Between the Lines Page 9

and the mama is willing

  and waiting to hear

  whatever words

  you’re ready to throw down?

  Be a clown

  if you have to—

  assuming

  she’s worth it.

  DARRIAN

  BROTHER EXCAVATES ENGLISH TO WIN A HOT HONEY

  We all know who Marcel is talking about. It’s not like he’s smooth enough to hide it.

  I’ve been meaning to call Freddie—not to cut in on Marcel, but to get her story.

  I get her home phone number from the slam poets list Mr. Ward put together, and I ring her up, you know, kind of casual. She answers the phone, all business.

  “Houston residence. May I help you?”

  “Listen to you!” I say. “All official.”

  “Darrian?”

  “Yeah. It’s me,” I say. “Good evening. See? I can be official sounding, too.”

  Silence.

  “So, how are you this fine evening?”

  “Fine. But I’m kind of— No, Carrie! Don’t touch that!”

  I hear a little girl’s voice in the background.

  “Sorry,” says Freddie.

  “Is that your niece?”

  “You and Marcel been talking?”

  “What?”

  “Never mind,” says Freddie. “Yeah. That’s my sister’s kid. Carrie.”

  “Cute name.”

  “So, Darrian? Was there something you needed?”

  “No. I just wanted to talk.”

  “Are you serious? I need to get dinner on and help Carrie with her homework.”

  “You finished your poem already, I guess.”

  “Freddie!” This time, the voice is a woman’s. “Freddie, give me a hand. I need some help.”

  “Coming, Mom!” yells Freddie. “Now, what was that?” she says to me.

  “I was wondering if you already wrote your poem for Open Mike.”

  Freddie lets out a dry laugh. “No. I’ll get to that after dinner, and Carrie’s homework.”

  “FREDDIE!”

  “And helping my mother with—whatever. Coming, Mom!” Freddie shouts back. “Give me a minute, Darrian.”

  She puts the phone down. Two minutes later, she’s back.

  “Sorry about that.”

  I whistle. “Damn, chica. You’ve got a lot on your plate.”

  A heavy sigh makes it all the way through the phone lines.

  “Listen, Darrian, I’ve gotta book.”

  “Yeah, okay. No problem.”

  “Thanks for calling, though. I don’t hear much from kids at school. It’s not like I have time to hang out.”

  “I hear you,” I say. “I’ll see you on Friday, right?”

  “Right!”

  “Can’t wait to hear your new piece.”

  “Right. Okay. Bye, then.”

  “Adiós, chica.”

  I hang up the phone, shaking my head.

  Man. You never know about a person, what kind of load they’re carrying. No wonder she comes off hard. Who wouldn’t?

  GIRL ATLAS BALANCES A WORLD

  TEAM GIRLZ: FREDDIE

  School rules. That’s what Mr. Ward says we have to stick to for the slam. No language. In other words, keep it clean. That works for me, since I usually have to bring my niece to after-school rehearsals. What else can I do? I’ve got a neighbor I can sometimes leave her with, but I don’t want to make a habit of that.

  I make it to rehearsal every week now. Of course, I’m usually late, blowing into the room as if the wind is giving me a push. I send Carrie to the bathroom and tell her to come right back.

  “There she is. Late. Again,” says Val. Angela doesn’t say anything, but she shakes her head from side to side, her way of letting me know she’s annoyed.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “Why are you always getting here late?” asks Val. “Everybody else manages to get here on time.”

  “I said I’m sorry.”

  “We get that you have to pick up Carrie first,” says Angela, “but still.”

  “Look,” I say. “There’s more to it than—”

  Val cuts me off. “I hate it when people are late!”

  “My father says it’s disrespectful when people are late, and he’s right,” Li adds.

  “Leave her alone,” says Jenesis.

  “Stay out of this,” says Val.

  “You don’t get it,” I say. “Sometimes, when I get home, my mom is—”

  “You think you’re something special?” asks Val, all wound up. “You think we should be happy to wait on you, like we don’t all have things to do?”

  “Stop it, Val!” says Jenesis. That’s when Val turns on her.

  “Why the hell are you defending Freddie?” asks Val. “She’s disrespecting you, too!”

  That’s it! “Hey!” I explode. “I don’t need this crap! I got enough to deal with at home. My mom came home drunk. Again. I had to put her in bed and fix dinner for when she finally wakes up. Then I had to get Carrie ready to bring her, because I can’t leave her at home when Mom is drunk, because, honestly, that’s worse than leaving her alone, so it took me a minute to get my act together and head over here. But you know what? That’s not your problem, so forget it. I’m outta here.”

  I tear out of the class just as Carrie returns from the bathroom. My heart is pumping like crazy, and I lean against the wall to catch my breath, and that’s when the tears come. Carrie tugs my jacket.

  “Aunt Freddie? What’s wrong?”

  Angela follows me out into the hall. She tries to put her arms around me, but I push her away.

