Queen of the Toilet Bowl by Frieda Wishinsky Page B

lucky to be here,” she always told me.
    I knew we were, but sometimes I missed Sao Paolo. True we had lived in two small, dark rooms and the streets were always crowded with beggars and little kids without shoes. I hated the smell of rotting garbage. Sometimes it hung in the air for days and made me feel sick.
    But there was also excitement on festival days. The city buzzed with people singing, dancing and laughing. People helped each other in Sao Paolo. After my father died in a car accident, people I hardly knew came over with food and comforting words.
    I missed the sunshine. The sun shone all the time in Sao Paolo. So many days in this new country were dark, dreary and cold. But Mom said there were more opportunities here. We could get a better education here, so I decided to go to High Road High.
    I’d had a choice. I could have gone to another high school, the one that was like a little UN with kids from Portugal, Jamaica, Haiti, Pakistan, India andcountries I’d never even heard of before. There were a few immigrant kids at High Road High, but they were sprinkled around like raisins in cereal.
    I chose this high school because it was better, because there were no gangs roaming the halls. And it was true, there were no gangs of girls with “Go to Hell” tattooed across their backs or snarling guys with knives. But there were gangs of girls with eyes that shut you out and voices that sneered and laughed at you. They didn’t beat you up or steal your money, but their looks felt like hard punches to your stomach.
    I couldn’t tell Mom what I’d overheard at the lockers today. She had enough to deal with. My little brother, Lucas, was a whiny pain. And Mom was always tired.
    â€œI’m going to my room to do homework,” I told her.
    â€œGood,” said Mom.
    But I didn’t start on my homework. I flopped down on my bed and stared ata picture of a butterfly I had snapped for photography class.
    I’d seen the butterfly perched on a rose last spring. After I snapped the picture, it flew away.
    I wished I was that butterfly. I wished I could fly away.

chapter three
    Even though it’s a crazy language with weird expressions and insane spellings, I’d learned English quickly.
    When I first heard the expression “she laughed her head off” in grade four, I looked around the classroom expecting some bloody head to bounce along the floor. Of course it didn’t, and I soon learned to repeat English expressions as if I’d grown up with them.
    I’d even lost most of my accent. Whatever I hear, I absorb as if I swallowed it.
    Mom was proud of how I’d learned English so quickly. She mentioned it often.
    â€œSometimes you sound like you were never born in Sao Paolo,” she said the next morning at breakfast. “It’s because you have a musical ear. I wish you would sing again like you used to in Sao Paolo. I miss your singing.”
    â€œMaybe one day I will,” I said. It had felt good to sing at Liz’s house. It especially felt good when Liz and her mom said they liked my voice.
    Liz mentioned it again at lunch.
    â€œYou really have a terrific voice,” she said. “My mother couldn’t stop talking about it last night. Which was great because she stopped talking about my room for an hour.”
    â€œHey. I like your hair,” I said, changing the subject. Liz had cut her long curly hair and it circled her face like a frame.
    â€œThanks,” she said. “I hated how short it was yesterday, but now I kind of like it too.”
    â€œFries any good?” I asked.
    â€œDisgusting but the ketchup’s good.”
    Liz and I laughed.
    â€œI keep promising myself to bring something edible from home, but I’m always in such a rush in the morning. Not like you.”
    â€œI’m not crazy about the caf food either,” I said. It was true, but the real reason I didn’t buy my lunch was money. I