The Waste Lands (Page 50)

There was a light knock at the door, and Jake turned warily in that direction.

“It’s Mrs. Shaw, John. May I come in for a minute?” He smiled. Mrs. Shaw—of course it was. His parents had drafted her as an intermediary. Or perhaps translator might be a better word. You go see him, his mother would have said. Hell tell you what’s wrong with him. I’m his mother and this man with the bloodshot eyes and the runny nose is his father and you’re only the housekeeper, but he’ll tell you what he wouldn’t tell us. Because you see more of him than either of us, and maybe you speak his language.

She’ll have a tray, Jake thought, and when he opened the door he was smiling. Mrs. Shaw did indeed have a tray. There were two sandwiches on it, a wedge of apple pie, and a glass of chocolate milk. She was looking at Jake with mild anxiety, as if she thought he might lunge forward and try to bite her. Jake looked over her shoulder, but there was no sign of his parents. He imagined them sitting in the living room, listening anxiously. “I thought you might like something to eat,” Mrs. Shaw said. “Yes, thanks.” In fact, he was ravenously hungry; he hadn’t eaten since breakfast. He stood aside and Mrs. Shaw came in (giving him another apprehensive look as she passed) and put the tray on the desk. “Oh, look at this,” she said, picking up Charlie the Choo-Choo. “I had this one when I was a little girl. Did you buy this today, Johnny?” “Yes. Did my parents ask you to find out what I’d been up to?” She nodded. No acting, no put-on. It was just a chore, like taking out the trash. You can tell me if you want to, her face said, or you can keep still. I like you, Johnny, but it’s really nothing to me, one way or the other. I just work here, and it’s already an hour past my regular quitting time. He was not offended by what her face had to say; on the contrary, he was further calmed by it. Mrs. Shaw was another acquaintance who was not quite a friend . . . but he thought she might be a little closer to a friend than any of the kids at school were, and much closer than either his mother or father. Mrs. Shaw was honest, at least. She didn’t dance. It all went on the bill at the end of the month, and she always cut the crusts off the sandwiches. Jake picked up a sandwich and took a large bite. Bologna and cheese, his favorite. That was another thing in Mrs. Shaw’s favor—she knew all his favorites. His mother was still under the impression that he liked corn on the cob and hated Brussels sprouts.

“Please tell them I’m fine,” he said, “and tell my father I’m sorry that I was rude to him.”

He wasn’t, but all his father really wanted was that apology. Once Mrs. Shaw conveyed it to him, he would relax and begin to tell himself the old lie—he had done his fatherly duty and all was well, all was well, and all manner of things were well.

“I’ve been studying very hard for my exams,” he said, chewing as he talked, “and it all came down on me this morning, I guess. I sort of froze. It seemed like I had to get out or I’d suffocate.” He touched the dried crust of blood on his forehead. “As for this, please tell my mother it’s really nothing. I didn’t get mugged or anything; it was just a stupid accident. There was a UPS guy pushing a hand-truck, and I walked right into it. The cut’s no big deal. I’m not having double vision or anything, and even the headache’s gone now.” She nodded. “I can see how it must have been—a high-powered school like that and all. You just got a little spooked. No shame in that, Johnny. But you really haven’t seemed like yourself this last couple of weeks.” “I think I’ll be okay now. I might have to re-do my Final Essay in English, but-“

“Oh!” Mrs. Shaw said. A startled looked crossed her face. She put Charlie the Choo-Choo back down on Jake’s desk. “I almost forgot! Your French teacher left something for you. I’ll just get it.”

She left the room. Jake hoped he hadn’t worried Mr. Bissette, who was a pretty good guy, but he supposed he must have, since Bissette had actually made a personal appearance. Jake had an idea that personal appearances were pretty rare for Piper School teachers. He wondered what Mr. Bissette had left. His best guess was an invitation to talk with Mr. Hotchkiss, the school shrink. That would have scared him this morn-ing, but not tonight. Tonight only the rose seemed to matter.

He tore into his second sandwich. Mrs. Shaw had left the door open, and he could hear her talking with his parents. They both sounded a little more cooled out now. Jake drank his milk, then grabbed the plate with the apple pie on it. A few moments later Mrs. Shaw came back. She was carrying a very familiar blue folder. Jake found that not all of his dread had left him after all. They would all know by now, of course, students and faculty alike, and it was too late to do anything about it, but that didn’t mean he liked all of them knowing he had flipped his lid. That they were talking about him. A small envelope had been paper-clipped to the front of the folder. Jake pulled it free and looked up at Mrs. Shaw as he opened it. “How are my folks doing now?” he asked.

She allowed herself a brief smile. “Your father wanted me to ask why you didn’t just tell him you had Exam Fever. He said he had it himself once or twice when he was a boy.”

Jake was struck by this; his father had never been the sort of man to indulge in reminiscences which began, You know, when I was a kid . . . Jake tried to imagine his father as a boy with a bad case of Exam Fever and found he couldn’t quite do it—the best he could manage was the unpleasant image of a pugnacious dwarf in a Piper sweatshirt, a dwarf in custom-tooled cowboy boots, a dwarf with short black hair bolting up from his forehead. The note was from Mr. Bissette.