In the old art room, there were just a few of those chairs with swing-up desks in a circle, a teacher’s desk with no chair, a big clock on the wall and some little kid’s ancient painting of a bright yellow sun thumbtacked to the closet door.
Esteban asked, Are we getting transferred to a new class? He put his knapsack down between his ankles and hugged himself.
Amari had taken his arm off Esteban’s shoulder but was still standing close to him. When Esteban shivered, Amari put his arm back. I heard him whisper, It’s all good, bro. It’s all good. Ms. Laverne’s not taking us somewhere we don’t want to be.
Ms. Laverne sat on the edge of the teacher’s desk and folded her arms. Every Friday, from now until the end of the school year, the six of you will leave my classroom at two p.m. and come into Room 501. You’ll sit in this circle and you’ll talk. When the bell rings at three, you’re free to go home.
Why can’t we just talk in our regular classroom? Holly asked, hopping up onto the teacher’s desk. I mean, in your classroom.
Our regular classroom wasn’t regular. We knew that. But still.
Down from there, please, Holly. Ms. Laverne waited for Holly to jump off again before she continued. I don’t want to hear what you have to say to each other. This is your time. Your world. Your room.
Sounds like you’re trying to get an early break from us, Holly said. Give yourself your own kind of half day.
Ms. Laverne laughed. One day, Holly, your brain will be very useful to you.
Holly looked like she wasn’t sure if our teacher was complimenting her.
What I’m trying to do is give you the space to talk about the things kids talk about when no grown-ups are around. Don’t you all have a world you want to be in that doesn’t have people who look like me in it?
Nope, Amari said.
Yeah, Ashton said. Not really.
We like being with you, I added. In the other room.
You like what you know, Ms. Laverne said. You like what’s familiar.
None of us said anything. She was right. What was wrong with liking familiar things?
Nothing’s wrong with that, Ms. Laverne said, being a teacher/mind reader. But what’s unfamiliar shouldn’t be scary. And it shouldn’t be avoided either.
But I don’t know what we’re even supposed to talk about, Tiago said. Like, schoolwork and stuff? And to who?
Schoolwork, toys, TV shows, me, yourselves—anything you want to talk about. To each other. And it’s to whom, Tiago.
To whom, Tiago said to himself like he was practicing it. To whom.
I think any other bunch of kids would have started happy-dancing and acting crazy because there weren’t going to be any grown-ups around. But we weren’t any other kids.
I heard Amari say that’s stupid so quietly that I wondered if I was hearing things. Then he said, We could be talking in class if we wanted to be talking. You trying to change the art room into the A-R-T-T room—A Room To Talk.
That’s tight, Ashton said. He and Amari pounded fists. I like that.
Ms. Laverne clapped once and pointed at Amari. You. Are. Brilliant.
I could have come up with that. Holly rolled her eyes. I could have added an R and thrown an acronym out there. She said acronym loudly, making sure Ms. Laverne heard.
Nice use of the word, Holly, Ms. Laverne said. Okay, so because the art room is now the A-R-T-T room, no one gets in trouble for talking here. You get in trouble for taking out your phone. You get in trouble for being disrespectful—
How’re you gonna know if you’re not in here with us? Amari asked her.
I’ll know.
And we all knew she was telling the truth. Teachers knew things. That’s all there was to it.
Well, what if I don’t have anything to say to anybody? Amari asked.
Ms. Laverne laughed again. Since when do you not have anything to say, Amari? She shook her head and waved her hand to include all of us. I can’t believe you all are so resistant. I’m giving you an hour. To chat! You get in trouble for this every single day. How many times do I have to say ‘No talking’? Now I’m saying, ‘Talk!’
Amari tried to hide his smile but he didn’t do a great job of it. Okay . . . I’m vibing it. The old art room is the new A-R-T-T room, y’all.
And I bet you can draw in here too, if you want, Ashton said to him.
Ms. Laverne nodded. Draw, talk. And yes, Amari—the A-R-T-T room is beyond clever.
