Euterpe Circus Peanut Otis was constructing a jelly sandwich in the kitchen. He had been doing so yesterday, but then Hyacinth came in and she wanted to find him an outfit — especially some shoes — and go get sodas at the drugstore, so he got distracted. Yesterday’s sandwich got dropped on the floor. But there was still bread and jelly, and he was hanging out waiting for Calliope to get home, so he might as well do another sandwich.
It turned out Calliope’s clothes fit him, which was cool, but not her shoes. Mordecai’s shoes worked okay for going to get sodas, but he didn’t like to wear them out. He’d paired them neatly with the borrowed socks folded inside near the other pair stuck to the dining room step. That seemed to indicate shoes would be happy there.
Calliope’s friend Glorie got his penguin tie back from the hospital, so apart from a few cuts and bruises, everything was cool.
He pasted the strawberry slice of bread on top of the grape slice, aligning the edges perfectly. “Hey, you guys want me to hit you with one of these?”
Hyacinth regarded him suspiciously. “No thank you.”
“I like peanut butter,” the green kid said.
Euterpe lifted the bread and considered the optimal coverage of grape and strawberry. “Nah, there’s no room.” He took a bite.
A door banged open in the other room. “Hyacinth! We have company! I hope like hell you’ve managed to keep Euterpe, because Calliope’s worried sick!”
The green kid blew past him on the way to the front room to say hi. He stuck his head out of the kitchen doorway, sandwich in hand, “I couldn’t go if I wanted to. She’s basically been staring at me the whole time.”
Calliope screamed, ran forward and hugged him.
“Hey, Calliope.” He regarded his smashed sandwich on the floor. “You guys got something against jelly sandwiches or what?”
“What’s your reasoning?” said the auburn-haired woman in the doorway. She set a grey valise on the tile floor and only briefly regarded the corrugated skylight.
“Oh. Hey, Terpsichore. Well, they’ve just killed two of ‘em in a row, is all.”
“Twice is a coincidence. Three times might need further study.”
“I guess when Calliope lets me go, I’ll make another one.”
◈◈◈
Calliope swatted her brother as he sat down at the kitchen table with Jelly Sandwich Number Three, but she was careful not to dislodge it or hit him anywhere with an obvious injury. His left hand was all bandaged and he had a piece of tape covering a bruise on the bridge of his nose. Most people punched back when you hit them, they didn’t give you a minute to explain you were asleep.
“Never scare me like that again!” she hissed.
“It wasn’t on purpose,” he said. “How’s Mom and Dad?”
“Also scared!”
Terpsichore sipped her coffee. “Mom has this habit of channelling her negative emotions into positive action, and she was already annoyed with the Miriams, because of the workhouses. She’s pulled all their finances. They’re going down. It was the Miriams, wasn’t it, Euterpe?”
Sitting across the table, somewhat apart, Milo nodded subtly. You could tell who was running the hospital by the dresses on the sisters.
“I’m sorry, man,” Euterpe said. “Are you the one who doesn’t talk or the one who doesn’t stop talking?”
“Don’t ask Milo two things at once,” Calliope said. “He talks a little, but we’re not there yet.”
Milo looked away.
She put an arm around him and squeezed gently. She knew he didn’t feel good about it, ever since he found out he couldn’t say “smile” or even “happy,” and she didn’t want to pressure him, but she didn’t want him to shut down either. She tried signing while speaking, “Hey, Milo, want to tell Erik and Maggie what we’ve got for ‘em in the suitcase?”
He didn’t even shake his head.
“It’s okay.” She put her arm around him again. “You don’t have to. I already know you can.”
He gestured faintly, with his body turned so only she could see it: sry.
Helen had actually laughed at Milo’s attempt to say “happy.” She thought Milo and Ann were more like Ojichan and he was just messing with her. She froze her face in a frown and signed, MACHINE, back at them, then grinned. She tried to apologize, after, but the whole lunch went to hell and Milo didn’t really perk up again until Helen’s watch started to play “Don’t Sleep in the Subway.”
