The 10 P.M. Question (22 page)

“The gene?” said Frankie, looking down at the floorboards. But he knew what she was going to say. He did and did not want to hear it. He knew it would make him feel sick. He studied the varnished black-borer trails, those nosing tendrils, roads to nowhere.

“You know,” said Gordana.

“No,” said Frankie. His voice was just a whisper. He wanted Gordana to say it.

Downstairs, Louie and Ray Davies clattered through the front door. They would come up any moment, he knew, and, again, he did and did not want them to. He wanted them to save him from himself, from his own inexplicable compulsion to hear something that would make him feel bad. But he wanted Gordana to carry on talking.

“What do you mean?” said Frankie.

“Oh, good
God,
Frankie,” said Gordana, turning around from the balcony doors, a sudden heaving thundercloud. “You know what I mean. The Freak-Out gene. You have it. Ma has it. You’re exactly like Ma. You freak out at things. You
know
you do.” She reached across the bed and pulled the light cord that hung from the ceiling; instantly the bedroom lit up like a fairground.

Frankie squinted in the brightness and drew back from Gordana, who seemed larger now, looming before him, her eyes firing, pink spots burning on her cheeks.

So,
thought Frankie. She had said it. It was out, in the bedroom with them, a stealthy demon whose presence he’d been trying so hard to ignore.

He had always known it, he supposed. It had been there always, alongside the rodent snarling, the knowledge that Louie and Gordana were like Uncle George — bold and carefree, fearless,
joyous
. And he was like Ma; he was timorous and beset, a hostage to dark imaginings, cowering somehow, waiting always for the chopper.

Funny, thought Frankie, even now momentarily arrested by a passing notion, he wasn’t actually freaking out about it, ha, ha, now that it had been said. He had no desperate urge to recite batting statistics or anything. And the thing
was
. . .

“But Ma
doesn’t
freak out at things,” he said. Ma was sad sometimes —“wobbly” as she called it — but mostly she was composed, even tranquil. She floated, somehow, in and out of the family racket, an eternal presence, calming things. Sydney had said that, too.

“Oh,
no?
” said Gordana. “She doesn’t freak out? Only at the teeming world outside the front door.” She stood with her arms folded, regarding him fiercely. “Ma’s calm like a stagnant pond, Frankie. She’s just opted out, hasn’t she? She’s been having a slow, silent,
secret
freak-out for the last nine years.
That’s
normal?”

And then Gordana’s hot green eyes filmed over, suddenly full and lucent under the ceiling light. She blinked hard, but too late; two tears fell straight down her face, and she flicked them away exasperatedly.

Absurdly, Frankie had a vision of the last time he remembered Gordana crying. She had been fourteen and her first boyfriend, Caspar Trugly, had gone away to Camp America. Gordana had stood, then, behind Ma, clinging to her like an overgrown papoose, crying into the back of Ma’s neck. Now she stood, defiant, in front of Frankie, two more tears snaking downward.

“Oh, good
God,
” said Gordana furiously. She sat down in the office chair and wiped her hands roughly across her face. “Stupid to cry. There’s no point. It’s just the way it is.”

The words on the computer screen seemed to pulse at Frankie.
Cuban, Louis, Stiletto, Spool.
He should have left Gordana to do her quiz, left things as they were. But he didn’t seem able to do that anymore. Something was making him pick at scabs these days, disturb all the surfaces.

“At least it’s better than it was,” said Gordana. She was talking almost to herself, looking at her bare feet now, twining them roughly around the chair’s circular base. Gordana’s feet were very white and long, and her toenails were painted the same Ming blue as her fingernails. The longer you looked at them, Frankie thought, the more her feet looked like two quite separate creatures. Elegant marine reptiles.

“At least she’s happier these days,” said Gordana. “Stable. That’s a big improvement.”

A parade of images walked quickly through Frankie’s head: half-caught scenes, like snatches of an old dream. Ma crouched down in the corner of the kitchen, her fists tight, sweat beading on her forehead. Ma’s face fixed in panic, her tentative two-step back and forth from the front door. Nellie in Frankie’s bedroom, packing his clothes and toys, stuffing Kidder in his backpack, knotting a scarf around his neck,
what fun
they were going to have, she was saying. Louie in the backyard, dribbling a soccer ball, going around and around in ever widening circles, a ceaselessly spinning top. Ma sitting on the sofa in her green brocade robe, an open book beside her as she waited, her soft hands and her breath as she pulled him close to her.

