Home Song (22 page)

After a surprised pause, Dora Mae said, “Okay.”

Speculation might run rampant among the office ranks and from there throughout the entire faculty, but Tom was a decision maker, and his decision was made within minutes after this boy walked through the door. He would not have dreamed of walking out and leaving this conversation unfinished.

He hung up and sat back in his chair. The interruption had cut some of the tension and given them a fresh starting point.

Kent took advantage of it. “Could we talk about you and my mom?” he asked.

“Of course.”

“Why did you do that—meet her at some party and just . . . well, you know.”

“What did she tell you?”

“That I was the product of a one-night stand. That she had one class with you and she'd always sort of liked you.”

Tom swiveled his chair slightly to the right and picked up a glass paperweight shaped like an apple. It was transparent, imbedded with a pattern of air bubbles, topped off with two pointed brass leaves. He pressed one into the pad of his thumb as he spoke. “Nothing I say now will make it right. Nothing excuses an impetuous act like that, especially since I didn't use any birth control.”

“I still want to know.”

Tom considered the wisdom of telling one of Claire's students the intimate history of their relationship. Before he could reply, Kent asked, “Is it true that you were getting married the next week to Mrs. Gardner?”

The brass leaf riveted Tom's thumb. He set the apple down.

“Yes, it is.”

“And Robby's the same age as me?”

“Yes, he is.”

“When's his birthday?”

“December fifteenth.”

Tom could see the math wizard compute the fact in a millisecond, along with the ramifications of Tom's guilt.

“You're right,” Tom admitted. “I was rebelling, plain and simple. I wasn't ready to get married yet. But the rebellion ended then and there. Mrs. Gardner and I have had a very happy marriage. I want you to know that, and I think I deserve to say that much in my own defense.”

Kent absorbed the information, ran his hands back across his jaws, and clasped them momentarily behind his head,
then let them slide down to his lap. “Wow,” he breathed. “That's some can of worms I opened. No wonder they hate me.”

“They don't hate you, Kent.”

“Robby does.”

“Robby . . . well, it's hard to characterize what Robby's feeling. If you want to know the truth, I think when you first came here he was jealous of you. Now I don't think he knows how to treat you. He's been laying pretty low over the weekend.”

“And Mrs. Gardner won't talk to me.”

“Give her time. She will.”

“I'm not sure I want her to. What I mean is, I don't know where I belong in the middle of all this. Before—when I didn't know any of you—at least I knew where I belonged. With my mother. Just the two of us . . . we've always gotten along. Maybe I didn't know who my father was, but Mom and I did okay. Heck, I don't even know how to say this. It's just that since Saturday afternoon when I found out about you, everything changed. Only it didn't. I'm still with my mom, and you're still with your family, so what do we do now? Do I keep staring at Mrs. Gardner's shoes in English class? And trying to keep ten yards between me and Robby at football practice? And Chelsea. . . well, I'm so mixed up about her I just want to run the other way when I see her in the hall.”

“I take it from things she said at home that the two of you had formed rather an attraction for each other?”

Kent stared at his knees. “Sort of,” he admitted sheepishly.

“That's a tough one.”

Kent nodded.

“She's not talking much around home yet, but I think she
feels pretty much like you do. Like she was duped by me. And I'm at fault for not bringing this thing out in the open the day I first met you. But time is going to make a big difference between you two, and between you and Robby, too. I think, as you grow older, you're going to realize that having a brother and a sister can be a blessing. At least, that's how I hope it turns out. My dad said as much when I talked to him yesterday.”

Kent's head shot up.

“Your dad?”

Tom nodded solemnly. “Yes . . . a grandfather, too.”

Kent swallowed and his lips parted. He stared in stupefaction.

“I told him about you because I needed his advice. He's a good man, full of old-fashioned morality and common sense.” Tom thought to ask, “Would you like to see his picture?”

Kent replied, quietly, “Yes, sir.”

Tom cocked his hips and drew a billfold from his rear pocket. He flipped it open to his parents' twenty-fifth wedding anniversary photo and passed it across the desk. “You'll probably never see him dressed in a suit and tie again. He wears his fishing clothes every place he goes. He lives in a cabin out on Eagle Lake next to his brother, Clyde. The two of them spend most of their time fishing and arguing and telling lies about who caught the biggest fish last year. And that's my mom. She was the salt of the earth. She died about five years ago.”

Kent stared. On his palm the billfold lay warm with the body heat of the man across the desk. Staring up at him was the picture of a woman he wished he could have known. “I think I got her mouth,” he said.

