The Sound of Us

by Sarah Willis

  She’s very kind to say so. The class was on separation and attachment impact, and the more I learn, the more worried I get. At night, as I fall asleep, I list the reasons I should do this, could do this. During the daytime, my life fills in. I agree to jobs, parties, a concert with Polly and her husband, a day hike in the Allegheny Mountains. I can’t stop living, waiting for Larissa. The first Sunday in August, I invite three interpreters over for chicken marseilles, risotto, and grilled vegetables. I buy a lemon meringue pie. We laugh and network, talk about movies and books. I never mention Larissa. That night, before I go to bed, I plan my next dinner, whom I’ll ask, what I’ll make, but I’m making two sets of plans now. I live one life in the daytime, but at night I never go to sleep without imagining Larissa. It is not her face I see, but her hair, and her small feet, her wet wrinkled thumb, her hand in a fist by her side. I am afraid that I have forgotten her face, but I haven’t forgotten what it felt like to hold her.

  One night Polly calls to tell me that her mother has some kind of viral infection, something no one can diagnose. Polly’s going to Massachusetts to visit her for a few days. “Tell her I said hi,” I say. “Call me as soon as you get back.”

  Thursday, August eighth, almost three weeks after Larissa called my house looking for her aunt, Yolanda calls me.

  “Alice, there’s a problem. Larissa’s not talking. To anyone. She won’t talk to me, her mother, her foster mother, or any of the children in the home. This kind of thing happens, but it seldom lasts this long. It’s causing some resentment in the home she’s placed in. Her foster mother’s asking for a transfer. It’ll be brought up at the hearing on Tuesday at the magistrate’s office.”

  I think about what she just said. She’s telling me this for a reason. “If you’re going to move her, can she come here?” I ask. “The home study is in two and a half weeks. I’ve gone to four classes. I’ve missed a few.”

  “It’s probably too early for that, but if we know you’re interested, we may be able to hold off the transfer until you’re ready. Would you consider a visit with Larissa? I’m thinking you might be less threatening than I am, less emotionally disrupting than her mother, and you have experience in communication, right?”

  “Yes. I do.”

  “So you would visit with her?”

  “Yolanda, I’d love to see her.”

  “Thought so. I mentioned you to the foster mother. She said I could give you her home phone number. You call her and make an appointment to come by.”

  “Oh, God, thank you!” I sit down on my kitchen chair. Outside it’s raining. It hasn’t rained for weeks.

  “Listen, Alice. This is not standard procedure. Even Larissa’s mother doesn’t go to the foster home. Visitations are at the Metzenbaum Center, not foster homes. This visit is a privilege you need to respect. The foster mother asks you to leave, you leave. She doesn’t want you to come again, you never call back. Do I have your word on this?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “If you can get her to talk, it would be great.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “And, Alice, one more thing. Because we might have to transfer Larissa, I’m going to suggest that you come to the hearing Tuesday as an interested individual. The magistrate might say no, but I think she’ll say you can come in. You should be there just in case. We should have your criminal background check done by then. So, next Tuesday. Eight-thirty?”

  “Where do I go?”

  “The hearing’s at Juvenile Court, Twenty-second and Cedar. And Alice, if your visit with Larissa goes well, we could ask her foster mother to speak up on your behalf. But even if the magistrate goes for it, things don’t happen right away. Nothing here happens right away. Larissa’s in the system now. You understand?”

  “Yes. I do. Can I call this woman now?”

  She gives me the name and number, then pauses. “I won’t be there, Alice. It will be a visit outside the system, just between you and the foster parent. But if it goes badly, I’ll get the blame.”

  “It’ll go well,” I say. “I promise.”

  “Then I’ll see you Tuesday morning at court.”

  I sit at the kitchen table, tracing my fingernail along the wood grain. Outside, the ground is so hard that the rain bounces back up like hail. Rainwater runs in a river down my driveway and out to the street, spilling into sewers. Once, after a hard rain like this, I found a wet, frightened rat in my basement. I called the animal warden, but by the time he came, the rat couldn’t be found. He said it probably went back down through the toilet in the basement, the way it must have come in. I had the toilet removed and the pipe capped. How far back would they check?