And here was Ray Davies on his way up the stairs. His unclipped nails made a crazy chatter; he was whimpering in anticipation as he climbed.

“Can you remember?” said Frankie quickly. “Can you remember when Ma used to go outside?”

“Some things,” said Gordana, still inspecting her feet. “Shopping. Going to the library. At the Aunties’, way back. Walking to school.”

“I can’t remember,” said Frankie. “Not anything. I can only remember all that time at the Aunties’, going places with them, staying there, and then seeing Ma sometimes, but only at home.”

Ray Davies was launching himself at the door, making a loony song with his whining and barking, but Frankie and Gordana remained on bed and chair, mesmerized briefly by those old, sad times.

“We used to visit you at the Aunties’,” said Gordana. “Me and Louie. Uncle George brought us over because we missed you, ha.”

Gordana had lain beside him on the bed in Frankie’s room, he remembered. She had read aloud to him.

“The Urchin and Little O,”
said Frankie. He could recall all
that
quite clearly: the Japanese paper kite suspended from the ceiling, a giant painted bird whose wings undulated gently when the window was on the latch; the sound of that latch, rattling in the easterly wind; the rise and fall of Gordana’s voice, her exciting proximity and school smell, her long braids and colored hair ties. The Urchin and Little O were brother and sister, too; it was an old book from Ma’s childhood. Frankie had stared at the blond children in the drawings, yet had somehow seen black-haired Louie and Gordana; he had longed to be in their games, then and always, back at his real home.

Ray Davies’s entreaties subsided temporarily into a thin whine. He would be standing in front of the door, Frankie knew, staring hopefully, slobbering with excitement.

“Aboly, jaboly, B T Piggle,”
said Gordana, smiling a little.

“Big O and Little O,”
Frankie capped the line. It was from the old paperback.

“Oh, good
God!
” said Gordana as Ray Davies flung himself once more at the door. “Let the idiot in.”

But the door opened wide before Frankie could rouse himself, and Louie walked in. He was listening to his Shuffle and playing air guitar, his face contorted in mock ecstasy.

Frankie lay back on the bed and yielded to Ray Davies’s moist attentions.

“Meine Schwester und mein kleiner Bruder!”
said Louie. For some reason, Louie often greeted them in German. He said it was the only thing he’d retained from school.
“Guten Tag!”

Imagine being Ray Davies, thought Frankie as the dog slurped and nuzzled him. What a great life. Perpetual enthusiasm, zero worry.

“Hey, Louie,” said Gordana. She had turned back to the computer. She had ruled a line under their conversation, Frankie knew, tidied it off. “What is a Novak?”

“Pass,” said Louie. “
Deine grosse, grosse Tanten
are downstairs, and they’ve brought fudge.”

“A limited-edition bag,” said Gordana. Click,
tring
. “By Alexander McQueen. Go to the top of the class, Gordana.”

“C’mon,” said Louie, lifting the dog off Frankie. “Your breath stinks, boyo. Give the guy a break. Frankie! I have a cunning business plan. You’re gonna like it.”

Frankie sat up slowly. His head was spinning, his skin gluey with dog lick.

“Franko!” said Gordana. She rotated the office chair like a miniature merry-go-round. “Last one, last one, I’m on forty-nine. Where does angora fiber come from? Which animal?”

“Rabbit?” said Frankie tiredly. It was a guess. Gordana halted her spinning abruptly and banged her hands on the desk.

“Correct!” Click,
tring.
“Not so stupid after all,” said Gordana, snapping shut the lid of her MacBook.

“
Ein kleiner Bruder
is a clever Dick,” said Louie.

Oy sey, Sarlick amit Knarfie gribins Naipsac nemschie,
Frankie said to himself. (Oh yes, Frankie is a prince among men.)

If only, if only.

“Have you ever done anything really bad,” said Frankie. “I mean, really?”

Ma didn’t answer immediately. She almost never did. Frankie liked that about Ma.

“I shoplifted,” said Ma. “With Mary-Lou Haines. We shoplifted six lipsticks from the Styx Pharmacy. The Aunties were mortified.”

