Also Known as Rowan Pohi (3 page)

Marcus studied the letter. "Did you read this to the end, Bobby? It sounds like Rowan's not really accepted until they see his grades and transcripts from his last school."

I sighed. "Yeah, well, that ain't gonna happen."

"His last school was right here," Big Poobs declared, rubbing his belly. "You know, I could go for a stack of pancakes right now."

"Is food your number one priority in life?" I demanded.

"Pretty much, yeah," Poobs admitted.

Marcus slurped the dregs of his drink. "So what should we do with him?"

Poobs blinked. "Who?"

"Rowan Pohi, genius."

It hit me: at that moment we were talking about Rowan like he was a real live person.

"I was thinking we're going to have to, like, deactivate him,"

Marcus suggested. "Not right away but, you know, pretty soon."

"Why?" Poobs asked.

I made a face. "Jeez, Marcus, let the poor kid live a little. He was just born a couple days ago!"

The waitress refilled our drinks and we kept talking like that for the next half-hour, all of us jacked up on sugar and adrenaline and the realization that against all odds our impossible plan had worked.

Here's what I didn't say to my friends: In a strange kind of way, I wasn't surprised to read that letter. Not really. Because the moment I wrote the name Rowan Pohi on that application, I heard a little electronic
blip.
Not just inside my brain, but out loud. Like the sound you hear when an instant message suddenly appears on your computer screen.

Like:
I'm here.

A
T QUARTER TO FIVE I LEFT THE RESTAURANT AND HEADED
home. The heat had finally broken; the summer air was soft and sweet. I was just passing Luquer's, the used-clothing store, when I noticed the girl coming toward me on the sidewalk. She was tall and leggy, with a purple headband and an impressive mane of hair, blond. I recognized her as that Whitestone girl who'd seen sitting in a booth with her friends at the IHOP a few days earlier.

Even from a distance you could see how pretty she was. Maybe she recognized me from the IHOP, because she flashed me a sly smile. Nice. I was still riding high from the Rowan Pohi thing and figured the least I could do was introduce myself. But then I tried to imagine it, playing the scene out in my head.

Hi.

Hey.

Didn't I see you at the IHOP the other day?

Uh-huh. I'm Melissa. What's your name?

Bobby. Bobby Steele.

Talk about a conversation stopper! My father and I had the same name. It wouldn't be surprising if she had read about my father in the newspaper or heard someone mention his name. I didn't want to take that risk, so I dropped my eyes and swung past her, like a guy who had more important things on his mind.

 

My father grilled sirloin tips for supper. The deck wasn't big enough for a table, so we ate in the kitchen. I turned on the fan and lifted the windows to let in the summer air. While we ate we could hear Spanish music drifting up from one of the apartments below ours.

"The Indians hunted meat," Cody was saying.

"Don't talk with your mouth full," my father told him.

Cody swallowed and gulped down some milk. "They used a bow and arrow to kill some cows."

The feather in Cody's hair was tilting; I reached over and straightened it.

"Not cows," I told him. "They hunted buffalo and antelope."

"Can I go to the bead store?" Cody asked. "Please, Dad?"

My father grunted. "You got money?"

Cody nodded eagerly. "I still got ten dollars from my birthday!"

My father glanced over at me. "Maybe Bobby will take you."

I groaned. "I'm busy."

Cody gave me a sulky look. "That's what you always say."

"Well, I am."

After supper, my father went to an AA meeting. Ever since
it
happened, he had been court-ordered to stay away from booze and go to at least three AA meetings per week. He had a special form he had to get signed to show he was there.

Later that night Cody appeared at my bedroom door, looking a little forlorn.

"You didn't read me a story, Bobby."

I sighed. "Oh, all right. C'mon."

I closed my book and followed him into his room. "Those PJs are way too hot. They're for winter."

"No they're not," Cody insisted.

"They'll make you all sweaty." I rummaged through his drawer until I found a pair of summer-weight PJs. "Put these on."

"Okay. Don't look, Bobby."

