The Substitute

by Nicole Lundrigan

  [28]

  When Warren returned home, his sister was still sleeping on the couch. He examined the mess on the coffee table — three empty cans of soda, a ripped bag of cookies, and the remains of a frozen pizza, barely cooked. Warren nudged her, and she mumbled, “S-s-sorry, Waarhsie,” and rolled toward the back of the couch. He was relieved that she was still there. That she was still breathing. He could not alter the fact that he had turned his back on her when she was twelve. Had walked away and never allowed himself to drift back. For almost a lifetime, he had pretended she never existed. She was a subsection, tucked inside his folder labelled Mother.

  Touching his face, his skin felt as though it belonged to someone else. He should clean it before Beth woke up. He did not want to give her a reason to be concerned.

  A single step toward the bathroom, and he was interrupted by tapping at the front door. Not like the banging from last night. Sharp smacks on the clapboard, the windows, shrill laughter that had torn him from his sleep. This was a gentle, determined tap, and Warren went to the door, peered out through the glass. Ms. Fairley, lips pursed, clutching the bottom half of a cardboard box, three pea plants in terracotta pots.

  “Dr. Botts. Thank goodness,” she said as he opened the door. She peered over her shoulder at the onlookers. Already gathered. Perhaps they never left at all. “What an absolute frenzy.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for this.”

  She stepped into the porch, laid the plants on the small table. “I thought you would appreciate having them back. They’re about to bloom.” Warren glanced at them. Eleven buds. Then she handed him a cloth bag. “And these,” she said. “I put them away before someone stole them or destroyed them. They’re quite beautiful, actually, if you like that sort of thing.”

  Warren glanced in the bag. Saw the small collection of insects encased in glass, a spider, a stag beetle, a scorpion. “Thank you for taking the time.”

  He turned then, stepping back into the living room to give Ms. Fairley room. She pulled in a sharp breath, “Dr. Botts? Your face?”

  He touched his cheekbone, skin hot and sticky, “I apologize. I just —”

  “What happened? What happened to you?”

  “Well. I mean. I went for a walk. Behind my house. Just followed a path in the woods.”

  “A path?”

  “Exploring?” He shifted his glasses, tried a faint smile. “Forever the scientist, I guess.”

  “Are you trying to be funny, Warren?”

  “No. Not at all.” Coughing. He glanced at her shoes, size seven, he estimated, and he began to skip count by sevens.

  She took Warren’s wrist, as though he were a child. “Come,” she said. “Let me take a look.”

  In the living room, Ms. Fairley stopped. Beth was snoring. “My sister,” Warren said. “She’s visiting. And well, she’s, I mean, she’s sick.”

  “Nothing serious, I hope.”

  “Um, an influenza virus, I think. I mean, probably the flu.”

  “Well, she certainly has her appetite still?” Gesturing toward the coffee table strewn with trash. “I’d take that as a good sign.”

  “Yes,” he replied.

  Warren followed Ms. Fairley into the kitchen. Opened the freezer, retrieved an ice tray, and twisted the contents into a clean cup towel. As he sat down, she handed it to him. “Press this against your face. It looks swollen but the split skin is only minor. Better not to bandage it, I think.”

  Warren sighed. Cold compress. Instant relief.

  “You fell? Did you fall?”

  “No, I found a home. I went to a home. I was just walking, and it took me to a trailer, a trailer place, I guess. A park? Is that what it’s called?”

  “Did someone assault you? Honestly.” She tapped her foot, one-two-three, one-two-three, folded her arms across her narrow chest. Twenty-four ribs. Twelve pairs. “This community. I’ve lived here all my life, Warren. It has changed. Significantly. Just completely deteriorated.”

  “No. I think it was my fault. I didn’t know it, but I —

  I ended up at Adrian Byrd’s home. He lives in a trailer. With his mother.”

  “Adrian? From your class?”

  “Yes, I mean. He was absent on Monday. He and,” Warren cleared his throat, “Amanda knew each other. You know. I just saw him. Saw him there, and thought I could talk to him. You know. See if he was okay.”

