life part 4

SAYING ANYTHING

b a c k w a r d

“I don’t know what to do with the kid no more,” Daddy slurs. I stand behind the door, tears pouring down my face as I finger my short hair. It was only last week when Daddy sheared it to just below my ears. Someone’s over at our house. I don’t know his name, but he brought alcohol. They’ve been drinking it for hours. While I did my homework. While I ate dinner. While I cleaned the kitchen. While I took a shower. While I cleaned my room, and petted the stray cat that I give milk sometimes.

“Get rid of it,” the guy replies with a burp. “Throw her out on the street!”

“Naw, naw,” Daddy cries. “I’d go to hell, Bob. I’d go to hell.” Tears and fear enter his voice making it whine. Making it blubber and plead. I feel disgust for him in my belly.

“I don’t wanna go to hell, Bob,” he sobs. “I dun wanna see her mommy again, I dun wanna see Crystal. Never see Crystal again…”

Soon both men are crying for their lost loves. I cry for my life, for my Mommy, Crystal. For my Daddy. For the stray cat who doesn’t get enough food. For the needles on the table. For me. I cry for me.

s t i l l

MB’s house is perfect. Her parents are slightly above average money wise, and every five years they go on a six month trip. Which is where they are now. MB won’t let anyone drink, or anything like that. Instead, she has the boys find a movie and make snacks. Nessa decides to stay down with Oliver. MB and I go up to her room.

All over her walls is sharpie. Phrases, quotes, lists of people she likes and doesn’t like, songs, names, friends, crushes, poems… I can’t even read it all. It’s organized. Everything. Lined up in order of color, or title. Everything is so clean. I look over at her in wonder. She almost looks embarrassed. Then we just sit on her bed, and we talk in quiet voices, and she keeps asking me questions, and I ask her a little bit, but mostly I talk. I still stay vague.

MB walks over to an antique record player and puts on a vinyl disk. She tells me it’s Sonic Youth. I just listen. I don’t really listen to music. We both just go silent and sway to the music. I pick out the lyrics and the beat. MB’s lips move silently along with the words. I close my eyes, and the world melts.

Suddenly, I feel something on my knee. I jump. MB is staring at me really intently, her blue eyes wide under her green eyebrows. I feel frightened. But then she says something that I will never forget, no matter what. Maybell just looks at me, with those innocent eyes and says clear as winter, “You can tell me the truth.”

And I do something that I haven’t done in such a long time. I cry. Right there in front of her, in front of the sharpie on the wall, in front of the Sonic Youth vinyl. I just cry. And when MB starts to cry, I cry even harder. And she hugs me. And I hug her. And I feel human.

But then there’s a cough at the door, and Alex is standing there, looking embarrassed. I turn to stare at the wall, and make my tears stop. He says the movie is on. MB tells him we’ll be there soon. She takes me into her bathroom and she washes my face, and her face, and then we go down to see the movie, which I can’t remember the name of. I think it’s really good though. Alex falls asleep pretty soon after the movie starts and doesn’t say anything about seeing me cry. Oliver and Nessa pass out on the couch at around 11. Thomas, MB and I stay awake.

We all spend the night.

MB brings out a futon for me to sleep on after the movie, and she and Thomas go up to her room. It takes me a while to relax, since I’m too busy being happy and confused. The last thing I see before I finally sleep is the red letters that say 2 AM.

When I wake up, Nessa and Oliver aren’t on the couch anymore. I can hear hushed voices in the kitchen, and the sounds of cooking food. It’s a long forgotten smell. So I lay still for a while. Then I roll over, only to find myself face to face with a sleeping Alex. I guess he moved onto the futon in the middle of the night. Or the early morning. His mouth is open just a little bit and he looks very peaceful. It’s so different from when he’s awake.

So I watch him for a while. But then he starts stirring, so I turn away.

“Hnn,” I hear him mumur in a yawn. There’s a pause, and then, “You awake?”

“Yeah,” I reply.

