“Mrs. Teazer said it’s not true,” Drew said, lifting his hand from the terrarium, a slurpy snail curled on his wrist. “They did this experiment where they mated the fish with other fish from different caves and then the baby fish could see. Their eyes were bigger and they could see everything.”
“Is that so?” she said. Sometimes she wondered how she’d gotten such a smart kid. And just how smart he might be.
“Mom, it was the cave’s fault. Not the fish.” His voice shook slightly and she knew he must still be sick, emotional. “The cave made them that way.”
“But it still doesn’t matter. They don’t need to see down there, baby,” she said, touching his forehead again. “There’s nothing to see.”
“It must have been weird the first time they saw their parents,” he said, peering closely at the snail on his wrist, his eyes glassed. “But their parents still couldn’t see them.”
“I think you still have a fever.”
“Mom, what was Dad doing in the backyard?” he asked, coaxing the snail up his speckled forearm.
She looked at him.
“Dad? He just left for work.”
“No, in the nighttime. Last night. Before the newspaper came.”
“What was he doing?”
He shrugged. “Talking on his phone. I saw the light on his cheek. He kept spinning around, talking. Who was he talking to?”
The hydraulic drill of the landline startled her.
“Katie? This is Helen Beck. Ryan’s mom.”
“Oh, Helen. Yes. Are you okay?”
“I’m so sorry. I heard about what happened. Between Hailey Belfour and your daughter.”
“Yes,” Katie said. “Thank you. Devon’s okay.”
“I’m at Ryan’s apartment. Taking care of things.” She let out a weighty sigh. “You should see how many T-shirts he has. They all smell like him.”
And then she said, “Katie, I think you should come here.”
“Pardon?”
“Well, it’s…I think you should come over. If you can. Do you think you can do that? It’s easier in person.”
There was a pause, Katie looking at Drew, who was drinking a tall glass of flat ginger ale with a leisurely grace.
“Oh, I remember this one.” Helen’s voice came soft. “The gray ringer. He used to wear this back in high school whenever he played baseball.”
“That’s three forty-six, Mom,” Drew croaked from the backseat, Post-it in his damp hand. “Is this where Ryan lived?”
She stopped at the box-shaped low-rise buildings on the right, just past the Quik Mart. Concrete walls, two sets of balconies, a banner across the facade: Affordable Rentals Call Today!
“Yes.”
She’d gotten in the car within ten minutes of Helen’s call, had not stopped to think. Or even to ponder the wisdom of taking Drew outside.
Helen met them at the door, the buzzer broken.
“He was working really hard, saving up,” Helen said as they walked inside, the hallway’s linoleum cluttered with circulars, tented takeout menus, a waterlogged stack of aging Yellow Pages. “He would’ve been out of here soon.”
“It looks fine,” Katie said.
“Hey, devil boy,” Helen said, winking down at Drew. She looked over at Katie. “Ryan used to get funny rashes like that all the time when he was little. They always told me it was my detergent, no matter which one I used. They never believed me.”
They climbed the staircase, Drew’s eyes jumping, his first time in an apartment building.
“This is where Ryan lived?” Drew asked. Inside, it looked like anyone’s apartment, any young person living paycheck to paycheck. Small and sunstruck, everything in it beige and worn, with the same foam sofas, the microfiber shiny with age, the halogen torchiere, the set of acrylic bar stools along the kitchen counter that were in all furnished rentals, everywhere.
But there were little things that made it personal, a gently broken-in baseball cap on the glass-topped coffee table, a Weaver’s Wagon apron hooked forlornly on a molded plastic coat stand. A windbreaker, faded red, hanging over the back of the sofa. Katie had seen Ryan wear it a half dozen times. She didn’t see his jean jacket. She guessed why.
“Their eyes have two thousand lenses,” Drew said, pointing toward a half-eaten blondie, its plastic wrap folded back, resting on the kitchen counter. “They can see everything.”
“What, devil boy?” Helen asked, winking at Katie.
They all watched as a cockroach scuttled across the counter and down the sink drain.
“We only have one lens,” he said, a little wistfully.
“Oh dear,” Helen said, walking over and squinting down the drain. “I saw a critter yesterday too. Well.”
There was a brief pause, then Katie couldn’t wait any longer.
“So, you wanted to talk?”
“In the bedroom.” Helen looked over at Drew. “Maybe we can put the TV on for Big Red.”
Later, many times, Katie would remember the room’s particular smell, sweat and must and forest pine from the Little Tree air freshener hanging from the blinds’ cord. And something else, something intimate, bodily.