  “You went to Adrian Byrd’s home?”

  “I didn’t intend to.”

  “You can’t do that, Dr. Botts. You can’t just show up at a student’s residence when you feel like it. No more than they should just show up at yours.”

  He closed his eyes. Saw an image of Amanda sitting on his porch, her head hanging down. Flecks of old blue polish on her chewed-down nails. “I just spoke with him. Wanted to make sure he was managing.”

  “That may be the case, but to be blunt, no one cares what your motives were. No one cares that you were just wandering through the woods. Having a leisurely stroll. No one cares if you care. There are rules in place to protect everyone.”

  “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “No, sir. It does not. But if I had a dollar for every thing that didn’t make sense with our education system, I wouldn’t be here. I’d be sipping a margarita on a beach somewhere.” She took the cup towel from his hands, crunched the ice, then handed it back to him. “It’s not about caring anymore. It’s not about connecting. What we need to do is keep the kids in their seats. Force them through the machine, like some cruel sociological extrusion. They all come in differently, sui generis,” waving a hand, “but all need to go out the same shape. It’s painful and it breaks parts of them and it doesn’t work. Sometimes the problems become so overwhelming, you don’t see any of the good.” She sighed. “Don’t get me started!”

  “I understand.” He stared at the linoleum on the floor. Each square foot had a pattern of overlapping octagons. He tried to calculate the number of octagons in the kitchen. Did the linoleum go beneath the cabinetry? Perhaps the cabinets were a permanent structure, and the installer had to cut the flooring. How much, then, would he have thrown away? He counted quickly.

  “Warren? Are you listening?”

  He stood up, blinked. The room spun for just a moment, and Ms. Fairley gripped his elbow.

  “My head.”

  “Do you want to sit down again?”

  “No. I need to move slowly, is all.”

  “As I said, my brother is a fine judge of character, Warren. We both stand behind you.”

  “Dr. Fairley? You spoke with Dr. Fairley?”

  “Oh, yes. Several times. He is aghast with the whole situation.”

  “Oh.”

  “Are you going to be okay?”

  “I am. Yes. Thank you.”

  She smiled at him, and Warren saw that the coldness she had displayed on Monday had vanished. Something in her gentle expression, the wrinkles around her eyes, reminded him of his mother’s friend. Sarie. Warren remembered when he was a small boy, he had stood on a chair beside Sarie and played with her hair. Brownish blond, long, luxurious, and he combed it and braided it. Brought it to his face, his unblemished cheek. So soft and perfect, smelling of vanilla and plastic. He had never seen such beautiful hair on a person. She called him her little hairstylist, said his fingers were relaxing, but when he peered closer at her scalp, he saw a crisscross of threads. Hair woven, sprouting from a strange fabric netting. The sight of it startled him, made him feel queasy and uncertain, and he slid down from his chair, went outside to spin on his tire swing. One hundred and ninety big steps between kitchen chair and tree trunk.

  Last night, after Beth fell asleep, he noticed the red light blinking on his machine. Her voice in the room, more irritated this time. “Seriously, Warren. Call me back. It’s —” more quietly now, “it’s about your mothe
r.”

  His mother.

  His mother.

  Warren’s skin tightened against his body. He felt as though he were packed in gravel, his arms and legs and chest unable to twitch or shiver. How had everything changed so quickly? One moment he was counting his steps, playing with simple numbers for a simple quiz, enjoying meals with a thoughtful woman. And all at once, the universe sneered, balking in the face of his ease, his contentment. That will not do, it said, shaking its starry head. That will not do.

  Amanda. Beth. Now phone calls from Sarie. Whatever she had to say, it was not going to be positive. Something had happened, was happening. For years, Warren had next-to-no communication with his mother. With some effort, he had pushed her from his thoughts. And now he would have to hear something. Learn something. Possibly even say something.

