A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Sara smiles. “Our first practice
writing famously.” I nod, but Sara’s game of names and fame
is not on my mind. “Sara,” I chatter, “your signature
theory has a fatal flaw. How will fans recognize your name?”
“I’ll be so famous they’ll just know me.” Sara tips her head.
Mr. F. gives us the girls, please! look, and says, “People, heads
up. Who knows the author? Dead white guy. Acted on stage.
Mega genius. Wrote plays, sonnets—anyone know his name?”
“Shakespeare?” Klaera Leesum pipes. Mr. F. smiles. “Bingo! Practice
speaking up, Klaera, okay? Now, how about the man’s signature
play? Anyone?” “Romeo and Juliet?” Sara says. “Nope, his fame
rests on Hamlet, a tragedy. Midsummer Night has its own fame.
A girl-chases-boy-who-chases-girl-who-chases-boy saga! Your heads
around that one? Keep the sign-up sheet going, I want every signature
on it. This is a major treat. Live theater. Real actors on a real stage,
and it’s cheap. Can’t beat that! Plus a chance for you all to practice
being adults. When did Shakespeare live?” Steve Shane, his name
synonymous with sloth and slouch, speaks up. “His first name
was Will, born April 24, and the dude had sixteenth-century fame.”
Steve smirks. “Will and me share a birthday. I don’t need practice
to remember that, but he’s still boring.” Mr. F. shakes his head.
“No, no, no! You’re going to like this play, I guarantee. So no staging
silly protests.” The sign-up sheet comes closer. I can’t put my signature
on it! I can’t ask Mom for money, especially now. But a signature
is required, according to Mr. Franklin. I want to fake a name!
Sara’s signing now with a flourish, as if she’s already a huge stage
star. She’s a great person, but this thing about being famous
sort of wears me out. Wish I could tell her what’s really in my head.
When she hands me the sheet, I take a deep, long breath, practicing
being calm. Messily, I scrawl my name. “Yes!” Sara says. “Fame’s
gotta come your way. Can’t waste that signature.” She taps my head.
“Way better than mine. How’d you stage that? I need practice!”
A Dozen Facts
1. Dad left us three weeks ago.
2. We need money to pay bills.
3. Mom has a plan.
4. The plan is to rent a room.
5. The room is my room.
6. The plan is to move me into the little front room.
7. That is the room we use for storage.
8. I hate this—that is another fact.
9. Landlady Mrs. Dann has okayed the plan.
10. Mom already has the renter.
11. Ladine Law, who works with Mom, will move in next week.
12. I hate this, and it doesn’t matter.
I Was Home Alone
when the phone rang, and it was Uncle Jud in Chicago, the problem uncle, the drinking uncle, the can’t-hold-a-job uncle, the never-did-as-good-as-his-older-brother-our-dad uncle, saying Dad was with him, he was okay, we weren’t to worry, that was the message, and when I tried to ask, Does he miss us, how long is he going to stay, doesn’t he want to talk to me, is he really okay? Uncle Jud said, You know what, honey, you gotta leave the guy alone, sorry I can’t talk anymore now, my phone card is running low, just wanted you all to know things are shaping up—or down, depending on your point of view—and he laughed and hung up.
Later, Spencer yelled at me, Why didn’t you get the phone number? and my teeth started to hurt and I wanted to cry and I thought how stupid I was and how much I hated everyone in my family, and then Thom yelled at Spencer to quit being mean to me, and then he came into my room and told me not to feel bad, that I did all right, but when Mom got home and heard about the call, she collapsed into a chair and her arms just hung over the sides like she couldn’t move, and only after a long while did she get up and wipe her eyes and say, Well, Jud never has a phone of his own, anyway.
What Mom and I Did Friday Night: A List Poem
Surveyed the tiny room and counted the stacked boxes: Ten.
Emptied all the stuff in the extra bureau into suitcases.
Sat on the suitcases to close them.
