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CHAPTER 1
LAURAS AND TOMS
When Tracy was called to the principal's office to answer for the pantsing of Brian Meltzer, the first question that Old Lady Standish asked was, "Is he the first boy to break your heart?"
"Oh no," said Tracy.
"There was someone else?"
"Yes," she said. "A telephone man who fell in love with long distances."
"A what kind of a man?"
"Mr. Wingfield," said Tracy, plucking one pencil from Standish's Reese's Peanut Butter mug, then another.
On the other side of the desk, the principal moved her computer's mouse around. Then, once she'd gotten her cursor to wherever it was she wanted it to go, she began to hunt and peck at her keyboard. "Wingfield, you said?"
Tracy rolled her eyes, lining up pencils on the desk, their dull points aimed at the dull old woman. "Have you ever seen The Glass Menagerie?" she asked.
"Is that Wilde or Williams?" asked the principal, still typing away with her index fingers. "I always get them mixed up."
"Well, they do both begin with a W," said Tracy, trying to hide her incredulity, but forgetting to mask her sarcasm in the process.
Principal Standish stopped typing, folded her hands in front of her, and stared over the glasses that sat precipitously on the edge of her nose. She was stone-faced for a moment, then two, but soon enough a smirk cracked through the veneer and she shook her head. Then she pushed her seat back from the desk, rose, and crossed to her bookshelf. She plucked a dusty old Norton anthology from the top shelf and returned to her seat.
"The pages are so thin," said Tracy, as she watched the old woman leaf through the tome.
"Just a smidge thicker than tissue paper," said Standish, "but there's a whole lot of canon to cram between two covers. Anything heavier and —"
Standish went silent, adjusted her spectacles, and read. She moved her lips for the first few words, then caught herself.
Though she would never say so out loud, Tracy was thankful that Principal Standish didn't consider her God's gift to Harwich High School. From the moment she'd transferred here, all those years ago, everyone else had treated her like some kind of golden child. How miraculous she was for having survived the divorce of her parents, the marriage of her mother to another woman. How astounding that, despite all the trouble in her life, she'd not only survived, but thrived. Tracy remembered the first spelling test she'd taken here on the Cape, back in the third grade, how the teacher had applauded the emotionally bruised child for spelling knight correctly on her first try. How hard it must be to string six letters together — some of them silent! — when your soul was as black and blue as hers. Tracy could still feel that teacher's hands on her shoulders, the sympathetic squeeze. She could still feel the fire in her cheeks as she tried not to look any of her new classmates in the eye.
"Which Mr. Wingfield?" Standish asked. "The son or the father?"
Tracy smirked, then thought better of it and ducked her head. Damned pompousness coming out again.
"The father," said Standish, closing the book, its two halves slapping together in her arthritic hand.
"Most people forget he's there," said Tracy.
"But he isn't," said Standish. "And that's the point."
On one of his visits home from Hawaii a few years before, Tracy's Uncle Michael had taken her into Cambridge to see a play one of his college housemates was putting on at some derelict building just outside the ivy-covered walls of Harvard. It wasn't a theater, this place; it was more like an old house. But that was perfect, Uncle Michael told her, "exactly what this guy's been imagining since the first time he read the script."
The script, of course, was The Glass Menagerie, and Tracy traced the abstract lines on its cover — the dog and the giraffe and all the rest — as Michael covered his ears on the Green Line, the ceaseless whine of the subway car driving him batty.
While they changed trains at Park Street, Michael, rubbing at his temples, told her about the thing he was most looking forward to. "The photo of the father," he said.
"The father?" Tracy asked him. "What father?"
Michael laughed. "Everyone forgets about the father, but my pal, the director, he wrote his whole thesis on the dude."
"But he's not in the play, Uncle Michael. The father isn't around."
"Yeah," said Michael. "And that's why he's so important."
Tracy recalled little of the forgettable production, but she would never forget the comically large portrait of the smiling soldier in the doughboy's cap, his toothy grin frozen in sepia forever. It hung above the mantle of the working fireplace, which roared throughout the show, and it was so big that the stage lights actually obscured the top of his head, his hat.
"On purpose," Michael had told her. "All on purpose."
Maybe, Tracy had thought, but she realized even then, even as young as she was, that a decision made on purpose could be a bad decision just the same.
"Do you miss your father?" Standish asked.
"I thought we were here to talk about me pantsing Brian," said Tracy, picking pencils up off the desk and replacing them in the cup.
"We are," said Standish.
"Okay," said Tracy. "Good."
Brian Meltzer was a schmuck, the kind of kid who helped a hot girl with her homework then stared at her ass as she walked away, a smug grin on his face, like he'd earned the ogle. They all went to him when they came to the tutoring center, though. It wasn't that they minded Tracy; it's just that she wouldn't do their work for them. And she'd tried to tell them, for the past four years, what kind of a kid Brian was, but they didn't care. "Do you know how you're paying for all that extra help?" she'd ask.
