Martin McLean, Middle School Queen

by Alyssa Zaczek

  mathletesmartin: That’s true . . . but he’s my dad. He’s supposed to love me no matter what. If my own dad can’t love who I am, how can anyone else?

  vividviolet: You know that’s not true, but I understand how you feel. Being adopted, it’s hard, sometimes. I used to wonder why my birth parents didn’t want me or what they’d think of me if they could see me now.

  mathletesmartin: But you don’t wonder about that stuff anymore?

  vividviolet: Yes and no. I still wonder about that stuff. But now that I’m older, I try to remember that where a person comes from—their biological family, their DNA—is only a part of their story.

  mathletesmartin: I guess so. . .

  vividviolet: Take me, for example. My family has been going to the same synagogue since I was a baby, but we still get weird looks every once in a while. And now I’m getting ready for my bat mitzvah, right?

  mathletesmartin: Sure

  vividviolet: And all the kids in my preparation classes at the synagogue have known me forever. But the other day someone asked if it was harder for me to read Hebrew because it’s “so different from Asian languages.” I barely know any Vietnamese!

  vividviolet: And look at you! Martin McLean? That sounds pretty Irish, but that’s only a part of your background, right?

  mathletesmartin: Yeah! I have family in Cuba and all over the place.

  vividviolet: You see? You’re so much more than the sum of your parts.

  mathletesmartin: I know you’re right. It just hurt so bad to hear him say those things.

  vividviolet: I know. But Martin, from everything I’ve heard about your dad, it sounds like he’s never really been around. And that’s his loss! Family is about being there for one another, regardless of DNA. Your family—your real family—is right here. And we’re not going anywhere.

  mathletesmartin: Thanks, Vi. You’re really good at this. You should be a psychologist or something someday.

  vividviolet: I’m actually planning on being a pediatrician. And maybe a composer, and a pastry chef too.

  mathletesmartin: Wow! That’s . . . a lot of jobs.

  vividviolet: I have a lot of interests! But I like listening and helping people best of all. I’m sure you know that, well, that I get bullied a lot, for being in my chair and because I don’t look like my mom and dad.

  mathletesmartin: I’m sorry, Vi

  vividviolet: Me too. I don’t want to be anybody’s inspirational poster, but I do want to put more good into the world than bad, you know?

  mathletesmartin: Boy, you are way too good for Pickle.

  vividviolet: Ha! I’m gonna tell him you said that.

  10

  Winter break came. We spent it in Chicago with Tío Billy and Uncle Isaiah at their new apartment near the lake, but I didn’t feel much of the holiday spirit. I still couldn’t get that video out of my head. It was like there was a version of myself in my mind, playing it over and over again, all the time. So I did what I’d always done—I clammed up. We saw all the lights on Michigan Avenue and went ice skating at Millennium Park, and I don’t think I said more than ten words the whole time. I knew Mom noticed because I saw her exchanging glances with Tío Billy, but she didn’t say anything about it either.

  On Christmas Eve, Tío Billy beckoned me into the bathroom, where he and Uncle Isaiah had laid out all their makeup on the counter.

  “Whoa,” I said, surveying all the compacts and palettes and tubes.

  “I know,” Uncle Isaiah said, running a hand over his head sheepishly. “It looks like a Sephora exploded in here. But let it be known, this is all Billy’s.”

  “Hardly!” Tío Billy laughed. “Okay, it’s time for Makeup 101.”

  “Uh, Tío Billy?” I said. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m not exactly my mother’s son. There’s no way I can do makeup.”

  “That’s quitter talk!” Uncle Isaiah said, spritzing my face with something in a slim black bottle. I coughed. “Take a seat, sir. School is in session.”

  They worked as a team, wiping and slathering and dabbing all sorts of products over my face. As they added each new element, they talked me through what it was and how to use it. Primer, foundation, highlight, contour—it was like learning a new language.

  “So for eyes, it’s really ‘go big or go home,’” Uncle Isaiah explained as Tío Billy swirled a little brush through a scarlet powder. “Though if you accidentally go way farther than you wanted to, you can clean up around the edges with some concealer.”