Carried ten boxes and two suitcases out of the tiny room.
Shoved and pushed them all under Mom’s bed.
Laughed when Mom said, “Not even room for a straw under there!”
Swept the tiny floor of the tiny room.
Put fresh flowered sheets on the cot.
Hammered hooks into the wall of the tiny room.
Taped photos on the door.
Hung a curtain on the window.
Put together a clothes rack, which refused to remain rigid.
Carried in armfuls of jeans, skirts, shirts, and socks.
Lined up shoes, sneakers, and sandals under the cot.
Declared ourselves done, finished, satisfied.
Surveyed the tiny room once more.
Closed the door.
Message
Mom said
the flowered quilt
left on my bed would give
a nice message: Welcome, Ladine.
I said
I did
not want to give
any message. No, none.
Mom slapped me and cried. I was
dry-eyed.
Ladine Law Arrives
She parked her yellow car in front of the house Saturday morning, took her long skinny self which was wrapped in a long yellow coat, out from behind the wheel, reached into the back seat and pulled out a yellow suitcase, a lamp, fortunately not yellow, a cardboard box tied with, yes, yellow string, and a lumpy laundry bag—regulation white—that looked like a not-so-distant cousin to my true love, Mr. Marty, by which I mean no disrespect for that mutt, who, along with his owner, still doesn’t get that I adore him.
Then, leaving everything on the sidewalk, she rang the bell, by which time I was downstairs opening the front door, and behind me were my brothers ready to carry up her suitcase, lamp, cardboard box, and lumpy laundry bag, and behind them was Mom, her hands out, saying in her best company voice, “Well, here you are! Welcome, Ladine.” She and Mom kissed on the cheek. “I am a little early, I know,” she said, with a big toothy smile, “but I was so eager, Liz, to settle into my lovely new digs that I just couldn’t wait.”
Next, we all followed Mom up the stairs, listening to Ladine. “Oh, my, those are rather steep stairs, but not to worry, Liz! I have very good balance. And this lovely girl who came down to greet me is your Vicki that you’re so proud of. Vicki! Your mother’s a wonderful, wonderful woman, who told me her children were all, and I quote, great kids, and that I need not be worried about noise or my privacy when abiding here among you, which is such a relief to me, as even a young girl like you can understand, I’m sure.”
After that, she had to take a breath. I darted around her and opened the door at the top of the stairs. My room—excuse me, my ex-room—is right there, in front, when you enter the apartment. “Oh, my, how lovely,” she said, walking in, standing on my rug, touching my quilt, sitting down on my bed … showing her teeth in another smile.
Sunday Supper
“Lay-deen is the correct way
to pronounce my name,”
she instructs us as soon as
she sits down. She loads her plate,
spooning hunks of jam onto bread,
forking away my appetite.
“Lay to rhyme with play, not la
to rhyme with my pa.”
She laughs and says it five, six,
seven times. “I’m forty-nine:
That’s my age. I know I don’t look
that
old!” A horsey smile. Her teeth.
Room Poem 1
One window.
One cot.
One clothes rack.
One bureau.
One folding chair.
One person.
Me.
Room Poem 2
Earrings, belts, and beads hang on hooks
Jeans, sweaters, and shirts jam on hangers
I stand on the cot
touch each wall
turn, turn, turn
turn
turn
turn
Ladine Poem
her round black eyes
are like the olives
she piles on her plate
at the supper table.
Room Poem Cinquain
night, dark.
the tiny room
wraps its arms about me,
holds me close. streetlight sparkles in
my eyes.
Play Money
There are a few people who still haven’t turned in
their money for the play, Mr. Franklin says on Monday.
The play is on Friday. If you have any problems, come
and see me, okay? Mr. Franklin reminds us on Monday.
People who haven’t paid up, we’ll work something out.
There’s always a way, Mr. Franklin says on Tuesday.
