The White Bicycle Page 4

  My Daily Schedule

  I am the only one who doesn't mind getting up early, and so the morning part of Martin Phoenix's day is my responsibility. We have a regular routine that we follow here at the villa. Alan Phoenix has washed and shaved by the time Martin Phoenix finishes his meal, and usually they go out into the yard looking for ripe figs while I do the dishes: theirs and mine from breakfast, and anything left over from last night when the five of us—Alan Phoenix, Luke Phoenix, Martin Phoenix, my mother, and I—had our bedtime snacks. Five of us can use a lot of dishes, even just at bedtime.

  After Alan Phoenix goes next door to work with Madame Colombe, his partner in an art project he is working on here in France, Martin Phoenix and I go for a walk anywhere that his wheelchair will allow, or else we play checkers, or work on paintings of our own. Martin Phoenix can paint with his fingers and I print the title of his work underneath. His painting this morning was called Garden Poop and consisted of various splotches of brown. In the corner of the page was a large gray figure that I thought was a pigeon but he said was his brother, my friend Luke Phoenix.

  I met Luke Phoenix last fall in a biology class at the University of Saskatchewan. We are the same age because I failed kindergarten and he failed a different grade after his mother died and his brother was born with cerebral palsy and had to be taken to various clinics all over the United States. Although Luke Phoenix is my friend, he could also be my brother someday if my mother and his father get married, but even though we are the same age we would not be twins. If my mother and his father get married, that would make Martin Phoenix my brother as well. If Martin Phoenix were my brother, I could not put this babysitting/personal care job on my resumé because you can't get a professional credit by working for your own family. I hope that my mother will not make any changes to our group dynamics until we get home to Canada and my work here is finished. Otherwise, my resumé will be ruined.

  Usually Alan Phoenix comes back home for lunch and by this time my mother is awake and Luke Phoenix has returned from his tennis lesson. We all have bread and cheese— there are many kinds of cheeses here to choose from—and sometimes my mother and Alan Phoenix even have wine, which is not appropriate for lunch. They defend themselves by saying it is customary in France to have a small glass at noon. I did not know wine habits could be different between two countries.

  We also have olives and fruit for lunch, as they grow all through the Luberon Valley. Peaches are in season and sometimes there are figs. I do not like the olives or peaches, but the figs are quite pleasant, with centers rather like blueberries when they are neither too sour nor too sweet. Luke Phoenix likes to eat olives and then spit the pits at his brother. He has a surprisingly good aim. When a pit hits Martin Phoenix he wriggles in his chair and then Luke Phoenix says, "Hot cross buns!" and Martin Phoenix calls Luke Phoenix bad names using his Tango, just as he has done before. I don't know what hot cross buns have to do with anything.

  Sometimes, while we are eating, there are silences, and my friend Luke Phoenix usually fills those silences with quotations. Sometimes he talks to the cuckoo we hear in the trees, calling out to it: "'Sing on there in the swamp/O singer bashful and tender. I hear your notes, I hear your call, I hear, I come presently, I understand you …' Walt Whitman, 1865." I don't know why he does this. The cuckoo cannot understand him.

  At other times when there are silences, my mother fills them by trying to give me advice. She is continually telling me what to do. Lately, she has been talking a lot about my jean dress. My jean dress, she says, is disgustingly old and should be thrown away. She has also been talking a lot about cooking classes. She thinks I should take a cooking class and learn some professional skills. She also thinks that I should get a card for the public library in Vaugines and see if they have any film nights where I would meet nice young people. Film nights? Nice young people?

  I told her that Martin Phoenix and Luke Phoenix were nice young people and that I was happy associating with them. That's when our conversation got kind of confusing. My mother said that because she and Alan Phoenix were a couple, even though they weren't married, Martin Phoenix and Luke Phoenix were kind of like my brothers.

  "Not really my brothers," I clarified, because I want to put the job of personal care assistant on my resumé.

