Educating Simon (11 page)

Suddenly I was standing in the tub, screaming, but without making any sound. Silent screams. Silent snakes. With my hands, I brushed frantically at my ribs, pushing the snakes down, pushing them off my legs, until I could get out of the tub. I stood on the marble tiled floor, dripping green-brown water that slowly faded to the palest pink.

My legs wouldn't support me, and I lowered myself to the floor. On all fours, I felt my lungs heave as though something had pulled me underwater and I'd barely escaped. The panic waned, and from my left arm a squiggly wet stream of watery blood made its way to the floor. I watched it without caring in the least what it was or what it meant.

Fully on the floor now, I lay on my side, curled into an embryonic ball. There were no tears. There was no pain. All that existed were the hard, cold floor and my own heartbeat. And then I heard it. My father's voice.

“What's green and brown, Simon, is the word
stop.
”

His colours were different to mine. I don't know what all his colours were. All I could do was believe the voice.

 

The knocking on the door went on for a while before I noticed it. Then I heard, “Simon? It's Ned. Can I come in?”

I pointed my brain in that direction, struggling to understand. My eyes opened, but still I couldn't see very well. It was late enough that there was not much light coming from overhead. From inside my embryonic cocoon I managed, “What?”

“Are you all right? Can I come in?”

“Wait.” At least I knew he must wait; nothing would happen quickly. I unfolded my arms first, checked to be sure my left arm was no longer bleeding, then straightened my legs as much as I could, and finally I sat up. “Wait,” I said again, just in case.

There was blood on the floor.

Standing slowly, I located first a light switch and then a sponge, which I wet in the pale pink water of the tub. I swiped at the floor.

“Simon?”

“Wait.” My brain started to kick in, and I realised this wasn't enough. So I added, “I'm just getting out of the bathtub, all right?”

There would be a stain between the floor tiles. No getting around that. I rinsed the sponge as well as I could and drained the tub, swiping with the sponge at the pink ring the water left behind. The blade, which I had dropped, lodged in the drain, and I picked it up carefully, wrapped it in a wad of toilet paper, and set it in the wastebasket.

At the sink I rinsed my arm. The cut wasn't very big. It would heal.

“Simon?” His tone had become more insistent.

“Wait! I said wait!” I was irritated now. Again, no privacy. I looked around the room to be sure it was as unrevealing as possible. Wrapping a towel around my waist, holding it with my left hand, my inner arm pressed against me to hide the wound, I moved the chair as quietly as I could and then unlocked and opened the door. “What is it?”

“You didn't come down for dinner.” He half grinned. “Persie will have your head. Anyway, I've brought your dinner up for you, along with mine. Why don't you get dressed, and then come out to the roof. We can eat together.”

“I'm not hungry.”

“Come out anyway. I'll be waiting.” He turned and left.

Feeling stunned and empty, moving slowly, I located a box of bandages and applied one in case the bleeding started again. In my room I peeled off my damp underwear, put on a dry pair, and wrapped myself in my bathrobe. Ordinarily, this robe gives me pleasure. It's a rich gold silk with dark blue silk edging sewn around the cuffs and along the shawl collar. But tonight, it was just a robe. Stepping into slippers, I made my sluggish way out to the roof.

Ned had the table set, complete with placemats, cloth napkins, and sterling silver. There was a half-bottle of wine in a marble stone cooler and two glasses. On the plates were Cornish game hens, something that looked like haricots, and something white and red.

“Gorgeous robe. It's almost dark enough for the light. Do you need it?”

“There's a light out here?”

“Sure.”

I sat. “No. No light.”

He poured some wine into the glasses. I didn't look at the label. I didn't care. Then he picked up his glass, holding it in my general direction. “Prosit,” he said, practically forcing me to lift mine. Once I had it in my hand, I took a sip. It was chilled, but it felt warm and buttery. “One of the Mersault selections. There wasn't a lot in half bottles. But I like this one.”

