The Stork Club

by Maureen Freely

  Unfortunately Becky was standing in the cloakroom. When I started venting my rage on the technically undeserving Vampyra, she intervened.

  I remember she was heavily made-up, but dressed as if for a bicycle race. Nevertheless, her voice was at its most maternal and condescending. ‘Let’s just calm down here.’ She turned to me. ‘What did Eva say about Jesse?’

  ‘Jesse’s not the problem. The problem is …’

  ‘Did she say Jesse could be admitted today?’

  ‘Yes, she’ll let Jesse in so long as I (quote unquote) correct his fucking lunch, but I’ll be damned if I…’

  She held her hand up. ‘Silencio. I said we had to get the story straight. I’m right in thinking that as far as Eva is concerned, Jesse can go in so long as he gets his lunch, right?’

  ‘I don’t care what that bitch says.’

  ‘Don’t be sexist, Dad,’ said Jesse.

  ‘Let’s find out what Jesse wants,’ she interrupted. She knelt down. ‘Jesse? Do you want to stay in school today? Or do you want to go home with your sister and your dad?’

  He looked at us all and burst into tears. ‘I want to join my peers,’ he sobbed. ‘I haven’t seen them for the whole summer.’

  Becky embraced him maternally. ‘You poor little thing! There really is nothing to cry about, you know!’ Looking over Jesse’s shoulder with a take-charge look, she asked Vampyra, ‘Anything at all left in Jesse’s lunchbox?’ Vampyra opened it up to reveal a carrot and an apple. ‘No hay problema in that case,’ Becky said. ‘I gave mine extra.’ Drawing back from Jesse, she looked him in the eyes and said, ‘I’ll tell you what. When it comes to lunchtime, hon, you ask my kids to share their sandwiches with you, because I made them more than they can eat. OK?’

  ‘OK,’ he said, and with that Vampyra took him off to the corner next to the window.

  Here she examined his hair: I did not realize what for. ‘Well! That’s OK at least!’ she said, beaming at us. Then she took Jesse into the classroom.

  Maria tried to follow them. When I told her she couldn’t go, she began to howl. I can’t tell you what that did to me. Again, I think my instincts were right when, with Maria in my arms, I kicked open Eva Braun’s door to let her see what her Brave New Creative Learning Centre had done to my child. ‘Is this your idea of an education?’ I remember yelling. ‘To punish a child because her mother is too goddamn lazy to pay her bills? Why are the rest of us supposed to pay because she didn’t tell me how much we owed or what you people won’t permit in a lunchbox? Huh?’ I stand by what I said then, although I wish I hadn’t said it, because all it did was confirm their suspicions about me being a man. This lost me the argument and allowed Becky to take charge.

  She was full of sympathy, which she administered with what she meant to be friendly (and what I took to be emasculating) pats on the back. She was full of advice about how to handle the school, which she referred to as Hitler Youth Camp. She made sure she got through to me by fixing me with long, unblinking stares every time she made an important point. She could understand my predicament, and your predicament, and our collective predicament. ‘Trying to bring up children these days, it’s mission impossible, it really is,’ she kept saying. Every time she said it, she closed her eyes and shook her head.

  Which would have been fine had we been sitting in her kitchen. But we weren’t. We were driving down California. Maria and Baby Roo, at least, were strapped up in the back, but my seatbelt was defective, and I was sitting in the death seat.

  Not only did she forget to look over her shoulder when she backed out of her driveway, thereby missing a minibus by that much, but when she got out on California, she kept straying into the oncoming traffic. She kept forgetting to brake for red lights, but if a light turned yellow when she was practically underneath, she would slam what felt like both her feet on them. Not only did she take her hands off the wheel for the back pattings and hand squeezings, but also to adjust her ponytail and/or unwrap another stick of gum. She ran through red lights at 5 m.p.h., just to make it a little more dangerous. She swore and shook her fist at drivers who looked armed, kept changing her mind about what route to take, forgot when she had left her handbrake on and left her choke out from start to finish. That is why, when she said, ‘We’re all in this together,’ I did not take it in the way she had intended. I thought: Dear Lord, have mercy. I’ve been caught by the enemy and the enemy doesn’t know how to drive.