  I take a deep breath and call Larissa’s foster mother.

  Chapter Nine

  I go to visit Larissa the next day, following a long morning interpreting for deaf parents of a hearing child who’s enrolling in the Cleveland Heights school system. I make mistakes as I interpret, and have to apologize several times. This is the school system Larissa will be in if I get Larissa. It’s August ninth. Might I get her before school begins? What grade will she be going into?

  The houses on 116th where Larissa’s foster mother lives are much like those in my own neighborhood, but on a smaller scale, older homes with front porches and meager lawns, the houses built close together. Women chat from their porches and children run across lawns. Like my own, except every face I see is black.

  In the late-morning sunlight children play in the street, riding scooters, tossing a ball. I have to drive carefully, and still I hit a pothole the size of Kansas. Something in my car clunks loudly. At least I have an old car, I think, as if that might make me fit in better. Actually, most of the cars parked on the street are bigger and newer than mine.

  I find the address. It’s a side-by-side, dark blue with white trim, and a trellis of pink roses across one side of the porch. There’s a bright yellow plastic slide on the small front lawn, and a few toy trucks. I think about my upside down frog sprinkler. Maybe Larissa will like that?

  On the porch is a black woman holding a baby. She’s talking with an elderly man who leans against a post. Walking up the front walk, I clutch my purse under my arm as if someone might run right by and grab it from me.

  “Hello,” I say, standing at the bottom of the steps. “Mrs. Hunt? I’m Alice Marlowe?”

  “Yes. I imagine you are,” she says with a chuckle and a glance over at the older man. She has deep wrinkles around her eyes, and a line of small moles across her throat like a necklace. The baby in her arms is no more than a few months old.

  “Come on in,” she says, opening her front door.

  “Good morning, miss,” the elderly man says, tipping his hat as I walk by. I say hello, then follow Mrs. Hunt inside.

  The front door leads directly into a small living room with dark wood paneling on the walls and heavy drapes over the windows. A fan on a tall stand rotates back and forth slowly, blowing warm air against my face. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust from the bright light outside. In a corner, a TV flickers, the sound turned down low. In another corner is a playpen with a toddler peeking above the netting. “Up,” the child says, raising its chubby arms toward Mrs. Hunt. The room has an odor I can’t quite place.

  “Just a minute, baby,” Mrs. Hunt says. “Larissa, Mrs. Marlowe’s here.” She turns toward the corner by the door we came through, and before I can tell her it’s Miss, not Mrs., I see Larissa. She’s curled up in a plaid recliner, her knees to her chin, wearing her pink pajamas, no slippers. It’s almost noon. I’d have her dressed by now, I think. Lucy is in her arms, one soft ear lying against Larissa’s cheek. She looks up at me and her eyes widen for just a moment, then she quickly looks down again as if she got caught doing something she shouldn’t. Her hair has been unbraided. It’s so thick that even tied back with a rubber band, it flies out all over, framing her face like a fuzzy halo.

  She looks all right, not harmed in any obvious way. Driving here, I imagined her
with a cast on her arm, a black eye, a dazed look, as if the harm of living in a foster home would be physical as well as mental. Not that any of the people I met at foster parenting classes were bad people, but I couldn’t help thinking the way I always had about foster homes.

  “I told her you were coming,” Mrs. Hunt says. “I don’t know what she understands. She don’t talk to me.”

  “Up,” the toddler says again. “Up.”

  “Hold on, baby. Let me put this one down.” She crosses into the next room, just as dark as this one, and places the baby in a crib. Everywhere there are toys on the floor. It can’t be safe to walk around in such a dark house with all those toys on the floor. “Shhh, shhh, now, you go to sleep,” she says to the baby, and puts a pacifier in its mouth.

  Back in the living room, Mrs. Hunt plucks the toddler out of the playpen with an ease I don’t expect from an older woman. Maybe she isn’t much older than me. Maybe she just looks a lot older. “I’ll leave you be by yourself. I’ll be right out here, on the porch. Have a seat.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “Be nice to the lady.” She closes the screen door behind her, leaving the big wooden door open. Outside, I can hear her murmuring to the toddler. The old man says something and Mrs. Hunt laughs, a loud hearty laugh. Are they laughing at me?

