Salvation City - By Sigrid Nunez Page 0,22

time, his mother had brought up something else she’d noticed.

“When I started middle school, I remember there were just one or two really busty girls, and it was such a big deal. Now it’s the flat-chested girl who’s the exception. And look at Krystal” (the ten-year-old next door). “She’s got more cleavage than I do.”

In this case, too, the cause was thought to be contaminants in plastics.

Cole hadn’t noticed women losing their hair until his mother had said something. As for early breasting, he had noticed a lot—you couldn’t help noticing Krystal—but he hadn’t realized this was something new. Some of the girls in his class were so big he had trouble believing they weren’t in pain. And how could you not feel bad for them? Never to be able to sleep on your stomach—because of growths on your chest? It wasn’t exactly vomitous—after all, ginormous breasts were a big part of what made a lot of apocalyptic girls apocalyptic—but it was close.

His father said, “When it’s warm out and the girls come to class half naked, it looks like something out of a men’s mag. I know it wasn’t that good when I was in school.” He roared with laughter when Cole’s mother said, “I guess that’s how women will look in the future: humongous boobs and no hair.”

And instantly they sprang to mind: a race of supergirls . . . bald, blimp-breasted, disc-eyed . . . with long muscular legs that they could turn into laser swords . . . supernaturally smart, although, because of some genetic defect, unable to read the alphabet . . . The Dyslexichicks, who communicated not with words but through a kind of music, like birds . . . engaged in never-ending battle with the evil Stubs, a race of short, bushy-haired bookworms (Cole envisioned something like troll dolls) who wished to rid the world of all music, even the music of birds . . .

His parents had stood by him, but still it was awful.

All he’d wanted was to show his friend Kendall, who could draw almost anything himself.

“What ya got there, boys?”

Mr. Gert. Short, bushy-haired, evil Mr. Gert.

“Mind if I have a look-see, too?” Like he was really giving them a choice.

Actually, the whole business had died pretty quickly. In confrontations like this his mother was a champ at getting the opposition to back down—not to mention expert at mimicking Gert’s sibilant voice: “Sssorry, but I know pornography when I sssee it.”

But in private his parents were less blasé. They were completely on his side, of course, and they thought Gert should be sssued. But they admitted that they also found Cole’s drawings disturbing. The sexy girls, okay, that was a normal obsession for a boy his age. But evil bookworms? Here was something they needed to talk about.

They didn’t say anything else about the comic book, and though Kendall had delivered his praise like a blessing—“You got the gift, dude. Use it wisely”—Cole tore up the panels he’d drawn so far. He refused to discuss the subject with his parents, until finally they dropped it. But of course every math class he still had to face Mr. Gert, who treated him like a budding perv.

Proving there really was no pleasure grown-ups couldn’t spoil if they put their minds to it.

But what was wrong with him? With his dad so sick and his mom trying so hard to be brave—couldn’t he at least have some nicer thoughts about them?

In fact, this sounded just like his mother, who not long before had complained: “It’s like you get colder all the time.”

That was him. He was like a glass slowly being filled with ice water.

His mother also accused him of being ashamed of his own emotions.

Back when they were still in Chicago, his class had started doing something called mindfulness training. Fifteen minutes, three times a week. It was supposed to help improve everyone’s ADD. Dimmed lights, chimes, something called elevator breathing. Close your eyes, drain your head, focus on your breath rising and falling. Lame. Cole breathed normally and let his mind wander. Which was how he found himself back in the summer when he was nine and his parents had gone away for two weeks without him. A friend of theirs had been getting married somewhere in Ireland, and after the wedding they wanted to visit Aunt Addy in Germany. Meanwhile, Cole would go to sleepaway camp, where he’d been wanting to go anyway, having heard from other kids that camp