and muffled.”
“It’s muffled because I’m talking to you through a door.”
Jocko was silent, perhaps thinking about what she said.
She tried the door but it wouldn’t open. The pantry had no lock.
“Are you holding the door shut, Jocko?”
“Talk to Jocko through the keyhole. Then your voice won’t be muffled and strange and muffled. If you’re really Erika.”
She said, “That might be a good plan-”
“It’s an excellent plan!” Jocko declared.
“-if this door had a keyhole.”
“What happened? Where’s the keyhole? Where’d it go?”
“It’s a pantry. Doesn’t need a lock. It never had a keyhole.”
“It had a keyhole!” Jocko insisted.
“No, little one. It never did.”
“Without a keyhole Jocko would suffocate. Did Jocko suffocate?” His voice quivered. “Is Jocko dead? Is he dead? Is Jocko in Hell?”
“You have to listen to me, sweetie. Listen closely.”
“Jocko’s in Hell,” he sobbed.
“Take a deep breath.”
“Jocko’s rotting in Hell.”
“Can you take a deep breath? A big deep breath. Do it for me, sweetie. Come on.”
Through the door, she heard him breathe deeply
“Very good. My good boy.”
“Jocko’s dead in Hell,” he said miserably but with less panic.
“Take another deep breath, sweetie.” After he had taken three, she said, “Now look around. Do you see boxes of macaroni? Spaghetti? Cookies?”
“Ummmm… macaroni… spaghetti… cookies. Yeah.”
“Do you think there’s macaroni, spaghetti, and cookies in Hell?”
“Maybe.”
She changed tactics. “I’m sorry, Jocko. I apologize. I should have called. I just didn’t realize how much time went by.”
“Three cans of lima beans,” Jocko said. “Three big cans.”
“That doesn’t prove you’re in Hell.”
“Yes, it does. It’s proof.”
“I like lima beans-remember? That’s why you see three cans. Not because it’s Hell in there. Know what else I like besides lima beans? Cinnamon rolls from Jim James Bakery. And I just put a dozen of them on the kitchen table.”
Jocko was silent. Then the door cracked open, and Erika stepped back, and the door swung wide, and the little guy peered out at her.
Because his butt was nearly flat, he wore blue jeans that Erika had altered to prevent them from sagging in the seat. On his T-shirt was a photo of one of World Wrestling Entertainment’s current stars, Buster Steelhammer. Because his arms were three inches longer than those of any child his size, because they were thin, and because they were creepier than a loving mother would openly acknowledge, Erika had added material to extend the sleeves to his hands.
He blinked at her. “It’s you.”
“Yes,” she said, “it’s me.”
“Jocko’s not really dead.”
“You’re really not.”
“I thought you were.”
“I’m not dead either.”
Stepping out of the closet, he said, “Jim James cinnamons?”
“Six each,” she confirmed.
He grinned at her.
When she’d first known Jocko, she recoiled from his grin, which contorted his already unfortunate face into a fright mask that gave pause even to the wife of Victor Frankenstein. During the past two years, however, she grew to love this disastrous expression because his delight so touched and pleased her.
He had suffered much. He deserved some happiness.
Motherly love made beautiful what the rest of the world found grotesque and abhorrent. Well, perhaps not beautiful, but at least picturesque.
Jocko scampered to the kitchen table, clambered into a chair, and clapped his hands at the sight of the white pastry box.
“Wait until I get dishes and napkins,” Erika warned. “And what do you want to drink?”
“Cream,” said Jocko.
“I think I’ll have cream, too.”
Victor was responsible for untold horrors and disasters, but perhaps the one thing he got right was the metabolism he designed for his creations. They could have consumed nothing but butter and molasses while remaining in good health and without gaining an ounce.
Erika set out two plates and forks, and he said, “Can Jocko eat one now?”
“No, you have to wait.”
As Erika put napkins and two drinking glasses on the table, he said, “Now can Jocko have one?”
“Not yet. Behave yourself. You’re not a pig.”
“Jocko might be pig. Part pig. Who knows? Lots of weird DNA in the mix. Maybe it’s natural for Jocko to hog down Jim James cinnamons right now and oink like a pig.”
“If you eat one right now, then you’ll only get one, not six,” she said as she put two quarts of cream on the table.
As Erika filled a glass from her quart and then filled a glass from his quart, Jocko watched her, smacking the flaps that were his equivalent of lips. She took a plump, glistening roll from the box and put it on her plate, and then put another on his plate.
He began to make snorting noises.
“Don’t you dare.” She sat across the table from him, opened her napkin, smoothed it across her lap, and regarded him expectantly.
Jocko tucked one point of the napkin under the neck of his Buster Steelhammer T-shirt, smoothed it across the wrestler’s face, and sat up straight in his chair, clearly proud of himself.
“Very good,” Erika said. “Very nice.”
“You’re a good mother,” he said.
“Thank you, sweetie.”
“You taught Jocko manners.”
“And why are manners important?”
“They show we have respect for other people.”
“That’s correct. They show that you respect your mother.”
“And they teach us self-control.”
“Exactly.”
As Erika used her fork to cut a piece from her cinnamon roll, Jocko snatched his off the plate and crammed the whole thing into his mouth at once.
In proportion to his body, his curiously shaped head was bigger than that of any human being, and in proportion to his unfortunate head, his mouth was bigger than Nature would ever have made it, but Nature had no hand in Jocko’s creation. All eight or ten ounces of the big Jim James roll disappeared into his mouth without leaving a trace of icing on his lip flaps.
But then the trouble began.
