The End of Marking Time (14 page)

Kathleen seemed pleased as she stood back and watched.

I built a level parking lot in the center for the cars and helped Jonathan build an excellent oval, complete with banked turns and a pit road. After that we raced around for an hour. Kathleen had shifted to a resin chair on the patio. She didn’t interrupt and neither did Charlotte.

Jonathan wanted to build a sand castle and this disturbed his mother.

“We have to go inside and get cleaned up.”

Jonathan protested and went back to playing, but he knew as well as I did that the visit was over. When I turned back to Kathleen I saw Nick standing behind her with a hand on each shoulder. I remembered what he’d said about staying home from work and I was sure the end of playtime had more to do with Nick’s work schedule than anything Jonathan or Kathleen had planned. After five more minutes, she came over and brushed the sand off our son. Then she asked him to wait on the swings while the grown-ups talked inside.

I wanted to throw my arms around the little guy, squeeze him, and pick him up, but all he offered was another five. I took it.

Kathleen kept Nick and I separated. She sent him through the door first and took the chair between us at the round kitchen table. The remaining chair had a blue booster seat strapped to it. Seeing it, I imagined Jonathan playing with his food at the table and making a mess. Could I really take care of him at my place? How much stuff did he need? A crib or another bed? What did he eat? All these questions were rolling around in my head when I noticed Kathleen and Nick sitting nervously still.

“What’s on your mind?” I asked, my eyes squarely on Kathleen’s.

That’s when I saw the folder. I knew it was horrible news by her tentative grip and her reluctance to say what was inside. She handed it over with a grim expression. The exchange would have gone better if Nick wasn’t there. She could have shown some compassion, but a guy like Nick didn’t want his wife alone with any man, never mind the father of her child.

“I want to adopt him,” Nick said.

I’d only met him an hour earlier. I had no experience with adoption, so I didn’t know what he was really asking. Until an hour ago I’d thought of children as a way to get more support from the government. That’s why my mother had them and that’s why my grandmother had them. The miracle of it all was brand new and Nick was already trying to rip that away from me.

“He’s only thinking of what’s best for Jonathan,” Kathleen offered.

I couldn’t say a word. I opened the folder and looked at dozens of words I couldn’t pronounce. The details were a mystery, but the intent was clear. I was a handicap to Jonathan. Nick was a respectable man who would make a good father. Jonathan would be better off. They’d all be better off, if I disappeared from their lives.

“You wouldn’t have to pay support anymore,” Kathleen said.

“I don’t care about the money.”

Nick stood up. “You wouldn’t! That’s because they give it to you for doing nothing.”

I shuffled paper and pretended to read the second page. I couldn’t understand anything and kept flipping. The last page carried Nick’s and Kathleen’s signatures and had a blank line with my name under it.

I thought about Melanie Michaud and her baby. Then I thought about Charlotte out in the car. She’d never date a convict, not one she counseled. Was there another woman out there who would fit me better? Would they all turn away when they learned what I’d been through?

Nick sat back down and seethed at me across the table. I was an embarrassment to him. His wife had slept with a relearner. His child wasn’t his. But it was more than that. Nick resented getting up and going to work every day. I’d never done it myself, but I knew it had to be a drag. That’s why he hated people like me. He followed the rules while I did nothing. Eventually I could afford a tiny house like his without working a day in my life. He’d been taught all about fairness and justice. What he hadn’t been told was that if you choose not to believe, these things don’t exist. They were just ideas created to keep people in line. Sure, if everyone was like me and stole for a living, there’d be nothing to steal. We’d be fighting on every street corner. The world needed people like Nick, lots of them, but because of him, I could afford a very different life. Responsibility, integrity, and fairness didn’t apply to me.

The injustice of it all made Nick crazy.

Carrying that folder down that little cement path was more painful than leaving court in chains, destined for state prison. I didn’t lift my eyes from the walkway until I reached the car. Charlotte was in the driver’s seat waiting for me. She studied my face for any hint of emotion. She knew Nick and Kathleen wanted to take Jonathan away from me when she arranged our meeting. There was no sympathy in her eyes, just an assessment of what I might do about the papers and what that meant for my treatment. Treatment wasn’t a word I’d use to describe what they were doing to me. Mistreatment, maybe. It wasn’t completely random. There was a point under it all, but with every step forward they extracted the maximum emotional toll. Maybe this was what it took to evoke real change, or maybe Nick wasn’t the only one out for justice.

I climbed in and she asked how it went.

“You know what happened in there,” I barked.

She nodded to the folder. “And?”

“What do you expect me to do?”

“I don’t expect anything. I’m here to help.”

She was so beautiful I wanted to believe her. I was foolish. I imagined she was trying to save me from losing Jonathan to some administrative deadline. I wanted her to feel what I felt when I looked at her. Most of all I wanted to be with her. If she was tormenting me, any sort of a relationship would be impossible. Why did I hold on? I think it was her looks that kept me close while she reached into my chest and rearranged my insides.

“What other surprises do you have for me?” I asked.

“Like?”

“My mother? My father?”

“They’re not as important as Jonathan. You needed to see him.”

“And what about my father?” I didn’t know why I was so upset about him. I hadn’t thought about him since I left school. He was just the guy who got my mother pregnant. She was easy when she was ready for another kid. There was no connection. Seven men, seven kids. We didn’t know who they were, though if the younger kids had asked, I could have given them some ideas. Maybe Jonathan awakened something in me, but I think I was just angry and wanted an excuse to vent.

“We haven’t found him yet,” she said.

“You found Jonathan pretty fast.”