  But how could he? He had made decisions on how to live, and he would stick with them. She was to blame. He had made that decision when he was a boy, and had never once wavered.

  When he was ready, he would call Sarie. He would listen to whatever she had to say, and without reply, he would hang up the phone.

  “Did you hear me? I should get to the school, Dr. Botts.”

  Warren looked up. He had forgotten Ms. Fairley was standing in his kitchen. “Thank you for coming by.” His voice was barely audible. “And for your kind words.”

  A strange series of grunts came from the living room, then. Warren and Ms. Fairley both watched Beth rise up from the couch, haul a blanket over her head. A shaking nomad, she stumbled across the floor, dragging her nubby cloak behind her.

  “Dead now officially awake,” came a grumble from under the blanket. “And going for a piss.”

  [29]

  Much to my disgust, my mother still accepted my aunt and Larva into our house. These visits were sombre at first, but they soon adopted a surprisingly normal quality. The three of them chronicled Button’s death over and over again, and once the truth had been steadily extracted from the story, it developed into an unfortunate, but inevitable fluke. Two months after the event, I even overheard my mother weeping, being bizarrely (and sickeningly) apologetic. “I’m so sorry, sorry, sorry,” she repeated. “So sorry.” Meaning, I deduced, she was remorseful that my aunt had to have such an experience with Button. That she had to be the one to suffer through that.

  “Don’t you even go there!” my aunt said, waving the air, thin minty cigarette in her fingers. “She was not well.

  We did our best. All of us. Right, Harvey? She was sickly. That was clear from the start.”

  “Yes,” my mother acknowledged quietly. “She never was a strong child.”

  “Or a strong baby.”

  “Sure, even I noticed that.” Larva’s asswipe contribution. His voice sounded primitive, rounded stones striking each other. “And I spent no to next time with her.”

  My aunt patted his hand. “Next to no, sweetheart.”

  “Huh?”

  Between these three adults, there was an execrable tone of it-was-bound-to-happen-and-perhaps-it-was-for-the-best. Button seizing, convulsing, body straining on hot cement until her heart fluttered and stopped. It was actually a good thing. Weakness culled. No one blamed the man who forced mouthful after mouthful of liquid down her throat, while she was slick with salt and sweat. Upsetting her electrolytic balance. It only took me ten minutes of research to understand that basic scientific concept. I could not comprehend how no one else came to that conclusion.

  The topic of conversation had now shifted to a rise in electrical bills.

  “Criminal. The costs.”

  “Someone is living off our fat.” My aunt adopted an appalled air.

  Larva next. “They’d have a hard time collecting from you, babes.”

  I stood up, slid out the back door without making a sound. Leaned against the warm brick of the house. I still did not know how to handle Button’s death. How to process it, make it fit neatly inside one of my mental folders. It was not that I was in the throes of grief, but during those months, I experienced near constant irritation. No matter what I was doing, one layer of my mental functioning was dedicated to her, grinding her memory into consumable portions. Who was responsible for stealing something that was mine? Aunt Floozy? Dickface? Lame witch of a mother who so quickly offered total absolution? I did not attempt to distract myself. My brain was masticating, and eventually it would come up with a fitting response.

  From that afternoon forward, whenever I was aware of an impending visit, I removed myself from the premises and retreated to the branches of my Mighty Oak. I shimmied up the trunk, digging the toes of my sneakers into the healed scars made by my father’s accident. The upper branches were accommodating, providing an exact fit between my scapulae, an appropriate angle for my vertebral column, a flattened area for my sacrum. While sitting in the crook of the tree I was busy solving a problem. I remained disguised for several weeks, and only when the leaves ceased chlorophyll production, and began to drop, did my neighbour discover me hiding there.