“She was a very pretty woman. My dad worshiped her.
And though I heard her tell him off a time or two, I never heard him raise his voice to her. He called her names like ‘my little petunia,' and ‘my little dove,' and he loved to tease her. 'Course, she wasn't above teasing him back. As soon as you meet him, he'll probably tell you about the time she put the smelt in his boot.”

“Smelt?” Kent lifted his eyes from the picture.

“It's a little fish, not even as big as a herring, indigenous to Minnesota. They run in the spring, and people flock to the streams up north to haul them out by the tubfuls. Mom and Dad went together every single year.”

Mesmerized by the story, Kent handed the wallet back across the desk.

Tom folded it and put it away. “Dad would love to meet you. He said so right away.”

Kent met Tom's eyes, his throat working. Tom could see that the idea of meeting a grandparent had him struggling with emotions.

“Somehow I don't think your children would like the idea of sharing their grandfather with me.”

“Perhaps the choice isn't theirs to make. He's your grandfather as well as theirs, and a lot of people's wishes need to be considered here.”

Kent thought awhile and asked, “What's his name?”

“Wesley,” Tom answered.

“Wesley.”

“After his mother's brother, who died as an infant. I have a brother, too. He'd be your uncle Ryan.”

“Uncle Ryan,” Kent repeated. And after a thoughtful moment, “Do I have any cousins?”

“Three of them: Brent, Allison, and Erica. And your aunt Connie. They live in St. Cloud.”

“Do you see them often?”

“Not as often as I'd like.”

“Are there any other relatives?”

“My uncle Clyde, the one who lives next to Dad at the lake. He's the only one.”

Kent considered awhile and said, “I had a grandfather when I was little. But I don't remember him much. Now there's an aunt and uncle, cousins, even a grandfather.” With a note of amazement, Kent said, “Gosh.”

Tom dared a very small smile. “A whole family in a day.”

“It's a lot to discover.”

A bell rang, signaling the end of the school day. Kent looked up at the clock.

“Stay where you are,” Tom said.

“But don't you have to be in the hall?”

“I'm the principal here. I make the rules, and this is more important than any hall duty. There are a couple of things I'd like to tell you.”

Kent settled back in his chair, showing signs of surprise that he was allowed to command so much of his principal's time. Suddenly he remembered, “I have football practice though.”

“Let me take care of that.” Tom picked up the phone and dialed. “Bob, this is Tom. Will you excuse Kent Arens if he's a little late for practice today? I've got him in my office.” He listened for a reply, said, “Thanks,” and hung up. Letting his weight back in his chair he said, “Where were we?”

“You had something you wanted to tell me.”

“Oh, yes. Your permanent record.” Tom shook his head as if with a fond recollection. “That was something. The day after I found out about you, your records arrived, and I sat here at my desk, going back over every word that was written about you, and looking at your class pictures.”

“My class pictures?”

“Most of them were in there, way back to kindergarten.”

“I didn't know that. I mean, that teachers put things like that in there.”

“They put a lot more than pictures in there. Samples of your first handwriting, an Easter poem you wrote one time, teachers' personal observations, as well as your very impressive report cards. I suppose what I felt that day was a lot like what you felt just now learning that you have a grandpa and an aunt and uncles. A little heartsick because I'd missed it all.”

“You felt that way, too?”

“Of course I did.”

“I thought it was just me.”

“No, not just you at all. If I had known about you, I would have insisted on seeing you. I don't know how
much
we'd have seen each other, but I know we would have, because regardless of the circumstances between me and your mother, you're my son, and I don't take that responsibility lightly. I've already told your mom that I want to pay for your college education. I can do that much, at least.”

“You'd do
that
?”

“I knew I'd do that within an hour after learning I was your father. That feeling we were talking about”—Tom thumped his heart with one clenched fist—“in here. When I was looking at your school pictures, it felt like I was being crushed, and I knew—I just knew—that I had to try to make up for what we'd lost. But that's a lot of years, and I don't know if they can ever be overcome. I hope so though. I really hope so.”

It was as close to making a prediction about their future as either of them had come. Kent was left uncomfortable by it, Tom could tell, so he went on.

“There's something else I want to say about going through that file. While I was reading it I came to respect your mother tremendously for the job she did raising you. Everything I saw told me how
there
she was for you, how vitally interested she was in your academic and personal life, how she stood up for you, taught you values and a respect for both education
and
educators. I have to tell you, there aren't a lot of parents like that anymore. I know. I deal with parents every day, and yours is the kind we could use more of.”

