The Greats

by Deborah Ellis

  All he has is pain.

  5

  “Sit.”

  Jomon relents to the pressure the officer puts on his shoulder and sits in the chair beside her desk. He rubs his wrists, glad that the handcuffs have been taken off.

  The officer sits down at her computer.

  “Let’s start with your name,” she says. Then, before he can make it clear he isn’t going to answer her, she asks, “Where are your shoes?”

  Jomon looks at his wet, bloody feet in his wet, bloody socks, then tucks them under his chair. They leave a smear of blood and water on the light-gray police-station floor.

  “Looks like you stepped in some glass,” the officer said. “And were you in a fight? There’s blood on your face, too, and on your shirt and hands. That’s a school uniform you’re wearing, isn’t it? Why are you wearing your uniform at this hour?”

  She does not wait for him to answer. She gets up and walks away.

  Jomon looks at her desktop. A name plate reads Officer Olivia Grant. A notepad, a pen, a telephone, and a computer are neatly arranged. On a corner of the desk sits a small photo in a frame made out of painted ice-cream sticks. In the photo, two youngsters in yellow-and-white school uniforms beam at the camera.

  The youngsters are a boy and a girl. They look about the same age. Jomon wonders if they’re twins. He guesses their bellies are full. Kids don’t smile like that when their bellies are empty.

  Officer Grant returns with a basin of water. She has a towel and first-aid kit tucked under her arm. She puts the basin on the floor, the kit and the towel on her desk, and sits down.

  “Give me your feet,” she orders.

  It is such an unexpected command that Jomon obeys before realizing he doesn’t want to. Officer Grant peels off his filthy socks and sticks his feet in the warm water of the basin. She takes a bottle of Dettol out of the kit and adds a capful to the water. The steam takes on an antiseptic smell. It is soothing.

  Jomon is no fool. He does not want infected feet. The warm water feels good.

  “Thank you,” he whispers.

  “You’re welcome,” says Officer Grant. “Are you ready to tell me your name? Age? Address? Why were you breaking windows and running the streets in the dark hours of the morning?”

  Jomon shakes his head.

  “Your parents are going to be worried.” She slides the notepad and pen closer to him. “Write down their phone number. Write an address. They have the right to know you are safe.”

  Jomon’s lips curl into a sneer. It is a slight sneer. Jomon is not a sneering sort of boy, so his sneer is a reaction rather than an attitude.

  Officer Grant sees it. She frowns and nods and leaves him alone again.

  Jomon feels like a fool sitting in the police station with his feet in a basin. He looks around the room to see if anyone is laughing at him.

  Men and women in uniforms sit at desks, talk on phones, sip coffee and look at their computers. No one seems to be paying attention to him.

  Two officers bring in a prisoner, a man they half walk, half drag into the room.

  “It was a cat,” the man slurs. “It was a giant cat. No, a rat! A rat, as big as a house!”

  “Is it a full moon?” the desk sergeant asks. “I’ve had two calls tonight about giant animals.”

  “Cats or rats?” one of the arresting officers asks, as he keeps moving the drunken man through to a chair beside a desk.

  “Clean your face with this.” Officer Grant reappears at Jomon’s side and hands him a wet cloth.

  Jomon wipes his face, scrubbing at the blood that has dried on his cheeks.

  “Now I can see you,” Officer Grant says. “You’re not a bad-looking kid. You take after your father or your mother? What is their phone number, by the way? Will you write it down for me so I can call them? Will you write down your address?”

  Jomon does not answer.

  “Are you able to write?” Officer Grant asks quietly. “No shame if you can’t. That happens sometimes. Can you read and write?”

  Jomon nods.

  “You are saying you can write the address but you are choosing not to. Is that correct?

  Jomon nods again.

  “All right,” she says. “We’re getting somewhere.” She takes another damp cloth and wipes the dried blood off his hands, examining the small cuts. She gives them a quick swab with Dettol and leaves them unbandaged. “Right foot, please.”

