Nervous System
Chapter One
Abbey grabs the red crayon from my hand and throws it at my head. I duck, and the crayon sails into the dry-erase board on the wall behind me, landing in the metal tray beneath it with a ping. Abbey giggles until she sees me scowling at her.
"Abigail!" Mrs. Gardener says sharply. "We do not throw things in class. Move your clothespin to blue, please. You will be missing recess."
Thank God the little heathen is missing recess. Maybe I'll try to get in a game of handball. As long as she isn't there to torture me, the other kids will probably let me play.
"Here you go, Thomas." Mrs. Gardener stands over me, holding out my red crayon. I take it from her with a small smile.
"You know, when people tease us, it's only because they like us a lot and don't know how to tell us."
"Thank you, Mrs. G," I say, "but sometimes a bully is just a bully."
I bend back over my worksheet and continue to color all the pictures of things that begin with the letter "R" in red.
Chapter Two
It's my turn to bring a book to school to share. I have to read it out loud.
Unable - or maybe unwilling - to make a choice, I run my hands back over the books on my shelf. Foundation, Friday, Neuromancer, Misery, Odd Thomas, Dune, all of Tolkien's works. I know that none of them are appropriate. I need Dr. Seuss, but the closest thing I have is J.K. Rowling.
Where the hell are all the children's books? I know I didn't come out of the womb reading Heinlein and Pratchett.
I track Mom down in the kitchen and ask her. "Do we have any children's books?"
Mom kneels before the open fridge, swiping out one of the drawers with a sponge. "All your books are on your bookshelf," she says, distracted.
"No, I mean books for kids. Young readers."
She finally stops wiping and blinks at me. "Why do you want those?"
"I have to bring a book to share with the class. I need something for them."
"Oh." Mom smiles, shuts the drawer, and stands. She closes the fridge. "I can take you to the library."
"That's fine," I say, "but where are all my old kids' books? I know I remember reading them, but I can't recall where they went."
Mom's brow furrows. She pitches the sponge into the sink, and puts a hand on my shoulder. "I have boxes of them in the garage. I thought you were done with them."
I blow out a breath, relieved that my memory is correct and, once upon a time, I read picture books and rhyming stanzas. "Can we get them out?" I ask.
Mom nods and we enter the garage.
I never noticed all the boxes before. Plastic bins in muted colors of blues, greens, and beige, each labeled with black marker, line all three sides of the garage, continuing up into the rafters where someone laid plywood for extra storage.
I read the labels of the bins at my eye level. Most of them contain things from my past.
"Thomas Year 1"
"Thomas Year 2"
"Thomas Year 2, #2"
"Matchbox Cars"
"Blocks"
"Thomas Year 5, #6"
"Grandma Ruth's China"
"Why do you keep all this stuff?" I ask her.
She laughs. "For you. So you can remember one day. And so that your kids can have it."
"Wow," I say. "Is there a system?"
She laughs again. "Not really, but I've been pretty good about labeling. And I know where most of the stuff is."
Mom walks to the back wall of the garage where the bins are stacked four high and pulls on a bin from the top row. It's too heavy for her to handle, and it crashes to the ground with a thump.
"Sucker's heavy," she gasps. "Let's open it here."
Mom lifts off the lid, and we both bend over the bin.
"Magic Tree House," she says. "Would one of those work?"
Forty or fifty Magic Tree House books are stuffed into the bin. I begin to unload them.
"No. No chapter books. I need a picture book or early reader." I stack the dog-eared books in teetering piles beside the bin.
"Why do you need a picture book if you can read something more advanced? Honestly, Thomas, you don't have to hide."
"I'm not hiding," I mumble. "I'm fitting in."
This is a familiar argument, and one Mom knows she can't win. Wisely, she gives up and digs into the bin.
"Here. This was one of your favorites." She hands me Noah's Ark, a picture book by Jan Brett. I take it and flip through the pages.
"I did love this one," I say. "The illustrations are breathtaking. But nope. Won't work." I pitch it to the floor.
"Why not?" Mom asks.
"Separation of church and state. No sense bringing a religious book to school. The last thing I need is to be labeled that Bible-thumping nut."
"You're being ridiculous," Mom says, and I suspect she's right. But too bad. I refuse to give my teacher and classmates any more ammunition against me.
