At Risk (25 page)

“Barry’s a jerk,” Charlie tells her. “I’ve got to finish these cages, Mom. I’ve got two males in together and they might beat each other up if I don’t move them soon.”

Polly nods and goes upstairs. She can hear the cassette player in Amanda’s room whirling backward, rewinding a tape. She can hear the clang of metal as Charlie empties out old cedar chips from a cage into a trash barrel. Polly gets out the Yellow Pages and riffles through until she finds DENTISTS. She calls the three orthodontists she finds listed on the North Shore, but not one will agree to see a patient who isn’t his own. Polly puts the Yellow Pages away after that.

These days it’s dark by five-thirty; Polly watches the light fade and she’s still sitting in the kitchen when Ivan gets home from the institute. As soon as she sees him, Polly begins to sob. Ivan sits down across from her at the table and watches her cry.

“Are you all right?” he says when Polly stops sobbing.

Polly nods and tells Ivan that the one wish Amanda has will never be granted; no orthodontist will touch her.

“Oh, yes they will,” Ivan says darkly.

He gets up and goes to the phone.

“Crosbie won’t do it,” Polly tells him.

“Fuck Crosbie,” Ivan says. He dials Brian’s number. He has to wait for Adelle to carry the phone into Brian’s bedroom. He tells Brian exactly what they need, an orthodontist who’s willing to work on an AIDS patient, and Brian tells him he’ll have to call around and get back to him. When he hangs up the phone, Ivan realizes that Polly’s been studying him.

“The friend you bought flowers for,” Polly says.

Ivan goes to the refrigerator and gets himself a beer. “Let’s not cook tonight,” he says. He feels a sharp pain all along his spine. “Let’s get pizza.”

“He’s the one who’s dying,” Polly says.

“That’s right,” Ivan says savagely. “The one who’s twenty-eight years old.”

Polly nods to his beer. “Can I have one of those?”

Ivan brings another beer to the table.

“Is your friend a dentist or something?” Polly asks.

Ivan laughs in spite of himself. “He worked on an AIDS hotline. He has friends.”

“Oh,” Polly says. She thinks it over. “Good.”

Ivan is out picking up the pizza and Amanda is setting the table when the phone rings.

“It’s Brian,” the voice on the other end of the line says.

“Brian,” Polly says. “Oh, Brian.” She can’t believe how young he sounds, how far away. “Ivan’s out, he’s getting a pizza.”

“That’s okay,” Brian says. “You’re Amanda’s mother, I can give you the secret password. It’s Rothstein.”

“Oh, God,” Polly says. “The orthodontist.”

“Bernard Rothstein,” Brian says. “He’ll do it.”

Polly is waiting out on the porch when Ivan gets back. They stand with the pizza between them; heat rises from the cardboard box.

“He called,” Polly tells Ivan. Ivan reaches and touches her face; her cheek is cold and soft. “He found someone,” Polly says.

“That’s good,” Ivan says. “That’s real good. I was a madman. I was ready to kill some poor innocent dentist.”

Polly can’t help but laugh. “Stop it,” she says.

“I mean it. Some poor unsuspecting jerk would be filling a cavity and in I’d walk with a shotgun.”

Polly is laughing so hard he can’t understand what she’s saying.

“What?” Ivan says, mystified.

“You don’t have a gun,” Polly manages to say.

“A bow and arrow,” Ivan says. “A fly rod.”

The back door opens and Charlie leans his head out. “Mom?” he says, puzzled when he hears Polly laughing.

“Who were you expecting?” Polly says. “Count Dracula?”

“Is that Mom?” Amanda says.

Amanda has come up behind Charlie and she peers past him, out to the porch. Polly spins around in a silly dance; the children can just about make her out in the dark. Ivan laughs low down in his throat; he sounds the way he used to.

“They’re crazy,” Amanda whispers to her brother.

“Yep,” Charlie says. “They sure are.”

The day before Amanda’s appointment with Dr. Rothstein, Polly phones Ed Reardon to let him know that they won’t be home at the time he usually comes over. Ed has gotten into the habit of stopping by the house on his way home for dinner. Sometimes he and Polly have a beer together; they sit at the kitchen table and talk about perfect vacations. Polly’s first choice is France; Ed always argues the merits of a month in Edgartown. Neither of them will get to half the places they’ve talked about, not alone, not together. Ed isn’t fooling himself; he knows theirs are less the conversations of lovers than of two people at a wake. And besides, he’s a man who fulfills his obligations, even though lately he feels like a charlatan. He’s supposed to be able to cure his patients and he can’t, and yet for no reason at all people continue to believe in him. Tonight he is a special guest, a witness really, at a school board hearing. It’s the school district’s policy to hold such a hearing should a petition surface like the one asking for Linda Gleason’s resignation. Two more children have been pulled out of Cheshire, but other than that the furor is dying down a bit, or maybe it’s simply gone underground. Some of the teachers who signed the petition against Linda Gleason have gone out of their way to be friendly to her; maybe they’re embarrassed, or maybe they’re just afraid for their jobs. After the hearing, Ed and Linda Gleason walk out to their cars together. It’s a damp night, and the air smells like woodsmoke.

“Thanks for supporting me,” Linda says. “Little do they know I’m thinking of quitting.”

“Me too,” Ed says.

They both take out their car keys.

“Not that we will,” Linda Gleason adds.

At home they both have children waiting, suppers in the oven, still warm.

“We could get in our cars and drive to New Mexico,” Ed says. “It would take them years to find us.”

