These Gentle Wounds

by Helene Dunbar

  He sits on the corner of another desk, his leg waving back and forth like a pendulum and his arms crossed.

  “So, what’s going on?” he asks.

  “Nothing,” I say, slumping down in a chair across from him.

  He makes a harrumph sound and clears his throat. “Let’s try this again. What’s really going on, Gordie?”

  So here’s the thing. I used to have this fantasy that Mr. Brooks might adopt me. I know it’s crazy. I mean, why would he ever want me for a son? But he’s like this guy who seems to have all the answers to everything and he never seems to get pissed off, either.

  So, for a second, I think about how cool he is in his Club Metro T-shirt and his purple sneakers. And how maybe, just maybe, if I told him about going camping with Sarah, and her paper-swan note, he might be able to make sense of it all for me. He might be able to tell me if I’ve done something wrong.

  Then I glance back at the rest of the class. I’m sure that none of them are so lame they have to ask a teacher what to do when a girl says she wants to see them after school.

  I sigh and pull at the loose fringes of my sleeve. “There’s just some stuff … ” I hope if I’m vague enough I can draw things out until the bell rings.

  “Stuff?” he prods.

  I look out the window and imagine something flying in and whisking me away to a place where everyone will stop asking me questions. I reach up to touch the bird charm under my shirt, but then drop my hand. I don’t want to have to explain that to him, too.

  But he’s waiting, and it’s Mr. Brooks. I don’t want to be a dick so I sort through all the issues in my brain to see what I can tell him that doesn’t involve Sarah.

  “My father,” I say. I didn’t even know that’s what was on my mind until the words came out.

  “Jim Allen?” His brow scrunches up and I shake my head. Mr. Brooks knows the whole crappy story and I have to be careful or he’s going to feel like he has to do something, and too many things are already changing.

  “Your real father?”

  I hate that Jim, who’s given me a home for the last five years, who’s Kevin’s “real” father just because he slept with Mom first, is considered my fake dad or something. While the person I hate most in the world is given credit when he’s really to blame for everything.

  Now that I’ve said the words, though, I feel all clenched up and shaky.

  “He wants … ” I twist and twist the band on my wrist, trying to force myself to push a whole damned sentence out of my mouth. “I can’t … ”

  Mr. Brooks puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes. “It’s okay. Do you want me to get you an appointment with Mr. Williams? Just to have a chat?”

  “No,” I blurt out, loudly enough that a third of the class turns around to stare. I push my lips together and turn away because I don’t want to know if Sarah is one of them.

  Mr. Williams is the same stupid school counselor I saw before. He’s just going to thrust his referral pad at me to go see someone who can give me a prescription. Besides, I hate, hate, hate that everyone thinks I need to see a shrink.

  “Sorry.” I try to keep my voice steady and quiet. “I’ll be fine. Really.”

  It’s clear that Mr. Brooks doesn’t believe me, which kind of bugs me even though I don’t blame him.

  “Or you could talk to me,” he offers.

  I used to talk to him all the time, but I was just a kid then. Everything is so different now. Besides, I don’t really know what to say and I’ve learned that saying nothing is way better than sounding like an idiot.

  There’s five minutes left of class. That’s five minutes before I can see Sarah and find out if I did something stupid yesterday or if maybe she regrets kissing me.

  “Thanks. Maybe,” I say, even though he knows it means I won’t. I just shuffle around and wait for the bell, which feels like it’s never going to ring.

  “Well, you know where to find me.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, just … ” He pauses. “Come ready to take your quiz tomorrow.”

  It’s clear he wants to say something different, but the bell goes off and I fly out the door into the hall and stand, bouncing up and down on the balls of my feet, trying to keep myself from pacing while I wait for Sarah.

  She comes out, already looking for me. “Hey, are you okay?”

  She looks worried. I want, more than anything, to lean over and kiss her. But we aren’t camping anymore. We’re in school, and I’m not completely sure what the rules are here. Maybe I imagined what happened. Maybe it was something that just belonged to that moment in the woods and will never happen again.

  “The swan … ”

  “You didn’t like it?” She sounds disappointed, and I hate being the cause of that.

  “No, I did. Really, it’s just—”

  “Relax,” she says as she reaches up and tousles my hair.

  Her touch makes me feel lighter and less worried, but her message still plays in front of my eyes like a scrolling marquee. I try to give her a real smile.

  “That’s better.” She leans in and gives me a feathery kiss on the cheek that banishes most of my fear. “Gordie?”

  “Yeah?”

  She smiles. “Not all surprises are bad.”

  Her words seem like something I need to consider, but before I can, the bells rings.

  “Come on,” she says, pulling my sleeve. “We’re going to be late.”

  It’s good that we have our next classes near each other, because she makes me feel like a ship being drawn in by the safe beacon of a lighthouse. I want to go wherever she’s going; I don’t even care where that is.

  I’ve never met anyone who was so good at so many different things. In addition to her other hobbies, Sarah plays the flute. Not classical flute. Rock flute. I didn’t even know that existed.