  It was out of terror that I agreed to understand why the school had to be strict about regulations. I was further compromised by the doubles of everything she lavished on me after she had corralled me into her house. Crib sheets, changes of clothing, toothbrushes, you name it. The very thing I had disapproved of the day before at her party! It was several hours before I got my bearings back. Before I was able to ask myself what actually happened this morning. Assuming that what Becky had said was right, assuming that this was the way schools had to operate these days, assuming that I had misinterpreted the characters and intentions of the teachers, assuming that this KGB questionnaire I had before me was actually in the best interest of the ‘whole’ child, assuming that you did need a more structured and protected environment these days in order to nurture the ‘whole’ child. If I bought all that, then what had gone wrong this morning?

  I recalled the argument you and I had had after the ponytail. I recalled in particular the sting in your voice when you told me I would find out for myself how much I needed your help. That was when I saw it.

  You had set me up.

  You had deliberately arranged things so that I would self-destruct in public.

  You were jealous of the bond I had forged with the children, because it left you out.

  You wanted to destroy me.

  You wanted them back.

  Well, I decided. It wasn’t going to be so easy.

  If the only way to hold on to my kids was to go by the book, that was how I would play it then.

  As you may remember, I didn’t talk to you at all that night, not even when you tried to say sorry.

  Instead, I read and reread every fascist bit of small print in that contract until I knew it by heart. I signed every last permission form. I put up the calendar, and suspended my disbelief. I went through the mess of papers in your files, retrieved Maria’s medical certificates. I packed obedient lunches, laid out obedient clothes. I went to bed early. I got up on time and ran through the breakfast routine without a hitch. And at 7.55 the next morning, I was sitting in Eva Braun’s office with an abject apology already to my credit. She was running over the basic points of the contract with me again, and cracking the metaphorical whip over me with every sentence. And I submitted to it, priding myself all along at how cleverly I was outwitting her.

  Did I realize what I was going to have to pay in the way of penalties if I brought the kids in late again? she asked me. Ouch, yes. Anything you say, Madame X! Fine then, that was settled, she said, and then she went, crack, did I understand the nutritional programme I had undertaken to support? Yes, ouch, yes! And the bake-sale regulations! Yes, ouch, aaagh, aaagh, I can even recite them for you, aaagh, aaagh, ouch! ‘Fine, then,’ she continued. ‘You understand that as a new primary caretaker you will be expected to attend all parent seminars. In addition to which there will, of course, be an orientation night next Tuesday for those primary caretakers such as yourself who will be starting to look at kindergartens for their five year olds. I’ll explain this in full on the night, but since you’re new I think I should explain that your child – this is Jesse I’m talking about now, you understand – will be assessed in the upcoming weeks by the school psychologist.’

  ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I told you already. I’ll agree to anything. And more. I really want to prove to you that I’m sorry about what I said yesterday.’

  ‘Fine, then,’ said Eva. With a pursed smile, she handed me back Maria’s medical records. ‘Well be able to receive her just as soon as we have the results from her TB test.’


  ‘Her what test?’

  ‘Her TB test. As we state very clearly in this medical information sheet,’ and then she handed it to me, ‘no child can be allowed on school premises without a TB test. I am already stretching things by letting her into the cloakroom.’

  ‘But that’s insane,’ I said.

  And she said, ‘It also happens to be state law.’

  And so I found myself, for the second day in a row, standing outside the Brave New Creative Learning Centre with my sobbing, now doubly traumatized daughter. Once again, I was unable to calm her down. Once again, Becky was lying in wait. But I was damned if I was going to let her risk my life again like she had the day before. I told her I would find my own way to the doctor’s office. I grabbed Maria by the hand and walked her off. I hadn’t gone two blocks before a Volvo stationwagon pulled up alongside me.

  It was Charlotte. She was all blonde hair and empathy.

  ‘I can’t let you walk all the way to Ophelia’s. It’s too far. Get in. I’ll drive you.’

  ‘Thanks but no thanks,’ I told her. But she wouldn’t take no for an answer.

  When I finally got in, I let her have it. ‘Why can’t you people just leave me alone? I know how to take care of my kids without your help.’

