The Figgs, page 11
“Oh right, my anger problem. The reason you all have to — what was it, Derek — walk on eggshells? I’m not fucking angry.”
“Your mother just wants you to be healthy.”
“Well it’s Golden Boy you should be worried about. Isn’t Marissa the second girl you got pregnant?”
Derek threw a bun at Vanessa’s forehead. “She had a miscarriage.”
“Keep telling yourself that, Derek. The clinic on eighth and eighth? It’s for abortions.”
Vanessa looked at her parents. She was so full of rage June said a quick prayer in case a demon was working through her daughter. “And why, you might ask, did she have an abortion? Because she was fifteen.”
June plugged her ears, and because her fingers were big, relative to her ear canals, she did not hear the resounding crash when Derek flipped the table. She did see the surprise on Vanessa’s face and the clumps of white potato that could have been a cheesecake Blizzard on the chest of her cowl neck sweater. Randy started cleaning up immediately, scraping lumps of potato into his empty bowl and picking up the pepper-shaker, which had rolled to a stop on a floor vent. Upstairs, Jaxx was screaming. Derek said, “Sorry,” and punched the wall on his way up the back stairs. Vanessa waited for him to leave, then took the stairs from the living room. “I hate you all,” she screamed. June remained frozen in her chair, which seemed odd now that there was no table. She felt like a piece of installation art. Now it was she who wanted to leave, but she didn’t know where to go. She just wanted out. She stood up as Randy righted the table.
“I’m going for a drive.” She grabbed her keys off the wall.
“I’m coming with you,” Randy said.
She held open the door. The air was bitter.
June drove to the nature reserve just north of their neighbourhood. It was still light out, and they’d be able to walk the trails if they wished. They stayed in the car, while a fringe station played music from the forties.
“Derek got a fifteen-year-old pregnant,” June whispered.
The grass was a monochromatic buff colour. Winter grass. It looked cold.
Randy warmed his hands. “We don’t know that for sure.”
“Vanessa always knows.” June turned to him. “That’s one thing we know about her. She knows everything about her brothers.”
Randy cocked his head a little to the side in agreement.
“Remember when we caught Tom with that joint?”
He sighed.
“Vanessa said he’d been doing it for years before then. It’s why he always took the dog for a walk.”
“I thought he was just being responsible.”
“He was a pothead.”
“Geez. And he took that dog out three times a day. No wonder it died.”
June turned off the engine. “Two pregnancies. Why wouldn’t Derek be using condoms?”
Randy ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know. I told them a thousand times. Don’t be a fool, cover your tool.”
June decided this was better than keep calm and wear a condom.
“Clearly Derek never got the message.”
“Twice a year we’d have that talk.”
“Maybe it’s because you presented it in a rhyme. Dr. Seuss.”
“Love Dr. Seuss. Oh the thinks you can think if only you try.”
“Like thinking about not using a condom.” June shook her head. “I thought Derek was the most sensible of the three.”
“Because he’s your favourite?”
She hit him in the arm. “I don’t have a favourite. I just never pictured Derek as that careless to have two unplanned pregnancies. Two.”
“Carefree,” Randy corrected. “You know how he is. He’s always been a glass-half-full kind of kid. He doesn’t always think of consequences.”
Like you, she thought.
“Come on,” he urged. “Let’s walk. We’ll feel better after some fresh air and a little exercise. Like you told Vanessa.”
She made a face like she might object, but her hand was already on the door. A silver SUV pulled in beside them, loose rock crunching beneath its tractor-like tires. Randy waited by the rear of the car and took June’s hand when she approached. They headed in the direction of a large rock, a landmark at the mid-point of the hill. People who looked like they loved nature but probably worked in the oil industry zipped by on mountain bikes and on foot, their all-American dogs named by their children in tow.
