Schooled (4 page)
As Cap’s caseworker, part of my job was to check in with the school from time to time to make sure he was doing well. That’s how I wound up having lunch with Frank Kasigi, assistant principal at Claverage Middle School.
“Oh, don’t worry about Cap from an academic standpoint,” he assured me. “He’s right up there with our brightest and best. Commune or no, he’s been very well educated by someone.”
I thought of Rain and shuddered, even after all these years. She had always been the teacher at Garland. For someone who rejected all forms of authority, she was a major tyrant in the classroom. If she hadn’t adopted the hippie lifestyle, she would have made a terrific Marine drill sergeant.
Then Mr. Kasigi let the other shoe drop. “Yet socially—in my entire teaching career, I’ve never met a student who knows so little about ordinary everyday living. Have you worked with any other students from this Garland Farm?”
“Only one,” I replied faintly. “She had a very difficult adjustment.” I didn’t bother to mention that “she” was me.
“Adjustment is one thing. But Cap is like a space traveler who just landed on Earth and left his guidebook on the home world! Is it possible that he honestly believes bullfighting is a sport we play in middle school?”
“Bullfighting?”
I repeated. “How did that subject come up?”
His reply posed far more questions than it answered: apparently, Cap had asked about it as part of his duties as eighth grade president.
Eighth grade president?
How could a brand-new student, who didn’t know a soul in the place, get himself elected president?
It made no sense to me. But later on, my sixteen-year-old daughter acted like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
“Duh—eighth grade president isn’t an honor, Mother. It’s like being elected village idiot. Every year they pick the biggest wing nut in the building. It must have seemed like the freakazoid dropped straight from heaven to fill the post.”
I was horrified. “Sophie—that’s awful!”
She shrugged. “What’s really awful is that you’re a social worker—with power over kids’ lives—and you have no clue about what’s common knowledge at that school.”
“Did this happen when you were in eighth grade?”
“Remember Caitlin Tortolo? She didn’t really win a semester in Europe. She left school early to have a nervous breakdown.”
“And you participated in it?”
“Everybody did,” she retorted. “At least, we did nothing to stop it. If you don’t go along with the gag, you’re next.” I must have looked disapproving, because she added, “Grow up, Mother. The world’s a big, tough, scary place—like you don’t know that.”
Actually, I
did
know that. I didn’t realize
she
knew it.
I felt terrible for poor Cap. It was hard enough for him to come out of total isolation at Garland without having to be dropped into the snake pit that was middle school. Worse, I couldn’t even warn him about it—not without poisoning his one-and-only experience of the real world.
My sole consolation lay in the fact that he would have to suffer this abuse only for a few weeks more. His grandmother was recovering well. I’m sure he would have liked to visit her more often. But the facility was an hour away, more with traffic, and there just wasn’t time to take him during the week.
Anyway, deep in my heart I believed that a genuine school, nasty and merciless as it could be, was still better than Garland Farm.
Besides, nastiness was relative. After school, Cap had to come home to my house, where Sophie was there to demonstrate the true meaning of nasty. She hated Cap Anderson with a passion that I wouldn’t have believed her capable of—and I was her mother.
Even when he did things that had nothing to do with Sophie, she took them personally. His healthy vegetarian diet she considered a slap in the face to her own eating habits. His neatness was a deliberate ploy to make her appear messy. She couldn’t bear that Cap woke up early to practice tai chi on our front lawn.
“But, Sophie,” I tried to reason, “why would it matter to you? You’re barely awake at that hour.”
“It’s humiliating!” she raged. “We might as well put a sign on the roof that says ‘Warning: Mutant on Premises!’”
The next morning, when Cap was performing the dancelike martial arts moves by the dogwood bushes, my darling daughter emptied an entire wastebasket full of water down on his head. This she followed with a string of language that would have set fire to the sidewalk. All from the girl who was so concerned about what the neighbors might think.
He looked up at her and he smiled—instead of heaving a rock through her window, which is what I would have done. Oh, what a sight he was, with all that hair hanging limply around his shoulders. He looked like a weeping willow in soggy sandals.
According to Sophie, the entire incident was my fault. By bringing Cap into our home, I had left her no choice but to take matters into her own hands.
Since Sophie was never going to apologize to Cap, I did it myself.
“I’m so sorry, dear,” I said, handing him a towel that wouldn’t have dried one tenth of his abundant hair. “You have to forgive Sophie, although I can’t think of a reason why.”
He looked sad. “She doesn’t like me.”
I smiled. “Sixteen-year-old girls don’t like anybody.”
His answer brought me straight back to my Garland days. “When you’re unkind to others, it’s usually because you don’t believe that you, yourself, deserve kindness.”
