The Disturbed Girl's Dictionary

by Nonieqa Ramos

  Miss CPS: “You always keep it interesting.”

  Me: “That’s me. Here for your entertainment.”

  Miss CPS: “Well, I’m here for you if you need me.”

  Me: “If I need you to take me away from my mother? Uh, I’m good. But thanks.”

  She leaves. I hurl all the food in a Hefty bag and launch it out the door. I stick my finger down my throat and throw up blue and red and yellow—the only rainbow I have ever seen.

  Field Trip

  Verb. Emphasis on the word trip, as in tripping out.

  My mother comes into the house holding a giant Hefty bag of groceries. The bag is slit on the side, and she’s struggling to hold everything in.

  “What the fuck, Macy? I found this outside. A milk gallon exploded! Why did you throw the groceries out on the lawn?”

  “Give me a minute to make something up.”

  “Fuck you. You know how much money Manny—”

  “Yeah, yeah, Manny spent all his crack money on us. Maybe if you’d get a job—”

  “Shut up, bitch, I been applying all over the place!” She tried to get a job at WalMars, she tells me. The leader of the WalMartians called her, she says, and left a voicemail.

  She forgets all about the groceries and pulls out her phone. Puts the message on speaker so I can hear. It’s a manager. He says Thank you for applying. We have had over one thousand applications. We are sorry to say we cannot offer you a position at this time, but we encourage you to apply again and wish you good luck on all your future endeavors.

  “What the fuck?” she says.

  What the fuck, I think. Over a thousand applications to be a cashier? “Don’t sweat it, Ma. Probly easier to get into Harvard.”

  “It don’t matter,” she says. “I interviewed for a job at the Taco Garage.” The Taco Garage is called that because you can get tacos on the inside and get your car washed on the outside.

  When my mother gets the call from the manager of Taco Garage three days later, it’s like we’ve won the lottery.

  She says to me and everybody she can get on the phone that we are going to buy our own washing machine and a dryer. We could get a new stove in the kitchen (See B for Burners) so we can cook without being electrocuted. I say, “How about some toilet paper?”

  She says, “How about just a sock?” This means I should stuff it. In my pie hole.

  I say, “I need socks too.” She throws a shoe at me. “Shoes too!” I say, ducking a flying Big Red. Kaboom. “And Fabuloso!!!” (See F for Fabuloso.)

  On my mother’s first day of work, she says George and I can stop by for some free chips. George and I head over after school to see this momentous shit take place. Somebody is going to be a boss of my mother. Somebody is going to tell my mother where, when, how, and how much.

  George and I watch my mother work. She carries around a pad and pencil and asks people what they want, very official-like. She says words I have never heard her say like: What can I get for you? This is different from her usual: What, are your damn legs broken? Get it yourself. But like the immortal Tupac said, I Ain’t Mad. I like watching her write down orders. When I peek over her shoulder I can see the fancy swoop of her letters. I’ve never really seen her write anything before. I mean, I’m the one who writes all the school notes, except for her signature.

  “You know, George,” I say, licking salsa off my thumb, “maybe things are looking up. I bet Yasmin gets to take home free food, too!”

  George sings, “A T-bone steak, cheese, egg, Welch’s grape!”

  “Maybe she can be a manager someday. Maybe I can work for the Taco Garage and then take over the business one day,” I tell George, passing him a lime.

  My mother’s boss overhears me. Chuey says, “Forget about one day. How old are you? Eighteen?”

  “Fifteen.”

  “Um. Maybe you can bus tables. Make a few bucks in the back, doing dishes. You come talk to me later, okay?”

  “Okay!”

  For the first time in a long time, my crystal ball ain’t as black as a bowling ball.

  Feed

  Verb. You are what you eat. (And yes I know feed comes before field, you obsessive motherfoe.)

  I’m on the phone with Alma. I’m on hold. Alma is feeding a baby. Alma is always feeding someone or something. They got three dogs too. Feeds everyone except herself.

  Alma: “I’m back. So, anyway, our latest project in Tomorrow’s Leaders is to collaborate with local artists for the multicultural fair next week. My partner and I are working on making an African shield.”

  Me: “What part of Africa?”