Like I said, anybody could have thought of that, Holly said.
Yeah—but I see YOU didn’t, Amari said.
And like I said, Ms. Laverne told us, in this room we won’t be unkind.
She started it—
Doesn’t matter, Amari.
I just want to get it straight, Ashton said. So, school now ends at two o’clock on Fridays?
He had pale white skin like my uncle, and hair that always fell into his eyes. Even as he asked, he was holding it back with his hand. Once Holly had said to him, Just cut it already, and his ears turned bright red. My own hair had always been bright red, but lately it had started getting darker and kinkier. If Holly’s mother didn’t braid it for me, I just pulled it back into a sloppy ponytail that frizzed all around my face.
Jeez, Ashton! Holly said. That’s not what she’s saying. This is so not deep, people.
I just don’t really understand why we’re going into another room, Ashton said, by ourselves.
* * *
• • •
I think, looking back on that day now, that’s the line that will always stay with me—another room, by ourselves. How many other rooms by ourselves have we walked into since that day—even if they weren’t real rooms and we didn’t know that’s what we were doing?
I stood there thinking about my father. In six months or a year—I didn’t know exactly when—I’d be walking into another room, the one where my father lived with me. And as I stood there, Esteban was inside the room where he didn’t know where his dad was. He glanced at me. That day, no one but Holly knew that my dad was in prison. I felt like I was betraying Esteban. Like I should have been standing next to him, saying, Hey, it’s gonna be okay. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t tell the truth about my dad to help him. So I looked down at my skirt and thought about rooms. I wondered about Tiago, Holly, Amari and Ashton—what were the rooms for them? What did they hide inside those rooms? Another room, I thought. We are always entering another room.
That day, Ms. Laverne pushed us out—from the Familiar to the Unfamiliar.
It felt like an hour passed as she waited for us to say something. I looked at the clock. The second hand made an echoing sound when it ticked. It was five minutes past two. Fifty-five minutes left.
You can do this, Ashton. You all can do this, Ms. Laverne finally said. And with that, she walked away. With that, she let us go.
6
We stood around staring at each other. Holly took a seat and patted the one next to it. Haley, sit here.
The boys took the other seats.
Boys against girls is unfair, Holly whispered to me. There’s more of them. I’ve been saying this since school started. And plus—are we going to get tested on this?
I smiled. Everything was unfair to Holly. We were both only children, but sometimes I thought maybe she had a bunch of brothers and sisters hidden away, because she always felt like someone was trying to cheat her out of something.
It’s free time, I whispered back. You heard Ms. Laverne. There’s not going to be a test.
Ashton, Tiago and Amari had pulled their seats farther back, making the circle bigger and lopsided.
Esteban’s was next to mine. He sat down heavily, put his head on the arm of the desk and closed his eyes. His lips were chapped and he had tiny freckles over his nose that I hadn’t noticed before.
I think that first day i
n the ARTT room, we were all sure his dad would be back soon. Tomorrow, the next day, the next week. None of us really knew about forevers yet. We were still just learning how things could change in a minute—how you could be in the middle of putting plates on the table when the phone rings with bad news. Or how your mother could come in and kiss you good night, and when you ask, Is Papi home yet? your mother says, No, but maybe he’s working late, and then you wake up in the morning and run into the kitchen and your father’s empty dinner plate is still on the table.
I thought about one of the stories my uncle liked to tell me. Before I went to sleep, he’d kiss my forehead and say, Don’t forget the happy ending.
The story went like this: Two kids got lost in a forest. First they came to a snake and asked him the way to go. The snake said, Freedom is through my lair. The kids knew they’d get eaten if they followed the snake. They came to a spider and the spider said, Freedom is in the center of my web. They knew they’d get eaten there too. They came to a wolf, a grizzly, more snakes, and on and on it went. By the time they came to a wild boar, they were tired and hungry and scared. So when the wild boar said, Freedom is inside that thicket of branches where I sleep, they followed him. They had given up and figured it would be fast and maybe not as painful to get eaten by a wild boar. But instead, the wild boar fed them apples and honey. When their bellies were full and their eyes grew heavy, the wild boar covered them with blankets made of leaves stitched together with vines and watched over them while they slept. When morning came, they climbed on his back and he led them safely home.
