Woman No. 17

by Edan Lepucki

  “He owe child support?” Smith Tatzko had asked.

  I said no. “Marco’s not Seth’s father.”

  It could have been a joke it was so hard to believe. Seth looked just like his dad and somewhere in Smith Tatzko’s office there was a photo of Marco to prove it. I had lied because I wanted Seth to know, even at his young age, that he was better than this missing man.

  I paid Smith Tatzko and said I wouldn’t need his services anymore. When Seth and I got home, I folded his birth certificate into a tiny square and stuffed it into a high heel I never wore. I was glad I’d given him my last name. I told myself I was trying to protect him. And I was. But there was a part of me that was keeping Marco for myself. I’d mourn him alone. He was mine.

  I still had those high heels. And if I didn’t, Seth could easily go order a new certificate on his own. He was new to adulthood, though; he probably didn’t know what his rights were.

  When I got to Sunset, I pulled in front of the Coffee Bean, the one Karl had taken Tanya to the morning after she slept in the Cottage. Had she covered her ears at the sounds of the coffee grinder and the blenders?

  With the engine still running, I grabbed my phone and did what I held myself back from doing more than once a year: I opened the web browser and typed Marco Green into the search window. It had been only seven months since my last search, but this was an emergency. My finger hovered over the screen and then tapped Go.

  My previous attempts were never fruitful, yielding only images of sixty-year-old executives and a string of small-town newspaper articles about a promising high school football star. But this time, a new result popped onto the screen.

  Someone named Marco Green had a Twitter profile.

  “My Marco?” I asked no one.

  The car was sweltering. When I pulled off my seat belt the buckle grazed my shoulder and I cried out; it was hot enough to brand me.

  @MarcoGreen71 was from Los Angeles, California; 1971 was Marco’s birth year.

  His profile photo showed a man holding up a large lizard; he was too far away for me to see his face, but his arms looked tan and ropy like Marco’s had been. His bio read Slacker turned entrepreneur. Please send Doritos.

  It looked like @MarcoGreen71 tweeted every couple of days, and none were personal. He last linked to an article about solar power lowering home utility bills.

  I closed the site. Then I opened the Twitter app.

  I think my son is breaking up with me.

  I waited. For what? A heart? For a retweet? I refreshed the page. Nothing new, but I didn’t put the phone down. Marco didn’t even know of this account; no one I knew did, and yet I felt the old desperation return after years of latency; it was brushing the dust off itself and standing tall. It would get Marco to respond. It would.

  I couldn’t control myself. I did what I’d promised myself I wouldn’t do: I would stop tweeting to myself and reach out to another person.

  I searched for @MarcoGreen71. I pressed the Follow button.

  “Hello,” I said aloud. “Here I am.”

  And then I typed.

  Hey @marcogreen71 this is Lady calling. Can you pick up the phone?

  25.

  It’s easy to demean the pain of a breakup, probably because it’s so demeaning to be dumped, but I can’t gloss over what I felt when Marco left me and Seth. I can’t gild the dog shit.

  What I remember most is the silence. Marco didn’t talk much, but he had been loud: his boots clomped; he chewed with his mouth open; his orgasms were groans he didn’t attempt to muffle even with a baby in the room. And that music. He played his records at top volume, the windowpanes shaking as they absorbed the reverb. Marco’s presence had a sound and when he left it was like he took all that sound with him.

  Seth was either mute from birth, the disability written into his genes, or something happened to turn him that way. The silence may have been there all along, but it didn’t stand out until he and I were alone. And even then, I didn’t think it was a real problem until everyone else did. I was too busy nursing my anger and grieving my loss. It took years for me to stop feeling acute pain.

  When your kid doesn’t talk at eighteen months, it’s not a big deal. When he’s two, you might get a few concerned glances, a couple “You’re lucky! Once they start they won’t stop!” But there still isn’t much concern, especially if your child is learning two languages at once, as Seth was doing at home and at Alma’s. At three, someone at the supermarket might remark, “Albert Einstein didn’t talk for the longest time, and look how he turned out!” A week later, the pediatrician suggests a specialist. “Head Start might not be the best preschool for a kid like Seth,” he says.