I dive back into the bin and pull out the five or six books that are left. On top is Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst.
"This is perfect," I say, holding the book up for Mom to see.
She smiles. "Let's put the rest back, then."
"Wait," I say, and Mom looks a question at me. "Can we put these back on my bookshelf in my room?"
"Why? We don't have much book space as it is."
"You can always give away your Susan Elizabeth Phillips collection to make more room."
Mom narrows her eyes at me. "Not on your life, buster."
I laugh. "Can I keep them out, please?"
Mom softens and throws an arm around my tiny shoulders. "Of course. But why?"
"I just want to feel normal," I say.
She looks away, sniffles, and grabs a handful of books. "Let's go, then."
#
I finish my reading of the book, and close the cover.
The class erupts into cheers and wild applause.
Actually, no, they don't, they sit there in silence, glaring at me, until Marco Vincetti yells out from the back, "I don't get it. What's Australia?"
Mrs. Gardener gently pushes me from the stool in front of the class and guides me back to my desk.
"Australia is a country on the other side of the world. The boy in the book, Alexander, threatens to run away there when he's having a tough day." She moves to the world map tacked on the wall and points. "Here is Australia. And here we are, in California, in the United States. Quite far apart. Thank you, Thomas, for sharing your book. That was some amazing reading."
"Thank you," I say.
"Any other questions, class?" she asks.
"Why don't they want black shoes?" Abbey asks without raising her hand. "Nobody wants white shoes with blue stripes. Those are stupid."
"Abigail, we don't call other people's choices stupid. They are just different," Mrs. Gardener says.
I know I should keep quiet, but I can't. I turn in my seat to look at Abbey. "Actually, white tennis shoes with blue stripes were very popular when this book was written. They didn't even make black ones back then."
"They didn't?" Abbey asks, eyes wide.
"Nope. They also wore socks with colored stripes. The boys would pull their socks up, almost to their knees, so people could see the stripes on them."
"No!" Abbey says, shocked. "Only girls wear knee socks."
"Not then."
"Was that like a hundred years ago?" she asks.
"About thirty years ago," I say.
Seeing an opportunity, Mrs. Gardener jumps in. "How much is thirty?" she asks. "Who can count to thirty by fives?"
I tune out. I slide my sketchpad out of my desk and into my lap. I sketch a little girl with ratty braids, eyes comically wide, saying, "No!"
It's a damn good picture.
#
As soon as I get in the car, it hits me.
"I need vitamin C, Mom," I say by way of greeting, and she pulls away from the school curb and into traffic.
"You want a pill or some orange juice?" she asks.
"I'll just take a couple pills. Maybe 500 milligrams. I had a stressful day."
"Oh," Mom says. "Did the book not go over well?"
I sigh. "It was fine. I just worked myself up quite a bit about it."
Mom pulls into our driveway and we head for the house. We enter the kitchen, and Mom pours me a glass of milk and takes out a bottle of vitamin C from our pill cabinet.
"Is this all you need?" she asks, tapping two large horse pills into her palm.
I sip my milk and swallow. "For now. I'm a little low on iron, too. Have any liver for dinner?"
Mom hands me the pills, screws the cap back on the bottle, and grimaces. "No way, José."
"Fine. Beef then."
"Done," she says. She leans back on the counter and smiles at me. "Do you remember the first time you swallowed a pill?"
I raise an eyebrow at her over my milk glass.
"Of course you do. Anyway, the pill wouldn't go down, and you gagged, spewing milk out your mouth and nose all over the bathroom floor." She laughs and hugs me. "You just stood there, two little drips of milk sliding from your nostrils, and do you remember what you said?"
I don't say anything.
"'Well, at least we know my gag reflex works.'" She says "weflex" instead of reflex, because at the time, I couldn't pronounce my Rs very well.
"One for the memory book," I say.
"Oh, you," Mom says, tapping me on the nose with her finger. "Even when you were one, you were so worried. You thought you'd be sick forever if you couldn't get that pill down your throat."
I move away from Mom and sit at the kitchen table, twirling my milk glass around and around in my hand.
"Do you think it's unnatural?" I ask. Twirl, twirl, twirl.
Mom is scrubbing the sink. "What's unnatural?"
"Me. Knowing what I know."
