When I was 4 years old, a strange man came to live in my house. I hadn’t thought of it since, but I was visiting my sister just the other day, and she brought it up. Do you remember that researcher that came to stay with us? And the memory came back to me. It was as if it had been tucked away in the back of a closet, and after moving a few things, there it was, as full and intact as the day it happened. 

I was the youngest of three, and my parents did what they could for us, but it was hard back then. My father was always away for work, chasing any job he could find. My mother would care for us kids, alone, and sometimes she worked, too. I barely remember Daddy being in that house, and the few times that he was, he was exhausted and angry, so I would avoid him best I could. My mother always tried her best to make us feel normal, like there was nothing wrong. It must’ve been hard for her to know just how bad it was and not have anyone to talk to. 

But she did have some friends because that was how she found out about the opportunity to have this man come stay with us. One of her friends – Kitty or Carol or something, I can’t remember her name now – would go to these focus groups. Companies would ask people to come in and try a product, like a brand of cereal or cleaning supplies, and then she would tell them what she thought of it, and they would pay her. I thought it was crazy to get paid just for your thoughts. It didn’t sound like a real job. But this friend – she told my mother about the focus groups, and my mother said, Oh, I don’t have time to sit in a room for hours listening to people yammer on about sponges, so then she told her about this new programme the companies were doing. It was where you let a researcher come and stay with you for three weeks. They would observe you using a product in your own home, and take notes, and they would pay you good money for this. My mother was a gruff woman, and it would’ve taken some convincing to get her to do this, but she must’ve been convinced because a man came to stay with us. 

He was a tall fellow. Long everywhere: arms, legs, torso. I remember his head practically brushing the ceiling, but I guess most adults looked tall to me back then. He was taller than my father, that was for sure. Daddy was big; he had the broad shoulders you need for manual labour, but I had never seen a man as tall as this researcher. When he first showed up, my mother lined us up in the hallway to say hello, and I hid behind her legs. He said hello to my brother and sister – they were older and more polite than me – and then he crouched down on those long legs to get a look at me behind my mother. Hello, I remember him saying, Thank you for having me in your house. As if I was the one who had invited him! 

I don’t remember now what exactly we were testing. It must’ve been a kitchen utensil or some food product, because he was very interested in meals. That first night, my mother was in a frenzy, saying something under her breath about having an extra mouth to feed. They must’ve been paying for more than our food, though, because there’s no way Mama would’ve allowed him to come if the money wasn’t making it worth her while. We had a kitchen that was connected to the dining room, just half a wall separating the two areas, and that man was sitting in a chair in the corner of the dining room. He watched my mother in the kitchen, his notebook on his lap. When she called us to dinner, and we all sat in our usual spots, he didn’t move. He just sat there, watching us all from the corner until my mother said, For God’s sake, at least join us at the table. She was annoyed with him, like he was a relative who had dropped by unexpectedly. He did come join us, though. He sat right in my father’s spot at the head of the table, which was usually empty while Daddy was away for work. Mama was standing over the set table, the food steaming, and we waited for her to say grace, but she just stood there staring at that man. Really glaring at him. And then she said, If you lay a finger on my children, I will kill you. You hear me? And we all looked over at him, but he was so calm, and he just said, Yes ma’am, and that was it. I spent the whole meal peeking over at him, not saying a word to anyone. I was so shy as a girl, even when it was just my family, and I felt so awkward with this stranger sitting in my Daddy’s chair. It was like an alien had come and taken over my father, pretending to be him. Where had he come from? I wondered if the company had made him in a lab, if that’s why his limbs were so long and lanky, because something had gone wrong in the growing process. Or did he have a family that was sitting around in their house with a replacement in his chair? 

The man was so quiet and passive, like he was trying not to spook us. We were all on edge, I think, not knowing how to act with him there. It was like being in a zoo — we were on display, watched by this man who might reward us with peanuts if we were good monkeys. 

We made it through dinner, and Mama must’ve decided that he wouldn’t harm any of us kids, so life went back to normal after that. I mean, as normal as it can be while you’re under surveillance. Those first few days, my sister and I would be in our room playing with our dolls, and when he would pass by in the hallway, we would go silent. Even that young, I knew he wasn’t like a new parent, but he was an adult, and adults were apart from us kids. There was a sense of separation. There was a certain way that we were supposed to be around them. 

