Come Back

by Claire Fontaine

  “That’s it? You must hate your parents! Are all the kids here like you?”

  “Most did more drugs, but kids from overseas are usually worse.”

  “Jessie,” interrupts a junior staff, “showers started five minutes ago, self-correct your late consequence?”

  Jessie grumbles a self-correct, then flips her off when she turns away. I smile to myself. I was the same way to Sasha at first. I really miss her. I hear she’s already practically running the facility she was sent to, some new school in the South. I wish junior staff here were more like her. There are about forty of them and they’re like the Spring Creek mafia.

  The general attitude toward them is a mixture of respect, admiration, fear, and hatred. Some of them are so confident and powerful it’s hard to imagine why they’re here. The rest of them you wish weren’t.

  Jessie emerges from the bathroom and joins some girls in the corner. I may have bitched about Morava feeling like kindergarten, but I prefer that to high school, which is what this feels like. The Spring Creek girls are in various cliques in the cabin and their stares are unnerving and unwelcoming. In Morava, every new girl was subject to a loving interrogation her first night, but Jessie was the first one to come and talk to us in almost a week.

  They’ve finally finished our cabin and we’re so excited to all be back together it’s all we can do to keep silence as we move in. We’ve named ourselves the Harmony family, and their goal is for us to assimilate into Spring Creek.

  Because the staff here discourages it, we talk about Morava as little as possible. I think about it, however, constantly, and can tell the other girls do, too. Roxanne is quieter, in school she gets distracted easily and I know whenever she’s doodling, her mind’s in Brno. Samantha’s nails are gnawed to the quick and Katrina’s been given a bathroom buddy to prevent her from purging. It’s never brought up, but we’re all worried about Glenn and Miss Zuza going to jail.

  I’m sweet sixteen today, or bittersweet rather. My family woke me up singing happy birthday and gave me a paper tiara along with ingeniously made gifts. We can’t use scissors, so Katrina tore paper into small squares, hole punched them, and threaded a ribbon to make me a small diary. Sunny sketched me a butterfly in honor of my Stretch.

  But it’s still mildly depressing. There’s nothing like handing over gifts to staff(keeping my cards would be considered note-passing) to remind you that you’re locked up.

  They let me keep the best gift, though. Growing up, my favorite question to ask adults was, “What was your Most Embarrassing Moment?” I would die laughing hearing about adults making total fools of themselves. My parents had friends and family members write down their stories. The whole cabin’s been hysterical over them.

  I miss my parents so much, especially after just seeing my mom. Walking with her in Prague on the Charles Bridge that night was pure magic. It was a storybook perfect setting, a sky full of stars, a layer of snow coating the statues on the bridge. Everything was so still, it felt timeless, and we stood there, hand in hand, listening to a musician play “Ode to Joy” on water glasses.

  Even so, there was always an edge. When I got up to go to the bathroom at dinner, there was that split-second panic in her eyes. It’s painfully obvious how little she trusts me, how scared she is I’m faking it.

  Still, it’s touching how she rests her hopes on the small chance that I’ve changed, that bit of faith that her baby girl is still in me. That part of me loves how she and Paul still take the time to make me feel special. As far back as I can remember, my mom could always think of a reason to come home with my favorite pastry or take me on a surprise visit to the Getty. She’d leave notes inside lunch bags that Paul drew calligraphic M’s on. I cringe when I think about how many beautiful lunch bags ended up in the Dumpster of my elementary school.

  It’s funny how care becomes a source of embarrassment. When puberty strikes, you start acting like you were hatched from some egg and dropped off in a random house. You’re on a sudden mission to prove you’re parentless. Mom, don’t kiss me in front of everyone! Paul, stop decorating my lunch bags!

  And now, we get excited over even just a letter from them.

  MUDDER’S MOST EMBARRASSING MOMENT

  The day before I left Brno, a Czech staff member, Ivan, took me to tour a nearby castle. On the way there, I bought my first Czech candy bar, which I happily consumed as we drove past sleepy villages.

