They're Both Wrong

Alec sat atop his suitcase at the edge of the driveway. His thumb reluctantly pointed toward Twin Sparrow Road. 

“Why exactly is he out there?” Claire asked. She stood at the kitchen window, staring at Alec’s back. She held onto a Diet Coke, sipping through a bendy straw. 

“I told you, he wants to run away.” Taylor said while stirring a pot of risotto at the stove. 

“Yes, I know, but why exactly?”

“When I picked him up today, he was upset,” Taylor pulled his white t-shirt, stained with various paints. “Something about boys teasing him because he wouldn’t play this game with them.” he scratched at his neck, “It wasn’t a game though, it was just squishing mud in their hands and making noises. Alec didn’t find anything too amusing about it. Anyway, when all of the kids got in trouble for playing in the mud, they all accused Alec of telling on them.”

Claire turned from the window, “Oh God, what did you tell him.” 

Taylor shrugged, “I told him there’s nothing he could really do about it.”

“And?”

Taylor laughed. “And? And nothing. Well, and he wasn’t too happy about that.”

“Jesus, Taylor.” Claire looked back out the window. Alec was adjusting his baseball cap, dark blue with a cursive ‘A’ on the front. A for Alec, he always said. 

“What would you have said, Claire?” Taylor snapped, “It’s just a fact of the matter. Boys will be boys. They’ll forget about it tomorrow and find something else to do or someone else to bother.”

Clair had her lips wrapped around the straw, still in her work attire, high-waisted pants and a dark blouse, tapping her foot with her black heels. She wanted a better answer. Advice for Alec. “What could he do?” she wondered out loud. 

“Yeah, tell me.” Taylor insisted. 

“Don’t get like that. Just because you got to stay home and raise him while I worked, you always get high and mighty about what’s best for him.” Claire rested her weight on her right hip. 

“I do not. First off, I didn’t get to stay home. It’s not like a won a coin toss on the matter, I paint from home, it made sense. You can’t teleconference into court.

"Second, I’ll be the last to admit I know what I’m doing. And you’re a great mom, and I don’t know what else to do. If you do, please let me know.” Taylor’s stirring had sped up from his frustration. He had a knack for cooking and let much of his stress season his risottos and gravies. 

Taylor had the stereo playing in the background, and the song switched to one they both knew. One they used to listen to when they drove together out on mid-land roads as teenagers. Before Alec, before marriage, before life had any responsibility other than themselves. It calmed them. Thinking of long nights with nothing but a pack of cigarettes, a tank of gas, and conversation. 

“I’m sorry.” Claire said. Taylor turned a burner to high, a pot of water with a sprinkle of salt began to warm. “You know, we don’t really fight about anything but Alec.”

“We care about him," Taylor said, "and this isn’t a fight.” 

A car approached their home. Claire’s heart jumped to her throat. It was  just Jessie Stanfield of two houses down. She looked at Alec sitting on the curb, his thumb anxiously trying to hitch a ride with a woman already flashing a turn signal for her driveway. Jessie looked to the house and saw Claire in the window. She smiled and waved. Claire waved back and Jessie drove toward her own problems.

Alec straightened his posture and turned around. Claire jumped behind a wall. “Is he looking?” she asked. 

Taylor turned from the stove and saw Claire hiding. He laughed and leaned his head to look out the window. “No, you’re in the clear,” he whispered. 

Claire relaxed her shoulders popped her head around the window’s frame. “The sun is going to set and it’s going to start getting cold. I don’t want Alec to get sick, he has that big science presentation on Friday, he’s not going to miss it. Maybe I should go out there, cheer him up or something.”

“Just leave him, he’ll come in soon.”

Claire bit the end of the straw, almost finished with the Diet Coke, she sipped slowly and in spurts. “He’s too smart for his age,” she said, “His teacher told us that, remember?”

“Well, why wouldn’t they move him up a grade?” Taylor asked. He grew tired of hearing this from teachers. Alec’s too smart, he’s bored and his grades lack. He moved to the island and grabbed a bowl of chopped asparagus to throw into the water once it boiled. He placed it next to the stove and continued stirring the risotto. 

