After Zero Page 14

  I find myself forgetting Beady and everything else for a minute and wondering if Miss Looping and her sister looked alike. Did they share secrets? Have a sister language? Did Miss Looping see it coming—the suicide?

  I get up and hand her my letter with a note on top. Sorry about your sister.

  She reads it and smiles. “Oh. Thanks. It took time, but I’m okay now. You could say I had some help.”

  I tilt my head inquisitively, and she tucks a curl behind her ear. “Sometimes when we feel lost, the universe sends a little help. Something or someone to guide us on our path.” She chuckles, her eyes gleaming. “And that can come in the most unexpected form.”

  I try to smile along like I know what she’s talking about, because this is how Miss Looping is sometimes—a little, well, loopy. But that’s also why I like her.

  “This isn’t for me, by the way.” She sets my note aside but hands my letter back to me without looking at it. “Hang on to it. I don’t need to know what happened, but other people will.”

  I take the letter back to my desk and slip it in a folder in my backpack. I pause at a piece of paper in the folder’s left pocket: my ghazal. I almost forgot to hand it in.

  • • •

  I’m a few minutes early to my meeting with Ms. Standish. Her office door is shut, but leaning close I can hear my mother already inside.

  “Yes…she talks at home. Well, she hasn’t spoken to me lately, but…usually…when she’s home…she talks. I mean, I’ll ask if she had a good day at school, and she’ll say yes. I’ll ask what she wants for dinner, and she’ll tell me. We never have elaborate conversations, but…” A pause. “You’re telling me that all this time, she hasn’t been talking at school?”

  I press my ear to the door. I’ve never heard her talk to other people about me. Is she only pretending to be concerned so that she sounds like a “normal” mother in front of Ms. Standish?

  “Yes, well, that’s what I’d like to discuss. I wasn’t fully aware of the problem until the incident at the track today. I knew Elise was quiet, but then I started talking to some of her classmates. They said she hasn’t spoken here at all for a week.”

  “At all?”

  “And in the months before that, she averaged a few words a day. Only when spoken to. Now, I understand she was homeschooled before she came here…”

  “So?”

  “Well, some would say home learners miss out on proper social development, and—”

  “Wait a minute.” I hear my mother shifting in her chair. “That’s a stereotype.”

  “I know. I was going to say, I don’t think that’s what’s going on here. I know other ex-homeschoolers who have no trouble talking.”

  I think of Fin and Conn.

  Papers shuffle. “Read this when you have a chance.”

  “‘Selective mutism’?” My mother’s voice wobbles. “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “It’s an anxiety condition—usually first noticed when a kid starts school outside the home. That’s preschool in many cases. In Elise’s case, eighth grade. It sounds like she had low-profile selective mutism for a while, but then it got worse.”

  I gape at the door. Is she diagnosing me? Who does she think she is?

  “And if she hasn’t been talking to anyone lately, including you, she might even have progressive mutism.”

  “Progressive?”

  “Meaning she started out not talking in certain situations, but now it’s progressed to all situations. Bear in mind, I’m a counselor, not a clinical psychologist, so you’d want an expert’s opinion. I recommend Dr. Rosetti…”

  Anger rattles my bones. What right does Ms. Standish have to analyze me like I’m the subject of a scientific study? I grab the door handle and storm into the office. Ms. Standish and my mother look up. It’s the first time I’ve seen my mother since I hid behind the bush the other day. The new wrinkles on her forehead couldn’t be for me. She has never worried over me. Maybe over my brothers, but not me.

  “Elise…right on time.” Ms. Standish smiles. “Have a seat.”

  I sit in one of the chairs against the wall opposite my mother.

  My mother’s eyes fill with watery stuff. Where have these emotions been? The only other time I’ve ever seen her cry was that moment in the driveway, when she didn’t know I could see.

  “Elise…” Ms. Standish leans her elbows on her desk and folds her hands. “Is there any way you can explain to your mother and me what happened today? Why you didn’t say anything or call for help?”

  They both watch me as if waiting for my body to break out in mime or sign language or interpretive dance. I look down at my hands.

  That’s when I realize why Miss Looping told me to write the letter.

  I reach into my backpack and take out the pages, giving them to Ms. Standish. She raises an eyebrow and begins to read, sipping her coffee. After she finishes the first page, she passes it to my mother. Their eyes dart across my words, and I think they forget I’m here. While I wait, I stare at the pamphlet on the chair next to my mother. On the cover, a black-and-white photograph shows a girl sitting in the middle of a classroom, her mouth a line, while the kids around her smile and raise their hands. White letters are printed over the picture: Selective Mutism. The girl looks young for someone so solemn. Is that what I look like to other people?

  The papers rustle. Ms. Standish hands the last page to my mother and drains her coffee, glancing up at me curiously.

  My mother keeps looking from the papers to me to Ms. Standish, her eyes wide.

  “Can you judge how much of this is true?” Ms. Standish asks her.

  My mother shakes her head. “This… I don’t even understand this.”

  “Do her brothers know about this…account of hers?”

  I study my uneven nails, waiting for my mother’s answer. She doesn’t say anything. I glance up, and she’s looking straight at me. “She doesn’t have any brothers.”

