The Bad Kid

by Sarah Lariviere

  Dad’s silver rings glinted under the kitchen light as he shuffled the cards to make a waterfall. The way he leaned back in his chair slightly, with his mouth twisted, gave off a funny impression. Like he was listening and not listening, comfortable and uncomfortable, at the same time.

  “Here’s my offer, Simon,” I said. “Either you teach me Grandpa’s business, or you bring me around the neighborhood so I can learn for myself. If it’s like television, or the underworld from the Greek gods, and everybody is backstabbing, and falling in love, and getting eaten alive by Hydras—”

  “Hydras?” said Dad.

  “If you don’t tell me, I’m gonna figure it out using my own methods.”

  Obviously, I knew Grandpa didn’t live in an ancient myth, or a television show, where the worst guys have the best lines and they cut out all the boring parts. It just made the Thing feel less powerful. Like it was just one more character in Grandpa’s story. A story I was starting to realize I didn’t understand at all.

  Dad kept shuffling waterfalls, saying nothing. He could tell me the rest of Grandpa’s story, and I knew it.

  But he never would. And somehow I knew that, too.

  I went outside for some fresh air. A steady stream of ­people trickled home from work. Misty rain came in sideways swirls, like it was in no hurry to get to the ground, or to the bottom of anything, at all.

  I sat on the damp curb, crunching a handful of dissolving popcorn. The mysteries were piling up. What was Grandpa’s story? What did the Thing have to do with it? Who was Alma Lingonberry? What did Mom want with her? And why was Dad all of a sudden pretending to have no idea what I was talking about?

  But did I feel like going around the neighborhood with a giant magnifying glass like some kid detective, sniffing for clues?

  No. I wanted to hang out and do nothing.

  With somebody, though.

  The worst Mrs. Ramirez could say if I asked to hang out with Lala was forget about it. I mean, she could say worse, but I’d heard all that before.

  Lala’s phone voice is higher than her in-person voice. “I can only talk for a second,” she said. “It’s my turn to help with the laundry.”

  I scuffed my sandal on the street. “Tell your mom I’ll do your laundry for a whole year if I can come over. Tell her I wanna be a positive member of the community. Tell her if she says no, I’m gonna get in more and more trouble until my life is nothing more than a horrible warning.”

  And that is how it happened that Mrs. Ramirez let Lala invite me over on a trial basis, on one condition: I had to chip in at the Sunset Park carnival. Mrs. Ramirez was the president of the organizing committee.

  We were all kneeling on the purple carpet in Lala’s bedroom next to a basket of clean clothes. Mrs. Ramirez looks like Lala, but with silver-framed glasses, straighter hair, and calmer outfits. She stopped folding pillowcases to nuzzle with Cutie Cat. “The carnival is insurance for keeping our homes safe. Everybody communicates, you know, when you pull the neighborhood together like this. And it’s fun. What would you like to contribute, ladies?”

  Lala carried a stack of white T-shirts to the pile near her door. Cutie Cat followed her. “I might write a poem. For the posters and stuff.”

  “People would love to read a poem by you!” said Mrs. Ramirez. “Will you write us a poem?”

  “Nah, I was just playing. For real I can’t write,” said Lala.

  “You can write, Laliyah. Although I agree you could write better,” said Mrs. Ramirez.

  Lala shook her long curls. “I hate school.”

  I balled up a pair of bright white sweat socks. “Me too,” I said.

  “Girls,” said Mrs. Ramirez, “you don’t have to like school. You don’t even have to do amazing in school on every single thing. But if you have problems with a subject, then this fall, take advantage of the new school year for a fresh beginning. Take advantage of the resources available to you.”

  Lala picked up a purple-blue dress and looked in the mirror. “This dress reminds me of a peacock at the Bronx Zoo.” Cutie Cat ran in circles around her feet.

  “You gonna write us a poem, Barba Amarilla?” said Mrs. Ramirez. “That’d be an intriguing beginning, what you said about the peacock.”

  Lala talked to the mirror. “I don’t have to prove I can write words on paper to be a poet. I just am one. Like a peacock who can talk. I spit it out. And so you know, Barba Amarilla is only one of my styles. She writes poison stuff, the kind of stuff that shuts brothers up. I got plenty of other styles too.”

