The Truth Is

by Nonieqa Ramos

  At this point @ShutupU2 pumps his chest in and out.

  @frodown’s phone hits @ShutupU2’s head. “Ow! Damn! I was just making an obser—ah! A sugg—ow!”

  Ms. Moore: “Okay, class, let’s return to our regularly scheduled program—me. Frida, retrieve your phone and put it away. By the way, what kind of case do you have?”

  “I know!” @frodown aka Frida says all proud, grabbing her phone. “You could drop it down a flight of stairs and it doesn’t crack.”

  “Wait,” says @ShutUpU2 aka Rudy, rubbing the back of his neck. “That’s bullying. Ain’t nobody gonna defend me?”

  “And does that make you a guy or a girl?” I interject, folding my arms.

  From the class collective: “Oh!”

  From @frodown aka Frida: “She always chimes in at the last minute. I kinda like that. Feel that burn!”

  From @ShutUpU2 aka Rudy: “Hey Ex-Machina.”

  I turn. “Huh?”

  “Shut up.”

  Ms. Moore is just about done talking to the new kid and giving them a desk assignment. To my relief she doesn’t put them in Blanca’s empty desk.

  @ShutupU2: 2 more minutes to get your bets in!

  Two more minutes because Ms. Moore will do her routine intro of the new student, where she will create a profile that always sounds like a dating ad. It’s our class’s private joke. Like, This is Nelly, who comes from the west coast, give her some California love. The only time she wants to perspire is lying in the sand at the beach. She enjoys photography, anything written by Brandy Colbert, and music by Childish Gambino. Pair him/her up with a mentor for the day, and mission accomplished.

  For the first time, Ms. Moore doesn’t have to shut everybody up before she makes an introduction of a new student. Backpacks stop zipping, sneakers stop shuffling. Thumbs hooked in his/her/their! pockets, they stand in front of the room with posture that’s too good for a guy. For some reason guys think females find scoliosis of the spine hot.

  “This is Danny La Spisa.”

  “Danny?” Rudy whines. “Are you kidding?”

  Danny, aka Daniel or Danielle, hangs his/her/their head, and the hood and the shadow it casts fall forward.

  “Verdad, you’re up. You’ll be Danny’s peer mentor. Today just drop—Danny off at the office before first period so—Danny can get some kinks in—Danny’s schedule worked out. Everyone, no hacking into the school website. Have a good day.”

  Rudy: “Whaaaaat?! But you didn’t—”

  Just like that, though, Ms. Moore turns on the smart board with her electronic marker and starts bullet-pointing lesson objectives for her second-period world literature class. Nelly holds up her laptop with her own translation:

  Objective 1: White people write literature about love, hate, war, peace, food, hunger, religion, magic, nature, humor. Objective 2: Native Americans write about buffalo and eagles. Objective 3: Brown people . . . migrant workers? Objective 4: Black people write about race.

  She gets major dap from Frida, Rudy, and a bunch of other kids. I jot down notes, not from Ms. Moore, but from Nelly.

  The bell rings. Everybody scrambles to scoop up tablets, coffee cups, and phones. Too late! Like a tidal wave, the juniors crash our party. If Blanca were here she’d play sports commentator. Freshmen swim bravely against the tide but get swallowed. Danny grabs my sleeve. Except for being cross-checked by backpacks, we make it out alive.

  “Thanks.” I rub the possible concussion I have from a laptop. “I’m supposed to be taking care of you!”

  “It’s a team effort, I’ve found.” Danny points to a poster on the wall.

  I look up and read: “There’s no I in team?” Eye roll. Ugh. I start walking north to the office.

  He follows my lead. “But there is meat in team.”

  I snort. What did my face just do? “And meta.”

  “Impressive. And tame!”

  “And,” I proclaim at the top of my dumb voice, “Mate!” Backtrack. “Like shipmate. Checkmate.”

  We’re at the office now. In an Australian accent, Danny answers, “See ya later, mate.”

  What just happened?

  ……

  In Ms. Belle’s room, I reserve my two desks and go about my business until the scent of buttered popcorn smears the air. Just inside it hovers a cloud of J. Lo’s Live. Ice sloshes in cherry soda. Blanca never needs a refill.

  At our old school, Blanca and I used to be in all the same honors classes. My moms had to campaign to get me into them. And she did it for Blanca too because her abuela only spoke Spanish.