  "They are not really your brothers," she said. "But they could be someday. So I don't want you getting ideas about Luke Phoenix, even though he is your age and you like him and spend a lot of time with him. You should be out meeting lots of other teens your age."

  I do not know what she meant about Luke Phoenix, so I am specifically writing that part down here. Maybe I will be able to figure it out if I think more about it. I wonder if my mother should be out meeting more people her age. Is consistency of age an important quality among friends? Sometime at lunch or dinner I will ask my mother about that. I like to ask her questions at lunch or dinner so that if she starts to talk too long, she will get hungry and stop talking. My mother seems to like the food here a great deal.

  The deli ham is disgusting—all slimy and full of fat. Also disgusting is the baking that comes from the markets where there are flies and other bugs. I saw a wasp crawling out of a hole in a honey pretzel just before someone bought it. Once Alan Phoenix brought home pigeon eggs, but I did not eat them. Pigeon eggs would be especially disgusting. I have seen what the pigeons eat around here.

  In the afternoons I usually go for a walk or a bike ride, but sometimes we all go sightseeing instead. One afternoon we drove through the Luberon Mountains to Apt and then over to Isle sur la Sorgue, and then to Fontaine de Vaucluse where there was supposed to be a special fountain, but it wasn't very interesting.

  We ate in a restaurant and I had crepes with butter and sugar, even though my mother tried to get me to order something containing a vegetable. Alan Phoenix and my mother had onion soup, and Luke Phoenix had duck basted with honey, garlic, and thyme, as well as creamed zucchini. Alan Phoenix asked him if he had brought his wallet. Martin Phoenix had chef's crepes, which had cheese, ham, and an egg on top, and then he had pistachio ice cream with a hair in it. The waitress told us that she came from a family with eight brothers and four sisters and she was proud to say that they all worked in restaurants. She herself has two children and is very happy with that number.

  "Mais vous semblez très heureuse avec trois enfants, Madame," she told my mother, holding up three fingers. My mother got all red and flustered. She had understood enough to know that the waitress thought Martin Phoenix, Luke Phoenix, and I were all her children. That would only be true if my mother and Alan Phoenix got married, and all I can say is that this better not happen this summer.

  "Do you offer cooking classes?" my mother asked the waitress in English and then Alan Phoenix translated it into French. I can see the scene now as if it is a movie replaying in my head.

  "Non," says the waitress, shaking her head.

  "Too bad, because my daughter would like to take one," my mother says.

  "No, I would not!" I say, with my voice loud enough to be in the red zone. But sometimes it is as if my mother is stone deaf.

  "We'll see," she says.

  The room starts to look white and I feel hot with my anger. But I think about sending the anger down through my body, away from my head and into my feet. This takes the whiteness away with it, and I can see in colors again. I do not like to cook. I have never liked to cook. And I am not going to learn to cook French food!

  Tuesday August 5

  This afternoon it is raining, so we are not sightseeing, and I am not going for my usual walk or bike ride. I am sitting at my big desk overlooking the yard and working on this journal. My mother is shopping after making me promise— three times, as if I'm a stupid baby—not to go outside in the rain without my raincoat. Alan Phoenix has driven Martin Phoenix to the doctor because Martin Phoenix has some kind of rash, and Luke Phoenix has gone along because he knows some of the French that his father does not.

&n
bsp; Through the large window of my bedroom I can see the cherry trees, and beyond them a grove of olive trees, and beyond that the vineyards across the road. Past the vineyards are the tree-covered Luberon mountains, which today are shrouded with mist. The sound of the rain on the tile roof shingles of the villa makes me feel sleepy, but I open the desk drawer and take out some cinnamon gum. Peppermint would be calming and organizing but cinnamon wakes me up. My mother read about gum on an autism website and, unlike much of her advice, I find the gum to be very helpful.

  Today I need to start thinking about my earliest memories and find the ones I want to include in this journal. It is easy for me to remember things. The problem is that some of the things I remember, I wish I could forget.