“Don’t be so nice,” I said. “She can be pretty mean. In her defense, she’s been through a lot in the last couple of weeks. Her father—my ex-husband—his heart’s in the right place, but he makes a lot of promises he can’t keep. And Sophie ends up caught in the middle. Just yesterday, she was waiting for him to pick her up for her first driving lesson. He never showed. That’s him—doesn’t come, doesn’t call, dead air. She won’t admit it, but she’s devastated.”
He looked thoughtful. “I guess when you have a lot of people in your life, there’s more of a chance that someone will let you down.”
I laughed. “You’re right. But it’s a risk most of us are prepared to take.”
Cap looked dubious. He had grown up with exactly one person in his life—Rain. And regardless of what I thought of her, to him she had been as constant as the rising sun.
How terrifying must it be to lose that?
I really missed Rain.
My whole life, whenever I got confused, there she’d be to explain it all to me. One time I remember, we were in Rutherford, laying in a supply of tofu. We grew our own fruits and vegetables at Garland, but everything else had to be brought in from outside. Then we stopped at the hardware store to stock up on duct tape, which was just about the most useful thing on earth for a farm commune. It repaired roofs, walls, pipes, cars, furniture, and boots. At least a quarter of Garland was held together with the stuff. It made an instant cast for a broken finger, and even pulled splinters out of your skin. Before I was born, when there were lots of young children growing up in the community, all those diapers used to be fastened by squares of duct tape.
But when we got to the store, there was a group of people blocking the entrance. They were carrying signs and chanting. They seemed to be really angry about something.
Rain explained that the employees were on strike, standing up for fair treatment. She thought it was an excellent idea. She refused to cross the picket line, so we drove twenty miles out of our way to buy our duct tape. We came back, though, and marched with the strikers for a couple of hours. Rain even let me unscrew the knobs to let the air out of the tires of the boss’s car.
Rain said the trip was the purest form of education—learning by doing. I sure could have used that kind of wisdom now, with so much going on in my life and so many things I didn’t understand.
Like bullfighting. I asked Mrs. Donnelly about it, but the subject really seemed to bother her. She advised me to ignore anyone who mentioned it again. So I looked it up in the encyclopedia, and I figured out why Mrs. Donnelly was so upset. Bullfighting is a cruel sport where innocent animals are tormented, tortured, killed, and have their ears cut off.
I needed Rain more than ever to ask her why a school would have anything to do with that. But she was out of the picture. This was a decision I would have to make on my own.
And I did. The next time I saw Zach Powers, I put my foot down. “I’m not going to ask Mr. Kasigi about bullfighting anymore. I object to it on moral grounds.”
He said, “I respect your honesty,” and shook my hand. As he walked away, I noticed his shoulders shaking. Overcome with emotion, I guess.
I was beginning to see that growing up knowing only one other person had some serious disadvantages. Without Rain as my mentor and guide, I was lost.
The school made me dizzy. I spent half my time wandering the halls, asking people directions to rooms they’d never heard of. Students were constantly peppering me with questions I didn’t have the answers to. And now a girl named Lorelei Lumley was writing me notes about how she’d love to run her fingers through my hair. Why would anybody want to do that?
The closest thing I had to Rain was Hugh Winkleman—hardly a replacement, but at least he was willing to help. We ate lunch together every day, and I found myself honestly looking forward to that regular meeting where Hugh could explain things to me.
“It’s obvious,” he said. “She’s in love with you.”
“I don’t even know who she is!” I hadn’t learned more than fifteen or twenty names at that point.
Hugh was disgusted. “Typical. I’ve spent my whole life in this dumb town, and I’ve never gotten a girl to give me a second look. And here you have someone named Lorelei throwing herself at you. You can’t let that slip through your fingers. Ask her to the Halloween dance.”
“What’s the Halloween dance?”
“Only the most important social event of the school year! Not that I’ve ever been to one.” His eyes narrowed. “If you’re eighth grade president, shouldn’t you know about it?”
“I hope not,” I said worriedly.
Hugh looked dubious. “Well, you probably shouldn’t go by me. I’m not exactly Mr. Popularity around here. But I think the president plans the whole shindig—refreshments, decorations, music—”
Something tingled directly beneath the peace sign I wore around my neck. I was developing a sixth sense for when trouble was coming my way. But what good was advance warning? Advance warning of
what
? I wasn’t going to understand it anyway.
Maybe that was my mistake—even
trying
to understand. Garland was so simple—seven acres of land containing exactly one house, one barn, a vegetable garden, fruit trees, a pickup truck, and only one other person. Maybe in a place as complex as C Average Middle School, it was impossible to analyze every single thing that happened.
