by Roz Nay
“No, I told you. I left him a long time ago.”
“How did you find me?”
“Facebook.” I feel tired. I want to lie down.
“I sent you messages years ago,” she says, pointing an accusatory finger in my face to punctuate her outrage. “To let you know when Mom died. And the same with Dad. And you didn’t respond. Now you show up?”
I shrug, fighting the urge to put my forehead on the table. I wasn’t in the right place then to respond to her messages. What could I have done for her or anyone?
“Do you know what they died of, Ruth? Our parents?” Her eyes sear right through me. “Pain and fucking misery.”
What does she expect me to say? I never meant to hurt our parents. Did she?
“But this is our chance to have a fresh start, to right the past,” I begin. “And I think Mom and Dad would be happy to know we’re speaking again. Especially Mom. She’d want this.” I smooth one hand over my belly. “You know she always loved it when we helped each other.”
Alex picks at a crumb of old muffin on the table. “How are you helping me?” she mutters, but my mention of Mom has made her soften.
I sit quietly, let the pathway widen.
“If you stay, there are rules,” she says slowly.
Bingo. I’m in. “Okay.”
“I’m serious, Ruth. You can’t break them.”
“Okay,” I repeat. “Whatever you say, Alex. I don’t want to be any trouble.”
“Number one, you don’t do anything that can harm your baby. Not one thing. You take responsibility. Agree? You will have this baby. We’ll figure out the next steps from there. Do you get that? No drugs, no alcohol. Nothing.”
I balk, but I don’t show it. “I want this baby, Alex.”
“Do you?”
“Yes, of course. I already told you it feels like a second chance, you know, a way to have a family of my own that doesn’t—”
“Number two,” she plows on, “you don’t tell Hal Nightingale where you are.”
How little she understands. I nod, a contrite agreement.
“And three.” She leans forward on her elbows. “You don’t talk about the past. Not with me. And more important, not with Chase. Ever.”
I blink at her. What does she mean? I’m not to talk about anything from before? Surely she can’t mean all of our past.
“The life we had is a tunnel that caved in a long time ago, Ruth, and I’ve no interest in digging it out.”
“But—”
“You left. You left me with all of it.”
“Alex, what I did—”
“You can show up out of the blue, waltz into my house, guilt-trip me with your pregnancy, and insinuate yourself into my life, but there’s no way you’re destroying it. Never again.”
“Me? Destroy your life?” I can’t believe her gall.
“Yes, you.” She stands over me, gathering her things, yanking her satchel strap over top of her. “You, you, you. This might be a new town for you, Ruth, but I know you. I know how you operate. We’re adults now. Do you know the meaning of that word? You say nothing to Chase. Nothing. Now I have to go to work. I’ll be home at the loft by four thirty. Break any of the rules and you’re done.”
Once she’s walked away from me and the door’s banged shut, there’s a dreadful silence in the bakery. The woman behind the counter stares at me. Then suddenly there’s a collective reclattering of spoons, a general and forced murmur. I look around, my stomach churning, but I know it’s not morning sickness this time. Every single person in the room has heard what Alex just said.
ALEX
It’s a short walk from the bakery to my work after lunch break, but I have to hustle: as much as I’ve dealt with the Ruth problem for now, she’s also made me late. I hurry into the elevator and press the faded button for the third floor.
As the elevator rises, clanking, I stare at the screen of my cell phone. No word from Chase, so whatever Ruth told him over breakfast can’t have been too disastrous. But Morris has texted me. That’s unusual. Normally he just catches me on the fly. I tap on his name and the sentence appears: Can you come straight to my office?
What has happened?
The elevator jolts, and the doors open for me, presenting with zero flourish the corridor to Family Services that I walk down every day, its walls, roof, and carpet entirely devoid of color. It’s like they’re trying to make the place as depressing as the work itself. The corridor is lit with strip lights that buzz as I pass underneath them, and there are cameras in murky semicircular globes, like squid eyes, suctioned to the roof. Family Services is the fourth of the cloned brown doors; once inside the office, though, it’s a barrage of rainbow stripes. It’s like walking into an explosion in a candy factory. There are pictures drawn by children in care on every wall, as if pinning up their work will surely slow the pace at which they replicate. I buzz myself in through the security panel.
“Is Morris here?” I ask the new receptionist.
“In his office, I think. He was looking for you about ten minutes ago. Can you tell him he forgot his toast again? He made it at seven a.m.”
Morris is the team leader, British, imported here from London when he married an American. We can’t always decipher him. He’s a stout man in his late fifties, divorced now, gappy in the front teeth. He makes toast every morning, often leaving it to grow rock-hard in the toaster.
“Has anything gone wrong while I was out?” I ask, and the receptionist looks at me like the question’s too vast to consider. “Never mind.” I head down the long corridor to my left. Social workers’ offices splay off to each side, little windowless cubicles, like hutches. Morris turns when I knock on the open door of his office.
“Brilliant,” he says. “You’re back. Good lunch?” He pulls out a blue-cushioned chair for me to sit on. Underneath is a pair of running shoes from the eighties, cracked along the sides, and a tangerine that looks petrified.