When I asked my uncle what the moral of the story was, he said, No moral. Just has a happy ending.
Amari got up again and pulled his desk close to Esteban’s. Your pop’ll come home, bruh, he said. I got a feeling.
Back then, we still all believed in happy endings. None of us knew yet how many endings and beginnings one story could have.
7
One Saturday morning every other month, my uncle drove the two of us the seven hours to Malone, where my dad was in prison. On the first Saturday in October, my father refused to come down to the visiting room. My uncle and I waited. Time passed and my uncle paced and asked the guards what was happening. Finally, after I don’t know how long, we got in the car and drove the seven hours back to Brooklyn.
On the ride home, I thought about how even our brains have rooms. And we could put stuff in those rooms we don’t want to think about. Or remember. I decided I was going to put us sitting in that overheated waiting area into a room and lock the door.
But that night, when my uncle came in to tell me a story and kiss me good night, he said, Your dad’s afraid. He hasn’t been on the outside in eight years. That’s a long time.
But it’s not our fault, I said. The rule is every other month he sees us. And if he won’t see us, how are we going to help him get ready for the outside? For coming home.
My uncle sat on the edge of my bed. I was staring at the wall and wouldn’t turn toward him. The anger inside me was fire. It was flames and ash too.
Look at me, my uncle said.
I shook my head. How could my father just sit in his cell. How could he choose sitting in a tiny cell over being in a room with us. With his brother. His daughter. His family. The only family he had left.
Haley, I’m serious, my uncle said. Look at me.
I turned toward him and pulled the covers up over my face.
Haley . . .
What! I snatched the covers below my chin and glared at him. What do you want?
My uncle’s voice stayed calm. He pressed his pointer finger between my eyebrows. I want you to know that we’re all flawed, he said. We all have those days we just don’t want to show up. Days we just want to forget the world. Doesn’t make us bad people. Just makes us people. And time moves as it moves. In a month, this moment won’t be anything.
But he didn’t even want to see us. After we drove all the way up there. That’s not right!
My uncle didn’t say anything. My dad was his big brother. He always said that my dad had been his hero when they were kids, that he used to follow my dad everywhere.
He can’t just choose to disappear. He can’t just act like . . . like he doesn’t love me. Like I’m not his daughter. He should be running to see me.
He does love you, Hales. The night you were born was the first time since we were kids that I saw my big brother cry. When I got to the hospital, you were asleep in your mom’s arms. You had on one of those tiny blue-and-pink caps they put on newborns.
‘Look at this,’ your dad whispered. And he gently pulled the cap back to show me your bright red hair. You didn’t have a whole lot then, and the room was nearly dark, but it glowed. I swear, your hair glowed.
No it didn’t. I was trying to stay mad but I couldn’t help smiling.
I swear, my uncle said. You had glow-in-the-dark hair.
Lies!
Anyway, your dad pulled the cap back over your head while you and your mom kept on sleeping. Then he took my hand and pulled me out of the room.
I leaned my head against my uncle’s chest. I could hear his heart. It was beating fast.
He said, ‘She’s so tiny, Steve. She’s so perfect.’ Then he put his hand over his face and started sobbing. ‘Those two people in there, they’re everything to me. Everything. How am I ever going to . . .’
My uncle stopped talking and sniffed. He reached his hand up to his face. I kept my ear pressed to his chest, my eyes closed. I knew he was crying and wanted to let him do it without getting embarrassed.
‘. . . be the best dad and husband.’ He asked me how he was going to be the best and I told him he didn’t have to be the best. That nobody could be the best.
I could feel his chin nodding into my scalp. How many times had he told me this story? Still, I could listen to it for infinity.