It was an effort to set my glass down carefully, I felt that weak. And then it was too much effort to pick up my utensils. So I just sat. So did Ned.

“I know something happened today that upset you very much. I hope you'll tell me what it was.”

My head wouldn't raise, but I did my best to look at him. I didn't want to talk about it. And I did want to talk about it. I didn't say anything.

“Is it about school?”

Was it? Yes, but so much more. I have no boyfriend. I have no cat. I have no parents. I have no home. I have no friends. I have no chance. I have no hope. How much of that could I say? To anyone?

“It's everything,” I managed finally. “There's nothing left. Nothing of me left. It's all someone else's life now.”

“Someone else? Like, who?”

My life has felt like a sham for so long. So I cast the blame in the most obvious direction. “My mother. It's her life. It's all about her. Everything that was me is gone. And they keep dumping more and more and more”—my head lifted now, and my voice got louder—“and more crap on my head. More shit I have to do that I don't want to do. More shit I have to deal with. It's like—it's almost like someone's cast an evil spell over me. And everyone keeps telling me to accept it, to work with it, or I can't go home. I feel like fucking Dorothy. And the witch who cried, ‘Surrender, Dorothy' has had her way.”

“So you want to go back to Kansas?”

I glared at him. “This is not funny!”

“Sorry. Couldn't help myself. So, getting back to London would make everything all right?”

I took a very, very shaky breath. Would it? Oxford or no Oxford, would I rather be in England?
Yes. Absolutely, yes
. “Every shred of me is back in England. I could be myself there. I can say ‘biscuit' there. I feel out of it here, out of everything. I want my cat back. I want to be able to visit my father's grave. I want a chance to build my life where I started it, where my roots go back further into history than people here can begin to imagine, where I feel like I belong. They ripped me away from it, and they're trying to make me believe that I can't have it back unless I do all this shit they're telling me to do.”

His face had an odd look on it. Almost angry. And as I realised that his own African roots were as old and as deep as mine, knowing that his ancestors had been yanked much more cruelly out of their soil than I had been, I shrank back into my chair. A challenge in his voice, he said, “What shit would that be?”

But he didn't have the right to challenge me. My problems were no less real than they had been five minutes before, and he wasn't the one who had arrived on these shores in the stinking, crowded cargo hold of a small ship. I stood so suddenly that the chair went over backwards. “All of it! Boston, this house, Brian, Persie, the fucking school, a course load that could kill me when I'm feeling good—and I'm feeling like shit—and now this latest thing—”

Turning away from the table I walked quickly to the far end of the roof, to the waist-high brick wall. I leaned my hands on the granite that tops the brick and looked over. It might or might not be fatal to fall from here. Everything would depend on the position I'd be in when I landed. Plus I'd have to be sure to clear the fire escape that's back here.

Ned was beside me, and almost under my breath I said, “I know I sound like a whingy little kid. But it just goes on and on, one thing after another.”

His voice was calm again, soothing. “And what's this latest thing?”

“It doesn't matter.” I turned and slithered down until I was sitting on the gravel. The sharp stones would have hurt if they hadn't felt good. “It doesn't matter.”

Ned lowered himself to sit beside me. His voice gentle, he said, “Let's think about time. Let's imagine eight or nine months. Picture how large that amount of time looks against seventy or eighty years. Just see that in your mind for a minute.”

He waited, then, “Now let's take those proportions, and instead of time, fit them into a landscape. Those eight or nine months, they're brambles, and maybe some nettles and poison ivy. Nasty stuff. But you have a long stick and a scythe. Getting through this part might not be fun, but once you're clear of it, on the other side—even from here you can see it—lovely, open, green pasture, a sweet little village, and in the distance a beautiful, lively city.”

Emerald City? But no, that wasn't Dorothy's real home. Ned was painting an English landscape. “I know what you're doing.”