  My Earliest Memory

  I am four years old. I have long dark hair and blue eyes, just as I do now. My father is walking me to kindergarten for the first time and the sidewalk has yellow dandelions coming up through cracks in the cement. My father says, "Look at all the yellow buttons on the sidewalk," but I do not see any buttons. I do not know why we are going to school, and I do not know yet that he will leave me there.

  In the classroom, I see four round red tables, sixteen small green chairs, a large brown desk with a big brown chair, a blue carpet, a brown rocking chair, a shelf of books, and bins of toys. I go to the bin that contains toy cars and begin lining them up on the edge of the carpet. It is important to get them in a straight line but every time I am almost finished, another kid comes along and moves one. I am concentrating hard on what I am doing and for a while I don't see who is moving the cars, so at first I keep thinking that it is my fault when the line is not straight. When I do see a kid pick up a car, I am so full of rage that I start throwing the cars all over the place. A woman comes and grabs my hands. Her mouth is moving but I can't tell what she is saying. Someone is screaming and it is so loud in here. Maybe the person screaming is me.

  Someone is taking me out of the classroom and talking at me in gibberish. I grab anything within reach and throw it, because I don't know where I am being taken. I look around for my father but he is gone. That is when I start to kick and everything goes white, like a screen at the end of a movie.

  After a long time, my mother is there. She takes me from whomever is holding me and sits with me for a while until I have caught my breath and start to see in colors again. Then we go home.

  This scene at school replays itself for many days. If it weren't for the fact that going to kindergarten always ended with me lost in a meltdown, it would have been almost comforting in its repetition: I go to kindergarten; I line up the cars; I have a meltdown and everything goes white; my mother takes me home. But it is not comforting. It is exhausting to be so angry and then, later, to become aware of being in a new situation different from the one that made me mad. As if everything has been erased and then replaced with something unfamiliar. Week after terrible week. And all the time I don't have the right words to make anyone else understand how I am feeling.

  My mother is sitting on a chair at the back of the classroom. I can see her sitting there while I am playing with the cars. I look at her every now and then, and I know that she is my mother because I recognize the flowered handbag she always carries. "That is really my mother," I keep saying to myself. I am glad she is here. When another child takes one of my cars, I open my mouth and yell. I am surprised that my mother does not come over and get it back, but she does not, and I yell harder. I yell until my mother does come over, but she just picks me up and takes me back to her chair. We sit there and I kick her every now and then, just to give her the message that I want that car back, until finally she wraps her legs around mine and I am wedged tightly onto her lap. I begin to breathe deeply and I can feel my eyelids closing. My mother is what the minister would call an island of stability. But I know I am not supposed to sleep here. I look drowsily at all the colors around us and slide off my mother's lap. My mother nudges me back toward the cars and I edge over to begin my play again.

  The teacher is putting up pictures on the October bulletin board. During the last month I have read all the books on the shelf and now I know better than to play with the cars because somebody always takes one. Today I am sitting at the computer typing random letters. This is best because if I write something intelligible the teacher always wants to talk about it.

  A boy comes over. His mouth is moving and sounds are coming out but I don't hear any words. Then he tries to push me out of my chair. I grab the mouse and pull it out of the computer; then I hit him on the side of the head with it. He runs away crying and I sit back down, plug in the mouse, and continue to type random letters.

  I am surprised when the teacher comes over and turns off the computer. The computer is always on all day.

  "Computer," I say. "On all day."

  "It's going to stay off until you apologize to Elton," says the teacher very slowly.

  I turn the computer back on, because that's the only way you can type the letters, and when the teacher tries to turn it off, I bite her on the hand.

  Then there are a lot of loud voices and soon I am sitting in an office where I see another computer. When the person gets out of the big chair, I go and sit there and then start typing my letters again. I do this until my mother comes and takes me home.

