by Dima Alzayat
**
After school Robert the counselor tells the girls that a group of potential foster parents will visit after dinner. He then pulls Girl aside and asks if she’s ready to get serious about being placed. ‘Listen, you’re both smart and pretty,’ he says. ‘You look like you could be anybody’s kid.’
Girl tries to go around him, but he moves when she moves and blocks her way. She lets him talk for another ten minutes, and then begins to groan. She folds herself in half, falls to the carpet, and groans some more. ‘I think I’m getting my period,’ she says.
Robert’s face turns red, but he does at last move. ‘I know what you’re doing,’ he says, ‘and I know that hasn’t happened yet. We keep charts of these things.’
Girl is happy when he leaves but she also feels bad for Robert. When his mother died he had brought her what he said were his mother’s favorite novels. ‘They might be what your mom might’ve given you if she could,’ he’d said. They were mostly romance thriller detective books and Girl didn’t like that the women had names like Kendra and Alicia and spent most of their time running toward or away from men named Jake and Eli, but she read them anyway. It seemed to make Robert happy.
After dinner the girls gather in the living room alongside three couples who chat to them in turn and ask them about themselves. In a corner, Robert sits and watches. ‘You have beautiful hair,’ a woman named Anne tells Girl. ‘I could show you how to straighten it.’
Girl looks at Anne’s hair, and to her it looks stiff and dry like dead grass. She wants to tell Anne she can show her how to not straighten it, but she knows Robert is watching. ‘Great,’ she says.
**
Girl’s dad liked to say that when he met Girl’s mother she had hair like dark woven silk, but in the two photographs Girl has of her mother, her hair grows like a thick shrub. In both pictures she has her head turned away, so Girl can only see half her face. But in each one she’s turned a different direction, so if Girl thinks of both photos at once she can nearly see her whole face.
Girl has had the same dream about her mother since she was five. In it the two are climbing a giant tree and Girl struggles to keep up. Each time she reaches her mother, her mother pulls herself even higher, and Girl gets scared she can’t keep up, that she’s not as strong. Like claws her mother’s fingers dig into the bark, and she can pull herself up three or four feet at a time. But Girl’s nails are broken and her fingertips are cut. Halfway through the dream she can no longer see her mother and has to climb on alone. At last she reaches the top, exhausted but not scared, her hands covered in dried blood.
**
Reading in bed before lights out, Girl decides The Witch of Blackbird Pond isn’t bad as far as school books go. In her book log she writes, This book is about a girl named Kit who moves from Barbados to America after her grandfather dies. The Puritans in her new village are a bunch of crazies who are suspicious of her because she wears fancy dresses and knows how to swim. Girl is at the part where everyone gangs up on Kit and accuses her of being a witch, and she wonders if they’ll burn her at the stake, or stone her to death.
II
‘I’m lactose intolerant,’ Girl says, ‘and allergic to cats.’ It’s her first day with her new foster parents, Anne and Mark, and she isn’t sure why she’s said what she has, only that it has something to do with Anne pacing around the kitchen clutching a drooling gray kitten to her chest and Mark not asking if she liked grilled cheese sandwiches before putting one on her plate.
‘Just eat the fries,’ Mark says. He gets up and whispers something into Anne’s ear, and Anne squeezes the kitten closer. Girl nearly says it’s fine, that she can learn to live with Mr. Snickers the cat, but before she can decide if she will or not, Anne leaves the kitchen. ‘She’ll take him to her mother’s,’ Mark says.
Girl likes Anne and Mark’s house. It reminds her of houses she’s seen in magazines, all creams and whites and plenty of carpets, cushions, seascape paintings and real flowers in glass vases. Unlike the rest of the house, her room is filled with color, purple walls and pink bedcovers, and when she and the social worker stood in the room that morning, Girl wondered why everything smelled like paint. ‘What color was it before?’ she asked.
‘The same. We just refreshed it,’ Mark said. He hovered in the doorway with Anne, and Girl began to say something about poisonous fumes but noticed Anne’s hands clasped together tight enough to turn her knuckles white so she stayed quiet. When the social worker left, Anne helped Girl unpack, and when she found in a drawer a photograph of an older couple surrounded by children, she removed it and apologized. ‘These are my parents and all of their grandkids,’ she said, and Girl nodded.
