Baby Teeth

by Zoje Stage

  Everything stank of not enough money, and even the art displayed on the walls looked like the work of ordinary children tasked with cliché assignments. Trees drawn as green circles set atop brown rectangles. The ubiquitous house with a pointy roof and a front door flanked by two misshapen windows. Not what she was expecting from a school that boasted of its creative commitments. Alex would hate it. She hated it.

  They found their way to the office, where an administrative assistant, a woman in mom jeans and a slightly shrunken T-shirt that she kept tugging down, smiled and pointed them to a row of chairs just outside the principal’s door.

  “Mrs. Wade will be right with you, she’s just finishing a phone call.”

  “Thank you.”

  Suzette and Hanna waited side by side on the hard chairs. They’d sat in so many waiting rooms, for doctors and specialists and schools. Waiting made Suzette nervous—it usually led to disappointing conclusions. Absently, she accordioned her purse strap into smaller and smaller pieces, releasing it when there was nothing else to fold, and then started again. Based on the poor physical conditions of the school, Suzette wondered how many of the students were on scholarship and not paying the full, albeit modest, tuition. If the school was desperate for money, perhaps that could work in their favor. They could promise other financial gifts, dependent upon Hanna’s acceptance. She tightened her grip on the purse strap, realizing there was no “they” and Alex would be appalled by every aspect of the bribe; he wouldn’t believe Hanna needed it or that Sunnybridge deserved it.

  She studied the administrative assistant, hunched over her computer. Her reddish hair revealed blackish roots. Whenever her shirt rode up, Suzette could see the elastic of a sensible pair of underpants. Everyone she’d seen so far was super casual, and Suzette was torn between thinking the staff didn’t make very much money, or they simply weren’t interested in appearances. It made Suzette self-conscious. She’d deliberately made a point of not overdressing, intent on portraying the image of a laid-back mom. Perfectly faded jeans. Perfectly white T-shirt. Effortlessly slouchy, loose-weave cardigan for the chill that still crept into the April air. She’d never had a “problem” with overdressing until she met Alex. He loved her body even when she didn’t and encouraged her to show it off with well-tailored clothing. Sunnybridge reminded her of her ragged high school years—a time marked by deterioration and disappointment. It didn’t put the school, or her mood, in a winning place.

  When it really mattered, during the time when teens declared their individuality by conforming to a peer group, her mother refused to support her fashion interests. Suzette wanted everything from dELiA’s catalog: maxiskirts and platform flip-flops and especially the stripe-down-the-side Postman pants. She would have killed for anything with Julius the Monkey on it. Her mother thought the trends were silly or unflattering and asserted her considerable authority to say “no.” No to the clothes she liked. No to driver’s ed. No to hanging out with boys after school. She said no to everything that might possibly have allowed Suzette to fit in, or even be normal. She gave reasons like money and homework and bad influences, but Suzette didn’t believe her mother had considered any of her desires long enough to actually formulate a reason. Her mother followed a script that she learned from her own parents: Teens have no judgment; don’t cave to their selfish desires; put your foot down.

  Her mother did agree to let Suzette shop at thrift stores, “because they’re cheap.” Suzette thought her second-choice style was cool. Patterned polyester shirts and men’s jeans rolled to midcalf. Her classmates weren’t impressed, but that wasn’t what killed her social life. As her health got worse—her mortifying diarrhea—she dropped her extracurricular activities, like theater club, where she once enjoyed designing and helping to build the sets. Then she started saying no to social gatherings, even casual ones with a couple of once-good friends at their favorite coffee shop. Eventually people stopped asking her anywhere. She spent poisoned hours alone in her room. They were bad years, and her mother never noticed. In spite of her own problems, Suzette spent more time taking care of the necessities than her mother did. Cooking, cleaning, walking to the supermarket, tending to their small yard. Instead of thanking her, her mother often quipped, “That’s the only reason I wanted a kid, so I could have live-in help.”

