Page 95 of The Sign for Home

“You’re right. But it wasn’t because of ill intention. It was ignorance.Arlo has shown me I was following a false God in my feelings for Brother Birch. You called it out in front of Sister Doris.”

“Who?”

“Jonathan’s wife. That day of the field trip in the parking lot. It was cruel of you, but it was the truth.”

Molly took another breath, looked up at the grand golden tin ceiling of the train station, and then looked at me. Her eyes were damp, but in a way clearer than I had ever seen them.

“Yes, I was in love with Jonathan, or thought I was. It’s hard being alone and controlling every urge inside yourself for most of your life. I so stupidly thought something real was happening. I trusted that Jonathan truly cared about me. But look what’s actually happened. I’ve been shunned by the congregation and removed from the Ecuador trip with Arlo. Meanwhile, Jonathan gets a slap on the wrist. When it was decided he could no longer see me without supervision, he didn’t even send me an email to say goodbye. That was it. Done. Like I meant nothing. And all the suffering we… I… caused for that poor boy… for what? Because I trusted that man more than my own instincts. How will God ever forgive me unless I help Arlo make things right? How will I forgive myself? Please help me make things right.”

I shook my head, clutching to my skepticism, unwilling to be swayed, but finally believing she was telling the truth.

“You know what you’re asking me to risk, right? RID might take my certification away, all because of you.”

“I’ll speak to RID and defend you. I’ll be a witness in court about Birch’s treatment of Arlo. I’d go find Arlo alone and help him if I could, Cyril. But I can’t. Arlo needs you. I need you.”

Molly had been twisting her hands anxiously. I stared at the gnarled bumps of arthritis, a familiar by-product of interpreting for too many years and not taking proper care. I stood there frozen, my head in a fog of pity and dwindling rage. A moment later Hanne and Lavinia walked back towardus. Hanne grabbed my shoulders and stared into my eyes like some old-timey war-movie commander confronting a soldier on his certain-death mission.

“Cyrilje, we have to go if we’re going to do this.”

The three women stared at me, waiting, impatient, asking me to do something that could amplify the destruction of my entire life.

“I’ll help you find Arlo,” I said bitterly. “But then I’m done.”

Once we were out in the parking lot, Hanne sat in the passenger seat while Molly climbed into the back of my Honda. It all seemed like a bizarre dream. Lavinia, sweat pouring down her face, leaned into the driver’s-side window, her eyes and voice damp with emotion.

“Cyril, I need you to do me a favor. When you find Arlo—and I know you will—please tell him it was an honor to have him in my class. And even though he missed the last two weeks, he still earned an A-plus—and I never give an A-plus. If he can learn his tenses, he will become a very good writer someday.”

Lavinia looked like she wanted to say something else, but whatever emotion she was feeling prevented her. She gave me one last kiss on the cheek and then waved us off.

45GRAND CENTRAL

You need to pee. You’ve needed to pee since an hour into the train ride down to New York City. Unsure if they have toilets on the train, you do not move for fear you won’t be able to find your way back to your seat. If you aren’t in the same seat, the conductor will not be able to tell you when you’ve reached Grand Central.

The next time the train stops, lots of people pass you by, but the conductor has not come to get you and your bladder is so full it presses hard against the bottom part of your belly. You check your watch and see that you must have already arrived at Grand Central. The conductor forgot about you, and now your need to get to a bathroom has become an emergency. It would be awful to meet Shri for the first time in five and a half years with pee in your pants. So you quickly write in your notebook:Can you help me off the train and show me where toilet bathroom PLEASE?!!!

The breezes of bodies rush by and no one helps you. It occurs to you that if you don’t get off the train it might leave again and go back to Poughkeepsie. So you stand up and let Snap lead you off the train. The platform air is stone-still, very hot, and smells like dirt, electricity, piss, and shit. You did not expect this from a place called Grand Central. The platform is too dim to see anything.