I’m dead serious about this—somehow or other, you all
are going to see that play, Mr. Franklin adds on Tuesday.
Either you come talk to me or you show up with the money.
That’s all I have to say, Mr. Franklin snaps on Wednesday.
What Happened Thursday Morning
1. Eating doughnuts and swigging coffee, my brothers left for school, pounding down the stairs, shouting to each other about sports and girls. Mom in her plaid jacket and long Ladine, in her yellow coat, big teeth munching a doughnut, went out together, talking about carpooling. From my window I watched them on the sidewalk. Mom threw me a last-minute, swift kiss. I danced my fingers at her and turned away, wishing I could turn away from knowing it was the day I had to turn in the money for the play.
2. Excuses tumbled uselessly through my head. I kept changing my clothes. I couldn’t decide what to wear. Plain blue shirt? Red V-necked shirt? Pink and purple striped shirt? Red socks or blue? Pants with one pocket or two? My clock with the yellow and red neon hands was tick-tick-ticking, saying late-late-late, but I still kept changing shirts, shoes, and socks.
3. Idreaded the moment when I would have to walk out the door down the street, past Kravinski’s Shoe Repair, Due Brothers Bakery, the motorcycle shop, and onto Carbon Street, past the empty factory with cracked windows and its smell of burned paper, past all the cute little faded pastel houses and up Fillmore Hill with the really nice big houses with lawns, which always make me think of Sweet Road—which seems so far away, so long ago—and then across the four lanes of roaring cars on Rousebreaker Road and, finally, into school late, reporting to the office and telling more lies. Or are they fibs?
4. I was ready to leave at last, my hand on the doorknob when I thought, Why am I going to school today? If I wasn’t in school, I couldn’t give Mr. Franklin the money I didn’t have for the play. But if I went to school, knowing Mr. Franklin, when he asked for the money and I didn’t have it, he’d just suck his teeth and tell me to bring it in tomorrow, and if I didn’t bring it in then, he’d tell me to bring it in on Monday. That’s the way he was. Helpful. I didn’t want his help. I didn’t want him, or anyone, to know about Dad … Ladine … money … us.
5. I stood there, thinking about this and looking into my old room, at the curtains and the rug and the bed neatly made up, and it seemed as if my room remembered me. As if it was inviting me in, speaking to me. Hey, it’s your room, not hers, she’s just a squatter. You can come in. You can walk around, look around, touch things. Make yourself at home. She’s not here now. Sit on the bed. Go on, mess it up a little. Hey, what’s that on the bureau? Take a look.
6. Did I know what I was going to do?
No.
No, no, no.
What Happened Next
1. The purse was dark blue with a gold clasp. I picked it up and snapped it open. It smelled of powder and chocolate. I would have liked a chocolate just then. I put my hand in and what it came out with was a bunch of money. I stood there for a moment. It was like my luck had turned around completely. Then I shoved the money in my pocket.
2. I was calm. I went out the door and down the stairs. I was aware of being calm and thinking how Mom always wanted us to be calm. Mrs. Dann was in the hall, sweeping. I said hello, as if it was any morning. She told me I looked nice, that I had good color in my face. I said thank you. I saw Mr. Rose and Mr. Marty outside on their driveway walk. I said hello to Mr. Marty. Mr. Rose said he was still thinking about my having a job walking Mr. Marty. He called me girlie, and his mouth went up. A smile. I said, “Thank you, Mr. Rose, that’s good.”
3. I ran all the way to school, determined not to be late. I hadn’t been late one single day so far. I was calm. I wasn’t thinking about the money in my pocket. It was there, I knew that, but it was like a story I was telling myself. All of a sudden, I had money. I wondered how the story was going to turn out and how much money I had, but I didn’t look. Looking seemed like cheating, like skipping the middle part of the story.