  “Don’t! Don’t you dare go feeling sorry for me,” I tell her. But Angela hugs me anyway. Then I see Li, Val, and Jenesis, and before I know it, there are arms everywhere, hugging on me and talking to me softly. Val’s is the first voice I hear.

  “I’m sorry, Freddie,” she whispers. “I had no idea.”

  “Maybe I should just drop out of the slam altogether,” I whisper.

  “No, don’t do that, sis,” says Jenesis. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  Little by little, my breathing slows.

  “Please stop crying, Freddie,” whispers Li. “We’re here for you.”

  And you know what? In that moment, I believe them.

  Somebody hands me a tissue. I wipe away the tears and we go back into the room.

  “Is everything okay, ladies?” asks Mr. Ward. Everyone looks at me, and I nod.

  “We’re good,” says Jenesis, speaking for all of us.

  Mr. Ward looks from one of us to the other.

  “I sense there’s something deeply personal going on between you, and that’s perfect for what I want to talk to you about today. Shared vulnerability. That’s what we’re after here,” says Mr. Ward.

  “What is shared vulnerability?” asks Val.

  “Yes,” says Li. “Please explain.”

  “Happy to,” says Mr. Ward. “The reason I have you do free writes and share some of your most private thoughts and experiences with each other is so you can learn to trust one another with your stories. I want you to see that we all have things we’re sensitive about. We all have complex lives, we all have wounds, and we all have struggles.”

  Struggles. Yeah. That’s something I know about.

  “Some of the best poems, the poems that touch us most deeply, are personal stories,” says Mr. Ward. “That’s especially true with slam poetry. And if we’re going to write and perform poetry like that in front of strangers, we need to feel strong about it. We need to feel supported. This room is your safe place, and the girls in this circle are your support group. It’s important that you get to know each other, to trust each other.”

  Val looks around the room and nods. “We
get it, Mr. Ward,” she says. And she’s right.

  “Great!” says Mr. Ward. “Then let’s get started.”

  We open the meeting with a free write, and the poem it leads me to is more honest than any I’ve ever written before.

  • • •

  I was worried Carrie would be bored, but she seems to like hearing us do poetry, especially the group pieces. She gets all into the rhythm and claps her little hands. Besides, the other girls think she’s cute and treat her like our junior mascot, coaxing her to write poems of her own. And we’re starting to rub off on her. Last week, when I picked her up from school, she showed me an eight-line riff on “roses are red” she’d scribbled in her notebook. I think I’ll show it to Marcel. I’ll bet he gets a kick out of it. The spelling was wonky, but the poem wasn’t half bad, for a squirt. Still, I’ve been wishing I could come to rehearsal without her so I’d feel free to let my feelings rip. School rules are not the problem. I can’t talk about Mom’s fixation on alcohol, or her penchant for being missing in action, or how hard it is for me to be a kid when I’m forced to raise one that isn’t even mine. With Carrie in the room, I have to bite my tongue, and it’s getting pretty bloody here lately. I’ll stick with it, though. Even the little bit of truth I get to spill makes my load feel a little lighter.

  School Rules

  by Freddie Houston

  Stage right,

  the lights fade on a daily life

  of tiptoeing around

  my niece’s feelings about the mom

  who traded time with her

  for time spent cozying up to crank.

  The truth is too rank

  for her tender little-girl ears.

  And so, until she’s fast asleep,

  I keep bitter thoughts

  under my tongue’s lock and key.

  Have I mentioned how it hurts me?

  That neither my niece nor I

  manage to have a mother

  worthy of the name?

  Oh, mine is present,

  in an alcoholic-fog kind of way,

  which is to say, hardly at all.

  I’ll give her what faint praise is due:

  Every week, she brings home

  what salary remains after

  her routine rendezvous

  with the local liquor mart.

  She’s smart that way,

  puts on just enough of a show

  of hardworking respectability

  and motherly concern

  to convince the world

  that all is well behind our door.

  It is not. And I want more,

  like a mom who truly

  carries Carrie,

  carries me

  so I can sometimes be

  the kid I am—

  do homework before stopping

  to make a meal,

  go to parties,

  be irresponsibly late

  without worry that a child waits

  for me at home. Alone.

  I want days, weeks, months

  of not overseeing my niece’s care—

  has she bathed?

  brushed her teeth?

  combed her hair?

  said her prayers before

  I tucked her in?

  When did that become

  too much to ask?

  Morning approaches.

  I bite my tongue

  and swallow the curses that rise

  whenever I look into

  Mom’s vacant eyes.

  Stage right,

  the lights come up.

  Mom’s running late.

  No surprise.

  I wake my niece

  and ready her for school.

  There is breakfast to be prepared,

  sack lunches to be made,

  a long day ahead of pretending

  not to mind playing Mommy

  to my sister’s child.

  Even when Carrie throws

  a temporary tantrum,

  she deserves to know

  what it’s like to be loved.

