Surrogate Child Read online

  “What do you mean? Why wouldn’t you tell the truth about why you fell?”

  “I didn’t think Joe would understand what made me fall,” he replied, and turned to her. “He might laugh at me, and I didn’t want that.”

  She hesitated to ask him, but he had the patience to wait for her to do so. His silence was demanding. She felt the inevitability of hearing the truth.

  “What made you fall, Jonathan?” She was speaking in a whisper now.

  “Well, it was like this . . .” he said, twisting his body in the water. “I was just finishing up what was left to do under the roof, and I turned when I heard you coming out of the house,” he added, and illustrated the movement. Then he paused again. He wanted her to draw it all out of him. She understood that he wanted her to feel responsible for making him say it.

  “Yes?”

  “And something . . . someone . . . pushed me.”

  “Pushed you? You don’t mean Joe?” she asked, realizing she asked it hopefully.

  “No. It was definitely not Joe.”

  “I don’t understand,” she said, even though she did. “What are you saying?”

  “I can’t explain it, but I felt pressure against my shoulder, and that pressure made me lose my balance.”

  “It wasn’t the wind,” she whispered.

  “No. It wasn’t the wind.”

  There was a long moment of silence between them. She sat back and stared at the bathroom doorway. He waited, frozen in position in the tub. Finally she nodded as though she could see something through the door.

  “You think I imagined it, don’t you?” he asked, sounding a note of frustration.

  “No.”

  “Because I didn’t. I was pretty secure up on that ladder. Ask Joe.”

  “I believe you,” she said. She stood up. “You keep soaking yourself,” she said. “I’ll be right back,” she added.

  “Okay.” He closed his eyes and leaned back in the tub to lower more of his torso into the warm water. She studied him for a few seconds and then walked out of the bathroom and stopped in the hall.

  Joe had gone back outside. It was quiet in the house. She looked in Jonathan’s room, but there was no one there. Then she thought she heard something behind her and saw that her bedroom door was open. She always kept the master bedroom door closed, and whenever Joe went in and out, he did the same. She smiled to herself knowingly and walked slowly to the bedroom.

  After she entered, she looked around, but she saw no one. Nothing looked disturbed, either. Then she noticed that the sliding closet door was just slightly opened. She nodded to herself and walked to it, standing in front of it for a moment. She took a deep breath, took hold of the door, and slid it completely open abruptly. Solomon stood there looking out at her. She expected he would be in there.

  The rope burn on his neck looked even more hideous this close up, but what was more revolting was the way his eyes bulged and his lips thickened. His face showed more resemblance of the face of a corpse than it had during any of her previous confrontations with him. His skin was more scaly and pale, and his usually neatly fashioned hair was disheveled, the strands lying over his forehead and down over his ears.

  Her eyes went from him to the plastic bag in the corner of the floor. It looked as though it had been disturbed. He said nothing to her; he simply stared, that hateful smirk on his face.

  “You pushed him, didn’t you?” she said. He didn’t reply. “I’m talking to you, Solomon. Answer me. You pushed him so he’d fall off the ladder.”

  “He’s clumsy, awkward. He fell himself. I didn’t have to push him. I don’t have to do anything to him. He’ll make a fool of himself by himself. I don’t see how you can continue to compare him to me.”

  “Jonathan is far from clumsy and awkward. He’s as bright as you were; maybe he’s even brighter, and he’s got a much more outgoing personality. Why, Joe even likes him more than he liked you. Everyone does.”

  “That’s a lie. Anyway, Joe doesn’t like him. You’ll see. Joe will want to get rid of him. Joe will hate him.”

  “Never. They’re getting along fine, and do you know why? Because Jonathan isn’t as selfish as you were. Jonathan cares about other people. He’s sensitive to their needs. He doesn’t reject them out of hand and leave them frustrated and alone like you did.”