I told him to just be there, my uncle said. For everything. Every first word and step and first love.
Yuck . . . , I said.
One day you’ll fall in love.
Ixnay on the love, Uncle. Back to the story, please.
You know the story.
Still, I said. I want to keep knowing it.
My uncle’s heart had slowed back down. Outside, a car drove past with its music turned up loud, the noise fading as it moved farther away.
Do you remember anything about her?
Just that picture, I said. The one where it’s the back of her and I can see her hand and her nails.
My uncle was quiet for a long time. There had been a flood that ruined two computers’ worth of pictures and a bunch of framed ones. And years later, just before the accident, there had been a small electrical fire that took out the bookshelves where all the photo albums and my uncle’s record collection had been. The picture of my mom and dad had been in my father’s wallet when he was arrested. The rest—that was up to memory.
She was so, so beautiful. My uncle pressed his lips into the top of my head. Then he pulled away and looked at me. You look more like her every day, you know that?
I nodded. Yup. You keep saying so. But I look like you and my father too. I look like everybody.
You look like you the most, though, Hales. I yawned as he brushed my hair away from my face with his hand.
Hey! I said. Can you buy me a voice recorder? I need it for a project at school.
How come you don’t just use your phone? he asked.
Not allowed to.
Yeah. Sure. I can do that. You okay?
I nodded. Yeah, just tired now.
He kissed my forehead and turned out the light. Good night, Haley. I love you to the moon.
I yawned again, pulled the covers over my head and said, I love you until Pluto becomes a planet again.
8
The following Monday, right after dinner, my uncle put a record
er on the table. It was small enough to hold in my hand.
It’s charged for now, he said. But I can show you how to do it. He looked at me. By the way, what kind of school project is it?
I don’t really know what it is yet. It’s like your stories.
How so?
I just want to record stuff, I told him. And then I want to see what it becomes, you know? I want to be able to listen to it later and figure out what it is, I guess. I turned the recorder around and around in my hands. Thanks for getting this. Can I be excused, since it’s your night for dishes?
My uncle nodded, then frowned at me. You okay?
Yeah. I’m good.
I ran up the stairs to my room. The comforter on my bed had a purple unicorn on it. Once I had thought I was going to die if my uncle didn’t buy it for me, and now, climbing onto it, it suddenly seemed silly and childish to me. How had what I liked changed that fast? I clicked the recorder on and held it in my lap. I recorded the sound of my own voice. Testing, one, two, three. Testing, one, two, three, then played it back. My voice sounded babyish and high. I got up, brushed my teeth and put on pajamas. Then I climbed into bed and turned the recorder on again.
My name is Haley Shondell McGrath. I am eleven years old. My father is in prison. My mother is dead. But don’t feel sorry for me. I don’t remember her. My uncle says I have her eyes. McGrath is an Irish name. It means ‘Son of Grace.’ But this McGrath right here is somebody’s daughter.
Ms. Laverne has put the six of us in the ARTT room. We are going to go there every Friday for an hour to talk. Me, Amari, Ashton, Esteban, Holly and Tiago. Our story starts in Ms. Laverne’s class in the borough of Brooklyn in the city of New York. But it’s a story on top of a story. It’s a story that’s started and ended a whole bunch of times. When we were studying the history of New York, we talked about the Lenape people—they were the real Native New Yorkers, but it wasn’t called New York then. Their name for it was Lenapehoking. But then the Dutch settlers killed them and took their land. That means wherever we put a single foot—it’s land that belonged to the Lenape. It’s land they might be buried under. It’s land that they died for. Ms. Laverne said that we should always remember this. That even though we have our dreams, the Lenape had dreams too. That even though we’re here now, they were here first. I think this is what the world is—stories on top of stories, all the way back to the beginning of time. Ms. Laverne asked us if we were living in Lenapehoking, would we fight alongside the Lenape or would we try to take the land for ourselves? We all said we’d fight with them. We all said we’d try to help them hold on to their land.
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