Mosquitoland(5)

I feel Arlene’s gentle touch on my back, and I’m afraid of what’s coming. The catchphrase monologue. The sermon of encouragement, imploring bravery in the face of a crumbling American family. It’s all in the manual. Adults just can’t help themselves when it comes to Words of Wisdom.

“Is he a good man?” she asks. Arlene, it would seem, has not read the manual.

“Who?”

“Your father, dear.”

Through the window, I see the ocean of trees, now in slow motion: each trunk, an anchor; each treetop, a rolling wave; a thousand coiling branches, leaves, sharp pine needles. My own reflection in the window is ghostlike, translucent. I am part of this Sea of Trees, this landscape blurred.

“All my sharp edges,” I whisper.

Arlene says something, but it’s muffled, as if from an adjacent room. The hum of the bus dissolves, too. Everything is quiet. I hear only my breath, my heartbeat, the internal factory of Mim Malone.

I am six, reading on the floor of our living room in Ashland. Aunt Isabel, visiting from Boston, is sitting at my father’s old rolltop, writing a letter. Dad pokes his head in the room. “Iz, I need my desk back. You done?” Aunt Isabel doesn’t stop scribbling. “I look like I’m done, Bareth?” Dad rolls his eyes, flares his nostrils. “What’s a bareth?” I ask, looking over my book. Aunt Isabel smiles, her head still bent over her letters. “That is,” she says, pointing to my dad. I look at him quizzically. “I thought your name was Barry?” Aunt Isabel shakes her head. “You thought wrong, little lamb.” I love all her nicknames, but Dad is not amused. “You writing a novel there, Iz?” She doesn’t answer. “Isabel, I’m talking to you.” “No, you’re not,” she says. “You’re making fun of me.” Dad sighs, mutters something about the futility of correspondence, leaves the room. I go back to my book for a few minutes before asking, “Who are you writing to, Aunt Isabel?” “My doctor,” she says. Then, setting her pencil down, she turns to me. “Writing sort of . . . rounds off the sharp edges of my brain, you know?” I nod, but I don’t know; with Aunt Iz, I rarely do. “Tell you what,” she says. “When I go back to Boston, you write to me. You’ll see what I mean.” I consider this for a moment. “Do I have sharp edges, too, Aunt Iz?” She smiles and laughs, and I don’t know why. “Maybe, little lamb. Either way, you should write. It’s better than succumbing to the madness of the world.” Here she pauses, glances at the door where Dad had just been standing. “And cheaper than pills.”

Sound returns. The steady hum of the bus engine, and Arlene’s voice, warm and wet. “Are you all right, Mim?”

I keep my good eye on the passing landscape. “We used to make waffles,” I say.

A brief pause.

“Waffles, dear?”

“Every Saturday. Dad mixed and whisked while I sat on a wobbly stool and smiled. Then I poured the mix into the waffle maker and . . .”

Another pause.

“Yes?” says Arlene.

“What?”

“You stopped in the middle of a sentence, dear.”

Aunt Isabel’s last line echoes in my head. Cheaper than pills . . . ills . . . ills . . . ills . . .

I turn, set my jaw, and look Arlene squarely in the eyes. I choose my words carefully, devoting attention to each syllable. “I think my dad is a good man who has succumbed to the madness of the world.”

At first, Arlene doesn’t respond. She looks concerned, actually, though I can’t be sure if it’s due to my answer or my behavior over the last few minutes. Then . . . her eyes flash, and she nods. “So many do, my dear. So many do.”

We ride in silence for a while, and I don’t know about Arlene, but it’s nice to sit that close to someone and not feel the incessant need to talk. The two of us could just be. Which is what I need right now.

Because I am Mary Iris Malone, and I am not okay.





4


Abilitol

I BEGAN MY sessions with Dr. Wilson just over a year ago. His many framed degrees assured everyone that he was an actual doctor, and not, as I feared, a professional clown.

“Tell me what you see here, Mary.”

“That’s not my name, Doc. Or . . . didn’t my parents tell you?”

The doctor’s lips curled into a coy smile. “I’m sorry. Mim. Tell me wha—”

“Wrong again,” I whispered.

Dr. Wilson looked to my father for help, but that well had dried up long ago. “Okay, then,” he said. “What is your name?”

“Antoine,” I said, straight-faced.

“Mim, that’s enough,” said Dad. “Answer Dr. Wilson’s questions.”

Most girls my age had long ago stopped telling the truth, and simply started saying what everyone wanted to hear. But sometime during middle school, or maybe even before, I’d made a choice about the kind of kid I was going to be, and more importantly, the kind of kid I wasn’t going to be.

“Mim?” prodded Dr. Wilson. “Can you tell me what you—”

“Where’s your bear, Doc?” I interrupted.

“I’m sorry. My what?”

“Wait—don’t tell me you’re a bear-less doctor.”