  “How did you learn all this?” I asked, closing one eye. Tío Billy swooped in and started swiping the shadow across my eyelid in short, light strokes.

  Uncle Isaiah shrugged. “Drag makeup is a lot like stage makeup,” he said, cleaning his hand with a makeup wipe. “When you do as much theater as we do, learning makeup is basically mandatory. Plus, someone had to help Billy beat his face when he was first starting out.”

  “Beat?” I exclaimed. That sounds violent.

  Tío Billy laughed and pressed some loose glitter under my eyebrow where he had just applied a tacky primer.

  “It just means doing your makeup,” he said. “To be ‘beat’ means that you’re painted for the gods, and to be ‘painted for the gods’ means—”

  “That you’re serving face?” I asked. Uncle Isaiah laughed in surprise, and Tío Billy looked impressed.

  “Basically!” he said. “It all means that you’re looking fierce.”

  It really is another language, I thought.

  “You feeling good, Martin?” Uncle Isaiah asked. I cracked my unpainted eye and looked in the mirror. My other eye, done up in blazing reds, pinks, and gold, stared back at me.

  “Wow,” I said. “I don’t even look like me.”

  “That’s not true,” Uncle Isaiah said, frowning a little. “You just look like a different version of you. A little more colorful, a little more pizazz.”

  “No, it’s definitely a good thing,” I said. “I look like Lottie.”

  “That’s what we want to hear!” Tío Billy sang. He had me look down while he applied mascara, combing black goop onto my eyelashes to make them longer and darker. “Okay,” he said, pulling away. “All done! Take a look.”

  “But you’ve only done half my face!” I protested, opening my eyes and staring at the bare side of my face in the mirror. Tío Billy laughed.

  “That’s because you’re going to do the other half,” he said. I blanched.

  “Nuh-uh,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s going to look like a Picasso compared to your side.”

  “And Picasso’s paintings are worth millions!” Uncle Isaiah said encouragingly, pushing the foundation and makeup sponge toward me. “Just try it. That’s the only way any of us gets better.”

  One hour and many makeup wipes later, I had replicated their artistry on the other side of my face—sort of. I had drawn the crease of my eyeshadow too high, and my eyebrows, which Uncle Isaiah said were supposed to look like sisters, looked more like third cousins, twice removed. But overall, I was pleasantly surprised. I wasn’t that bad!

  “See?” Uncle Isaiah said. “A few more trial runs, and you’ll be an old pro.”

  “Go ahead and take it off, león,” Tío Billy said, handing me the pack of makeup wipes. “We’ve gotta get dinner started before your Mom chews her own arm off. You know how she gets when she’s hangry!” He rolled his eyes and closed the door behind him and Uncle Isaiah.

  Alone in the bathroom, I took a moment to really look at myself in the mirror. I wasn’t fully Lottie, not yet, but I could see her in me, shimmering beneath the surface. My heart swelled with pride. Painted for the gods, I thought, smiling. I turned my face to admire my work from different angles. Fierce.

  But then my thoughts flashed without warning to the video, to baby Martin in his heels and earrings, and to Dad’s voice, echoing through my head.

  You had better grow out of this . . .

  I don’t know how I could live . . .

&
nbsp; He’d hate everything about Lottie. Which meant he’d hate everything about me.

  And suddenly, I wasn’t feeling very fierce at all.

  The next morning, we opened presents beneath Tío Billy and Uncle Isaiah’s tree. The whole apartment sparkled with Christmas lights and tea candles and the sun reflecting off the lake. I opened up a card from Mom first. Inside was a download code for a computer program.

  “Ooh!” I plugged the name of the program into Google on my phone and read the description. It would allow me to look at constellations in the night sky anywhere in the world, and on any night in history. “This is amazing! It’s like a time machine, but for astronomers!”

  “I’m glad you like it, mijo,” Mom said, and I leaned over to kiss her cheek.

  Tío Billy slid a box toward me that was covered in tons of ribbons. Uncle Isaiah smiled at me from where he sat next to Mom on the couch.

  “This is from your uncle Billy and me,” he said. “We heard you were in need of something like this.”