  The couch is too far away from Larissa, so I pull over a blue-topped stool meant for a child and place it in front of Larissa’s chair, just two feet away. When I sit down, my knees come up higher than my waist and I must look foolish. Still, I’m on the same level as Larissa and that’s what counts. I put my purse on the floor between my feet, and sign as I speak. This is what I’ve decided to do on the drive over.

  “Hello, Larissa. I told you I’d see you again. I’m sorry it took so long. I missed you, Larissa.”

  As soon as she catches the movement of my hands, I’ve got her attention. When I sign her name the second time, the L to my chest, she takes in a breath that says oh! As an interpreter, I watch people’s faces, so even though it’s just a small breath, a small oh, I see it.

  “Are you watching a cartoon?” I ask, nodding my head toward the TV. “What cartoon is it?”

  She looks at the TV, then back at me.

  “Is it Sesame Street?” I’m not even looking at the TV, just at her face. There’s a slight frown on her forehead. Maybe Sesame Street is no longer on TV these days.

  “Mrs. Hunt seems nice. Do you like the other children here? How many are there?” I try to keep the patronizing tone out of my voice. How can she take care of so many children?

  Larissa doesn’t answer, just watches my hands. “Is she nice?” I whisper. “Does she take good care of you?” Completely inappropriate, but it just slips out. Larissa shrugs.

  “You know, Larissa, I came because you’re not speaking to anyone. I know how you feel, but it’s important you talk. Having a voice is important. You shouldn’t hide yours. You’re important. The things you say are important.”

  She only frowns.

  “How’s Lucy?” I ask. She looks down at her rabbit. A seam is split along the rabbit’s neck, a puff of gray stuffing sticking out. “Would you like me to sew her up?” I ask, still signing every word. She shakes her head hard, clutching Lucy tighter. “It wouldn’t hurt her,” I say. “It would just tickle her to sew her up because stuffed rabbits are special that way. I just don’t want her to fall apart. I know how much you love her.”

  Larissa shakes her head again, but now looks at Lucy with obvious worry. She sticks a finger in the tear, pushing the stuffing back in.

  “Would you like to sew her up yourself? I could show you how.” I have a small sewing kit in my purse, one of those things that looks like a big pack of matches. My mother gave it to me, telling me to keep it with me at all times.

  Larissa glances at me, surprised. Then she nods, just once.

  Taking out the sewing kit, I find a needle and thread it with brown thread, making a thick knot at the end because Lucy is made out of a loose-woven material. “Okay, Larissa, you hold the needle like this. Be very careful.” Maybe I shouldn’t be letting her have a needle, like a prisoner not being allowed to have sharp objects. Could I get in trouble for this?

  “Okay, put Lucy on your lap. Get her comfortable. Let’s get her head turned this way.” Moving Lucy causes the stuffing to tumble out again. Gently I push it back in. “Now, start here, right here, on the inside, so the knot won’t show, and push the needle right through.” I talk Larissa through the process, not signing now, pointing to each place she needs to put the needle. She does pretty well and I encourage her to give a good tug, to make the stitches tighter, like a good doctor would. She lets me tie the knot when she’s done. I stick the needle back in the packet and put it away in my purse, relieved that her foster mother didn’t come in and see us. Larissa looks down at her bunny with a smile. It’s the first smile I have ever seen on her face, and I know that I want her to smile at me that way; my forty-eight years of life has boiled down to this strong, possibly obsessive need for this child to care for me.

  “Oh, I bet Lucy feels so much better now! She must be very thankful you’re so good at sewing her up.”

  Larissa looks up at me, the smile lingering slightly in her eyes.

  “Don’t you think Lucy looks so much better now?” I ask.

  “Do your hands,” she says.

  I’m so startled, I just stare at her. “Sign?” I finally say. “You want me to keep signing with my hands as I talk?”

  She nods once. It’s a no-nonsense nod. She knows what she wants.