“Have a seat,” he says. The walls of his office are covered in cards, thank-you notes, and photos of himself with his arms around children that he’s tacked to the wall. If there’s a gap of more than four inches, he’s covered the space with an inspirational quote or a poster with something caring on it. Nobody can hurt me without my permission, reads one of his latest additions. He sees I’m reading it.
“That’s Mahatma Gandhi.” He nods, spinning his black office chair to face me. “He was amazing.”
“Wrong, though.”
“Pardon?”
“Nothing. What’s up? You needed to see me?”
“Right.” He clasps his hands together as if in prayer. “We’re in a bit of a pickle.”
My first thought is of Buster. If something’s happened to him, I’m going to pull Minerva’s LEGO hair out by the fistful.
“Look, Alex, here’s what I need to say first: You’re my best worker. Hands down. The most energized one, and don’t think I haven’t noticed.” His teeth shine, but there’s something wrong. He’s never normally this effusive. “Every single day, you strap on your boots and you wade on out into the shit. It’s admirable, to be honest.”
“You do it,” I mumble, as I pull my hair forward and suck at one strand. “We all do.”
“No, no, some of us retreat to the paperwork.” He smiles sadly. “You never do. You’ve never even gone on stress leave. Do you know how rare that is? Where would we be without people like you?”
“It sounds like there’s a but.”
“But as much as I trust your instincts, I think that if you undermine Minerva’s work, you’re going to create a hostile working environment.”
I jerk back as if I’ve been slapped. “Undermine Minerva’s work? What are you talking about?”
“I’m afraid she’s put in a complaint. Not an official one at this point. But one that I have to confront nonetheless. As team leader, it’s my job to—”
“She was in here complaining about me? Why? Because I called her out on the Buster Floyd
case? That’s it, isn’t it? Jesus, Morris, we left that child in disgusting circumstances. I’m trying to protect him. I thought that was what we do here.”
He shifts in his chair. “It is. And we are … all … trying—”
“Are we? Minerva’s wait-and-see policy on protection is dangerous, Morris. I’m right about this one.”
“I don’t know the Floyd case.” He strokes his tie, a sign that he’s finding the conversation stressful. “There isn’t a previous Family Services file on them—I checked—so all I’ve seen are Minerva’s notes. What I would say, though, is that when you feel at odds with a colleague, Alex, you have to try to find—”
“What did she say? What exactly did she say about me?” I want to go down the corridor and set fire to her office. She’ll be in there right now, playing pop music and eating bridge mix.
“I think she found your demeanor adversarial. Your tone aggressive. That’s a loose précis.”
“This is ridiculous. Has she even opened a Family Services file on the Floyds now?”
“There’s an open file so we can offer support services. There’s no active investigation into the Floyd couple. Just to be clear. And Minerva is the lead on the case.” His skin has blotched pink around his collar.
It’s impossible to do my job if my coworkers pull while I push. I feel sick, like the room is spinning, and somewhere in my mind, I see that little boy again. Except, it’s not him. It’s a different boy. No. I take a deep breath and bring myself back to reality and the problem in front of me. What am I supposed to do? I can’t work with Minerva, but I can’t ask to be taken off the case.
“I wasn’t being aggressive toward Minerva,” I say. “I was simply pointing out that she should be more so herself.”
“Righty-ho.” Another tie sweep. “Listen, why don’t you make some notes and send me an email?”
A jaded laugh escapes me. It’s his go-to, the email request. It gets him out of all confrontation while providing him with a handy paper trail. Nobody says what they mean when they know they’re being recorded.
“You know how it works,” he says, then waits for me to speak. I don’t. I won’t. “Okay, so is that everything? Can we agree that you’ll approach your coworker with a little more decorum and respect for her authority?”
I wonder if he can see the muscle in my jawline tweaking.
“She might have a different approach to yours, Alex, but it’s not without merit. Hmm?”
I have to play the long game, not lose my temper. I need time to think. “I’ll try harder to incorporate her ideas,” I mumble. “But to be clear, I’m in it for the kids, Morris. I always have been. And I’m worried about that boy.”
“I know that. I know. We’re all working from a place of good intention. Best to remember that. But sometimes, slow and steady wins the race, right?”
He nods like the problem is solved. I leave his office and head to mine, where the walls are uncluttered. All I have is one poster by my desk: the Hulk smashing things. I admire his approach to adversity. I try firing up my laptop, but my hands are shaky on the keyboard. Why am I the only one willing to go the extra mile for a child in danger? I wrap a curl of my hair around my forefinger, chew on the end of it. With an open Family Services file, the entire history of the Floyds becomes more available. Confidentiality laws can be circumvented by a legal exchange of information between social workers, police departments, health administrators. Minerva might have told Morris that there’s no need for an active investigation into Frank and Evelyn, and he might not have sanctioned one, but didn’t he also say that as workers we all have our own approach? I grab my bag and head back toward reception, passing Minerva in the hallway.
“Oh, hi,” she says, resting a flat palm on my forearm. “Listen, I hope you don’t mind that I spoke with Morris about the Buster case. I just feel that as a team, we need to work together more. Be more like glue.”