Linda looks at him carefully. It’s hard to tell whether or not he’s kidding.

“Forget about all this for a night,” Linda advises him. “Take two aspirins and call me in the morning.”

“I’d still feel the same way,” Ed says.

Of course, he doesn’t mention wanting Polly beside him in that car headed to New Mexico. Ed knows that to say it out loud would make him seem like a desperate man. He goes on with his life, with his responsibilities, as best he can. He goes home, he gets into bed beside his wife, but he doesn’t feel that he’s where he’s supposed to be until the morning, when he drives to the Farrells’. Ivan has been making pancakes; he’s still wearing an apron.

“A day off,” Ivan says as he lets Ed inside.

“For some of us,” Ed jokes, but he’s shocked seeing them all together for breakfast. He has been thinking of them in pieces instead of as a family. Polly waves from the counter. She’s pouring boiling water through the coffee filter; she’s wearing a linen suit and high heels. Ed can’t remember ever having seen her so dressed up before. He feels dazed. Something inside him rattles as Charlie and Amanda argue over who gets the syrup first.

“Just in time for breakfast,” Polly tells Ed.

Ed stands behind Amanda and gently puts his hand on the base of her neck. He squeezes slightly, as a greeting, but also to feel her swollen glands. Amanda has taken two bites of her pancake, that’s all.

“No time for me,” Ed says. “I have approximately three hundred office visits today.”

He’s going to get into his car and drive to his office. He’s going to see patients all morning, then order a sandwich from the South Street Café and have it at his desk. At a little after six, he’ll drive home. He knows what he’s going to do and when he has to do it, and none of it includes running off. Not to New Mexico, or Martha’s Vineyard, or France.

“Save your first smile without braces for me,” Ed tells Amanda.

“Not a chance,” Ivan says. “I’ve already got dibs on that.”

“Good luck,” Ed says to Amanda, but he’s looking at Polly.

“Thanks for stopping by,” Polly calls, as if it had been a social visit; she makes certain not to turn around until he’s gone.

They drop Charlie off at school, then drive south on I-93, toward Boston. At the office in Brookline, Dr. Rothstein takes longer removing the braces than they’d expected. Polly and Ivan hold hands in the waiting room. They’re trying not to think about the bill he’ll send them or what their insurance will and will not cover for the rest of Amanda’s medical treatments. They’ll sell the Blazer if they have to. Polly can always go back to photographing weddings and birthday parties. She’d be better at that now, she wouldn’t feel so compromised.

Up until the very last minute, when Dr. Rothstein actually came into the waiting room to welcome them, Polly and Ivan weren’t certain he wouldn’t change his mind. When he came out of his office he shook Amanda’s hand, then led her along the hallway. Once she was in the chair, he put on two pairs of rubber gloves and a surgical mask and he got to work. He talks to Amanda mostly about his dogs; he’s a fanatic about West Highland terriers. He shows them all over New England, and he’s about to breed them, in case Amanda knows anyone who’s looking for a puppy with great bloodlines. Amanda’s mouth hurts from keeping it open for so long, but she’s used to that from visits to Dr. Crosbie. She grunts sometimes when Dr. Rothstein leaves places in his conversation for a comment. He used to have collies, but he couldn’t take all their shedding. He can fit both his Westies into a shopping bag and sneak them onto airplanes and trains. They’re so well behaved they never make a sound.

When he uses the drill to cut through the metal wires, Amanda closes her eyes. The noise goes right through her and she holds onto the arms of her chair because the braces hurt just as much coming off as they did going on. Dr. Rothstein is wearing protective goggles over his eyes; he doesn’t mention the fact that she’s sick, but he’s very nice to her. Never paper-train a dog, he tells her, if you do you’ll just have one more habit to break him of. Amanda nods, agreeing with him. He puts some thing metal into a metal bowl and the sound sends shivers down Amanda’s spine.

“Think about a Westie puppy, Dr. Rothstein says. ”I’d give you pick of the litter.”

When he’s done, Amanda rinses out her mouth and spits into the little sink. She runs her tongue over her teeth. The naked enamel feels cold. Dr. Rothstein takes off his goggles, his mask, and his gloves. After he scrubs up he takes a mirror and faces Amanda.

“Ready?” he asks her.

Amanda nods, although she’s not sure she is. What if she’s uglier than she was before? What if her teeth are just as crooked?

“You’re sure?” the orthodontist asks.

“I’m sure,” Amanda says.

He holds up the mirror and Amanda takes a deep breath, which she doesn’t let out till she sees her face looming in front of her. She leans forward and tentatively opens her mouth. Then she smiles. And even though she tries to keep her mouth closed, she’s still smiling when she walks out into the waiting room because now she knows. She would have been beautiful.

NO ONE COMES TO THEIR door on Halloween night. They can hear whoops of laughter as children outside go careening down the sidewalks, ringing doorbells and rattling their bags of candy. In the front hallway there’s a bowl of Milky Ways and Almond Joys and a glass jar of pennies for UNICEF. Charlie, who advised everyone he was too old for trick-or-treating, has the TV turned on. At a little after eight, Ivan sits down beside him on the couch and tosses him a Milky Way. They might as well eat them, no one else will.

“What are we watching?” Ivan says as he unwraps a candy bar for himself. Amanda and Polly are upstairs in Amanda’s room playing Scrabble in bed; Amanda has a sore throat, and every so often Polly comes downstairs for cough drops or tea.

“Halloween III,”
Charlie says flatly.

There’s someone with a big knife and a lot of terrified teenage girls.