At the end of the block the blue and gray bird with the Mohawk is sitting in his empty tree with his mean eyes and he looks right at me and squawks. “Here,” I tell him and hang the bird feeder on the bottom branch. “Happy Yule.” He tips his head at me and bobs a little. “Now stop being such a jerk.”
• • •
One time a lady came to school to teach us stress management and every time Jack goes crazy I breathe just like she said. Slow and deep and from my stomach. But no matter how I breathe my brain keeps making plans. If he really hurts her this time, where should I look for Mom’s phone first? What if it’s not charged? Should I run next door? Do I take Tommy? What if he’s asleep? When Granny was still here, Mom told me sometimes she’d lie in bed at night trying to figure out how to save me and Tommy and Granny if the house caught on fire. This is kind of like that.
Then the yelling stops and I sneak down the hall to the bathroom like I have to pee. I can hear better from here but there’s nothing so I wait, sitting on the closed toilet staring at the shower curtain which almost touches my knees because the bathroom’s very small. It’s covered with lilacs and I try to count the petals on one but the rows aren’t even and I keep getting lost. Then I hear Mom’s voice and let my breath out so I guess I wasn’t managing stress after all.
“He’s your son,” she says. She’s right next to the wall so I stand up and lean my face against it like trying to reach her. Jack says something I can’t hear. “You know he is,” Mom says quietly. “I’m not talking about me, or Brittany. Jack, I can’t buy diapers. I can’t even feed him. Please.” Even though I can’t see her I know she’s looking down. But it doesn’t work. I hear the bedroom door slam and then the front door too. I wait a long time to see if Mom will cry but she doesn’t. Or if she does, she hides it in her pillow.
• • •
Odessa and Tiny are on the porch hanging Christmas lights. Odessa’s got a Santa hat on with a bell that jingles just like her wind chimes. I put on my coat and stand at the fence where she told me about God laughing when people make plans. “Can I help?” I ask in my small mouse voice.
Tiny looks up and says nothing but Odessa says, “Sure, baby! Come on over.” I run over quick but walk up the steps slow. “I could use some young fingers help me straighten this mess out.” Odessa hands me a tangle of lights. “My arthritis real bad tonight.” I pull the strands through and around each other and Odessa passes them to Tiny who’s so tall he tapes them right onto the ceiling with no ladder.
We keep going like that, me untangling and Odessa handing them up and Tiny taping. No one says a word, which is not like Odessa, but it’s one of those moments that’s better off quiet. There are a million lights and the porch gets brighter and softer and pretty soon it’s shining gold. We have one strand left and Odessa goes in to get an extension cord.
“Brittany.” Mom’s at the top of our steps holding her sweater wrapped tight with her arms crossed. It’s weird to see her from here, like I’m in space looking down. She looks small and helpless like Patches and I wish it was as easy as giving Mom some milk and a new name.
“Hi, Mom. We’re almost done. Odessa just went in to get a cord.” Mom nods at me and then at Tiny. He nods back. “Doesn’t it look beautiful?”
“It does.”
“Come over!”
“No, I gotta—”
“Mom! Come over! Just for a sec.” And she does! She runs over in her socks just like me and her breath puffs out little clouds and Odessa comes back out and we finish the last one and all of us just stand there in the gold light.
Tiny says, “Hope heaven feel like this.”
And Odessa laughs rumbly and says, “For you it will, baby. For you it will.”
• • •
I didn’t even realize what day it was until I asked Mom why we were eating dinner (if you call one can of tuna and lots of mayonnaise dinner) at four o’clock and she said, “It’s Christmas Eve. And we’re going to church.” On my bed was a dress and tights and shoes and even a black velvet headband laid out in the shape of a person and I thought, I wish I could really be that person. “Where’d you get the money?” I asked.
But Mom said, “Don’t worry about it.” She put Tommy in a little green suit that was too tight but since he’s a baby he looked adorable anyway and we got on the bus like some kind of regular family.