  A kid turns around, sees nothing, turns back. Rubs the back of his neck. Ms. Belle scans the room but can’t find anybody eating anything. Her evil eye settles on me, but all she sees are my folded hands (with my middle finger ever so slightly raised), and my homework neatly organized on my desk. She frowns, eventually finds her markers in her cluttered drawer, and starts the class review.

  Me: See that? She gave me the mal de ojo.

  Blanca: I can see she’s not a fan.

  Me: That’s okay. I know how to play the game.

  Blanca: Is that what school is?

  Me: That’s what life is. And from the looks of Ms. Belle, it’s a game of Clue. I’m gonna end up dead with a compass sticking straight out of my heart.

  Blanca: Maybe life is Candy Land. Every once in a while you get stuck in toffee. But it’s still toffee, man. Life is life. So exactly why does Ms. Belle want to end yours?

  Me: Okay . . . I failed a few tests.

  Blanca: You?!

  Me: Well, because. Because, my mom. She goes, you can handle another Honors class, easy peasy lemon squeezy.

  Blanca: Oh. Throwing another game, are we?

  Me: It’s war. I’m getting 100 one day, a 50 the next. Ms. Belle starts singling me out. Trying to teach me math like Elmo trying to teach the number seven on Sesame Street. Going, it’s all about focus, Verdad. Organizing your ideas. Taking it step by step.” The woman can’t even organize her purse, but she’s going to tell me about organizing my ideas? The other day she says to me, “You know your mom said this class would be too easy for you, but I warned her of the challenges.” I go, “Did you warn all the other kids who went into Honors that they shouldn’t because it’s too hard—or just me?”

  Blanca: And what did she say to that?

  Me: Something along the lines of, “Itthatwhat?” To which I said, “You do teach math, but some English is required.”

  Blanca (laughing): How is it you can say what other people can’t, yet you can’t hold a simple conversation?

  Me: Simple conversation is the least simple thing in the world.

  Ms. Belle, squinting at Blanca’s desk and clearing her throat: “You’ve entitled yourself to two desks, Ms. Reyna, so maybe you want to take two tests?”

  Me: “Absolutely.”

  I finish them both in five minutes.

  Me walking up the row to turn them in: “I corrected your question on number three Test B.” I go up to the board and demonstrate why her dumbass equation cannot have an answer as it stands.

  Ms. Belle could cook huevos on her head, it’s so hot.

  Ms. Belle (each letter starched and ironed): “Thank you.” To the class: “Everyone, you make skip question three if you have Test version B.”

  Those with Test B: “Yaas!”

  Blanca: Yup. It’s gonna be the compass. Don’t turn your back.

  I pack up my one-hundred-pound backpack. I’m a freakin Marine.

  Guy who I could peer tutor in math and who could give me tips about how not to end up unconscious in gym class: “Verdad’s too school for cool.”

  Pink-haired girl I could be joking with in bio lab: “She’s been like that since middle school. She’s a walking calculator.”

  Boy with blue lipstick: “A robot.”

  Some dickhead: “Ex Machina.”

  The next bright and colorful circle of hell is Spanish. Orange, red, pink, and yellow picado banners surroun
d tasseled star-shaped pinatas. Vases of terecitas, bouquets of puffy blue, purple, and pink flowers stand on either side of the serape runner covering the teacher’s desk. The wall is lined with sombreros with enough silver sequins to make a solar panel for the eastern United States. Just like in church, I have a hard time understanding how any of what I’m seeing relates to me. Somewhere El Diablo is making another tally mark and my mother is signing the cross.

  Ms. Hewitt writes the objectives on the board. “Please review present, past, and future tenses with irregular verbs.” Her handwriting is as perfect as her neat blond French braid, pencil skirt, and crisp ruffled blouse. Her shoes do not match her outfit perfectly. She lets us chew chicle in class. She brings us guayaba. I hate her aerobicized ass.

  Ms. Hewitt: “Verdad, please review your conjugations from last night’s homework.” Her accent is perfect like her teeth. My moms keeps threatening to stick braces on mine. I got gap teeth. I keep reminding her I know how to use pliers as well as she does.

  Me: “Presente. Yo tengo. Tu tienes. El/ella tiene. Nosotros tenemos. Ellos tienen. Past. Yo tuve . . .”

  Ms. Hewitt: “Verdad. Let’s work on your accent. Repeat after me. Yo tengo.”

