she asked.
Like a fish on a hook, Mrs. Vanni, who had been squatting to remove Gabby’s shoes, lifted her head, a worried expression on her face.
“Oh, don’t worry, Rosie,” I said, bending down. “Everything’s okay.” I glanced at Mrs. Vanni and tried to smile. She would hate to hear about my mother and Mrs. Castro shouting at each other in the street.
Taking the jacket that Bobby had just placed on the chairback, I held it open for Rose. “We need to go home and check on Nana, okay? I’m sorry for barging in like this,” I told the Vannis. Then I turned to Bobby. “I know you’re trying to get to work.”
He paused for a moment, his face somber and concerned. “Will you call me later?” he asked.
“Of course.”
With Rose on my hip, I again walked through the park. The hill and the pond below it were beside us when Rose let her head sink against my shoulder. “I’m hungry,” she said.
“I know, Rosie,” I said, laboring to carry her. It used to be so easy; she used to be so light. “We’ll get you something to eat at Nana’s.”
Gordo’s nose was pressed against the back door as he awaited our return, and he looked as though he wanted to break right through the glass.
Mom sat at the kitchen table and our eyes met. I opened the door. “Hey, Nana,” I said as casually as possible, while Gordo wound himself around my legs. “Rosie is getting pretty hungry.” I set Rose down on the floor and again peeled off her jacket. “You want to watch a show while I fix you something?” I asked.
She did. And while my mother settled her in front of the TV, I began making her a grilled cheese sandwich. I had just turned on the stove when Mom came to stand next to me. “
Is Warren upstairs?” I asked, as I added a pat of butter and watched it slide across the hot pan.
Mom rubbed her hands over her face, then clasped them in front of her, nodding. “Yeah,” she said. “He’s working on a plane.”
We stood in silence while the sandwich browned, each submerged with our own thoughts. After I cut the grilled cheese into four triangles, I brought it, along with a bowl of apple slices and a glass of water, into the family room. Pulling one of the TV trays from its holder, I set it down in front of Rose, who leaned her head past me so as not to miss a second of her show. Without moving her eyes from the screen, she picked up a piece of apple and began eating. I ran my hands over her wild red curls. “You’re a funny girl, Rosie,” I said softly, before turning and walking back through the kitchen. My mother was still standing by the stove, her face angled toward the window above the sink. I needed to talk to Warren.
• • •
“Hey, War,” I said, rapping lightly on his door. “It’s me.”
I waited a moment for him to answer. When he didn’t, I pushed the door open and peeked inside. He was at his desk, the bright halogen lamp bowed over his slender fingers as they gently twisted together two wires that protruded from the belly of a plane. Walking across the cornflower blue carpet, I sat on the edge of his bed, his plaid comforter pulled smoothly over the mattress, and watched him.
Warren spoke first. “Mom shouldn’t have gone over there,” he said, not looking up, his hands illuminated as he worked.
“No,” I said. “Probably not. But she was only trying to look out for you, you know?” There were a few more beats of silence before I asked, “How much did you hear?”
His brow tensed slightly, but he didn’t look up. Nor did he answer. I imagined he’d heard the start of the argument, then begun working on his plane. That’s what he used to do toward the end of our parents’ marriage, when their fights would rock the house, when Lydia’s name was lobbed about like a grenade. He would go up and work on his planes and I swear that he wouldn’t hear another word.
“I guess Zack Castro thinks you’re the one who stole his mountain bike.” At this, Warren’s hands stopped. I paused, not knowing how much more to tell him. But then, seeing the side of his face, the line of neat stitches above his eyebrow, I said, “Mrs. Castro says that’s why he did what he did.”
Slowly, Warren raised his head, and though he remained still, his eyes moved back and forth, as if scanning the lines of some cryptic text. He seemed to be reliving some event, replaying it in his head, and he smoothed his bangs down over his forehead.
“Warren, I’m sorry,” I said, thinking that maybe it had been stupid to come up here to tell him what Beth Castro had said. “I didn’t mean to . . .” I looked around, at a loss for a phrase to explain what I hadn’t meant to do.
But Warren’s head jerked around and he found my eyes. “No,” he said, to stave off my apology, my remorse. Then his attention turned back down to his desk, his chin tucked to his chest. “It’s good that you told me.”
I steadied myself with a breath, preparing for the question that came next. “Warren, I’m sure you don’t . . . but I have to ask. Do you know what happened to that kid’s mountain bike?”
He let his head fall to the side. “No, Jenna,” he said. “I don’t.”
And not for a moment did I doubt him. Rising from his bed, I wrapped my arms around him, hunching over him from behind in a tight, enveloping hug. I heard him let out a low and slightly uncomfortable chuckle before reluctantly patting my arm. “Oh, boy,” he said, delivering another pat. “Okay.”
