Room: A Novel

Dinner is mini pizzas, one each plus one to share. Then we watch a planet where persons are wearing lots of frilly clothes and huge white hair. Ma says they’re real but they’re pretending to be people who died hundreds of years ago. It’s a sort of game but it doesn’t sound much fun.

She switches the TV off and sniffs. “I can still smell that curry from lunch.”

“Me too.”

“It tasted good but it’s nasty the way it lingers.”

“Mine tasted nasty too,” I tell her.

She laughs. The marks on her neck are getting less, they’re greenish and yellowish.

“Can I have a story?”

“Which one?”

“One you never told me before.”

Ma smiles at me. “I think at this point you know everything I know. The Count of Monte Cristo?”

“I’ve heard that millions of times.”

“GulliJack in Lilliput?”

“Zillions.”

“Nelson on Robben Island?”

“Then he got out after twenty-seven years and became the government.”

“Goldilocks?”

“Too scary.”

“The bears only growl at her,” says Ma.

“Still.”

“Princess Diana?”

“Should have worn her seat belt.”

“See, you know them all.” Ma puffs her breath. “Hang on, there’s one about a mermaid. .”

“The Little Mermaid.”

“No, a different one. This mermaid is sitting on the rocks one evening, combing her hair, when a fisherman creeps up and catches her in his net.” “To fry her for his dinner?”

“No, no, he brings her home to his cottage and she has to marry him,” says Ma. “He takes away her magic comb so she can’t ever go back into the sea. So after a while the mermaid has a baby—”

“—called JackerJack,” I tell her.

“That’s right. But whenever the fisherman’s out fishing she looks around the cottage, and one day she finds where he’s hidden her comb—” “Ha ha.”

“And she runs away to the rocks, and slips down into the sea.”

“No.”

Ma looks at me close. “You don’t like this story?”

“She shouldn’t be gone.”

“It’s OK.” She takes the tear out of my eye with her finger. “I forgot to say, of course she takes her baby, JackerJack, with her, he’s all knotted up in her hair. And when the fisherman comes back, the cottage is empty, and he never sees them again.”

“Does he drown?”

“The fisherman?”

“No, JackerJack, under the water.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” says Ma, “he’s half merman, remember? He can breathe air or water, whichever.” She goes to look at Watch, it’s 08:27.

I’m lying in Wardrobe for ages, but I don’t get sleepy. We do songs and prayers. “Just one nursery rhyme,” I say, “please?” I pick “The House That Jack Built” because it’s the longest.

Ma’s voice is yawny. “ ‘This is the man all tattered and torn—’ ”

“ ‘That kissed the maiden all forlorn—’ ”

“ ‘That milked the cow with the crumpled horn—’ ”

I steal a few lines in a hurry. “ ‘That tossed the dog that worried the cat that killed the rat that—’ ”

Beep beep.

I shut my mouth tight.

The first thing Old Nick says I don’t hear.

“Mmm, sorry about that,” says Ma, “we had curry. I was wondering, actually, if there was any chance—” Her voice is all high. “If it might be possible sometime to put in an extractor fan or something?”

He doesn’t say anything. I think they’re sitting on Bed.

“Just a little one,” she says.

“Huh, there’s an idea,” says Old Nick. “Let’s start all the neighbors wondering why I’m cooking up something spicy in my workshop.” I think that’s sarcasm again.

“Oh. Sorry,” says Ma, “I didn’t think—”

“Why don’t I stick a flashing neon arrow on the roof while I’m at it?”

I wonder how an arrow flashes.

“I’m really sorry,” says Ma, “I didn’t realize that the smell, that it, that a fan would—”

“I don’t think you appreciate how good you’ve got it here,” says Old Nick. “Do you?”

Ma doesn’t say anything.

“Aboveground, natural light, central air, it’s a cut above some places, I can tell you. Fresh fruit, toiletries, what have you, click your fingers and it’s there. Plenty girls would thank their lucky stars for a setup like this, safe as houses. Specially with the kid—”

Is that me?

“No drunk drivers to worry about,” he says, “drug pushers, perverts. .”

Ma butts in very fast. “I shouldn’t have asked for a fan, it was dumb of me, everything’s fine.”

“OK, then.”

Nobody says anything for a little bit.

I count my teeth, I keep getting it wrong, nineteen then twenty then nineteen again. I bite my tongue till it hurts.

“Of course there’s wear and tear, that’s par for the course.” His voice is moved, I think he’s over near Bath now. “This seam’s buckling, I’ll have to sand and reseal. And see here, the underlayment’s showing through.”

“We are careful,” says Ma, very quietly.

“Not careful enough. Cork’s not meant for high traffic, I was planning on one sedentary user.”

“Are you coming to bed?” asks Ma in that funny high voice.

“Let me get my shoes off.” There’s a sort of grunt, I hear something drop on Floor. “You’re the one hassling me about renovations before I’m here two minutes. .”

Lamp goes out.

Old Nick squeaks Bed, I count to ninety-seven then I think I missed one so I lose count.

I stay awake listening even when there’s nothing to hear.