  Male half of “the couple” (his ear always has her red lipstick on it; she always smells like his cologne) detaching momentarily: “Yeah, girl. You sound whiter than the teacher. No offense.”

  Even Ms. Hewitt laughs. She’s one of those teachers that likes to be all buddy-buddy with the kids.

  I huff and start future tense: “Tendre. Tendras. Tendra.”

  Three Boricuas in the back crack up laughing, repeating the tenses as if the Queen of England is saying them.

  Texts light up my phone.

  @ShutupU2: Deja lo. It’s not Ex Machina’s fault. Spanish don’t compute in her program.

  Me looking at @ShutupU2 aka Rudy: “Chíngate!”

  Some dickhead: “Uh-oh. Ex-Machina is mad.”

  Rudy: “She’s at twenty-five percent!”

  Me: “Mira, perras—”

  Rudy: “Oh, fifty percent!”

  If Blanca was here, she’d put everybody in their place. In Spanish. Blanca never questioned who I was. When I was with her, I never did either. She would understand how I feel about Ms. Hewitt.

  Me: It’s just that I can’t speak Spanish, but Blondie up there can? What the fuck?

  Blanca: I get it. But Rubia speaking it isn’t stopping you from learning how to speak it.

  Me: I just wish I didn’t have to work at it. At—being Puerto Rican. I mean white people don’t work on being white. They just born like that. Nobody says to them, you’re just not white enough.

  Blanca (laughing): I guess not. Okay, Let’s solve this problem. Pop quiz. What are the three things we put in our comida?

  Me: Adobe. Sazon. Cilantro!

  Blanca: And at every meal?

  Me: Rice, beans, carne.

  Blanca: Goya—

  Me: Oh Boya!

  Blanca: And if you didn’t act right when you were a kid?

  Me: El Cuco would get you.

  Blanca: Fill-in-the-blank. Sana Sana—

  Me: Colita de rana.

  Blanca: You’re a Boricua. Pass!

  Me: Just pass?

  Blanca: There’s no 100 percent nothing no more, Verdad.

  Me: Tell that to my mother.

  Without Blanca, I’m lost. We might as well both be ghosts.

  ……

  Off to history. I plant myself in my customary spot, with my customary reserved desk. The last row in the back of the room where I can see and access the door, as far away from the windows as possible.

  We do lockdown drills here. Teachers cover the window with black paper. Kids hide in the back of the room away from the windows. Lockdowns do save lives. But the truth is somebody’s already dead by the time a lockdown starts. The truth is, if it isn’t you it’s the person you were planning on sitting with at lunch. That person you once knew is now frozen in time, on a stage in your mind and they’ve forgotten all their lines.

  Miss Kim excavates herself from her desk of ancient textbooks and stands beside her giant globe, which everybody learned fast not to spin without her say-so: “Good morning! Let me remind you to place your phones on my desk.”

  Rudy: “Can’t you get your own? They got payment plans.”

  Miss Kim: “Now.”

  Rudy: “That’s harsh. You’re the only one who takes our sh—stuff.”

  Miss Kim: “That’s a good point. I’ll talk to the other teachers about that. We need to be on the same page about your sh-stuff.”

  Rudy ducking pencil missiles: “Ouch. Ouch. Ouch.”

  Me: “Most people get smarter at school. You’re gonna have brain damage before lunch.”

  Miss Kim: “Today we are starting a new unit on current events. I want each of you to come to the board silently and write a current event that you feel passionate about.”

  Damn it, I don’t want to share. I should be happy that Miss Kim is keeping it real, but I feel panicked. My raw unfiltered thoughts are safest inside my head.

  A knock comes on the door. I crouch down a bit. It’s Ms. Perez again, apologizing and signaling Miss Kim to step outside. Everybody’s hair gel, colognes, body lotions overpower my nostrils. My sense of smell amps up every time I’m on the verge of freaking out.

  Miss Kim, heading into the hall: “Xavier, you get this party started right. One by one. Row by row starting by the window.”

  The classroom door closes behind her. Xavier picks up his jeans to waist level, stands sentry at the board, and snaps for everybody to begin.

  I always sit on the opposite side of any window. Of course, since I’m sitting in the back by the door, I have to deal with the crushing suspense of being last. I feel transparent. Aware of every part of my body. No matter how hard I try to relax, it’s like the beat of my heart is audible to everyone. Can everyone hear my eyeballs moving in their sockets like I can?