I turned around to give him some privacy and glanced at his bed. He had already picked out the book he wanted to read:
Horton Hatches the Egg.
It was the same worn copy Mom read to me when I was little.

I sat on his bed, leaning back against the headboard. Cody leaned against me as I started reading the Dr. Seuss book. He laughed at the pictures, and chimed in whenever we came to the part where Horton says, "An elephant's faithful one hundred percent!"

Then we came to the part that talks about Mayzie, the lazy mother of the bird egg, who is on some kind of extended vacation. She's having so much fun chilling out at the beach that she decides she's never going to return to the egg to take care of it.

Cody got very still.

"You okay?" I asked him.

He nodded. But after that he didn't laugh at the pictures. And next time we came to the part where he could chime in, he said nothing.

"You want me to keep going?"

Quietly: "I don't care."

"We can stop, if you want."

"It's almost done," he said.

I finished reading the book. Cody climbed off me and slid under the covers. He grabbed his stuffed squirrel and turned toward the wall.

I put my hand on his back. "You miss Mom?"

Eyes closed, he tucked the squirrel under his chin. I waited for him to say something, but he didn't. It broke my heart that he didn't answer me one way or another. I couldn't give him Mom, but I wanted to give him something. Anything.

I cleared my throat. "Okay, I'll take you to the bead store."

He turned to look at me. "You will?"

I nodded.

"When?" he asked. "Tomorrow?"

"One day this week. Thursday."

He grinned. "I got ten dollars."

"I know."

I told him good night and went to my bedroom.

When I closed my eyes that night, Mom's picture rose into my mind. She had been gone more than a year now, but I remembered her like she'd just left this morning. The smell of her perfume. The way she hummed while she was cooking. Seems like she was always frying a big skillet of onions in the kitchen. There was a big dark mole on her back—Mom's raisin, that's what me and Cody called it. I remembered the dreamy, faraway look in her eyes when she stirred her morning coffee.

And I will never forget what my father did to her.

M
Y PARENTS ARGUED A LOT, BUT LATE LAST SPRING THEIR
fights turned nasty. They fought about money, mostly. Mom had gotten laid off at the school where she worked as a special education teacher. Dad had work troubles too. An inspector said the ventilation system at his repair shop didn't meet city code and shut down the shop for two months. Dad got really pissed. A royal rip-off, he insisted, but finally he realized it was cheaper to update the system than fight City Hall, so that's what he did. It cost him close to ten thousand dollars.

On that particular night, I was in my bedroom, trying to tune out their fighting while I worked on an essay I had to write for English about
The Lord of the Flies.
Jack and Ralph. Dark and light. The conch shell and Piggy's glasses.

What really happened in our apartment that night? It took two days before I had a general idea. Certain things I witnessed myself. Certain things were told to me. But certain things I didn't find out about until I read them in the newspaper. The events that night never formed themselves into a connected story with a beginning, a middle, and an end. Instead I was left with a list of facts.

 

For supper that night Mom had splurged on Alaskan king crab legs.
The crab cost $14.99 per pound.
She was ironing a blouse when my father came home.
He got in her face for spending so much money on food.
Usually Mom backed down when they had a fight.
That night she didn't back down.
They started screaming at each other.
Bellowing so loud the neighbors heard it.
My father grabbed the hot iron.
Pressed it to Mom's bare upper arm.
A piercing scream from the kitchen.
I ran from my room. Took in the scene.
The ironing board upended on the floor.
A bad new smell in the kitchen. Like seared meat.
Mom bent over the sink.
Sobbing.
He had her arm under the kitchen faucet, running water over the injured skin.
He was talking to her. Talking gently.
She couldn't stop crying.
They argued again, almost tenderly this time.
Him: You need to go to the hospital.
Her: I'm okay.
Him: I'm taking you to the hospital.
Her: No, I'll be okay by tomorrow.
Him: You're not okay. I'm taking you to the emergency room.
Her: I'll be okay, Bobby.
Finally she gave in.
She told me: "You're the man of the house. Keep an eye on Cody."
By some miracle, my brother slept through the whole thing.
They left in a taxi.
I didn't know what else to do, so I turned on the TV
They came home two hours later.
Mom's arm covered in gauze from the elbow up.
A trying-to-be-brave smile on her face.
"It looked worse than it is. The doctor said I'll be fine."
Dad poured himself a drink. Old Smuggler Scotch.
Turned on the TV to catch the end of the baseball game, but it was over.
Fifteen minutes later the doorbell rang.
Two police, one tall, one short.

