“I’m sorry.” He doesn’t sound sorry. He sounds indignant.
“What have you been doing while you’re not in school?” This sounds like the wrong question the moment it leaves my mouth. But it’s not.
“With all due respect, Mrs. Daniels, what difference does that make?”
“It’s Ms. Daniels.”
“Ms. Daniels.”
“With all due respect, Principal.” I’m being sort of cheeky to use his language, but I do it anyway. “What I’m trying to figure out is, is he skipping against school? Or for something else? If he’s going to be punished, we should at least punish him for the right thing.”
Principal Borman doesn’t say anything in a that-makes-sense kind of way. I look to Cody. I wait for an answer. “Cody?”
Cody cracks his knuckles and shrugs. He has as many variations on a shrug as Eskimos have words for snow. There’s one-sided, two-sided, with an eye roll, a head wag, both, or neither. For someone who says so few words, he definitely manages to communicate a lot of information.
“Cody!” I’m not mean, but I mean it.
“I don’t know,” he says finally. Now I feel bad, like I crossed the line.
Principal Borman steps in. “Cody,” he says, “your mom asked you a question. Give her an answer.”
Cody fidgets. “What was the question?” He’s not exactly being defiant, he really doesn’t remember. It’s like he’s missing one marker on the memory gene.
“Why have you been skipping school?” Principal Borman says again. I’m starting to get why he’s the principal. He’s really authoritative, without raising his voice at all. And Cody, by some miracle, is doing what he says. “What have you been doing with that time?”
“Fine,” he concedes to Principal Borman, then turns to challenge me. “Mom, why do you even care about that?”
“Because I care about that.” It’s interesting to me that he thinks I should explain myself before he explains himself. Is that what things have come to? When I was growing up, this was called sassing, and you could get a bar of soap in your mouth for it. There are moments I wonder about all the so-called good parenting I’ve done, and this is one of them. “Answer me.”
Cody glances at the principal, then back at me. “Usually I go to the comic-book store and play Magic. But other times I just ride the bus. Or go home and hang out in my room.”
Cody’s getting fired up now. “Because school is stupid. I just sit here and watch, like, boring PowerPoint presentations, while the teachers drone on and on about boring shit. I haven’t learned anything since ninth grade.”
I look at Principal Borman. Cody might be wrong, but he’s not irrational. His explanation makes perfect sense, even if it’s sixteen-year-old-guy sense.
But Principal Borman only cares about the rules. Because he’s a ruler. He’s not worried about crossing the line. He’s worried about drawing it. “Well, Cody. Truancy is wrong. And you’re being suspended.”
“Whatever.”
Non mihi curae est.
“You’ll be back in school on Monday. Obviously, you’re going to take a fail for the test. It’s up to Mr. O’Brien whether he’ll let you make it up or not. Same with your other teachers. If they don’t let you catch up on your work, you may have to do it in summer school. Several of your classes, Life Sciences included, are required for gradu—”
“Great.” Cody glares at him and shoots me a pleading look. “Can we go now?”
“Sure.” Principal Borman stands up. “I’d say we’re done here.”
Cody practically knocks his chair over he gets up so fast. He’s out of the room in a flash.
“Thank you, Principal,” I say confidently. “I don’t think it will happen again.”
“Ms. Daniels, can I be frank with you?”
I pitch my shoulders back a little. I wasn’t expecting anything beyond a polite good-bye. “Sure. Of course.”
“You seem like a nice person. I can see that you care a lot about your son.”
“I do.”
“I can see that.” He takes a breath, like this is important, or hard for him to say. “Skipping school may not seem like that big a deal. But your boy is asking for something. Rules. Structure.” Another breath, deeper this time. “Cody’s not gone yet, Ms. Daniels. But if something doesn’t change, he will be.”
He doesn’t even make nice at the end with a little smile. He just holds out his hand to shake mine. My lip is trembling, and I grab my bag and blindly fish around in it, furiously scraping the contents from one side of the bottom to the other, trying to find my key chain. Stupid fringe.
As I step out of the office, I see Cody at the far end of the long hallway. My kid is in trouble. Not huge trouble, but trouble just the same.
Maybe no one can make up for it when your dad bails.
* * *
We ride home in silence. Until I had Cody, I thought silence was emptiness, a lack of communication, but it’s not. Silence is as full of information as talking is. Cody entered the world knowing this, and he’s been teaching it to me for sixteen years. Sixteen very quiet years. It’s a big part of his essential mystery.
When he was little I used to try to encourage him to talk, with lots of questions and conversation. Somewhere around year nine, I gave up, and that’s when I realized how much communicating he was actually doing. Like right now. He’s hurt and angry and ashamed and indignant and defiant and proud of himself, all at once. He also knows another mother would be yelling at him on this car ride, and not that he would ever say this, but he’s grateful I’m not. I read in a parenting book once that when a kid becomes a teenager, they fire you as a boss, and if you’ve done a good job, they rehire you as a consultant. This is one of those situations. The classes have been skipped, the boy is suspended, what’s done is done, and stupid rhetorical questions like what were you thinking? aren’t going to undo it. He skipped school for a reason—he wanted to let us all know we can’t control him—and he accomplished his objective. We all know we can’t control him. Especially me.