While he was bent over fixing it so she could set it to “vibrate” and wear it in libraries, Helen apologized silently, just to Calliope, for making her explain such a mean joke. But she followed it up with a protest that he signed like one of those mini bicycle license plates. Come on, Calliope. I’m sorry, but I’m not wrong.
She wasn’t. Sign language was big and expressive, because you couldn’t yell to get people’s attention. Milo was tiny and mechanical. His “I’m sorry” was like “I’m sorry, we have no bananas,” not like he really felt bad about something, even though she knew how he meant it. She didn’t want to tell him. He felt bad enough already. Anyway, she could understand him and it wasn’t like he’d be doing a lecture series for a bunch of deaf people any time soon.
Euterpe spoke while signing, “It’s like his pen’s running out of ink.”
She swatted him again.
Mordecai stared at the other sign-fluent person who’d never bothered to mention it. He slumped forward and put his head in both hands, “For gods’ sakes.”
Erik put a hand on his arm. He straightened instantly and made a smile.
Erik wasn’t buying it. “Were you worried too? I was a little upset about Corinne, but I’m okay now. Lola’s going to read a lot of books on stonework and get back to us. She’s interested.”
“I’m also interested,” Terpsichore said. “Just from what I’ve heard. I’d like to meet these people. But Em is unhappy because he couldn’t propose marriage to the woman with the cheetah at the train station…”
Mordecai leaned back in his chair and pressed both hands over his face.
Now Hyacinth was staring. “My gods. The weirdness just rubs off on anyone who gets near you people.”
“…He’s barely said two words the whole trip.”
“I just wanted to say hello!” the red man said.
“He very clearly said, ‘Oh, gods, marry me,’ and then stared out the window looking devastated for an hour,” Terpsichore said. “I was sitting right there.” She drew a leather-bound notebook out of her valise and folded back about half the pages. “One hour and seven minutes. That’s the best I could do, Polyhymnia said I shouldn’t take my stopwatch because it is, quote-unquote, ‘rude.’”
Erik urgently pressed both hands over a snicker.
“She hasn’t wanted to marry anyone yet and she’s like seventy, Em,” Calliope said. “I don’t think she was waiting around for you.”
“Well, we’re never gonna find out now!” he snapped. He sighed. “She’s still gorgeous. For two seconds, for two seconds,” he held up his hand with his fingers a tiny space apart, “I was ten years old and back in the theatre watching her suck the life out of men in Jungle Vampire. Then we pulled out of the station and she was gone. I should’ve jumped out the window and run back. If it’d been one of the old third class cars, I would have.”
“I think it was a function of social pressure,” Terpsichore said. “Desire for conformity, safety and anonymity, coupled with knowledge of Calliope’s distress and a wish not to upset her even more. Like super window glass.”
“Wow,” Maggie said, grinning. “What kind of scientist are you?”
“It’s more of a lifestyle, but they’re paying me to do research on high-energy magic right now.”
“Milo, you must want to talk to her a lot,” Erik said hopefully.
Mordecai gave him a nudge and shook his head.
“…even if it’s… hard and you’re still… learning.” Erik smiled, doing his best to look cute.
“Now I know you know you’re pushing it,” Mordecai said. “Let Milo have some space, dear one.”
“Calliope, can you teach me how to say hi?” Erik said.
“Oh, you already know that,” Calliope said. She did the wave and mouthed the word, looking extra happy to see whoever it was. “Wanna know how to ask for your presents?”
Erik and Maggie both nodded.
She smiled at them. “This is specific, not presents in general.” She signed it for them a few times and let them copy her. “Hey, Milo?” She grinned and signed it with them. “Yeah?”
Milo recognized “candy” and “dog” and assumed the part he didn’t know had to be some form of “give.” Calliope’s suitcase was in the front room. He stood without otherwise attempting to communicate, and departed to get their purchases from the Rocking Horse Candy Emporium & Soft Toy Petting Zoo.