“Sleep well?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” I roll over, Alex is laying on his back, blinking hard in the light streaming through the windows. He raises his eyebrows. “I guess we’re not going to school today.” My eyes widen. He laughs, and then just smiles.

It fades quickly, and he rolls himself up so he’s propped up on his elbow. Concern lines his face. I sit up, confused. No one seems to know we’re awake. Maybe they do, though, and they’re just pretending that they don’t. I don’t really want it to be either.

“I’ve never seen you laugh,” Alex says seriously. He pulls himself upright, and remains looking very upset, I start to play with my hair, which is even crazier than usual. He just looks at me. I’m not really sure what to do. I bite my lip. I close my eyes.

“I didn’t hear whatever you guys were talking about last night, but there are a few things I want you to understand about me,” Alex whispers. “Take a walk?” I open my eyes to his serious face, and I nod. He clambers up and pulls on his sneakers, which are at the end of the bed. I tug on my red shoes.

“We’re taking a walk!” he calls out once we’re at the door. Someone says okay. We leave. The morning is chilly, but that’s okay. Alex is wrapped up in his jacket. I’m wrapped up in my shirt. We’re okay. The sky is bright and clear, with no clouds. Thomas’s truck is still in the driveway. We pass it and head down the right side of the street. Alex seems to know the way. It occurs to me that they probably do this a lot. I feel a sense of disconnection. But it passes.

“My mom has cancer,” Alex says suddenly. I turn to stare at him. “Leukemia. She’s had it for two years, but she won’t last much longer. She just had a relapse. No one really talks about it.” With fumbling hands, he reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a packet of cigarettes. He lights one with a red lighter, and offers me one. I shake my head, disgusted. So he just smokes it. I smoke on his words.

“I didn’t know,” I say finally.

“I don’t really talk about it.” Smoke. “So, like, only the people in there really know. That and family.” Breathe. “I guess. I dunno. It’s crazy. All this stuff. My dad practically lives at the hospital. My sister, who’s in college, stopped visiting because she can’t handle it. I just can’t wait to leave.” Smoke. “Don’t you ever feel like that?” Breathe.

You don’t know how much. “Sometimes.”

“You should come with me. Me and MB and Thomas are all leaving once we turn eighteen. We’re never coming back,” Alex says.

“Maybe,” I whisper. I’ll probably leave before that. Neither of us says anything else. We start walking back. Alex throws his cigarette on the sidewalk and stomps it out.

“I dunno,” he says. “Maybe you understand me better now or something.”

I don’t say anything.

LONELILY

f o r w a r d

He is waiting for me in the police station.

Just like the time I last saw him, his hair is shaggy. Shaggy and long, but clean. He looks unkempt, like he's been sleeping in the same clothes for a long time. His head is in his hands. I crouch on the ground in front of him, but he doesn't look up. I want to apologize, but I don’t know how. So instead I just sit there with my eyes speaking, and my mouth looking.

The officers are watching us, but not interfering. He won’t speak. Or maybe he can’t. So I wait. And I don’t talk. And he doesn’t talk. And the officers don’t talk. And no one talks.

And I wish that I were fifteen again. And that I was taking a walk. And MB was there. And Thomas. And Nessa. And Oliver. And we had never gone wrong. And that life had never been wrong in the first place.

All of a sudden, I'm crying. He finally looks at me. It only makes me cry harder. I am really crying. He looks like a mess. I figured it's probably my fault, at least partly. He climbs off the chair and sat in front of me, and just hugs me.

For the first time in a long time, I have no idea what to do.

s t i l l

It’s Friday. Yesterday, Alex and I took a walk, and he smoked a cigarette. We went home and we had pancakes. And nothing was wrong.

I’m in PE. I’m early. Tiffany hasn’t gotten here yet. I have to wait for her to approach me. My eyes are that bad already. The class starts to steam inside in a consistent blur of colors. Once she’s about five feet away from me, I see Tiffany, and I wave. She sits down next to me and crosses her legs. She’s wearing dark skinny jeans and black shoes. I smile.

