Room_ A Novel - Emma Donoghue [98]
“It’s me again, how are you doing, really?” Grandma asks. She nods and nods and says, “He’s keeping his chin up.”
She gives me the phone again, I listen to Ma say sorry a lot.
“You’re not poisoned with the bad medicine anymore?” I ask.
“No, no, I’m getting better.”
“You’re not in Heaven?”
Grandma covers her mouth.
Ma makes a sound I can’t tell if it’s a cry or a laugh. “I wish.”
“Why you wish you’re in Heaven?”
“I don’t really, I was just joking.”
“It’s not a funny joke.”
“No.”
“Don’t wish.”
“OK. I’m here at the clinic.”
“Were you tired of playing?”
I don’t hear anything, I think she’s gone. “Ma?”
“I was tired,” she says. “I made a mistake.”
“You’re not tired anymore?”
She doesn’t say anything. Then she says, “I am. But it’s OK.”
“Can you come here and swing in the hammock?”
“Pretty soon,” she says.
“When?”
“I don’t know, it depends. Is everything OK there with Grandma?”
“And Steppa.”
“Right. What’s new?”
“Everything,” I say.
That makes her laugh, I don’t know why. “Have you been having fun?”
“The sun burned my skin off and a bee stinged me.”
Grandma rolls her eyes.
Ma says something I don’t hear. “I’ve got to go now, Jack, I need some more sleep.”
“You’ll wake up after?”
“I promise. I’m so—” Her breath sounds all raggedy. “I’ll talk to you again soon, OK?”
“OK.”
There’s no more talking so I put the phone down. Grandma says, “Where’s your other shoe?”
• • •
I’m watching the flames dancing all orange under the pasta pot. The match is on the counter with its end all black and curly. I touch it to the fire, it makes a hiss and gets a big flame again so I drop it on the stove. The little flame goes invisible nearly, it’s nibbling along the match little by little till it’s all black and a small smoke goes up like a silvery ribbon. The smell is magic. I take another match from the box, I light the end in the fire and this time I hold on to it even when it hisses. It’s my own little flame I can carry around with me. I wave it in a circle, I think it’s gone out but it comes back. The flame’s getting bigger and messy all along the match, it’s two different flames and there’s a little line of red along the wood between them—
“Hey!”
I jump, it’s Steppa. I don’t have the match anymore.
He stamps on my foot.
I howl.
“It was on your sock.” He shows me the match all curled up, he rubs my sock where there’s a black bit. “Didn’t your ma ever teach you not to play with fire?”
“There wasn’t.”
“There wasn’t what?”
“Fire.”
He stares at me. “I guess your stove was electric. Go figure.”
“What’s up?” Grandma comes in.
“Jack’s just learning kitchen tools,” says Steppa, stirring the pasta. He holds a thing up and looks at me.
“Grater,” I remember.
Grandma’s setting the table.
“And this?”
“Garlic masher.”
“Garlic crusher. Way more violent than mashing.” He grins at me. He didn’t tell Grandma about the match, that’s kind of lying but not getting me into trouble is a good reason. He’s holding up something else.
“Another grater?”
“Citrus zester. And this?”
“Ah . . . a whisk.”
Steppa dangles a long pasta in the air and slurps it. “My elder brother pulled a pot of rice down on himself when he was three, and his arm was always rippled like a chip.”
“Oh, yeah, I saw them in TV.”
Grandma stares at me. “Don’t tell me you’ve never had potato chips?” Then she gets up on the steps and moves things in a cabinet.
“E.T.A. two minutes,” says Steppa.
“Oh, a handful won’t hurt.” Grandma climbs down with a scrunched bag and opens it out.
The chips have got all lines on them, I take one and eat the edge of it. Then I say, “No, thanks,” and put it back in the bag.
Steppa laughs, I don’t know what’s funny. “The boy’s saving himself for my tagliatelle carbonara.”
“Can I see the skin instead?”
“What skin?” asks Grandma.
“The brother’s.”
“Oh, he lives in Mexico. He’s your, I guess, your great-uncle.”
Steppa throws all the water into the sink so it makes a big cloud of wet air.
“Why is he great?”
“It just means he’s Leo’s brother. All our relatives, you’re related to them now