Future Home of the Living God(3)

“It’s only for a day.”

“Listen to the news. There’s a lot about . . .”

“What?”

“The president is talking about declaring a state of emergency and there’s a debate in Congress about confining certain . . .”

“Dad, you’re always—”

“This time it’s real, please come back.”

Sera gets back on the phone. She has composed herself. One of her deepest tenets—her belief in my autonomy—is at stake. She has warred with herself off the phone, and won.

“Well, we don’t know. This could be a new kind of virus. Maybe bacteria. From the permafrost. Use hand sanitizer, okay? Will you call us when you’re there and call us when you get back?”

“Sure.”

“And fill up with gas first.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“Of course you will.”

It isn’t until after I’ve hung up that I remember how Glen and Sera often congratulate themselves on their prescience regarding the tech and housing bubbles, then Iraq, the Mideast, Afghanistan, then Russia, the increasing chaos of our elections, and our first winter without snow, among other things, and how good their track record is on political idiocies and wars and natural disasters. They didn’t foresee this, of course—nobody did—but they’re excellent at reading the fallout of events. I should probably be more nervous than I am, but I evade all common sense by dialing statewide 411 information and getting the phone number of the Superpumper where my biological family work. Then I even let the automated cheery voice on the information dial automatically for me, which costs extra.

“Boozhoo?”

God, I think, they speak French.

“Bonjour,” I say.

“H’lo?”

“Hello.”

“Who’s this?”

“I’m . . . ah . . . looking for Mary Potts.”

“Well, I’m not her. Who’s this?”

“Okay, well, I got this letter from Mary Potts Senior about a year ago; she contacted me about the fact that she is my biological mom. Is this? I mean, you don’t sound like Mary Potts Senior, but are you maybe—”

“Whatthefuck?”

“Hey!”

“MAAAAAHM! Some INSANE BITCH is on the phone who says you’re her mom and you wrote her last year.”

Mumbling. A voice. Gimme that. A crackling thump as someone drops the receiver. A man’s voice saying, Who’s that, Sweetie? Woman’s voice. Nobody! First voice again. Getthefuckawayfromme. A raging scream that fades and ends abruptly in a crash—slamming door?

“Mary Potts Senior?” I ask the hollow breath on the other end.

“Speaking.” A whisper. A croak as she clears her throat. “Yeah, it’s me. The one that wrote you.”

And I suddenly want to cry, my chest hurts, I can’t breathe, I’m breaking. The only thing that could possibly overcome what I feel right that moment is a simultaneous mad anger that bubbles up in me and freezes my voice solid.

“By any chance, will you be in tomorrow?”

“In?”

“Home.”

“I’m not doin nothing.”

“I am coming up there. I am going to visit you. I have to speak to you.”

“Awright.”

Who’s that, Sweetie? Man’s voice. Nobody! she says again.

I ignore the awful prickling in my throat, the reaction to the second time that she has said nobody.

“Who’s calling you sweetie?” I ask.

“That’s my name,” says Mary Potts Senior. “They call me Sweetie up here.”

“Oh.”

Her voice is so humble, so hushed, so astonished, so afraid. I feel a sweep of killing rage, but it just comes out in cold, weirdly complicated grammar.

“Well, that’s very fitting, I am sure, Sweetie; however, I think that I will just call you Mary Potts Senior, if that’s all right.”

“I’m not senior, though. I’m almost senior, not quite. Grandma’s still alive.”

“Okay, Mary Potts Almost Senior. Now, might I ask for directions to your house?”

“Sure you might,” says Mary Potts, or Sweetie, but then she doesn’t say anything.

“Well?” I say, icy voice.

Sweetie gets a little sly now, maybe she can’t help it, maybe she’s a mixture of humble and heart-struck and shrewd, I don’t know.

“You said you might ask. You asking?”

Now I feel a stab of what is probably instant hatred, because she is the one who wrote me and she is the one who asked me to contact her and she is the one who originally bore me from her body and then dumped me. But I can handle her petty manipulations.

“Just tell me,” I say in a cool, neutral voice. “You can give me your address. I’ll use Siri or GPS.”

“We ain’t on no GPS, and Siri’s dead. You don’t know?”

“Know what?”

“You’ll find out. You coming up from where? Up or down?”

“I’ll be coming up from Minneapolis.”

“Well, you know the highways up to Skinaway—then you cut . . . ah . . . it’s a left. You take a left at the river.”