You’re on glue, I want to tell her, but I manage not to.
“No problem.” I move away. “We’re all doing our best.” Some bests are better than others.
“Where are you going now?” she asks.
“I’m meeting Sully.” It’s not true, of course, but it’ll sting, and I know it. I exit through the security door and walk fast to the elevators.
Outside, the temperature has dropped and glacial air hits me as I head across town. I pass the police department, but I can’t go in there. I’ve just spent half an hour telling Sully how frustrating it is that there’s no Floyd investigation. He told me to record my concerns and trust my boss; it’s not advice I’m taking. I carry on past the station. From a block away, the Moses River Health building sags in its own gray drabness, a metaphor in brick, heaving under the sadness it contains. I head straight in and take the stairs to the second floor, to the offices of Mental Health and Addictions.
The reception area is empty, but on every wall are signs about noise, about cell phones, about consideration of others’ sanctity. A basket of stuffed toys sits brimming in the corner. I wonder how many kids have to spend unexplained hours in the waiting room. Next to the stuffed animals is a plastic xylophone with a bright red hammer. That’s asking for trouble. A poster of a skeletal tree growing against a backdrop of uplifting green is pinned to the front of the main desk. Pain is real, the slogan reads, but so is hope. The bottom of the poster has been ripped entirely in half, but someone’s attempted to put it back together again with Scotch tape. As I approach the desk, the woman behind it takes a deep, melancholy breath. She’s about sixty, clearly eking out the last of her union-required shifts before she can escape into a pension.
“Can I help you?” she says.
“Hi, my name’s Alex Van Ness.” I reach into my bag and pull out my social worker ID, hoping to prove that I’m privy to any kind of information I require. “I’m with Family Services. We’re following up on an active case, and I need the mental-health records of two of your clients.”
She stares at me through the smeared lenses of her glasses. “If you want information, there’s a legal process. You can’t just walk in here and take files.”
“I realize that. And I’ll get all the legal paperwork. I was just passing by your office, though, and I thought I’d get a jump on things.”
She snorts, a wet noise. “Let me see if we even have the records. What are the names?”
“Frank and Evelyn Floyd.”
One finger at a time, she pushes buttons on her computer keyboard. I don’t believe the Mental Health: Let’s Talk badge she’s been made to wear on her linty sweater. She’s the last person I’d ever want to talk to.
“Have you got the clients’ signed consent?” she asks.
“No, not yet. But we’re planning to run a psych assessment. Parental capacity. Court-ordered. So we won’t need their consent.” There’s no way I’ll get a psych assessment past Morris: they cost thousands of dollars. “So can I get a quick look at the files? You know, just to get the lay of the land?”
“Not. Even. A maybe.” She presses one button per word, tutting.
“Listen, there’s a child in danger. It’s an active Family Services file…” It’s hard to keep my voice even, to avoid betraying my frustration at this lump, this human barrier.
“I don’t care if it’s an active bomb, dear. You’re not touching it.”
Beneath the level of the desk, I grip my own thumb and squeeze.
She hits one more button, almost with flourish, and then sits back. “The records are available. Get your paperwork organized, and then you can have them.”
“Are there separate files on the Floyds? Surely you can tell me that much.” Perhaps one Floyd is in worse shape than the other. I might as well hone my approach.
She exhales heavily, vacillating. Will she throw me a tidbit? She really shouldn’t.
“If I’m coming back with a court order, I need to know what I’m asking for.”
Another long, irritable sigh before she surrenders. “The husba
nd’s file was closed a while ago.”
“Oh? And the wife’s?” She watches me pick up my ID card carefully. I don’t make eye contact.
“We had to reopen hers. Hers was active until about ten months ago.”
About ten months ago? I try hard to keep my expression neutral.
“Thanks a lot,” I say, turning. “I’ll get back to you with paperwork as soon as possible.”
“You do that,” she calls after me.
I leave, pulling the door tight behind me. Outside, the sky’s brightened and the wind has dropped. I sit down on a low wall beside a fire hydrant to catch my breath and calm down. What I’ve just done is, I suppose, illegal. It could get me in trouble, but already I’ve stumbled upon a fact that would affect any judgment of Evelyn’s capacity to parent. She’s been struggling much more recently than Minerva made out. My guess? With drugs. Once an addict … And did Minerva lie about that on purpose to make herself look good? Or does she really not know? Either way, I’m onto something now. If I can persuade Morris there’s more at play here, I might find real ways to help Buster.
I reach for the cell phone in my pocket. It’s not long before Sully picks up.
“Hey,” he says. “Do you need another coffee already? You must be missing me.”
“No, it’s not … I mean, I am, but it’s not that.” I laugh a little, as if I’m not wound up. I can do this. I’m doing the right thing. I can have a positive impact with this case. “Sully, I need your help on something. It’s about the family I was telling you about earlier.”
“Anything,” he says, and I hear him close a door, muffling out all the surrounding sound. “You know that.”
“I just need you to put the Floyd names into your system. See if anything comes up.”
“Morris has opened an investigation on them? Alex?”
“He will. If I bring him new info. Please, Sully, can you just run their names?”