Now that I think of it, I don’t think Dad was living with us when we first moved in with Granma. That was later.
Tish,
I’m delighted that you finally let me read a “real” entry in this journal. I’ve felt frustrated seeing almost all your previous entries marked “don’t read”, because I can tell you’re writing a lot. But of course I’ve wanted to respect your wish for privacy.
Based on this one entry, I think you may have a knock for writing—a knack you’ve managed to hide in practically everything else you’ve handed in. Perhaps you’ve needed the power of a childhood memory to stir you. Whatever, I think you ought to consider trying out for the literary magazine staff here—probably you’ve seen it, The Lodestar? You could make quite a contribution. Talk to me if you’re interested.
You’re rather vague here about the problem with your mother (and father?). I don’t want to pry, but you know there are lots of people here at the school who are ready and willing to help you with any personal problem(s). You could go to one of the counselors or take advantage of the new Student Assistance Program Or if you’d feel more comfortable talking to someone your own age, the peer counselors might help. And of course, I’d be perfectly willing to talk to you, if you want. Just don’t assume you have to handle everything by yourself.
October 21
Do NOT read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
I can’t believe I forgot to put the “don’t read this” label on my last entry. How dumb can I be? So now Mrs. Dunphrey knows I’m having problems. Great. She kept looking at me funny all during class today, and I didn’t know why until she handed the journals back and I saw what I’d done. Hey, Mrs. Dunphrey, everyone has problems, okay? Leave me alone.
I’m so embarrassed that she made all those suggestions for where I could go for help. The counselors? Yeah, right. Like Mrs. Herzenberger has time for anyone. Last year when I went in to show her what classes I wanted for this year, the whole conversation was, “Um-hm, um-hm. Okay. Fine. Can you send the next student in?” Or, wait—I’m supposed to go to the peer counselors? That’s the biggest joke of all. Everybody knows the peer counselors are the worst gossips in the whole school. Just look at poor Ronda Hartshorn. She talked to Heather Owens and Mitch Ramirez “strictly confidentially” and, funny, next thing Ronda knew, everybody in the school had heard she was pregnant and thinking about having an abortion. Poor Ronda. Even Mr. Tremont tried to give her advice.
So, thanks but no thanks, Mrs. Dunphrey. I can handle my problems all by myself. I may not do a great job, but they stay my problems.
At least I didn’t say too much in that last entry. It’s just about Granma and the bogeymen and the smell of her perfume. I guess there are a lot more embarrassing entries I could have let Mrs. Dunphrey read by mistake.
Isn’t it hilarious that she thinks I should try out for The Lodestar? Like Megan Satterthwaite, with her $150 sweaters, would let me within 100 feet of that thing. Like I’d want to hang out with those snobs. Like I even care about writing anything.
October 23
Don’t read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
Can’t you give it a rest? When you asked me to stay after class today, I was sure I was in trouble. But no, you just wanted to talk about The Lodestar again. And how I should be on the honor roll, not barely passing. Right.
The funniest thing was when you asked if it’d help to talk to my parents. How’d you put it—” I know most teenagers are hesitant to acknowledge their parents, but sometimes parental involvement is necessary. Sometimes parents and teachers need to work as a team…” Sometimes, Mrs. Dunphrey, you talk like a book. I can just see you and my mom getting together. It makes me crack up. Let’s see, here’s Mrs. Dunphrey with her silky blouses and classy skirts and big words. And here’s my mom in her ragged jeans and her “ain’ts” and “she don’ts.” You’d say “academic potential” and my mom’s eyes would just go blank. She’d say, “Huh?” about fifty times.
Or let’s say you got real ambitious and hunted down my dad. Supposing you found him, you’d be real impressed with his beer company cap and his old ripped flannel shirts and long Johns. (That’s about the fanciest clothes I ever remember seeing him wear.) He’d say, “Tish who?”
Come on, Mrs. Dunphrey. Give up.