  She talks about it like it’s no big deal, but now I’m standing

  in front of her locker after school and she’s holding out her old MP3 player, the one she doesn’t use anymore, the one she’s loaded up for me.

  She’s smiling. She looks proud of herself. She thinks she’s giving me something great and special. I look down at the small blue square in her hand. I want to want to take it, but that isn’t the same thing as wanting it.

  Music is great and all, but it’s tied up with The Night Before for me and I know if I take the player, she’ll expect me to listen to whatever she’s put on it. I don’t think I can just pretend to do that.

  “What’s wrong?” Her smile has wilted a little.

  I’m glued to the floor, helpless in front of this beautiful girl who is trying to be so nice to me. I want to do whatever it takes to make her happy. I’m just not sure how to do that.

  I shrug and take the small metal square. It’s warm from her hand and for some reason that makes me blush a little.

  “Thanks.” I close my palm around the player. It reminds me of holding her hand. I wish I were, right now.

  “You don’t have to like it or anything. I mean, I can take criticism,” she says as she spins the dial on her lock. “And there’s other stuff on there. It isn’t just me.”

  “That’s … ” I search for a word that isn’t going to hold me to anything. “Great. I mean, not that you added stuff. I mean, I want to hear your music.” Saying the words almost makes them true.

  “Then come to our show on Thursday night.” Her words are a challenge and she knows it. She puts her hands on her hips and waits for an answer.

  “Your show?”

  “Yeah. I’ve been sitting in on a friend’s band from … from my old school. Frozen Polar Bears. We’re doing an all-ages show at the Metro.”

  I tighten my hand around the MP3 player. I can feel its edges digging in my palm, working its way into me just like she is. I know where the Metro is, but, like I
tell her, I have no idea how I’d get there.

  “Maybe Luke would pick you up? Or maybe your brother could drive you?”

  The idea makes me smile. Kevin and I do a lot together, but it’s been a long time since we went out and did something fun.

  “I don’t know. I’ll ask him.”

  “Good,” she says, reaching back into her locker. “You know, I never did show you those pictures I took of you. But I printed this one off.”

  She holds out a black-and-white photo of me from when she snuck into the locker room. I’m ducking down and my hair is flopping halfway across my face. She caught a ray of sunshine flitting across the room behind me and there are specs of dust in the light, looking like the reflection of stars glittering in a pool.

  It’s been a really long time since I’ve seen a photo of myself, except for shots from games when I’m in uniform. This is different. It feels more real. I wonder if this is how she sees me.

  “Can I keep it?” I ask.

  “Of course. Do you like it?”

  I try to figure out who the last person was who cared about my opinion. Mom, maybe? I’m not sure.

  I wonder if Sarah has any idea how good she is.

  I want to kiss her. I bite my bottom lip, hoping I can keep myself from just leaning toward her. I force myself to look back down at the photo. To try to stop thinking of how much I want to feel the weight of her arm around me again.

  “Do I really look like that?”

  She smiles as I put the picture between the pages of my geometry book. “Are you, like, a vampire? You can’t see yourself in mirrors or something?”

  “No,” I say, looking down at my shoes so that she doesn’t see how embarrassed I am. The white toes are scuffed on the top and the laces are tangled again. “Of course not. I guess I just don’t pay much attention.”

  “Boys,” she scoffs. “You’re all alike.”

  I know she means it as a jab. But there’s something in her words that I like. Something that says she sees me as normal. I never think of myself as being like anyone else.

  I wonder if she’ll be disappointed when she figures out I’m not.

  Nineteen

  Someone way smarter than me would have figured out that making plans is asking for trouble. Assuming that things will be okay is a sure-fire way to disaster. Thinking I could possibly be happy is like flashing a beacon to the universe asking for everything to suck as much as possible.

  I give up on going to the rink and spend the whole walk home working myself up to listen to Sarah’s music. I pull the photo she took of me out of my book, shove it back in, and take it out again, just to prove that it’s real.

  I think about her hand in mine. And next year. And normal.

  I’m still looking down at the photo when I get to the house. It isn’t until I walk straight into the shrubs that I look up and see the front door open and the strange car in the driveway.

  Regardless of what Sarah says, surprises aren’t good. My mind blurs with ways to get back to school, the playground, the rink.

  I read a book last year about how people cope after something happens to them. It said everyone falls on one end or the other of a fight-or-flight response. Some rush into danger, thinking they can head it off. Others try to get away as soon as possible. I just kind of freeze, like someone has super-glued my feet to the floor.

  Kevin must have been waiting for me, because he flies out of the house before I can unfreeze and put any of my exit strategies into action.

  “Who’s here?” I ask, although I don’t really want to know.

  “DeSilva.” He puts a hand on my shoulder and leaves it there. “You need to talk to her.”

  That doesn’t make me feel any better. As much as I like her, Amy DeSilva is only bringing bad news these days.

  “Crap. Why?”

  His arm snakes behind my neck and pulls me forward. “I don’t know. She wouldn’t say anything to us until you got here.”

  Us. I swallow down the fear that rises in my throat. “Jim’s here too?”

  “Yup. Full house.”