  That visit to the pediatrician was where my memoir should have begun, for it was the first time an expert expressed concern, thus turning Seth into a specimen. At the appointment, Dr. Herrera asked me question after question. First they were related to language acquisition: Does he have special names for objects, even if they’re gibberish to outsiders, such as ga for car? When he’s upset, does he call out for you? Did he ever have latch issues? Did he need to have tongue-tie surgery at birth? Does he attempt to make noises?

  “He cries, or he’s silent,” I answered. “He used to vocalize more, you know, gibberish, but I feel like he only does it rarely now. I can’t remember the last time. Oh, but he can laugh. Sometimes I can tell he’s frustrated and wants to verbalize, but he doesn’t.”

  As I spoke, I realized how suspicious all this sounded. How could I not have brought him in earlier? Alma never seemed concerned about Seth’s silence, but maybe that was because she watched too many kids to worry about any one of them in particular. The silence in our apartment unnerved me, yes, but I was also used to it. We didn’t hang out with other mothers and children, and I hadn’t realized how odd it was.

  Or, no, I did. I must have.

  “I guess I expect him to open his mouth someday and speak in complete sentences.”

  Dr. Herrera scribbled something into the file. “That has been known to happen.” We both looked at Seth, who was sprawled across the floor of the examination room, looking at a book about dinosaurs like any three-year-old might.

  “Is he sensitive to sounds in general?” he asked.

  I remembered how he used to cover his ears when Marco put on a record. But that was wise; the music was too loud for his tiny eardrums.

  “My son is normal except for this one thing,” I said.

  Dr. Herrera’s questions changed. Does Seth show affection? Does he make eye contact?

  “You know he does. He smiled at you when you said good morning.”

  “I’m sorry, you’re right, you’re right.” He held his pen aloft for a moment, like it was a model ship he was admiring. When he looked back at me, he was so serious I felt scared. “There isn’t anything else I should know?” he asked.

  “Like what?”

  “Provided there isn’t a medical reason for Seth being nonverbal, and we will be sure to check his hearing, get his blood tested—”

  “What will a blood test show?”

  “There are certain, very rare, diseases. Aside from all that, children often stop speaking if—”

  “He never started speaking,” I said. There, there, I think.

  “True. But a child’s verbal development might be affected if he has experienced trauma.”

  “Trauma?”

  “Witnessed a violent crime, or been the victim of—”

  “There’s been nothing like that, thank goodness.”

  He looked relieved to be interrupted; he was already turning toward the exam room’s computer. “Let’s first get his hearing checked then. I’ll get Martha to give you some referrals.”

  “Great,” I said. “Thanks so much.”

  This part of the story didn’t bother me. Not really. It was what happened after we left the pediatrician’s office that haunted me. Another memory that wouldn’t let me go.

  We’ve returned to our apartme
nt. I take Seth into the bedroom, where his crib lies on its side because he’s outgrown it. He likes to use it as a jungle gym. We share a bed anyway, and that’s where we sit.

  “The doctor is concerned about you,” I say. “¿Me entiendes?” Do you understand?

  Seth nods. That and shaking his head are the primary ways he communicates. He also points and claps his hands.

  “You need to start talking,” I say.

  You need to. I shiver. That had been my mother’s favorite refrain. You need to stand up straight. You need to smile when ordering at a restaurant. You need to pause between sentences. You need to, you need to.

  I don’t even get a nod from Seth. Nor a headshake. He’s got his eyes on the sideways crib and I can tell he wants to climb it. He isn’t listening.

  “Seth.” I put my hands on his shoulders but he squirms away. I grab his arm. Even as it’s happening, I know I’m being too rough. My mother never grabbed me like this. Her words may have been burred but her touch was, if not gentle, then at least neutral.