  DARRIAN

  I look around the room, notice all the girls huddled together, hanging on Freddie’s every word. There’s something happening with them. They seem . . . closer. Yeah. I’m pretty sure. Or maybe it’s just this poem, pulling them all in, making them think about their own moms. Freddie’s poem sure makes me think about mine, about how lucky I was.

  I don’t think I told Mami thank you enough. I don’t think I ever could. I still have time to tell Papi, though.

  ANGELA

  Kyle’s got a lot of patience. I bet that would surprise people. He loves speed, and he’s the first person to challenge someone to a race, but he’s good at slowing down, too. Lately, he’s slowed down enough to give me skateboard lessons. Turns out he’s a really good teacher. He’s got me up on a skateboard. Me! On a skateboard! You should have seen the look on Mrs. Wexler’s face when I told her. Priceless.

  After a few lessons with him, I’ve gotten pretty comfortable on my board. He just bought a new one, so he loaned me his first until I can save money to buy one of my own.

  It’s crazy. I thought I’d be afraid of falling or hurting myself. Instead, I was mostly afraid that I wouldn’t be able to handle the board at all, that I couldn’t stand on it right or find the right balance, or whip up enough nerve to even try. But I was wrong.

  Kyle meets me in front of my building every morning, and we skateboard to school together. We zip down the blocks, take fast corners, and even ride the curb once or twice on the way. I’m a little slow on the lingo, but when I ride, I feel peaceful inside, and when I go especially fast, Kyle says my hair looks like a red flag in the wind. I like that.

  “One day, you’ll be a ripper,” says Kyle. That’s a really good, consistent skater. Imagine!

  Last week, Kyle started digging around in my head, trying to figure out what kinds of things scare me.

  The streets are pretty busy at this hour, but we skateboard side by side as much as possible. We separate whenever we need to let someone pass.

  We’re skateboarding home after school, and an ambulance tears down the street with its siren splitting every eardrum in the city. I step off my board for a minute to cover my ears until it passes, then keep going. Kyle comes up behind me.

  “That didn’t scare you?”

  “What?”

  “The ambulance. The siren.”

  “No. Why should it?”

  “Sirens scare a lot of people,” he says.

  I just shrug.

  He’s quiet for a block or so. Then he batters me with more questions.

  “What about gunshots?”

  “What gunshots?”

  “You know. Sometimes there are gunshots around here. Don’t you worry about that?”

  I think for a minute.

  “If I hear one, and I know that’s what it is, I jump. But I don’t, like, think about gunshots a lot, or worry about them happening, if that’s what you mean.”

  “That’s weird. What about gangs?”

  “What about them?”

  “Do they scare you?”

  “Well, I try to avoid them. Other than that, I don’t think about them much.” We reach the next corner and wait for the light to turn green.

  “Okay,” says Kyle while we’re waiting. “Then what kinds of things do you stress about?”

  Good question. I can’t say “everything” because I realized I’m not stressed out about gangs and gunshots. I don’t like either one, but I honestly don’t think about them that much. So, what makes me anxious?

  “Myself, mostly. I get anxious about what’s inside of me. Or what isn’t.”

  “Huh?”

&nb
sp; “I stress about whether people will like me or not. I’m afraid that people won’t take me seriously, or that they’ll only take me seriously. I’m afraid that I’m too smart, or that I’m not smart enough, or brave enough, or pretty enough for a boy to—”

  Oh, God! Why did I say that out loud?

  My cheeks burn. I look at Kyle out the corner of my eye and see him smiling.

  What does that mean? Why is he smiling?

  The light is taking too long to turn green. I check for cars, then push off with one foot on the board, the other pushing along the ground to build up speed. I reach the other side of the street and keep going, moving faster than I ever have. Half a block away, Kyle catches up. When he gets close enough to talk, he coughs like he’s trying to clear his throat.

  “So what you’re saying is, you’re afraid that you’re not enough,” says Kyle.

  “What?”

  He says it again. “Sounds to me like you’re afraid of not being enough.”

  I don’t say anything at first. I just turn his words over in my mind. Then I feel them slide around like tiles on a Rubik’s Cube. One by one, they slip into place, and suddenly, the puzzle is solved.

  “Yes. Yes! That’s exactly it.”

  “I thought so.”

  “Wow.” I don’t say anything else. I go quiet and let this new idea sink in. The word enough echoes inside my head, pinging back and forth, until Kyle breaks the silence.

  “You know that’s just plain silly,” he says. “Of course you’re enough. Everybody is enough. I’ve got a fake heart valve, and I’m still enough. Think about it.” Then he and his shiny new board take off flying.

  I never quite catch up. Before I know it, I’m home.

  Anxiety

  by Angela Marie Bailey

  Anxiety would be

  easier to slay

  if the things I feared

  were outside of me.

  I could take karate lessons

  to fend off muggers,

  learn to repel rapists

  with a swift kick

  in their tender places.

  But it’s not fear of these

  that gets my knees wobbling.

  No siren blare

  or nightmare of gunshots

  sends me running.