Kent's face took on an even greater expression of amazement. Undoubtedly, he'd expected antagonism rather than praise for his mother, given the present situation. Hearing her lauded raised his respect for Tom another notch.

“Well, listen. . .” Tom pushed his chair back and stretched his arms against the edge of the desk. “I've kept you from your practice long enough, and if I hurry I can still get in on the end of the meeting at the district office.” Tom stood, pushed his suit jacket back, and tugged up his belt. Kent got to his feet and went around behind his chair to keep farewells on an impersonal basis.

“We can talk anytime,” Tom offered.

“Thank you, sir.”

“You know where to find me.”

“You know where to find me, too.”

With a desk and a chair between them they felt buffered from the unwanted urge to touch each other some way.

“May I tell my mother about our talk?”

“Certainly.”

“Will you be telling your family, too?”

“Do you want me to?”

“I don't know.”

“I'd like to, with your permission.”

“Robby, too?”

“Only if you say so.”

“I don't know. It's been pretty hard on the football field, and now that I understand about our birthdays . . . well, I don't want to antagonize him any more.”

“How about if I play it by ear? If I sense that he's still jealous or that he feels threatened in any way, I'll hold off.”

Kent let his fingertips slip off the back of the chair as if to give approval by preparing to leave.

“I'm glad you came,” Tom said.

“Yes, sir.”

“Well”—Tom raised a hand—“have a good practice.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“And I'll be keeping my eye on you during the game Friday night.”

“Yes, sir.”

Kent took one step backward toward the door. Their hearts and wills strained toward one another, their connection reaching clear back to ancestors neither one of them had ever known or seen, bringing with it the compulsion to hug.

But touching in any way would have been absurd; they were, after all, still strangers.

“Well, goodbye,” Kent said finally, opening the door.

“Goodbye.”

He stood with his hand on the knob, looking back at his father—one last impulsive study—as if reconfirming how much they looked alike before heading for football practice.

H
OMECOMING
was scheduled for the last Friday in September. Every year Tom dreaded Homecoming week. It meant disrupted and skipped classes, a lot of ornery teachers, an upsurge in student drinking, and general wildness, including necking in the halls. It brought complaints from homeowners in the vicinity of the school whose yards were TP'd, torn up by tires, or, on occasion, even urinated on. It meant, for Tom, a lot of after hours at school, where floats were being constructed, the gym decorated, and signs painted.

Homecoming had its upside though. During that week groups of students came together in a marvelous camaraderie that would, for many, bond them for the remainder of the school year. A similar fellowship blossomed between teachers and students who worked together on the various projects. The faculty had the opportunity to see a new and different side of the kids, who became enthusiastic and inventive as they threw themselves into undertakings in which they were vitally interested. The students often surprised the teachers by showing dependability and resourcefulness they'd hidden
until now, and in some cases, remarkable leadership qualities as well. During those days of planning floats, dances, pep fests, and painting signs, they used their ingenuity to solve problems, delegate work, and meet schedules.

But Homecoming week brought something more to Humphrey High, a vitality it lacked at other times of the year, an upbeat tempo that caught and motivated the entire school population. For many, the excitement would culminate not at the football game on Friday night, but at the crowning of the king and queen candidates on Friday afternoon.

First, though, came the announcement of the candidates.

Stationing himself just inside the main door of the gym for the Monday afternoon pep fest, Tom felt the tension everywhere—in the office secretaries who had counted the votes of the senior class; in Nancy Halliday, the speech teacher and the only member of the faculty who knew the results; in ten of her speech students, who had been sworn to secrecy and had prepared introductions that they would deliver in the next thirty minutes; in the faces of the class leaders, the popular ones who stood a chance of being singled out by one of Nancy's students and escorted to the stage.

The excitement was infectious and the student body rambunctious as they crowded into the gymnasium. The pep band was blaring. Drumbeats reverberated off the ceiling. The sun streamed through the skylights and lit the hardwood floor, turning the room gold. Red, red everywhere: on the bleachers and the folding chairs set up on half the gym floor where the senior class would sit—red sweaters, red pom-poms, red baseball caps, and red letter jackets with white H's sewn proudly in place.

While they filed past Tom, he waited only for a glimpse of Claire.

Nothing had changed at home. For two weeks the deep freeze had continued, until bedtime had become an exercise in stoicism. She had begun play practice in the evenings, so most days the two of them hardly saw each other until they claimed their distinct halves of the mattress to lie stiff and tense, pretending the other wasn't there.

When she finally entered the gym Tom's heart actually jumped. He smiled, but she glanced aside, her expression disdainful, and moved on with the crowd.