**
When Girl’s grandfather died it was on top of her grandmother. Girl’s dad didn’t say this to Girl, but to his friends, the ones who came to play cards and gossip and give Mona a hard time. Girl wasn’t allowed in the room while they played, but she snuck near enough to listen to what was said. Many of the stories her dad told she already knew, but she wanted to hear the ones she didn’t, and when he told the ones she did know, she wanted to hear how he changed the details.
Girl’s dad said that after his father’s funeral people swore they could hear his mother speaking to her dead husband as if he were still alive. When Mona asked what it was the grandmother said, Girl wanted to know too. But Girl’s dad couldn’t answer. ‘Didn’t you say they were all listening?’ Mona asked. Yes, he nodded, ‘They were all trying to hear his replies.’
On her tenth birthday Girl’s dad gave her a framed photograph of her grandmother. She recognized it as a large copy of the one he carried folded in his wallet. The creases from the original were now thick white lines that slashed across her grandmother’s face. ‘You look like her. You look like your father’s family,’ her dad said. Girl shook her head. ‘No, I look like my mother,’ she said, and as he turned away she thought she saw him nod.
**
On the television, the image of the news anchor cuts away to footage of people on boats. Girl sits on the sofa with Mark and Anne, and she wonders why the boats, with so many people on them, are blow-up and not the real kind. The image cuts to the people getting off the boats. All of them are wet. Some cry. Some carry children. ‘It’s a shame,’ Mark says.
Girl wants to ask why, and what has happened to these people. ‘They’re running away, from danger, war,’ Anne says, sensing the question. ‘Some of them anyway.’
‘Will they stay there?’ Girl asks. ‘On the beach, I mean.’
Mark looks at her and nods. ‘Some will, nearby. Some will keep traveling. And some will be sent back, if it’s not really dangerous where they’re from.’
‘Who decides what’s dangerous?’ Girl asks. Anne shrugs and so does Mark.
On the screen, a woman with a baby bends down and touches her forehead to the wet sand, kisses the ground, then the baby, and again the ground. Then she sits with the hand not holding the baby open, so her palm faces the sky, and her lips move.
‘The poor thing has lost her mind,’ Mark says as the same woman again touches her head to the ground, over and over, the baby still in her arms.
‘She’s praying,’ Girl says. ‘My dad prayed like that.’
‘Oh,’ Mark says, and turns to her. ‘We didn’t know that. That’s fine, of course.’ He clears his throat and smiles, then looks at Anne.
‘Of course, it’s fine,’ Anne says, also smiling. For a moment no one speaks, then Mark changes the channel. ‘Just know,’ Anne says, ‘that in this house, you can do what you like, and wear what you like,’ and her smile reminds Girl of the smile Robert would make when he was worried about one of the girls embarrassing him, or getting him into trouble, and she asks to go to bed.
**
Girl’s grandfather became a real Muslim, Girl’s dad liked to say, but he still named his three eldest sons, Samuel, Sammy, and Sam, after his father. Imagine what people thought, Girl’s dad said, three Muslim boys
with names from the Bible! Girl didn’t understand. What’s the big deal? she asked, and he looked at her like it was the most obvious thing in the world. By the time Girl’s father, the fourth son, was born, Girl’s great-grandmother was dead, and there was no one left to make proud or upset, and Girl’s grandfather gave his youngest son, her dad, a Muslim name instead. And that’s the difference between my brothers and me, Girl’s dad said.
When Girl asked her dad about her uncles he shrugged or changed the subject. If he did speak of them, it was to tell her funny things from when he was young, and they were young, and long before Girl was born. If she wanted to know anything else, like where they were now, and why they never visited or even called, he closed his eyes instead of answering. To Girl, it looked like he was reaching down, all the way inside himself. Each time she hoped he would find something new, and each time he opened his eyes and told her another story, from long ago and far away, and she stopped asking.