“Oh my God,” she begins. “I saw you get into that truck with Alex and Thomas and Nessa and Oliver and Maybell, and then you weren’t here!”

“We spent the night at MB’s house, and stayed up late,” I clarify. “Nothing really happened.”

She looks almost disappointed and I almost feel like apologizing, but that would be stupid because there’s nothing to apologize for.

“What was it like?” she asks. “Maybell is so cool. What did you call her? MB? I would never have the courage to shave my head. God, she’s so great. I heard she wants to shave her eyebrows now. She’s so pretty like that too, don’t you think? And Thomas. God, he’s such an amazing bassist. Like, he’s really, really good. I’m totally jealous. I heard him play one day, and ohmigod. He’s totally gonna be a professional. I so wish I looked like Nessa. She’s had so many boyfriends, it’s crazy. But she’s been with Oliver for longer than the rest of them, and they’re so cute. He’s an awesome drummer, I’m telling you…”

And she just goes on and on and I let her, because I really do like Tiffany.

After PE, I go to math, the one class where I have Alex. When I sit down, he approaches me and sits on my desk, feet propped up against the table next to him. Almost immediately, his mouth starts running, like a motor. His eyes wander around the room while he talks, but I know he’s talking to me. I know he’s paying attention to me, because I know his mannerisms fairly well.

I don’t listen to the words as much as I listen to the sound of him, because that’s where most of his expressions are. He talks about this funny thing that happened, and how he wanted to skip next period, and maybe I would come? He had to buy more cigarettes, and asked if I had ever smoked, which I hadn’t. He just talks really. And I just listen.

Once the bell rings, he went over to his seat, two rows away, just to where his outline is blurring into the wall and into other outlines. I can see his smile, so I smile back.

Class ends. I stick my homework in my backpack, and start walking to lunch. Alex catches up to me, and wraps his arm around my shoulders. I feel myself stiffen. I hate it when he does things like this.

“Come eat with us today,” he says.

“I eat with Tiffany,” I reply.

“Who?”

I just keep walking. He doesn’t follow me.

Tiffany isn’t at lunch. Alex leaves me alone, but he buys me lunch. He just sets it down in front me and walks off. I eat it, and put my head down on the table. Daddy still hasn’t come home. He hasn’t been home for a month now. I’m actually getting a bit worried. He usually only leaves for a week or two. Maybe he’s not coming back this time. Maybe he never planned to come back.

Like Mommy. I’m old enough now to realize why she left, and that despite what she said, she’s never coming back. She probably lives in a beach house with a nice politician and a lovely child. That’s what happens in books and movies. She probably never wonders, “Is Samantha okay? Does George ever beat her? Is he dead? Is she living with a foster family?” It probably never once crossed her mind. I wonder if she even remembers what I look like. What my favorite food was. What I liked to watch on television. I bet she knows everything about her kid though. The kid I know she has. I bet it’s a girl. A beautiful girl. With straight blonde hair and obsidian eyes. But she’ll never become a bird. Not like me, or like Alex, or Tiffany. She’ll remain human forever, anchored by a wonderful life by the sea.

Alex, Tiffany, and I, we can leave this world because of the things we’ve been through. That’s why we’ll become birds. That’s why we can fly. That’s why we can fly, and she can’t.

The bell rings.

I stand up.

I leave, just like everyone else.

At home, we have no food. Daddy hasn’t been there. The smell of incense is drifting out the window, on a life long trip, just like Daddy. They left together, I guess.

Over the month, I’ve been cleaning. Our home – my home – looks presentable. There isn’t anything on the floor. The counter top is clean. I’ve swept, scrubbed and vacuumed. After all, what else can I do? I’m all alone here. It looks like I’m about to sell it. Maybe I could. Once I turn eighteen, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll sell it. Then I’ll move to New York and go to college and buy an apartment. That’s what I’ll do.

I sink to the floor.

I cry.

And I cry.

And I cry.

I’m so hungry. I want to eat something. I’m so alone. I want to around someone. Not even the birdmen are here. I think I scared them off. Maybe it was Alex. I close my eyes. I want Daddy.