  The neighbour was an enfeebled baldie, with round glasses and an oh-so-typical brown cardigan. But he was unconventional in other ways. I determined this based on the front bay window of his house. It allowed no sunlight in, as it was full of novels, piled one upon the other, pages facing out. During the fall, he came onto his front step, sat in a chair made of natural wicker, read a paperback. Sometimes he would wave, and being a courteous individual, I would return the gesture. Occasionally, when the weather was decent, he would lumber over to the tree, ask if I knew a good “knock-knock” (No, sir, I’m not big on jokes), or if I wanted kick the ball around on the lawn (I shook my head, thought, Seriously?). “My daughter had a swing on that there branch,” he said on another attempt. “It’s in the garage. I can find it if you like.” I glanced over at the open garage door, a floor-to-ceiling wall of boxes and junk blocking the way. “No, no, Mister. That won’t be necessary. I don’t swing.” He had nodded, retreated to his chair.

  “Do you want a cookie?” Today, he stood right below me, the tip of his cane lost among the dead leaves. The afternoon was cloudy, cold, and I had begun to grow stiff. This time I nodded, slid down the tree, accepted his offer.

  As anticipated, his home smelled of paper, books, magazines, a heap of yellowed newsprint. Not unpleasant in the least. Calming, actually. In his kitchen, all of his food items were neatly out on display.

  “My daughter brings me cookies. Every second week she drives for two hours to bring me a houseful of groceries, but she only ever says she’s bringing me cookies. She never wants me to think I’m a bother.” His hands shook as he struggled with the plastic lid.

  “That’s kind of her,” I said.

  “She is kind. She is that.” He chuckled.

  Careful not to alter my breath or lean forward, I waited patiently until he pushed the container of oversized double chocolates toward me. I took one, two, then he reached over and closed the lid.

  “You don’t want?”

  “No, no, I’m diabetic. I stay away from the sugar.”

  “Then it’s illogical for your daughter to bring you cookies.”

  “Yes, you’re right. She believes I entertain visitors.”

  “Do you?”

  “Well, not really. But, you are here. You are a visitor, and consuming something. So, my response has just turned to ‘yes.’” He filled a kettle with water, placed it on the stove, then lifted the lid of the smallest canister, dropped a teabag in a cup.

  I finished the cookie, then gestured toward the container. “Might I?”

  “Of course. I would offer you a tumbler of milk,” tapping his chin, “but I don’t have any.”

  Squinting my eyes slightly, I replied, “And your daughter fails to consider a visitor might like milk?”

  “Touché!” Mock surprise. He understood my humour, and sounded delighted with the
banter. “You’ve got her there. I apologize for her obvious lack of foresight.”

  “Doesn’t matter. It makes me sick, and even if it didn’t, I’d refuse to drink it. I find the concept quite disgusting. Did you know we are the only animals to consume milk from another species?”

  “Yes, I did know that. And I concur. It is vile. Juice, then?”

  “Too acidic.”

  “Soda?”

  A flash of Button behind my eyes, orange bubbling from her mouth. “Too many chemicals.”

  “Water?”

  I nodded. “No ice.”

  “That’s perfect. I don’t have any.”

  He handed me a glass, old and etched from years of washing. I avoided the chipped section of the rim. “I see you are quite the bibliophile,” I said as I sipped the lukewarm water. “What sort of material do you prefer?”

  “Well, let me see. Mysteries. True crime, mostly. Whatever I choose, it must be provocative. Grisly, even. Otherwise I would fall asleep.”

  “The one you are reading now is not provocative. Obviously.”

  “How did you guess?”

  “I saw you napping on the porch.”

  “Well, then! Very observant.”

  I straightened my back. “I wasn’t spying.”

  “I never said you were. I meant that as a compliment, my young friend. Not an admonishment.”

  There were shelves and bookcases and drawers and countertops laden down with books. Paperbacks, hardcovers, photographic journals. Fiction, non-fiction. The concept of all those stories, all that information so close to me made me salivate. Our local hag librarian had caught me in the adult section many times, and not only was my access restricted, she had taken to following me when I entered the double doors. I believed such surveillance was tantamount to a war crime.

  “Yes,” he replied. “I had an occupation that required waiting, and I’m not one to be idle.”