  Alma: “What do you mean, what part?”

  “I mean, you go up one block in my neighborhood and the gang signs change. So how does the whole continent of Africa got one kind of shield?”

  “I don’t know.” I can hear her thinking about my question. “Anyway, we’re carving them out of real wood and they’ll be on display at the Cultural Arts Center.”

  “Cool. Do they work?”

  “What do you mean, do they work?”

  “I mean, can they really shield you against anything?” I’m picturing walking to school with my machete (See C for Clang) and a shield.

  Alma: “No, Macy. They are art.”

  Me: “Art sounds useless, no offense.”

  “None taken. Why are you breathing like that? You sound like a prank caller.”

  “I’m climbing the gutter on the side of my house.”

  “You’re what? How are you talking to me if you’re scaling the side of your house?”

  “I taped the phone to the side of my face.”

  “Macy! What’s with you and tape? Are you crazy?”

  Me: “You already know the answer to that.”

  Alma: “Why are you climbing the side of your house?”

  Me: “Hey! I’m waving at you. If you climbed on your roof with a pair of binoclu-binoclulars—thingamahjigs, you could probly see me!”

  “Macy, you get down, right this instant!”

  “You said right this instant. You are so adorable.”

  “MACY.”

  “Okay. Okay. In five minutes. I have a plan.” I figure I have five minutes total to get away with it. “I’m getting out my wire cutters.”

  Alma to me: “Why? Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?!!!”

  Me: “Because nobody bought this cable anyway. Half the block is stealing cable with this line.”

  Alma to God: “WHYYYYYYY?!!!”

  Me: “Because I want to see what is going to happen.”

  Alma: “You can’t do this, Macy.” She says it like I’m about to give the codes to nuclear silos to North Korea.

  Me: “It’s done. I only have four minutes to get the other box cut.”

  Alma: “Macy, you are going to electrocute yourself!”

  Me: “Probly. It wouldn’t be the first time.” (See B for Burner.)

  Alma: “Blah blah blah blah blah blah.” She talks too fast for me to understand what she is getting all yelly about and also she uses very big words. I think I heard the word incorrigible. “And who is gonna cut that tape off the side of your bald head? Not me, okay—”

  “Yes you will. Love you. Shhhh.”

  Seriously, I now have three minutes. Even Spider Man would be stressed. I scale a telephone pole and let my wire cutters do their work.

  Back on my roof, as I’m balancing on the gutter, I imagine the scene taking place on my block. People are aiming their remotes at their TVs like Dwayne Johnson pointing a M4A1 Carbine. People press down on the power button so hard they suffer thumb disfigurement. (Have you suffered permanent thumb disfigurement? Call Lawyer Charlie Ton. He’ll fight for YOU!) Just like a banging of drums before the Super Bowl, there will be a banging of remotes against end tables. I swear that I can actually hear it all now.

  I mean, people are about to get up from the couch.

  Children’s toys are violated, their batteries yanked and reinserted into dented remotes. I get out my
binocs. I made them myself.

  Phone: “BLAHBLAHBLAHBLAH!”

  Shit! I almost fall off the roof. (The gutter actually does fall off.) I forgot the phone was still taped to my head. The phone shifts, pulling on my little tiny hairs and skin. “Ow. Ow! Ow!!”

  Alma: “Blah blah blah. It’s stuck to your scalp, isn’t it? Isn’t it, Macy?!”

  Me: “You think peanut butter would work?”

  “That’s for gum in your hair! Hair—which you haven’t grown overnight, I suspect! Do you even have peanut butter?”

  “No. Manny’s allergic to peanuts.”

  “Macy! I’m watching the kids, so I can’t help! You’re going to have to sleep with it on your head.”

  I aim my binocs over the neighborhood. “Oh, shit. They’re coming out!” I tell Alma everything I see.

  A man in a Dallas Cowboys cap comes out the door checking the terrain. I can’t see his face. He grabs his crotch. He spits. The man with the Dallas Cowboys cap is holding a knife. He may have to cut whatever it is that broke his television. (I stop, drop, and lay as flat as a girl with DDs can.)

