The Removed(53)

“He can do impersonations,” Ernest told Sonja. “Do you want to hear him do a Frenchman?”

Sonja looked confused.

“Maybe later,” I told them. “Why don’t you two go in the other room and let me talk to Sonja.”

Wyatt bowed again and turned, heading into the living room, Ernest following him.

“He’s cute,” Sonja said.

“Very cute.”

“I’ve been texting Edgar,” she said, her voice low and serious.

“Is he coming?”

“I don’t know. He won’t reply.”

“Not at all?”

She set the mixing spoon down and leaned against the counter. She took a deep breath. “I don’t know. Something tells me he’ll show, though. I have other things to think about.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“Nothing, it doesn’t matter.”

We were silent a moment, and I waited for her to open up, but she didn’t. She turned and went back to stirring the blackberries, so I went into my bedroom and gathered the laundry. I took it into the basement and started a load of laundry. When I returned to the kitchen, Sonja had left.

*

After lunch, Ernest and I watched a crime drama we had recorded on the VCR. Sonja had said many times that we were the only people on the planet who still watched videotapes on a VCR, but it was easy enough for us to operate, and we liked watching TV.

“Tomorrow is Wyatt’s hearing,” I told Ernest.

Ernest was eating peanuts from a small bowl on the TV tray. “Already?”

“He’s gone,” the TV said. “He’s dead.”

Ernest looked at me, waiting for a response.

“We’re a temporary placement, remember?” I said. On TV, two police officers sat in a squad car, talking. One of the police officers was shaking his head, disappointed.

“The timing of it all,” I said. “Think of the timing. Tomorrow is the hearing. It’s also the sixth, the day of our bonfire.”

“The timing,” Ernest said, setting his fork down on his plate. He leaned back in his chair and watched TV. We sat in silence for a few minutes, then I pointed the remote at the TV and turned it off. We were both still staring at the screen even though the TV was off.

“I want to put on my sneakers and go for a run,” Ernest said.

“A run? What are you talking about, a run?”

“What do you think? A run. A jog. To go out into the night and jog down to the lake and back, like I used to. I haven’t done that in a long time.”

“Nobody’s going for a run right now,” I said.

He looked at his hands and made a fist, cracked his knuckles. He rubbed at his knees. A moment later Wyatt entered the room quietly. It almost startled me.

“Do you want to watch home videotapes?” he asked. “Old home movies?”

Ernest and I both looked at him. I knew I should tell him about the hearing, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it just yet. “Well,” I said. “We don’t watch them often, but we could if you want to.”

“Play the one with Edgar following Ray-Ray in the parade,” Ernest said. “It’s the one with the bicycle.”

I didn’t want to watch home movies. Ernest could tell but he wouldn’t let it go.

“It’s just a videotape,” he said.

I dug through a cabinet where we kept all our old videotapes. I found one labeled KIDS PLAYING/BIRTHDAYS but didn’t know the year or what was on it. I put it in the VCR and pushed play, then left Wyatt and Ernest on the couch. I stepped into the kitchen and poured a glass of water. For a moment I stood at the window. I could see my reflection in the door of the microwave, my face unrecognizable, blurred. My hair was pinned up, but it looked strange in the reflection, as if some stranger was staring back at me. Some faceless presence watching me.

I knew what they were watching, but I couldn’t bring myself to watch it. The tape was old, full of static. A tape of Ray-Ray at his birthday party. Edgar kicking a soccer ball in the backyard. Sonja riding her bicycle, ringing the bicycle bell. A vacation camping trip to the Southwest.

“I don’t recognize my voice,” I heard Ernest say from the living room. “Is that my voice?” I heard Wyatt laughing.

I sat at the dining room table for a while, thinking about Edgar. I imagined him packing a bag to come home, boarding a bus for Oklahoma. Tomorrow morning, maybe, he would call and ask me to pick him up at the bus station. Or he would show up at the house, without a knock on the front door, just letting himself in the way he used to, with a smile on his face, and asking me to make him something to eat. Yes, I wanted to cook for him again, bring him a plate of spaghetti or a bowl of soup and sit across from him and watch him eat. He would tell me about his friends, everything he did during his day at work. Maybe I would ask him about a girl he liked, or if he was going to tuck his shirt in. He was always easy to embarrass. I pictured him laughing into his glass as he took a drink the way he used to.

When I heard the tape end, I returned to the living room. Ernest and Wyatt seemed somehow more approachable, at least in this instance, maybe because they seemed so happy. I didn’t want to disrupt their contentment, but I had to bring up the hearing, and this was as good a time as any. So I told him. “Wyatt,” I said, “earlier today Bernice mentioned you would likely go stay with your grandparents.”