Room (6 page)

I’m shaking my head a lot. “Then we couldn’t see.”

“We could, we’d be sitting right here in the rocker.”

“Bad idea.”

“OK, forget it.” Ma folds her arms tight.

The TV woman is crying because her house is yellow now. “Did she like it brown better?” I ask.

“No,” says Ma, “she’s so happy it’s making her cry.”

That’s weird. “Is she happysad, like you get when there’s lovely music on TV?”

“No, she’s just an idiot. Let’s switch the TV off now.”

“Five more minutes? Please?”

She shakes her head.

“I’ll do Parrot, I’m getting even better.” I listen hard to the TV woman. I say,
“Dream come to life, I have to tell you Darren it’s just beyond my very
wildest imaginings, the cornices—”

Ma hits the off. I want to ask her what a cornices is but I think she’s still cranky about moving the furniture, that was a crazy plan.

In Wardrobe I should be going to sleep but I’m counting fights. That’s three we had in three days, one about the candles and one about Mouse and one about Lucky. I’d rather be
four again if five means fighting all the days.

“Good night, Room,” I say very quiet. “Good night, Lamp and Balloon.”

“Good night, stove,” says Ma, “and good night, table.”

I’m grinning. “Good night, Wordy Ball. Good night, Fort. Good night, Rug.”

“Good night, air,” says Ma.

“Good night, noises everywhere.”

“Good night, Jack.”

“Good night, Ma. And Bugs, don’t forget the Bugs.”

“Night-night,” she says, “sleep tight, don’t let the bugs bite.”

•   •   •

When I wake up, Skylight’s all blue in her glass, there’s no snow left even in the corners. Ma’s sitting in her chair holding her face, that means hurting.
She’s looking at something on Table, two things.

I jump up and grab. “It’s a jeep. A remote-control jeep!” I’m zooming it in the air, it’s red, as big as my hand. The remote is silver and a rectangle, when I
wiggle one of the switches with my thumb the jeep’s wheels spin
zhhhhung.

“It’s a late birthday present.”

I know who brung it, it’s Old Nick but she won’t say.

I don’t want to eat my cereal but Ma says I can play with the jeep again right after. I eat twenty-nine of them, then I’m not hungry anymore. Ma says that’s waste, so she eats
the rest.

I figure out to move Jeep just with Remote. The thin silver antenna, I can make it really long or really short. One switch makes Jeep go forward and backward, the other does side to side. If I
flip both the same time, Jeep gets paralyzed like by a poison dart, he says
argbbbbbb.

Ma says she’d better start cleaning because it’s Tuesday. “Gently,” she says, “remember it’s breakable.”

I know that already, everything’s breakable.

“And if you keep it turned on for a long time the batteries will get used up, and we don’t have any spares.”

I can make Jeep go all around Room, it’s easy except at the edge of Rug, she gets curled up under his wheels. Remote is the boss, he says, “Off you go now, you slowcoach Jeep. Twice
around that Table leg, lickety-split. Keep those wheels turning.” Sometimes Jeep is tired, Remote turns his wheels
grrrrrrrrr.
That naughty Jeep hides in Wardrobe but Remote finds him
by magic and makes him zoom back and forward crashing into the slats.

Tuesdays and Fridays always smell of vinegar. Ma’s scrubbing under Table with the rag that used to be one of my diapers I wore till I was one. I bet she’s wiping Spider’s web
away but I don’t care much. Then she picks up Vacuum who makes it all noisy dusty
wab wab wab.

Jeep sneaks way off in Under Bed. “Come back, my little baby Jeepy,” says Remote. “If you become a fish in the river, I will be a fisherman and catch you in my net.” But
that tricksy Jeep stays quiet till Remote is having a nap with his antenna all the way down, then Jeep sneaks up behind him and takes out his batteries ha ha ha.

I play with Jeep and Remote all day except when I’m in Bath they have to park on Table not to get rusty. When we do Scream I push them up really near Skylight and Jeep
vrums
his
wheels as loud as he can.

Ma lies down again holding her teeth. Sometimes she does a big breath out out out.

“Why are you hissing so long?”

“Trying to get on top of it.”

I go sit by her head and stroke her hair out of her eyes, her forehead is slippy. She grabs my hand and holds it tight. “It’s OK.”

It doesn’t look OK. “You want to play with Jeep and Remote and me?”

“Maybe later.”

“If you play you won’t mind and you won’t matter.”

She smiles a bit but the next breath comes out louder like a moan.

