“These are my last three today,” whispered Mother, as she rooted around in her bag. Meanwhile, others began singing with the speaker-girl. “I can get more. Don’t worry. Does your friend need any?”
“No,” I said.
Walter held out his hand. “Two for me, please!”
Mother eyed him and placed one in each of our palms. Walter tossed his into his mouth and crunched it with glee. I hid mine in a secret pocket inside my jacket.
A woman, with skin that looked like scrambled eggs, stepped toward me. She touched my face gently, and then ran away just as quickly.
“Ari,” cried Mother. “Come and say hello.” She stopped five feet away, but wouldn’t return. “Don’t mind them,” said Mother. “They didn’t believe that you’d come.” Her eyes got watery. “I didn’t even know if I really believed. But you’re here! Sweet, Michael, you’ve found the truth.”
“Yes,” I said, swallowing hard. “The truth is, I have plans for tonight.”
“We all have plans!” she said, as if this were what she had longed to hear. As tears began down her face, she said, “We can have our future together.”
Behind, I saw several of them bringing out a long table and chairs as if we were going to have some sort of a feast right out in the open. Others brought trays of what looked like roasted rats piled on metal plates. Mason directed everyone with his cane.
Mother kissed me on the cheek. “You’re home. I’m so glad you’re with your family.”
I owed it to her to tell her about my plans for the show, but the way she had stressed your and now gazed intently at me, I asked, “My family?”
Turning, she looked at the others, who were all laughing, joking, and smiling, I felt they might never have been happier. “Before you came along,” she said, “your father had trouble producing healthy children. He had more than six thousand with all sorts of women. Most didn’t survive.” She hugged me to her. “You were the best and the prettiest boy,” she continued. “Even so,” she waved toward the others with her left hand, “you needed lots of pieces from your siblings.”
Sixteen
They sat me in the middle of the worn wooden table as if I were the guest of honor. Above, they had strung dozens of LEDs that glowed like tiny red planets. The speaker-girl handed me a tall stemmed glass filled with a clear, yellowish drink.
“Corn wine,” she said, her eyes filled with happy tears.
I put it to my lips but just pretended to drink as I watched them talk, laugh, and make a dozen hopeful toasts. “What do you mean pieces?”
“To fix what was wrong. You were deformed, like the rest.”
“From now on,” announced Mason, who had climbed atop his chair, “we’ll be allowed inside the families’ cities. We’ll put on shows for them.” He spun his cane in his hand and laughed as though he were drunk. “We can raise our ticket prices a hundred times. We’ll get new tents. Better trucks. And new costumes for everyone.”
After she poured for the others, the speaker-girl sat across from me. While they drank and celebrated, she stared at me as if she couldn’t believe I existed. The man with the enormous genitals pointed at her.
“Sing, Maricell! Sing for our brother!”
She stood and did so. For the longest time, I couldn’t place the song, and then I knew. It was her version of Adjoining Tissue. Only her odd, beautiful, and sad voice made the song poignant and serene in a way it never was before.
“You got your mouth from her,” said Mother.
“My mouth?” I asked, afraid what this meant.
“Yours was too disfigured,” she whispered. “You didn’t have a working jawbone so, the doctors used Maricell’s. It was just the right size.”
I stared at the scar just below her nose and wondered if Mother could be right. Touching my face, I traced my lower jaw though my flesh as though I could tell if it were mine or not.
The young man without arms, only fingers, suggested that he and I dance together in their show. “I have ideas for us!” he said, his eyes wild and joyful.
“We’ll have plenty of time to talk about that, Rex,” said Mother. Whispering, she told me, I had gotten my arms from him.
“No,” I said.
“Yes, tour father wanted you to have good, strong arms. Yours were thin, your bones, brittle.”
As others made toasts and praised my arrival, I reached inside my jacket, under my shirt, and touched my shoulder as if searching for a seam or scar. I wasn’t sure if I believed Mother or not, but as I scanned the faces around me, I began to see similarities to Father and me. One had a mouth the shape of his. Another had his nose. The speaker-girl’s eyes resembled mine.
At the far end of the table, the boy with the mechanical heart stood and made a toast. Before Mother leaned toward me, I knew.
“After my heart attack,” I guessed.
She nodded.
I didn’t want any of it to be true, but I couldn’t disbelieve it away either. It explained the way I felt sometimes. When I woke from the coma after my aneurysm I sensed that I was different, that I shouldn’t be alive. Maybe I should have died. And maybe that was why I quit dancing, because I knew something was wrong. And was this what I had wanted to know all along? “Why?” I asked her. “Why them and why me?”
“Your father, Hiro Bruce Rivers.” She gazed into my eyes with a wisdom and tenor I had never seen from her before. “He wanted to have a beautiful son. He did everything he could to make you perfect.” Scanning their faces, she concluded, “Your brothers and sisters and your half brothers and half sisters were your spare parts.”
“Spare parts?”
After a deep breath she said, “For years I’ve debated whether or not to tell you… whether it was fair or you were ready.” She combed hair from my cheek and said, “I think you’re ready now.”
“What do you mean? What happened?”
Spinning her empty glass, she stared forward and said, “You should ask your father.”
“You won’t tell me?”
“It’s really between you two.” Frowning, she added, “I think that’s best.”
“Mother!” Her quiet resolve was more frustrating than her usual hysteria, but she was right. It was between Father and I. As I glanced around, I felt like I should thank them, or apologize, or better yet, somehow give all of their flesh and bones back. “What should I do?”
“Dance with us.” Tilting her head to the left, she smiled and added, “Dance with Tanoshi No Wah.”
I wished I hadn’t asked. As responsible as I felt, I didn’t want to dance—I had vowed not to ever again. Besides, I didn’t fit in here. Not that I wasn’t obviously a freak in my own right, but I was a city boy. A family boy. I should be with Nora, drinking cream coffees, appreciating silences and colorless interiors.
Of course, I wasn’t going to be that either. I was going to destroy Father and myself. Then again, maybe that would be my brothers and sisters’ salvation: once RiverGroup, Father, and I were gone, none of them would be used again.
Looking Mother in the eye, I said, “I can’t.”
“You don’t have to dance,” she replied. “There are other possibilities. We’re just glad that you found us and that you’re here.”
“I can’t stay. I’m sorry, but I can’t help. I have to destroy Father. I’m going to kill him, end RiverGroup, and save Nora.” Now I expected Mother to have one of her fits. Instead, she gazed at me solemnly. “Because he is going to kill her,” I explained. “There’s no other way to stop him.”
Her expression darkened. She bit her bottom lip and fixed her eyes on her empty glass. She said, “Not good,” so quietly, it made me feel terrible.