"It's just our asses," they'd say. "And he's not the only one. And at least we're getting something out of it with him."
Tracy would sigh, they'd wave a dismissive hand, and that would be the end of it.
"What made this morning different?" asked Standish. "What pushed you over the edge?"
"I'm mad as hell," said Tracy, "and I'm not going to take it anymore."
Standish laughed. "A great film, that one. Have you seen it, or just caught clips on YouTube?"
"Unlike the men in my family, I —"
"I thought we weren't talking about your family," said Standish, an eyebrow raised.
"Touché," said Tracy.
Standish smirked, gave a curt nod, and directed her attention to her window. Tracy looked now, too. School buses were lining up in a neat row outside. The doors to two of them opened and the drivers, one male and one female, stepped out. They chatted amiably, the woman offering the man a stick of gum.
"Years ago," said Standish, "they would have been smoking."
"Nasty habit," said Tracy. "Killed my great-grandfather."
"Do you know what kind of chemicals they put in chewing gum, Ms. Silver? Or in those Diet Cokes you guzzle like they're going out of style?"
She knows what I drink at lunch? thought Tracy.
Standish pulled a manila folder from a wire rack stuffed with them and plucked a form from it, one of those horrible triplicate things, the yellow form bound for home, the pink for the teacher who filed the complaint, the white for Tracy's permanent record.
As Standish began to write, Tracy gave an ahem.
"Yes."
"Just so it's clear, I had no idea Brian was going commando today."
"Commando?" said Standish.
"Commando," said Tracy. "You know: sans underpants."
Standish grinned, shook her head. "I've never heard that term."
"My mothers let me watch too many Friends reruns as a kid."
Standish finished writing, then handed the form over to Tracy to read.
"The surprise appearance of Mr. Meltzer's penis did not factor into your punishment," she said.
Tracy nodded, took the lone pen from the Reese's cup — you couldn't sign these things in pencil, right? — and signed. "One day's suspension seems fair," she said. "And it gives me extra time to pack for my college visit this weekend."
"I've forgotten," said Standish. "Where are you headed?"
"Hawaii," said Tracy. "To visit my uncle and check out U of H. He teaches there," she added. "Illustration and art history."
Standish nodded. "Maybe take the play with you," she said, "and re-read it on the flight."
"You think I missed something?" said Tracy.
Standish bit her thumb and considered Tracy for a moment.
"I did," said Tracy, "didn't I?"
"Are you aware of Mr. Meltzer's home situation, Ms. Silver?"
Tracy nodded. "Lives with his mom," she said, "which, if I can say, makes his behavior even more —"
Standish raised a finger and Tracy shut herself up.
"It's not just the Lauras of the world who are missing their old men," said Standish. "It's the Toms, too."
Tracy nodded again, tore off the bottom copy of the form, and then folded it into a square. She stuffed that into the front pocket of her jeans.
Standish said, "We'll see you in a couple of days then."
Tracy nodded one last time, but the gesture felt all wrong. There were words left to be said, and she had not yet mastered the art of holding her tongue. She envisioned this for a second, actually pinching the fleshy instrument of her self-destruction between thumb and forefinger, and the pause was just long enough for Standish to notice.
"Yes?" said Standish.
Tracy ducked her head and half-mumbled, "Permission to speak freely?"
"Permission to what?" said Standish.
Tracy looked up. "Don't you think your reading of the text is a little heteronormative?"
Standish raised an eyebrow.
"I mean, Laura and Tom's issues with their mother have more to do with Amanda's psychoses than the lack of a father figure. Amanda would be messed up even if her husband were still there." Tracy paused, bit her lip, tried to hold back. But she couldn't. "Not every work in the canon is centered around daddy issues," she said. "My life isn't any worse because I have two mothers, Mrs. Standish. It just isn't."
"Ms. Silver," said Standish, steepling her hands in front of her face for a moment, then unsteepling them, then smiling the smile of a woman who's just dropped a deuce in her pantsuit. "You will undoubtedly be the valedictorian of your class. Your performance here, occasional lapses in judgment notwithstanding, is so far beyond the standards we have set that our faculty struggles to challenge you. My point: you could attend any college you wanted, and I know you have been courted by a great many of them."
"Yes," said Tracy. "And?"
"And yet," said Standish, "your first choice, if you'll permit me to speak freely, is a second- or third-tier school whose sole perk is its proximity to the only male authority figure you have ever truly valued."
Tracy felt her brow furrow, felt an eyebrow raise, felt words ready to tumble from her mouth. But once more, just as she was about to speak, Standish raised a solitary finger.
"Ms. Silver," Standish began again. "Your mothers are among the finest parents I've dealt with in all the many years I've been at this school. This has nothing to do with them and everything to do with you."
"I don't need a father," said Tracy.
Standish gave the briefest of chuckles. "It's funny," she said. "Mr. Meltzer said the same thing. And yet, when his father came to pick him up this morning, to take him away for the Thanksgiving holiday, his face was lighter than I've ever seen it. As for you, Ms. Silver, isn't it true that your college essay is about the rise and fall of your uncle's band?"
