I move Tooth to my gum. “What?”
“Want to have pie on the couch and watch the game?”
“OK.”
• • •
I pick up branches fallen off the trees, even enormous heavy ones. Me and Grandma tie them into bundles with string for the city to take them. “How does the city—?”
“The guys from the city, I mean, the guys whose job it is.”
When I grow up my job is going to be a giant, not the eating kind, the kind that catches kids that are falling into the sea maybe and puts them back on land.
I shout, “Dandelion alert,” Grandma scoops it out with her trowel so the grass can grow, because there isn’t room for everything.
When we’re tired we go in the hammock, even Grandma. “I used to sit like this with your ma when she was a baby.” “Did you give her some?”
“Some what?”
“From your breast.”
Grandma shakes her head. “She used to bend back my fingers while she had her bottle.”
“Where’s the tummy mommy?”
“The — oh, you know about her? I have no idea, I’m afraid.”
“Did she get another baby?”
Grandma doesn’t say anything. Then she says, “That’s a nice thought.”
• • •
I’m painting at the kitchen table in Grandma’s old apron that has a crocodile and
There’s Ma in the window.
The red spills. I try and wipe it up but it’s all on my foot and the floor. Ma’s face isn’t there anymore, I run to the window but she’s gone. Was I just imagining? I’ve got red on the window and the sink and the counter. “Grandma?” I shout. “Grandma?”
Then Ma’s right behind me.
I run to nearly at her. She goes to hug me but I say, “No, I’m all painty.”
She laughs, she undoes my apron and drops it on the table. She holds me hard all over but I keep my sticky hands and foot away. “I wouldn’t know you,” she says to my head.
“Why you wouldn’t—?”
“I guess it’s your hair.”
“Look, I have some long in a bracelet, but it keeps getting catched on things.”
“Can I have it?”
“Sure.”
The bracelet gets some paint on it sliding off my wrist. Ma puts it on hers. She looks different but I don’t know how. “Sorry I made you red on your arm.” “It’s all washable,” says Grandma, coming in.
“You didn’t tell him I was coming?” asks Ma, giving her a kiss.
“Ithought it best not,incase of a hitch.”
“There’s no hitches.”
“Good to hear it.” Grandma wipes her eyes and starts cleaning the paint up. “Now, Jack’s been sleeping on a blow-up mattress in our room, but I can make you up a bed on the couch. .”
“Actually, we better head off.”
Grandma stands still for a minute. “You’ll stay for a bit of supper?”
“Sure,” says Ma.
Steppa makes pork chops with risotto, I don’t like the bone bits but I eat all the rice and scrape the sauce with my fork. Steppa steals a bit of my pork.
“Swiper no swiping.”
He groans, “Oh, man!”
Grandma shows me a heavy book with kids she says were Ma and Paul when they were small. I’m working on believing, then I see one of the girl on a beach, the one Grandma and Steppa took me there, and her face is Ma’s exact face. I show Ma.
“That’s me, all right,” she says, turning the page. There’s one of Paul waving out of a window in a gigantic banana that’s actually a statue, and one of them both eating ice cream in cones with Grandpa but he looks different and Grandma too, she has dark hair in the picture.
“Where’s one of the hammock?”
“We were in it all the time, so probably nobody ever thought of taking a picture,” says Ma.
“It must be terrible to not have any,” Grandma tells her.
“Any what?” says Ma.
“Pictures of Jack when he was a baby and a toddler,” she says. “I mean, just to remember him by.”
Ma’s face is all blank. “I don’t forget a day of it.” She looks at her watch, I didn’t know she had one, it’s got pointy fingers.
“What time are they expecting you at the clinic?” asks Steppa.
She shakes her head. “I’m all done with that.” She takes something out of her pocket and shakes it, it’s a key on a ring. “Guess what, Jack, you and me have our own apartment.”
Grandma says her other name. “Is that such a good idea, do you think?”
“It was my idea. It’s OK, Mom. There’s counselors there around the clock.”
“But you’ve never lived away from home before. .”
Ma’s staring at Grandma, and so is Steppa. He lets out a big whoop of laughing.
“It’s not funny,” says Grandma, whacking him in the chest. “She knows what I mean.”
Ma takes me upstairs to pack my stuff.
“Close your eyes,” I tell her, “there’s surprises.” I lead her into the bedroom. “Ta-da.” I wait. “It’s Rug and lots of our things, the police gave them back.”
“So I see,” says Ma.
“Look, Jeep and Remote—”
“Let’s not cart broken stuff around with us,” she says, “just take what you really need and put it in your new Dora bag.” “I need all of it.”
Ma breathes out. “Have it your way.”
What’s my way?
“There’s boxes it all came in.”
“I said OK.”
Steppa puts all our stuff into the back of the white car.
“I must get my license renewed,” says Ma when Grandma’s driving along.
“You might find you’re a bit rusty.”
“Oh, I’m rusty at everything,” says Ma.
I ask, “Why you’re—?”
“Like the Tin Man,” Ma says over her shoulder. She lifts her elbow and does a squeak. “Hey, Jack, will we buy a car of our own someday?” “Yeah. Or actually a helicopter. A super zoomer helicopter train car submarine.”
“Now, that sounds like a ride.”
It’s hours and hours in the car. “How come it’s so long?” I ask.
“Because it’s all the way across the city,” says Grandma. “It’s practically the next state.”
“Mom. .”
The sky’s getting dark.
Grandma parks where Ma says. There is a big sign. INDEPENDENT LIVING RESIDENTIAL FACILITY. She helps us carry all our boxes and bags in the building that’s made of brown bricks, except I pull my Dora on its wheels. We go in a big door with a man called the doorman that smiles. “Does he lock us in?” I whisper to Ma.