 

"I need to speak to Robert Steele.

" My father came to the door.

"Mr. Steele?"

"That's me."

"We have a warrant for your arrest."

"But I don't want to press charges!" Mom protested.

"It's out of your hands, ma'am. This is a criminal matter.

Sorry."

They handcuffed my father and took him away.

 

For a few weeks our life at home was like a circus.

A stream of strangers tramping through our apartment.

Police who needed to talk to Mom.

A lawyer who needed to talk to Dad.

Two social workers who needed to talk to me and Cody.

I didn't want to talk to anyone. Not even Marcus or Big Poobs.

One day I had had enough. If I didn't get out, I would start throwing things at people.

So I went for a walk. Bought the local paper at the newsstand.

There he was. On the front page.

My father.

Dark circles under his eyes.

Looking like the kind of man who really could do such a thing.

The headline:
IRON STEELE.

I sped through the article, soaking up the missing facts and details nobody had bothered to tell me.

Marilyn Steele suffered second-degree burns.

Robert Steele was charged with aggravated assault, a felony.

The article quoted a nurse in the emergency room: "The pattern of the iron had been branded into the victim's skin."

A man approached the newsstand. He plunked down two quarters and grinned at Ivan, the guy who sells the papers.

"Now, that is a man who knows how to make a good impression!"

The two of them shared a laugh.

Dad didn't want a trial, so he copped a plea.

Except I didn't call him Dad. After what he did that night, I would never think of him as Dad again.

He was sentenced to ninety days in the county jail.

Mom brought us to see him every Sunday afternoon. Trust me: it feels surreal to visit your father in jail, but it's amazing how fast you get used to the routine. We had to go through a metal detector. One time Cody pulled a plastic pistol from his pocket, just a toy squirt gun, but the guard confiscated it and didn't give it back when we left.

My father looked tired. He grew a little beard, sort of a goatee thing, but I didn't much like it, and I don't think Cody did either.

I don't know whether Mom liked it or not. I didn't know what she was thinking. While my father tried to talk to us she sat without speaking, a tight little half smile on her face.

The doctor removed the bandage on her upper arm. She said she was completely healed, but the skin looked different—darker and shinier—than the surrounding area.

With time credited for good behavior, my father got released in sixty-five days. We had to talk to the social worker a few more times after he came home, but it seemed like things might finally go back to normal. Mom got rehired at school. My father went back to brake jobs and timing belts at his repair shop. He also had to take an anger management class.

One afternoon I came home. The apartment felt different. On the kitchen counter there was a note with a gold wedding band sitting on top of it. Like a tiny paperweight to prevent that note from blowing away.

 

Dear Bobby and Cody,
I love you so much
goodbye
Mom

 

When my father came home from work, he read the note.

"Well, boys, your mother's left and gone."

"Where?" Cody asked in a small voice.

"I don't know."

"Is she coming back?" he squeaked.

"I doubt it." He shook his head. "Looks like we're on our own."

He never talked about her after that.

I
T WAS HARDEST FOR CODY. HE CRIED ALMOST EVERY NIGHT
.
It wasn't easy listening to that.

My brother began acting peculiar too. For instance, if he and I were walking in the city, and Cody saw some woman who looked even remotely like Mom, he'd start hyperventilating with excitement, jumping up and down.

"I see Mom! Look, Bobby! She's right over there!"

"No, she's not," I'd tell him. He wouldn't believe me, so I'd have to bring him closer until he could see for himself that it wasn't Mom.