As the hill wound to the left, it steepened, and June felt her heart rate increase. Her calves tightened, and she stopped twice before they reached the rock. The area around it was well worn, trampled down by adventurous people with small children and by alcoholics. Remnants of beer bottles cluttered the ground. Someone had written “my bitchez rule this rock” in red graffiti.
Randy climbed up on top. “Join me.”
June scanned the rock face. “I can’t get up there. I’m too short.”
“Oh, come on,” he said. “I’ll help you. Go around that way and I’ll pull you up.”
He looked like an oversized four-year old, proud and stupid. But she relented. “Fine.”
She found a foothold and heaved herself up. Randy, crouched on one knee, took hold of her wrists and hoisted her to the top. He motioned for her to sit. To the left was the airport and to the right, the downtown core. The highway, a bent line between with a steady flow of traffic. The noise of the city did not carry to the rock. They watched it on mute. Planes landing and taking off, freight trains curving in the distance. Randy spread a cloth napkin on the rock and emptied out a box of chocolate almonds.
“Have one,” he encouraged.
She didn’t want one. It reminded her of the macaroons and Jaxx’s sad little room with the graffiti. My bitchez rule this bedroom. “Randy, did you find Fergus?”
Randy looked up from the cloth. He’d arranged the almonds into a circle. “Not yet.”
“Did you at least find any leads?”
“There are literally thousands of records. And you have to search by surname. I don’t know his surname. I don’t even know that they named him Fergus. It was one of a few names they told Glenda they were considering.”
“Have you ever talked to Glenda about it?”
“No.” He shoved a handful of chocolate in his mouth. “I haven’t even seen her since that time in Wicker Land.”
“But you said she worked for a family of dentists. That shouldn’t be hard to find.”
“Maybe.” A plane from the north made its descent onto the runway. They watched it land.
“What else do you know about her? Did she ever marry?”
“No idea. I tried looking her up years ago.” He had assembled a pile of pea-sized rocks in a depression beside the napkin and began pitching them into the grass below. “She knows sign language.”
“You should try to look her up again. If you’re serious about finding Fergus. Find out what she knows. Maybe they’ve already reconnected.” Everything seemed logical coming out of her mouth, but once it was out there June wondered if she was making a mistake. What if Glenda liked Dr. Seuss and whistling as much as Randy? Would she find them on the porch one day finishing each other’s sentences and eating ice cream with sprinkles?
“I’m scared to meet him,” Randy confessed.
“Of course you are. That’s completely normal. You’re worried he won’t like you.”
“No, actually.” He looked mildly hurt. “I’m likeable.”
“Yes, you’re likeable.” It was true. Randy had a Ned Flanders vibe that people found endearing.
“What if he’s…you know…not successful?”
“Like a loser?” June asked.
“I don’t like that word. I mean what if everyone I’ve spawned didn’t quite make it? What if he works at 7-Eleven or is unemployed and makes Minecraft videos for YouTube?”
“Or works at a recycling depot?”
“June!”
“I’m kidding.” She watched the brown and yellow tail of a UPS plane disappear into the only pocket of clouds in the sky.
“Or, on the contrary, what if he’s really successful? Like a lawyer or a doctor.”
“Then he’s probably ugly.”
He looked at her with pleading eyes, and she came to the horrifying conclusion she was acting like Jim Carrey. “Sorry,” she apologized. “Continue.”
“I think it would be weird.”
She understood, because she thought about it too. She wondered what impact Fergus’s perceived success would have on all of them. Would they be inspired and go back to school or give blood? Or would they feel like failures, collect employment insurance, and sell Shakeology? If Fergus was successful, did it mean it was her genes that let Tom, Derek, and Vanessa down? Or if he wasn’t, was being an underachiever just simply part of being a Figg? A bird hopped along the grassy path above the rock and pecked at the ground, its body the size of a golf ball. It reminded her of Jaxx. Then she thought of the crest. The birds without wings. A curse.
“Success is subjective,” she reminded him.
“Like stew,” he replied.