“Worse than that?” said Frankie. He was on top of Ma’s bed, hugging the winter quilt, his breath making weak clouds in the bedroom air. He could see his breath because the moon was full tonight, the uncanny light filling Ma’s room.

Ma had been reading
Doctor Zhivago.
Again. She read it every year. The book had slipped from her hands and she had just turned off the light when Frankie tiptoed in. He picked up the book now, inspected it, though it was well known to him. The cover was silver, the title in black curlicue letters. The broad spine was creased with countless tiny wrinkles. When Frankie was first learning to read, he had thought the author’s name was Boris Pancake because of the P and the K in Pasternak. He still liked to think of him that way.

“I’ve
thought
bad things.”

“Like what?”

“Too private,” said Ma, after a moment.

“Thought doesn’t count, anyway,” said Frankie.

“Count for what?”

“For my question.”

“I suppose I’ve never been tempted,” said Ma. “Or I’ve been too scared.”

“Same,” said Frankie. “I’m too scared to shoplift.”

“Good,” said Ma.

Frankie squinted at the woman in the painting. He had decided she must be in an asylum, a very grand asylum with canopied beds and maidservant nurses. Could there be such a thing? Why not? It was his version of her story. Maybe she was called Hannah. Or Ruth. Or Deborah. He knew all the Biblical names. Nellie had read him Old Testament stories when he was little.

“Naomi?” Frankie asked, nodding at the painting. He asked Ma every night now, whole lists of names, exactly like Rumpelstiltskin, ha.

“No,” said Ma.

“Rachel, Rebecca, Bathsheba?”

Ma laughed. “Sorry.”

“Basically, you have to be brave to be bad,” said Frankie.

“Is there something on your mind?” said Ma.

“Probably,” said Frankie.

“Can I help?”

Probably not,
he thought, but he said, “So, we’re finishing
The Valiant Ranger
over the holidays.”

“You pleased with it?” said Ma.

“Pretty,” said Frankie. “Uncle George’ll laser print it. It’s not due till the fourth week of next term, but Sydney wants to get it done.”

“A woman of action,” said Ma.

The distant sound of a siren reached them through the bedroom window, which was opened to the night. Ma liked night air in her room, she said, even when it was cold.

Then why not go out into the actual night? Frankie wanted to say. Just step outside. Look at the stars. Check out the full moon. Lately he imagined these rebel questions just popping out of his mouth sometime, being spoken aloud without his bidding. They were bad-tempered, insistent questions, like the croaking toads that spilled from the mouth of the princess in the old story.

The siren grew louder. The Queen Victoria Hospital was just down the hill, so they heard sirens regularly. Frankie stole a look at Ma. Her eyes were closed. She hated sirens. Uncle George had told them years ago that siren sounds were the only thing Ma could remember about her parents’ car accident. Ma had been in the car, too, and unharmed, but she could remember nothing, just that high-pitched, unrelenting wail and the flashing lights.

“Sydney might be leaving,” said Frankie, to distract Ma. This was not precisely true, nor was it exactly untrue. But it was, currently, Frankie’s number-one anxiety. Ma opened her eyes.

“Oh, Frankie,” she said. “Why?”

“Who knows,” said Frankie. “Her mother gets itchy feet.”

“Tell me what her mother does, again?” said Ma. The siren was fading now. Frankie imagined it racing out to the western suburbs, a straight arrow to some disaster.

“She reads to the blind,” said Frankie. This was the only thing he knew for sure.

“That’s a neat thing to do.”

Somewhere in a reasonable corner of his brain, Frankie conceded it might be a good thing, but he refused to rearrange his hostility toward Sydney’s mother. He hated her and that was final.

“But all that moving around,” said Ma. “Must be hard on Sydney and her sisters.”

He was irritated at Ma for stating the obvious. But he said, “They’re used to it. And Sydney goes to Holland in September anyway.”

“Maybe she won’t go before, though,” said Ma.

Frankie said nothing. The moon had risen higher, well above the windows now, and the light in the bedroom had diminished. The painting woman had receded in the way she did every night, just her hair showing, lustrous and abundant.
Prudence,
thought Frankie; that was an old-fashioned name. The Aunties had had a school principal called Miss Prudence Fanshawe.