I pull into the driveway and Cody’s got his car door open even before I throw the gearshift in park. He heads for his room without looking at me, which stings, but I know this is part of the show—he’s performing Person Who Isn’t Under Anyone’s Control—and he’s all the way committed to the role. Knowing this doesn’t make it any less painful.
“Cody.” I say it softly, because I want to make sure he knows I’m not forcing him to talk, but it might be a good idea if he would. “Please, let’s sit down for a minute and talk about this.”
Instead, Cody slams the door to his room, his door scraping against the frame with a sharp sound. I know everything about Cody’s emotional state based on the pitch and decibel level of that door hitting that frame. I now respond to it like Pavlov’s dog.
I’ll be honest. At times like this, I wish there was someone to help me. I wish there was someone to call, someone to come over, someone to sit with me so I don’t feel so alone. It’s not even that I’m wishing Cody had a dad—to be honest, I kind of like doing everything my way—but how great would it be if someone walked through that door right now who could say the right thing, give me some hope, tell me everything’s going to be all right? Someone who could hold half of my fear, like carrying the other end of an especially heavy sofa on moving day? Someone whose investment in that kid equaled mine?
How great would that be?
It would be so great.
But it’s not going to happen.
I heard a Christian minister on early-morning television say once that men don’t follow institutions or ideas—they follow leaders. All this time, I thought I was doing Cody a favor by not getting married, but now I’m not so sure. I thought it would undermine his security if, for instance, he asked if we could go to the county fair and I had to say Let me check with Bob first—inste
ad of just making all the decisions on my own. I thought Cody would be traumatized if suddenly he had to deal with some guy named Bob whose authority derived solely from the fact that he was having sex with me.
Maybe it’s time I admit that Cody has needed a man in his life all along. Not to be his father—that ship has sailed—but to be someone in his life who isn’t so worried about crossing the line that he fails to draw one at all. Because that’s what men do, don’t they? Like Principal Borman, they draw the line.
I can’t give Cody his dad back. But I could give him a man in his life. That structure thing? That I can do. Until now I’ve been happy just to have Jake as a boyfriend—a side dish, even—who never has to be fully integrated into my life. I haven’t needed a man for the traditional reasons: money, or status, or to give me a baby. I have all of that. But what I do need a man for is Cody. My son, who has lived for sixteen years without a father figure—and who desperately needs one. I’ve done everything for him but the one thing I cannot do myself: create the kind of structure and stability that comes with a traditional family.
I’ve always thought Jake was too young for that, but maybe this is the sign I’ve been waiting for. Maybe Jake is the guy. Now that we’re taking everything to the next level, maybe his age doesn’t matter so much anymore. He loves me, he wants to commit and run a business together. What more could I ask for? It’s all right here. I’m flooded with hope that we can do it—the house, the relationship, the restaurant, the family, all of it. Is this what it feels like to know it when you see it?
I pull out my phone to call Jake. He answers on the first ring.
“Baby? I think I’m going to make an offer on that house.”
4
* * *
RONNIE
By the time I board the bus to Portland, there are only two seats left: the one next to the toilet, and a window seat next to a young mom whose kid has green stuff oozing out of his/her right nostril. I pick the one next to the mom, even though it’s clear from her body language that she wants the space all to herself and her kid despite not having a ticket for him. Or is it a her? I feel bad, but I stand at her row anyway and finally she looks up at me like Who, me? Which forces me to be the bad guy.
“Excuse me,” I say, “that seat open?” I nod in the direction of the seat. I can’t even really make eye contact because this is basically the first real live woman I’ve spoken to in seventeen years and it’s overwhelming.
Reluctantly, the girl swings her knees into the aisle, giving me room to pass. I stand there a second, unsure which way to face as I slide into the seat—should I put my ass or my package in this young woman’s face? When you imagine your first forty-two minutes of freedom, this is not what you think about.
I finally decide on ass and move so quick I almost fall into the window seat, startling the toddler, who begins to wail. The oozing green stuff moves up and down, getting closer to cresting her/his top lip with every shudder.
“Sorry about that, young lady,” I say, nodding politely to the mom. I’ve always had nice manners. I believe presentation is a form of respect. Even if all I had to wear was the standard-issue uniform at FCI Sheridan, there were going to be sharp creases in my khakis and high shine on my shoes. “Sorry about that to you, too, little one.”
I flip on the sparkle switch. The kid literally stops whimpering on the spot and just stares at me, because my eyes are that blue.