“Like stew.” She took one of the stones from his pile and flicked it down the side of the rock. It stopped in a crevasse near the bottom. “Maybe Fergus has been looking for you.”
“You think?” He crossed his legs.
“Sure. Lots of adopted kids look for their birth parents.”
“Not you.”
She shivered. “Yeah, but this isn’t about me. I had perfectly good parents. Why look for another pair? And besides, I’m too old. Too old to invite more people into my life. I can’t even manage who’s already in it.”
“Maybe Fergus feels the same way.”
June was quiet.
Randy continued. “You think there’s a chance he doesn’t know he’s adopted?”
“Maybe, but he’d be, what, thirty-four, thirty-five now? He probably figured it out by now. That he never really fit in.” She looked at Randy, who stared back at her with his mouth hanging open. “What?”
“That’s a terrible thing to say.”
“I didn’t mean anything negative toward you. It’s just something you hear adopted people say. That they always felt like a stranger in their own family. You hear it all the time.”
“Did you feel that way? I hope he didn’t,” Randy said. “Makes me sad.”
She placed her hand on his bent knee. Once-pink gum was stuck to the bottom of his sneaker. “I used to feel that way, but then I got to a point where it didn’t matter. It’s hard though. The feelings of isolation. Not being able to connect or make sense of things. Poor Fergus.”
“Geez, June. I’m sure his childhood wasn’t that traumatic. Glenda said she chose a really wonderful couple. They couldn’t have kids of their own and they didn’t care if he was a boy or a girl. That says something about them.”
“Oh, I know. I didn’t mean to imply that Fergus grew up unhappy. I just think if you ever get to meet him, be sensitive to the fact that he may have spent a considerable amount of time feeling like he never fit in. That’s all.”
“Duly noted.” He ate the remaining almonds and carefully folded the napkin into a small triangle. He looked worried.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said.
She hugged her knees up around her chest. It was an uncomfortable position that drove her sit bones into the rock, but the air had cooled. She wondered if Fergus was somewhere out there, wandering around feeling that he never belonged. Not being able to identify with the shape of his mother’s face or her slow metabolism or the way she planned everything so meticulously. Or his father. His six-foot frame and crooked spine. His love of Chaucer and pickled fish and open spaces. June gasped at what her brain had just done. This was not supposed to be about her and her parents. She covered her mouth, as if to keep the thoughts from escaping, and tapped her cortices. It didn’t work. Coming to the park had seemed like a good idea, but now it only reminded her how she hated open spaces. Growing up in the country was boring and exhausting. She was always in the fifth percentile for height, and the walk to the bus stop was too far, and sometimes the bus driver would forget to stop and would drive past her house. And she never understood why she had to eat pickled herring when the ocean was nowhere in sight. She remembered her mother with her parallelogram-shaped head and size-ten feet hanging out the back of her kitchen clogs, telling her it was in her blood to like fish. But June disagreed. Other than the battered haddock from their favourite diner, eating fish felt about as natural as eating hamster.
Randy helped June down from the rock and motioned for her to start down the path toward the parking lot, but her legs were unsteady. She moved slowly, turning her hip to the front so that she side-stepped down the steeper portion of the hill. She experienced a wave of adrenaline she couldn’t explain. She was not afraid or in danger. No one was lost or injured. It was that she didn’t want to be adopted. She didn’t want to go there. It was a notion she’d buried, like a seed, deep beneath the floorboards where it was invisible and not privy to the resources it needed to grow. And now it was a tree that crashed through the floor, all trunk and branches. She couldn’t get away from it. She needed a chainsaw. All she had was butter knife. David and Goliath.
She concentrated on breathing in through her nose and out through her mouth until they reached the edge of the parking lot. A collie peed on a sign identifying wildlife in the area. She gave her legs a little shake and released an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Poor Fergus,” she projected, pointing for Randy to drive home. “Must have been tough.”
Jaxx was awake and sucking on Derek’s hand when they returned from the nature reserve, his eyes the pageant blue of a dress uniform.