  “Oh yeah?” said Mrs. Ramirez, standing and stretching. She had Lala’s smile, which sometimes almost made me laugh out loud. It looked like Mrs. Ramirez was about to sneak out with a friend who was a bad influence. “Okay, girls. I’ve got to go to the carnival meeting. When the boys come home, tell Jamie to run to the store for pasta, and tell him it’s a message from me so do so now, and tell him whole wheat pasta, please, and something green, what he wants but not lettuce. We got a chicken defrosting. There should be plenty for whoever shows up tonight. Claudeline, do you have supper plans?”

  “Yup,” I said. I didn’t, but there was no way I was gonna sit through a lecture about taking advantage of community resources while simply trying to eat a juicy roasted chicken.

  Mrs. Ramirez’s voice faded as she went down the hall. “Thank you for agreeing to help at the carnival, Claudeline. I appreciate you for wanting to help other people rather than hurt them. You look lovely tonight, by the way.”

  One dress and the whole world’s head explodes. Girls wear dresses sometimes. Boys wear dresses sometimes. Get over it.

  Lala felt my skirt. “You rock this, Claude. You should let me do your hair.” I was about to ask what was wrong with my hair when Lala said, “But listen. I should be getting more famous for my poetry than that Alma girl, right?”

  Alma Lingonberry. In my face, again.

  “I don’t know,” I said, touching my hair.

  Lala picked up Cutie Cat. “I was just telling Andrew how much I can’t stand that girl.”

  “So are you and Money officially engaged?” I asked.

  Lala rubbed noses with her cat. “Please. That boy thinks he’s all that. He’s getting on my nerves too.”

  I played with my sandal buckle. “You don’t think Alma is some psycho trying to trick people like Brett’s mom into raising money for her?”

  “Alma? No way! She’s definitely real,” said Lala.

  “How do you know?” I asked.

  Lala didn’t answer. She was busy reading her phone and smiling. “He says he bought me earrings.”

  “Lala?”

  “Hmm?” said Lala, still reading.

  “How do you know Alma is real?” I asked.

  Lala talked while she typed on her phone. “Alma’s real, all right. We should pretend to be her friend just to get our personalized poem and see how boring it is.”

  I was confused. “I thought you said she was talented? At the noodle shop you said—”

  “Me? Nah,” said Lala.

  I leaned back on my elbows, sinking my arms in purple carpet fluff. So the queen of perfect hair and boyfriends and family values wasn’t so perfect after all.

  “You’re jealous, Lala,” I said. “Because Alma isn’t afraid to share her poems.”

  Lala looked up from her phone. “Huh? No way! And why do you care about Alma, Claude? Are you friends with her or something?”

  “Are you kidding?” I said. “If she’s real, she’s pathetic. It’s embarrassing to be desperate for friends.”

  “If you can’t make friends in real life, hello!” said Lala. “There must be a reason.”

  We kept cracking jokes about Alma, which should’ve been exactly the type of nothing I was in the mood to do. But when we said good-bye and I started walking home, the fun part of making fun of Alma Lingonberry sank like a blimp with a leak.

  The dying poet was following me like a shadow. A shadow sending messages from the dark
. What was it trying to tell me? And why did I have a hunch it was important?

  As I walked past smudgy storefronts and fallen-over bins of trash, I found myself slipping into detective mode, hoping that the stranger would write me back.

  UNTITLED #206

  Trees have a secret life that is only revealed to those willing to climb them.

  —Reinaldo Arenas, poet

  Before I crossed under the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, I stopped in front of the foot-massage place. I love foot-massage posters. If you’ve never seen one, it’s a colorful map of the bottom of a foot that shows which parts connect to which organs. I like to imagine my insides filled with a rainbow of wires. A yellow wire stretching from my toes to my kidneys, a blue wire winding up my leg, tying itself in a bow around my liver.

  That’s when I noticed it. Next to the foot poster there was an Alma flyer.

  My Alma flyer.

  Untitled # 206

  For a girl

  Who’s like a tree

  Lost out at sea

  I’m glad to be

  Your friend.

  —Alma Lingonberry

  Hello, Sunset Parkers. How’s the weather out there? By now, many of you know the reason I am writing to you today . . .

