The School for Good Mothers(73)

They crane their necks.

“Up high,” Emmanuelle says.

The father must be six-three or six-four. Emmanuelle asks if he’s a giraffe. The father overhears them and laughs. He turns around, introduces himself. Tucker. Frida shakes his hand. Her voice cracks as she says hello. The man’s palm is soft, much softer than hers. She hasn’t met a man who isn’t a guard since last November.

Tucker’s doll son, Jeremy, is a pale, chubby brunette, a three-year-old with a bowl haircut and the stare of a serial killer. Tucker sets him down. Emmanuelle waves. Jeremy pokes her arm. Emmanuelle touches his hand. Jeremy hugs her roughly, then tries to stick his entire fist in her mouth.

“Whoa, too rough,” Frida says. Tucker asks Jeremy to be gentle. They make eye contact with each other instead of their dolls.

Frida looks and looks. Tucker is her age, maybe older, a fortysomething white man with the slouching body of a reader. His straight hair is mostly gray and flops over his forehead. It’s been cut haphazardly. When he smiles, his eyes almost disappear. He smiles easily. He’s thinner and less attractive than Will, more wrinkled than Gust, has enormous straight teeth that give his face an equine quality.

She checks for a wedding ring, remembers the jewelry rule, must find a way to ask. Emmanuelle notices her blushing.

“Why you hot, Mommy? You okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Tucker is blushing too. A suitable response, she thinks, to meeting in uniform in a tent with blue food.

There are blue hot dogs, cookies, slices of watermelon, ice cream sandwiches, Popsicles. The dolls must be fed first. Frida and Tucker lead their dolls to an empty corner of the tent. The parents’ self-segregation is dispiriting. Latino fathers hold court with Latina mothers. The lone fiftysomething white father has found the trio of middle-aged white women. His teenage doll daughter looks mortified.

Known lesbians in the community keep to themselves. Frida and the other mothers engaged in interracial socializing, especially the white mothers flirting with Black fathers, receive angry stares. Frida feels guilty, but if Roxanne or anyone else gets on her case, she’ll say that Tucker was simply standing in line, that this isn’t a manifestation of growing up with white culture. Most of the Black and Latino fathers are too young, most of the white fathers too creepy. There are no Asians.

Emmanuelle’s and Jeremy’s mouths are ringed with blue. Tucker and Frida talk about their dolls, whether their dolls are typically shy around strangers, how they behaved this morning, how they normally behave in class. Even chatting over blue food, she’s surprised to find that she feels safe with him, enjoys his deep voice and the way he listens. She asks if the fathers have good food or more privacy, if they have Friday counseling and Saturday cleaning crew, how they celebrated Father’s Day, if there have been romances or injuries or suicides or expulsions.

“We’ve had one. One suicide, I mean.” She doesn’t add that she could be next.

“None for us,” Tucker says. “I’m sorry. You have my condolences.”

“I didn’t know her very well. I want to feel sadder. It’s hard to feel anything here.” She admits her detachment makes her feel selfish.

“You don’t seem selfish.”

Frida smiles. “You don’t know me.”

Tucker cheerfully answers her questions about the father’s school: no cleaning crew, yes brain scans, counseling once a month, no talk circle, what’s talk circle, some hand jobs, but no real romances, not that he knows of. A bunch of fistfights, but no expulsions. Some malfunctions, but no dead dolls. They get to call home for an hour every Sunday. No one has ever lost phone privileges. The counselors think it’s important for them to stay in their children’s lives. For the most part, it’s been a supportive group.

Tucker has made friends. “From all walks of life,” he says.

Frida regrets asking. She rolls and unrolls the sleeves of her uniform, sighs deeply. If she’d been able to speak to Harriet every Sunday, as promised, how different this year apart would be.

She waits for him to ask about the mothers’ program. When he doesn’t, she says, “Don’t you want to know about us?”

“Sorry. We haven’t talked about you ladies very much. Do we have to talk about this? I don’t want to talk about this place. We have the day off. Tell me about you.”

“Really? Why?”

Tucker looks amused. “I’m interested in learning about the survival of the human spirit. Tell me about your spirit, Frida.”

“I don’t know if my spirit is allowed to talk to you.”

“Is your spirit already taken?”

“Oh, definitely. Full dance card. I’m super popular.”

“A girl like you,” he says.

He wants to know about her old life. Where she grew up, where she went to college, where she lived in Philly, where she worked. His earnestness makes her wonder if he’s Christian. She wants to know what’s wrong with him. He seems like a natural with children. She’d once had the same feeling about Gust.

“I miss my books,” he says.

“I miss reading the news. Remember how much time we used to spend doing that? Doesn’t it seem ridiculous now? I can’t wait to get my hair cut. I miss having bangs. They cover my frown lines. I have this horrid eyebrow crinkle. See? I can’t cut them myself, it would look too crazy. I don’t want to ask anyone here to cut them. I shouldn’t have this much face showing.”