  She was lucky to have been able to graduate from high school on time, having missed weeks of class following her bowel resection, and weeks more after her fistula developed. Her school counselor made sure she got all her assignments to work on at home, and encouraged her to come back to class. Suzette had resisted at first, certain everyone would smell the shit seeping through the bandage beneath her shirt.

  For three years after graduating she rarely left the house, except to do the marketing and go to the library. But she made productive use of her hours alone—studying, drawing, researching. The highlight of her life became the monthly delivery of magazines with glossy pictures of beautiful houses and contemporary furniture. Hours and months and years of magazines and clipping out pictures and organizing folders and laying everything out like puzzle pieces of What Could Be. Her mother changed the packing—thin sterile strips of cotton—twice a day in her wound that wouldn’t heal. By the time she felt physically able to handle college, she was so socially awkward that she focused solely on classes. The other students were only a few years younger, but she felt so far behind them—in life, in love; she pushed herself to graduate from the Art Institute a year early. Her portfolio was impressive enough to earn her a position at the firm where Alex was a rising young star. And he became the person who helped her, at twenty-four, finish growing up.

  He recognized her talent the first time they worked together. “Naturally gifted,” he called her. “With a profound aesthetic.” Their friendship blossomed quickly, and then she boldly asked him out one day, determined to seize back some of the chances she’d missed. Sometimes she still thought of how he smiled in reply—relieved and momentarily shy—before nodding and suggesting a thousand things they could do, like going out with her had been on his mind for longer than was possible. After their first couple of dates their lives fell into an easy rhythm. She told him everything about her inexperience in the world, and her concerns that she’d never catch up. He taught her how to drive, and not only didn’t ridicule the deficiencies she considered backward about herself, but praised her determination and self-awareness.

  “You had no one,” he said, with a hint of pride and sadness.

  Suzette didn’t fully agree. “I had my mother. Way too much of my mother.” It shamed her that she hadn’t been able to escape sooner, that they’d stuck together in such a sickly, co-dependent, useless sort of life.

  But Alex hadn’t allowed her to dismiss it all so easily. “You did the best you could. Learning so much on your own, making the best of an impossible situation. And you did it. You’re here. Your life brought you to me.”

  Sometimes she dared to think what would have become of her if she hadn’t met him. She wouldn’t have made it. Life—and her mother—would have taken her down. She couldn’t erase certain indelible images from her childhood. Her mother’s rattling snores as she slept her life away, oblivious to her responsibilities as a parent (or hiding from them). Her mother’s daft-eyed spaciness as she sat on her throne in the living room, consumed by the television, blowing her nose and tossing her dirty tissues into a pile on the floor. Her laziness was made possible by her husband’s early death—a generous life insurance policy and help from his family. Her mother called it depression. It began as mourning, but never went away. If Daddy hadn’t died when she was four … Another thing Suzette tried not to think about.

  Parenting was hard for her. But she tried to be responsible in the ways her mother was not, with a reliable schedule and healthy food, a desirable wardrobe and constant investment in Hanna’s well-being. Suzette started out fully determined to be everything she would have wanted for herself. But Hanna didn’t want what she had to off
er. Maybe if she could just get her enrolled in school, and work on this weird new witch identity with a therapist—at least she was talking!—they could start again. It worried her that her mothering was too much of one thing and too little of another, but somewhere along the line she lost track of which and what.

  * * *

  Mrs. Wavalene Wade—as identified by the lettering on her door—popped out of her office. Older and plumper, but just as casual as the rest of the Sunnybridge staff, she flashed a warm smile and gestured for them both to come in.

  “Sorry to keep you ladies waiting. I’m so happy you were able to come in today.”

  “Thank you for seeing us on such short notice.” She held up her index finger, gesturing to Hanna to wait a minute. Hanna sprang from her chair and followed the adults into the room. Suzette’s facial muscles tightened in annoyance, and she feared that Hanna would remain oppositional throughout the meeting.