  I can’t believe her. Here I am, giving away my letter, trying to tell the truth, and she’s lying to my face?

  “So these two boys… You never had them?” Ms. Standish asks.

  “I never said never.”

  Ms. Standish frowns. “Sorry?”

  “I did have them.”

  “But what—”

  “They passed away.” My mother’s hands tremble as she sets down my letter on the seat next to her. “When she was a baby. They were in a car accident.”

  I sit up in my chair. Passed away? Why is she saying that?

  “Oh.” Ms. Standish puts a hand on her chest. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I had no idea.” She holds out a tissue box.

  My mother takes a tissue and dabs her eyes. “That’s why she couldn’t have seen them. It’s just not possible.”

  Lies, I want to shout. Don’t let her fool you. Lying is her specialty.

  Ms. Standish taps her chin and looks over at my letter on the chair. “Well, there is the possibility…” She hesitates. “You’ll see in the pamphlet I gave you that selective mutism often coexists with other types of anxiety. Does Elise seem to worry a lot? Any trouble sleeping?” She doesn’t turn her head, but her eyes flit in my direction. “Sleep deprivation can cause hallucinations.”

  Cold air prickles my neck. Is that an accusation?

  I spring to my feet. I refuse to listen to any more of this.

  My mother squints at me through puffy eyes. “Are you okay?”

  She’s suddenly so interested in my well-being. I hurry past her and Ms. Standish, snatching my letter off the chair. Both of their jaws drop, but they don’t have time to object because I’m out the door.

  I run all the way home. I think I beat my personal record for the mile. Coach Ewing would be proud.

  I burst through the front door and bound through the house, looking in every room and o
ut the windows into the yard. No one is here waiting for me. No Granny P. No boys with eyebrows that almost meet in the middle.

  In the kitchen, a few dishes sit in the sink, though not as many as last time. I notice another appointment card for Hillview Counseling & Psychotherapy on the table. And the knitted scarf, still not finished but longer than before. Next to it lies a folder with a sticky note on it and words in my mother’s hand: For Elise. I open the folder. A few newspaper clippings sit inside. I spread them out, my vision moving in and out of focus across the headlines.

  Father dead, sons in critical condition after single-car crash

  Young crash victim brain-dead, older brother still fighting

  Tragic update to Barmazian brothers’ story

  I snatch up the last one. The paper shakes because my fingers shake.

  BOSTON—Pregnant math professor Moira Barmazian was teaching a class on April 13 when her water broke—a week earlier than expected. A colleague drove her to the hospital and phoned her husband, Greg Barmazian, who was at home with their two sons.

  Approximately fifteen minutes later, drivers down the road from the hospital saw Mr. Barmazian’s car crash into a guardrail, flip, and roll down an embankment before striking a tree.

  Mr. Barmazian was pronounced dead at the scene, while three-year-old Eustace Barmazian and five-year-old Emerson Barmazian were rushed to the hospital where their mother was in labor. It appeared that Mr. Barmazian had not been wearing a seat belt, and his sons had not been properly secured in their car seats.

  Doctors later told Mrs. Barmazian that Emerson was drifting in and out of consciousness and might pull through with long-term health complications. Eustace, however, was on life support and showed no brain activity or hope of recovery.

  I pause, trying to calm my heartbeat. Trying to clear my head. Barmazian? I don’t know that last name. But the first names match up. My mother’s, my brothers’…and the date of the accident.

  I force myself to keep reading.

  Yesterday evening, following weeks of silence, the family finally updated the press. Liesl Pileski, the boys’ grandmother, was in tears as she relayed a message from their mother, revealing that Mrs. Barmazian had given doctors permission to switch off Eustace’s life support a week after the accident.

  Just three days later, Emerson had suffered bleeding in his brain and had been put into a medically induced coma for emergency brain surgery. Once taken off full sedation, he had remained comatose.

  “It’s like he followed his brother,” said Pileski. “Like he couldn’t be without him.” Yesterday morning, Mrs. Barmazian granted permission to withdraw Emerson’s life support.

  Chapter 22

  I push away the clipping. My chest heaves.

  No—this is wrong. All wrong. I saw them. I heard them. At the cottage in the woods. They were both there, Eustace and Emerson, safe and sound.

  I clamp my eyes shut so I can go back.

  But when I try to picture the clearing, the cottage, my brothers…I can’t see the details. I can’t tell Emerson from Eustace. I can’t see their faces. I can’t see Granny P either. I can’t see any of it. It’s all a blur, a windshield under broken wipers in the rain. Sleep deprivation can cause hallucinations…

  There are colors, lots of colors, tumbling together and then apart. The awake and the unsleep, crashing together and then apart.

  Was there ever a cottage in the woods? Was there ever music? Two boys and an old woman?

  Is Ms. Standish right?

  I leave the clippings scattered on the table and stumble out the back door to the shed. Inside, I find the teddy bear in one of the boxes and straighten his bow tie. Smooth out his fur. I wrap my arms around him and curl up on the shed floor like I’m five instead of thirteen.