  Solomon smiled, but his look was so cold it made her shudder. She embraced herself quickly and bit down softly on her lower lip. He pulled his head back in that familiar arrogant way she used to admire. Now she detested it.

  “I’m surprised at you, Mother. I would have thought you would be more discerning. I guess I did overestimate your capabilities and your intelligence.”

  “I don’t want to change the topic. You pushed him, and I know you did. He knows it, too.”

  “He knows it? That’s a laugh. He doesn’t know anything unless I want him to know it. Actually, now that I see what’s going on, I’m rather happy you brought him here. Things were getting rather boring watching you and Joe mope about the place. Now I have someone to play with, someone on whom to tinker.”

  “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare disturb him, and don’t you ever, ever try to hurt him again. Do you understand me? It’s too late for you,” she said, and then, as a way of demonstrating her feelings, she reached in past him and dug down into the plastic bag to fetch Solomon’s gold chain.

  “What are you going to do with that?” he asked her, but she ignored him. “Mother?”

  She closed the closet door just as abruptly as she had opened it, shutting him away from her. Then she marched out of the bedroom and went back to the bathroom. Jonathan was just getting out of the tub. He reached for the towel on the rack as she approached.

  “Feeling better?” she asked.

  “A little.”

  “That’s good. I knew the warm bath and the massage would help. We’ll rub in some Ben-Gay. You go to your room and lie down and wait for me,” she said as he wiped his body dry.

  “Okay.”

  “But before you do, I want to give you something. You earned it.”

  “Earned it?”

  “You suffered for it,” she said. “Come here.” She took him by the arm and set him before the mirror. “Look into the mirror,” she commanded, and then she brought the gold chain around and draped it at the base of his throat, clipping it behind his neck. She ran her fingers down over the metal, and they both stared at the image in the mirror—Martha, her face as flushed as his, standing right behind him, his eyes bright and fixed on hers.

  They spoke to each other through the image in the mirror. For Martha it was like looking through the window into a warmer and more secure world, a world that was more than ever within her reach once more.

  “It’s beautiful,” he said, pressing his fingers over her fingers that were still on the chain. “I never had one.”

  “Now you do, and it looks good on you. It looks as if it always belonged to you.”

  “It was Solomon’s, wasn’t it?” he asked.

  “Yes, but he didn’t appreciate it.”

  “I appreciate it,” he said. “I always will appreciate anything you give me.”

  “I know you will.” She put her hand between his shoulder and his neck. “Dear Jonathan.”

  “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll always cherish it.” He turned around and kissed her on the cheek. Then he walked out of the bathroom and left her standing by the sink, her hand on her cheek, her face on fire from the heat of passion that burned beneath her skin and behind her eyes.

  When she got the Ben-Gay out of the medicine cabinet and stepped out of the bathroom, she saw Solomon standing in her bedroom doorway, a look of shock and disappointment on his face. He had his hands over his neck to cover the rope scar. She hesitated in the hallway and smiled at him. Then, like a defiant child herself, she turned away and walked to Jonathan’s bedroom.

  He waited, sprawled on his stomach on the bed, the towel draped over his buttocks. She p
aused in the doorway and looked in at him. His skin was still red from the hot water, but it looked soft and smooth.

  She looked back. Solomon had stepped into the hallway. He was pleading with his eyes, begging her not to go to Jonathan. But she had nothing more to say to him, and Jonathan needed her. She entered the bedroom, closing the door softly behind her, and Jonathan turned and smiled as she went to him.

  Joe continued painting and finished all the window frames before he went in for lunch. Martha told him that Jonathan was asleep upstairs. He followed her into the kitchen, where she made him a sandwich from leftover turkey. He noticed that she looked rather flushed. She had her hair pinned up, and she had changed into her heavy cotton, white bathrobe and wore those green and blue slipper socks she had bought for Solomon last Christmas. She worked quietly, with an afterglow on her face that reminded him of the moments after their lovemaking.