  Mrs. Wade closed the door behind them and went around to sit behind her (messy) desk. Her office was filled with bookcases of (messy) books and a menagerie of children’s sculptures made of clay and play-dough. A mobile made of plastic straws and felt-covered cardboard stars dangled from the ceiling. Struck again by the substandard artwork, Suzette pondered the possibility that the problem might be budgetary: perhaps Sunnybridge couldn’t afford the extensive art materials of the more elite schools Hanna had previously attended, with their foiled papers and lap looms and fancy wooden beads. She declined to comment or inquire, and remained standing.

  “I was hoping we could speak alone, just the two of us, for a few minutes?” she said.

  Hanna plopped herself into one of two chairs across from the principal’s desk. Suzette fought the urge to breathe flames through her nose.

  “Yes, of course. But since you’re both new to our school I always like to start by getting acquainted, hearing a bit about each of you, and telling you a little about us.” The principal gestured toward the empty chair.

  As she sat, Suzette registered Hanna’s victorious smirk.

  Mrs. Wade, in appearance and mannerisms, reminded Suzette so much of a character she’d liked on Nurse Jackie played by Anna Deavere Smith—the boss of a drug addicted nurse. Suzette couldn’t shake the feeling that she was about to be busted for something. Hanna turned her attention upward, toward the wobbling mobile.

  “I’m Wavalene Wade—the principal here and one of the original founders of the school.”

  “I’m Suzette, and this is my daughter, Hanna.”

  “Hello, Hanna.”

  Hanna held her gaze on the ceiling, seemingly unaware of being spoken to.

  “She doesn’t talk that much—that was one of the things I wanted to talk to you about.”

  “Sure, we’ll have time for that. So, I gathered from our brief conversation that both you and your husband are creative people?”

  “Yes, Alex is an architect, specializing in green materials and technology—”

  “Wonderful!”

  “I’m an interior designer by trade, but for the past few years I’ve mostly been a stay-at-home mom.”

  “And Hanna’s creative too?” Mrs. Wade turned her genial grin to Hanna, who continued acting as if she were unaware of the adults in the room.

  Suzette faltered. She didn’t want to bullshit her, but the truth was almost shameful. They hadn’t had even a scribble to clip to the refrigerator since Hanna was three. They had no way to justify—based on their child’s performance—enrolling her in an artistic school. Only Alex saw any potential there. She saw Sunnybridge slipping away from them as she and Hanna failed a test that had only just begun. Desperate to not lose the school as an option, Suzette decided to stretch the truth, in whatever ways she needed to. She’d be grateful for even a few weeks’ reprieve, if Hanna’s behavior ultimately got her expelled. Something—anything—was better than nothing.

  “As my husband would say … Hanna … She expresses herself creatively all the time, even in how she moves through the world.”

  “Wonderful! So, if I understood correctly, you’ve been homeschooling her?”

  “That’s right—she’s exceptionally bright, we’re already working on second-, even some third-grade material.”

  “But you’d be looking at enrolling her in second grade for the fall?”

  “Well…” She gripped the hem of her sweater, twirling the extra fabric around her finger. “If there was any way … I know there’s only two months or so left in the school year, but Hanna is really … She’s at a point where she really wants to have other kids to socialize and play with.” In her peripheral vision, Hanna’s jaw clenched and her nostrils flared at the lie. “So we were hoping … Could she jump into the first grade and finish the year with you?”

  Mrs. Wade bobbed her head a bit, weighing the possibility. “It’s not completely out of the question, but I’m not sure, since she hasn’t been in school before, if that would make for the smoothest transition.” She looked at Hanna. “How do you feel about it, Hanna? Are there things you’re looking forward to doing in school?”

  Suzette held her breath, unsure how Hanna would respond. Once upon a time, she could have counted on her to remain mute and disinterested. She was almost as startled as Mrs. Wade when the girl began snarling like a vicious dog.

  Hanna looked the principal right in the eye, her teeth bared, and emitted a guttural growl followed by a volley of savage barks. Fearing what her daughter might do, Suzette gripped Hanna’s forearm.

  “Hanna! Stop it!”