"How can it be unnatural?" she asks. "You came by it naturally."
"I suppose, but most people can't do it."
"Most people can't play piano like Mozart, either, but I wouldn't call those that can unnatural. It's another ability. Another blessing."
I nod and sip some more milk. It's another ability. For sure. But a blessing? The jury's still out on that one.
Chapter Three
Mom and I sit in the principal's office with Mrs. Gardener. My teacher has spread copies of my various test results over the table in front of us. Mom barely gives them a glance.
"I thought this was a goal-setting conference," Mom says.
Principal Wasserman and Mrs. Gardener exchange a look. My principal speaks.
"It is, Mrs. Van Zandt. As you know, Thomas is exceptional. We want to make sure that we get this right."
Mom nods for her to continue.
"Mrs. Gardener is at a loss. She's not sure what goals to set for Thomas."
I'm hurt by that. I look at Mrs. Gardener. "You don't know what to do with me?"
She smiles at me. "Thomas, I'm the luckiest teacher in the world to have you. I know, though, that you don't need me. You already know everything we teach in the first grade, and probably everything we teach at this school. I don't want to hold you back."
"You're not," I say. "I'm learning tons in your class. Tons! Just yesterday, when you talked about the life cycle of a frog, I never knew all that."
Mom clears her throat, and I backtrack.
"Well, okay, maybe I knew that stuff, but I've never heard it explained that way before."
Mrs. Gardener laughs. "I'm sure that's true," she says.
"Look," Mom says, "I know Thomas is advanced, but I want him in school, with classmates his own age. I want him to have the social interaction."
"He's bored," the principal says. "The curriculum does not challenge him. We feel he would be better served at a private school, or with private tutors."
"Is my son a discipline problem?" Mom asks.
"Of course not," Mrs. Gardener says. "Even when he's bored, he entertains himself."
"Then I don't see the problem," Mom says. "Let him do his own thing. I'm taking care of his education. He has plenty of books and activities at home to challenge him. But he needs to stay in school to make friends."
Principal Wasserman eyes Mom steadily, then turns her attention to me, and I prepare myself for an argument. But she surprises me.
"Thomas, do you have any close friends?"
I swallow hard and try to make a joke. "Abbey threw a crayon at my head the other day."
Mrs. Gardener smiles, but no one else does.
"Okay then, here it is." Principal Wasserman selects a piece of paper from the mess on the table and pulls out a pen. "Your primary goal for this semester is to make one close friend." She writes as much on the paper under the comments heading. "Even though you have reached all the first-grade academic goals, and though your mother is in charge on that front, we are still an academic institution, and I cannot let you get away without any academic goals whatsoever. Ladies," she says, looking at Mom and my teacher, "and gentleman, of course, what say you?"
"Thomas?" Mom asks me, and I appreciate it.
"Well, I have a little anxiety...I mean, it's not much to speak of, really, but it might be considered an area in which I need some improvement..."
Mom pokes me.
"Public speaking. I don't like it. Makes me nervous."
"Excellent," Principal Wasserman says, scribbling some more on the paper. "What else?"
"How about anatomy?" Mom says. "You're very interested in the human body." She winks at me, so that I'm the only one who can see her.
"I like that," the principal says. "How about learning the bones of the body?"
"I know all 206 bones," I say, "but I have been planning to do some research on the nervous system. How about that?"
"How about we tie the two things together?" Mrs. Gardener says. "You make me an outline about the nervous system. With nine major topics. And each week, you can give the class a speech about what you've learned. You can be the teacher that day."
"Really?" I ask. "I can teach the class?"
"As long as you use words they'll understand," she says, smiling.
"What about his homework?" Mom asks. "It's fine with me if you want him to do the assigned work, but can I give him work of his own?"
The three of them launch into a discussion of curriculum, areas where Mom can give me harder homework, and how she and Mrs. Gardener can collaborate to make sure I'm learning.
I'm not really listening.
I'm thinking about the nervous system and how to present it in nine succinct lectures.
Chapter Four
Dad comes home today, Flight 227 United Airlines, arriving at 11:09 am.
Mom lets me stay home from school.
I finish vacuuming my room for the third time, and I wrestle the behemoth thing back down the hall and into the closet of the laundry room. I have to wipe the sweat from my brow, the damn vacuum's so heavy.
