It’s an activity Perley and I could do together, besides swinging, on visitation days.
The Outside Girl said, Isn’t knitting for girls? But Mama L said, Knitting was invented by ancient fishermen making their nets.
Yeah, I said, even though it was the first I’d heard of it, but right then I knew that being an ancient fisherman was probably almost as good as being an elf.
The Outside Girl leaned down to me on the swing and looked meaningfully into my eyes and asked me, Perley, would you like to learn to knit?
And even though I had never thought about knitting before and even though I didn’t really believe that Mama L knew how to knit or at least I had never seen her knit, of course what I said while I looked meaningfully into the Outside Girl’s eyes was, Hell yes.
So then Mama L reached into her coat and brought out this yarn that was the color of kings and queens I mean it was purple like a cape and the Outside Girl said, Maybe this would be a better activity for next time when we’re at the Center where it’s warm, but Mama L said, We have another hour. Legally. My lawyer will file a motion. And the Outside Girl was like, Ms. Marshall, there is no need to be angry. Knitting sounds constructive. I’m supportive of knitting. It sounds like a Strength.
Then Mama L made me sit down with her on the bench but I thought, If she is really just teaching me how to knit how come she is breathing in such an organized way? My elf sensibility began to speak to me via my scar and Mama L pulled me close and handed me the yarn it was a knot.
This is a skein, she said. The first thing that you have to do is wind the skein into a ball. Find the end, so I found the end. She said, And what do you wind it around? What is at the center of the ball?
My finger? I asked. A marble? An acorn?
Or anything, she said. Then she reached back into her coat and she brought out a pink plastic egg, the hollow kind for Easter candy that I am not allowed to have. What’s inside? she asked. Candy, I said. Nope, she said. There’s nothing inside it. She looked at me hard. She said, It’s empty.
So I wound the skein of yarn around the hollow plastic Easter egg, wound it around and around until the skein disappeared and a big purple ball sat in my lap.
The pink egg was its secret center.
The Outside Girl sat next to us on the bench, watching us like a totally unskilled spy who didn’t even know how to spy. I know how to crochet, she said, and then Mama L sounded just like the Mean Aunt and she said, Aren’t I supposed to get some time alone with him? I mean legally, which was basically her new favorite word. The Outside Girl looked hurt which was weird and she said, I’m just doing my job. I’m trying to defuse the tension. I’m trying to be an advocate for Perley. Did it ever occur to you that I’m not your enemy, Ms. Marshall? But Mama L said, No, that didn’t occur to me, and she threw a flaming axe at the Outside Girl’s forehead or that’s the kind of look she gave her. The Outside Girl moved to the next bench, but she was still close enough to hear what we were saying.
Mama L took a breath. Are you cold, Perley? she asked me. Yes, I said. Are you too cold to learn to knit right now? she asked. No, I said, because something about the way that Mama L held that yarn so solemnly, so royally, made me want to knit so bad. Mama L took out two gleaming needles like Bilbo Baggins’s dagger. Her fingers flashed and there were loops up and down. Then she taught me this rhyme, In through the front door, Round to the back, Down through the garden, And off pops Jack. Every time she said And off pops Jack, she put a loop on the other needle and pretty soon I could do it, too, because I am a genius.
But there was a problem. I knew that Mama L wanted to tell me something besides Down through the garden, besides And off pops Jack, I knew that she wanted to tell me something that she