  When we reached the mountaintop castle, I stuck the candy wrapper in my purse before joining a group of elegant Europeans. Once inside its cool, stone walls, Ivan politely pointed to my rear end. A hunk of chocolate must have fallen onto the passenger seat and melted. There was a big brown splotch on the seat of my nice linen shorts.

  Great. In an effort to blend, I’d slicked my hair into a French twist, worn my black Italian loafers, and I now looked like I had diarrhea and the Depends weren’t up to the challenge.

  I’d already cried through all my Kleenex, so I carried folded toilet paper in my purse. I tore off a few sheets, backed up to a shadowy corner and discreetly wiped off as much as I could. Which wasn’t much. Ivan assured me with, “Don’t worry, Ms. Fontaine, everyone is interested in the castle, not your bottom, they will be looking up not down.”

  He’s probably right, I thought, I’ll just stay at the back of the line. When we came to a very narrow staircase, I lagged and went last. Halfway up, there was a rush of squeaking soles behind me, then a sudden gasp right below my butt. I froze—it was the aloof couple in Mephistos. Looking up.

  There were murmurs of disgust beneath me, my translator was nowhere to be seen, and it was too narrow to let the couple pass. So, I turned, pointed to my butt and said as graciously as I could—

  “Chocolate—it is cho-co-late,” as if they were third-graders, “caan-dy?”

  They looked at me as if I were mentally ill. Worse, mentally ill and trapping them on the stairs to speak of things fecal. Quick, Claire, show them the candy wrapper! I jammed my hand into my purse—and whipped out a wad of brown-smeared toilet paper.

  I could hear those Mephistos tripping over themselves all the way down.

  22.

  Cameron’s speech was prophetic. The new girls are already back to Level 1. Except Brooke, the girl whose intake I did in Morava.

  Once the heroin finally left her system, it was hard to believe it was ever there. In less than three months she’s become a bright-eyed, feedback-giving machine. Between being molested as a child, addiction, street life, and having an abortion, she had plenty to deal with and wasted no time getting down and dirty with her issues.

  As she shares today, there’s a giant, fair-haired man in jeans and cowboy boots sitting cross-legged next to her, his head cocked in concentration. He leans his elbows on his knees, as if he doesn’t know what to do with his huge top half. He’s probably in his thirties, but he’s got a friendly-looking boy’s face with an upturned nose. His name’s Mike Linderman, and I’ve seen him around the school during the week.

  We’ve all heard Brooke speak about her molestation before, but never like this. She’s not just crying or angry, she’s talking about how it translates into her everyday life, how it affects her relationships, her ability to feel feminine, her ability to feel at all.

  I think about those things all the time! I never know if not liking girly clothes is a personal preference or my way of avoiding sexual attention; or if always feeling nervous, like something really bad’s about to happen, is about my old dad or just the way I am. I want what she has, to understand myself like she does, to not feel so out of control.

  We end group and Mike starts to head for the door. Without thinking, I leap up and tap his back. He turns around. Shit, what am I doing?

  “I’m like Brooke,” I blurt out. “I mean, that happened to me, too, and I don’t know how to deal with it.”

  It pops out more coherently than I anticipated. He crinkles up his green eyes and smiles.

  “I might be able to help y
ou out with that.”

  The teensy cabin across from the cafeteria turns out to be Mike’s office. The staff escorting me there is overweight and out of shape. It’d be a cinch to just take off. I’ve been thinking of running and it’s not even because I want to, just because I can. I think part of the reason I liked my old lifestyle was the challenge of it. Always having to find your next fix, being on the run, was exhilarating. I never thought like this at Morava and it bothers me that I think it here. Sometimes I worry that I can’t do well outside of Morava, that it was a magical place and the me that existed there can only exist there. Like a cake in the oven, if even one ingredient is missing, the entire recipe is ruined. Seeing Mike’s red roof snaps me out of my daydream. I thank staff and walk inside. Immediately, I feel claustrophobic. What are you doing, Mia? You hate shrinks.

  He’s on the phone but smiles and motions to the chair in the corner. The walls are full of photos of students, their poems and drawings.