  “Sit,” I say. “This is important. Talking is important.”

  I put a hand on his jaw. He doesn’t move. He’s been to the dentist. He’s seen a ventriloquist and his dummy. Has he witnessed a man kiss a woman? Does he remember Marco kissing me?

  I pull his jaw and he opens his mouth. When I push up on his chin, he closes his mouth.

  We do that for a moment. Open, closed, open.

  The summer I turned fifteen, my mother had us both chewing every bite of food twenty-five times before swallowing. To aid digestion, she said. My jaws went open and closed, open and closed. That was also the summer I fainted for the first time.

  “Talk,” I say.

  I lean in to get a better look at his open mouth. His front teeth are spaced wide apart and he doesn’t have all his molars yet. His mouth smells like buttered toast; it always does, even if he hasn’t eaten toast for days.

  “Is your tongue merely ornamental?” I ask.

  I’m sure Seth doesn’t know what I mean, but my question dissipates his tolerance and he moves away.

  That’s when I grab for his jaw and yell, “Talk!”

  The sound of my own voice startles the both of us, and with the flat of my hand against his chin I push him backward. Seth falls off the bed and onto the floor. He’s bitten his tongue and there is blood on his teeth.

  His whimpering, like his laughter, has a sound. If he wasn’t damaged before, I think, he is now. This is the first and last time I have ever laid a hand on my son. It would make a good opening chapter for my book if I were willing to tell anyone about it.

  “Hey,” I whisper. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I really didn’t. I love you, Seth. I’m sorry. I love you.”

  I rub his back until he gets up from the floor and comes to me. I swipe the blood from his teeth and put my sullied finger in my own mouth. Seth gives me a hug. He cries big, slobbery, wet tears into my shoulder until my shirt is soaked.

  Children forgive too easily.

  “We can talk without words,” I tell him. I’m thinking of sign language, but it will be a year before Seth and I start our ASL classes. His proficiency with the language will be as swift as mine is hobbled. For now, neither of us knows anything.

  I hold out my cupped hands. “This means sorry,” I say. “Try it.”

  He doesn’t move.

  “It means more than just I’m sorry,” I explain. “It means, I’m sorry and I love you.”

  Sorry Love.

  I wait with my hands out like a bowl, but that first time, Seth doesn’t mimic me. He isn’t the sorry one.

  This is the first special sign, born out of twin desires to communicate with my child and to express my guilt for hurting him. Language has two functions: to harm and to repair harm.

  We never used that sign again.

  26.

  My dad said he’d perish if I didn’t come up for the long weekend, but I stayed in L.A. and, hey look, he was doing A-okay. He kept texting me photos of vegetables harvested from his garden, which he called the Farm only half-facetiously and to which I replied with various produce emoticons. I wanted to say I missed him and his ridiculous gardening gloves, printed with sunflowers and fraying at the wrists, and that I wished we could gab over Arnold Palmers and avocado toasts like we used to. But I couldn’t. The Katherine Mary project was growing teeth and I had to keep away any and all distractions, Dad included. Dad especially.

  Because who but Steve Shapiro would figure out that something wasn’t quite right with me and try to set things straight? It wasn’t only my make-under and the few pounds I’d gained from drinking every night. I had changed. I could feel it in my drawings. They were so ugly and free, like nothing I’d ever done before. As much as I wanted to tell him about this project I’d gotten inside of, how I was pretending to be what I wasn’t: a drinker, a mischief maker, an artist, how maybe I was those things after all, I didn’t, because, if I did, the drawings would stop. Steve Shapiro would summon Esther, and I didn’t want her found.

  It wasn’t just the art either. It was Seth. The threat and promise of him, and the trouble he’d cause if I let him. Sometimes I carried the Scrabble tiles in my pocket, just to have them near. I’d bitten into the H, hoping to leave teeth marks. I pictured returning the scarred tile to the Scrabble box for Lady to puzzle over and Seth to get off to. This was straight-up Katherine Mary thinking. Almost twenty years ago, she had paid the neighbor girl five bucks an hour to babysit me while she bagged the skateboarder. It wasn’t sleeping around that she liked, but sneaking around.