  Three barefoot girls follow behind him. They are zombies. They definitely have not eaten any brains lately so they are hungry. They don’t step off the porch. They watch to see who the lead zombie will kill so the television will turn back on. There are other girl zombies too. I can see them pressed against the windows watching.

  A grandmother steps out the house next door. She looks up at the sky. Could this have been caused by God? I laugh because—I am GOD.

  She looks at her front door in horror. She knows in five seconds the kids will realize the TV don’t work.

  It is unleashed.

  Kids between two and ten pour from doors, out of windows, and off the rooftop, spilling out onto the street. They blink in the sunlight. Boy in a Pokémon shirt: “What do we do now, Uncle?”

  Uncle, a boy in a SpongeBob shirt, about three years older than his nephew: “I don’t know. I ain’t never been past JJs. Let’s cross to the other side.” And with a wave of Uncle’s hand, all the kids fan out and head on to many adventures.

  Me: “It is done.”

  Alma: “And how are you going to get down?”

  Me: “I’m gonna—” I look at the gutter crashed to the ground. “Oh shit.”

  Fly

  Noun. As in, a fly in my soup.

  Next time George and I stop by the Taco Garage, about a week after my mother’s first day, I see a customer with a pointy mustache sit at one of my mother’s tables. Mustached dude needs two chairs, one for each ass cheek. George shakes his head and goes to the restroom.

  Yasmin steps back and knocks over mustache man’s water. She says she is so sorry. He says he would forgive her if she got some of that spilled water on her T-shirt. I expect her to dump that water on his head.

  But Chuey swoops in behind her and says, “Well, sir, that depends on how much you’re going to tip, right, Yasmin? Go get the man’s food, okay? I’ll clean up here.”

  I stand up ready to rip off that man’s mustache with my bare hands. George comes back from the restroom. I get him up to speed. He’s ready to crack skulls, he’s just waiting for me to tell him which one. My mother sees us and shakes her head. Mouths, No, please. I need this. We sit down.

  My mother shakes it all off and delivers food to her tables like she is in a competition: World’s Top Waitress. Meanwhile George and I count our change to get a pack of baloney down at the corner bodega. If we flip a few of those on mustached man’s hood and let those sit, his paint job will be fucked up beyond recognition.

  Two seconds later it’s like everybody finds a fly in their soup. Everybody at my mother’s tables.

  First mustached man starts yelling at her. He told her three times that he wanted the Special Number Three, not what she brought him. He says she’s no good and he ain’t paying.

  Chuey says the meal is on the Garage. He gives my mom the eye. Another customer complains. Yasmin gave her the wrong drink. Turns out she gave everybody the wrong everything. I’m thinking mustached man upset her so much, she couldn’t concentrate—until my mother throws her notepad down. She locks herself in the bafroom.

  I pick up her notepad. I read it. Or try to. WTF? There are fancy loopy letters everywhere. But they are not cooperating. They are not making words.

  Chuey goes into the women’s room. I stand outside it and crack the door. “Poor baby,” he says, “maybe you ain’t no good at this. Don’t feel bad. But I have an idea. Got it from looking at you.”

  My mother stops sniffling. “What idea?”

  “We just got a liquor license. Gonna set up a margarita bar out back. It’s real simple. You and maybe some of your girlfriends can work out there, won’t even need a notepad. Less you could find one that’s waterproof! You just need a sponge—and a little string.”

  Turns out Chuey wants my mother and her girlfriends to serve drinks and wash windshields at his car wash. In string bikinis no less. When George and I walk in there a couple days later, there is my mother scrubbing that mustached man’s car. There is his hairy finger sticking a five in her bikini string. I guess it’s all right if he’s giving her a five. Chuey’s words echo in my mind: Maybe you could work here one day.

  “We better be leaving,” I say, elbowing George and marching our asses straight out of that Taco Garage.

  We go back to my place. Apparently my mother has gotten her first paycheck because there’s food. There’s Big Red and Oreos and Cap’n Crunch and Chef Boyardee and even milk to put in the bowl.

  George plops down on the couch next to me. He sings, spraying chip crumbs, “Doctor doctor I’m so sick. Call the doctor quick quick quick.”

  Me too. I don’t even think I can eat. But the sickness don’t last long. The soul is willing but the flesh likes chili cheese. I can’t resist a Dorito.