• • •
On the way back down the stairs, I passed a framed photo of Warren and me with our grandfather. He had on his fishing hat with one arm extended around each of us. Warren and I were both smiling, looking skinny and gangly. Our grandfather looked exactly the way I would always remember him, in a plaid wool shirt tucked neatly into his trousers.
When Grandpa was diagnosed with lung cancer, my parents hadn’t spoken to each other in over a year. Now they had to get on the phone because someone needed to take Grandpa for radiation. Dad had just been promoted and was traveling almost constantly. And Lydia had our half sister, Alexandra, who was a toddler at the time, to look after. You’d think you or your wife could get your father to the hospital, my mother would say, the word “wife” particularly sharp. But my father was across the country. And Lydia said that she’d really like to, but . . . So it fell to my mother. Or more accurately, it fell to my mother and Warren.
Really, my mother adored Grandpa and was grateful that it was she who cared for him during his final months. He’d lie in bed and close his eyes and ask her to sing. He had always loved music, loved singing. He used to take Warren and me to see a Broadway show every year at Christmastime. So Mom would sing and he’d hum along as best he could, his blanket-shrouded toes tapping the air. And Warren was there as well, sitting just out of view on the floor beside the couch, or in the narrow foyer. Every bit present, but safely out of reach.
That was in the fall of our senior year of high school and I was on the varsity soccer team. Go to your game, Grandpa would say. I’m not much fun right now anyhow. And the emphasis he put on the present always made me believe that there would be a future. Or maybe that’s what I told myself. Because while I was on some bus traveling to some field to play in some game, Warren would be standing in my grandfather’s kitchen with a large oven mitt on one hand, frying him catfish and trying to tempt him to eat. Grandpa would always take a small bite for Warren. Mmmm. Tastes fresh, he’d say. Did you catch it yourself? And Warren would swell with pride.
When the day of the funeral arrived and it was time to walk into the nave that held my grandfather’s casket, Warren wouldn’t go. My mother and I both begged him, whispering hushed pleas as we stood before the heavy wooden doors, splayed open to reveal the flower-laden altar, the pews full of people. Lydia was there, wearing formfitting black and sobbing in the front row. But Warren just shook his head, refusing to look down the aisle, his feet planted on the floor. He could take care of our grandfather during his final months, could pretend not to hear as he vomited into an emesis basin, but he couldn’t quite manage the spectacle of the funeral. And when it was over and we walked outside, red-eyed and hollowed out, we found Warren sitting cross-legged on the lawn outside the church. Dad saw him and his jaw hardened. He marched across the lawn and stopped right in front of him, looking down at his son, who was running his fingers over a blade of grass. “I have never been so ashamed of you,” he said, his voice shaking with fury and regret. “After everything your grandfather did for you, you couldn’t even pay your respects.”
• • •
Back in the kitchen, my mother was still standing at the stove, and Rose still watching TV. Gordo was lying on the floor by her feet. He lifted his head and when he saw it was me, he grunted and lay back down.
“Warren’s doing fine, Mom,” I said, preempting her question as I sidled up next to her. “We’re going to fix this, I promise. I’ll go talk to Beth Castro. I’ll explain the situation.” Because wasn’t it fixable? Wouldn’t she understand that Warren hadn’t stolen anything? Couldn’t that be made clear?
Mom looked at me the way I sometimes looked at Rose, when her innocence made my heart break. “Jenna, honey,” she said. A cartoon crash sounded from the television and Rose’s laughter bubbled through the air. “This is bigger than you think.”
“What do you mean?”
She looked thoughtfully down, and I noticed how thick and black her eyelashes still were. “I mean that some of the neighbors have been saying things.”
I was suddenly angry, already knowing the answer to the question I was about to ask. “What have they been saying?” Though I didn’t let myself look around, I thought of the house, of its contents cluttered and piled and filling every available space. I thought of the exterior, chi
pped and faded; the lawn that had spent all those years littered with this and that. I thought of all the FOR SALE signs up and down the neighborhood. And then I thought of Warren walking the streets, his gaze extended heavenward, toward his flying machines as they swooped through the sky.
Mom and I stood eye to eye for a moment before she got down on her hands and knees and pulled loose the wood facing beneath one of the cabinets, letting it echo hollowly as it hit the tile floor. It was her hiding spot, where she used to keep cigarettes before she quit. She reached carefully into the tight space and pulled out a small stack of papers.
“Here,” she said, handing them to me. “They’ve been coming in the mail.”
I scanned them quickly, passing from one to the other, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. They were letters, written anonymously. And though each consisted of only a single sentence, the words occupied the entirety of the page.
“They’re in order,” said my mother.
The first ones were cryptic, with lines like, Neighborhoods are built house by house—we all need to do our share! But they became increasingly direct. The condition of your home is impacting the value of ours! Then it seemed that once the thefts began, so did the attacks on Warren. Your son cannot use this neighborhood as his ATM! And finally, Warren has become a burden that this neighborhood can no longer bear!
“Oh, my God,” I said, looking up at my mother, the papers held loosely in my hands. “Who are these from?”