  ‘We know that,’ she said. ‘We also know you need support.’ She patted me on the back. ‘OK, good soldier?’

  ‘Dear Lord, help me,’ I said, covering my face with my hands. This got interpreted as a breakdown, and earned me more unwanted pats on the back.

  ‘Listen,’ she said. ‘Don’t be ashamed. We all have our breaking points. I mean, I couldn’t count all the breakdowns I’ve had the past five years on the fingers of both hands.’

  That’s right, I felt like telling her. That why your kids are so fucked up. But there I was sitting in her car, so instead I said, ‘I am not having a breakdown.’

  ‘Oh pooh,’ she said. ‘You can’t fool me, my young fellow, so don’t even try. I know what horrible stress you’re under at home right now.’ Oh great, I felt like saying. ‘And I know better than anyone what a taskmaster Eva can be until she thinks you’re broken in. So let me help you out a little. OK?’ She gave me a Mrs Walton smile. ‘I am going to take you to Ophelia’s office. I am then going to go do my chores. Then I’ll pick you up in an hour or so, and take you home. And then this afternoon, I’ll bring your son home. I know Becky thinks she’s going to do this, but frankly you’re not the only one who doesn’t like her driving.’

  She then went into a complicated explanation of the car-pool arrangements for the rest of the day. It involved afterschool art, swimming and gymnastic lessons. Which ones was Jesse attending? I had no idea. ‘You let me handle it,’ said Charlotte, reading my mind. ‘You just sit at home and enjoy your time with Maria. We’ll get Jesse back to you in time for supper.’ She pulled up in front of the doctor’s office. Stunned once again into obedience, I got Maria out.

  I think back often to that office and the way it looked that day, and I am disturbed by the fact that I saw nothing out of the ordinary. Kiki, Ophelia and Mom responded to the crisis like a team: there were no indications that in real life they were no longer talking to each other.

  Of course, Maria was just what they needed. Nothing like a traumatized three year old in the care of a distracted and mistrusted father to bring out all their fondest illusions about their caring instincts.

  There, to get things started, was Mom. Refusing to stand on ceremony, and being pretty loud about it, too. Coming out from behind the reception desk to embrace poor little Maria. Cooing at her in Spanish, making a big show of bejewelled affection in the waiting room, which was, of course, so child-centred as to not be believed. Oh, what wonderful toys! And wouldn’t Maria like to play with them and wouldn’t she like Mom to help? How about if Maria helped Mom make a fire station with the blocks? She refused to allow Maria to put a single block where she, Mom, didn’t want it. Having achieved the kind of fire station you would expect from a fifty-eight-year-old Cuban woman, she then pulled Maria back into the reception area. Here she set her to drawing. Again, she insisted on holding Maria’s arm so that she drew exactly what Mom thought she should draw. When Maria objected, she said, ‘Don’t joo be a silly little crybaby.’ When I tried to get Maria out of her clutches by saying there was no need for Mom to lavish such attention on the girl, Mom just pushed me away, saying, ‘Foo let me do what I know best, OK, mister?’

  And now here was Ophelia herself. ‘I heard what happened,’ she said to me, revealing that the grapevine had been buzzing. ‘Don’t you worry, though, we’ll get working on a rehab right away.’

  She rang for the nurse, who took Maria off into an examination room. ‘Now you know how these things work,’ Ophelia half said, half asked me. She handed me a card. ‘On, let’s see, Friday at about this time, you can check Maria’s arm and analyse what you see. Notate it on this card and send it to us. Or if you really want her in school by the beginning of next week, maybe you should bring her by on Friday and I can give you the form Eva needs from you then and there.’

  ‘On Friday? Why do I have to wait till Friday? We can’t wait till Friday! This is insane!’ I shouted.

  She put up her hand. ‘Let me see what I can do.’ She went into her office and came out again two minutes later. ‘OK, I’ve got you clearance. She is going to make an exception just this once. She does make exceptions, you know, if you state your case reasonably.’ She gave me a look, indicating that she knew everything I had said to everybody we both knew during the past twenty-four hours. ‘And by the way. Her name is not actually Eva Braun, even though Becky likes to call her that. It’s Eva Prout. She runs an A-l programme. You’re lucky to have your kids in it.’