  “Where do you think your son gets that pattern from, Tina?” Mike says into the phone. “You create the same dynamic with your husband.”

  It’s hard to tell if the mom’s in therapy or the son. I try unsuccessfully to picture Colleen giving my mom marital advice. As he wraps up, I notice a framed desk photo of a blond woman hugging three small children, his family I’m guessing.

  When he hangs up, he grins at me, leans way back in his swivel chair, and kicks his feet up on his desk.

  “So, let’s talk, Mia.”

  I look at his mud-covered cowboy boots, shitkickers. Everything about him is so untherapeutic, I’m not sure whether to talk about myself, ask for tips on riding, or just shoot the breeze. Not to mention it’s only now sinking in that I’m in a male therapist’s office. I’ve never seen a male shrink—a male anything for that matter.

  “About what?”

  “Oh, this is my session, I didn’t realize that. Well, let’s see, I birthed a calf yesterday, there’s a new Chevy blazer I’ve been eyeing. This what you had in mind, dear?”

  I laugh, but still can’t think of an opening line besides “No.”

  “You came to me, girl, you had to have something in mind, something, say, like sexual abuse, maybe?”

  Shit. He doesn’t waste any time.

  “That term make you uneasy?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “It’s a common reaction, Mia. Those words make people squirm who’ve never even been abused. It’s not a popular topic, it’s un-com-for-ta-ble. And that’s what I’m all about, diggin’ up the dirt. That’s what we’ll do in here if you choose, pull up the rug and see what you’ve been sweeping under it. And it’s not always fun, but you must have realized that something about the way you’ve been dealing with it isn’t working for you, or you wouldn’t have come up to me.”

  Part of me wishes I hadn’t, because I am un-com-for-ta-ble.

  “Why don’t we start with the facts, what happened, who, how long.”

  I go over the part I could recite in my sleep. Molested, biological father, two or three. It’s the other parts that I omit. The becoming terrified for no reason, the urges to scratch off my skin, to rid myself of any part of me that can be touched. I leave out feeling like no guy will ever want me and hating myself for wanting one in the first place.

  “You’re voting up today, or I WILL drop you to Level 1. You’ve earned it, everyone supports you, and I’m done convincing you to trust in yourself.”

  Miss Kim is our new family mother and yet another one of the brick walls my mom is so happy this program is full of. She’s as tough as Miss Zuza, but less formal. She’s half Native American, with delicate features and black eyes and already feels like she’s been with our family much longer than a few weeks.

  “This is so unfair! I’m not ready to be junior staff and I’m irritable and they’re going to sense my bad attitude and no one’s going to vote me up.”

  She gives me a look, the look, where she raises her eyebrows, tilts her head and, poof, you know you’re screwed.

  “Then change your attitude,” she replies, walking away.

  The remaining hour of class goes by way too quickly. Before I know it, the door flies open.

  “Girls going to junior staff group, line up!”

  Sunny, Roxanne, and I rise, all looking less than thrilled. Advancing on the lower levels is easy, you just need points. For upper levels, you need points and your peers’ approval.

  Their group’s outside today, great. It’s about forty degrees and the wind’s blowing, so I have to vote up with my teeth chattering while trying to project my voice.

  “Everyone voting up today, stand up,” Miss Marcy shouts to the group. She’s a tiny, energetic woman in charge of junior staff.

  I rise. Most of the others are smiling, excited. I feel like a case of dysentery is setting in.

  Roxanne’s vote-up takes all of two seconds. A natural leader, she only has three people stand in lack of support. She’s smiling ear to ear as everyone claps and cheers. Sunny, who threw a bigger hissy fit than I did, looks positively miserable. Like sharks to blood, the junior staff instantly pick up on her insecurities, and Sunny disappears into the ring of people standing up around her.

  Her face falls, and my heart along with it. She’s so easily affected by things, it will be hard for her to get the confidence to vote back up. I saw this coming, though. She still hasn’t come out about being gay and even if they haven’t guessed it, they sense something’s not ringing true.

  It’s my turn. I feel nauseous and I’m praying words come out of my mouth instead of vomit.

