“What thing led to another thing?” said Flora. “What irrevocable acts occurred?”
“It’s complicated,” said William Spiver. “I don’t want to talk about it right now. But as long as we are asking each other questions of an emotionally fraught nature, why did you say that your mother wanted a lamp for a daughter?”
“It’s complicated,” said Flora.
“I’m certain that it is. And I empathize.”
There was another long silence punctuated by the clacking of typewriter keys.
“The squirrel is working on another poem, I suppose,” said William Spiver.
“I guess,” said Flora.
“It sounds like a long one. Epic in nature. What in the world would a squirrel have to write about at such length?”
“A lot happened today,” said Flora.
It was late afternoon. The shadows of the elm and the maple in the backyard entered the kitchen and flung themselves in purple lines across the floor.
Flora would miss those shadows when she moved away.
She would miss the trees.
She supposed she would even miss William Spiver.
And then, almost as if he were reading her mind, William Spiver said, “I meant what I said. I’m here because I was looking for you. I missed you.”
Flora’s heart, the lonely, many-armed squid of it, flipped and flailed inside of her.
She opened her mouth to say that it didn’t matter, not really, not now. But as usual, what she intended to say to William Spiver and what she said were two different things.
The sentence Flora intended to say was “It doesn’t matter.”
The sentence she said was “Have you ever heard of a place called Blundermeecen?”
“Pardon me,” said William Spiver. He held up his right hand. “I don’t mean to alarm you. But do you smell smoke?”
Flora sniffed. She did smell smoke.
Now there was going to be a fire? On top of everything else?
For the love of Pete.
Flora’s mother and father entered the kitchen together. Her mother had a cigarette in her mouth.
Her mother was smoking!
Her father had his arm around her mother’s shoulder.
This was almost as alarming as seeing her mother smoke. Her mother and father never touched anymore.
“Good news, Flora Belle!” said her father.
“Really?” said Flora.
She never believed it when someone said there was good news. In her experience, when there was good news, people just said what the good news was. If there was bad news that they wanted you to believe was good news, then they said, “Good news!”
And if there was really bad news, they said, “Good news, Flora Belle!”
“Your mother thinks that it would be wonderful to have the squirrel stay here,” said her father.
“What?” said Flora. “Here? With her? And where am I supposed to stay?”
“Here,” said her father. “With your mother. You, your mother, and the squirrel. That’s what your mother would like.”
Flora looked at her mother. “Mom?” she said.
“I would be honored,” said her mother. She took a long drag on her cigarette. Her hand was trembling.
“Why are you smoking?” said Flora. “I thought you stopped smoking.”
“It seemed like the wrong time to stop,” said her mother. She squinted. “I am under a lot of pressure right now. Speaking of which, I see that the squirrel is typing. On my typewriter. Where I write.”
“He writes poetry,” said William Spiver, “not fiction.”
“Let’s just have a look-see,” said Flora’s mother. She walked over to the typewriter and stood looking down at Ulysses and at the words on the page. “Let’s see what kind of poetry a squirrel types.”
Her voice sounded funny still, tinny and far away, as if she were speaking from the bottom of a dark well. Actually, what she sounded like was a robot, someone pretending to be human and doing a lousy job of it.
Flora felt a little flicker of fear.
“Let me just light another cigarette here,” said her mother in her robot voice.
She lit a new cigarette from the tip of the old one, which was, of course, chain-smoking and dangerous behavior at the best of times.
And this, obviously, was not the best of times.
Her mother inhaled deeply on the cigarette. She exhaled. She said, “Shall I read the squirrel poetry aloud?”
Actually, it wasn’t poetry.
Not yet.
So far, it was just a list of words that he wanted to turn into a poem.
The first word on the list was Jelly.
Jelly was followed by Giant donut, which was, in turn, followed by Sprinkle.
The list continued on with these words:
RITA!
Sunny-side up
Pascal
Giant squid
Little shepherdess
Vanquished
Capacious
Quark
Universe (expanding)
Blundermeecen
Banished
The list ended with the words of Dr. Meescham’s good-bye:
I promise to always turn back toward you.
The words were good words, Ulysses felt, maybe even great words, but the list was very incomplete. He was just getting started. The words needed to be arranged, fussed with, put in the order of his heart.
All of this is to say that when Flora’s mother read the list out loud, it didn’t sound terribly impressive.
“Gosh, that’s some swell poetry,” said George Buckman.
“Not really,” said William Spiver. “There’s no point in lying to him, even if he is a squirrel. It’s actually pretty lousy poetry. But I do like the last part, the part about turning back. That has some emotional heft to it.”
“Well, I think it is just great,” said Flora’s mother. “And I’m glad to welcome another writer into the family.”
She patted Ulysses on the head. Too forcefully, he felt. The pat approached violence.
“We are going to be one happy little family,” said Flora’s mother. She gave Ulysses another whack disguised as a pat.
“Really?” said Flora.
“Oh, yes,” said Flora’s mother.
There was a knock at the back door. “Yoo-hoo,” someone called out.
Tootie! thought Ulysses.
“Tootie!” said Flora.
“Mrs. Tickham,” said Flora’s mother. “Do come in. We were just reading some words that the squirrel typed. Ha-ha. We were reading some squirrel poetry.”
“William,” said Tootie, “I’ve been calling and calling you.”
“I didn’t hear you.”
“Well, I must admit that I wasn’t calling very loudly,” said Tootie. “What did Ulysses type?”
Flora’s mother read the list of words again.
Tootie put her hand over her heart and said, “Oh, those last lines are beautiful, heartbreaking.”
“Those last lines are the only bit of coherence in the whole thing,” said William Spiver.
“I’ve been inspired by Ulysses to write a little poetry of my own,” said Tootie.
Ulysses felt himself puff up. He had inspired Tootie! He turned and sniffed his tail.
“I’d like to read your poetry, Tootie,” said Flora.
“Well, we should have a poetry reading at some point. I’m sure Ulysses would enjoy that.”
The squirrel nodded.
Yes, yes. He would enjoy that.
He would also enjoy a bite to eat.
Dr. Meescham’s jelly sandwiches had been wonderful, but that was a long time ago. He would like to eat, and he would like for Tootie to read poetry to him. And he would like to work on his own poem.
Also, he would like for Flora’s mother to quit pounding him on the head, which she was doing again now.
“William,” said Tootie, “your mother called for you.”
“Did she?” said William Spiver. His voice was squeaky with hope. “Really? Did she ask for me to come home?”