Like what were those little white paper balls that I kept brushing out of my hair every night? Was there so much paper in a school that the molecules eventually clustered and fell like precipitation? And how did a pickled brain and all those other weird objects get into my locker? I thought the whole point of a lock was that no one could open it but me.
I
sure never put pink goo and a dead bird in there.
Rain always recommended meditation for stress and confusion. But if you meditate in front of your locker, someone might steal your sandals while your eyes are closed.
I had to go home barefoot on the school bus that afternoon. I know complaining is a negativity trip, but it was hard to stay positive about the floor of a school bus. It’s a collecting place for the filthy, smelly, sticky, and often sharp and jagged castoffs of a society run wild.
If I’d ever questioned why Rain and her friends gave up on city life in San Francisco and founded Garland back in 1967, five minutes on that bus explained it. The dark underbelly of the human animal was turned loose on that vehicle. It was crowded, noisy, dirty, rowdy, and uncomfortable. People fought, shrieked, threw things at one another, and tormented the hapless driver. It was an insane asylum on wheels.
By the time I made it to the Donnelly house, my bruised and bleeding feet were decorated with lollipop sticks, chewing gum, hairs, broken soda-can tabs, straws, buttons, and some things I couldn’t even identify.
To make matters worse, Sophie caught me in the backyard hosing off my feet at the outdoor tap.
“Nice,” she muttered. But the thing is, her expression said she didn’t think it was nice at all. Lately, every time I talked to Sophie, she looked like she had just eaten some turnips that had been harvested a week too late. Her face twisted into an unpleasant contortion that made it hard to see how beautiful she was. But I tried my best, because I knew about her disappointment over her father and the driving lessons. I realized my good fortune at being raised by Rain, who never broke a promise and never let me down in any way.
The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to do something nice for Sophie, to make her feel better. But how could that ever happen? Every time I went near her, she practically bit my head off.
My mother is the most generous, caring, good-hearted, sympathetic person in the world. She even chose a career devoted to helping people. She’s a saint.
I always knew that lousy attitude was going to get us in trouble one day. Still, never in my wildest nightmares could I have imagined myself living with a refugee from Bizarro World.
The stuff he scraped off his feet alone would have been enough to get the house condemned by the board of health. God only knew what was living in his hair! And his clothes—I was amazed they didn’t get up and walk away on their own.
Mom insisted he was very clean. I told you about her—generous to a fault.
“He’s been wearing the same stuff for the past three weeks,” I accused.
“They just look the same because they’re all cotton tie-dyes,” she explained patiently. “He has plenty of clothes. I drove out to Garland myself to pick up his things.”
“I hope you brought extra shoes too,” I put in. “Somebody hung a pair of corn husk sandals on the high-voltage wires by the commuter line. I wonder who they belong to. I called Brad Pitt, but he’s wearing his.”
“Don’t be unkind,” she told me sharply. “The way those kids are teasing Cap is inhuman. Have a little compassion.”
“Have a little compassion for
me
,” I said sulkily. “Josh was just dropping me off while the freakazoid was scraping a third-world country off his feet. You know what he said? ‘Is that your brother, Sophie?’”
“What did you tell him?”
“What
could
I tell him? I said it was a homeless guy. A person can dream.”
My solemn vow: should Capricorn Anderson put the kibosh on my chances with Josh Weintraub, not even Mother’s social worker training could save him.
If Josh and I started dating—are you there, God? It’s me, Sophie—there’d be no way to keep that space alien off the radar screen. I could have sworn there were six of him. Wherever I wanted to be, that’s where he was—squeaking the porch swing, or hogging the kitchen table, eating those organic soy nuts Mom bought for him. He’d even started watching
my
favorite show,
Trigonometry and Tears
, the high-school soap opera. Because he had never seen TV before, he was a total addict who barked out warnings and advice to the characters on the screen.
“Will you shut up?” I yelled, not for the first time.
Even though he was embarrassed, he still defended himself. “Nick doesn’t know that Alison found out he’s been seeing Corinne on the side!”
“They’re actors! It’s a story! They can’t even hear you!”
And he understood. Sort of. But he didn’t stop talking to the TV. It was just too new to him. How would I ever explain
that
to Josh?
I needn’t have worried. That relationship was over before it started. I probably should have told Josh that Cap
was
my brother. Or maybe my husband. It would have saved me the most boring date of my life.
To think that I pulled strings and called in favors just to meet him! What a letdown. He talked about video games for three hours before telling me he was getting back together with his ex-girlfriend from Indiana. Rock on.
So I wasn’t in the best of moods when Josh took me home after the ordeal. There was only one thing that could have made this night any worse—face time with My Favorite Martian.
He was waiting for me on the porch. “Hi.”
“Where’s my mother?”
“Around the corner at the Peabodys’,” he told me. “Quick—we should have just about an hour.”
