The Descendants Read Online Free Page A

for some reason, the fact that I didn’t get this made me feel completely besieged. It’s crazy how much fathers are supposed to know these days. I come from the school of thought where a dad’s absence is something to be counted on. Now I see all the men with camouflage diaper bags and babies hanging from their chests like little ship figureheads. When I was a young dad, I remember the girls sort of bothered me as babies, the way everyone raced around to accommodate them. The sight of Alex in her stroller would irritate me at times—she’d hang one of her toddler legs over the rim of the safety bar and slouch down in the seat. Joanie would bring her something and she’d shake her head, then Joanie would try again and again until an offering happened to work and Alex would snatch it from her hands. I’d look at Alex, finally complacent with her snack, convinced there was a grown person in there, fooling us all. Scottie would just point to things and grunt or scream. It felt like I was living with royalty. I told Joanie I’d wait until they were older to really get into them, and they grew and grew behind my back.
     
     
     
    ESTHER, AS USUAL, is humming. Our kitchen is a good size, yet it feels small whenever I’m in it with her. She’s a short ball of a woman and has no awareness of her body; her stomach is always brushing me on the hip or abdomen. I’m slicing carrots and celery that Scottie can dip into a bowl of ranch. I realize Esther and I are in a sort of food battle, Iron-Chef ing my child’s lunch.
    “Have you talked to your family yet?”
    “Not yet,” she says.
    Just a week ago I told Esther that we won’t need her anymore, even though I feel terrible about this, but she claims her family is away from their home in San Diego and she doesn’t have the keys to her house.
    “They still on vacation?” I ask.
    “Yes,” she says.
    “The Jersey Shore, you said?”
    “Yes. Jersey Shore.”
    “How lovely.” I bend over to pick up shreds of vegetables I have dropped, and Esther walks behind me. I feel her stomach brush across my ass.
    “You’re not ready anyway,” she says. “There’s much I haven’t told you.”
    She has been using her years of experience with Scottie as power, dishing it out slowly to extend her stay. I allow it because I can’t deny how helpful she is and how much she loves Scottie. Her method is genius—I truly do need her to teach me more things before she goes. I feel like I’m taking the bar again—I’m cramming, stuffing myself with rules, learning the logic and the language of girlhood. Esther teaches me what Scottie loves: Xbox, dance, SMART magazine, almond butter, hamburgers, Jay-Z, Jack Johnson, making playlists on her iPod, text messaging, and I tell myself I need to know this because Joanie may be weak for a while, out of sorts; she may not be herself mentally or physically for a long time, but I never tell myself that I need to learn the habits of this creature because Joanie may die.
    “Should we continue?” I ask.
    Esther sighs as though this is tiring, but I know she enjoys our study sessions. She gets to be the teacher of her employer, she gets to show me the girl she knows so well, and she gets to create the girl she wants Scottie to be.
    “She like for read Jane and listen to music,” Esther says as she stirs her pot of fat and beans. The kitchen smells like a heart attack. “She used to like MySpace, but now she does the scrapbook. She like Dog the Bounty Hunter. She like back rub.”
    “Back rub?”
    “Yes, when she was baby, I rub her back until she sleep. I still do this now when she wake up with nightmare.” She pokes the pot with a wooden spoon.
    “Nightmare? What is she having nightmares about?”
    This is a stupid question. Her mother is in the last state before death, the brain on the last and lowest level, but I don’t want to admit this has a profound psychological effect on Scottie.
    “I don’t know,” Esther says. “I