  “Hear that?” George asks.

  Whatever it is is scratching on the bafroom door. George is my backup. He shadows me. I grab Manny’s baseball bat leaning in the corner and tiptoe to the bafroom door. Holding the bat in one hand and the doorknob in the other, I crack the door and swing. I stop myself and hit the door—before I hit the itty bitty puppy dog that trip-traps out. Apparently my mother bought something else with her cash. I decide to name it Washing Machine.

  George shrugs and goes back to the television. Sesame Street is on and it’s doing the letter S, and not even the sudden appearance of a puppy is going to mess with the word Shizam.

  I pick the dog up by the scruff of the neck and cradle her. Her body is so warm in my arms. I get all the feels. Till I feel her pissing on me.

  Maybe Washing Machine’s name should be Of Course.

  Firelight

  Noun. All light brings is shadows.

  That night, my mother comes home super late.

  “You quit yet?” I ask.

  “Quit? Have you seen these tips?”

  “Have I seen your what?” I throw her shade. “Nasty.”

  “These tips,” my mother enunciates, “got you those Oreos. And a puppy.”

  “Yeah, I named it Washing Machine.” I spit the Oreo I’m chewing onto the rug.

  Mr. Guest stops by. “Cute dog.”

  Fuck you, says Washing Machine.

  My mom dumps frozen hot dogs into boiling water. Mr. Guest opens up cabinets. “Got any beans to go with that?”

  “Beans? You can’t give a dog beans.”

  “Wait,” Mr. Guest says, “ain’t you gonna make me none?”

  Guess the honeymoon is over, dude.

  My mother blows on a hot dog and carries it to the couch. Flips on the TV and hand feeds Washing Machine.

  Mr. Guest whines worse than the dog.

  “Okay!” My moms sucks her teeth, then gets up and makes another pot of dogs from what’s left of the pack. I already ate two raw. The hot dogs don’t sit right in Washing Machine’s stomach. She poos all over the place. My mother don’t get mad, though. (She don’t cl
ean it either, damn it.) Mr. Guest just steps right over it. I wrap my hands in plastic bags and get the rags and Fabuloso. I’m the one gotta sleep out here on the couch, motherfoes!

  Washing Machine hops on my mother’s lap. She talks to the dog in this high-pitched voice like you'd use for a baby and kisses her all over her face.

  “Can I get some of that sugar?” Mr. Guests leans toward my mother’s face. Until—“Fuck! It tried to bite me!”

  “You scared her. She’s just a baby.”

  “Time to put Baby to bed.” Mr. Guest stomps toward the bedroom. Washing Machine is kissed and tucked into her bed by the TV.

  “If you sing that dog a lullaby, I swear I’ma—”

  “Hater!” My mother laughs and follows Mr. Guest to the bedroom. So does Washing Machine.

  “Yasmin! Get this fucking dog out of here!”

  The dog screeches as it’s launched from the bedroom to the hall.

  “Welcome to my world.” I kick off my sneaks and hop on the couch.

  But the dog boomerangs back and starts whining and scratching at the door. After a minute my mother opens the door. “C’mon in, baby,” she says, scooping up the dog, “you can sleep with mama.”

  “What?” yells Mr. Guest. “I wasn’t planning on sleeping!”

  Washing Machine bolts into the living room with Mr. Guest on her tail. He reaches for her collar. “Fuck. It’s biting me! For real!”

  He tries to shake her off his sleeve, but she ain’t letting go.

  “Macy!” my mother shrieks. “Do something! Grab the broom.”

  “We have a broom?”

  “Shut up! It’s in the kitchen.”

  Thirty seconds later: “Grab on this, Washing Machine. It tastes better.” Mr. Guest is released. I lead Washing Machine to the couch and toss the broom. I hold her by her collar and scratch her ears.

  “Prolly got rabies!” Mr. Guest says, looking at the nip like it’s a gaping wound. “Fuck this, Yasmin.” He flings the door open and storms out.

  My mom squats down in front of the couch. “It’s okay, he’s gone. Come here, baby.”

  Washing Machine growls.

  “Macy!” My mother backs up. “Let her go!”