Remote Control

Remote Control

“Hi, Mom.” Eleven-year-old Kevin Schuster flashed a lopsided grin at his mother and then bent back over the model car in his hand. He could feel her eyes on him while he spread glue on the edge of the miniature grille. She stayed quiet until he levered the piece into place with a pair of tweezers, but he knew she was waiting. She asked him the same question every night.

“You get your homework done?”

“It’s Saturday. I did it last night.”

“All of it, Kevin?”

“Yeah, all of it. Honest, Mom.”

“Okay. Just so I don’t get any more notes from your teacher.” She knelt next to him, her frilled slip rustling. He could smell her perfume and the scent of her bath soap. She rubbed the small of his back, a mom gesture from as long as he could remember.

“I’ve got to get going.”

“You could stay home.”

“Wish I could. I hate leaving you alone at night. It’s not right.”

“I’m not a baby.”

“You’re my baby, and I don’t like leaving you alone.” She reached across him and picked up the empty model box. “So, whatcha working on tonight?”

“It’s a T-Bird, just like yours.”

“You mean it leaks oil and needs a water pump?” His mom laughed. “Can’t be much of a demand for a model of an ‘89 Thunderbird.”

“It’s not an ‘89.” Kevin rolled his eyes. “It’s a ‘57. But it’s still a T-Bird.”

“I hope it ran faster than mine does.”

“It smoked, Mom. It had a 300 horsepower supercharged engine. Only thing that could beat it was a ’57 fuelie ‘Vette. Or maybe a big hemi DeSoto Adventurer with the dual-quad set-up.”

“A what?”

“A DeSoto. That was a fast car. High performance cam, solid lifters, two four-barrel carbs, 345 horsepower. And the Torqueflite transmission was way better than any Ford piece of, of…” He swallowed the last word.

His mom ruffled his hair before getting up. “I swear, Kev, you know more about the past than the people who lived it. At least about the cars. You sound just like your dad used to.”

She glanced at the clock on his bedside table. “Holy shit, I’m gonna be late again. Mac’s gonna fire me for sure.” She whirled out of the room in a flurry of thigh-high square dance skirt. Kevin heard the thud of her boots down the hallway, and then the other inevitable nightly question floated toward him from the kitchen.

“Kevin, have you seen my name tag?”

Until she mentioned it, he had no idea where it was. Somehow, as soon as she asked, he could see a picture in his head of exactly where she’d left it last night when she’d come home. A piece of fake wood with the name ‘Susie’ branded into it, lying on the kitchen counter near the toaster. Like a black-and-white photograph behind his closed eyes. It had always been like this.

“Next to the toaster, Mom,” he shouted without looking up.

“How about my keys?”

As easily as that, he saw them lying on the table near the front door where she’d dropped them. His mom’s back was in the picture as she faced down the hallway toward the kitchen. Always he could just picture where the things were that his mom mentioned. A still shot in answer to her question.

But this time, the photograph wasn’t static. It moved like a video. 

“Cool.”

In his head, Kevin watched his mom walk to the fridge and grab a Pepsi. When she popped the top, he “clicked” the video to fast-forward so she chugged the soda. Her jerky quick-step to the table made him laugh out loud.

“Kevin, my keys???”

Fascinated with his new ability, he barely heard her. Maybe he could run the movie backwards. Backwards and in fast motion. That would be really cool.

He held his hand over his mouth to keep the giggles in. His mother flew out of her chair, spit the Pepsi back into the can, un-popped the pop-top and tossed the can into the fridge. She ran backwards down the hallway, her coat jumping onto her arms, her boots onto her feet. The keys leaped from the table into her outstretched hand. He paused the tape after she backed out the front door, then let it run forward at normal speed.

This time he noticed all the things he’d never been able to see before. The messed-up hair. The rip in her blouse after she shrugged off her coat. How slowly she bent over to pull off the cowboy boots. The way she scuffed toward the kitchen, as if she was too tired to lift her feet. Her fingers fumbled with the pop-top. She took a swallow or two and then collapsed onto one of the kitchen chairs. When she covered her face with her hands, Kevin couldn’t watch any more.

“Kevin??”

Deliberately changing the script, he pictured her again last night. This time his movie opened with his mom at the back door, her hand on the knob. She was just the way she’d been when she left, fresh and clean and smelling of soap. This time she dropped both her keys and name tag near the toaster. She shrugged off her coat, took a Pepsi from the fridge and walked down the hall toward the front door to pick up the mail.

“Kevin? My keys?” When he opened his eye, his mom stood in the doorway of his room. “Do you know where they are?”

“Next to the toaster.”

“Not my name tag, my keys. Do you know where my keys are?”

“I told you, next to the toaster. With your name tag.” He set the model down and scrambled up from the floor, trotting into the kitchen with his mom at his heels. The keys jingled when he handed them to her. “Here they are.”

“But…”

“I told you they were here.”

“But I just looked there not two minutes ago. They weren’t...”

“You must have just missed ‘em, Mom. You better hurry.”

