Shane wanted to talk to me because he had a great game. The LP Llamas managed a narrow win but one of those that would fit right into a sports movie. Kids in the crowd went nuts, he signed baseballs and gloves, and his trading card deal was still in limbo.
And I thought he’d be the hardest to talk to.
I caught him with a baseball bat and an eye towards the opposing team’s line of vans. So that was who was running up the league’s equipment budget.
“Hey! You have a witness, dummy,” I said to him. “And unfortunately I have contacts at the police.”
“So do I, you think that makes you special?” Well that made enough sense.
“I teach your younger siblings, that’s all. Turns out you all are real celebs at the high school.”
“Man, even BettyJo?” I didn’t nod or shake my head. That conversation was for later, like when I actually met her. It didn’t seem like she got outside that much thanks to children and an ankle bracelet. “Well, I’m down for a beer with you. Hopefully you’re fine with my fiancé and all.”
“Believe me…I have no grounds to not be.”
His fiancé was the father of Shasta, as it turned out. He pulled Shane in for a passionate kiss in the middle of a desert dive bar. Jealous. I had never seen them together, so I got to let my imagination run wild about Shane. For a cocky, presumed criminal baseball rookie, he had eyes only for his fiancé once Brice came in and paid for our tabs. I figured that he forgot about me, but then again, he’d want to once he knew what I wanted from him.
But in my case, I felt so much better talking to a gay man than to anyone else. I came into this town full of energy but fearing the great unknown of people. Then again, I hadn’t had any luck with dating either! Everyone I liked was a parent of my students and no one wanted to be that teacher who dated a parent. Which I ignored so I could talk to Sandria’s kids and have a goal behind it. Foster parents were approved by some mighty umpire in some way…Shane would probably kill me for the comparison.
“…and that’s why I’m banned from a whole street in P-town.” Shane and Brice kept me there until nearly midnight. There were darts and beer and some guy grilling sausages outside and, yeah, the time passed quickly for me too. I really liked having gay friends in Lucky Palms.
I liked it so much that we wasted the whole night without even mentioning the past. But it got me into the inside of this family, so to speak.
Shane’s “journey” started with an accident he had no memory of.
“And grandparents?” I asked him.
“Oh, they refused to take care of me after, what, two weeks? I wore on them fast.”
Before Sandria, there was another foster family: The Oakleys. Two early retirees from up north who wanted to do good for the rest of their lives took him in. Shane had a full bedroom, at least when their own grandkids weren’t there. They grew their own citrus trees so he could have a grapefruit for breakfast every morning. The private school was alright! I even knew one of the teachers there, Mr. Jameson the music teacher. We did our master’s together.
And most important of all: their house wasn’t falling apart.
He never knew why he was taken from that house until much later. Mr. and Mrs. Oakley didn’t want him to leave at all. There were some mumblings about genealogy and the ICWA. Bureaucracy breathed down Shane’s neck and no one told him why.
Shane was the first child to arrive to Sandria’s new house. She was far from being more qualified than the Oakleys. Maybe they wanted someone who had something in common with him? If the only qualifier was how broken everything was, then sure. Sandria and Shane were one in the same.
The wallpaper peeled away from the wall in the main room, and there wasn’t any air conditioning. They both were sweating and Sandria was ready to cry.
“…and we don’t have beds yet but I ordered some and I don’t have a bed either,” said Sandria. She slept in a green sleeping bag for years after that too, often in the yard. Shane’s first memory of her wasn’t anything of sacrifice though.
“But my other mom had a bed for me.”
“This…well, they want to think I’m just a normal foster mom. But I’m gonna try my best. We’ll even get some fans in here.”
Shane wasn’t taking it at all. Considering how many foster homes he had already been through, how could he? He pouted even as the other foster kids arrived with a little more sympathy. He didn’t want cereal but ate it begrudgingly, since Sandria’s groceries ran out. The only saving grace was that, for the most part, he got along with his new siblings.
He somehow got placed with three girls, no other boys. Sheena, with her round face and ginger ponytail, liked to exercise her mind. Chrystal, who liked teal as much as Shane did and could barely see beyond her pin-straight bangs, liked to exercise her body and reflexes. Just like Shane! Finally, BettyJo, with her glasses thick pigtails, dabbled in both. That made her the most competitive and irritating.