We get off at the corner and walk down the block and the church is enormous, not like the little red brick church we used to go to at the old apartment when it was just Mom and me and she was tired but never terrified. A little black and white sign on the church says Our Lady of Sorrows and I look up at Mom and know exactly what that means. “Maybe we should go somewhere else,” I say but Mom says, “No, let’s go in. It’s supposed to be beautiful inside.”
It is. The walls are pink and blue like baby blankets and the lamps shine like silk and there are arches and statues everywhere. I hold Mom’s hand because I get dizzy from being so small. Tommy fussed the whole way here but even he’s quiet now. Some of the people smile at us and we smile back, still pretending to be a regular family. Mom’s better at it than anyone. She walks straight up like nothing to hide and picks a pew in the middle and we slide in.
Then I look up and the whole ceiling is covered in daisies. “Granny!” I whisper and Mom looks up too. There must be a million of them, daisy sculptures, all beaming down at us and I’m sure they’ve been here forever but it still feels like a sign from heaven and I don’t even believe in heaven. I spend the whole Mass like that (except when I have to look down to pray), staring at those white daisies in their blue boxes of sky, feeling Granny smiling down on me, which is the best Christmas present I could ever get.
• • •
Someone’s knocking on the door. It’s not that late but it’s late enough. A tiny part of me hopes it’s Jack with the money Mom needs but most of me hopes it’s not. Anyway he wouldn’t knock. Mom’s frozen on the couch like Granny used to be and the knocking starts again. “Should I see who it is?” I ask but Mom doesn’t answer or even move her head.
“Brittany?” a girl’s voice says and I run to the window and peek through the blinds and it’s Agata!
I turn all the locks quick and swing the door open and Agata smiles. Her hair’s still long and perfect and blond and her glasses are still black and smart but this time she’s got on lipstick and a church coat and high heels. “Wesołych Świąt” she says and I blink and she laughs. “That’s ‘Merry Christmas.’ ”
“Merry Christmas!” I tell her and hug her tight and she laughs again. “Good to see you too.” Then she yells something in Polish to the car on the street and a boy her age ducks his head down so he can see us. He gives her a thumbs-up and waves to me. He might be her brother or cousin or boyfriend but either way my heart leaps that Agata’s with someone so nice.
“Aren’t you going to invite her in?” Mom says.
“Uh, yeah.” Agata steps in and I wish the couch wasn’t scratched up and covered in laundry but at least it’s folded and Mom and I are still in our church dresses and our hair’s brushed. “Mom, this is…”
“Agata,” Mom says because she read my Plan B notebook so now she knows everything. Almost. “I’m Maureen.”
They shake hands and Agata says, “So nice to meet you.”
“Thanks for being so kind to Brittany at U Stasi,” Mom says. “It means a lot.”
“Of course. She’s a great kid.” I blush, partly because Agata thinks I’m great and partly because she thinks I’m a kid.
Agata opens her purse and pulls out a Christmas card and for a heartbeat I think She found my dad and he sent a card to say he’s sorry for abandoning us for twelve years but now he’s rich from some mathematical equation he invented and we can all live together in the Polish countryside. But when Agata opens it there’s just a huge church wafer inside with Mary and Baby Jesus carved on it. “I brought opłatek,” she says.
And Mom says, “Oh!” the way
she did when I hit her with a squirt gun last summer. I was aiming for Jack but chickened out at the last second.
“It’s a Polish Christmas Eve tradition,” Agata tells me. She breaks the wafer and hands me half. “For you, Brittany, I wish love and peace and happiness for the year to come.”
“Thank you,” I whisper because I can’t believe Agata’s here at all and now she’s making a wish for me.
“Now you break off a piece and eat it,” Agata says. I do, and even though it looks pretty it tastes just like the wafers at Our Lady of Sorrows.
“Now you do the same for Agata,” Mom says and I stare at her because she knows more about my dad than she says. I make a wish for Agata and she hugs me again and goes back to the car with the nice boy driving and Mom and I just look at each other.
Mom breaks off a piece of her wafer and holds it out to me. “I wish you more love than you can imagine,” she says. Her wafer tries to stick on my tongue but I force it down.