“Oh, God, Mac’s gonna kill me if I’m late again.” She planted a kiss on the side of his head and sprinted for the door. “Since it’s Saturday, you can stay up ‘til ten-thirty. But no later, and no junk food.”

“Aw, Mom.”

“You heard me, Kevin. I love you.”

The door slammed before he could answer.

At only a little after ten-thirty, Kevin lay in his bed, listening to the night. The sounds were comforting, almost as good as having his mother home. A branch ticked against the house, lulling him toward sleep. 

           Wonder how I did that. The keys were on the front hall table, and then they weren’t.

Moonlight through his curtainless window picked out his models, standing in a row across the top of his dresser. He pictured the ’57 T-Bird with them, seeing it finished, wishing they actually had one instead of his mother’s old, beat up ’89.

Of course, he’d rather have a DeSoto.

~~~~

“Hi, Mom.”

“You get your homework done?”

“Yeah, all of it.”

She knelt next to him, her hand on the small of his back. “Whatcha working on tonight? Did you get the T-Bird finished?”

“Yup. See?” Kevin pointed to the row of model cars that lined his dresser. The ’57 T-Bird ended the long parade of classics.

“It’s real nice, honey. So what’s the new one?”

“A DeSoto, just like yours.”

Wait a minute.

Kevin glanced down at the model in his hands and remembered. Remembered it both ways, when her car was an ‘89 T-Bird and when her car was an ‘89 DeSoto. 

“I hope it doesn’t leak oil.” She picked up the box. “It doesn’t look much like mine.”

“That’s because it’s a ’65. First year for the two-seater.” And he remembered it both ways again, when the last DeSoto was made in 1962 and when their first two-seater came out in 1965.

“Cool,” he muttered.

“It sure is cool. I wish mine looked like that.” She leaned over to kiss him. “Got to get going. Tomorrow’s a school night. Make sure you’re in bed before nine.”

“I will.”

“I love you, baby.”

“Aw, Mom.” Her laughter trailed back to him over the sound of her boot heels against the floor as she went down the hall.

“Kevin…”

“Next to the coffeepot, Mom.”

“Got ‘em. Night, baby.”

Kevin rolled his eyes.

~~~~

Somewhere in the middle of the night, the sound of crying woke him. He crept toward the kitchen and stood in the doorway, watching his mother sift through the mail. She pushed it away and buried her head in her arms.

“I can’t do this anymore.” The words were muffled, but Kevin could hear them clearly enough.

“Can’t do what?”

His mother’s head snapped up at the sound of his voice, and she scrubbed at the tears on her face.

“Kevin, honey, what are you doing up so late?”

“Why are you crying? Are you sick?”

His voice wobbled. She held her arms out to him and he crawled onto her lap, too scared to scorn being held like a baby. She smoothed his lower back with the palm of her hand.

“No, I’m not sick. Just wondering where the money’s going to come from to pay all the bills.”

“But you’re working…”

“Yeah, I know. Sometimes it’s just not enough.”

“Why don’t you get a job that pays more money?”

Her short laugh made him twist his head up to look at her face. “I’m lucky to have a job at all. It’s really hard to find a good one without a degree.” She shook her finger at his nose. “You just remember that, mister, when it’s time for you to go to college.”

“So why didn’t you go?”

She tucked his head back against her neck, rocking him just a little.

“I did. For a while. Then I met your dad and you happened and I never finished. When he left, I couldn’t go back. Your grandma was really disappointed. She’d scraped and saved her whole life so I could go.”

“So it was my fault?”

“Oh, baby, never. Never. Don’t you ever think that. You are the most wonderful thing in my life.” She kissed the top of his head twice. “Nope. It was my fault. Well, mine and your dad’s.”

Her laugh this time didn’t scare him.

“Well, I wish you’d never met dad then. You could have finished college.”

“Sometimes I feel the same way. But only when the bills have to be paid. Because if I had never met your dad, I would never have met you, and that’s something I don’t even want to think about.” She kissed him again and hugged him tight for a minute, and then set him on his feet. “Back to bed with you, young man. You have school in just a few hours.”

“I could stay home.”

“You could go back to bed. March.”

“I love you, Mom.”

“I love you, too, baby.”

This time, Kevin didn’t roll his eyes. Instead, he crawled back into bed and lay there thinking for a long time.

~~~~

The sun streamed through the plate glass window of her one-bedroom apartment. Susan Schuster hopped around the kitchen trying to button her suit jacket, slip on her second high heel, and talk on the cell phone all at the same time.

“Sure, Frank. The Carson case file is in the upper right-hand drawer of my desk. No, don’t give it to Miles. Let Carol have it. She’ll eat them alive.” 

With her jacket buttoned and both shoes on, Susan searched the counter top, the inside of her purse, and the kitchen table. 

“Yes, I’m sure. I don’t care if he’ll be pissed or not. Who’s the boss here, anyway? Yeah, okay. I’ll be in as soon as I can find my damn car keys.”