“Can I hold him?” June asked.
Derek raised him up and placed him into June’s arms. “Sorry I flipped the table.”
June concentrated on Jaxx, hoping if she ignored Derek’s apology long enough he would go away and she wouldn’t have to talk about the baby he aborted or the age of that baby’s mother. But Derek persisted.
“It was a miscarriage,” he said. “I swear.”
“How’s my sweet baby boy? You’re a hungry boy today. Getting so big drinking all that non-breast milk.”
“Mom,” Derek said. “Acknowledge me.”
“What, Derek? What do you want me to say? Am I supposed to congratulate you because you only have one unplanned baby and not two?”
“I just want you to believe me.”
She brushed Jaxx’s hair to the side. “Why didn’t you ever consider using a condom? How does this happen twice? Vanessa’s right, you know. About that clinic.”
She passed Derek a receiving blanket and moved Jaxx to her shoulder. Derek didn’t respond. He put his head down on the island and looked like he might fall asleep, eyes red and outlined with fatigue.
“Why don’t you go to bed?” June said. “I’ll look after him.”
“I have to work tomorrow.” He lifted his head.
“Maybe you should shower first. Jaxx will be fine. Work will be fine.”
“Leslie’s teaching me how to install kitchens.”
“Tomorrow?”
“The depot is giving me another week off.”
“Then go get some sleep.”
Derek threw his arms around her. She stumbled backward.
“Whoa.”
“I love you, Mom,” he croaked.
“I know you do, Derek.”
He pulled back and wiped away tears, his face all blotched from pressing it against the counter. He seemed both bipolar and hormonal. A typical new mother.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m going to bed.” He patted Jaxx on the head, his hand still immense in comparison, and he disappeared up the stairs, past the hole he’d punched in the wall.
June wondered if Vanessa was home, but suspected she wasn’t. Nothing had been slammed in the past twenty minutes. She took Jaxx to the makeshift change station that was still set up on the family room coffee table. When she pulled up his diaper shirt, the remainder of Marissa’s umbilical cord fell off. It was an amber-coloured chunk the size of a large raisin. She picked it off and gently cleaned the pool of custard-like pus that had collected in his belly button.
“Grandma’s going to get you a new diaper,” she cooed, crawling toward a box of Pampers. Jaxx sucked his fist, his eyes slightly crossed.
Derek, looking no different than he had five minutes ago, was back in the kitchen. “I forgot to give him his vitamin D.”
“Leave it on the counter, I’ll do it.”
The cupboard door closed. “One squirt,” he said. “And by the way, when Vanessa was in Grade 11, she brought a knife to school.”
June fetched the bottle of vitamin D drops. “Impossible, Derek. We would’ve known about that. There is no way the school wouldn’t have contacted us.”
“Vanessa paid Tom two hundred bucks to pose as Dad. She was suspended for a day. They never expelled her because it was a first offence, and you and Dad agreed to send her to counselling.”
June squeezed the bottle in her hand. “And you knew about this?”
“She gave me fifty bucks not to tell.”
“Vanessa brings a knife to school and you decided her safety and perhaps the safety of others was worth fifty dollars?”
“She told me it was just a prop for art class.”
“And you believed her?”
He shrugged. “Sort of. Remember that big mural by the gym?”
June vaguely remembered the anti-violence mural. She thought Vanessa had painted the grenade. “So the school believed Tom that it was a misunderstanding?”
“Yes, but only because you and Dad agreed to some investigative counselling just in case.”
“Investigative counselling?” Randy said. “What does that mean?” He stood on the top step from the basement in an undershirt and track pants.
“Don’t ask,” June said. “Derek, go shower and go to bed.” She looked at Randy. “I have to give this to Jaxx.” She held up the bottle with its built-in dropper.
Jaxx was still comfortably on his back, a second fist now jammed in his mouth. She measured out a dose and moved his hands away from his face. “Good boy.”