  The more I reread my poem, the more uncomfortable I felt.

  It was the part about the tree. The stranded part, and the roots all wet. Floating around, alone. The picture Alma’s poem put in my head reminded me of something.

  It reminded me of me.

  When I got home, I ate the box of dumplings Dad had left on the kitchen table. If you gotta eat alone, I recommend dumplings. You can eat them pretty fast, so you don’t have much time to think about the fact that you have nobody to talk to.

  After dinner I went into my room to check my e-mail. The poem was in my inbox, too—same as the flyer. A group message. Then a bubble popped up on my screen.

  LILPOET123: claudeline? yr online?

  CLAUDEFENG: who is this?

  LILPOET123: IT’S ALMA! o weird timing. how r u doing?!

  I stared at the bubble.

  LILPOET123: r u there?

  Um . . . ?

  LILPOET123: hello?

  CLAUDEFENG: uh, nice to meet you, alma lingonberry

  LILPOET123: stop! i already know u

  I leaned back in my chair.

  LILPOET123: sorry, that was weird, totally don’t know u

  CLAUDEFENG: you don’t, though, right? you weren’t, like, in my homeroom class? and now you got some fake name?

  LILPOET123: o no. nevermind. sorry 2 bother u, claude, o, sorry sorry. bad idea

  Actually, this was the most interesting thing that possibly could have happened to me tonight. The shadow speaks.

  I decided to play along.

  CLAUDEFENG: don’t worry about it. we can chat

  I took my laptop into bed and snuggled under the covers.

  LILPOET123: k, great!

  CLAUDEFENG: what’s up?

  LILPOET123: just wanted to say hi! in person, like u said. how r u?

  CLAUDEFENG: not what i meant by in person

  LILPOET123: i know, best i can do. i’m full of tubes and stuff

  Tubes, huh? She was laying it on thick.

  CLAUDEFENG: that must be tough, with the tubes

  LILPOET123: it is, actually

  CLAUDEFENG: so what do you do, stuck in bed all day full of tubes, alma lingonberry?

  LILPOET123: just write a lot. not much else 2 do

  Brett’s bedroom light was on. I wondered what he was doing right now. Reading? Watching an alien movie?

  I sighed.

  LILPOET123: r u there? did u have 2 go?

  CLAUDEFENG: no, i’m here

  I stuffed a pillow between my back and the wall.

  CLAUDEFENG: where did you live before the hospital?

  LILPOET123: ?

  LILPOET123: sunset park

  CLAUDEFENG: what school do you go to?

  LILPOET123: charter school

  CLAUDEFENG: what street do you live on?

  LILPOET123: jeez. paranoid much? u should be friends w/ my mom!

  CLAUDEFENG: just wondering who you are

  LILPOET123: yea i get that. but like, what do u mean?

  CLAUDEFENG: who ARE you?

  LILPOET123: gosh, this is a fun conversation

  CLAUDEFENG: just tell me what street u live on

  LILPOET123: claude, i’m sorry to let you down, but my mom won’t let me give that type of information. she’s VERY paranoid

  CLAUDEFENG: maybe she doesn’t want you making friends with strangers. it’s not the best thing to do

  LILPOET123: thanks, b/c i totally never thought about that?

  CLAUDEFENG: just saying

  LILPOET123: mom reads every single email i get. and every chat, by the way

  CLAUDEFENG: if she’s so strict, why does she let you do this?

  LILPOET123: it’s called indulge the sick girl. if u r some freak believe me she’ll block u. she threatens 2 make me quit but she won’t. everybody’s afraid i’m going 2 die

  That surprised me.

  CLAUDEFENG: i’m sorry

  LILPOET123: it’s ok. she cares. i get it

  My next thought dropped out of thin air, like water from an air conditioner on the thirty-third floor, plopping on your head when you pass underneath it.

  I thought about my mother. How she named me after her so she wouldn’t feel alone in the world. She didn’t wish I’d never been born. If I was in the hospital, she’d be a wreck.

  Of course Alma’s story had gotten Mom’s attention.

  Alma reminded her of me.

  The strangeness of this situation was creeping up on me and tapping me on the shoulder. Whoever Alma was, she was right here, right now, chatting with me about death.