  This was when the nurse stepped in. They consulted in whispers. The nurse looked concerned, the way nurses look concerned in soap operas. Ophelia scratched her nose and said, ‘Oh dear. Here we go again.’

  She whispered something to the nurse, who then went into Kiki’s office. She went in and closed the door behind her. Soon she came back to confer with Ophelia. Then she led Maria into the reception area, ostensibly to get a sticker that said ‘I am a great kid’. After she had put it on Maria’s shirt, the nurse leaned over and whispered something to Mom, who put her hand to her mouth and gasped. ‘Ay, pobrecita,’ she murmured.

  Now Kiki’s door had opened, and Kiki had come out. Did I notice a cloud of stale air coming with him, the smell of socks? Probably not. I was too busy wondering why this man was wearing such a stern expression: you would have thought he had just been informed that our child had five chambers in her heart. He peered down at Maria’s head. Turning to Ophelia, he said, ‘I need better light.’ He crouched down to Maria’s level and said, ‘Hey, little honey, have you ever seen my fish tank?’ Taking her by the hand, he led her into the office. Twenty seconds later, he poked his head out the door and said, ‘Yup. She sure does.’

  He was speaking to the nurse, but it was his wife who responded. ‘Righteo,’ said Ophelia grimly. She asked me to follow her into her office, sat me down, sat herself down and then, with a heavy sigh, said, ‘I’m afraid we have another problem.’

  That is how I found out that Maria had nits.

  Ophelia did her professional best to reassure me. It was a worldwide epidemic. It did not imply that Maria was dirty or even that I didn’t wash her hair enough. It was, however, a serious problem that required urgent action. Eva Braun was one of the pioneers of the No Nits Policy, which was, Ophelia informed me, the only policy that worked. After I had washed Maria’s hair with the prescription shampoo, I was to remove all the dead nits from her hair with a nit comb. As she wrote out the prescription, she told me I would also have to wash all my linens in boiling water and bleach, as well as vacuum all unwashable surfaces.

  As Charlotte drove me to the drugstore, I made the mistake of saying that I felt like I was being force-marched into a religious crusade. To my horror, Charlotte nodded. ‘I know several
people who felt like that at the beginning. But it’s the only method that works. Also, you don’t want to depend on that shampoo too much because it destroys the enzyme balance if you use it more than twice a year. Listen. I’ll tell you what. I’ll see if I can get you a copy of the latest issue of World Headlice News. It tells you how to implement prophylactic measures that don’t harm the enzyme balance, and so far they’ve worked for me one hundred per cent.’

  Failing to interpret the horror on my face, she continued talking helpful hints. By the time we got home, I felt as numb as if I had been dropped into a vat of cement.

  I made lunch with the élan of a robot. It was all I could do to put the dishes into the sink. But I forced myself to keep on going. I ran a bath. I put Maria into it. I applied the shampoo. The shampoo stank. I rinsed the shampoo off. I put Maria in front of Sesame Street. I stripped the beds. I scoured the apartment for hair implements, threw them into the sink, doused them with boiling water. I got out the nit comb. I tried to run it through Maria’s hair. It was too tangled to receive a comb. I spent the next hour getting the tangles out. Maria was as good as could be expected.

  Mister Rodgers was just putting his sneakers on when I began to run the nit comb through Maria’s hair. He was taking them off when I picked up the phone to tell Ophelia that she had given me a defective nit comb.

  She told me I was probably using it the wrong way. The teeth were supposed to run through the hair with the sharp edge going first. I followed her instructions, but I was still not able to remove a single nit.

  I called her up again. She told me I could try the Thumbnail Method. She described it to me in confident detail. I followed her instructions to the letter. I found that I was taking five minutes to slide a single nit down a single hair shaft.

  I called up Ophelia and told her I was never going to get the nits out. She said she was sorry but she didn’t know what else to say. She explained that the nit shampoo was only ninety-seven per cent effective. Nit removal was therefore extremely important. I told her I felt like taking Maria to the barbers and cutting all her hair off. She said this was impossible as it was against the law for barbers and hairdressers to cut hair if they detected the presence of nits or headlice.