To stop your bladder from leaking, you squeeze that part between your balls and your ass.

Snap go! Snap Toilet!

Snap, who has never been to Grand Central before either, turns left and you follow her into the hot darkness. Snap, who can only lead you to a toilet once you’re in a restroom, is as confused as you are and stops. Just in case someone is around, you wave your laminated sign asking for help. A drop of urine leaks into your underwear. You assume that the direction of the exit must be in the same direction the train was moving when it arrived in the station, so you turn Snap around and hurry toward the right. A large round trash can in the middle of the platform attacks you from your left. But because you have to go to the toilet so bad you don’t really notice the pain. Your feet feel the bumpy warning strip on the floor, keeping you from falling on the tracks. Snap can sense your urgency and walks quickly forward. The hard floor changes textures and starts to slope upward. You can feel cooler air coming from somewhere ahead. A hint of light. A change of scent. You pass through a door. You are in a giant room. Another drop of piss leaks out. You hold up your sign, and finally someone (a woman) touches your shoulder. She smells like hairspray and baby powder. You show the woman the note and she leads you and Snap across a very big room, through crowds of people, then down very slippery hard steps into another room that smells like all different kinds of very delicious food. She pulls you in different directions to avoid hitting things and then finally, just after the smell ofhamburger-hamburgers and onions, you also smell toilets. Because she’s a woman she cannot go inside the men’s toilet, so she pushes you in the right direction. You enter the large bathroom and immediately bump into a row of sinks. At school the urinals were at the end of the row of sinks, so you use them as a guide. But at the end of the row of sinks is just a wall. The angry liquid inside presses harder and harder, demanding release. You hold your breath and squeeze. But it’s too late. Hot piss gushes into your underwear before leaking all the way down your right pant leg, into your sock, your sneaker, and onto the floor.

You want to cry.

You can’t go rescue Shri like this, and you don’t have a lot of time. Brother Birch will be looking for you. You need to clean yourself. So you remove your belt and put it and your wallet in the front pouch of your backpack, setting it next to a dry area on the floor. Even though there are other people around, you remove all your dirty clothes from the waist down. Your face boils with embarrassment, so you have to be quick. Locating the soap dispenser, you wash your pants, underwear, right sneaker, and right sock as best as you can. You also wash your crotch, legs, and feet. The wind and vibrations of other people’s bodies pass by you. Snap leaps toward something.

No! Stay! Stop causing trouble!

You are mad at Snap for being a bad girl when you are having such a difficult time. When everything is finally clean, you pull the sopping-wet clothes onto your sopping-wet body. It feels terrible. At least you won’t smell like piss. You feel good about that. But when you reach for your backpack, it’s not where you left it. Panic. You and Snap search the floor of the entire bathroom. Under the sinks. On the counter. In the stalls. Signing and using your voice, you ask for help but no one listens, no one understands. Your backpack with your SBC, magnifying glass, travel cards, notebook, laptop, belt, wallet, money, and Shri’s address: all gone. A DeafBlind man lost and alone with no way to communicate. You are nothing. You start to scream.

46LOST AND FOUND

The three of us barely said a word to each other the entire drive down to the city. It was as if we worried that the friction of our voices might slow the car down. Molly texted Birch that after leaving Snap at the guide dog rescue, she and Arlo wanted to have a goodbye dinner together, and asked if it would be all right if Arlo got home on the late side. Birch agreed, probably due to whatever guilt he might have about separating Molly from Arlo. Whatever the reason, it bought us a little more time.

None of us knew much about Queens other than that was where New York kept its airports. The highway led us to boulevards that spit us out onto residential roads where we saw a myriad of cultures walking around, from Hasidic Jews in religious garments to South Asian families in saris and hijabs. The architecture was equally diverse, ranging from elegant English Tudor mansions to ugly brick high-rises. Of course, we weren’t there to take in the sights.

“Turn here!” Hanne cried out, her eyes locked on the Maps app. “This is the street where the nursing home is.”

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