The Disturbed Girl's Dictionary

by Nonieqa Ramos

  Principal: “I really don’t have time for this today, Macy. I’m short on staff in the office as it is. What is the beef between you and the art teacher?”

  Me: “She just hates me.”

  Principal: “Do you think if you actually did any of her assignments she would hate you less?”

  Me: “I do her assignments. Some of them.” (A couple.) “I just do them in my way. Why does everything have to be only one way at this school?”

  Principal: “Macy! In the adult world we don’t always get our way. You have to grow up—”

  Me: “Grow up? I been grown up forever. When can I just be a fucking kid?”

  Principal: “Language!” (Sigh.) “You’re coming with me on my rounds. Move.”

  I zip my backpack. Check to see if the pockets are closed right. Scratch my temple because of a deep thought. La Jefe’s foot starts to tap. I count to three—THEN I move. Like I’m wearing lead sneakers.

  La Jefe takes me on her morning route to the Child Development room. This is one of Alma’s electives! In middle school, Alma got a award for volunteering to read to the kindergartners during her recess. She would sing and us kids would stick our heads into the library just to listen.

  Principal: “Find a seat in the back, young lady.”

  I find a desk that creaks every time I move—which is A Whole Lot. I see Alma in the front of the class. She is sitting in a rocking chair. She looks up at me and nods. A big-ass book is spread on her lap. Kids are at her feet. I cozy up in my sweatshirt to listen to her read. But it’s hard because none of the little kids are listening. They’re squirmy and loud.

  Something’s wrong with Alma. She’s reading all the words, but she’s not doing any voices. She’s talking where she should sing. Is she sick? I lean forward. She’s not coughing or sneezing. She’s smiling. Sort of. At least her face is in the upright position. For some reason I get to thinking about that dolphin poster again. And its smile. And whether it’s really smiling at all.

  Then Somebody is touching me. Somebody vertically impaired. That Somebody throws a book at my desk.

  Somebody, AKA the Pre-K Kid, says, “Read this to me. You have to do what I say.”

  “Me?” I squint my eyes. Grit my teeth. Crack my knuckles. “Ain’t you afraid of me?”

  Pre-K Kid: “Why? I had a aunt who had chemo. Don’t worry. You could get a wig.”

  Before I burst into hysterical laughter, I feel it. I don’t have to look up to know the principal and the teacher are ready to tackle me. And that’s one reason why I get up, go sit in a beanie chair with the kid, and open up the book, Green Eggs and Ham.

  Me: “You know, these is the only kinds of eggs and ham in my house.”

  Pre-K Kid, tilting her head: “My mom makes me pancakes. I like pancakes. Sometimes she makes them with chocolate chips. But not green. You should come to my house for breakfast.”

  For a minute, I contemplate it. Mmm. Pancakes. Then I contemplate the look on the mother’s face when she opens the door.

  Me: “Hello, your kid invited me—”

  Mom: “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!”

  I look at the kid for the first time and flinch. This little girl has curly hair like my baby sister did. If my baby sister had lived, she could be this girl.

  I do what I’ve figured out Alma is doing. I read to the little girl with one side of my brain and think about something else with the other side.

  My baby sister was born a preemie like me. I had to stay at home with Zane so my parents could look after her at the hospital. While they were gone, I was on the phone with Alma 24/7. She schooled me on how to make baby formula. She told me to quit trying to make milk out of my tit-breasts because only Mary Mother of God could do that. As you might imagine, I tried anyway. I had to give up after Zane was getting too interested in audience participation. I stole formula. (See I for I Don’t Want to Talk About It.) I learned how to boil the water but cool it right so the baby’s mouth wouldn’t get burned.

  When my parents brought my baby sister home, they looked like the living dead. My mom had to have a C-section. She got fired from her job at the diner because she missed so much work. They put Baby Girl in her crib and collapsed in their bedroom. In the middle of the night she cried, but neither of them moved. I wheeled her crib by my couch. Stared inside. My little girl was so tiny, I knew it wasn’t right. Zane kept staring through the bars. He kept shoving stuffed animals in.

  I hissed, “Stop shoving shit in there!”

  I cleared the crib and kissed Baby Girl’s head. She had a whole crop of hair. I checked her chest to make sure she was breathing. I felt bad for her. I wondered how long before we all wiped that smile off her tiny face. I took pictures of that smile with my mother’s phone.