Today is Matt’s birthday. I picked him up after school and then we took the bus to McDonald’s. (He likes that better than Burger Boy, even though I can’t get an employee discount at McDonald’s—I guess Matt gets sick of Burger Boy burgers because I bring them home all the time.) I told him he could get whatever he wanted, so he ordered a Big Mac and a large fries and a big strawberry milkshake. He didn’t finish any of it. But, hey, it’s his birthday. I told him nothing mattered today. I wouldn’t yell at him over anything.
“You don’t yell at me, Tish,” he said.
“Yes, I do,” I said. “You don’t have to be nice. I know I yell at you a lot more than I should.”
“But only because you want me to be good,” he said. And he smiled in this way he has, where he shows his side teeth, and he looked so little and cute and innocent. I think he got that idea about being yelled at for his own good at school. Anyway, it made me feel like I’m not so bad to him after all.
I couldn’t get him the Nintendo, because I couldn’t save enough money in time. (Maybe I would have been able to, if Mom would give Matt and me lunch money, instead of me always paying for everything.) Instead, I got him a baseball mitt. I thought it was kind of a stupid present—I just couldn’t think of anything else. But Matt got all excited. He said all the other boys at school have mitts, but he didn’t think he’d ever get one. He fell asleep hugging it.
Maybe I’ll be able to afford a Nintendo for Matt for Christmas.
October 24
Don’t you dare read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
Well, Mom’s gone and done it. While I had Matt at McDonald’s last night, she started driving around town looking for Dad. She found him down at the Alibi Inn on Sidell Street—it’s a horrid bar, all smoky and gross. I’m sure you wouldn’t know anything about it, Mrs. Dunphrey. I don’t know what Mom told Dad—I don’t want to know—but this morning when I got up and walked into the kitchen, he was sitting at the kitchen table eating eggs and toast, sort of normal, like he’d never been away at all.
I just stopped and stared at him.
“Is that how you greet your dad, when you haven’t seen him in two years?” Dad asked, all sweet and nice.
Hey, it’s not my fault I hadn’t seen him in two years. “Hi, Dad,” I said. Cautious.
I didn’t know it, but Matt was right behind me. And as soon as I said that, Matt came out in front of me, “Dad? Daddy?”
Then he ran over to Dad and gave him one of those big hugs only a kid can give. Totally trusting. Dad swung him up on his lap and said, “Now, that’s more like it.”
“It’s really you?” Matt said. Dad nodded and let Matt hug him again. I could have cried right then and there, the way Matt was acting. He looked happier than I’d seen him in years. I guess I’d stopped noticing how sad his eyes looked all the time. Matt grinned and grinned and grinned. I wanted to grab him away and scream, “No—don’t. You can’t trust him.” Then Mom came in from taking the trash out, and she was grinning too, like a big fool. Am I the only one in the whole family who remembers anything?
“So where have you been?” I asked. “It has been a while.”
I was waiting for him to yell at me for my smart mouth—the sarcasm was dripping—but Dad just shrugged.
“I got a job driving coast to coast,” he said. “Oranges from Florida, pork bellies from Chicago—you name it.”
And then he started telling us stories about his adventures, how he’d outsmarted a robber in Flagstaff, Arizona, and how he’d gotten trapped in a blizzard out in Burlington, Vermont. And it was like no one but me thought it was weird that he was back now, that he’d never even sent a postcard the whole time he was away. Matt kept beaming, holding onto Dad
’s leg, and Mom sat beside them, reaching out every now and then to touch Dad’s hair. Like she couldn’t believe he was real.
I stayed back by the door. I think I was thinking I could get away fast if I needed to. Except I’d want to take Matt with me.
October 27
Don’t read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
While I was working at the Burger Boy last night. Dad took Matt over to Children’s Palace and bought him a big Nintendo system, even better than the one I was going to get. When I got home from work, Dad had it all set up, and they were playing some video game that had to do with saving the world from invading aliens.
Matt wanted me to come play with them, but I told him it was past his bedtime.
“Any adult should know that,” I said. And then I was scared, because that was the kind of thing that would have really set Dad off in the past. I was lucky—I don’t think Dad heard me because the video game was so loud.
“Ti-ish, please play with us,” Matt said.