I grab two rags from the laundry cabinet, along with the Pledge, and head back to my room. I spray every exposed piece of wood I can reach and wipe and wipe some more.
My room smells lemony fresh.
I think about reorganizing my books alphabetically, but Mom calls out to me instead.
"Thomas! Time to go!"
I snatch up the dirty rags and can of polish and rush out.
#
Mom says she used to be able to meet Dad at the gate and watch him step out of the airplane tunnel.
I wish we could do that now, but since I support the extra security at the airport in light of 9/11 and other terrorist threats, I have no room to argue.
So we stay in the car and circle John Wayne Airport, waiting for Dad to appear outside of baggage claim. On our third pass, I spot him.
He cuts an imposing figure. Standing 6'4" tall, muscular without looking like a bodybuilder, he leans forward on his duffel bag, world-weary yet strong. He's wearing his fatigues, "Van Zandt" stitched across the breast, but the "Z" is gone, a scorched-at-the-edges hole replacing it.
Mom gasps, and I know she's seen the hole.
She pulls over directly in front of him - even though it's crowded, no car has claimed that space, whether out of deference for his uniform or in caution of the dangerous-looking man, I'm not sure - and Dad leans in my window as I lower it.
"Hey, Champ," he says.
"Dad!" I unbuckle my seatbelt as fast as my stubby fingers allow and throw the door open. Dad steps back just in time to avoid me clocking his kneecap.
I hurl myself into his arms. Dad sighs into my neck.
"You smell like french fries," he says, chuckling. "I could use me some of that."
Mom is standing a few paces away on the curb, waving a McDonald's bag in his direction.
"Big Mac, super-size fries, Coke extra ice," she says.
Dad releases me, kisses the top of my head, and moves to Mom.
"I knew I married you for a reason," he says.
"Wasn't for my cooking," she says.
The bag rustles as Dad envelopes her. I see her eyes close, her face buried in his collar, hear Dad sigh the sigh of homecoming.
Then the ritual begins.
"You smell of salty grease, Cherry Blossom body spray, warm nights..." he catches his breath, "...cool sheets, promises."
Mom speaks through her sobs. "You smell like dust, sweat, victory and defeat, smoke, fire, hope...and promises."
They pull back at the same moment and draw back together as though one is a magnet, the other iron. Their lips meet, almost a smack, but they've done this too many times to mess it up. They mold and then they meld.
I smile.
Dad's home.
#
We cuddle up in Mom and Dad's bed, Mom and I each resting our heads on Dad's shoulders. He has an arm around each of us, and it takes Mom about two minutes to start snoring.
For her, the difficult part is over. Dad is home, he's alive, there's nothing else to worry about.
It's not that simple for us guys.
I can feel Dad's weariness radiating from every muscle in his body. I can feel his tension, too, coiled within those muscles, ready to spring to action at a moment's notice.
"Dad, what's it like in Afghanistan?" I ask him.
Dad isn't moving, but I feel him go still.
"Why do you think I was in Afghanistan?"
"I haven't heard of any special ops in North Korea, except for those documentary people taken hostage, and I don't think they'd waste you on that assignment."
"There are special ops going on all over the world," he says.
"Probably," I say.
He sighs. "It sucks. It just flat out fucking sucks."
I giggle.
"I'm glad to be home, Thomas. You've grown."
I lift my head and look at him. "I have. One and three-quarter inches in the last fourteen months. Plus I'm gearing up for a growth spurt. Mom's gonna have to buy more milk."
Dad chuckles. "She buy you that Wii yet?"
The last time I Skyped Dad, about three months ago, he told Mom to buy me a Wii. She said it wasn't in the budget, but maybe I'd get one for Christmas. They argued about money. Apparently, Mom was living off Dad's regular paychecks, and saving up all his hazard pay in a special trust for me. Dad said he'd earned the right to spend the hazard pay on me now. Mom didn't agree.
"Not yet. Christmas."
"We're buying one tomorrow. I want to play MarioKart with you."
Dad and I have never played video games together. We play poker when he's home, and he makes sure that we hit the batting cages, and he even taught me how to drop kick a soccer ball. But Mom doesn't like me in front of the television.
"Mom might not be too happy about that," I say.
"She'll come around. Every kid should play video games. She can even play with us."
