Room: A Novel

I don’t like her like this. “What’s for breakfast?”

Ma stares at me. Then she stands up and goes over to Cabinet and gets out a bagel, I think it’s the last one.

She only has a quarter of it, she’s not very hungry.

When we let our breaths out they’re foggy. “That’s because it’s colder today,” says Ma.

“You said it wouldn’t get any colder.”

“Sorry, I was wrong.”

I finish the bagel. “Do I still have a Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Paul?”

“Yeah,” says Ma, she smiles a bit.

“Are they in Heaven?”

“No, no.” She twists her mouth. “I don’t think so, anyway. Paul’s only three years older than me, he’s — wow, he must be twenty-nine.” “Actually they’re here,” I whisper. “Hiding.”

Ma looks around. “Where?”

“In Under Bed.”

“Oh, that must be a tight squeeze. There’s three of them, and they’re pretty big.”

“As big as hippopotami?”

“Not that big.”

“Maybe they’re. . in Wardrobe.”

“With my dresses?”

“Yeah. When we hear a clatter that’s them knocking down the hangers.”

Ma’s face is flat.

“I’m only kidding,” I tell her.

She nods.

“Can they come here sometime for real?”

“I wish they could,” she says. “I pray for it so hard, every night.”

“I don’t hear you.”

“Just in my head,” says Ma.

I didn’t know she prays things in her head where I can’t hear.

“They’re wishing it too,” she says, “but they don’t know where I am.”

“You’re in Room with me.”

“But they don’t know where it is, and they don’t know about you at all.”

That’s weird. “They could look on Dora’s Map, and when they come I could pop out at them for a surprise.”

Ma nearly laughs but not quite. “Room’s not on any map.”

“We could tell them on a telephone, Bob the Builder has one.”

“But we don’t.”

“We could ask for one for Sundaytreat.” I remember. “If Old Nick stops being mad.”

“Jack. He’d never give us a phone, or a window.” Ma takes my thumbs and squeezes them. “We’re like people in a book, and he won’t let anybody else read it.”

For Phys Ed we run on Track. It’s hard moving Table and the chairs with hands that feel not here. I run ten there-and-backs but I’m still not warmed up, my toes are stumbly. We do Trampoline and Karate, Hi- yah, then I choose Beanstalk again. Ma says OK if I promise not to freak out when I can’t see anything. I climb up Table onto my chair onto Trash and I don’t even wobble. I hold on to the edges where Roof slants into Skylight, I stare hard through the honeycomb at the blue so it makes me blink. After a while Ma says she wants to get down and make lunch.

“No vegetables, please, my tummy can’t manage them.”

“We have to use them up before they rot.”

“We could have pasta.”

“We’re nearly out.”

“Then rice. What if—?” Then I forget to talk because I see it through the honeycomb, the thing so small I think it’s just one of those floaters in my eye, but it’s not. It’s a little line making a thick white streak on the sky. “Ma—”

“What?”

“An airplane!”

“Really?”

“Really real for real. Oh—”

Then I’m falling on Ma then on Rug, Trash is banging on us and my chair too. Ma’s saying ow ow ow and rubbing her wrist. “Sorry, sorry,” I say, I’m kissing it better. “I saw it, it was a real airplane only tiny.”

“That’s just because it’s far away,” she says all smiling. “I bet if you saw it up close it would actually be huge.”

“The most amazing thing, it was writing a letter I on the sky.”

“That’s called a. .” She slaps her head. “Can’t remember. It’s a sort of streak, it’s the smoke of the plane or something.” For lunch we have all the seven rest of the crackers with the gloopy cheese, we hold our breaths not to taste it.

Ma gives me some under Duvet. There’s shine from God’s yellow face but not enough for sunbathing. I can’t switch off. I stare up at Skylight so hard my eyes get itchy but I don’t see any more airplanes. I really did see that one though when I was up Beanstalk, it wasn’t a dream. I saw it flying in Outside, so there really is Outside where Ma was a little girl.

We get up and play Cat’s Cradle and Dominoes and Submarine and Puppets and lots of other things but only a little while each. We do Hum, the songs are too easy to guess. We go back in Bed to warm up.

“Let’s go in Outside tomorrow,” I say.

“Oh, Jack.”

I’m lying on Ma’s arm that’s all thick in two sweaters. “I like how it smells there.”

She moves her head to stare at me.

“When Door opens after nine and the air whooshes in that’s not like our air.”

“You noticed,” she says.

“I notice all the things.”

“Yeah, it’s fresher. In the summer, it smells of cut grass, because we’re in his backyard. Sometimes I get a glimpse of shrubs and hedges.” “Whose backyard?”

“Old Nick’s. Room is made out of his shed, remember?”

It’s hard to remember all the bits, none of them sound very true.

“He’s the only one who knows the code numbers to tap into the outside keypad.”

I stare at Keypad, I didn’t know there was another. “I tap numbers.”

“Yeah, but not the secret ones that open the door — like an invisible key,” says Ma. “Then when he’s going back to the house he taps in the code again, on this one”—she points at Keypad.

“The house with the hammock?”

“No.” Ma’s voice is loud. “Old Nick lives in a different one.”

“Can we go to his one someday?”

She presses her mouth with her hand. “I’d rather go to your grandma and grandpa’s house.”

“We could swing in the hammock.”

“We could do what we liked, we’d be free.”

“When I’m six?”

“Definitely someday.”

There’s wet running down Ma’s face onto mine. I jump, it’s salty.

“I’m OK,” she says, rubbing her cheek, “it’s OK. I’m just — I’m a bit scared.”

“You can’t be scared.” I’m nearly shouting. “Bad idea.”

“Just a little bit. We’re OK, we’ve got the basics.”

Now I’m even scareder. “But what if Old Nick doesn’t uncut the power and he doesn’t bring more food, not