  That night my parents yell a lot against each other. I can't tell what they are saying, because they are in their bedroom and the door is shut, but the voices are so loud they make my teeth ache. My skin starts to hurt and I roll myself up in the sheet from my bed. If I roll it tightly enough, the soreness in my skin goes away. Then the yelling comes out of the bedroom and fills the whole house and I am in the middle of it. I am in the middle of the yelling and I can't find any relief.

  I am in a little room at school and my mother is sitting on a chair outside the door. I can see a corner of her flowered handbag where it sits near the doorway. There is a person across the table from me and a gray machine on the table, and the machine dangles red, white, and green cords. I am wearing headphones and I am supposed to say "yes" every time I hear a beep.

  "Yes," I say. "Yes, yes, yes. Yes." I pause, listening carefully. "Yes."

  This goes on for eleven minutes and then we are done.

  The person goes outside to talk to my mother and I can hear them whispering.

  "Good news. She has normal hearing," the person says.

  "I knew her hearing was fine," says my mother. "She hears like a cat."

  "Can we get a cat?" I call.

  "No," my mother says, coming back into the room and holding out her hand. "Time to go back to the classroom. Come on."

  My Second Year in Kindergarten

  I am five and I am in kindergarten for a second year. Over the weekend, the teacher has put up the October pictures. They are the same pictures she put up last year in 1988. When she asks me to show my mother what I like about the classroom, I select a book from the orange box that she has placed under the bulletin board.

  "Bernardo was a little brown bat," I read aloud.

  "Oh, Taylor. You must have this book at home," says the teacher.

  I look over at my mother. It is frightening to hear the teacher say that she thinks we must get this book. I don't know where we would find it. Will I be punished if we can't find it?

  "He lived in a hole in the side of a chestnut tree," I read, my voice shaking a bit. "In the daytime, he slept in his cozy nest. At night, he flew out and ate bugs."

  "Very nice reading, Taylor!" says the teacher. "I bet you've read this book so many times you've memorized it!"

  I look at the teacher. Everything she says is confusing. I look at my mother.

  "Taylor can read," my mother tells the teacher.

  "I'm sure she isn't really reading this book," says the teacher. "It's fairly advanced. She's a smart child to memorize things, but she's not a dictionary."

  I stand up and go over to the teacher's desk. There is a dictionary on the desk and I pick it up. Of cours
e I am not a dictionary. I am a girl and a dictionary is a book.

  "Webster's Dictionary," I read the title, and then go on to read the other words on the cover. "Modern definitions. Easy-to-read type. Parts of speech. More than 440 pages. Specially designed for home, school, and office."

  "Oh, my goodness," says the teacher. "I see what you mean. That is quite amazing." The teacher pauses. Then she says, "She does seem academically ready for school. We'll just keep working on the social part. I'm sure being an only child has been difficult, because she won't have had much practice sharing. And she is quite spoiled—you should not give her everything she wants, Mrs. Simon, just because she yells. But not to worry—her social skills will develop. We'll keep working on them and each day is a new day. Right, Taylor?"

  I look at the teacher. I have no idea what she is talking about. I look at my mother. She nods. I nod. Then we go home and I hear my mother making sounds in her bedroom that are not happy sounds. I sit naked in a sunbeam until my father gets home and then we have supper.

  There is a big amount of yelling in my parents' bedroom. Their voices are so loud I cannot tell one from the other. This frightens me and I squeeze under the couch, where I am pressed between the wooden frame and the cool tile floor. Eventually, I hear some words and I think someone is saying, "And all the buttons are wrecked on the vcr!" But maybe I heard incorrectly even though I know that all the buttons are wrecked—the vcr has not worked in eleven days. I miss the satisfaction of pressing those buttons and seeing something change.

  "Don't you tell me I should be a better mother!" someone says. "You should be a better father! How about that?"

  I count as high as I can, into the ten thousands, and then I see my father's shoes. He is not supposed to wear them in the house. He is jingling the car keys in his pocket and I come out from under the couch and we go for a drive. We drive past the pet store two times. On the third time we don't go past, we go in, and I ask for a cat. My father says, "No."