Chapter 24

24

The vivid memories of my childhood start when I was eight years old. I wish I didn’t have to rely on these memories alone, but I do. Some people frame their perspectives of the past with worn photographs or the same stories told a thousand times by someone who loves them. I didn’t have these things. My mother didn’t either, and maybe that was part of the problem. We had only one version of the truth.

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•   •   •There is one thing that comes to me: the white lining of my stroller, the dark blue florets and an eyelet ribbon trim, and the middle of the chrome handle wrapped with cane. My mother’s canary-gloved knuckles loom over me. I can’t see her face looking down, just her shadow floating over me every once in a while, when she turns a corner to put the sun behind her. I can’t possibly remember anything this early, I know. But I can smell sour formula and talcum powder and cigarette smoke, and I can hear the sound of the slow city buses bringing people home for dinner.

I play this game in my head sometimes about Sam.

What might he remember? The sharpness of the grass on the hill at the park, or the orange quilt we laid him on, three faces bobbing above him like umbrellas? Maybe the smell of the pumpkin muffins Violet liked to bake. The big spoon with the red handle that she always gave to him, slopping with batter. The bath toy with the spinning light you wanted to throw out. Maybe the painting in the nursery—the cherub child always seemed to catch his eye in the morning.

But here’s what I think it would be: the tiles on the wall in the change room at the community swimming pool. I don’t know why, but I think these would have become a part of him. Every week I put him on the wooden bench in the corner stall and held him still with one hand while I reached over to lock the swinging door with the other. He always looked up at the wall with searching eyes and touched the small colored squares placed in a random pattern as if they were alive. Mustard, emerald green, and a beautiful dark blue. A sailor’s blue. The tiles calmed him. He made soft noises and widened his eyes as I put on his swim diaper and wrapped a towel around my still-puffy waist. I looked forward to Sam seeing those tiles every time we went. They were the thing in his little world that sang to him.

I go back to that change room often. Looking for him in those tiles.