It was a little disappointing Ansalem didn’t have a real storefront petting zoo with a real live pony in the window, but it was still a super fun store with colourful clear display tubes full of all kinds of sweet things to eat, in bulk, and plenty of cool toys. The stuffed pony’s name was Annamarie. Kids were allowed to ride her for five whole minutes, but photos cost extra. So Calliope just sketched it, and made Annamarie a dinosaur.
The cuckoo clock was on top. He bought one of those little snow globes that said ANSALEM, some postcards and a bunch of candy, and Calliope bought a broken cuckoo clock from a thrift store window. It’s perfect, she said.
He set it aside and kept taking things out, finding the bagged candy by feel. Navigating the slipspace inside a magic suitcase was a little like trying to find a specific sock in a bucket of soapy water.
These are mine, these are mine. Ooh, this is mine. He put the loose caramel in his mouth. This is Lucy’s. He tucked the stuffed tiger under his arm. Here they are.
He returned to the kitchen with two tie-dye stuffed doggies and two bags of candy. Gummy bears for Maggie, and cherry zings for Erik.
“Kii!” Lucy squealed, bouncing in her Lu-ambulator. Milo gave her the tiger. She chewed on its ear.
Euterpe jerked in his chair. “Oh, gods. For a second, I thought you killed Mr. Snaffles.”
Terpsichore folded her hands under her chin. “Perhaps we should have him stuffed. You know, when he goes. Just as an object of curiosity. I imagine the skeleton alone…”
“He’s a pet,” said Calliope and Euterpe.
“Dead pets aren’t much fun,” Terpsichore replied.
“Thank you, Mr. Rose,” Maggie said obediently. “Mom, may I eat sugar?”
The General was standing away from the table, observing the scientist from a comfortable distance. “Not before dinner.”
Maggie dropped the act like a hot potato, “Euterpe is eating sugar before dinner!”
“There is very little I can do about him.”
“A rainbow puppy!” Erik managed at last. “Calliope…”
“Rainbow. Baby. Dog,” Calliope signed for him, grinning.
Rnbw bby dg? Erik managed.
“Make it bigger,” Euterpe said. “The feeling is all in the movement and your expression. You like that thing enough to yell about it, right? You’re happy?” He signed the “happy” part. “Like fey lights!”
RAINBOW BABY DOG!! Erik signed.
“Awesome, Will.” Euterpe signed, GOOD!! JOB!! at him, even bigger.
Milo sighed and slumped in his chair.
Calliope put a hand on his leg. “I’m really sorry, babe.” She addressed the table, “Sign language… could be more Milo-friendly. That is not his fault. He’s doing his best, Euterpe. You gotta realize how hard it is for him to even say ‘sorry.’”
She hadn’t, at first. Milo could already say “sorry.” He said it all the time. Like, for existing. But Ann explained how scary talking was for him, how even the concept of sign language freaked him out, and it really was a big deal.
“I’m super proud of him just for trying.”
“Milo… I think if you want them to leave you alone about it, you’re going to have to change,” Mordecai said. “It’s not on purpose, but it’s new and they’re excited. With low impulse control.” He regarded Euterpe as he said it.
Hyacinth broke off pouring herself more coffee and folded her arms. “I’m not excited, I think it’s a terrible idea.”
Milo did a double take. Erik and Calliope frowned at her.
“What the hell, Cin?” Calliope said.
“For starters, just look at how miserable this is making him,” she said. “He’s been out of the city for the first time in his entire life, and he met a huge chunk of your family and they loved him, and Ann, and he apparently has bulk candy to eat. But he’s sitting there unhappy he can’t say ‘rainbow baby dog’ up to a standard. He’s not even communicating at the level he usually does, and I don’t think that’s just because we’ve got a couple strangers in the house.”
“They’re not strangers,” Calliope said. “Terpsichore’s been at home the whole time, and he knows Euterpe from before. He still has that gum wrapper crane.”
Euterpe smiled. “Aw. I wonder if I still have that card he gave me?” He put a hand in his pocket and frowned. “These aren’t my pants.”
