Only Ten Toes
by Amanda Zila
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 |
part 1
When Thomas was six years old, he had an invisible friend. Like most children, he played with his invisible friend. Like most children, he insisted that his invisible friend was real. Unlike most children, he was correct. His friend was not another boy or a cute animal; it was a cat-sized, wrinkled creature that reminded Thomas of babies when they had just been born, all half-formed and mottled.
Thomas didn’t particularly like his invisible friend, but it wasn’t as if he could just trade it for another. About a year later, when he realized he was the only child he knew that still had an invisible friend, Thomas decided to name it Gus. But Gus didn’t like its name.
“Gus? What kind of name is that? I hate that name! Think of something better! A name that suits my good looks and scathing wit. Like... Ukobach! And isn’t Gus a boy’s name? I’m not a boy. Or a girl!” it emphasized.
Thomas didn’t think his invisible friend had wit — whatever that was — or good looks. And he didn’t particularly care if it was actually a boy or girl or something else.
“Uko...back? That’s weird. I’ve never heard of a name like that. It’s too long. I will call you Gus.”
Gus was not happy. It threw a tantrum, taking Thomas’s stuffed animals and ripping them apart. It took Thomas’s cup of pencils and broke every single one in half. Then it went into the closet and slammed the door.
Gus was awfully needy, its demands growing over time. Usually that meant scraps of food from Thomas’s dinner. Thomas whisked these off his plate and onto the floor where his invisible friend waited like an annoying terrier. Gus’s appetite for food increased tirelessly until Thomas’s mother got suspicious. Thomas would ask for seconds and thirds, yet his shirts hung loosely from his skinny frame.
One day after dinner, Thomas’s mother came to him while he was watching his favorite program. Well, not really his favorite — he preferred the ones with genius little boys that invented really impressive laser gadgets. But it was Gus’s favorite, which meant that Gus behaved reasonably well while it was on. It also meant that the show had a lot of violence.
“Thomas? Honey, I think we need to talk,” his mother said, frowning at the television when a particularly bloody scene came on. “I’m worried about you. You have lost a lot of weight. Do you have enough to eat? I can buy more food if you’re hungry. Or I can try cooking different meals? I’ll make anything you want.”
Thomas was glad Gus was distracted with his program. Otherwise he would have made Thomas ask for things like tuna or moldy cheese. Gus particularly enjoyed stinky foods.
“That’s okay, Mom. I like your cooking.”
“But you’re so skinny, honey. I’m not sure where all of that food goes. You have a healthy appetite, but...” she trailed off. “Maybe you need to go to the doctor. Do you have, you know, normal bathroom—”
“Moooom, gross! I don’t want to talk about this. I feel fine, okay? I’m just going through a growth spurt. Stop asking me weird questions!” His mother tutted softly, then went back to the kitchen.
Eventually his mother threatened to make him see a counselor, worried that he had some kind of eating disorder. So one night in Thomas’s room, Gus made a deal with him. Thomas didn’t have to give it his food anymore. Instead, Thomas would give it other things. At first Gus was satisfied with ordinary items: rubber bands and chewing gum and bent nails from construction sites.
And Thomas gained weight until his mother stopped following every bite of food between his plate and mouth. Allowing himself to relax a bit, Thomas considered doing something with his newly-earned free time. As he often did, he thought about his father.
Thomas’s father died when Thomas was five years old. Old enough for him to have memories like the sound of the guitar as his father sang at bedtime, the taste of shared Rocky Road on hot summer days, and the smell that still lingered on the shirts Thomas’s mother kept in the back of her closet: tobacco mixed with that “outside” smell. And old enough for Thomas to understand that his father’s death had been his fault.
His mom had worked at the coffee shop downtown and needed to be there early to get ready for the morning rush. That meant his father took him to kindergarten every day. They had all stayed up late the night before, working on a diorama of ice age animals; the sabertooth cat was his favorite with its giant fangs. In the rush of getting out the door, neither Thomas or his father remembered the shoebox until they were in the drop-off line.
“Dad, my teacher will fail me! I need my diorama!” Thomas had tears running down his cheeks. His father leaned his forehead onto the steering wheel and puffed his cheeks. He let the air out in a rush and looked at his watch.
“Okay, Thomas. Go ahead inside and I’ll drive home to get it. Go on, now. Don’t want to be late on top of everything.”