  Unless I was imagining all this, which would mean I was the insane one. Which would make a shocking detective story, but I truly hoped that was not how this one was gonna turn out. I had enough problems, already.

  Either way, I felt uncomfortable. The topic of dying was not something to brush off like it was nothing.

  CLAUDEFENG: i’m sure your mother is scared

  LILPOET123: now that i think about it, u r right, tho. u have 2 be careful, 2. lemme try 2 answer yr questions, ok? i’m 11 yrz old. i have long red hair. i luv meeting new people, writing poems, and i’m obsessed with durian ice cream

  CLAUDEFENG: so gross

  LILPOET123: r u CRAZY?!?! the best

  Durian is a size XXL spiked fruit that smells rotten but tastes like custard. Which is something anybody could know, but it’s unusual to drop it into a conversation if you don’t live someplace with a good Asian market. I like it, but not in ice cream. In ice cream I think it tastes like fake bananas.

  I wasn’t sure what to say, but something told me we should keep chatting.

  CLAUDEFENG: i read my poem

  LILPOET123: o, no. hope it was ok? some r stinkers

  CLAUDEFENG: kinda freaked me out actually

  LILPOET123: o

  LILPOET123: that bad?

  CLAUDEFENG: not bad, exactly. how do you write a poem?

  LILPOET123: they come 2 me, i guess? especially when i’m lonely. which i have been lately. big shock right? girl advertising for friends off the street is lonely

  That made me smile.

  LILPOET123: like i said tho, some of my poems r bad, i think. so so so sorry didn’t mean 2 offend u?

  CLAUDEFENG: i’m not offended. i don’t read poems usually. it’s probably good, i would not know

  LILPOET123: thx!

  CLAUDEFENG: so like is that why you’re doing this? you want new people to write poems for?

  LILPOET123: new friends. there r tons of nice people out there i might never get 2 meet any other way. i know it’s silly, but i won’t be around 4ever, so who cares? maybe somebody out there needs a new friend as much as me

  The bubble was silent for a minute.

  CLAUD
EFENG: hello?

  LILPOET123: your turn

  CLAUDEFENG: oh. ok.

  Brett’s bedroom light turned off.

  LILPOET123: o claude sorry sorry sorry. my doctor just came in can we continue over email?? promise 2 write back 2 all yr paranoid questions, u r a funny kid haha :P just promise u will tell me more about yrself and i will 2 ok??

  CLAUDEFENG: sure

  LILPOET123: don’t worry claude. seems like u r having some hard times??? but u will get thru it. k??? make a wish upon the wind u never know who might catch it and send it back!! talk soon

  A wish upon the wind?

  I shut my laptop and stared at my wall, at the blank spot where my photograph of the Fuzhou crew used to hang, and imagined the pencil drawing on the flyers coming to life. Alma, hanging around the neighborhood. She was pale, even when she wasn’t sick. She walked like a duck and wore polka dots. Overalls, like a younger kid. Maybe I’d seen a girl like that, and forgotten. It wasn’t impossible.

  I sighed. Time for a nightgown and some dreams. Hopefully ones without the Thing in them.

  As I brushed my teeth, the bathroom tile felt cool under my bare feet. Our chat had proven one thing, anyway. If she wasn’t a real person, Alma Lingonberry was a frighteningly good imitation.

  I woke up to the sound of stomping across my bedroom floor.

  My desk lamp threw a sideways blast of light on Mom, who was wearing her silky robe over a skirt, like she’d been in the middle of getting undressed. Half of the blond streaks in her hair looked white in the light. The other half of her was lost in total darkness. “Gimme back my stuff. Don’t make me count to ten, Claudeline.”

  My bed squeaked as I sat up. “Give you back what?”

  “Who do you think you are?”

  “I was asleep!” I said.

  My desk drawers groaned as she opened them and slammed them shut. She looked under my bed. I tried to remember what I’d taken recently. Was she this mad about some breath mints? Maybe five or ten bucks, here and there . . .

  She whipped around and grabbed my computer.

  “That’s mine!” I yelled.

  Mom’s voice was low, like she was making a threat. “I earn the money in this house. Therefore, like the contents of my purse, it is mine.”

  Mom left the room. With my laptop.