Terpsichore had pulled a pencil out of her hair and was taking rapid notes.
Hyacinth ignored them. She indicated Milo with a pointed finger, “So why’s he doing the deer-in-headlights routine in his own kitchen, Calliope?”
“Babe…?”
He put both hands over his face and hid from her.
“Everyone is pressuring him and he needs some time to get used to it,” Mordecai said. He put a careful hand on Milo’s back. “That isn’t a problem with learning sign. That’s… ape society messing with him.”
“I don’t know what the hell you mean about society,” said Hyacinth, “but this thing where he’s supposed to light up like a game show host to communicate is a problem with learning sign, Euterpe just told Erik.”
She shook her head. “Beyond that, I don’t know why you want to teach him a way to communicate that he can’t use with most people. This is going to work on people in the house who know it or who are able to learn it, and if he happens to run into a deaf guy. You know Milo does not do well getting out of boxes and you are building this one around him on purpose. It’s not even a comfortable box.”
“There are lots of ways Milo talks that only work for people in the house,” Calliope said. “He only draws with me!”
Hyacinth shook her head. “He was doing that before he even came here and he figured it out for himself.”
“With me,” Calliope said. “He draws with me. It’s different, it’s more, and I’m not going to tell him to stop because other people don’t understand it as well. He asked me to teach him how to say ‘I’m sorry.’ I’m not going to say he can’t.”
“He wanted to learn how to say ‘smile,’ too, and apparently sign language itself said he couldn’t.”
“Well, that’s just…” Calliope huffed a sigh. “He could fingerspell everything he can’t say, but…”
“If he could, then he would and he wouldn’t be freaking out like this,” Hyacinth said. “Calliope, I promised him I wasn’t ever going to try to make him talk. Him, not Ann. I’m not going to break that promise and I don’t like everyone else running him over like this. He looks like roadkill.”
Milo was facedown on the table with both arms piled on top of his head, now hiding from everything.
“Milo already has a sign for ‘smile’ and it’s this!” Calliope said. She put a hand over her mouth and cast her eyes to the side, looking incredibly embarrassed. “Why can’t he just do that?”
Milo looked up at her. She did the sign again. “Right?”
He shook his head.
“Deaf people wouldn’t get it,” Euterpe said.
“Home sign is a thing! Like, half of MSL is home sign they standardized to talk to each other at the school.” Calliope glared at Hyacinth. “Just talking to your family and people who know your system is worth doing. Otherwise, deaf kids wouldn’t be able to tell anyone what they need, or get what language is in the first place. It’s a place to start.” She darted a finger at Hyacinth, “You’re like those assholes who just wanted deaf kids to learn lip-reading and Anglais! Helen and her parents are still pissed at them!”
“You lost me the instant you said ‘a place to start,’” Hyacinth said. “I’m not going to push him like that. You can work it out with him however you want. I won’t break my promise.”
Calliope slid closer to Milo and took both his hands. “You’re allowed to make up signs. You’re allowed to change sign language however you need to make it work for you and I’m sorry I forgot that part. Are you okay?”
He shook his head.
She winced. “You just want to get changed so we can quit this?”
He nodded.
“I’m really sorry, babe.” She put both arms around him and stood with him.
“Da!” Lucy protested.
Calliope tapped the Lu-ambulator and let her come with them.
“That thing is totally killer,” Euterpe said. “That kid is never gonna learn how to walk. I wouldn’t.”
“If it worked that way, I would’ve made him throw it away,” Hyacinth said.
◈◈◈
Mordecai issued a moratorium upon Ann and Calliope’s return: “No more talking about or in sign language unless Milo himself brings it up and I am going to have to trust you on this, Ann.”
She nodded gravely, “All right, Em,” and made a smile. “What are we going to do for dinner? We’ve got to go out and call Rin and Stephen, so we might as well visit a restaurant. What do you think?”
“How about that kebab place on the corner?” Euterpe said.
“No,” said all the Violena Street natives.