  I’d had my mom’s bunny for just over a week when I got another idea for my project. I’d go on Craigslist to request photos of people’s mothers before they became mothers: the teenage pic, the honeymoon shot, the sad candid. PHOTOS WANTED FOR ART PROJECT. I had an idea that I’d paint them. Or I’d stage the same photo, myself in their mother’s place, and paint that. I’d be the whole world’s mommy.

  It was Monday night and I was drunk-posting the ad, the bunny nose-twitching on my lap, when the phone rang.

  I picked up on the first ring, my hello loud and peppy. I must have been imagining my dad on the other end.

  “Esther? Is that you?”

  “Mom,” I said. “I’m on Craigslist.”

  “Missed Connections?”

  As soon as she said it, I knew she was drunk—and not Happy Kathy either. There was a drag and belligerence to her speech.

  “No,” I said carefully. “I’m posting a request…it’s hard to explain. It’s for something I’m working on—”

  “I can’t believe you took my pet.”

  She said something else but the sounds of traffic made it impossible to hear. Someone walked by, laughing.

  “Where are you?” I asked, leaning down to put the bunny in his pen. “Call a cab when you’re done, okay? Or use the app I downloaded to your phone. The charges come to me so you don’t have to worry.”

  “Shut the fuck up,” she said. “I don’t care about your fucking apps!”

  I didn’t answer.

  “You know what?” she said.

  “What?”

  “You should get the word ‘bitch’ tattooed on you. A tramp stamp. Right above your little ass crack.”

  “Just promise me you’ll use the app,” I said, and hung up.

  There was a time, back when I first started college, when I would have let her talk as long as she wanted. She only called me in a mood because she was lonely, and what could I do if that loneliness had a mean streak? You abandoned me, she’d say. You don’t love me. You’re selfish and stuck-up. You’re Daddy’s girl, aren’t you? She said awful things, and they were awful because they were true. At least my mom was being honest with me. In those moments, I had unfettered access to her thoughts. In a sick way, I felt close to her. The call would come like a bill, and I would pay it.

  The first time I hung up on her, she called back, bloodlust in her voice, and I hung up again. That seeme
d to squash it for a while, but she always fell back into the routine. Everett called it Mom Rage. My dad didn’t call it anything because he had no idea.

  The phone rang again.

  “I seriously can’t do this right now, Mom.”

  “You know what should be a disability? Having children. Don’t ever have kids, Esther, you hear me? All they do is hurt you. They’ll ruin your life.”

  “Good night, Mom.”

  After I’d posted the Craigslist ad and made sure the project’s email address worked, I sat with Women by Kit Daniels. After the phone calls I needed a night off.

  I was still thinking about the two versions of Woman No. 17. Kit had altered one version. But why?

  I slid my body off the mattress and pulled the book down with me so that we were lying side by side on the carpet. On my back, the ceiling seemed as low as ever, like it was sagging closer and closer to the floor, and I flipped onto my stomach. I inched closer to the book and nailed it open with my chin. I slipped my hands into the waist of my jeans.

  The page was matte rather than glossy. The left side of the book was blank, the number 17 printed in black ink in the lower left-hand corner, and across from it Lady stared. From this angle she was so close up I couldn’t see anything except the grainy texture of the black-and-white film. Kit never shot on digital, a fanny pack of film around her hips like a cowboy and his holster.

  Because it was stuffy in the Cottage, I’d left the door open a crack—ass crack—and I wondered now if Peter Rabbit would sniff a waft of pussy with his hyperactive nose and run scared, only to get eaten by a coyote. Or if Lady, out for a little midnight stroll, would catch me masturbating to her image. But the book’s just a pillow, I’d tell her. It’s Seth I’m into, and he doesn’t look anything like you.