“Good. And do you know what
you're
doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you know what you're going to do next?” I shook my head. “No? I do. You're going to come with me back to the table and enjoy that scrumptious meal I put together for us.” He stood and held a hand out. “One step at a time, Simon. You'll get through the brambles.” I took the hand, and he pulled me to my feet and into his arms for a quick, firm hug.

Ned brought an oil lantern to the table and lit it. We didn't talk whilst we ate. Outdoors, it didn't matter that the game hens, the beans, and the tiny red potatoes had gone cold. It was more like a picnic this way. The wine was cool, and that was perfect. The only sounds that registered for me were the tiny clinks of sterling silver on china, which—when I hear them outdoors—always seem to be the very sound of luxury.

As Ned poured the last of the wine, he said, “Dessert, which is a divine almond torta served with vanilla bean ice cream and the richest fudge sauce you have ever tasted, is in the kitchen. And before you can have any, you have to tell me what today's load of shit was all about.”

I took a sip of wine and set the glass down carefully. “I have to help an eleven-year-old boy named Toby Lloyd—Christ, another Welshman,
and
another eleven-year-old—prepare for some national spelling bee.”

Ned sat up straight. “The Scripps National? Wow. That's a huge,
huge
deal, Simon. So, you're his coach?”

“Yes.”

“And how is this appropriate for you?”

“There's this course IB students have to take, almost like a community service sort of thing. But mine is
special
.” My tone of voice reflected how special I thought it was. “I can spell anything. Well, anything I've seen once, and most words I haven't. I have a really good memory, and of course there are the colours. The synaesthesia.”

“Mmmm-
hmm
. How is your synaesthesia going to help young Mr. Lloyd, do you think?”

He was right. “I don't know.”

“Because if I remember rightly, the words those kids have to spell would challenge even you. They aren't words most people ever see, really. The kids have to know etymology, derivations—that sort of thing. So I doubt the colours would help you, and I certainly don't see how they're going to help Toby.”

“They won't. That's not something I can teach him.”

“So it looks like you'll need to figure out what
will
help him. And I guess you can't really begin to do that until you meet him. When does that happen?”

“I'm supposed to go to his house tomorrow afternoon. Brookline, wherever that is. Two o'clock, for a couple of hours. Every week.”

“Are you taking a cab, or do you want to try your hand at the T? I can help you figure out how to get there.”

“What's the T?”

“It's the subway. Only not all of it's underground.
T
stands for transit, I guess.”

I hadn't thought about that option. “A taxi, I suppose. But you're talking like it's really going to happen.”

“Isn't it?” That question hung in the air for maybe a minute. When I didn't agree or disagree, he asked, “If you were in London, and your school there gave you this project, would you take it on more willingly?”

“Maybe.”

“So, here, it's just a case of all this shit getting to you. You might actually enjoy it, you know. I get that you're wading through a lot of crap that's been thrown at you. I really do. So figure out which bits aren't really shit, focus on those, and hack your way through the rest of it.”

I toyed with my glass, sulking, not looking at him.

“Life's not fair, Simon. I'm sure you've heard that before. Now you're living it.”

“It's my mother's fault.” I tried that again, though it was rather halfhearted by now. Maybe she hadn't lost Oxford for me, or Graeme, but she'd made me lose home, and Tink.

“I'm not arguing. But it kind of doesn't matter. Laying blame isn't terribly useful. What's useful is figuring out how to get out of the mess you're in. And for you, time will be a big factor. Once you wrap your inestimable brain around that, you'll make the rest fall into place. If you never forgive your mother, that's up to you. But when we find ourselves standing in shit, we need to wade through it to get out. You'll get out, I promise.”

“I told her I have a boyfriend.” I don't know what possessed me to say this; maybe it was so I wouldn't blab that I'd almost taken another path out of that shit just a little while ago.

Something in my voice tipped him off that there was some question about it. He asked, “And . . . do you?”

I shook my head. “He's straight. But I love him. I've wanted him to be my boyfriend. I almost convinced myself he was.”