Monkey Island

Monkey Island by Paula Fox

Book: Monkey Island by Paula Fox Read Free Book Online
Authors: Paula Fox
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maybe a year ago when his magazine folded. Ma learned to work computers and worked at night. She’s having a baby. I guess it’s born by now.” He glanced quickly at Mrs. Greg, wondering if she knew something he didn’t.
    Mrs. Greg was looking at him attentively, her head cocked slightly forward as though to catch every word.
    â€œWell, my father went away. Missing Persons couldn’t find him.”
    â€œWhen do you think that was?” Mrs. Greg interrupted him.
    â€œAbout seven months ago,” Clay replied. “Then Ma stopped working. Pretty soon we couldn’t pay the rent. Then we went to the hotel—after Ma went to Social Services. That’s where they put us—in that hotel. She went away too. She was gone when I woke up in the morning. I thought she’d come back. She didn’t.”
    â€œHow long ago was that?” Mrs. Greg asked.
    â€œHow long have I been in the hospital?”
    â€œTen days,” Mrs. Greg said promptly.
    He thought for a moment. “About six weeks and four days,” he said. “That’s when she went away.”
    â€œSomeone took care of you in the park? A young black man?”
    â€œBuddy,” he said. “And Calvin too. But Calvin drank too much and now he’s in a hospital and isn’t going to make it.”
    Mrs. Greg stared at him for at least a minute. He didn’t mind. He felt easy now. After all, he’d told her only the truth.
    â€œDo you have relatives anywhere?” she asked at last.
    â€œMy father’s mother, in Oregon. If she’s alive,” he replied. “But she won’t have anything to do with us.”
    Mrs. Greg looked very interested.
    â€œWhy is that, do you think?” she asked.
    â€œI know why. Because my mother is Italian. And my father’s mother said that that ended the family. But my father said she’s lost out on everything.”
    For a second, Clay thought he might start yelling at the top of his lungs instead of speaking so calmly and coolly. Then he recalled what Calvin had said in his dry voice: “Families can let you down.” Maybe that was half-true. Calvin had a son he hadn’t seen in years, and if Calvin died, the son wouldn’t even know he’d left the world. Thinking of Calvin, how funny he could be even when he was sarcastic, made Clay feel less like yelling. “Life is like that,” Calvin would have said.
    â€œYou must feel you’ve been dropped from a cliff,” Mrs. Greg said softly.
    Perhaps he did feel that way. But he didn’t want to be told how he felt.
    Mrs. Greg was leaning forward. Suddenly she reached out and took his hand. Not quite meaning to, he made a fist, but she kept on holding it.
    â€œThose two men were good to you?” she asked. “They didn’t mistreat you?”
    â€œYes,” he answered so loudly they both jumped. “They were so good to me!”
    She let go of his hand and glanced down at her notebook. “Listen, Clay,” she began. “You’re not going back to the streets. We have to do a few legal things, like making you a ward of the court. That’s a formality. And we’re going to find you a really nice home with nice people—and very shortly, not in a hundred years and a day. Meanwhile, we’re going to look for your parents. I want you to write down your old address and your mother’s and father’s full names, and where you went to school and the name of the hotel. Also the name of anyone who came to see your mother, like someone from Social Services. All right?”
    He thought of Miss You-can’t-fool-me. But he wouldn’t write that down.
    â€œYou may find it hard to believe, but your getting sick has a good side to it,” said Mrs. Greg. “You can think of this hospital as part of the net.”
    She isn’t so bad, he thought. She probably wouldn’t look away from people lying on the sidewalk.

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