  • • •

  When I wake up, a blanket covers me. I sit up to find my mother sitting cross-legged near a box behind me, looking at a toy boat in her hand.

  “The plan was to give it to you myself,” she says. “The folder.”

  She turns the boat this way and that, studying it from different angles. She still can’t look at me.

  “But I guess you know now…how it ended.” She takes a long breath. “And I hope you don’t think I blamed you.”

  The newspaper clippings flash before my eyes. Doesn’t she realize it’s a little too late for that? If it weren’t for me—if I hadn’t come early—my brothers and my father would be here. I’d know them. We’d be an actual family, and my mother wouldn’t be so…

  I turn away, hiding my face in the crook of my arm. I can’t let her see my tears.

  “Listen. Do you know why your father crashed that car?” She pauses. “It wasn’t because of you.”

  I shake my head and keep my face in my arm. The newspaper clippings made it clear: He was driving to the hospital. I might not have caused the crash, but he and my brothers wouldn’t have been in the car at that moment if it weren’t for me.

  “One thing we kept from the press…” My mother sighs. “Well, there’s no nice way to say it. They found alcohol in your father’s system.”

  I lift my face and turn to stare at her. She told me a drunk driver had killed him. She never said he was that driver.

  “I know.” She presses on. “I should have told you. I should have told you lots of things.”

  I wipe my eyes and watch her tuck the toy boat inside a box. “I had this idea that I could separate you from what happened. I mean, that’s why I gave you my maiden name. That’s why I moved us a few towns away and homeschooled you for so long. So you wouldn’t have to live in the shadow of a tragedy. But I handled it all wrong.” She closes the flaps on the box of toys. “And I shouldn’t have hung on to their stuff like this. It never helped, the way I’d come out here some nights just to breathe in their scent.”

  I think of the two nights I spotted her leaving the shed.

  “Maybe tomorrow, if you’re free, you can help me bring some of these toys to the charity shop.”

  I look around at the boxes. It will be a good thing. The toys will find new homes, and children will play with them again, bring them back to life. But my mother said some, not all, so I tuck the teddy bear under the blanket for safekeeping.

  My mother reaches into a box without an Emerson or Eustace label and pulls out an old photo album. She opens it and scoots toward me, holding it out so I can see. I look on as she flips through baby pictures of my brothers. Sometimes my mother is in them, smiling at the boys, and sometimes a man with a moustache is there too. In one photograph, Emerson is sitting on my father’s shoulders while my father smiles at the camera, a beer can in hand. In the background, my mother is watching, frowning. But in another picture, my father is on a couch with my brothers, one on each of his knees, reading a Dr. Seuss book to them. I can tell he loved my brothers. And he would have loved me.

  Still, it’s funny: I didn’t know about my brothers or Granny P until this month, and yet they feel more real to me than my father, who’s been a vague figure floating at the back of my mind all my life. And he only grows vaguer now, maybe because I can’t understand why he, or anyone, would do something that endangered those he loved. Maybe someday I will, but right now it seems impossible.

  We come to a picture of an older woman with my brothers. “That’s my mom.” My mother taps the woman with her finger.

  I squint at the photograph. The old woman’s face is out of focus, like the face of the old woman in the woods.

  “Some people criticized my decision,” my mother says. “Kept saying miracles could happen. But your granny understood. I don’t suppose you remember her? She died when you were five.”

  My stomach sinks. She’s dead?

  On some level I must have known.

  “I should have brought you to see her more often. But I had trouble leaving the house, facing people, back t
hen. That’s how I lost friends, lost my job, stopped teaching for a while. Could only manage online classes after that.” She keeps her eyes on the photograph. “Right before she died, she kept insisting I tell you everything. I promised her I would when you turned thirteen. I figured you’d be old enough to understand then. And I could put it off a while. Then last weekend you found their stuff in here, and I…” She shakes her head. “I still couldn’t face telling you. Silence was easier. And I realize now what sort of harm that might have done.”

  She takes something out of her pocket—the Selective Mutism pamphlet—and looks at the girl on the cover. “You must have been frustrated with your own silence. Not knowing how to explain it. I can see how appealing it must have been to think your silence could bring home your brothers.” My mother half smiles. “Believe me, I prefer your version.” She folds and unfolds the pamphlet, eventually setting it aside. “It’s still hard. I still question my decision every day. But I couldn’t keep either of them here like that. They weren’t there anymore. I just…” Her voice trails off, and she presses her lips together.

  So that’s what she meant. No one understood why I couldn’t keep them here.

  She slides a hand over her graying hair, and it shows—what she’s been through. During all the years I mistook for indifference, even resentment, she’s been suffering.

  And now that the right colors have come into focus, I understand that I’ve been suffering too. No wonder my mother and I couldn’t be there for each other. We couldn’t even be there for ourselves.

  Next in the photo album we come to a picture of a girl no older than three, holding a toy telephone to her cheek, her mouth open. My mother smiles. “You were little miss chatterbox.”

  I stare at the picture. Can that really be me? What happened to her?

  My mother takes a deep breath. “I know I haven’t been mom of the year. Or the decade. But I need you to know none of it was your fault.” She looks me in the eye now. “You know that, right?”