  “He felt all right after the bath?” he asked her. He suspected she still blamed him for the accident.

  “I rubbed him out. We’ll wait and see how bad the pain is after he sleeps.”

  “I don’t know how he fell off that thing,” Joe muttered. He was braced for her lecture on how to handle kids. He once angrily asked her what made her such an expert on children, and she calmly replied that she came from a large family and that was enough to make anyone an expert. He wondered. Maybe she was right.

  But she surprised him now—she didn’t go into any tirade; she didn’t bawl him out for the way he supervised the boy. Instead, she turned toward him and took on a look of fear, her eyes wide, her mouth pulled back at the corners. It gave him the chills. He actually turned around to see if there was anyone standing behind him.

  “Things can happen to him, Joe,” she said softly. “We’ve got to do more to protect him.”

  “What do you mean, things can happen to him? Things can happen to anybody. I could have fallen off that ladder, too. Just because someone is older, it doesn’t necessarily mean he’s invulnerable.”

  He started to eat his sandwich but stopped to look up at her because she continued to stand so still. She had her hands clutched and pressed against the base of her throat. He noticed that she had turned pale, as if something had frightened her so badly the blood had drained from her face. Yet there were only the two of them in the kitchen, and the house was relatively quiet.

  “No, Joe,” she finally said. “Things are different for him. He’s more vulnerable. We must get stronger and keep him insulated. He’s fragile and unprotected.”

  “Jonathan? Come on. You see the way he handles himself around kids his age and what he can do with tools when he wants to. That boy can be on his own, easily.”

  “Oh, God, Joe, can’t you ever see anything? Kids, tools. He’s in terrible danger. Terrible,” she added and walked to the edge of the kitchen doorway where she looked up toward Jonathan’s room. Joe stared at her and then shook his head and continued to eat his sandwich.

  “What terrible danger? What the hell are you talking about?” he asked after taking another bite.

  “He must never be alone in this house,” she said. “Never. Promise me, Joe. Promise you’ll never let that happen.” She looked terrified.

  “What? Alone in this house? What’s wrong with that?”

  “Just promise me.” She turned on him, a desperate look on her face. “Will you?”

  “Jesus, Martha. You’re beginning to frighten me. What the hell are you talking about?” She didn’t reply, but he thought he saw her fingers trembling. He thought he should end it as fast as he could, whatever it was. “All right, all right. I promise. He’ll never be left alone in the house,” he said, feeling silly for saying it.

  “Good,” she said. “Good.” And then her face changed abruptly, a wide, happy smile appearing. “If Jonathan’s up to it later, why don’t we all go out for Chinese food? It’s Sunday night, and we all used to do that when Solomon was alive, remember?”

  “Sure.” Her dramatic reversal worried him. She had roller-coaster moods when Solomon was alive. He never knew what things would be like when he came home from work, and even if the day or the evening started out hopefully, something could happen to radically change it, something intangible and unseen. It was like living on the edge of hysteria. He blamed it solely on the kid and the terrible pressures he placed over her, but he couldn’t get her to see that.

  Once, and now that he recalled it, not that long before the suicide, he had a talk with Solomon about Martha’s fragility. The night before, she had done a lot of sulking and eventually gone to sleep early. He knew it had something to do with an argument she had had with Solomon, but she would not tell him what it was about, and Solomon offered no insights. When he had come home from work the day after, Martha was still out shopping. He knocked on Solomon’s bedroom door, waited, and knocked again more emphatically. Solomon opened the door and stepped away, turning his back on him and going right to his computer as if opening the door was some unimportant and annoying chore.

  “I want to talk to you about your mother, Solomon,” he said. He could see that Solomon was obviously surprised by the announcement. He looked more interested than he had looked about any other suggested topic of conversation between them. Only, Joe felt that the boy had a kind of condescending expression, as if to say “You want to talk about her?”

  “What about my mother?”