  Jomon thinks about refusing, but he has the strong suspicion that Officer Grant would have no problem letting him sit with his feet in the basin for an infinite amount of time. He will have to comply at some point. Better to do it now and get it over with.

  Officer Grant spreads a towel over her knees to keep her uniform clean and dry. She dries off his foot, then inspects the cuts before applying first aid. All the while, she keeps talking. Her voice is low, casual, like a good teacher discussing how to tackle an algebra equation.

  “I’m wondering now if you are afraid to tell me how to contact your parents because they will beat you. Maybe your father will hit you, maybe your mother, maybe both. I see some old bruises on your arms and face. Who’s been hitting you, son?”

  He doesn’t reply.

  She looks at Jomon’s foot with a magnifying glass and uses tweezers to remove small bits of glass. She puts some antiseptic lotion on the cuts that makes his foot sting. He flinches.

  “That hurts, doesn’t it?” she says, wincing. “Some things have to hurt a bit before they get better. The lotion I put on your cuts will help them heal but first it will make them feel worse. It’s like whatever is going on with you. Right now you think that by holding your tongue you will avoid pain. In the short term, you may be right. But the pain will only get bigger the longer you avoid it. Tell your story now, feel the pain, get it over with and move on. Destruction of property, attempted robbery of the liquor store, resisting arrest, assaulting a police officer. These are serious charges you are facing, but not so serious that you can’t get through them and put them behind you. Especially since you are only thirteen.”

  “Fifteen,” says Jomon.

  “Fifteen,” she says simply.

  She stops talking then, finishing one foot and moving on to the other. This one also has bits of glass in it. She bandages him up, then takes the basin and the first-aid kit away.

  Jomon squirms in his seat. The foot bath and the first aid have been humiliating, but even though the deepest cuts are throbbing, his feet feel better with the glass out and the antiseptic on.

  “Gimme a smoke!” a man yells.

  Jomon swivels around to see the drunk guy the police brought in handcuffed to a chair a few desks away from him.

  “I want a smoke!” the man yells again. Then, like a balloon with a hole, all the energy drains out of him and he slumps back in his chair, face to the ceiling, snoring away.

  Jomon watches him for a moment. A waft of booze reaches his nostrils. Jomon is afraid he is going to be sick. He covers his nose and turns away.

  Officer Grant returns. A young police officer comes up to her desk with a clear plastic evidence bag in his hand. Jomon catches a glimpse of what is inside it.

  “The owner of the liquor store says nothing was taken and no damage was done except for the broken window,” the officer says. “She’s going to have a lot of glass to clean up. She found this on the floor. Says it doesn’t belong in her store.”

  “Thank you,” says Officer Grant. The young cop leaves. Officer Grant takes the medal out of the bag and looks closely at it.

  “2020 Guyanese National High School Geography Competition, First Place Team,” she reads out loud. “Is this yours?”

  Jomon lowers his eyes. She turns to her computer, types a moment, then sits back and looks at the screen.

  “Here it is,” she says. “On the Chronicle’s websit
e.” She leans in to look at the photo and the caption. “Your name is Jomon Fowler and you are fifteen years old. You are a ninth-grade student at Durban Park Community High School. Let’s see if I can access the school records. Yup, here they are. Your file says your mother is deceased and you live with your father on Hadfield Street near Durban Park. There’s even a phone number here. Shall I call your father?”

  Jomon can feel his body ache to run, to flip over the desk and jump through a window. No more questions! He wants out!

  “Shall I call your father?” Officer Grant repeats.

  Jomon stands up. He has to get out of that police station and away from this nosy Officer Grant.

  “I need you to sit,” Officer Grant says, standing beside him and putting her hands on his shoulders. “If you are not safe at home, we can protect you, but sit down and together we will telephone your father.”