She went through a long explanation as she drove. Children of single mothers were all tested. Finding the mother was academic. Finding the father depended upon his DNA being collected after an arrest or when he applied to work in a sensitive government office. Not everyone was on file. Most law abiding citizens weren’t. That was one advantage Nick’s holier-than-thou lifestyle gave him over me.

“Are we done then?” I wasn’t looking forward to the answer.

She said when I decided what to do about the papers, she’d be finished with my case and she’d turn me over to Joanne. Did I need a woman to help me find a woman? I’d never had trouble before, but I’d spent a few hours with Charlotte and she wasn’t the least bit interested. Maybe the world had changed. Maybe the riots soured people to relearners so much that I’d need help to overcome the prejudice.

I couldn’t decide what to do about Jonathan then. Even if I could have, I wouldn’t have told her. I needed a reason to see her again. I needed hope. Even now that I’ve made my decision, I’m not sure I did the right thing. But I want you to know I did what I did because I had no other choice.

We drove on for several blocks without saying anything.

I asked if she wanted to go out for lunch.

She said she had an appointment.

When she stopped in front of my building I didn’t want to get out. “Does this really work? What you’re doing to me?”

She understood my meaning, but skirted the question. “I’m here to help you. I’m not doing anything to you. I’m helping you deal with things that need to be taken care of.”

I remembered what they said about the ankle bracelets. Somewhere this conversation was being recorded. I had to assume that anytime we were together someone was listening, if not to weed out subversive counselors, at least to measure their performance. Maybe that’s why she kept her distance.

“I meant the whole thing. Wendell, the black box, you, the others.”

“Most times. Wendell’s a smart guy.”

“What happens when things go bad?”

“Wendell doesn’t give up on people. He’s one of the good ones.”

“He is, isn’t he? But what happens when he gives up?”

She pointed to the door without saying anything.

“The others are different aren’t they?”

She folded her hands on top of the steering wheel.

“Do some people really go crazy?”

Charlotte wouldn’t admit those other programs existed. She looked straight ahead through the windshield. No matter how many times I asked, she said nothing. Finally, she took her phone from her purse and pointed to the red button on the side.

“It’s time for you to go. Don’t make me call for help.”

I imagined if she pressed that button, special police would be on us in minutes. Anyone listening to our conversation would be worried that I wasn’t getting out of the car. She didn’t want to cause trouble for me or for Wendell, but I couldn’t tell if she was really scared because she hid her emotions behind a plastic smile. Other relearners could have turned violent. I didn’t want to cause myself any more trouble. I got out of the car and she sped away.

It was a long lonely climb up to my apartment. I dropped the folder on the coffee table and stared at the black box in front of my television. It was lunchtime and I was hungry, but I wanted to finish the day’s lesson so I could go wander around the neighborhood without worrying about falling behind. I grabbed a Devil Dog from the freezer, cracked a can of Coke, and sat down on the couch.

The folder kept drawing me away. I turned on the television and put the disc in, but before I snapped on the wrist strap and started the simulation, I opened the folder and studied the five typed pages Kathleen had given me.

I didn’t own a dictionary or a computer to look up the words I didn’t recognize, but I’d never been so intent on something written down before. I think that’s what got me through all the gibberish. I’d never hired a lawyer. They’d always been given to me when I’d broken some law or another. That wasn’t the case here. If I wanted to fight to keep my relationship, more accurately, to start a relationship with Jonathan, I’d have to hire my own lawyer. I decided to worry about that later and plodded through all five pages, guessing at the words I didn’t understand. A few things were clear even to me. If I signed this agreement, Jonathan would live with Nick and Kathleen and I wouldn’t be allowed to visit without permission. After seeing the anger in Nick’s eyes, I was pretty sure he wouldn’t let me near Jonathan if he didn’t have to. There was only one benefit for me. The deductions from my bank account would stop.

I couldn’t sign the papers, but I didn’t tear them up either.

I took the folder to the kitchen table so I wouldn’t keep looking at it. I’d never wanted a child or a family, but my hour in the sandbox had drastically changed my thinking. I understood why Nick wanted to protect Jonathan from me. Having me for a father wouldn’t help the boy any, but I wasn’t ready to give up my claim. It seemed Charlotte had taught me the most memorable lesson of all.

I connected the strap around my wrist and started the program.

A new scene showed on the screen. It was a young boy’s bedroom, my bedroom. I don’t say it was my bedroom because it was a seven-year-old version of me on the screen. The walls and the furniture matched the room I’d slept in, right down to the three other boys sharing the room. The graphics were good enough to show where we had pictures on the walls. It seemed Wendell could only spend so much time on each relearner because the images themselves were different. Even so, I was impressed.

By that time I was comfortable navigating the virtual world, though I hadn’t put my own clothes on before. It turned out to be as easy as opening the bureau and picking a pair of jeans, sneakers, and a blue T-shirt.

Across the apartment and into the kitchen I met my mother. She was as large as I remember, dumping cereal into bowls with a snarl on her face. Maybe I imagined the snarl, but I remembered what the guys said about acting like a saint. I sat in my place, ate my cereal, and carried my bowl to the sink when I was done. My mother told me to have a good day at school and out the door I went.

A trail of green dots appeared on the sidewalk and I followed them. I assumed that green was good and that the line would lead me to school. I stopped half a block from home, remembering my previous failures. Should I have brushed my teeth? My mother didn’t say anything about it, but I went back upstairs and brushed them to be sure.

Thinking myself Saint Michael, I continued after the green dots.

About a block later I spotted a little girl sitting on the curb, sobbing with her head on her knees. After my time in the sandbox I knew it was wrong to keep walking so I stopped and typed a question, Can I help?