The festivities began. The band played the school song. The cheerleaders cheered. The co-captains of the football team spoke. Coach Gorman was roasted. Six of the less inhibited members of the football team came on the floor in line-dance formation, with bare midriffs, stuffed bathing suit tops, and miniskirts, kicking their hairy legs in an oafish parody of the cancan.

One of the dancers was Robby.

Tom stood near the wall off one end of the bleachers, laughing. The boys swung around, presented their butts and wiggled them, faced the bleachers, joined arms, and went for a high kick, as graceful as a herd of buffalo. They put their hands on their knees, jumped in, jumped back, shimmied until their fake breasts flopped, and raised an uproar of laughter that nearly drowned out the music.

It had been weeks since Tom had lost himself in a hearty bout of laughter. He turned to look up at the bleachers and find Claire. She too was belly-laughing at their son, rearing back with her mouth open and her cheeks curved like red apples. Her merriment wrenched Tom's heart. He wanted back what they'd had, this ability to enjoy all of life again, to be restored by its amusements. They should be sitting
together in the midst of this celebration, sharing their uninhibited son, turning from him to the mirth in each other's eyes. But Claire was alone up there, sitting in the crowd with some other English teachers, and he was alone down here.
Look at me, Claire
, he thought,
you know where I am. I'm down here wanting an end to this cold war between us. Please, look down, now while Robby is showing us all we have to fight for.

But she refused.

The parody ended and the senior class president quieted the crowd with a brief explanation of how the king and queen candidates had been chosen. Tension erased the buzz of voices from the student body. It brought a deeper slouch to the burnouts and a squaring of posture to the leaders. Nancy Halliday's speech students were brought forward to the middle of the gym floor to introduce the royalty-elect.

Sabra Booker, a pretty and poised girl, with a rich contralto voice, read a brief bio of the first candidate: honor student, student council member, lettered athlete in various sports, member of the yearbook staff, member of the Math Club—the credits could have belonged to dozens of seniors, both boys and girls. As she left the mike stand, the band struck up a tinny rendition of “Beauty and the Beast.” She strolled the center aisle of the main floor, stopping to scan various rows of seats, reversing directions, drawing out the suspense until finally reaching toward the third seat from the aisle and summoning a stocky blond boy named Dooley Leonard. As he got to his feet, surprised and pleased, his face flushed, the entire school population burst into applause and started thrusting their fists in the air, chanting,
“Duke, Duke, Duke!”
while he walked up to the stage on Sabra Booker's arm.

A queen candidate was named next, another achiever
named Madelaine Crowe, who was escorted to the stage by a tall senior boy named Jamie Beldower.

After that, Terri McDermott, who had dated Robby last year, went out to pick another king candidate. She, like the others, extended the anticipation by walking back and forth, up and down, pausing to consider sections of students before finally marching toward a row of boys with a step that said,
This is it.

She pointed straight at Robby Gardner.

Pride shot through Tom while he watched Robby unfold and tug at his clothes with the typical self-consciousness and shy pride of a normal teenage boy. As Robby made his way past six sets of knees, Tom flashed a glance at Claire. She was on her feet, beaming and applauding like a rabid rock fan. Her gaze veered to Tom, the pull too strong, the habit too established to resist—and he felt her first real warmth in weeks. It redoubled the swell of emotion in his breast as they stood lauding their son, separated by rows of noisy people, still surprised by the realization that the boy who'd been introduced, among other credits, as “someone who's lettered in every sport imaginable” was actually Robby.

Chelsea was on her feet jumping and clapping with the other cheerleaders. Some teachers beside Tom offered congratulations, and Claire, too, was enfolded in felicity as she sat down and diverted her attention to those seated nearby.

Tom watched Robby walk to the stage with Terri McDermott, a girl he'd always liked, the two of them talking and smiling from their disparate heights while the student body chanted, “Rob, Rob, Rob!”

After that, “Beauty and the Beast” swelled and faded, and the candidates seemed to wane in importance as their principal watched them plucked from among their peers and singled out for this honor that would keep them in the
limelight for the rest of this school year and in the memories of their classmates for the rest of their lives.

Claire had been a homecoming queen candidate in high school, but he hadn't known her then. He'd seen pictures of her though, in her yearbook, her long ironed hair parted down the middle.

The last candidate was being introduced, and the list of credits sounded like so many others that Tom paid little attention—student council, Math Club, DECA Club, honor student, a whole range of sports. Then something caught his ear, some organization HHH didn't have, some club with a Spanish name, and he perked up as a stately speech student named Saundra Gibbons executed the tension-mounting search for the right candidate.