  “She seems to be under a great strain lately. I think you’re putting too much on her shoulders.”

  “Too much of what?” He turned from the computer and looked up amusingly. Joe felt his temper inflating like a small balloon within the rear of his skull. It sent a ring of pain around to his forehead. He pinched and squeezed his temples with his thumb and forefinger.

  “Too much of yourself, maybe. I don’t know. You’re laying problems on her, and she’s not as strong as you imagine.”

  “Really?” He turned away and began writing quickly in a notebook. “Did she ask you to tell me this?”

  “No, and I don’t want you to tell her we had this discussion. That would only upset her more. You know she wants to do all she can for you.”

  “Yes, I know,” he said, but he didn’t sound happy about it, and Joe remembered being confused about that.

  “You can see what I’m talking about, can’t you, Solomon? You see how she’s been these past few weeks?”

  “Yes, I see,” he said in a tone of resignation. “You’re right.” Joe softened.

  “If there are things troubling you, I’d be glad to help. I mean . . .”

  “I understand,” he said. “Don’t worry.” He turned around, but his eyes were teary and red. “I won’t do anything to aggravate her or frustrate her.”

  Joe felt the need to say something else about it, to ask other questions, but his struggle for the right words ended in defeat. He couldn’t help it; there was something about the way he and Solomon confronted each other, something between them that kept them from being close. He longed to understand what it was and rip it down. He wanted so much to reach his son and have his son reach him, but it seemed as though they were miles apart.

  All he could do was nod.

  “What are you working on?” he asked, choosing another avenue of conversation.

  “An English report.”

  “Anything I can help with? I was pretty good in grammar.”

  “This is an advanced placement essay,” Solomon said dryly, and turned his back on him again. “They advanced me in English, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah, right. Hey, I got a new game for the IBM . . .”

  “I’m not interested in turning the computer into an electronic toy,” Solomon said quickly.

  Joe nodded without speaking even though Solomon kept his back to him. After a moment, he left him. He felt so drained from the experience, he had to go downstairs and sit in his easy chair.

  As far as he knew, Solomon said nothing to Martha about their conversation. Martha never mentioned it, and he knew she wou
ld if Solomon told her what had transpired. Still, he felt as though his son held it over him. When they went out for a Sunday dinner like the dinner Martha was now suggesting for him and Jonathan and her, Solomon cryptically quipped about the need to handle his own problems. Martha didn’t pick up on it, but Joe saw the impish twinkle in his son’s eyes and hated him for it.

  “It’ll be a way of celebrating one whole week with Jonathan, won’t it?” Martha said, pulling him out of his reverie.

  “Huh?”

  “Going out to dinner. What do you think?”

  “I suppose. I’ll finish up the trim work in plenty of time,” he said. He watched her move about with a great deal more energy and shook his head in amazement as he finished his sandwich.

  Later in the afternoon she came out to tell him that Jonathan was feeling all right and they would go out to eat. He sat at the top of the ladder, and she stood beneath him, her arms folded beneath her breasts.

  “So he’s up to it. Good. Then out for Chinese food it is,” he said, smiling.

  “Just like a family,” she said. “Just like we used to be.”

  “Fine,” he replied. “I’m almost done here. I’ll finish and then go in to take a shower.”

  “It’s all right. Take your time. He’s on his homework, so he won’t have to worry about it later.”

  “Just like Solomon. Always getting it out of the way,” Joe muttered. His son’s organizational skills always impressed him, but he got to the point where they annoyed him, too. He kept such a rigid schedule sometimes, it was impossible to do anything together spontaneously. Yet he knew there were many parents who would have liked to have to complain to their child that he worked too hard and too well.

  Nevertheless, after a particularly frustrating moment, he told him, “Once in a while you can screw up, Solomon. Hand something in late. Show them you’re human.” Solomon didn’t get insulted. One thing he hated to do was show emotion. He’d rather be sarcastic or witty. That was his way.