I break off a piece for Mom. There’s so many wishes she needs I don’t know where to start so I just say, “You too.”
• • •
The days between Christmas and back to school are so boring I can’t even count them down because every time I try it’s still the same day. We haven’t seen Jack since before Christmas Eve and Mom took us to the food bank which gave us two huge boxes because we were first-time users so we’re not hungry now but what happens the second time? Plus Tommy’s sick so Mom’s spending most of her time worrying and taking his temperature which is why I was so surprised when she said, “Do you want to have a friend over today?”
Marisol on our doorstep is like a double rainbow, like catching the ice cream truck, like daisies on the ceiling. When I open the door we shriek and hug and jump up and down so I guess she was bored too. It’s strange how two days back to back can be so different. Marisol starts talking before I even get the door locked and she has a whole bag full of magazines and a whole iPad full of songs. We’re chirping like birds at each other and I can hear how dumb it sounds but I don’t care. We go into my room and I look back at Mom and her eyes are ancient memories.
Mr. McInnis writes New Year’s resolution on the whiteboard in two different colors and stands in front of it, grinning at us. Something about him looks new even though his hair and glasses and clothes are the same. “I learned a new verse for ‘This Land Is Your Land’ over the break,” he says. But that can’t be it. One song verse couldn’t make someone that happy. But then I think of Marisol so maybe it can. We sing the regular verses, then we add:
“There was a big high wall there that tried to stop me
Sign was painted said ‘Private Property’
But on the backside, it didn’t say nothing
This land was made for you and me.”
“My New Year’s resolution is to follow my heart,” Mr. McInnis says. “And not to worry too much about the rules.” This sounds pretty dangerous to me and I hope he doesn’t get fired for following his heart because this school’s all about rules and we all need Mr. McInnis.
It takes me a long time to think of my resolution and by the time I scribble it down most of the class is taking out their science books. I write, Treat every day like a beginning. Because today really does feel like the beginning of something. It could be the new year or Mr. McInnis’s new verse or the fact that I walked to school by myself (just because Tommy’s still sick and Mom didn’t want to take him in the cold, but still) but it also feels like the beginning of something else I can’t explain.
• • •
We’re back at the hospital where Granny died. Where we left her body and took the paper with the number on it that told us to wait six to eight weeks to know where they buried her. “Mom,” I’d whispered. “Granny’s not an Indian.”
And Mom said, “Not Indian. Indigent.” I didn’t ask her what it meant but the next time we went to computer lab I got on the dictionary site and asked Mr. McInnis how to spell it and he blushed so I thought it was a bad word, but the dictionary just said lacking money, very poor. And Granny was that.
I feel terrible that Mom has to be back here where they used a show-off word to call Granny poor. That she has to sit in this waiting room where maybe she sat with Granny, with all these people bent over or barely dressed or moaning or all three. Did Granny sit here too? Did she see all this or were her eyes already clouds?
The lady behind the glass calls Mom’s name even though she just turned in pages and pages of papers about Tommy. She holds up a clipboard. “I forgot a page!” she calls but Tommy starts the gravel cough and Mom doesn’t move.
“I’ll get it,” I say and bring back the clipboard with its pen swinging off the side, attached with green yarn. Tommy’s still coughing and Mom’s holding him close with her head against the wall and her eyes closed. The Scrabble box is in her lap. “Can you fill it out for me, Brit? Is it complicated? You can just read me the questions.”
I look at the sheet. It’s only four questions and it doesn’t look hard. It doesn’t even look like a real hospital form. “I can do it,” I tell her.
1. Is your partner emotionally abusive? Does s/he ever call you names, act possessive or jealous, or accuse you of things you didn’t do?
I circle YES.
2. Is your partner physically abusive? Does s/he ever kick, grab, push, punch, or choke you?
I circle YES.
3. Are you afraid of your partner?
I circle YES.
4. Would you like to speak to a victim advocate today about your safety and options?
This one’s harder. I look at Mom. Her eyes are still closed and I don’t know what a victim advocate is but I know Mom doesn’t want to speak to one. But I want to hear about safety and I want to hear about options.