I was wary. “For what? To pick a few more staples out of your feet?”
He held up the car keys and jingled them in front of me. “Driving lessons.”
I stared at him. “Driving lessons? From a little squirt like you?” Then I remembered what Mom had told me—that Cap had been arrested and released for driving without a license. At that lawless flower-child Camp Day-Glo, they probably let you drive when your foot could reach the pedal without breaking the moisture seal on your training pants.
“I know your other lessons got canceled,” he went on.
Oh, thanks, Mother. Someday I’ll repay you by telling
your
personal business to every passing hobo.
I felt betrayed, furious—and intrigued. My father was a total flake. He’d probably get around to giving me a lesson one day, but it would be pure random chance when and if it ever happened. And Mom’s killer schedule didn’t leave a lot of windows of opportunity.
I wanted to drive. I
needed
a teacher. Even if it had to be the freakazoid.
I did a lot of things I’d promised myself I’d never do. I got in the car with him. I listened to him and did what he told me to do. That idiotic Zen-hippie style of his turned out to be just right for a driving instructor. No matter what mistakes I made, it didn’t seem to faze Cap—not even when I thought someone’s driveway was a side street and turned onto it.
“Honest mistake,” said Cap, but, rattled, I stepped on the gas instead of the brake.
The Saturn burst forward. Suddenly, a white-painted garage door loomed out of the darkness, coming up fast.
I lost it. I didn’t even have the sense to take my foot off the gas. I was in mid-panic when Cap reached over and yanked on the steering wheel. We swung around, the tires of the Saturn churning soft earth as we plowed into a flower bed. The rough ride slowed us down long enough for him to reach over and shift into park. The car lurched to a halt.
“Abdominal breathing,” he ordered quietly. “In through the nose, out through the mouth.”
“But I almost—”
“There’s no almost,” he lectured serenely. “Only ‘happened’ and ‘didn’t happen.’ This didn’t happen.”
“Get us out of here!” I whimpered when my lungs refilled with air.
“You’ll do that. It’s a circular driveway. Just continue around.”
I was really panicking. Visions of an angry homeowner coming at us with a shotgun were whirling around my head. “I can’t! It’s too narrow, and there are trees on both sides! I’ll hit something!” At that point, I didn’t care if I never drove again. I just wanted to make it home alive in something that still resembled a Saturn.
He was endlessly patient. “This is a philosophy Rain passed on to me when she taught me how to drive our truck.”
I very nearly hit him. “This is no time for your hippie-dippy wisdom!”
But there was no stopping Cap when the subject was the immortal Rain. “She said, ‘If the front gets through, the rest will drag.’”
I stared at him. “That’s philosophy?”
“Rain used to drive a taxi in San Francisco before she formed Garland.”
I let out a nervous giggle, and it relaxed me. I put the car back in gear and aimed the hood between the two trees. May Mother never find out that I was piloting her precious Saturn on instructions from Rain, the face of so many of her childhood nightmares.
When we reached the road, I was panting with pure relief. The freakazoid made me pull over while he went back and replanted all the flowers I’d spun up. I was so grateful, I didn’t even kill him.
Surviving my first brush with disaster must have boosted my confidence, because I was a better driver after that. In short order, I was tooling around the neighborhood with something approaching skill. Pretty soon I even forgot that my learner’s permit probably wasn’t valid when I was in the car with someone even less qualified behind the wheel than I was.
I was so wrapped up in the experience that it took me a few seconds to recognize the female pedestrian we’d just passed.
“My mother!” I rasped. “Oh, man, we are so busted!”
He didn’t seem to understand. “Why?”
“Think, for once in your life! What does neither of us have? A driver’s license, maybe?” This was more serious than a few uprooted chrysanthemums. We were doing something highly illegal. “If she catches us, I’ll be grounded till I’m forty, and you’ll be sleeping in the street!”
For the first time, he seemed to realize that we weren’t playing by hippie rules. Obviously, Mom hadn’t noticed her car, because she wasn’t sprinting after us, yelling. Hands trembling, I turned off the block, and we switched drivers. I may have been bugging out, but I have to say Cap was totally cool under pressure. We had to go out of our way to avoid passing Mom again. But he whipped that car around corners, through darkened streets, and up into our driveway. We sprinted in the back door, and were on the couch in front of
Trigonometry and Tears
when she came in.
She regarded me suspiciously. “What?”
I immediately grasped the weak spot in our cover. Mother had left two teenagers at war, only to return home to a peace treaty.
So I turned to Cap and snarled, “Keep your split ends off my side of the couch!”
That seemed to mollify her. It was exactly the kind of thing I’d been saying to Cap ever since he’d arrived at our house three weeks before.
But my heart wasn’t in it that night.