“So?”
“I dunno.”
The phone rings. It is Cecile. She has returned from the park. “Can you come over later today? To visit Jake?”
“Yes, but—”
“Two o’clock.”
“Okay.”
I am looking at Jake. “Your mother is coming by to talk to you.”
He is confused. He goes out into the yard to play. I go through his room, gathering anything and everything with sharp edges.
It is almost two. It is very warm, but I’m putting a turtleneck sweater on Jake anyway.
“It’s too hot,” he says.
“Better too warm than too cool.”
He waits in his room. Cecile and Lilith arrive. Cecile is dressed very motherly; plain dress, flat sandals. Lilith is wearing a long-sleeved blouse.
I show Cecile to Jake’s room. I leave the door ajar and go to join Lilith in the living room. “How’s it been going?” I ask.
She tells me that things have been going fine, that Cecile has never been happier.
I tell her I do not doubt this.
We sit in silence.
Then I say, “Cecile tells me you may be moving.”
Lilith tells me they may be visiting Providence.
Silence.
I excuse myself and visit the hallway just outside Jake’s room. I can hear Cecile reading. A person cannot talk while devouring a child. I return to silent Lilith. Twenty minutes pass and Cecile is ready to leave. Jake remains in his room. I call to him. He answers. I see out the guests. Cecile is quiet. They leave.
Jake is at his window. when I enter. He knows I’m in the room. I sit on his bed. He turns to me.
“You want to talk?” I ask.
He looks out the window.
“Want to grab a pizza?”
We are in the car. People around us are driving like complete and utter fools, but Jake is quiet. His horn is silent. He gazes ahead.
We are in a booth with our pizza.
“She’s weird,” Jake says.
I say nothing.
“She made me feel funny.”
“What do you mean? Did she make you feel uncomfortable?”
He thinks. “Yes.”
“It’s okay, son. It’s okay to feel that way.”
“Do you think she’s weird?”
“Well, I know her a little better.”
He is silent.
“Do you want her to not come back?”
“I dunno.”
“You okay?”
He nods.
We finish eating and drive home.
Jake is in his bed. I have just put out his light and am about to leave his room. “Sure you’re okay? I mean, you can come sleep with me.”
“I’m okay.”
I get into bed myself. I am lying awake. I feel someone in my room, in my bed. I pull my son closer and cover him up.
It is Tuesday. I am pouring gas into the lawn mower. It is a dependable machine, an unfortunate feature for a lawn mower. I push around the house to the back yard. Jake trots past me toward the front. I am cutting the grass, stepping over waste from the neighbors’ dogs.
Jake is calling me I stop the mower. He is excited. Perhaps he has injured himself. I am running to the front yard. I am slipping on dog shit. I am on the ground. Jake is still calling. He is screaming now. I get to the front and see my son riding away in an old Volvo. It is all very loud Jake is screaming. I am shouting. The Volvo’s muffler is dragging along the street. Mr. Hicks’s collie and another dog are barking and snipping at the tires. I am running alongside the car. Cecile rolls up the window. I pound on it. Lilith is driving. Cecile has Jake in her lap. Jake is squirming and twisting and reaching to unlock the door. He is looking at me. He is afraid. His eyes are wet and wide. He is screaming, begging me to stop the car. Cecile is staring straight ahead. Her head is still. Only her hands are moving, busy holding Jake, restraining him. Mr. Hicks, who has been out watering his flowers, runs to the street as we approach and directs the spray of his hose onto the windshield of the Volvo. Lilith switches on the wipers and swerves slightly. I lose my balance, fall, and roll some distance. I am sitting in the street. I am wet and smelling of dog shit. My elbows are scraped and bleeding. I observe the license plate. I don’t know why; I know who they are.
Mr. Hicks is standing over me, hose in hand. “You okay, Grayson?”
I nod. Bloody, wet, and smelly, I run into my house and pick up the phone. “My son has been kidnapped,” I pant.
The police sergeant puts me on hold.
I hang up and call back. “My son has been kidnapped.”
“And just when did this happen?” He is very calm. And why not, his son has not been kidnapped.
“Just now. Just a minute ago.”
“Wait a second.” He, I imagine, has covered the phone with his hand and turned to someone. His removed voice says, “Really? How was she?” There is a response I cannot make out. “Okay,” he says, back on the line, “who snatched him?”
“His mother.”
“Hmmmm. Hang on.” Again to someone else, “I wouldn’t mind getting in there myself.”
“Hey!” I shout into the receiver.
“By his mother, huh?”
“Listen, I have sole legal custody.”
“She ask for money?”
“Are you talking to me?”
“Yeah,” he snaps. “Money? Ransom? She ask for ransom?”
“No.”
“Then it ain’t kidnapping.”
“Okay, she stole my son.”
“I’m sorry. She is his mother.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning we can’t do much.”
“In case you didn’t hear me — I have sole legal custody. The operative word here is ‘legal.’”
“Like I said.”
“May I speak to someone else, your superior.”
“He’s just going to tell you the same thing.”
“Please.”
“Listen, buddy, there’s damn little we can do. I suggest you get a court injunction to keep her away from the kid.”
“She already has him.”
“Why don’t you steal him back? That’s what I would do.”
I hang up, go to my desk and search through my drawers. I find Cecile’s address.
The Volvo is not here. I am at the front door, looking inside, pressing the buzzer. No one answers. The door is unlocked. No one is here. In the bedroom, drawers have been left open, empty. There is the bed. This is where that awful apish woman kisses my wife.
I go out and sit in my car. It is very hot. I am bloody and smelly from dog shit. I recall Lilith mentioning Providence. The Volvo’s muffler was dragging the ground. The bus terminal.
The Volvo is here, muffler against asphalt and all. Inside the depot, I see them. They are at the lockers. I run up the stairs and weave through people toward them. I snatch Jake away and place him behind me. “How dare you,” I say.
Cecile and Lilith are startled. They recoil.
“How dare you.”
“Grayson,” says Cecile, her voice soft with a quality from the past.
“I don’t understand, Cecile.”
Lilith is upset. She runs toward me. She is on me and we are struggling. I push her away into the lockers. She runs into me again and we go over the railing. We are falling.
“Grayson!” screams Cecile.
She has called my name. Her ape and I are falling, but she has called my name.
We land on the vinyl couches and a fat man. My leg is injured, but I stand. Lilith is up too. Cecile is running with Jake down the stairs to us. I am looking at Lilith. I am laughing. I am laughing as I pull my fist and let fly a punch. It feels good to hit her. She falls.
I turn and pick up my son. Cecile is looking at me.
“Cecile,” I say. “Jake and I are a family. Please, leave us alone.”
My son and I are leaving, backing out of the terminal. Lilith starts forward, but a silent, staring Cecile pulls her back.
“Please, leave us alone,” I say.