  The next day my mom wheeled Baby Girl back into her room all pissed off. But the next night, I was up making formula. After that, the crib was permanently parked next to my couch at night.

  A week later my mother came out of her coma. I remember her trying to dress Baby Girl in a itchy pink tutu outfit that was way too big, saying, “She’s a perfect little girl.”

  I asked, “Isn’t there something more comfortable you could dress her in?”

  “Shut up, Macy. What, you think you know everything now?”

  The baby started to whimper. I reached out to pick her up.

  “I got this,” my mom said, glaring, grabbing her and rocking her too fast. Baby Girl cried louder.

  “Hey, Yasmin, let her do it,” my daddy said, walking into the room. “You need your rest.” He picked Baby Girl up and handed her to me. He planted a kiss on the baby’s forehead and started walking Yasmin out the room massaging her shoulders. “Yeah,” my daddy said, “she’s going to make it. She knows it.”

  And I did do it. Rock her. Change her. Even maybe sing a little. What I didn’t do was sleep. At all. Three days later, I blacked out. Literally. It was light when I last remembered being awake and dark when I woke up. I jumped up. What day was it? Oh my God! Did Baby Girl wake up and I not hear it? Shit! But the house was completely quiet. Nobody was up but me.

  I peeked into the crib. At some point Zane had stuck in all these stuffed animals again. I threw them out. Fuck! How many times did I tell him? A stuffed horse hit the wall right on its plastic eyeballs. But Baby Girl didn’t move. I looked in the crib to fix her blanket. Baby Girl still had that smile. I reached in to touch her face. She was stone cold.

  Baby Girl was dead.

  What happened next? My mother said things to me she tried to take back later. (See I for I Don’t Want to Talk About It.) I said things to Zane about those stuffed animals I shouldn’t have said.

  My dad just broke shit.

  Pre-K Kid tugs on my sleeve. She has another book in her hand. I blink.

  Pre-K Kid: “Stop talking to yourself. Read this.”

  But now the teacher clears her throat. The class and that little girl, my baby girl, race to their seats. Alma piles up all the books she read to them this period. A little kid reaches his hands up to Alma to be picked up. She leans down and pats him on the head and shoos him away.

  Dolphins don’t smile because they’re happy. They don’t smile at all. We see what we want to see.

  Like my parents wanted to see in my baby sister’s face.

  My sister didn’t smile because she knew she was gonna make it. She smiled because she knew she wasn’t.

  Do Not Disturb

  Verb. No vacancy.

  If you stay at a fancy hotel, you eat at a restaurant every night. Food is not served in old potato chip bags. Food is served on plates. At a fancy hotel, they clean the room every day, not just if CPS is coming. They make the bed with crisp sheets, not sheets with crispy things on them. If you want privacy, you put a sign on your door. This tells the maid to stay the hell out. She’ll have to come back to get you those fresh towels. Fresh does not mean you stick them in the dryer at Mr. Bubbles Laundromat because you can’t afford the washer and at least the heat will kil
l the bugs. I learned about all these things from movies like the one I’m watching now.

  The floor starts shaking. My mother is moaning about Papi, and she don’t mean her daddy or mine. Mr. Guest snorts like a pig. I turn the movie volume high. This tells them that I’m awake. This tells Mr. Guest to come out the bedroom with his clothes on. This tells them Do Not Disturb.

  He comes out the room smoking a cigarette. He walks to the fridge for a beer. I worry that besides his socks, the only thing he is wearing is the refrigerator door. I turn the TV up. It’s my force field.

  Mr. Guest comes over and stands by the couch in his underwear. He burps and takes a swig of beer. “So you like that new TV I got you, ah?” He’s standing so close I can smell his sweat and her sweat all mixed up. His thing is like a foot away from me. I move over. He sits down.

  “Manny!” my mother calls. “Where you at?”

  He don’t move. I turn the TV louder and louder. He grabs my hand on the remote and lowers the volume. “What is this shit you’re watching?”

  He yawns and scratches his balls. “Maybe one of these days you want to say thank you.” He puts his hand on mine.

  I rip my hand away, throw the remote at the TV, and run toward the front door. “You’re gonna pay for that if you broke it!” Mr. Guest yells.