I try to imagine Mom playing a video game, but my imagination won't go further than her turning the television on.
"Maybe we should just wait. You're not the one who has to live with her."
I immediately regret my words, but there's no way to snatch them out of the air and stuff them back in my mouth. Dad stiffens and pulls me tighter against him. I lay my head back down, and it bobs up and down with Dad's stoic sobs.
Chapter Five
Dad's been home for three days, and it's been the best three days of my life. No school, no Abbey, no schedules at all. Just the three of us, sleeping late, wearing pajamas until noon, eating ice cream and pancakes and Dad's favorites treats for dinner.
It can't last. I know that. I go back to school tomorrow, and I know that without me home as a buffer, as the object of my parents' attention, things will begin to get tense. I'm dreading it.
My parents love each other. I don't doubt that. But there's a dynamic to our lives that becomes unbalanced when Dad gets home after being away for a while.
I don't expect you to understand unless you have a parent in the military. See, when Dad's gone, Mom and I have our routines. We have our rituals. We get to decide how we spend our time, what we want to eat, when we want to go to bed (or Mom decides, at least). Then suddenly there's a new person in the mix, someone who is used to giving orders rather than taking them. Someone whose own routine is the complete opposite of ours, someone who likes things a certain way. He's not wrong. I know Dad has to do things a certain way just to survive. It's just that it's different.
And keep in mind, he's only home for a month. We have to wiggle and shift and compromise and make room for this gigantic personality, and quite suddenly, he'll leave us again. And we'll have to go back to our pre-Dad routines, trying to fill the void of his absence.
It's tough. Glorious, and tough, all at the same time.
Dad hasn't had a month of leave in over three years. Usually he just has a week. I wonder why he suddenly has this chunk of down time - maybe the scorched hole in his uniform has something to do with it.
So three and a half more weeks, and Dad's taking the opportunity to do things he's never done before. Like visit me at school. He's actually going to spend an entire day in my class with me, helping out. I have mixed feelings about it. I like that he won't be out of my sight, and I like that my mom will have some time to herself. I don't like the possible repercussions of having my "daddy" around for a whole school day. I cannot predict how the other kids will react. Dad's pretty cool, so it could be good. Or it could be disastrous for me.
Dad hasn't exercised since he's been back, probably a record for him. So we decide to walk to school. He holds my tiny hand in his large one, and he quizzes me about school as we stroll.
"So tell me about your friends," he says.
"Um, there are twenty-six kids in my class," I say, hedging. "In alphabetical order, there's Abigail, Brian, Britney, Casey--"
"That's nice," he says, "but I'll never remember them all. Tell me about the ones you play with. Your close friends."
"Look at that," I say, pointing to a hedge growing beside us. "Honeysuckle. Can you smell it?"
Dad squeezes my hand a little too tight - he doesn't know his own strength, like I do. "Thomas," he says.
I sigh. "I'm not too close with any of the kids," I admit. "I don't have much in common with them."
Dad knows that, but I don't think he expected me to be a loner. He doesn't call me on it, though.
"Well, who are the nice kids, then?" he asks.
"Tessa," I say, a little too quickly. And Dad flashes me a grin.
"She cute?"
"In that girl-next-door kinda way," I say. "She wears glasses, which I'm quite fond of. They make her green eyes look like jewels in her face. Blonde hair to her shoulders. Sprinkle of freckles across her nose. Cute."
Dad chuckles. "And she's nice? Smart?"
"The best reader in our class after me. And when Abbey called me a freak a couple of weeks ago, she told Abbey to shut up."
"Some kid called you a freak?" Dad asks. His voice is tight with anger, and I realize my mistake.
"Oh, I, it's no big deal. I did something stupid. It's over."
"You are not a freak. You need to stand up for yourself, Thomas, or people will run right over you."
I study the sidewalk. "I know that. I do stand up. I do."
"This Abbey. Is that the only incident you've had with her?"
"No, sir," I whisper. I think furiously, trying to come up with a way to diffuse this situation. I do not want my father confronting Abbey.
"Hmm," he says, swinging our arms between us. "Well, there's an idiot in every bunch. We'll see if we can knock some sense into her."
I grimace, but hide it from Dad. I'm not sure what his idea of "knocking some sense" into Abbey might entail.
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