Still, I’m glad Dad has finally stopped trying to hide the discussions from me. Although it’s not the same as inviting me to be part of their decisions about my future, it’s easier to take than the whispered conferences and closed doors. I’m not sure why he’s had this sudden change of heart or if it’s simply a temporary lapse because he’s on the defensive about the secret consultations.
Doctors, not The Disease, are the enemy, according to Mom. She religiously meets with Misty once a week to collect the herbal concoctions Undertaker recommends for my “condition.” If Miss T. Undertaker treats all this like it’s temporary, it’s okay by me. In my mind, temporary means “not fatal.” It’s a weird and comforting kind of logic.
For weeks I’ve been primed and ready for this debate about school. Since Meredith’s suggestion, I’ve been lining up my arguments like soda cans on a fence. I worked out all the ins and outs so I’d be ready to shoot holes in both of their theories. After Mom sits down across from Dad, I sit too. When I start to talk, they both look up in shock as if they’d forgotten I was there. So much for the out-in-the-open-time-to-share-everything theory, but it doesn’t stop me.
“School attendance is mandatory, right? The government can make kids go to school.” Despite the splint bracing my ankle, I’m still careful not to knock it against the table leg. Expressing pain at this point would be fatal to my credibility. “So…maybe the opposite is true too. I have a right to go. That might be constitutional.”
“Daniel, your father and I are talking about adult issues.”
“That affect me.”
Dad puts his hand on top of hers, a signal I recognize. He thinks she’s getting into dangerous ground. I take the opportunity and run with it.
“Don’t you have to sign a religious waiver or something to homeschool?” This is all part of my game plan.
Because the idea of Essex County telling Mom what’s right for her kids doesn’t sit well, there’s a glimmer of connection in the way she doesn’t leap to argue. Dad gives me a look of Thanksgiving gratitude. I’m making sense, making his job easier. If there’s a regular procedure to bypass the argument on principle, it would be the easiest way to settle this without making a federal case out of it. Dad’s nightmare is Mom on a rampage.
He nods agreement. Relief floods his face and he actually smiles at me, the one who has brought all this trouble down on the Landons. “We could sign a homeschooling commitment, Sylvie.”
“It’s not right. He’s doing all the same schoolwork the other students are doing. He just doesn’t physically go to the building and sit through the lectures. I want them to give him the same tests as all the other students.”
“Let’s just go to the meeting and see what they have to say.” Dad holds up his hand for me to be silent. “Listen and keep an open mind. And we can start by not assuming they’re the enemy.”
After the board meeting, but before the superintendent makes his official pronouncement, the Essex County Department of Social Services mails out a second letter, same gold seal, telling us they’re sending an inspector, but no date, which seems to defeat the purpose either way. Mom doesn’t wait until Dad gets home to go ballistic. But when Dad finally reads the letter he dismisses it as standard operating procedure.
See? Another one of those military phrases. It shuts her up temporarily.
Mack and I are in the middle of a chess game when a dinged-up black sedan parks under the field cedar by the dock.
“Whose car?” Mack points.
He’s beating me. Badly. Mack, at least, shows no consideration for my condition. It’s piddling rain, firing off little pings on the fiberglass roof of the houseboat and fatter pongs on the river. With the binoculars I can see the same county seal on the driver’s door and that pale blue license plate for a public service vehicle.
“County gestapo,” I say.
The lady honks, then yells something through a two-inch crack where she’s rolled down her window. Mack takes the binocs and lifts his glasses to his forehead to focus. He talks through the strap.
“Maybe she melts when she gets wet,” he says.
I add, “Like the Wicked Witch of the West.”
She yells again. “Is your mother there?”
Mack hands me the binoculars. “She could be an alien.”
“Nothing so exciting. Some nosy government person. No name, just a camera hidden in her nose. They’re stalking us.”
She must think we’re deaf because she yells even louder. “I said, is your mother there?”
Mack shrugs, but he’s smiling. I yell back, “No, ma’am.”
“Are you boys alone?”
“No, ma’am,” we yell together and can’t help laughing at the obvious.
Stepford-Hanes trained us to be precise. We’ve answered the question exactly, yet the wicked witch from Social Services is not happy. Still, my insides tighten at the insult, her inference that we’re too young to be alone in the first place.
At the yelling my father comes out from the back cabin, with his finger in the book manuscript he’s editing. He holds it to his chest, moves along the side of the cabin to stay inside the dripping roof, and shimmies up the ladder to the top deck. Hunched over the manuscript to protect it from the rain, he edges in where Mack and I are sitting under the bimini trying to stay cool in the humid drizzle that drips all around us. Dad shades his eyes to see across the water.
“Whose car is that?” he asks me.
I motion to Mack to give Dad the binoculars. “Some lady from Essex County, maybe Social Services.”
“What’s she yelling about?”
Mack moves his chair back to give Dad some dry space, while I explain the extent of our analysis. “She says she needs to talk to Mom.”
Dad moves to the edge of the bimini and yells through the wall of rain that sheets across the creek. “What do you want Mrs. Landon for?”
With her mouth lifted to the top of the open window, the woman shrieks. “Excuse me, sir, we’re not allowed to talk with anyone who’s not part of the family. Are you related to Daniel Solstice Landon?”
“Only his father.”
After a minute for her pea brain to digest that, she yells back in her official voice. “I’m here to do a home investigation. I’ll follow you to your house.”
She stays in the car, though. Clearly she’s confused, but she’s not taking any chances with these crazy people. My first thought is they should issue binoculars to Social Services personnel so they don’t come off sounding so idiotic. And umbrellas so they can brave the elements to have a civilized conversation. But actually it’s probably better she can’t see the details. Dad’s T-shirt is one of his favorite (and oldest) Beatles shirts, WHY DON’T WE DO IT IN THE ROAD. The wicked witch might swoon like the women in those Jane Austen books. She definitely wouldn’t give the Landons a good report.
Dad hands me the manuscript and leans out over the edge of the roof. Maybe so she can see he really is old enough to be the father. The rain sprays polka dots on his shirt at the shoulders. He starts to speak, cocks his head to the rising wind like a question, then clears his throat. This time he yells louder.
“This is our house.”
And just like Holden at the ridiculousness of the situation, my face burns, one hundred fifty degrees, and as red as Babe the Blue Ox is blue. Regular people don’t actually live on houseboats. Regular people talk on telephones or on doorsteps.
I aim my mouth up at the sky and let the wind carry my words in her direction. “Mrs. Landon’s not here and I’m not talking. To anyone. Go away.”
Dad doesn’t even wait to see if she stays or goes. With an exaggerated frown, he takes his editing back to the cabin.