Terpsichore turned to a new page of her notebook, “Teach me your culture. Polyhymnia will kill me if you don’t.”
◈◈◈
Terpsichore introduced herself to the proprietor of the soda counter, offered to shake his hand and said, “My sister tells me your phones are super racist. Care to comment?” She held her notebook with pencil at the ready.
Calliope put money in the phone and dialed. Euterpe ordered a raspberry cream.
Altogether, it was like a three ring circus, and Erik wasn’t sure which act he wanted to watch.
“Hi, Mom. He’s okay. A little banged up. No, I didn’t, but I’m pretty sure it’s just because he got in a fight and walked, like, a mile with no shoes. Look, it would be really hard to prove anyway. I love him, but he’s not exactly credible…”
“For example, I think my friends Erik and Em are obeying an implicit rule not to stand near the counter. In comparison to those who have little reason to feel an implicit bias, they have arranged themselves, like, forty-five percent farther away, as you can see on this diagram…”
“Hey, man, I get my sister is super distracting, but I have a limited amount of soda time over here…”
“Mom, we have barely been here for two hours, give Terpsichore a little more time. Okay, yeah, it is on the way home, but I wanted to see Euterpe first. Well, now we’re gonna have dinner. Xinese.”
“I have to leave Maggie out of my calculations because although she does have minority status, Marsellia’s demographics result in people with Ifran heritage receiving comparatively less overt hostility. Pardon me, Maggie. You’re a world traveller. How does the discrimination you deal with locally compare? Do you feel welcome to approach the counter? Glorie, do you have a comment?”
“I kinda think you’d better put it in a to-go cup. Not ’cos you’re racist. I dunno if you’re racist. It’s, like, the system, right?”
“I promise I’ll send her straight to Our Merciful Lord tomorrow morning and she can take a whole bunch of notes. Okay, yes, specifically about the conditions and not about anything else, but I can’t promise… I’ll write it down and hard-stick it to the front of her notebook, but she’s two years older than me and you know she doesn’t listen.”
“I haven’t even asked you to let my friends sit at the counter. That’s interesting. The ticket-seller offered to upgrade us all to first class after I spent a few minutes interviewing him about the racist trains. Does the fact that I’m ignoring the implicit nature of the discrimination make you so uncomfortable you wish to offer me a concession simply to end the encounter? Would it make you feel any better if I used some kind of euphemism for ‘racist’? How about,” she clasped her hands and batted her eyes, “‘a widdle bit wacially-chargy-wargy’?”
“I know how to make a raspberry cream, do you mind if I do it myself?”
By the time Calliope called Terpsichore over to talk on the phone, the drugstore owner had become involved in the “interview” and Euterpe was wearing a paper hat and taking soda orders.
“Mom, I was in the middle of something. Hmm? Yes, I promise. Does it have to be tomorrow? Well, I was thinking of extending my stay. They have a spare room here and Polyhymnia trades jobs with me all the time. It’s…” She covered her mouth with a hand. “Calliope’s birthday is on the thirty-first, may I excuse myself because I love my little sister so much?”
She bobbed her head from side to side and nodded uncomfortably. “Okay, I want to study them too. They seem like fun people.” She groaned. “No, please don’t tell Polyhymnia. Make some excuse. Tell her it’s just for Calliope’s birthday. Put Dad on for a second, please. I can hear him. Dad? If I get home and Polyhymnia starts giving me shit about how I said people were fun, I’m gonna know you told her. Okay. I love you too.
“I dunno, Mom. He’s working the soda counter right now. No. You think a soda counter would hire Euterpe for real? Hang on.” She covered the receiver. “Euterpe? Pinkie-Promise Mom and me right now you’re not going to take off on us and you will come back with me on the train after Calliope’s birthday.” She lifted the smallest finger of her hand in his direction.
He set down the ice cream scoop and did likewise. “‘Kay.”
“If you abuse the power of the Pinkie-Promise, I won’t ask you to do it anymore, and I’m going to buy a pair of handcuffs instead.”