"Yes," said Tracy, "but —"
Old Lady Standish shushed her one last time. Then she stood, crossed to the door, and made ready to open it.
Tracy stood and stepped toward the door. But Standish still hadn't opened it. "A final lesson?" she asked.
"Consider this," said Standish, her hand fiddling with the knob, "I never said you were a Laura. Maybe," she said, "you're a Tom."
Tracy rolled her eyes and sighed, "I don't think you understand what I meant by heteronorma —"
Standish shook her head and finally pulled open the door. "Good afternoon, Ms. Silver," she said. "Have a safe flight."
"I have, like, so much more to say about this," said Tracy. "It is totally unfair the way teachers start a debate and then end it before —"
Standish set a hand on Tracy's shoulder and squeezed. Then she nudged her out of the office. "Oh," said Standish with a smile, "the maelstrom your mothers have set loose upon our unsuspecting world."
And, not knowing whether to take these words as a compliment, an insult, or something somewhere in between, Tracy watched Old Lady Standish shut the door.
CHAPTER 2
BAILEY & SCROOGE
It began with a piano falling from the sky.
Veronica stepped onto the subway platform, guitar case in hand, and tried to shake the image from her mind. But just as the last whispers of the instrument's final cacophonous chord faded into a gentle hum, she caught sight of something that scared her even more.
It was a man, a sales man. He stood in his suit, leaning against a pillar, his nose in a book. It was Dickens, a collection if she'd read the spine correctly. But he didn't read, not him. She knew this man. He watched and he listened, but he did not read.
The Salesman looked up at her as she stepped tentatively toward him. He dog-eared the page he was on, then flashed her a wide smile. "Veronica," he said. "It's me. It's —"
"I don't know you," she said, turning away, stepping toward the yellow line that separated platform from track.
"You do," he said. "Or, well, you did. You did know me."
"Fine," said Veronica, listening as his footsteps grew closer. "I don't know you anymore."
"That can be fixed," he said, setting his hands upon her shoulders. "It can all be fixed."
She thought to shrug him off, so blatant was his bullshit. But he was selling her on it, the way he always did. How many times had the feel of his hands on her shoulders calmed her, comforted her? Whether it was on the swing set, each gentle push of his filling her with the bravery it took to swing higher and faster; or when she'd learned to ride her bike, and his lightest touch could right her most severe wobble; or at the piano, where even the suggestion of his hands nearby could convince her to power through the next measure.
The piano! She gestured toward the exit. "Did you see what happened out there?"
"I did," he said. "A shame. A real shame. Avoidable."
She turned on him, had to see in his eyes if he believed his own spin. "How?" she asked. "It was an accident. How do you avoid having a piano dropped on your head?"
"Stay away from high-priced high rises."
"Excuse me?" said Veronica.
"Stay away from places where a piano is likely to fall on you from an unsafe height and you are less likely to have a piano fall on your head." He smiled and ran his hands along her upper arms, giving her shoulders a squeeze as he said, "It's simple logic, sweetheart."
She stormed away from him, stared down the tunnel, squinting to see if she could make out any oncoming trains. "Don't call me that," she said. "You don't know me. You don't have the right."
"But I do," he said, his voice echoing through the empty station. "I've known you for longer than anyone else in the world, except perhaps your mother and the doctor who delivered you. Veronica," he said. "Look at me. It's me. It's —"
"Shut up," she said, frightened by the sound of her own voice, the authority it had as it bounced back at her. She looked around, disoriented. Where was everyone? Had the city shut this place down after the piano fell? But, if they had, why hadn't she and the Salesman been evacuated, too? Something was going on here. "Where am I?" she said. "What is this place?"
"It's a subway platform," he said.
"Yes, I get that," she said, crossing to the map of the subway system, which showed not the Red and Green and Blue lines she was expecting, nor the Orange or the Silver, but instead a Purple line and a Yellow and a Black. She set a finger upon the Yellow Line and followed it to its terminus, a station named Oz. She shook her head. "I get that it's a subway platform," she said. "But is this real, or is it all happening inside my head?"
"Ah," he said. "Well, to quote one of your daughter's favorite books, 'Of course it is happening inside your head, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?'"
She turned and faced him again. "Are you messing with me?" she asked.
He held a hand to his heart, trying to look affronted. "Would I ever?" he said.
"Yes," she said. "Yes, you would."
"I am not messing with you," said the Salesman.
Veronica tried to place the quote, but couldn't. And this surprised her. There were only so many books on their shelf at home, and she had read each of them to her daughter so many times. "What book is that from?" she said. "I don't recognize it."
"Of course not," he said. "It's what — when did you go to sleep? 1999? — That book hasn't even been published yet. But once you bring that one home, you're going to read it to her. Again and again."
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Missing Mr. Wingfield"
by .
Copyright © 2017 E. Christopher Clark.
Excerpted by permission of Clarkwoods.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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