“If she doesn’t want to play, that’s her problem,” Dad said. “It’s just more time for us, right? More father-son time. This is a boy’s game—we don’t need any girls.”
“Right,” Matt echoed. “No gi-irls allowed, Tish.”
I went back to my bedroom so mad I wanted to hit somebody. I pounded on the bed over and over again, until Mom yelled, “Tish, stop that!”
And I couldn’t yell back at her, either, because she and Dad are so lovey-dovey now he’d probably beat me if I said anything to her.
I wish I could be like Mom and Matt and just smile, smile, smile—who cares that Dad was gone for two years? He’s back now. Who cares that he yelled all the time and broke dishes and hit Mom and sometimes even me? He’s not hitting anybody now.
Yet.
If Granma were here, she’d be on my side. She’d tell Mom and Matt how stupid they’re being.
Tish,
Okay. Do think about The Lodestar…
November 3
Don’t read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
Dad is still being really nice. He bought Matt a pirate costume and took him out trick-or-treating Saturday night. I went to a Halloween party with Rochelle and Chastity, and no one noticed that I didn’t get home until 3 A.M.
Could real life be like this always? I can’t believe in it.
I have noticed that Dad doesn’t seem to have a job anymore. I don’t know where he’s getting the money to buy all those things for Matt. He bought me some perfume the other day, too, but I told him it wasn’t a kind I use. It was White Sands—something for women a lot older than me.
November 6
Please don’t read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
I knew it was too good to last. Mom and Dad had a big fight last night. I came home from the Burger Boy, and Dad was throwing things at Mom—his shoes, one of the lamps, a decorative Elvis plate Mom had to go and order off the TV.
“Where’s Matt?” I asked right away. Dad yelled at me—something about how I was probably worse than my mother. I thought he was going to throw one of Granma’s old flowerpots at me. I ran to my room and slammed the door. Then, when I was sure Dad hadn’t followed me, I crept down to Matt’s room. Matt was in there, hiding under the bed crying. I pulled him out and made him sit on the bed with me. He had lint in his hair, and his eyes were all swollen and red, like he’d been crying for hours. I wanted to march back out to the living room and tell Mom and Dad to shut up, or leave, or something—anything to quit scaring Matt. Instead I held my hands over his ears.
“That’s not Daddy out there,” Matt told me.
“Oh yeah?” I said.
“No, it’s a bad man. Daddy gives me presents.”
What was I supposed to say to that? After a while, Matt said, “What are they fighting about?”
I’d been trying not to listen, but I would have had to have been deaf not to hear some of it. Mom was all whimpers now—pitiful apologies—but Dad was going on and on in a loud voice about Haggarty’s and someone Mom worked with. I think Dad thought Mom two-timed him while he was away. That’s so crazy. I don’t think she’s looked at another man, ever, maybe—but so what if she did? He was away for two years! What’d he expect?
Anyhow, I told Matt they were fighting about grown-up stuff. I told him he’d have to be a lot older to understand.
“Do you understand?” he asked. “You’re a lot older than me.”
The way he looked at me with his innocent eyes, I could have cried. I don’t want him thinking that’s how people are supposed to act. But what was I going to say—” Mom and Dad are horrible people”? They are horrible. I hate them—hate them, hate them, hate them! I wish they would both run away to Flagstaff, Arizona, or Burlington, Vermont. Maybe I even wish they were dead. I don’t care where they go, how bad they ruin their own lives. But do they have to ruin everything for Matt and me, too?
November 7
Don’t you dare read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
Well, it looks like it’s Monday night at the fights. Again. Tonight, Dad didn’t like the way Mom cooked his spaghetti. Last night, she didn’t turn the TV on right away when he asked her to. The night before—I don’t even remember what the fight was about the night before. Except, every night, Matt and I hide in his room. At first, I tried to read to him, play games with him, anything to keep him from hearing them in the living room. But he just stares at the Dr. Seuss pages, he forgets to take his turn in Candyland. I have trouble remembering, too.
Tonight Matt asked me, “How much more do they have to fight about?”
