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I spend the rest of the day zoning out—not that my grades are important to me. Track practice is an easy one since we have the meet tomorrow. I take the city bus home, the familiar sense of foreboding settling in the closer I get.
I wonder what I’m going to walk into this time.
When I walk inside, Grace is in the kitchen cooking. It smells like chicken and green beans.
“You can go fold the laundry and clean the bathrooms,” she tells me. “Then we’ll eat together.”
Thank god.
Fuck the together part, but I didn’t have dinner the day before or breakfast this morning. I’ll take the win.
I fold and put away the laundry, then scrub the house’s two and a half bathrooms, at least enjoying the silence. Once finished, I head down to the kitchen, wash my hands, and sit across from Grace at the table.
“We need to pray,” she says.
I follow her lead—the routine—bowing my head while she thanks someone for all the blessings surrounding us, but I don’t think it’s any type of god who brought me here.
“And I know, Lord, that you will bless this family with a child when the time is right. Arealchild,” she adds.
I fight the urge to scoff and roll my eyes.
“Amen.”
She finishes before I do but stays at the table—manners or whatever. Maybe it’s just to watch me. I feel her eyes boring holesthrough me. She wants to say something, and I know better than to ask what it is.
Eventually, I hear it anyway.
“You look ugly when you eat,” she says. “Like a rat. You know that?”
“I’m sorry,” I say after I finish chewing. “What do you suggest I do instead?”
“I don’t think there’s much hope for you, I just wanted you to know that. You look ugly right now.”
Six more months.
“Your mother was at least taught better. Prettier than you, too. You got your dad’s nose. Have you ever even seen him? Do you remember what he looks like? I’m sure he’s in jail, too, wherever he is.”
I grit my teeth and push back my chair. “Do you want me to take your plate?” I ask.
“Clean it all up,” she says, standing from the table.
“I have a track meet tomorrow,” I tell her. “It’s in Mount Vernon. I’ll be home late.”
“I’ll be waiting. If you miss the last bus, you’re walking.”
I clear the table, load the dishwasher, and head straight to the shower. I wash the day from my skin and try to pretend I’m somewhere else, anywhere else.
Maybe on a beach somewhere, washing the sand from my feet after a long day. But reality pulls me back.
A waste of time.
Ugly.
Have you ever even seen your dad?
The whistling.
I crack the side of my disposable razor and remove the blade. The last one had grown dull, and it’s worse when they’re dull. I’m getting better at this; I barely cut my fingertips when I remove it from its plastic casing.