  “Okay.” I wipe my hands on my slacks, then rub them together as if I’m about to give a performance. “This is how you say okay, and this is how you say yes. If I ask you a question, you can sign yes, just this way. It’s very easy. See?” I repeat the sign for yes, elbow bent, a fist held out, flexing my wrist up and down twice.

  Those dark straight eyebrows lower down closer to her eyes. She’s watching, concentrating.

  “Can you say yes with your hand?”

  Slowly, she lifts her hand up, makes a fist and bobs it, just as I showed her. I grin like all get-out. “Good! Very good. And I bet you’d like to know how to say no, because that’s an important word too. It’s easy, too. Just like this.” I make the sign for no several times, and then she imitates me. “Good,” I say. “That’s very good!”

  We sit silently for a minute, satisfied. I listen to the whirl of the fan, the mumble of the TV, the sounds of the street outside.

  “I have an idea,” I say happily. “A game. I’ll ask you questions, and you sign yes or no, okay?” She doesn’t answer, or sign, but I go on. “Okay, let’s start. Is your name Larissa?”

  Those eyebrows lower. It’s a tell, like in poker. She’s thinking, deciding if she should participate. Finally she signs yes. It’s working!

  “And is your rabbit’s name Hermione?”

  She looks confused for a moment, then smiles and makes the sign for no. She smiled again! Two smiles! I wish I had this on camera. I want to prove to the whole world she smiled twice while I was with her. I ask her more questions, and she signs yes or no. Three more times, when I ask silly questions, she smiles. I’m up to five smiles when her foster mother opens the screen door.

  “You two doin’ okay?”

  “Yes,” I say, signing the word yes, glancing over at Larissa. The corners of her mouth turn up, and I count that as the sixth smile.

  “We’re talking in sign language,” I say. “Larissa is a very smart girl. She also said a few words, out loud.”

  Mrs. Hunt crosses her arms under her chest. “Well, I wish she’d talk to me. It’s hard, her not talkin’. I don’t know what she wants. The other kids, they tease her, call her names. Truthfully, it gets on my nerves, her not speaking to me.”

  “Larissa,” I say, also signing, “Won’t you speak to Mrs. Hunt?”

  Larissa shakes her head and makes the sign for no. I feel myself start to grin, and stop.
>
  “She only wants to help you, Larissa.” I want Mrs. Hunt to know I’m on her side. Sort of.

  Larissa sits there stonily. Frowning.

  “Well, that’s up to her, I guess,” Mrs. Hunt says. “You might want to remind her school starts in a week. She’ll have to talk there.”

  Want to bet? I think.

  “I got to make lunch. You staying much longer?”

  “Oh, I . . . I don’t want to interfere with your lunch.” I suddenly imagine myself sitting at her kitchen table with however many children she has here.

  Wuss, Vince says. What, they might bite? Rabid maybe?

  Shut up, I spell with my hand.

  “Well, how about you stay until lunch is ready. About fifteen minutes more?”

  I nod.

  “You can come back another day, if she want you to.”

  “Thanks,” I say. “Would you like me to come back again, Larissa?”

  Larissa looks at me, then over at Mrs. Hunt. She lifts up her hand and signs yes.

  “That means yes,” I tell Mrs. Hunt.

  “Well, so does noddin’ a head.” She walks off into the kitchen.

  I look at Larissa, and lower my voice. “People get mad at you when you don’t talk to them. It hurts their feelings and then they get mad so they don’t get hurt. Do you want to hurt Mrs. Hunt’s feelings?”

  Larissa shrugs, indifferent.

  “Try just saying yes or no when she asks you questions. Then she won’t be so hurt. Just give her that little bit, and she won’t get mad.”

  All of a sudden, tears are running from the corners of her eyes, spilling down her cheeks. Her thumb is back in her mouth, her breathing heavy, just like I heard on the phone that night.

  Oh, God, don’t cry. I lean forward on the small stool. “I know, Larissa. This has got to be very hard for you. But it’s temporary. It’s only for a little while. They say maybe you can come stay with me for a little bit. Would you like that?”

  “I want my mommy,” she says. “I want to go home.”