I circle YES.
• • •
We wait a long time with all the undressed, upset people. The sun climbs down the sky and hits the office buildings and turns the windows orange and I remember how this morning I thought something was beginning and feel stupid.
They call Mom’s name and we go into a room where there’s a girl Agata’s age. She has wavy hair the color of sand and wears all black except for a hot pink hat, nail polish, and lipstick. I’m not sure why she still has her hat on because it’s really warm in the room.
“Hi,” she says. “Have a seat.”
Mom blinks at her, confused about why she’s not a nurse. Tommy’s almost asleep in Mom’s arms and I know he’s heavy but Mom doesn’t sit. “Did you…need something?” she asks.
“My name’s Haley,” the girl says. “I’m a victim advocate here at the hospital and I see you wanted to talk about your safety and hear about some options today.”
Mom stares at her.
Haley holds up the form I filled out. “Sorry. This is yours, right?”
Mom squints at it and sighs. “Brittany.” I look at her but don’t say anything because there’s nothing to say. “I’m sorry,” Mom tells Haley. “This is a misunderstanding. My daughter filled out that form and I think she was confused about the questions. We’re fine. Everything’s fine.”
Haley looks at me and I’m embarrassed about my faded clothes and tangled hair but I stare back at her hoping she’ll push Mom harder, the way Mr. McInnis tells Ms. Sanogo we need to be pushed.
“Oh, okay,” Haley says. “Well, here’s my card.” She hands Mom a little white card with a pink flower on it, the same color as her lipstick and hat and nails. Is it part of her uniform, the way everyone at Walmart wears blue shirts? “We have all kinds of services,” Haley says. “Court advocacy, shelter, counseling. We have a twenty-four-hour crisis line that you can call anytime with any questions or if you need resources. We have children’s groups and support groups. So please don’t hesitate. Even if you just want to talk.”
Mom smiles with half her mouth. “Thanks,” she says and takes the card. Tommy coughs and turns his head on Mom’s chest. We move toward the waiting room but Mom
turns back to Haley. For half a second, my heart jumps like someone shocked it with one of those machines hanging on the wall. “Does that form…go anywhere?” Mom asks and Haley shakes her head like she knows what Mom means even though I don’t.
“No,” Haley says. “It’s completely confidential.” Mom nods and Tommy coughs and we walk through the door with Haley calling after us, “I hope he feels better!” We sit down in the waiting room in the same chairs to wait some more. The sky turns dark blue and I’m starving, but nothing else is different.
• • •
I’m missing school but Mom has no way to get me there because she won’t let me ride the bus alone even though I already rode the 82 and 56 by myself (twice). I sit by the window in Tommy’s hospital room and watch the wind blow the top layer of snow off the banks and around and around because there’s nothing else to do. I wonder if Mr. McInnis is worried about me the way he was about Jerome. I wonder if he called Mom’s phone and if she’d tell me if he did.
This is our third morning here, I think. All the days and nights feel the same. The hall lights are always blinding and the beeps are always loud. The nurses always come to check Tommy’s vitals. Even if Mom just spent an hour patting him to sleep. They just wake him back up. One of them says “So sorry, little prince” and that’s nice of her. I’ve never, ever been this bored but I don’t say anything because Tommy’s never been this sick and Mom’s never been this worried.
But this morning’s a little different because the doctor’s supposed to tell us if the IV can come out and Tommy can eat cereal and drink his bottle. (He barely cried when they stuck the needle in his foot. He’s braver than me.) This seems like good news but I can’t tell because Mom doesn’t seem less worried.
The door opens but it’s not the doctor. It’s Jack, who hasn’t been to the hospital one time. His eyes are zigzags and he keeps sniffing like he has a cold. He shouldn’t be here with germs around Tommy because the nurses say his immune system is sensitive. Maybe a nurse will notice and kick him out but probably not. Mom is sitting on a chair next to Tommy’s bed and doesn’t stand up or move or say anything.
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