They even flooded the backyard one day thanks to an abandoned well in the yard. The water was rusty at first, but some minnows and baby carps swam through the pipes and into their hot yard. That was all the kids needed to have fun. As it turned out, they were all avid anglers into adulthood.
“So where did you come from?” No one answered and Shane’s stories about his other foster families fell flat in terms of giving him a pity party. As it turned out, everyone went through it. It so happened that this house was weird.
Sandria ended up giving up her sleeping bag so everyone stayed warm as the desert night got cold. Shane had no idea where she was. He did try to get some info out of his new sisters but they were clueless too.
She was never patient and forgot how to do math homework. She slept late. And Sandria smelled like hot and sandy garbage sometimes. But she could cook and fix plumbing, so she probably was high off the thought she could be a parent on those alone.
And even those skills were lacking.
Most of Sandria’s money went towards pancake breakfasts (or dinners) when the stove caught on fire or she burnt it. Kids ate free on some days at the nearest diner, and the pancakes were pretty incredible to four hungry children.
Though according to Shane, she got better at making spaghetti and frybread tacos later on.
Shane turned his nose up at the thought of caring about Sandria’s hobbies. She liked things where you could sit down and exercise nothing, and never made it to Shane’s Little League games. Then again, the royalty checks from her writing started to pay for clean clothes and 24/7 electricity. And hot water! He hated hot baths and Sandria got a nasty call from the school about her kids showering correctly.
It seemed to be more help than she ever got from “the system”, the complex web of bureaucracy that left Shane and his new sisters parentless.
His mind may have changed when he realized what Sandria did when she wasn’t writing.
Well, she painted too.
But there were whole days spent at City Hall, begging the local DCS for respite care. For a housing stipend so she could at least be closer to town. For food, for clothes, for charity, even for obscure grants. Maybe they weren’t supposed to fund that anyways, but she was desperate and the department pretended that their coffers were barren and that she didn’t exist. It was more like another government job than her thinking she was supermom.
Shane’s other foster parents got a healthy stipend for him. One took advantage of the money but Sandria wasn’t, if it was coming to her at all.
Something changed on a depressing morning. The tub broke. One of the handles flew off, and the water that leaked and sputtered everywhere threatened the whole county’s supply during a summer drought. And Shane missed the bus with his sisters.
“It just flew off and I missed the bus AND I’m so hungry!”
Sandria stood there silent. Her stomach growled too. She also looked like she didn’t get any sleep or just got off a nasty phone call…that was what he heard through the door anyways.
“And you can’t go to a better home,” she mumbled. “I always wished you could.”
“What, you don’t want me? Just like everyone else?”
“No! It’s…it’s state and court stuff and I dunno if you’re ready to hear it…”
“…listen Shane, I’m happy to be your mom. I’m happy to do it for as long as I need to. You’re having a hard time with this and I am too and…and I hope that’s enough to find in common with me.”
“I dunno.”
“I’ll take you to school and we can figure it out with the guidance counselor,” she said.
“Fine.”
During a long meeting with what turned out to be every school admin, the kids played at the playground next to the school. The jungle gym was under repair but they could play catch or do homework.
Shane leaned back like he was in a reverie. He was recounting this to me at his houseboat on the artificial lake. I was that kind of friend. He also invited one of his sisters, the ever beloved Sheena. Everyone wore their swimsuits and it wasn’t weird at all. “There was this girl a grade ahead of me there. I wanted to ask her about their pet mealworms.”
“Wait, you had to do those too?” I asked him.
“All over the country huh?”
He described this girl in so many more unnecessary details than he described his fiancé. She loved to run and played field hockey when she was older. She had a pet guinea pig. She had two brothers. Her father could make spectacular French omelettes. And her mom was the most beloved local news anchor (Shane didn’t own a TV).
“…everything got better with the love of my life, Yuna.”
“You’re gay and engaged to Brice,” I said.
“Bi people exist, Gemini!” He mostly laughed it off. Life was messy and complicated and bound to the whims of stupid decisions. And bisexual people existed, Shane wasn’t a liar at all about that.
Now I didn’t have any of Yuna’s family as students, but the Tanners were numerous. Two of her nephews went to elementary school, and of course I talked with those teachers too during bus duty. I envied their crafts projects and mealworm labs, and they envied my students sitting still for a whole class. And we gossiped, or at least I was subjected to it against my will. I was the last person in town to not know about Yuna.