  From Row 1, Boricua 1 sprints to the board like an Olympic medalist. She chooses a red marker and sticks it: catcalling

  Boricua 2, aka Penelope with the pink hair: rape culture

  I can’t help but stare, because something clicks in my memory, but the key is broken. She looks at me, but I look away.

  Boricano 1: paranoia #wejustwannatalk

  Boricua 3, with a Tierra Santa band T-shirt, chipped black nails, skipping a Chicana’s turn: #everydaysexism

  White Guy 1, who clearly has the Axe gift set: #feminazi

  (He fist-bumps a bunch of guys as he makes his way to his seat.)

  Boricuas 1, 2, and 3, eyeballing White Guy 1’s groin: “Shake those maracas, baby!”

  White Guy 1 blushes and hurls himself into the safety of his desk like it’s a bomb shelter.

  Las Boricuas: “C’mon. Don’t be shy. Let me see you smile. Open that mouth. Show us that pink tongue.”

  White Guy 1 shrinks and pulls his cap way down over his eyes, shaking his head.

  Miss Kim raps on the glass window of the door and points to Xavier.

  Xavier: “If y’all don’t stop she gonna give you a research paper.”

  Miss Kim gives a thumbs-up through the window.

  Mexican Girl 1: immigration & DACA

  Mexican—er, wait—AfroLatinx Guy 1: dreamers. (He also writes a #lesbians by White Guy 1’s #feminazi.)

  Boricua 4, with dope cat eyes: colorism

  White Girl 1, aka @kidsister: #EnoughisEnough

  Nelly, writing in bubble letters: Enough Is Enough When Your Asses Are Getting Shot At, Huh?

  Me. I just want to walk up and erase the board. Erase everyone’s memories. Unplug every TV and computer. I want it to be like the 1980s when my moms was a kid and you could actually shut everything off. Out. Every one of my nerves is charged to full capacity.

  White Boy 2: Religious Freedom

  White Girl 2, aka @XoXo: #loveisloveislove

  White Girl 3, in a crop-top hoodie: Right to Bea
r Arms

  White Girl 1 out loud: “A bear arm?”

  Some dickhead: I like pizza

  Everybody laughs hard.

  Xavier, pointing to the door: “Shhhhh.”

  Nelly, back up at the board: RIP #TamirRice #EricGarner #MichaelBrownJr. #AltonSterling. . .

  Black Guy 1 with waves and a low fade: No Justice No Peace

  My scar radiates heat. I want to limp, but I autopilot it to the board. I am my mother’s daughter. I am strong. Like her when she went back to work a week after her C-section because how else were the bills getting paid? Strong like when she made me go back to school two weeks after the funeral.

  From Row 3, Black Guy 2 with some GQ glasses, working the sweater vest and khakis: #BlackLivesMatter

  White Girl 4: #AllLivesMatter

  White Girl 5, with henna on her hands: The second amendment.

  Me. My body moves me forward like I’m a prisoner held inside it. I take my turn. I don’t speak my mind. My mind speaks me. Whether I like it or not. My hand writes what I don’t even know has been incubating in my brain: #brownlivesmattertoo

  White Girl 4, standing up: “Right. Like I said. All Lives Matter.”

  Me, still standing up, towering over all the girls—and a lot of the guys—in my class: “That’s not what I meant.”

  Nelly, sizing me up: “That’s some bullshit, Maquina!”

  White Girl 1 aka @kidsister: “What’s she’s trying to say is black doesn’t matter more than white. Or brown.”

  Me: “Don’t tell me what I’m trying to say.” I may not know Spanish as well as my gringa teacher, but I don’t need nobody speaking for me. “I’m saying our history is messed up too. Our people were killed, enslaved. Our people have suffered too.” To Nelly: “Shit, at least you’re in the history books.”

  Nelly: “And what is in those history books? Just a 101 on how to keep us enslaved. Talking about slavery as if it’s past tense. Making our identity all about being slaves or being saved—by everybody but ourselves.”

  Black Guy 1: “Word, Nelly. Put Maquina back in her box.”

  Nelly, on a roll: “Those history books never talk about African revolts, black concentration camps, Black Wall Street, Blacks inventing shit like half the music every white person listens to. I mean Mozart is great but you don’t hear people blasting that from their cars, do you?”