Lost and Wanted(69)

I backed up and almost bumped into the small wooden play kitchen that Terrence had shipped from L.A. The kitchen had a range and control panel at the right height for a toddler, as well as an oven crammed with pots, cooking utensils, and wooden food. Simmi saw me looking at it.

“I don’t play with that anymore,” she said.

“Jack keeps some toys he used to play with, too.”

“Uh huh. Okay, watch.”

I watched her do a series of tricks; she did the walkover Jack admired, several cartwheel variations, and walked on her hands. Then, to my alarm, she jumped on the trampoline and launched herself backward in the air, doing a full rotation before landing on the mat. She raised both arms in the air, Olympian-style.

    “That’s really something,” I said.

Simmi dropped into a split. “My grandma doesn’t like me to do it so much.”

“How come?”

“She says I’m going to be too tall for gymnastics.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that now.”

“She thinks I should do ballet instead.”

“Well, if you like gymnastics…”

“That’s what my mom used to say. But I think she really wanted me to be a scientist, like you.”

“Really?”

“She was really into science. She wanted to write a show about it.”

“She told me that.”

Simmi nodded. “I don’t know if I like science, though.” She bent her front knee, drawing it toward her, and lifted her back foot, clasping it with both hands behind her head.

“Moms want their kids to do what makes them happy.” It was the kind of platitude I try not to rely on too heavily, but it seemed best to go with safe and dull, under the circumstances.

Simmi trained her big eyes on me. “Did she tell you that?”

“Well, not exactly—we didn’t talk on the phone too much.”

“She hated talking on the phone,” Simmi said.

“I don’t like it either.”

“But you know what?” Simmi rotated her hips into a straddle, then stretched forward, so her forehead was against the mat. “Sometimes when it rings, I think it’s her. Isn’t that weird?”



* * *



—

We ate at a small table in the kitchen downstairs, Terrence sitting on a stool because there were only three chairs. He held his plate on his lap, and reached down periodically to make sure we all had what we needed for the meal. There were no glasses—we drank water from mugs, but Terrence had found small bowls for various garnishes: sour cream, cheese, cilantro, and sriracha.

“This is amazing,” I said.

    Terrence was skeptical. “You just got back from Europe.”

“Dessert in Austria is so great, but you’d think the rest of the food would be better than it is.”

He turned to Simmi. “They fly Helen all the way to Europe to talk about physics.”

“What is that, again?” Simmi said.

I looked at Jack, but he didn’t seem interested in volunteering.

“Physics is the study of forces. We use math to describe the way things move.”

“I hate math,” Simmi said.

“Me, too,” Jack said immediately.

“You don’t hate math,” Terrence said. There was a sort of pleading in his voice that surprised me.

“I do,” Simmi said. “It’s so boring.”

“It is so boring,” I said.

Both children looked at me, Jack in amazement, and Simmi with that same kind of wary interest.

“It’s so boring until you get to higher math, which is one of the most fun things you can do.”

“When is higher math?” Simmi asked.

“It can start in high school,” I said. “Some people take two years of calculus in high school—I did.”

“I’m not going to do that,” Jack put in.

“But you have to do math, so you might as well work hard.” I had an inspiration. “It’s like gymnastics,” I said. “Imagine if all you did was warm up. If you had to do warm-ups every day in practice, but you decided never to try the tumbling.”

Simmi laughed. “That would be stupid.”

“Or surfing,” Terrence said: “What if you just practiced pop-ups on the sand and never got in the water?”

“Exactly,” I said.

“But math isn’t like gymnastics,” Jack said.

“She says it is.” Terrence gave me one of his disconcerting smiles.

“I could take you guys to see a real physics lab one day,” I said. “We could have a private tour.”

“Would we wear lab coats?”

I couldn’t tell if lab coats were a draw. “Not coats, but definitely eye protection.”

    “Protection from what?”

“Lasers. We could go see a project called LIGO.” If nothing else, Neel’s presence would make this an easy promise to fulfill.

“Lasers are like light sabers,” Jack explained.

“I know what they are,” Simmi said. “May we be excused?”

I looked at their plates: both children had finished the chili, which substituted hominy and vegetables for meat, and was somewhat spicy. When they’d left the table, I complimented Terrence.