**
In the passenger seat Anne’s entire body shakes but she does not speak. The one time she inhales deeply enough to make Girl think she might say something, Mark’s hand reaches out from the steering wheel and holds hers still. In the backseat, Girl wears a scarf, not around her neck, but over her hair and tied beneath her chin. She has her earphones in but keeps the volume turned low in case they say something, but they don’t. Looking at herself in the rearview mirror she thinks that with the scarf she does after all look like her grandmother, at least a little.
In class, Mrs. Adler stops speaking mid-sentence and looks at her. She starts to say something, and stops again, and assigns the class quiet reading time instead. Marcy leans over and tells Girl she wishes she could wear a scarf over her hair too. ‘So dumbass people would stop asking to touch my braids,’ she says. Mrs. Adler shushes them both and tells them to take out their books.
Girl reads about Kit getting used to the colony: she teaches Sunday school classes even though she thinks church is boring, and she even gets engaged to a rich guy named William, who all the girls want to marry. But then she tries to make the Sunday school fun and has the kids act out a story from the Bible and Girl can tell all hell will break loose, and it does. The school shuts down and Kit escapes into the woods. There, she meets a woman named Hannah who’s not allowed in the colony because she’s a Quaker. Girl knows the best thing Kit can do now is stay in the woods with Hannah, but she also knows Kit won’t.
During lunch kids nudge one another and stare at Girl as she walks through the cafeteria. Marcy sticks out her tongue at some of them until they look away and Lien flips off a few until it makes Marcy and Girl laugh. No one looks as much as the kids at Ryan’s table and in the corner of her eye Girl sees Isabelle. She thinks of how, when they were younger, Isabelle’s mom would drive the two of them to school and Girl’s dad would pick them up and take them to the park or for ice cream. She remembers the sleepovers, and trips to the pool, and how they held hands everywhere they went.
At the counter, one of the lunch ladies shakes her head at Girl when she sees her. ‘What’s that on your head?’ she asks.
‘A kind of experiment,’ Girl says. The lady nods, like she understands, and when Girl asks for two chocolate milks, she gives them to her.
When Girl reaches Ryan’s table they don’t immediately notice her, and when they do, Isabelle’s eyes grow big and she looks away. ‘Do you want some chocolate milk?’ Girl asks her.
‘Go away, loser,’ Ryan says.
‘Do you?’ she asks again.
‘I said, go away, Osama,’ Ryan says, and his friends laugh with him.
‘Just leave the milk and go,’ Isabelle says.
‘Did you know my dad died?’ Girl whispers. Isabelle’s eyes turn sad, and Girl wants to say, It’s okay, I’m fine, It just hurts to swallow. ‘Why do you hang out with them?’ she says instead. Girl watches Isabelle’s eyes change back.
‘They’re not that bad,’ Isabelle says. ‘Anyway, you’re the one making a scene.’ Someone else at the table says something that makes the others laugh, and Girl walks away.
Back at her table Girl shakes her head at the sandwich Lien holds, but Lien puts it down in front of her anyway. ‘What were you even doing over there?’ Lien asks.
‘I felt bad for her. She always looks miserable hanging out with them.’
Lien rolls her eyes. ‘Girl,’ Marcy says, ‘she’s exactly where she wants to be.’ Girl thinks Marcy might be right, but that there’s still something about it that’s not, though she doesn’t know what it is.
‘I’ll be back,’ she says, standing up.
At Ryan’s table again, she feels her face get hot and she tells herself to walk away, to go back to her own table. But she knows that already it’s too late, and before they speak or laugh, she smacks the milk carton down on the table and watches the cardboard break. Ryan screams and jumps straight up, but he’s too slow. Chocolate splatters onto his arms and turns parts of his white T-shirt brown. His friends begin to yell, and Girl knows she’ll be sent to the principal’s office and begins to head there herself. When she reaches the cafeteria doors, she looks back one last time and sees Isabelle helping Ryan clean himself up.
Mark picks Girl up after school and tells her he has good news and bad news. ‘Seems your uncle is looking for you,’ he says.
‘He’s dead!’ Girl says, then remembers there are still two others.
Mark laughs. ‘He sounded pretty alive to me. Listen, he wants to get to know you better, to become your legal guardian, have you live with him and his family.’
Girl tries to understand but can’t. ‘I don’t even know him,’ she says. She looks at Mark, but he stares ahead at the road, and she wishes he would turn and look at her.
