The Crazy School (10 page)

“I had trouble sleeping last night. I’m concerned about Mooney and Fay. Fay especially.”

“She seems so fragile,” I said.

We were walking on grass now, a shortcut to the path that would take us into the woods and down toward the Farm.

“She’s survived a great deal,” said Dhumavati. “Horrible family life.”

“Mooney hinted at that. He’s very protective of her,” I said.

“Fay brings that out in people, I’ve found.”

“Yes,” I said.

“I found her very compelling from the moment she came to us.

She has great depths of compassion, especially for a child who’s been through such trauma. I think she’s tremendously brave.”

We reached the trees and soon hit a rough patch of trail.

“You’re limping,” I said. “Lean on me, if you’d like.”

“I’m fi ne.”

“Really, it’s no trouble.”

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13

Dhumavati smiled at me and put her arm across my shoulders. “Fay reminds me of my daughter. Similar-looking, but really, it’s that sweetness.”

We walked on in silence, her weight shifting onto me slightly whenever she took a step on the tender ankle. We came to a break in the trees, the Farm below us, alongside the large vegetable garden the kids were put to work in while they were doing time in the low-slung building.

“Where is she now, your daughter?” I asked. “Don’t tell me you have a kid in college. I can’t believe you’re old enough.” That was a lie—she looked ancient in the slant of light fi ltering through the surrounding trees. I just wanted to cheer her up.

A brief grimace of pain crossed her face. “I’m sure she would have been. Allegra died when she was eight years old.”

“Oh, Dhumavati,” I said.

“That was the hard time I told you about when we fi rst met.”

“I’m so sorry.”

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She slowed as we approached the garden’s white fence—

nothing much inside this time of year. Pumpkins. Spent stalks of corn that had faded from green to gold with the season.

“Allegra loved to be around growing things,” said Dhumavati. “Gardens. This one was my idea. In her memory.”

The hand-painted rectangle nailed to the gate read: greetings. everything grows well in this place, especially the children.

“Did you make that sign?” I asked.

Dhumavati nodded. She’d painted a colorful border of fl owers and butterfl ies around the words.

“Lovely,” I said. “And that saying seems so familiar.”

“Not original to me by any means,” she said. “But I was always fond of the sentiment.”

“You do a lot to make it true around here,” I said as we drew abreast of an old wooden bench set in a ring of white stones just off the path.

Dhumavati eased herself down on it. “Would you mind if we rested up for a bit here? I’d like to catch my breath before we head in. You look tired yourself, Madeline,” she said.

“Not a lot of sleep lately. And today was a little intense,” I said, sitting next to her.

“David’s thing this morning?”

David. Dr. Santangelo.

“Partly that. Partly some stuff I brought up with Sookie after lunch.”

“And last night’s drama with Mooney and Fay.”

“Sure,” I said. “That too.”

“This is a very hard place to be. Especially for people like the two of us, who care so very much about the kids.”

The two of us but not Santangelo?

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She sighed. “I knew it wouldn’t be any easier for you than it is for me. I recognized that about you when we did your interview for this job.”

“I think I’m fl ailing most of the time.”

“You’re there for these kids in a way few people have the courage to be.”

I crossed my arms. “They matter to me.”

“Yes.”

“I’m not always sure how it all—”

“You mean David?” she asked.

I didn’t answer.

“He and I don’t always walk in lockstep,” she said. “But I’ve found over the years that I can trust him. He’s tremendously committed, and he’s got an astonishing depth of insight even when his methods seem counterproductive. I hope you’ll be with us long enough to know the truth of that for yourself.”

“You’re worried I’m going to leave?”

“I’ve seen dozens of teachers come and go. I know the signs.

This is grueling work, in every sense of the word. And I’ll tell you, in confi dence, that many of the people who stay here the longest are the ones least suited to the job.”

I snapped my head toward her.

She laughed. “We aren’t stupid.”

“
You’re
not,” I said.

“I have seen miracles happen here,” she said. “And I want you to know that I believe you can be part of that, even become one yourself.”

“I’m honored.”

“I know you’d probably like nothing better than to go home tonight and never see this place again.”

True enough.

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“I want you to try toughing it out. We need you. And I think you need us.”

“I’d like to believe that.”

Kind of.

She looked away from me, out toward the garden. “David told you we’re considering changes around staffi ng?”

“Nothing specifi c.”

“I may be taking time off after the winter break. David thinks you’re the best candidate to fi ll in while I’m gone. We both do.”

“Dhumavati, you’ve got to be freaking kidding—”

She held up a hand to cut me off. “I want you to think about it.”

“I don’t
have
to think about it. That’s the most harebrained idea I’ve ever heard. I can’t even remember to bring pens to my classes. There’s no goddamn way I could handle your job.”

“My job doesn’t require perfection,” she said.

“Dhumavati—”

“It requires compassion. That’s why David wants you.” She got to her feet, wincing a little.

There was a small bronze plaque screwed to the back of the bench, right where she’d been sitting. beloved allegra, it read, april 3, 1970–november 18, 1978.

And I’d just written November 17 on Mooney’s homework sheets.

Dhumavati kissed her fi ngertips, then pressed them against the raised letters of her daughter’s name.

I took her hand. “Tomorrow?”

“Yes, it’s the eleventh anniversary,” she said.

“And Santangelo picked today to discuss replacing you?”

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“
I
picked today to tell him I need replacing,” said Dhumavati.

Something in her voice made me doubt that. “And does he realize?” I said pointing at the plaque.

“David had this bench made for me.”

I wasn’t sure the gesture could be considered evidence of kindness.

“I’m exhausted,” she said. “I want a couple of months to myself. Three at the most. David has a house in Mexico—San Miguel de Allende. If you’ll cover for me, he’s willing to let me go down there. You’d only have to take the reins temporarily.”