“You Pinkie-Promised you wouldn’t ask unless it was super important.”
She nodded. “I stand by that.”
“‘Kay.” He picked up the ice cream scoop. “You want chocolate or vanilla, ma’am?”
“You do not work here!” cried the man whose hat Euterpe had somehow stolen.
The drugstore owner had plugged a disme into one of the other phones. “Get me the police.”
Mordecai grabbed Erik and began dragging him out of the circus, not wishing to be included in the finale.
“Mom, I think we’d better go,” Terpsichore said. “Unless you want me to try to get myself committed? No, I don’t mind. You sure? Okay, talk to you later.”
◈◈◈
After they had sprinted half a block away from the drugstore, Terpsichore took out her notebook again and asked Erik his opinion of soda counters. When they arrived at the Xinese restaurant, she closed her notebook, put her pencil back in her hair and said, “Thank you, I’m all done being social for now. You may talk amongst yourselves. I don’t mind if you discuss how weird I am, but hold your questions for a later time.” She had a pocket book of puzzles in her purse and she hid behind it.
“What?” said Mordecai.
Terpsichore shook her head with a sigh.
“Boy, they never listen,” Euterpe said.
Calliope frowned. “She could’ve at least told us what she wanted to eat.”
“Please, somebody tell me what’s happening,” Mordecai said.
“The little green guy in the Terpsichore suit is tired of pretending to be human and it’s going to beam back to its home planet for a couple hours and let us decide what it ought to have for dinner,” Calliope said. She flung an irritated gesture. “She does this when she’s away from home, there aren’t any designated places for no-talking. I’m surprised she lasted this long. Maybe she got distracted studying you and ran out of gas.”
“Nah, I bet it’s an experiment,” Euterpe said.
The little green guy in the Terpsichore suit smiled quietly to itself, but did not look up from its book of puzzles.
Calliope and Euterpe politely ignored her and began discussing whether they ought to get her something good for dinner, or payback for experimenting on them without asking. Calliope insisted she was going to order a bucket of Beiping duck faces, just the faces, and see if the restaurant was willing to go along with it.
“I love my adoptive family,” Ann said, smiling. “Let’s get her something she likes, Calliope. It’s her first night in San Rosille. Please?”
◈◈◈
Terpsichore had an order of sweet and sour pork with hot and sour soup and an egg roll on the side. She ate it without comment.
Calliope let Euterpe ride the Lu-ambulator home. He was still sore from yesterday’s hike with no shoes. Lucy kept giggling at him and beeping the horn on her steering wheel, like she wanted him to clear the road.
“I feel like Fay Wray,” he said, reclining between its front legs. “No. Whatsername. From Creature from the Black Lagoon.”
“Julie Adams,” Mordecai said.
“He really needs a hammock for right here, Calliope.”
“If Milo wants to come out for candy later, you can ask him about it,” Calliope said.
“He thinks…” Ann began, but she shook her head. “No. You’re right, Calliope. Let’s see if we can get him to come out for candy and be a little bit social.”
“If he doesn’t like it, you don’t have to change. He can just play with my puzzle book,” Terpsichore said. “See? They all have resets.”
“Oh, look, it’s back,” Calliope said dryly. “We fed your vessel. How was it?”
“Not as spicy as I like, but there wasn’t any hot sauce on the table,” she replied.
◈◈◈
Ann excused herself upstairs to talk with Milo as soon as they got home. Terpsichore asked to be included, but easily shifted her attention to the baby when Ann said no.
“Some cultures try to gauge a child’s future by presenting it with different symbolic objects and observing which one it crawls towards,” she declared, grinning. “I think it’s possible for parents to game the system, either via object placement or something like the Psychic Horse Phenomenon. May I experiment on your daughter, Calliope?”
“Sure. She likes a little exercise after dinner.”
“I told Polyhymnia you’d let me!” Erik tugged on her purse strap. “What? Are you going to let me?”
“Yes, but I want to hear about the psychic horse.”