At 05:57 I say, “Ma, it’s nearly six,” so she gets up to make dinner but she doesn’t eat any. Jeep and Remote wait in Bath because it’s dry now, it’s their
secret cave. “Actually Jeep died and went to Heaven,” I say, eating my chicken slices really fast.

“Oh, yeah?”

“But then in the night when God was asleep, Jeep snuck out and slid down the Beanstalk to Room to visit me.”

“That was cunning of him.”

I eat three green beans and have a big drink of milk and another three, they go down a bit faster in threes. Five would be fasterer but I can’t manage that, my throat would shut. One time
I was four, Ma wrote
Green beans / other froz green veg
on the shopping list and I scribbled out
Green beans
with the orange pencil, she thought it was funny. At the end I have the
soft bread because I like to keep it in my mouth like a cushion. “Thanks, Baby Jesus, especially for the chicken slices,” I say, “and please no more green beans for a long time.
Hey, why do we thank Baby Jesus and not him?”

“Him?”

I nod at Door.

Her face gets flat even though I didn’t say his name. “Why should we thank him?”

“You did the other night, for the groceries and the snow offing and the pants.”

“You shouldn’t listen.” Sometimes when she’s really mad her mouth doesn’t really open. “It was a fake thank.”

“Why it—?”

She butts in. “He’s only the bringer. He doesn’t actually make the wheat grow in the field.”

“Which field?”

“He can’t make the sun shine on it, or the rain fall, or anything.”

“But Ma, bread doesn’t come out of fields.”

She presses on her mouth.

“Why you said—?”

“It must be time for TV,” she says fast.

It’s videos, I love them. Ma does the moves with me most times but not tonight. I jump on Bed and teach Jeep and Remote to shake their booties. It’s Rihanna and T.I. and Lady Gaga
and Kanye West.

“Why do rappers wear shades even in the night,” I ask Ma, “are their eyeballs sore?”

“No, they just want to look cool. And not have fans staring into their faces all the time because they’re so famous.”

I’m confused. “Why the fans are famous?”

“No, the stars are.”

“And they don’t want to be?”

“Well, I guess they do,” says Ma, getting up to switch off the TV, “but they want to stay a bit private as well.”

When I’m having some, Ma won’t let me bring Jeep and Remote into Bed even though they’re my friends. And then she says they have to go up on Shelf while I’m sleeping.
“Otherwise they’ll poke you in the night.”

“No they won’t, they promise.”

“Listen, let’s put your jeep away, then you can sleep with the remote because it’s smaller, as long as the antenna’s right down. Deal?”

“Deal.”

When I’m in Wardrobe, we talk through the slats. “God bless Jack,” she says.

“God bless Ma and magic her teeth better. God bless Jeep and Remote.”

“God bless books.”

“God bless everything here and Outer Space and Jeep as well. Ma?”

“Yeah.”

“Where are we when we’re asleep?”

I can hear her yawn. “Right here.”

“But dreams.” I wait. “Are they TV?” She still doesn’t answer. “Do we go into TV for dreaming?”

“No. We’re never anywhere but here.” Her voice sounds a long way away.

I lie curled up touching the switches with my fingers. I whisper,

“Can’t you sleep, little switches? It’s OK, have some.” I put them at my nipples, they take turns. I’m sort of asleep but only nearly.

Beep beep.
That’s Door.

I listen very hard. In comes the cold air. If I had my head out of Wardrobe, there’d be Door opening, I bet I could see right into the stars and the spaceships and the planets and the
aliens zooming around in UFOs. I wish I wish I wish I could see it.

Boom,
that’s Door shutting and Old Nick is telling Ma how there wasn’t any of something and something else was a ridiculous price anyway.

I wonder if he looked up on Shelf and saw Jeep. Yeah he brung him for me, but he never played with him I don’t think. He won’t know how Jeep suddenly goes when I switch Remote on,
vrummmm.

Ma and him only talk for a bit tonight. Lamp goes off
click
and Old Nick creaks the bed. I count in ones sometimes instead of fives just for different. But I start losing count so I
switch to fives that go faster, I count to 378.

All quiet. I think he must be asleep. Does Ma switch off when he’s off or does she stay awake waiting for him to be gone? Maybe they’re both off and me on, that’s weird. I
could sit up and crawl out of Wardrobe, they wouldn’t even know. I could draw a picture of them in Bed or something. I wonder are they beside each other or opposite sides.

Then I have a terrible idea, what if he’s having some? Would Ma let him have some or would she say,
No way Jose, that’s only for Jack?