As the bus pulls out of the station and heads toward Interstate 5, I look around trying to get a feel for what’s different. White paper coffee cups, for starters. Those mothers are everywhere. Water bottles. People drink water from bottles now? Who knew? Piercings. I see three people with metal in their faces just on this bus—that wouldn’t have happened in 1998. Electronic stuff is everywhere—even the destination sign on the bus is all lit up. A lot of women are wearing tights as pants. Now that’s a trend I can get behind. And last but definitely not least, every man, woman, and child on this bus seems to have some sort of gadget in their hands that they’re clinging to for dear life.
The baby starts to fuss again and the mom glances at me apologetically.
“Sorry,” the mom says. “It’s nap time.”
“I remember those days,” I say. The girl will relax if she knows I’m a parent, too. “Your life is ruled by the schedule, right? What’s her name? Or is she a he?”
“Kelsey.” The girl wipes the big booger from Kelsey’s nose, the way a person starts cleaning when someone drops by. “I’m Chloe.”
“Ronnie.” I hold my hand out like a flipper, because there’s not enough space between our bodies for a full handshake.
“I’m not going for the K thing, like the Kardashians—my name starts with a C. I just like the name Kelsey.” I can tell Chloe has explained this a lot of times.
“Gotcha,” I say. “The Kardashians are krazy, huh? With a K?”
This gets a smile out of her.
As far as pop culture goes, I’m probably way more current than the average fifty-seven-year-old. Prison is filled with young men, coming in and out, and they keep you up to date on all the latest music and lingo and girls who are famous for their booty.
“How many kids you got, Ronnie?”
“One. A girl, her name is Nicki.” Last time I saw her she was right about Chloe’s age. Now she’s gotta be thirty-six or thirty-seven. Is that even possible? I wonder what she looks like now, if her hair is still long and curly, and whether she’s plump or thin. To say I’ve missed her all these years—that doesn’t even come close. It’s been more like a death. Or a kidnapping, because you never stop holding out hope that you might actually see the person again.
I’m never going back to prison.
Yes, I know I said that in 1988, and I said it in 1993. But it really is different this time. Because this time I learned my lesson. This time I educated myself. I read the books! I took the courses! I did the work—inner and outer. I know why I became a criminal and made the life choices I did. I built a new character.
I forgave myself.
“Only one?” Chloe sounds a little disappointed.
“Well, you know what they say.” I grin playfully. “God only gives you what you can handle.”
This time, I’m going to stay out. I’m going to avoid trouble, keep my nose clean, do the right thing. Because I’ve got a daughter I’ve missed, a grandson I’ve never met, and there is a lot of making up to do.
There’s only one problem: Nicki hasn’t spoken to me since before I went to prison this last time, and she doesn’t know I’m getting out.
But I can get around that. I have to.
* * *
I line up the small plastic container in front of my fly and wait. This is going to be my life now: pissing into cups and handing them to Melissa Devolis, a thirtysomething plain Jane who probably studied social work because she wanted to save the world. That’s how all these caseworkers are. They think they’re going to do something for the less fortunate. “Something” ends up being a job as a reentry caseworker at the Oregon Residential Reentry Facility, which turns out to be essentially a babysitter for grown men who have no skills for the real world.
I exit the bathroom, still screwing the lid onto the warm cup, and hand it to her.
“I’ll take care of this”—she means the pee—“and meet you in my office in five”—she means minutes. “You go ahead and take a seat in there.”
Two minutes later, she slides her largish ass into the cheap office chair, the weary springs protesting her every movement and her extra twenty pounds. She’s obviously tired of this job, and probably her life. There’s something sad about the way she does her hair, a half-assed ponytail with grown-out bangs that she bobby pins off her face. It’s a hairstyle that says I’ve given up. She pulls out a folder with my name on it and opens it. Surprise! It’s jam-packed with forms that have to be filled out and
signed.
“Let me start by saying very few guys in this place ever successfully make it back into the world.” Melissa’s real down-to-business. She takes her job seriously. “And I doubt you will, either.”
“Why would you want to start like that?” I give her some serious eye contact, with twinkling. My whole spiritual practice is built around the idea of being present and knowing that you create your life with your intentions. And here this woman is predicting that I’m going to fail. I’m not mad at her, but I would like her to question that, just for a second. The best way to do that is to turn on the sparkle. “You’ve never met anyone like me before.”
Melissa looks up from my file and holds my gaze. She takes a full breath and lets it out in a long sigh.
“Mr. Daniels, you can’t possibly think you are the first man to get out of jail one day, then sit down in that chair and try to charm me the next.” She pauses. “Can you?”
“Hah!” I clap my hands and laugh out loud. “You did not just say that! You’re great.”
She didn’t expect this response. I can see that she’s slightly suppressing a smile.
“Melissa Devolis, you are straightforward. I like that in a woman,” I say. It’s true, I really do like that in a woman. I call her out. “I can see you’re trying not to smile. Don’t front. We’re going to be spending a lot of time together, so we might as well be friends.”
Melissa takes another full breath. She brushes a piece of hair away from her face and in the process shows me her wrist.
Multiple Listings Page 4