  “Hi, I’m Mia. I’m voting up for Level 4 today. Everyone who doesn’t support me, please stand.”

  I hold my breath.

  Two, four, eight, eleven, fourteen people out of forty. I call on the closest kid.

  “Mia, you give awesome feedback, people look up to you, but in my experience you still hold back when it comes to your emotions and that sets a poor example.”

  “DITTO!” is echoed by the group.

  Max Silvers goes next. He’s a stocky redhead, one of the most powerful males on the facility and he knows it. The fact that he doesn’t support me isn’t good; stafft end to respect his opinion.

  “Mia, in my experience you could be one of the most powerful kids in this facility, but you’re stubborn. You know what you need to do to change, and the fact that you don’t is what bugs me. I experience you as relying on your potential to get you through the program. I feel a lot of the support you get isn’t what people see you doing, but what they think you can be doing and that’s just not enough for me right now.”

  Great, he basically just told everyone supporting me they shouldn’t be. I half listen to the rest of my feedback, while picturing Max dangling from a cliff, one hand clawing the edge while I look down at him and he pleads for his life.

  While the other kids finish, the junior staff have been talking among themselves.

  “Mia, congratulations, you just earned Level 4.”

  The kids cheer and Roxanne rushes over to hug me. Sunny smiles weakly, and I feel awful for her. I spot Mike mouthing “good job.” I hadn’t noticed him standing outside the circle.

  “But,” Miss Marcy continues, “we agree with Max’s feedback. You aren’t living up to your potential and until you do, consider yourself on thin ice. We really need to see you run with this, got it?”

  Got it. I don’t care if she just stipulated I can’t breathe the entire time I’m up there—I’m Level 4!

  “He’s not your typical shrink, that’s for sure. I half expect him to arrive on a horse,” Mia tells me on our monthly call. “He actually birthed a calf the other day, yuck.”

  “I hope his therapy is just as atypical.”

  “Well, if you call putting muddy cowboy boots on his desk during therapy atypical, it is. I like him though, he doesn’t BS.” She pauses, then adds, “You’re still going to Focus next week, aren’t you? I really want you to go, mom.”


  I can hear the hope in her voice. Because, unlike Discovery, which is primarily about awareness, Focus demands real change based on an even more unsparing look at yourself. Which means a lot of parents avoid it, including Paul.

  This is going to disappoint her. “I was getting to that. Jordana got a director for All Good Children, and we’re going to London for rewrite meetings with him.”

  Jordana is a close friend and the producer of a screenplay I adapted from Marianne Wiggins’s transcendent novel, John Dollar.

  “Really? I’m so happy for you!” A pause. “But you’ll still do the seminar, right?”

  “As soon as I get back, monkey, I promise.”

  23.

  EXT. RANGOON HARBOR 1919 MORNING ESTABLISHING

  Steamships, freighters, and native fishing boats crowd the harbor. Docks SWARM with Burmese fishermen in sarongs, Chinese coolies, Europeans in white linen. Rice mills belch filthy smoke. ELEPHANTS stack teak logs with their trunks.

  A dozen turbaned SIKHS swim to a barge, put the tow ropes in their mouths, turn and swim back, pulling the barge in by their teeth. Beyond them, a huge golden spire towers over Rangoon, the Shwedagon Pagoda.

  ANGLE ON A STEAMSHIP—THE VICEROY OF INDIA

  A milky-skinned young woman with sea-colored eyes, CHARLOTTE LEWES, stands at the bow, entranced by all she sees. Her fingers rest on a small metal military kit balanced on the rails. The kit is stamped Lt. Harry Lewes. Without lowering her eyes, her fingers appear to move slightly. The kit slips down and sinks into the cloudy water below. It might have been an accident.

  She turns and walks around a group of wilted ENGLISHWOMEN in pale silk dresses already clinging with sweat. She continues toward the gangplank as it’s lowered.

  Charlotte walks unaided down the narrow plank. Into the sweating humanity, the shimmering heat, the unearthly sounds and colors. Into Burma.