‘Don’t worry. They agreed to let you stay with us the rest of the school year. Everyone thinks that’s for the best. But they’re asking to fly you out to Milwaukee this weekend.’
Girl wants to ask Mark if he spoke to her uncle himself, what he sounded like, if he said why he’d never visited, if Mark thought he’d like her. ‘So what’s the bad news?’ she asks instead.
‘I’ll be sad to see you leave,’ he says. ‘I was hoping you’d be with us longer.’
Girl feels her chest grow tight. Through the window, she can see a small bird in a tree extend its wings like it might fly. Instead it draws them in again, the brightest feathers disappearing underneath the darker ones on top, and hops from one branch to the next.
**
When Girl’s uncle Samuel died, he was with his mistress, not his wife. This is a story Girl heard her dad tell Mona. They had come back late from dinner and she was on the sofa pretending to be asleep. She could hear them in the kitchen as he crushed ice and poured drinks, and when they walked into the living room she stayed quiet and hoped he wouldn’t send her to bed. When Mona told him to wake her, he sat on the rug instead and asked Mona to sit beside him.
Girl learned that Samuel had mixed Viagra and cholesterol pills for what her dad said was a good time, and that the mistress was in fact a prostitute. Girl’s dad also said that when the mistress slipped out from under Girl’s uncle she smoked a cigarette before she called for help. After Samuel died, his wife took their only daughter and moved to Vienna where her sister lived. But she did this only after finding the mistress. Girl’s dad said the wife and the mistress talked for hours, all night and through the next day. When Mona asked how he knew that, he said, ‘Everybody knew!’ They even kept in touch, he said. Long-distance phone calls and letters pages long. It became a scandal, he said. But when Mona asked what was in the letters, he didn’t know. Girl lay on the sofa trying to keep still and also wanting the answer. Why had no one asked the women what they were writing, she wanted to know, what it was they said?
III
At the airport in Milwaukee, Girl is greeted by a man with a goatee and two identically dressed girls who look about five and seven. He holds a sign with Girl’s name spelled out, first and last, and she cring
es as people connect her to it and the man. When he sees her, he flings the sign aside to hug her, and tells his daughters to do the same. He leans in and hugs them all, too close and too tight and Girl can’t breathe.
In the car the little girls scream in the backseat and Girl’s uncle speaks loudly over them both, but Girl doesn’t listen. She thinks only about how he looks like her dad, his goatee and its bits of gray, eyes that squint in the light. His nose flares when he inhales and when he says there it sounds like zere. She rolls down the window and rests her head against the door, lets the cold air hit her face as they move. ‘Are you okay?’ he asks, and she says Yes.
Girl thinks about what happens when someone has a heart attack. How the main artery becomes too blocked to allow oxygen to pass. That without oxygen, the muscle cells and tissues begin to die. She knows that sometimes a person can survive an attack. The muscle can heal like a skin wound, and like a wound, a scar forms over the damage. But after that, the heart just isn’t as strong. It can’t beat as hard, or as much. She also knows that sometimes a person can’t survive at all, and in that case, the heart just starves to death.
They spend half the day in the mall and the other half in front of the TV watching a movie with talking animals. Girl’s uncle laughs the loudest when a pig farts or a bird flies into a tree, and halfway through the movie, Girl’s aunt asks if Girl would like to look at photo albums instead.
Upstairs, the two of them sit on the bedroom carpet and the aunt lets Girl turn the pages. Most of the photos are of her uncle as a young man and of her aunt and uncle at their wedding. But toward the end of the album are a few with faded color or no color at all, and her aunt touches one of four boys standing in a line, their arms wrapped around one another, their smiles identical. ‘There,’ she says, and points to the boy on the end, the one holding a ball and looking at the camera.
Girl looks at the boy who’s also her dad and wonders what he felt like when the photo was taken. She knows he must have been hot because his face is shiny, that he must have been playing, running and sweating, when he was told to stop and stand still. His smile is wide and everywhere on his face, in his round cheeks and eyes. The alley behind the boys is mostly covered by their bodies, but she wants to know what it looks like, what it all looked like, so that maybe then she’d know how he felt. ‘Do you think he was sad he never went back?’ she asks.