It’s like he thinks there’s some end I can tell him about, like medicine you only have to take for two weeks. Even if it tastes awful, you can choke it down thinking, “Only ten more times, only nine more times, only…”
I told Matt I didn’t know how they could possibly have anything left to fight about. But that’s not true. The more I listen to them fight, the madder I feel. I don’t think I could ever get rid of that mad, even if I went out and screamed at them for the rest of my life. I’ve started thinking crazy things. Tony Brill next door has a whole gun collection. I could just borrow one of them. I wouldn’t even have to shoot anyone, just use it to scare Mom and Dad, just make them shut up. I lie in bed at night and I picture me holding them hostage, at gunpoint. I’d tie them up and gag their mouths so they wouldn’t be able to yell. Or—better yet—I’d let them talk to one another, but only in good ways. I’d say, “Talk nice.” Granma used to say that to Matt and me.
I scare myself. I think if I had a gun, I really might use it.
Maybe I’m not any better than Dad or Mom.
November 12
Don’t read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
Last night I remembered why Granma taught me to crochet.
She was always crocheting something—both Matt and me have baby blankets she made. Mine is pink with white bows and his is green with fruit shapes on it. And every year at Christmas and for our birthdays, we’d get something else crocheted—mittens, scarves, sweaters. I was proud of them, until about third grade when one of the other girls, Heather Richards, I think it was, made fun of me having everything homemade. I started hinting to Granma that I’d rather have something store-bought. It’d be easier, I said. Why did she have to crochet all the time?
“It’s better than hitting someone,” she told me.
That was a time kind of like now, when Mom and Dad were fighting about everything. It didn’t seem so bad then, because Granma was always there, telling Matt and me stories, singing songs to us so we didn’t hear Mom and Dad. (She didn’t forget to turn the Dr. Seuss pages.)
But then one day, Dad came home and Mom was out somewhere, at the grocery maybe, and he started yelling at me. And I yelled back. I told him to shut up. I told him he was bad. And then he hit me so hard it knocked me across the kitchen. I still have a little scar on my forehead where I hit the table.
Granma was there right away, and she took me away and washed the blood off my face. Then that nig
ht she gave me a crochet hook and some orange yarn and said, “Here, let me show you how to do a chain stitch …” She said more, she said, “You can control the yarn, even if you can’t control anything else.”
And then for a long time, both of us crocheted every night, back in Granma’s room. Matt would hide in the yarn between us. He said it was better than listening to songs or books. He said in the yarn, he couldn’t hear anything.
It all sounds so stupid now. Did Granma really think I could solve anything by crocheting?
Did she ever solve anything?
Tish,
Okay. I mould appreciate getting to read another of your entries sometime soon. I know I said you could mark every entry “Don’t ready” if you wanted—but do you really have to?
November 18
DON’T read this, Mrs. Dunphrey.
So you’d appreciate the chance to get to read one of my entries, Mrs. Dunphrey? Oh great, wonderful. I’m sure they’d make you very happy. Oh, isn’t this precious, you could say, how well Tish writes about her parents’ fights. “Tish,” you’d ask, “would you mind if The Lodestar reprinted that wonderful description of you and your brother cowering in his room while your father throws flowerpots at your mother? It’s so exquisitely done.” Or wait, maybe if you read my journal, you’d understand why I’m not exactly keeping up with Julius Caesar right now. What would you do then—say, “Sure, Tish, you don’t have to read Act II. I understand completely”? Would you stop calling on me? Would you stop looking disappointed when I don’t know the difference between Cassius or Brutus or anyone else?
Mrs. Dunphrey, I don’t really dislike you. It’s just, your problem is you’re too innocent. You’re even worse than Matt. You look out at us in the classroom and you think we’re all there ready and eager to learn about literature and grammar. I don’t know, maybe we would be, if we weren’t too busy thinking about our real lives. It’s not just me, either. I’m not the only one whose parents fight all the time. There are other kids who can’t think about Julius Caesar because they’re worrying about their parents being out of work. Or they’re afraid they’re pregnant. Or they’re on drugs.