  Something like this? I tore open the wrapping paper, tossing all the ribbons aside, and lifted the lid of the box. Gently peeling back the petals of tissue paper, I reached in and pulled out an unbelievably beautiful wig. It was like my natural hair, only bigger and better: a voluminous Afro with gorgeously defined curls the color of rich milk chocolate. My mouth fell open.

  “It’s perfect,” I said, pulling it awkwardly onto my head. Over all my hair, it didn’t sit right, and Tío Billy laughed.

  “We got you a wig cap, too, león,” he said, coming over to help me put it on properly. The wig had something called a lace front, which Tío Billy explained was a fancy kind of closure that made it look like the hair was really growing out of your head. You had to cover it with a little makeup, but Tío Billy promised that it would be easy enough for me to do on my own.

  “It’s too big!” Mom said, waving a Christmas cookie at me. “It’s so 70s!”

  “It’s the trend right now. Everything old is new again,” Uncle Isaiah soothed. “It’s real human hair, you know. That’s the best kind of wig you can buy.”

  “Wow,” I said, stroking the curls. “How do they get the hair?”

  “People donate it or sell it,” Uncle Isaiah explained. “There are women who intentionally grow their hair out real long and take extra-special care of it so they can cut it all off and have it made into wigs.” He bounced a finger off the tip of my nose playfully. “Nothing but the best for Miss León!”

  “Billy, where’s my fancy wig? I could use a new ’do.” Mom teased.

  “You have waaaay too much hair for a wig, mamacita,” Uncle Isaiah said, wiggling his fingers in Mom’s direction. “You better work those natural curls, though.” Mom fluffed her hair, looking pleased with herself.

  “Does it look okay?” I asked anxiously. Everyone nodded enthusiastically.

  “It’s the perfect ’do for Lottie León,” Tío Billy said. “Ferocious and fierce!” I giggled as he gave a lionlike growl.

  “You’re going to look perfect,” Uncle Isaiah said. “Promise.”

  Later that night, as Mom packed our bags for the flight in the morning, I sat by the window and looked out at the lake. I held Lottie’s new wig in my lap, letting the soft curls fall effortlessly through my fingers. As excited as I was about Lottie, I couldn’t help thinking about Dad’s video. And even though Violet had told me not to worry about what Dad would think, as I gazed at the wig, I kept hearing his voice. There had been hatred there, deep down beneath his joking tone, and I couldn’t forget it.

  I leaned my head against the cool window, wishing the thoughts out of my mind and the stinging tears out of my eyes. I heard the shuffle of fabric behind me and smelled Mom’s jasmine perfume. She placed her hand on my shoulder.

  “Mijo?” she asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” I murmured, not looking at her. She sat down on the window seat across from me.

  “You’ve been especially quiet this whole trip,” she said. “Is something bothering you?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I said.

  “Martín,” she said, “you promised you’d talk to me.”

  “I don’t want to!” I snapped. She looked surprised, and even I was startled by my sudden increase in volume.

  “Hey,” Mom scolded gently. “Don’t raise your voice at me, Martín. I’m only asking because I’m worried about you.”

  “I—I know,” I said, squeezing my eyes closed tight.

  “So can you talk to me? Please?”

  “It’s just a lot,” I said, wiping my nose with the back of my hand. “School and Mathletes and drag . . .”

  “I know,” she said, scooping me up in her arms. “Baby, you don’t have to do it all if you don’t want to.”

  “I do!” I said. “I want to, a lot. But it’s complicated, and it’s all on the same night, and Nelson is a jerk, and Dad . . .” I trailed off. Mom rearranged herself so she could look me in the eye.

  “Hey, what did you mean about your dad?” she asked, scanning my face for answers. “Did he reach out to you?” I shook my head.

  “No,” I said. “It was after I went up to the attic.” And then I told her about the video. As I spoke, her face got very tight and very still. By the time I was done, I had stopped crying, but Mom looked like she was about to start.

  “Mijo,” she said quietly, “listen to me. Your dad, for all his imagination, could never have dreamed up a kid as amazing and incandescent as you.”