  Jim is never home this early. He must have known she was coming. Worse, he must have known she was coming and didn’t tell me.

  I imagine that the roots of the trees are coming up through the ground and tying my feet down. I’m not sure I can move, but Kevin’s arm is strong and pushing me forward. Their voices, Ms. DeSilva’s and Jim’s, float out of the house.

  Everything goes quiet when Kevin pulls open the screen door and pushes me inside.

  I put my backpack down and head toward the dining room, where they’re sitting at the paper-covered table.

  Ms. DeSilva gives me a hug. “Sorry for doing this so unexpectedly, Gordie, but I just picked up this paperwork and it didn’t seem like it should wait.”

  “Just tell me.” I’m not trying to be rude so I reluctantly add, “Please.”

  My skin feels electric. I need to keep moving, but there are too many people in the room. No escape.

  Kevin must see me starting to panic because he comes up behind me and puts a hand on each of my shoulders. “Let’s go sit down and hear what she has to say.”

  He leads me to the table and we take two seats in the middle. Jim is at one end and Ms. DeSilva is at the other. I have a very quick flash of memory, one I’ve never had before.

  We’re in the old house and sitting down to dinner. All of us together, which is rare. My father’s not around much and things are usually too chaotic for regular dinner times.

  It’s my birthday. The twins aren’t born yet, but Kayla is. I think I’m seven or eight. Mom made me a cake shaped like a hockey stick. We’re all eating dinner. Like this. Around a table. There are cake crumbs everywhere. My father is yelling at Kayla for getting frosting on the tablecloth.

  My arm shakes and Kevin’s hand squeezes my wrist.

  “Sorry,” I say, turning to Ms. DeSilva. I wish I knew how to explain to her that I’m okay. I mean, I’m not having a seizure or anything. It’s just a spin. I’m not going to bite my tongue off.

  She takes a deep breath and shuffles the papers in front of her. It feels like it takes a million years for her to say anything.

  “Gordie, what do you remember about us trying to reach your father after the … incident?”

  What I remember the most is that word. “Incident.” It was the one she always used. “Accident” was never right, and no one was going to come out and call what my mother did “Murder.” Not around me, anyway.

  I search my brain for something else. There’s … nothing.

  “I don’t remember,” I say. “Just being here, I guess. At Jim’s. I remember the … ” In my head, I see my father at the funeral, all in black. Staring at me. Mom and the kids are in boxes and …

  I shake my head hard.

  “He … ” This is also something I’m missing a word for. I don’t like to think of him as my father, but I have no other way to refer to him. “He didn’t want me, after.”

  I don’t say out loud that my father not wanting me is the thing I’m most grateful for in the universe, because as much as it makes me happy, it also hurts like hell. I’ve never really understood how that works.

  Ms. DeSilva’s face falls a little. I get it. This sucks. This all sucks. I was just a little kid and no one can go back and change the past and now I’m all fucked up. That still doesn’t mean I want to deal with those damned looks.

  “It isn’t necessarily true that he didn’t want you, you know,” she says, oblivious to the pressure that’s building in my head. “It’s just that after the funeral we couldn’t locate him. We figured he was dealing with everything that happened in his own way and that he’d come forward eventually.”

  She pauses and waits to see if I’m going to say anything, but there are no words in my mouth at all. All I’m aware
of is that the thing in my stomach is starting to tighten.

  There’s no one to bail me out. Even Kevin is sitting rock-still and looking a little green.

  DeSilva continues. “After a while, when we didn’t hear anything, I petitioned the court to award guardianship to Jim so that you and Kevin could stay together. And the judge agreed.” She looks from one of us to the other. I can tell there’s something big to come. It’s a good bet I don’t want to hear that either. “Do you have any questions so far?”

  We all shake our heads.

  I realize I’ve been holding my breath when I try to let it out and it feels like it’s sticking in my lungs. I lean over and grab a pen off the table. I’m sure I look like an idiot, but clicking that pen is the only thing that’s going to keep my heart from exploding.

  I close my eyes and focus on the clicks until I’m breathing kind of normally again.

  Kevin knocks into my leg and holds his hand out for the pen. I’d tell him to fuck off if DeSilva weren’t here, but I’m not going to cause a scene over a stupid plastic pen.

  When I hand it over, he puts it on the other side of the table.

  I glare at him and start twisting the bracelet. I know he’s happy because it doesn’t make any noise, but it doesn’t help as much either. Not that he gives a shit.

  It sounds like everyone exhales at once, and Ms. DeSilva starts talking again.

  “Because your father never stepped forward, and because we just didn’t want to put you through anything else at that time, we chose not to pursue any more formal arrangements. We would have had to go to court to charge him with neglect or abandonment.”

  “And?” I know there’s something horrible lingering somewhere on the tip of her tongue and if she doesn’t spit it out soon, I’m afraid that not even the stupid band on my wrist is going to be enough to keep me from losing it right here.

  “Jim never officially petitioned to adopt you. You need to understand that it isn’t because he didn’t … doesn’t care about you. There were no other relatives in the picture, and we just didn’t think it was necessary. Instead he was granted guardianship.”