Madison and Timothy had flown to D.C. with Jasper, to simply be visible. Carl was on the property, but of course he was preoccupied with other stuff, barely seemed to care what I did with the kids. We played basketball, swam in the pool, read books, did our yoga. It was peaceful, honestly, like the end of the world had happened and we’d missed it. So much intensity had been directed toward these kids, and now that everyone was getting what they wanted, it was like we became invisible. They hadn’t caught on fire in a long time; at least it seemed like a long time to me. And when you are weird, when your surroundings become quiet, you think maybe you aren’t quite so fucked up. You think, Why was it so hard before?
One morning, we’d been testing the starch level in potatoes, and Bessie said, “Is anybody in the mansion?”
“No,” I said. “Well, I mean, the staff is there.”
“Can we go over there?” she asked, and I was like, why not? Who the fuck cares? Or, no, who the fuck was going to stop us?
Just to be safe, they put on their Nomex long underwear, which had finally arrived, this scratchy white material that made them look like they were living in a science fiction movie. They kind of loved it, except for how sweaty it made them. I wasn’t sure if memories of the mansion, long forgotten, might surface and cause them to catch.
So we walked over and of course the doors were locked. And we just banged on the rear entrance until Mary, so pissed to be disturbed, opened the door.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“We want to explore,” Roland said.
“Fine,” she replied, and waved us in like she was letting the plague spread through the house, like she didn’t care if she lived or died.
“Thank you, Miss Mary,” the kids said, and she replied, “Come by later. I have bread pudding. With whiskey sauce.”
“Yay!” the kids shouted.
But once they were inside, free, they grew quieter, more respectful, like they were in some old European cathedral, like the place was lousy with important dead people.
“Do you remember it?” I asked, but they both shook their heads.
“I bet your rooms were upstairs,” I said, and we walked up the staircase. I told them how horses had been hidden in the attic during the Civil War, but they didn’t care any more than I had cared.
We walked down the hallway, peeking our heads into each room. We saw Timothy’s room, all those stuffed animals, and the kids’ eyes got real wide. They walked in carefully, fully expecting it to be booby-trapped, and then they stared at the piles of plush. Bessie punched her fist into one of the piles and retrieved a zebra with Technicolor stripes. “I’m taking this,” she said, a kind of tax, and I was like, A-okay with me, so Roland grabbed an owl with a monocle and bow tie.
We walked around some more, and then they stopped in the doorway of one of the rooms. “This was it,” Bessie said. “This was our room.” I had no idea how she could tell. Now it was an exercise room with a NordicTrack and some weight machines, and all the walls were covered in mirrors. “It was right across from that bathroom,” Bessie said, remembering. “And we had bunk beds, and I slept on top.”
“And there was this toy box right under the window,” Roland continued.
“It was white and had flowers painted on it,” Bessie said. “And we each had our own desk.”
“Where is all that stuff?” Roland asked me, and I just shrugged.
“Maybe it moved with you and your mom when y’all left the mansion,” I offered.
“We didn’t take anything with us,” Bessie replied. “Mom wouldn’t let us.”
“So where is it?” Roland asked.
“I guess we can ask Madison,” I said. “Do you want that stuff?”
“No,” Bessie admitted. “I just want to know if he kept it.”
They seemed tired now, and so we went downstairs to the kitchen and Mary let us have bread pudding, which really had a kick of whiskey to it, but I let the kids have it anyway. We sat there, the three of us eating this sweet thing, Mary watching us, tolerating us. When I finished my bowl, without thinking, I dipped my finger in the glaze that had accumulated and Roland licked it right off my finger, ravenous. “Quite a sight,” Mary finally said, and I felt like maybe she was sincere, that we were something to behold.
One morning, Carl showed up at the door. “We need to take the kids to the doctor,” he said, and I knew that he had practiced how he would say this and had decided that a direct statement, like it wasn’t up for debate, was the best way to proceed. I imagined him saying it to his reflection in the mirror.