Some gut instinct told Tom, even before Saundra paused in the aisle beside him, that she would single out Kent Arens.

When she did, the auditorium broke into riotous applause.
“K.A.! K.A.! K.A.!”
they shouted. The football team did high-fives, and the student population cheered their newest gridiron hero. Over the PA system a voice overrode the band. “Oh yeah, we forgot to tell you . . . most of his life he lived in Austin, Texas. He's only been here for three weeks. What a way to welcome him to HHH and Minnesota!”

Kent acted too stunned to rise. While Saundra was still reaching out a hand, Tom fired a glance at Claire. She was drop-dead shocked and clapping as lamely as if under the influence of a sedative. He found Chelsea, standing totem-straight with both hands over her mouth. Up on the stage, Robby was clapping dutifully, unable to do otherwise, showcased as he was before the entire school population. By the time Tom's eyes found Claire again she was bending at the hip to resume her seat. For a moment she was cut off from view, then those around her sat and he caught her laser stare
shooting at him like a thin red line capable of cutting the retinas out of his eyes.

She looked away first. Whatever smile she'd given earlier had left no more mark than the band director's baton. “Beauty and the Beast” droned on and on as Kent moved up the steps to the stage and shook hands with the other candidates. He reached Robby, and from thirty feet away Tom felt their reluctance to touch. They did what protocol demanded, perfunctorily, then Kent took his place beside one of the queen candidates, who gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Tom was their principal. His congratulations were expected, even prized. He moved toward them with emotions warring within him, the irony of this day creating a pain between his shoulders as if a hatchet were buried there.

Robby's was the third hand he shook. As he smiled into his son's eyes he saw the questions that others didn't see. He saw this moment of glory addled by the muddle of relationships represented in this gymnasium. And though he was a principal who wasn't supposed to play favorites, he was a father, too, and he caught Rob's neck in the crook of one arm and gave him a hug.

“I'm so darned proud of you,” he said at Rob's ear.

“Thanks, Dad.”

He moved on down the line—girl, boy, girl, boy—until he came to Kent and shook his hand, the first touch they had shared since discovering their relationship. Tom covered their joined hands with his free one and felt his own gripped so strongly his wedding ring gouged his other fingers. He was quite unprepared for the vehemence of his own reaction, the urge to hug Kent, to hide his stinging eyes in a paternal embrace. But behind him Claire glared and Chelsea watched, mystified and confused, so he could only hide his feelings and hope Kent read them in his eyes.

“Congratulations, Kent. We're so proud to have you at our school.”

“Thank you, sir,” Kent answered. “I'm proud to be here, but I'm not sure I deserve this.”

“Your classmates say you do. Enjoy it, son.”

The word quavered both their souls while this first crushing grip continued. Tom saw surprise darken Kent's eyes before he finally pulled free and turned to address the student body.

It was difficult to marshal his thoughts with both of his sons standing behind him, his daughter and wife before him, but he suppressed his personal involvement to do his job.

“I look forward to this day every year, the day when you seniors cast your vote of approval for ten of your classmates who exemplify all the best that a student, a friend, a member of the school community can represent. In the past it might have been true that the election of a homecoming king and queen was nothing more than a beauty contest. But the ten students standing before you today are leaders, each and every one of them. They're kids who spend far more than thirty hours of classroom time in this building every week. They represent friendship, generosity, respect, academic and athletic leadership, and more.”

Tom let his eyes scan the bleachers while he went on speaking. Frequently they stalled on Claire, who sat for the first minute with one forearm over her crossed knees, studying the underside of her watchband. The next time he looked she was staring at Robby and gave the impression of adamantly refusing to lock eyes with her husband.

His speech ended. The coach said one parting sentence and thanked the students and teachers who'd planned the program. The cheerleaders led the assembly in the school
song, and the pep fest concluded.

The stage became a mob of people, Claire among them. She hugged Robby but managed to sidestep Tom. His heart sank while he wished she'd come to him, slip her arm around his waist, and say, “Can you believe it? Great son we've got, huh?”

But their estrangement had only been exacerbated by this ceremony today, and he was left to bump around the crowd accepting congratulations from everyone but the one who mattered most.

Then he turned, and there was Chelsea, looking up at him with wounded eyes. She had heat spots in her cheeks and he read very clearly how it hurt her to see Claire giving him the cold shoulder here at this auspicious moment. Her confusion over Kent showed clearly in her eyes, and in her hesitation to hug her father. Before she could, someone spoke at Tom's side and he turned his attention elsewhere.