I wondered if she’d overheard him mention the possibility of making my reassignment permanent.

“You’d be doing me a tremendous favor,” she said. “Promise me you’ll think about it?”

“I think it’s a mistake.”

“It’s not,” she said, turning to limp toward the front door of the Farm.

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14

They had a woodstove cranked up inside, fl ames jumping red-orange behind the isinglass in its doors. The air was roasted so dry that breathing made my septum ache.

The kids at the farm were expected to chop all necessary wood. No furnace in this place.

Pete took Mooney’s assignment sheets from me, adding them to a pile on a long table at the center of the room.

Beside that were two clipboards and a dented cardboard carton fi lled with Walkmans, each tagged with the name of the kid who owned it.

I asked Dhumavati what they were for.

“The kids can listen to music for study period if they’ve fi nished their quota of chores. David decided there had to be some tangible reward at the end of the day, something to anticipate.”

Pete picked up a clipboard and started reading off names.

One by one, the kids took homework sheets off the pile, then lined up single fi le by a door at the back of the room. No one spoke.

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“Textbooks are kept on their bunks during the day,” Dhumavati explained. “Could you help Mooney carry his?”

I got in line behind him. Pete opened the door to the bunk-room hallway. We shuffl ed past him, silent.

There was a girls’ room and a boys’ room, both doorless, as were the pair of singles for overnight supervisors. The air was cold away from the stove, with a sharp edge of mildew.

I followed Mooney into the boys’ room. The bunks were triples, made up quarter-bounce tight with army blankets and coarse sheets. He’d rated a bottom-tier bed because of the stitches.

I reached for the pile of books at its foot, whispering, “You guys warm enough at night? Those blankets look pretty damn thin.”

“This time of year you gotta bring a hat,” he whispered back, lifting the pillow to show me a knitted watch cap. “Can you give this to Fay? I don’t know if she remembered.”

I snatched it up and hid it between two textbooks.

Back in the main room, the kids dropped their piles to claim scattered armchairs and sofas, then lined up at the table.

Dhumavati read a list of names off the second clipboard, and Pete distributed Walkman swag to every kid but Fay and Mooney.

“Two hours,” said Dhumavati. “Let’s all do a good job and keep it quiet.”

She followed Pete into the kitchen, pausing beside its swinging door to hang the clipboards on their respective hooks.

I was still holding Mooney’s stuff, so I lowered it onto the table.

“Sorry to make you miss out on the comfy spots,” I said.

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He shrugged, watching Fay pull out a straight-backed chair.

She didn’t look up at him, just placed her books on the wooden seat, dragging the load away from us toward a windowed corner across the room.

Mooney moved around to the other side of the table so he could keep an eye on her.

Fay pushed her books off the chair, then turned it so her knees shoved into the corner when she sat down. She slumped over toward the window, her cheekbone and temple coming to rest against its glass.

“Why’s Fay over there?” I asked. “Did you guys have a fi ght?”

Mooney shook his head. “She’s cornered.”

“Explain ‘cornered.’ ”

He picked at the mitt of gauze enveloping his injured hand.

“Unless she’s doing chores, she has to sit in a corner with her back to everyone.”

I could hear the tinny whine of the other kids’ music, the crackle of the woodstove, Dhumavati and Pete murmuring in the kitchen. Against all that, Fay started humming a tuneless riff, soft and throaty, like Astrud Gilberto.

No-Hope Samba.

“Us kids aren’t allowed to talk to her,” Mooney said. “That’s why I want you to give her my hat.”

“Does she have to eat there?” I asked.

“Everything. From now until lights-out.”

“What if she needs to go to the bathroom?”

“She’ll raise her hand, wait for a teacher.”

I straightened his pile of textbooks. “It’s too much. She’s already on the Farm.”

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“They don’t do both at the same time a lot. Santangelo got all freaked out when he found out she was cutting again.”

“Even so,” I said, shaking my head.

“They should have made her be handheld.”

“What the hell is that?”

“Someone holds your hand all day. Comes to classes with you and stuff.”

“Another kid?” I said, not wanting to ask him again about the toileting logistics.

“Yeah,” he said. “They wouldn’t’ve picked me, but it’s still better. At least you can talk.”

“They ever do that to you?”

“A bunch of times,” he said. “I actually think it helps, you know? You can’t just wallow in your own shit. It makes you want to not be a total suckbag for the person who’s gotta hang on to you.”

“I guess I can see that.”

“It’s kind of comforting once you get used to it. That’s what they should’ve done for Fay. Not cornering,” he said.

“How long will it last?”

“If she does all her work, they’ll probably let her stop over the weekend.”

“How about your work?” I said. “You could fi nish reading
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
.”

He didn’t answer.

“Want me to crack the spine so it stays open?”

My question skittered across his attention, weightless as a fl at stone whipped sidearm along the surface of a pond.

I slipped the novel free. He didn’t take his eyes off Fay.

She was swaying a little now, one shoulder rocking slowly 9 4

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forward and back along a slender arc, keeping time as she continued to hum.

“It’s my fault,” said Mooney.

“You can’t take it all on yourself, Mooney,” I said.

He checked the room to make sure no one was listening to us. “
I
got her pregnant. She’d be okay if it wasn’t for that,” he whispered.

“How did it happen?”

He looked away, shifting in his seat. “If you don’t know, I’m not sure I should be the one to explain it to you.”

“No. I mean, did a condom break or something?”

“Right,” he said. “Like we’re allowed to have condoms.”

Of course they weren’t. And the kids had no access to a drug-store unless they ran away.

Add another item to Santangelo’s “fi rst things kids want to score on the road” list: coffee, Marlboros, pack of Trojans.

“I just—” He paused, picking at the corner of his math book.