But that only lasted for the first week or so. Especially with how calm he was, we got used to him fast. He would jot down his notes every once in a while, but other than that, I swear, it was like he blended into the wall. He was like a statue, or a piece of furniture. Once you got used to it, you hardly even notice it’s there. He was able to soften my mother, too. I remember one time he complimented her cooking, right as he took another helping, as if to emphasise the point, and she was smiling the rest of the evening. I don’t think my father ever complimented her cooking, not once in my whole life. As a mother now myself, there was one day that I can hardly believe. This would’ve been a couple of weeks in, when we were real good and used to him being around. Back then, I was too young to go to school, so I always stayed home with Mama. On the days when she got temp work, she would drop me at the neighbour’s house or take me with her if the job allowed it. Since we started the research thing, she hadn’t been working at all, and the three of us were sitting in the living room when the phone rang. I was on the floor playing, and Mama was on the couch, watching TV, I think. The man was in Daddy’s recliner, reading the paper. She got up to take the call in the kitchen, and I couldn’t hear what was said, but her voice got upset. When she came back, she stopped in the hallway and looked at the two of us, this man and little four-year-old me, and she mulled it over for a second before she said, I have to run out. Would you mind watching her? He folded over the edge of the paper to look at her, then looked at me, and said, Yes, that would be fine. I couldn’t believe it! I still can’t. She didn’t even want to go to the bother of taking me next door to the neighbour; she would rather leave me alone with this strange man. 

Well, she left, and I was staring at him, and he just kept reading his paper. I think eventually he got sick of trying to ignore me and must’ve thought I wanted his attention, because he folded up the paper and came over and sat down right next to me on the floor. He pointed to the doll my sister had nearly torn apart before passing down to me, and asked, Who’s she? I’m sure he could see the shock on my face. Grown-ups didn’t ask questions like that. And I’d hardly spoken a word to him in the time he had been at our house. The whole situation was so bizarre. But for some reason, I started telling him all about my dolly; that her name was Susie and she was a vet, even though she was allergic to dogs. I was like a busted hydrant – once he got me started, I couldn’t stop. He listened and asked more questions, and we stayed like that until Mama came home, practically dragging my brother by his ear. We must’ve made such a sight: me, showing my raggedy doll to this gangly man all tangled up on the living room floor next to me. 

He went back to reading his paper after that, and it was like I dreamed the whole thing. But there was another time, when we were at dinner. My siblings and I usually knew better than to sass Mama, especially when Daddy was around, but this night he wasn’t, and my siblings were feeling bold. When my brother made a smart comment at my sister over dinner, Mama tore into both of them, and I just squeezed my eyes shut like I always did, waiting for the yelling to be done. Mama sent them off to their rooms and stormed into the kitchen, knocking around the pots and pans. The researcher and I stayed in our seats, forgotten with the dinner. I was avoiding his eyes, feeling embarrassed and worried that I might get a talking to if I so much as breathed wrong, but the man stood up and walked over to my chair. He picked up my tiny hand and pressed something into the palm, closing my chubby little fingers around it. He left the dining room after that, and I investigated. It was a tiny chocolate in a crinkly blue wrapper. I crept back to the room I shared with my sister, quiet as a mouse, and sat in the closet. That was my special hiding place. I unwrapped the candy so slowly, trying not to make any noise at all, and let it melt on my tongue. 

When the 21 days were up, my mother gathered us all back into the hallway to say goodbye, telling us to stand up straight and use our manners, wave goodbye to the nice man. After he left, my family dispersed, already moving on with the day, but I stood at the front door and watched him drive away. When his car disappeared around the corner, I went into my room and threw myself down on my bed and cried and cried. My tiny body was overcome with this sadness. I remember thinking that I was going to miss him so much, even though I barely knew him. I had never spent that much time with a man before in my life, including my father, who was always coming and going. And then I forgot him. I forgot all about him until the other day. I wonder what he said my family thought of the product, whatever it was. I wonder if it was helpful for his research.