  “Incandescent?”

  “It means ‘burning brightly,’” she explained. “And that’s what you do, Martin. You burn even brighter than those stars you love so much.” She pressed her lips against my forehead and closed her eyes. “What your father would or wouldn’t think of you doesn’t matter, because he doesn’t deserve you. So you can’t worry about him, okay? Just worry about being yourself—your incredible, intelligent, fabulous self.”

  “Being myself is hard,” I said. “Sometimes I don’t know who that is.”

  “Por supuesto,” Mom replied. “It can take your whole life to figure out who you are. You know, your abuela didn’t want me to become an artist.”

  “She didn’t?” Mom didn’t talk about Abuelita Inez a lot. She died when I was pretty little, and she lived in Cuba, so I never really got to know her. From the bits and pieces I’ve been able to get out of Mom, I knew that she loved her kids, but she was pretty strict.

  “No way! She wanted me to either get a job doing what she called ‘real work,’ like a doctor or a lawyer, or get married and have babies.” She shrugged. “But I wanted to be a painter, so I got as many scholarships as I could and went to art school. And it was the best decision I ever made. Besides having you, of course.”

  “You met Dad at school, right?” I asked.

  “When I went for my master’s. He was a student in the film department. A real hot shot. He was going places.” Mom’s eyes drifted away from me, remembering. “If I hadn’t followed my passion, you wouldn’t be here. And your dad followed his passion, too, mijo. He just followed it away from us. Es triste, pero it is what it is.”

  “Yeah,” I said, thinking. “Mom?”

  “Yes, mijo?”

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “For what, baby?” Mom wrinkled her brow.

  “For yelling at you. I . . . I guess . . .” Mom opened her mouth to speak, but I kept going. “I guess I’m trying to follow my passion too. Like you and Dad. But the thing is, I don’t want to be like Dad—I don’t want to be mean to the people I love. And I haven’t been doing a very good job of that. I’ve been trying to do so much at once, and it’s been so hard, and sometimes I don’t know how to talk about it. So I yelled. And I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry.”

  “Oh, baby,” she sighed. “I accept your apology.” She put her hand under my chin. “But you could never, ever be like your dad. I promise. You’re my sweet boy. And I love you, no matter what. You can grow up
to be a drag superstar or a pet psychic or a synchronized swimmer, and I’ll love you just the same!”

  I smiled at that. I was so relieved she wasn’t mad at me—I don’t think my heart could have handled that.

  “Did Abuelita Inez ever come around?” I asked.

  “To me being an artist? I don’t really know,” Mom said. “She wished I were in a position to make more money, I know that. But I think she appreciated that I loved something enough to go out and get it, no matter what it took. And I’ll never forget the look on her face when I gave her the first portrait I painted. It was her in her rocking chair, by the fire at her house in Baracoa, smoking a cigarette.” Mom smiled, but her eyes were teary. “She looked so proud, she was almost glowing. Like those old paintings of the saints.” She leaned forward and held both my hands in hers.

  “And that is how I feel about you, mijo,” she said. “So, so proud. Please believe me: as long as you stay true to what’s in here,” and she tapped my chest, right over my heart, “you’re going to be spectacular, baby.”

  Stay true to my heart? I thought. My heart felt so confused. What would staying true to it even look like? But then my eyes fell to my new wig, still splayed across my lap.

  Lottie came straight from my heart, I realized. She lived there for so many years without me even knowing.

  As Mom wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close, I hugged the wig against my chest. And now that she’s here, if I want to follow my heart . . . maybe first I have to follow Lottie’s lead.

  JANUARY

  ReadMe App

  JAN. 7—12:58 PM

  PicknLittle: We have the perfect plan

  LadyOfTheStage: We have the PERFECT plan!

  PicknLittle: Ha, beat you to it

  LadyOfTheStage: Rats!

  mathletesmartin: A plan?

  PicknLittle: Yes, a Patented Pickle Plan. Operation Calcu-Yaaas.

  mathletesmartin: Um, what?

  PicknLittle: I’m told “Yaaas!” is common parlance in the drag scene.