Terpsichore beamed at him. “I love you. I’m stealing you. You’ll fit in my valise.”
“No,” said Mordecai.
“You’re already all done with diapers and everything. Do you like science?”
Erik grinned and nodded.
“No,” said Mordecai.
Terpsichore spoke aside, not quite a whisper, “If you ever want to live in Vignoble for a few years, call me.”
Erik took hold of his uncle’s hand and whispered, “I won’t. I still want you to take care of me even if we have a vacation sometimes. Don’t worry.”
Mordecai was glaring at Terpsichore’s valise. “I know. That’s not the part I’m worried about, dear one.”
“I’ll go with you,” Maggie said.
Terpsichore shook her head. “No, you’re already going to live with my parents at the school, I don’t want to get attached.”
“I’m sorry, what?” said the General.
“I’m fairly certain you’ll get that scholarship. You’ll just have to hide your bicycle from Dad. May I recommend Room 3 of the Music building? That’s where Polyhymnia and I hide ours, it’s a short walk.”
The General’s expression twisted. “What?”
Mordecai was grinning. He swung Erik’s hand gleefully back and forth. “The Academé St. Honorée, General D’Iver. Calliope’s family owns it. It’s pink now. Her grandfather made a mistake on a form. I have a new brochure for you. In colour!”
“WHAT?”
“…And then she can come and work with Hector and me. We’re trying to weaponize cheese right now, but I have no idea where we’ll be in ten years.” Terpsichore clapped her hands and smiled. “Help me find some symbolic objects!”
When Milo peeked out of his room, Euterpe, Terpsichore and the kids were playing and/or experimenting with Lucy on the dining room floor.
“Pick the lamp, Lucy! Grow up and be a lighthouse keeper!” Euterpe cheered.
“No, pick the kitty!” Terpsichore said. “I’m smiling and excited! You don’t care what words are coming out of my mouth! You want attention! Yeah? Yeah?”
“I have attention over here, pick the lamp!”
“You are a terrible control group, Euterpe. Kitty, Lucy. Kitty!”
“Lamp-lamp-lamp-lamp!”
Hyacinth leaned out of the kitchen and said, “Spaghetti can! Be a metalworker!”
Mordecai’s hand appeared and dragged her back.
“What?” said Hyacinth’s voice. “You just hate fun, that’s your problem.”
“I just want this kitchen clean so I can have breakfast without sitting in a puddle of mustard!” Mordecai’s voice replied.
Milo tiptoed down the stairs and knocked on the kitchen doorway.
Calliope was drying a jelly-glass and looking extremely sedate, given her surroundings. “Hey, babe. Barnaby saw Xinese food coming for dinner and he decided to make himself a sandwich instead. He left Cin a note.”
This was in bright yellow mustard on the wall under the painting of crying doves (with fancy hats, a late addition by their resistant artist): I DO NOT WANT ANY STRING BEAN CHICKEN!! “You can help if you want,” Calliope said. “Or play with Lucy. Or eat candy. Wherever you want to be. I’m still sorry about…” She sighed. “Basically the past four days of scaring the hell out of you. We don’t have to do talking at all. I just like you.”
He shook his head. He edged into the kitchen, wary of more mustard, and handed her a card.
Calliope —
I love you so much and I do want to learn sign
but I can’t do that sign you made up for “smile.”
I do that when I don’t want people to see me smiling weird.
Sometimes I want them to know I’m happy
but sometimes I’m smiling about something I shouldn’t
and trying to hide it. ↺
I’m sorry.
It’s really cute you noticed I do that
when I want to smile.
I don’t mind you knowing
I just don’t want to tell everyone so I can pretend they don’t know.
I love you a lot and it’s not your fault I feel scared.
That’s just me. OK?
She pulled off her reading glasses and hugged him. “I’m sorry, babe, I didn’t even think of that. Do you want to make up a better sign for ‘smile’?” She shook her head. “You don’t have to right now.”