4. I walked into home base, my head hurting from running, from pounding the pavement, but only two minutes late.
Mr. Franklin waved me into my seat. Sara wriggled her hand at me. “You made it,” she said, as I sat down. “Just!” I touched the money in my pocket. What if there wasn’t enough to pay for the play? Or what if it was a lot, like three hundred dollars—or three thousand? Stupid thought. Nobody would leave thousands of dollars lying around. “Sara.” I leaned over to her. “Stupid thoughts are like spaghetti. Before it’s cooked, it looks strong and straight, but you can break it into pieces. After it’s cooked, it’s no better. It’s limp.” I made her laugh. Would she laugh if she knew what I’d done? Another stupid thought.
5. Mr. Franklin was having one of his “teaching moments.” “Some of you folks still haven’t turned in your money for the play. You guys are miscreants. Which means someone who does something wrong or bad. Got that? Root word, creant, comes from the Latin for belief. Mis, the prefix, means bad or wrong. So a miscreant was a bad believer, a person who had a false religion. From that, it came around to meaning wicked or evil. And now it just means someone who’s not 100 percent good.”
Sara whispered, “He could be a movie star, like Denzel Washington, don’t you think? Except he’s much shorter.”
She kept looking at me. “Do you feel okay?”
“Headache.”
“Bad one?”
I nodded.
“So now when you use words like misplace, mistrust, or mistake,” Mr. F. was saying, “you know you’ve got a prefix going.”
Was miserable another one? Maybe erable meant happy. Today I had money. I should feel erable.
“Okay, we’re backing up,” Mr. F. said. “Someone give me a definition of prefix.”
Klaera raised her hand. “Means something that comes before something else,” she said in her tiny voice.
Right. If Dad had come back before Ladine moved into our house, I wouldn’t have gone in her room. That would have been a definite prefix. Everything fixed. Now everything was unfixed.
Unfixed. The word repeated in my mind over and over. Unfixed. Unfixed. Unfixed. And as the first bell rang, the calmness that had covered me like an ice cap cracked.
Four Fives
1. Five Useless Facts
It’s drizzling while I’m sitting on the steps outside school writing this.
I gave seven dollars to Mr. Franklin.
I had fifty-four dollars in my pocket.
Tomorrow is the play.
My chest aches, my head hurts, and my butt is getting soaked.
2. Five Scary Qu
estions
Will Ladine miss the money?
Does she know how much she had in her purse?
If she knows it’s missing, will she think of me first?
Will she tell Mom that money is missing?
Will she accuse me?
3. Five Frantic Thoughts
Maybe Ladine won’t be sure how much she had.
But maybe she will be sure. Positive.
If she accuses me, I’ll deny everything.
I won’t let her look in my pockets.
I have to get rid of the rest of the money.
4. Five More Frantic Thoughts
I’ll give the rest of the money to Mom, tell her I found it.
No, can’t just hand it to her. She’ll ask where I found it.
I’ll say in the street on the way to school. I’ll name a street, say
I want her to have it. Don’t thank me, I don’t need it, I don’t want
any of it.
She won’t believe me. She’ll look at me and know I’m lying.
Even if she did believe me, she would probably boast to Ladine
what a good kid I am, how I found all this money and shared it
with her. No, not even shared, just gave it to her.
What I Did
I got up and walked downtown. I walked fast. I knew what I was going to do. Near city hall, I found the first one—a man sitting on the street with a cardboard sign that said in scrawly black letters HOMELESS, PLEASE HELP. A small cardboard box was on the sidewalk next to him. I walked up to him and dropped some bills in the box. He looked in the box. He looked at me. “God bless you,” he said. “God bless you, God bless you!”
Around the corner, a woman was standing near a restaurant. She wore a kerchief tied under her chin and a brown jacket with the lining coming out. “I need something to eat,” she was saying to everyone who passed. You could hardly hear her, though. “I need something to eat. Can you give me some money?” She held out her hand and looked right at me. “Yes,” I said. I was dizzy.
What I Believe Page 5