  The girl didn’t stop. Mrs. Wade inched away in her rolling chair as Hanna rose from her seat, the barking growing more rabid.

  Suzette saw nothing of her once beatific baby in that ferocious face, no trace that Hanna had ever been the toddler who smiled when she and Alex sang to her. In her place was a feral animal. Even her eyes shone with cruelty, and Suzette feared there was something—someone—else in there. She wanted to grab Hanna and shake her, shake the demon loose and scream “Give her back to me!” But she couldn’t, not as a stranger watched.

  “Stop it, Hanna!” She didn’t want to do it, invoke that other name, but desperation drove her. “Marie-Anne, stop it this instant!”

  And Hanna stopped. She smiled, smoothing out her flowered skirt like a girl at a tea party as she sat back down. She even folded her hands on her lap and beamed at Mrs. Wade like she was eager to be asked another question.

  For a moment, neither woman spoke. They both gazed at Hanna, horrified and unsure how to react. Suzette sank back into her chair, trembling with defeat. She felt herself growing pink with shame. How could she explain her daughter? To Mrs. Wade. To Alex.

  But Mrs. Wade quickly recovered.

  “I see what you mean about having a few private words.” She came from around her desk and opened her door. “Hanna, would you like to wait in the outer office for a minute? There are some books on the table, if you’d like to read. And some crayons and paper.”

  Hanna sashayed out of the room. Mrs. Wade watched her get settled in a chair, then closed the door and returned to her desk.

  Suzette sat with one elbow propped on an armrest, holding her hand over her eyes as if shielding them from the sun. She wanted to hide. She wanted to rewind the day back to when Hanna and Alex were still in his study. She could throw a few things in a bag and slip out before anyone noticed she was gone … No. Not unless Alex would sneak away with her.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said.

  “It’s all right. Why don’t you tell me, now that it’s the two of us, what sort of issues you’re having.”

  Suzette grabbed her purse. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come here—” She stood, ready to bolt.

  “Wait, please. I’ve been teaching kids for thirty-five years, I’ve seen everything. Let me help you.” She extended her hand toward the chair, until Suzette finally crumpled back into it.

  Unable to find the words at first, she just shook her head. “It wasn’t always this bad—not li
ke this. She…” She closed her eyes and saw a curtain of red. She blinked hard, trying to clear the blood from her vision. Mrs. Wade’s expression was like a beacon of hope, so full of calm understanding. “I’ve tried so hard and I don’t know where I went wrong and I don’t know how to fix—”

  “But you’re trying to figure it out, that’s the important thing.” She folded her hands atop her desk, committed to the conversation.

  “She never liked me. No, that’s not true. When she was a baby…” Suzette knew she was oversharing, but the words spilled out. “But at some point this war began. And I’m losing. I’m losing it. And I can’t tell my husband because, I try but … He doesn’t see it. And where would I be? I’m supposed to be a good mom, the mom I never had, that’s what I wanted. That’s what I promised him, what I promised myself.”

  Mrs. Wade leaned back in her chair, crossing one leg over the other, like they were two women who’d known each other forever and always sought the other’s counsel. “Being a mother is the hardest job in the world. And every other mom understands that. I can’t tell you how many parents—it’s bittersweet, of course they want to spend as much time with their kids, but it’s such a relief when they’re finally in school.”

  Suzette nodded in firm agreement. “I thought everything would get better. Kindergarten. But she didn’t talk. That’s how it all started. We tried doctors, there’s nothing physically wrong. But every place I’ve tried to enroll her. And every babysitter. It’s like she wants to torture me—just me.”

  “I know it seems that way—feels that way. But sometimes kids don’t know why they do what they do. They want something but don’t know how to express it. And for someone with the communication difficulties that it sounds like Hanna has had … Have you tried therapy?”

  “We’re going to. A developmental psychologist. The pediatrician recommended someone.”

  “That’s good. That’s a good start.”

  “I never have anyone to talk to about this.” She refused to let herself cry, even as she wished for a mom like Wavalene and the routine comfort of an older woman’s wisdom.