  “Pay for what?” my mother yells, coming out the bedroom in a sheet. She sees me unlatch the door and go out. “Macy!”

  In fancy hotels, the doorman holds the door for you. Your mother don’t come screaming out the door half necked in a sheet. I run down the steps and lock myself in the car. I hot-wire it so I can listen to the radio. I’m in that hotel. Setting my baggage down for someone else to deal with. I breathe on the car window then write with my finger:

  DO NOT DISTURB

  Even You

  Noun. These things happen.

  It could happen to you. It could happen to anyone.

  Fabuloso

  Noun. Forget Lysol, Pledge, Mr. Clean, this is a all-purpose product.

  My mother cleans the house. Which means she hides all her pot.

  Me: “CPS is coming?”

  My mother: “Tomorrow. They never say the time.” She actually hands me a phone. “Here.”

  Me: “Really?”

  My mother: “Don’t get too excited. I give it a couple days tops before Steve shuts it off.”

  Steve? I don’t recollect no Steve. A car horn honks outside.

  Me: “Not Steve, right?”

  My mother: “Later!”

  The door shuts behind her. After surfing the web for a few minutes on Steve’s data plan, I call.

  Me to Alma: “They’re coming.”

  Alma: “Who’s coming?”

  Me: “THEM.”

  Alma: “CPS? Again?”

  Me: “They come every month. With board games. But I know the real game now. And how to beat them at it.”

  Alma: “What are you going to do?”

  Me: “An exorcism, that’s what.”

  Alma to herself: I’m not going to ask. No. I can’t stand it.

  Alma to me: “Macy? Why an exorcism?”

  “Because that’s the only thing that’s gonna get this house clean. I went to the dollar store. I’m going to use Fabuloso, a all-purpose cleaning product. Better than holy water. Let’s say you have a lot of guests. And a lot of stains. Fabuloso cleans that shit right up. I wish I could make all the guests dip their hands in it before they come in.”

  Alma: “Right. I get it. I use it too. Peas, carrots. Poop, pee. It works. Sorry, baby’s crying. Good luck! If anyone can do it you can!”

  After I tie a bandanna around my mouth, I grab my trusty bottle of Fabuloso. A archaeologist would have a easier time excavating a fucking pyramid than cleaning our floors. Or walls. The ceiling too? Damn it. Where to start?

  First thing I spray is the door handle. It’s deadly, man. If there’s ever another Black Plague scientists will trace that shit to us.

  With old socks, I scrub down the kitchen floor. I swear if the world ended right now I could survive forty days with all the Kraft Macaroni and Cheese caked on it.

  On to the couch. I’m going to need a ancient spell to clean this motherfoe. I scroll Steve’s playlist. I turn on LL Kool J’s “Mama Said Knock You Out.” That will do. I need a sacred drink, something to put me in the right frame of mind. Kool-Aid ain’t gonna do it. But Fabuloso? It’s the next best thing. I’m not stupit, though. I’m just gonna take one gulp. One, two, three . . . It burns . . . I’m ready.

  I scrape and scrub and start to realize the color of the couch now is not the color it started with. Nasty. I hear something and turn down the bass. Is that screaming? I press my ear to the cushions. Sprinkle more Fabuloso. “I command you in the name of—”

  For the first time, I realize I’m smelling something new. I inhale deeply. Normally my brain smells of fire and smoke: cigarette and pot smoke. But for right now—it smells of lavender. I swear a weight has been taken off me because I feel lighter. I rub some on my hands. Every bad thing I have ever done is clear! I head toward the mattress. This will be my biggest challenge yet. I may have to take another swig.

  Ring!

  Me to Alma: “I sip a took.”

  Alma: “You what a what?”

  Me: “TOOK. A. PISS. SIP!”

  Alma: “Of what?”

  Me: “You know.”

  Alma: “Oh my God—you didn’t. You drank Fabuloso? Call Poison Control!”

  Me: “On. One. On. I mean no! I fnk my fun is numb.”

  Alma: “I’m calling.”

  Me: “Neth you have ot hang pu on me. You reven do that way-two call ginth right.”

  Alma: “Okay—okay. But don’t drink anymore! Just talk to me, Macy. Can you tell me why?”