  Jomon spins away so that all Officer Grant has is a grip on one arm. He tries to pull away but she will not let him loose.

  “Jomon, calm down,” Officer Grant says. “Remember where you are. You cannot behave like this in here. Sit down now and I will call your father.”

  Jomon snaps. He yells right in her face. “Call my father? Go ahead! Call him! Call him!”

  He is a trapped animal. His chest heaves with air he cannot get in or out.

  And then he throws up. Vomit shoots out from his throat and onto the police-station floor.

  He is hauled through the station and into the lockup. Cell doors bang as adult prisoners are moved to accommodate him.

  “Juvenile,” Officer Grant says. “Extra protection and extra consideration.”

  She cuts through the grumbling from the prisoners. “Come on, gentlemen. Would you want your young son in the same cell with a bunch of grown men? Get a move on and consider it your good deed for the day.”

  His school tie is taken off him. Then he is pushed into the cell. With his last bit of fight, he throws himself from wall to wall. Officer Grant stands at the bars and watches him.

  “There’s no need for that,” she says quietly. “Calm yourself. You are a competition winner, so I know you know how to control your nerves. Employ those skills now. Don’t make things worse for yourself.”

  She leaves him in the lockup. The door bangs shut.

  The cell block fills with the jeers and shouts of the other prisoners. They’re mad at being moved, mad at being crowded in together.

  Jomon sits on the metal slab bed and puts his head in his hands. He tries to summon the old Jomonland, the green trees and the cool grass. He used to be able to do it when his father was raging, but he can’t do it now. The angry voices and the putrid smells of vomit, disinfectant, missed toilets and fear are keeping him too rooted in the real. It’s all he can do to keep breathing.

  “Hey, little baby!” prisoners call out to him. They make noises of babies crying. They say rude things. They threaten him with beatings and worse. Jomon keeps his face in his hands and doesn’t respond.

  Eventually, they leave him alone and complain to each other.

  Jomon raises his head to look at where he’s landed.

  The cell has three sides made of cinder blocks, one with a tiny, grimy window too high up to see out. The fourth wall of the cell is made of bars, including a barred door.

  Jomon looks across the hallway to the cell facing him. It’s empty. He’s glad there’s no one there to watch and bother him.

  Jomon curls into the least uncomfortable position he can manage on the hard bed. There is no pillow to cushion his head and no blanket to pull up over his face. He breathes in foulness. He keeps his eyes open, staring at the tiny window, willing the daylight to come but not having any hope that dawn will make anything better.

  Officer Grant comes to see him at the end of her shift. She talks to him through the cell bars.

  “You’ll be in here until court on Monday,” she says. “Don’t lie to the judge and don’t refuse to talk. If you want to be released, you’ll have to have a responsible adult in the courtroom to take control of you, either a parent or officially designated guardian. Do you understand?”

  Jomon remains curled up and doesn’t respond.

  “Sit up when I’m talking to you!”

  Officer Grant’s tone sounds so much like his mother’s when she was having no nonsense that Jomon automatically sits up.

  “Look at me,” orders Officer Grant.

  He looks at her.

  “Do you understand what you need to do if you want to be released?”

  Jomon nods.

  “Ask one of the officers to make a phone call for you,” Officer Grant says. “I’ve tried to phone your father, but the number is out of service. I drove to the address on your school records, but your family was evicted almost a year ago. You shouldn’t be going through this alone, but I can’t help you unless you talk to me. You’ve got some serious charges. It’s bad but it’s not the end of the world. You can still get through this and put it behind you. Is there anything you want to tell me before I go?”

  Jomon shakes his head. He doesn’t want her to leave him alone in this place, but he doesn’t say so. He figures there’s no point.

  “All right, then,” says Officer Grant. “I’m going home to cook breakfast for my kids. You behave. You can make this better for yourself or you can make it a whole lot worse.”

  With that, she leaves.

