The Long Mars

24

And so, over the years, Joshua had kept in sporadic touch with Paul Spencer Wagoner, as the strange little boy grew up into a somewhat stranger young man. He’d felt it was a kind of duty. Joshua was probably the boy’s only contact, save for his immediate family, from his childhood in Happy Landings. Joshua Valienté was always big on duty.

But he was also curious. And in Paul Spencer Wagoner there seemed to be a lot to be curious about.

As far as Joshua could tell, Tom and Carla Wagoner had always tried their best with Paul, and his little sister Judy; certainly they had never hurt the kids. But when their marriage broke up, cracking under the stress caused by the kids, Joshua guessed, Tom was left to deal with Paul alone. And what Tom couldn’t cope with was when his son, growing in knowledge if not in wisdom, and acquiring a certain power mentally if not physically, turned on his father.

Paul was just ten when he was taken away from his father.

“Paul knows me too well,” Tom said to Joshua, when they met at the Madison Home in the spring of 2036. Joshua was back to see how the Sisters were coping in the aftermath of the death of Sister Agnes, the previous year. “How I broke up with his mother,” Tom said, “and she took little Judy away. By the way, Carla’s coping no better than me, I can tell you—she has just the same issues with Judy as we had when Paul grew up. And he knows how I screwed up at work. Paul saw all that, he understood far more about it than any damn kid ought to. About what’s going on inside my skull, I mean.” He shook his greying head regretfully. “When he takes me apart over some flaw or foul-up, it’s—crushing. I don’t feel like a father with an uppity kid. I feel like a pet dog being punished. Totally subordinate.

“But it’s worse when he’s deliberately cruel. Oh, I don’t mean physically, I guess I could handle that. He can slice you to pieces with words. Damn kid. And you know what the worst of it is? He does it just because he can. For fun—no, not even that. For curiosity. To see what happens when he opens you up, like cutting open a frog. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, he is just a kid, but…”

A little digging revealed that Paul’s sister Judy had by now also been taken away from her mother. And, such was the whim of the care system, the siblings were kept apart.

Paul, meanwhile, it was clear, was not happy, not settling anywhere, and in danger of spiralling out of control. After a couple more disastrous attempts at foster care, Joshua pulled a few strings. Paul was taken into the Home in Madison, and placed under the stern but perceptive care of the Sisters.

After that, Joshua saw him more regularly. The boy remained a mystery, though, to Joshua and the Sisters, as he grew into a strange maturity.