Thomas yelled a thanks as he shut the car door and ran towards the school. Later that morning he squirmed as all of his classmates presented their dioramas at the front of the room. A flush rose up his neck and into his cheeks as his teacher checked her list.
“Thomas, you’re the last one left. Come on up.”
“I left it at home by accident. My dad was supposed to bring it but he didn’t.”
It wasn’t until his mom picked him up, her eyes swollen with grief, that he found out why.
They said his father was on his way back to the school when he must have swerved off the road to avoid hitting something. A deer, maybe. He died instantly. It was the cruelest of ironies when the police returned the belongings recovered from the totaled car. Thomas’s diorama was untouched, the animals still standing.
After his father’s death, his mother insisted on displaying the diorama in the china cabinet. She said it was a beautiful reminder of the last thing they did together as a family. To Thomas it was a monument to the dead: the extinct animals and his father.
Thomas knew, deep down, that it was his fault. It had been his responsibility to remember his school project that morning. He had made his father go home and get it. But for him, his father would still be alive. It was that simple.
Next to the diorama was a faded picture of his father on a stool, singing and playing his guitar at a local bar. The overhead stage spotlight cast deep shadows on his face, making him look both rather ghoulish and very dramatic. Thomas only kept two of his father’s possessions: his guitar and his boots. To protect them from Gus’s temper, Thomas stored them in the attic, where Gus couldn’t go.
One afternoon while his mother was at work and Gus was watching TV, he stacked some of her thick cookbooks on the floor until he could reach up and grab the string attached to the attic ladder. Dust immediately showered down. Thomas sneezed and rubbed his eyes.
He climbed up the small wooden stairs, thankful for once that he was slight, as they faintly creaked under his weight. After his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he spotted the large, black guitar case. He set it on its side and flipped the three rusted latches, slowly lifting the lid. He picked up the old Martin parlor guitar and ran his hands over the dark, chocolate-colored wood. He returned the guitar to the case, wrestled it down the steps, and put it in the back of a hallway closet, arranging several thick, down-filled coats over it.
Later that night Thomas and his mother were eating dinner.
“Hey, Mom?” he ventured. His mother’s drooping head jerked up, surprised by his voice. Thomas didn’t talk much, especially on the nights after she had a particularly hard day at work.
“Oh, yes, Thomas? What is it?”
“I... I went into the attic today... and I brought down Dad’s guitar,” he said.
“Your father...” She cleared her throat and sat up. “Your father made pure magic with that guitar. He could silence an entire room when he started playing. It’s how we met, actually.” She blushed. “He made every single person in that bar feel like he was singing just to them. The music was entrancing. He sounded like an angel. And he plucked the guitar strings like the delicate strands of a spider web. Funnily enough, he was missing part of one of his pinkies, but that didn’t stop him. I didn’t see him again for a long while, but a few months later we ran into each other. He bought me a drink, and that was that.”
“How come he didn’t become a big rock star?” Thomas asked.
“I always encouraged him to get more serious with his music, but after we got married he insisted on getting a ‘stable’ job to provide for his family. He still played on special occasions just for me. And you, after you were born.
“He loved that guitar very much. Not as much as us, of course. But that guitar wasn’t just a guitar. It was part of him. I’m glad you brought it down.” The ensuing silence was punctuated by a soft sniffle from his mother.
“I’m so sorry, Mom!” Thomas blurted, his tears a torrential flood compared to the soft raindrops of his mother’s. He was quickly enveloped by the smell of her shampoo and he buried his face into her sweater.
“Honey, why are you sorry? What’s going on?”
“It’s all my fault. The accident. Dad dying. It’s my fault! If I hadn’t forgotten my diorama, then he wouldn’t have had to go get it and he would still be alive. I’m really sorry.”
His mother pulled back and raised his chin to force him to look at her.
“Is that what you think? Your father’s accident was just that: an accident. If you want to blame something, blame whatever it is he swerved to avoid hitting. I don’t blame you, and I know your father doesn’t, either. He loved you more than anything in the whole world. Do you feel better now?”
He didn’t really feel better, but maybe there was something he could do to keep part of his father alive.
“Can I take guitar lessons?” Thomas asked, still uncertain. He didn’t want to cause his mother any more sadness.
“Oh, Thomas,” said his mother, voice wavering and eyes shining, “Your father would have loved for you to learn how to play his guitar. I would love it, too.”
Copyright © 2023 by Amanda Zila