  Jomon rushes to the bars and presses his face against them. He has to bite his tongue to keep from calling her back.

  He doesn’t have anything to say to her.

  He just doesn’t want to be left alone.

  Alone with his thoughts.

  And nothing else.

  6

  As Jomon faces his first morning behind bars, Mrs. Simson arrives at the national museum to begin her day.

  As usual, she is the first to arrive. Cleaners generally are. The bosses don’t want to deal with dust and garbage, not even to see it being removed. Cleaners come to a jobsite very early or very late and have the place to themselves.

  Mrs. Simson, a widow, started cleaning at the museum back when she was still in high school. She wanted to earn money to go to university to study anthropology, but while she was sweeping the floors she got swept off her feet by a man with more charm than sense. All her earnings went into cleaning up his messes and paying down his debts, even after he died in a car accident.

  She was sad and bitter for a time, but she’s made her peace with it. She got her education at the public library, which is right next to the museum, and she thinks about what she’s learned while she cleans the exhibits.

  Mrs. Simson is an efficient cleaner, wiping fingerprints off the glass cases containing the taxidermied capybaras, caimans and birds and running her mop from room to room, gallery to gallery, from insect displays to collections of early gold-mining tools.

  At the very end of her route is Gather’s room.

  She isn’t planning to clean in here because she knows the wall is being repaired, but she always likes to say hello to Gather. She knows it’s silly, but it feels like she and Gather are friends. There aren’t many people in her life that she can talk to. There are the other people who work at the museum, but they generally don’t talk to her, except to tell her that some visitor has spilled coffee or tracked in muddy footprints. There are people at church, and they’re friendly, but she doesn’t see them outside of services. There are people at the library, but they, too, have their noses in books. They are there to read and learn, not to have conversations.

  But Gather is always here, always ready to listen.

  Mrs. Simson tells Gather everything, good and bad, big and small. She tells Gather what groceries she needs to buy after work, about the stray cat she feeds who lets her get a teeny bit closer every day, about a beautiful sunrise and about being scared that she
’ll die alone. When Mrs. Simson can’t sleep, she imagines Gather’s gigantic arms wrapped around her, Gather’s claws acting like armor, keeping her safe.

  Mrs. Simson would feel more foolish about telling her life to Gather if she hadn’t heard so many other people tell their troubles to the giant sloth over the years. As a cleaner, she is invisible. She can be standing right close to someone, wiping and polishing, but they don’t notice her. They whisper to Gather: “The cancer is back. How will I tell my children?” “If I fail this test, my parents will hate me.” “I like this girl at school, but she likes someone else.” “I hate my boss. I should be running that place, not him!”

  The giant ground sloth takes everything in and passes it on to no one. She knows how to keep secrets.

  Mrs. Simson goes down the stairs and through the door into Gather’s exhibit hall. Dawn is on the other side of the protective plastic and the room is soft with calm gray light.

  Mrs. Simson has already read everything about Gather. The Megatherium’s bones were discovered by miners in Omai and Oko Creek, down by the Cuyuni River. The discovery put Guyana on the paleontology map. Artists and curators took great care to recreate Gather in a setting that would be natural for her, with paintings and fake trees and shrubs. The exhibit was a huge achievement. Gather got her name in a nation-wide Name the Sloth competition. Guyana is very proud of her.

  Mrs. Simson walks over to the bench facing the exhibit and sits down. She looks up …

  At nothing.

  She blinks, not quite believing what she is not seeing. Then she foolishly does what anyone would do. She looks under the bench, behind the fake trees, and even opens the secret door into the supply closet. She knows full well that not even Gather’s paw would fit into any of these places.

  Mrs. Simson’s heart is beating so loud that she almost misses the soft rustle of the loosened plastic in the gentle morning breeze.

  She tiptoes to the plastic. There, on the floor, in the dust the workers have left behind, are two footprints — massive, extinct, ground sloth footprints.