“It’s not that kind of smarts and you know that. It’s a maturity thing. He knows things kids his age shouldn’t. The things it takes years to understand, do you know what I mean?”

“Not really,” Taylor murmured. 

“Oh c’mon, don’t you care?”

“I do, honey, I do.” Taylor faced her with a spoon in his hand, gesturing toward her. “I just don’t know what you mean. He’s a smart kid but his grades aren’t great or anything.”

“It’s not about grades, Taylor. You of all people should know its not about grades.”

Taylor turned back to the risotto. “You and I both had trouble with our grades.”

“And look how we turned out.” Claire walked to the island and placed her elbows on it, pushing her Diet Coke away from her. She thought out loud to herself, “Maybe we should have let him believe in Santa Claus. He just knows things others don’t.” 

“I still don’t know what that means.”

“Jesus Christ…”

“I’m just being honest, Claire.” 

“Okay, okay.” Claire let her temper subside, sighed, picked up her can, and walked back to the window. 

“Can you set the table?” Taylor asked. Claire did a 180 and opened a cabinet full of plates and bowls. There was nothing to be angry about, but Claire couldn’t help feel frustrated. She always felt like the overly-concerned parent compared to Taylor. She never knew who was more in the right. Or if there was a right at all. 

“Do you remember last week when Alec went to his friend Mac’s house?” Claire asked as she set three plates at the table. 

“Remind me.”

Claire rolled her eyes, “You went to watch the sailing competition with your father.”

“Sure, sure.” 

“When I picked him up, Mac’s mother came out and told me what the boy’s did. A few friends came by, plus Mac’s brothers.” Claire pulled three forks from a drawer, holding them for a moment, thinking about the conversation. “They had played kickball in their backyard. One team had clearly won, and the team Alec was on lost. Now the winners kept taunting the other team, you know, calling them losers, calling themselves champions. Bullshit kid stuff.” She moved to the table and gently placed the forks down. “Anyway, Mac’s mom tells me that she had a conversation with all of the children to remind them,” -Claire did her best impression of Mac’s mom, I high mouse-like voice, “I told them, that everyone’s a winner!” Claire laughed. “Can you believe that?”

“I can," said Taylor, "Mac’s mom is kind of loopy. In a-” Taylor thought about it, “In a... I’m not religious but I’m spiritual kind of way.” 

“Yeah, exactly,” Claire laughed as she grabbed napkins. “Anyway, in the car ride home I asked Alec about it. I asked, ‘what do you think, are the boys right, are they the winners and you losers or was Mac’s mom right and you’re all winners?’ And Alec thought about it, eyes out the window as usual, and he said, ‘No, Mom, they’re both wrong.’” 

“They’re both wrong.” Taylor repeated as he dropped the asparagus in the boiling water. “What does that mean?”

“He didn’t say. That was it. But with such certainty that I believed him.” Claire grabbed her can of Diet Coke and sipped through the straw but nothing came up, just the sound of an empty can. “They’re both wrong,” she mumbled with the straw in her teeth. “He gets things, Taylor. Things other people don’t, that’s what I’m saying.”

“How’s this explain the running away? Shouldn’t he know already that, whether you like it or not, you’re chained to this world? Wherever you go you’ll feel like an outsider if you’re, in fact, an outsider?”

Claire reached for glasses at the top shelf but couldn’t reach. Taylor came over and grabbed three and placed them on the counter. She touched his waist as he went back to his risotto. 

Claire shrugged, “Maybe he just wants a little attention? To make a statement?” She placed the glasses on the table, and squinted out the window. “Oh, here he comes anyway. I guess we can ask him ourselves.” 

Alec dragged his suitcase with two hands up the driveway, his chin chattering. 

“Good, it’s going to get cold tonight.” Taylor said as he poured the hot water and asparagus into a colander, “And dinner is ready, anyway.”