  Me: “Be to I want Fabuloso!”

  Alma: “You are Fabuloso!”

  Me: “No, no on! I want to be Fabuloso in my soulllll.”

  Alma: “Macy, get up. You need fresh air.”

  Me: “Nah. I’ma nap.”

  Alma: “Get up, bitch.”

  Me: “Ut id foo all me?”

  Alma: “Get up and open the damn door, bitch. Your neighbors at 3211 said they’re gonna kick your ass.”

  Me: “Ait. hTaw did ouy say? I gonna ick er ass?”

  I hang up. I get up. I open the door. Whoever it was must’ve started running. I run to catch them. After about two blocks, I stop running. I begin to think, Alma tricked me. I also begin to think, I do not feel Fabuloso. I throw up. I half-crawl, half-walk back.

  Make it through the door and trip on a screaming phone. “Macy blah blah blah this instant!” I tell it I’m going to nap on the porch because some idiot sprayed the whole house with Fabuloso.

  Fine Print

  Noun. Rhymes with squint.

  Miss CPS sneezes as she walks through the door and my mother walks out of it. My mother can’t be present when me and Miss CPS have one of our little convos.

  Me: “Smells Fabuloso, don’t it?”

  Miss CPS: “Achoo!” She tilts her head. “Is this a new couch?”

  Me: “Heh heh heh.”

  Miss CPS: “Okay. Well, I already talked to your mom. She did quite a job cleaning up in here!”

  Me: “Yes! She worked till she dropped. Ain’t you going to take a note about that? Snap a pic?”

  Miss CPS: “Um, yes. Of course. Absolutely! Maybe you can open a window while I do that?”

  I do. “Okay. Well.” I walk to the door and open it. “Bye!”

  Miss CPS: “You’re funny! So I thought we might hang out and play Spit.”

  Me: “S-p-i-t? I must admit I’m intrigued.” I wave her to the new table.

  Miss CPS running her hands over it: “Nice.”

  And now a word from our sponsors: Did your last table have cigarette burns in it because your mom and her guests kept using Cheeto bags for ashtrays? Duck tape on the legs? Did it have knife stabs from playing Five Finger Fillet? Blood stains from a guest t
rying to get fancy? Razor cuts in from the coke? No problemo! If you do it with Manny you get a brand new(ish) one. No money down. Just you.

  I like the card game. It does not actually involve spit, but it does involve speed. Each person gets half the deck. You each lay down a card so there are two piles. You each say Spit!

  I like saying Spit loud. Each player slaps down a card on either pile. If, like, you see a card that has a jack, you pound down a queen or a ten. If you see a ten, you could put down a jack. You have to go in order but not in one certain order. I like choices. The object is to get rid of as many cards as possible as fast as possible. When you have no more cards you slap the lowest pile.

  Maybe sometimes I slap the CPS worker instead of the pile. Hee hee hee.

  I win the first round. “No one can outslap me.”

  Miss CPS shakes out her hand. “I feel that!” She checks a text. My stomach has been growling the whole time, but now Miss CPS can hear it.

  Miss CPS: “We’ll pause the game so you can fix yourself a snack.”

  THIS IS A TEST. Fail and get a one-way ticket to foster care!!! PLEASE STAND BY.

  I walk to the fridge like I’m walking the plank. Sweet-timin it, I open the fridge. A full fridge.

  Kool-Aid winks at me from a pitcher. Kool-Aid, the nectar of the gods. Twinkies, Ho Hos, and Little Debbie cakes stick out the cabinet. There is milk without chunks in it. Fruity Pebbles. Yabba-dabba delicious! Thank you again, Mr. Guest.

  I fix myself a bowl. I stare at it. The milk is turning blue.

  Miss CPS: “Don’t let me stop you.”

  She isn’t stopping me from nothing. But Daddy’s words are. You let me know if anything’s going on, okay? I can’t eat it.

  Until Miss CPS gets on the do you want to talk about it eyes. “Is anything wrong?”

  I shake my head. I eat. Miss CPS plays with her phone until I’m done.

  Miss CPS: “So Macy, how is school?”

  Me: “I don’t know. Why don’t you ask it yourself?”

  Miss CPS: “Ha. All right. Anything new in your life?”

  Me: “I thought I found God. But then, shit, I lost him.”