If he had some he might start getting realer.

I want to jump up and scream.

I find Remote’s on switch, I make it green. Wouldn’t it be funny if his superpowers started Jeep’s wheels spinning up there on Shelf? Old Nick might wake up all surprised ha
ha.

I try the forward switch, nothing happens. Doh, I forgot to put up the antenna. I make it all the way long and try again but Remote still doesn’t work. I poke his antenna through the
slats, it’s outside and I’m inside all at the same time. I flick the switch. I hear a tiny sound that must be Jeep’s wheels coming alive and then—

SMASHSHSHSHSHSH.

Old Nick roaring like I never heard him, something about Jesus but it wasn’t Baby Jesus that did it, it was me. Lamp’s on, light’s banging in the slats at me, my eyes squeeze
shut. I wriggle back and pull Blanket over my face.

He’s shouting, “What are you trying to pull?”

Ma sounds all wobbly, she says, “What, what? Did you have a bad dream?”

I’m biting Blanket, soft like gray bread in my mouth.

“Did you try something? Did you?” His voice goes downer. “Because I told you before, it’s on your head if—”

“I was asleep.” Ma’s talking in a squashed tiny voice. “Please—look, look, it was the stupid jeep that rolled off the shelf.”

Jeep’s not a stupid.

“I’m sorry,” Ma’s saying, “I’m so sorry, I should have put it somewhere it wouldn’t fall. I’m really really totally—”

“OK.”

“Look, let’s turn the light off—”

“Nah,” says Old Nick, “I’m done.”

Nobody says anything, I count one hippopotamus two hippopotamus three hippopotamus—

Beep beep,
Door opens and shuts
boom.
He’s gone.

Lamp clicks off again.

I feel around on the floor of Wardrobe for Remote, I find a terrible thing. His antenna all short and sharp, it must have snapped in the slats.

“Ma,” I whisper.

No answer.

“Remote got broke.”

“Go to sleep.” Her voice is so hoarse and scary I think it’s not her.

I count my teeth five times, I get twenty every time but I still have to do it again. None of them hurt yet but they might when I’m six.

I must be asleep but I don’t know it, because then I wake up.

I’m still in Wardrobe, it’s all dark. Ma didn’t bring me into Bed yet. Why she didn’t bring me in?

I push the doors and listen for her breath. She’s asleep, she can’t be mad in her sleep, can she?

I crawl under Duvet. I lie near Ma not touching, there’s all heat around her.

I
n the morning we’re eating oatmeal and I see marks. “You’re dirty on your neck.”

Ma just drinks some water, the skin moves when she swallows.

Actually that’s not dirt, I don’t think.

I have a bit of oatmeal but it’s too hot, I spit it back in Meltedy Spoon. I think Old Nick put those marks on her neck. I try saying but nothing comes out. I try again. “Sorry I
made Jeep fall down in the night.”

I get off my chair, Ma lets me onto her lap. “What were you trying to do?” she asks, her voice is still hoarse.

“Show him.”

“What’s that?”

“I was, I was, I was—”

“It’s OK, Jack. Slow down.”

“But Remote got snapped and you’re all mad at me.”

“Listen,” says Ma, “I couldn’t care less about the jeep.”

I blink at her. “He was my present.”

“What I’m mad about”—her voice is getting bigger and scratchier—“is that you woke him up.”

“Jeep?”

“Old Nick.”

It makes me jump that she says him out loud.

“You scared him.”

“He got scared at
me?
”

“He didn’t know it was you,” says Ma. “He thought I was attacking him, dropping something heavy on his head.”

I hold my mouth and my nose but the giggles fizz out.

“It’s not funny, it’s the opposite of funny.”

I see her neck again, the marks that he put on her, I’m all done giggling.

The oatmeal’s still too hot so we go back to Bed for a cuddle.

This morning it’s
Dora
, yippee. She’s on a boat that nearly crashes into a ship, we have to wave our arms and shout, “Watch out,” but Ma doesn’t. Ships are
just TV and so is the sea except when our poos and letters arrive. Or maybe they actually stop being real the minute they get there? Alice says if she’s in the sea she can go home by the
railway, that’s old-fashioned for trains. Forests are TV and also jungles and deserts and streets and skyscrapers and cars. Animals are TV except ants and Spider and Mouse, but he’s
gone back now. Germs are real, and blood. Boys are TV but they kind of look like me, the me in Mirror that isn’t real either, just a picture. Sometimes I like to undo my ponytail and put all
my hair over and worm my tongue through, then stick my face out to say boo.