He set her back gently. He put his hand over his mouth like when he wanted to smile and then nodded, encouraging with the other hand. Go on.
“You could close your hand like this,” she said. “That’s S, for smile, but it’s not fingerspelling. Sign uses letters like that a lot. Like my name?” She signed it. “That’s ‘criminal,’” she signed that, “but with a C.”
Mordecai paused in mopping the wall. “Isn’t ‘criminal’ always with a C, Calliope?”
“No, not in sign.” She smiled. “Helen named me that after we got arrested for putting sweaters on trees.”
Mordecai slowed almost to a stop again, then he sighed and continued to clean. “Tell me later.”
The General did not even look up from the brochure she was reading. “That is the entire story as it was told to me. They put sweaters on trees and were arrested for vandalism. If you think you can glean any more useful information about it, you are welcome to try.”
“Stop staring at the pink school and help us clean,” said Mordecai.
Still without looking up, she waved a hand and the writing on the wall evaporated.
“Cheater.”
“Technically, you’re not supposed to give people names if you’re not a real deaf person,” Calliope went on, to Milo. “You just spell them.” She signed C-A-L-L-I-O-P-E. “Getting a name is like they let you into the club. But I think we’re going to build you your own club, so that’s okay.”
Milo nodded. He tried tapping his fist against his mouth like Calliope had done.
“Repetition has meaning,” she said. “We’ll call two times, like, a regular smile and one time a half smile and more for a big smile. Then you don’t have to sell it like a game show host. Okay?”
Milo covered his mouth for a moment. Then he closed his hand and signed Calliope a smile level two.
“Yeah.” She hugged him again.
He gently extricated himself after a few moments. He had two more cards. One was about a hammock for Euterpe, but he wanted to deliver the other one to Hyacinth before they went any further.
Hyacinth —
I still want to learn sign.
But you’re not wrong about any of that stuff you said.
I think knowing you’re not going to make me talk
makes me feel safer trying to talk.
I guess I won’t disappoint you.
Does that make sense?
over↺
If I ever try to teach you to sign
even a few words so you can understand me
it feels like that would mean I’m going to stay in the box
you said they were building me.
I might ask you to let me later, but not yet.
Calliope might not be wrong
about it being a place to start.
“Okay,” Hyacinth said gravely. “May I hug you?”
He nodded. She did.
“Woo!” said Euterpe’s voice in the adjacent room. For a second Milo thought he was commenting on the hug. Then he continued, “Go, Lucy! I don’t even care about the lamp! You can work at the cat shelter with Melpomene!”
Milo set Hyacinth aside and peeked out the doorway. His eyes widened. He turned to address everyone in the kitchen, and for a moment, he just froze.
BABY! he signed. Then after another instant of grasping, he walked two fingers across the air in front of him.
Calliope said, “No way.” She elbowed Milo gently aside and looked into the dining room.
“Kitty, Coconut!” Erik said, waving the stuffed tiger. “Kitty!”
“Try it with the spaghetti can, I think she just likes you!” Terpsichore said.
Erik ignored her. “Kitty! Come on!”
Lucy was standing, uncertain, in the middle of the dining room, having just pushed away from the side of the playpen.
Mordecai, Hyacinth and the General had run out the other door and were observing from around the corner, three heads like a totem pole. Maggie shushed them with a finger.
“Do it again and Uncle Terp will buy you a real tiger!” Euterpe said.
“Uncle what?” said Terpsichore.
Lucy staggered a few more steps forward and sat down hard. “Ah?”
Calliope ran in and swept her up. “Euterpe, you jerk!” she said, laughing. “Where am I gonna get a real tiger?”
“Just write Melpomene and ask him to mail you the next one,” Euterpe said with a shrug. “I’ll spot you the postage.”
“No,” said Mordecai.
“Gods, you hate fun,” said Hyacinth.
Terpsichore was bent double, leaning on the wall and cackling. “Uncle Terp. Am I Aunt Terp? I want to be Aunt Terp!”
Milo just stood in the doorway, signing “smile” over and over again.
