thick with pot and cigarette smoke, the stereo Bruce bought us blaring in the front room: the Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Ten Years After, Pink Floyd. In the living room, girls would be sitting on the laps of their boyfriends, some of them sharing a beer or cigarette or joint. In the dining room, at the table that came with the house and one we rarely used, five or six would be playing 45, using for an ashtray their beer cans or one of our cereal bowls.
I hadn’t moved up to the attic yet, and my room was still on the second floor in the back of the house across from Jeb’s. I’d go up there and shut the door behind me. I’d lie on my bed and try to ignore the weekday afternoon party voices and laughter, the yelling or loud trash-talking from Nicky G. or one of the rent collectors from Seventh who’d started coming around too. I’d lie there and imagine being a different kind of kid, one who could walk downstairs and open the front door and yell at them all to just get the fuck out. And when they wouldn’t, I’d jerk the men to their feet one at a time. They’d swing at me, and I’d duck and then start hurling punches and kicks like Billy Jack, smashing bones and severing arteries, all with my hands and feet.
Instead I stayed in my room and waited for the sun to go down and for them to drift off, two or three at a time.
Still, some would come around at night. Once, close to ten o’clock, Mom lay on the floor in front of the TV in her work clothes, a pillow under her head, her cheap coat covering her like a blanket. A knocking echoed from the front door and Nicole got up and answered it. I was sitting in a wicker chair. I was half asleep, but there was a mild electrical current telling me that I should have gone to the door, not my ten-year-old sister.
She walked back into the room. Her back was held erect with her scoliosis brace, her chin resting on its plastic collar. “It’s Glenn P. He wants to talk to Suzanne.”
Mom opened her eyes. “Well you tell Glenn P. to go take a flying fuck.”
Nicole turned and walked through the hall to the door. I could see her red hair pulled back over the rear collar of her brace. “Um, my mom says for you to go take a flying fuck.”
If Glenn P. said something back, Nicole didn’t repeat it. She locked the door and walked back into the living room and sat down with her homework.
ONE RAINY afternoon in April, I came home to another full house and I went straight upstairs and there was Kip L. and Donna H. coming down the narrow hallway. He was half a foot taller than I was but lighter, his skin white, blue veins and capillaries standing out in his arms and hands. People said he shot heroin, and I was sure that’s what he and Donna H. had been doing up here, maybe in the bathroom, but her halter top was unbuttoned and beneath the flared hem of her hip-huggers were bare feet. As she passed me in the narrow hallway she smelled like sweat and Kip L.’s leather jacket.
They didn’t say anything, and I didn’t either. Then they were back downstairs and I walked into my room. Rain pattered against the window. The only light was gray and shadowed, and I flicked on the overhead bulb. Lately I’d been making my bed some mornings, pulling the top blanket or bedspread tight at the corners. I could see it was still made but rumpled, and there, in the middle of my mattress, was a spot of wetness the size of a quarter.
ONE WEEKDAY morning I’d somehow woken before anyone else and went down into the kitchen to see what there might be to eat. Usually the inside of the fridge was nearly empty shelves, but I was reaching for its handle anyway when I heard the hissing. I turned to see the blue flames of the front burner. It had been going all night. Inches away was a greasy Burger King bag on a stack of dirty dishes, and I rushed over and switched off the gas. The air was warm and smelled like scorched metal.
That night, long after everyone was in bed, I lay on my mattress
I hadn’t moved up to the attic yet, and my room was still on the second floor in the back of the house across from Jeb’s. I’d go up there and shut the door behind me. I’d lie on my bed and try to ignore the weekday afternoon party voices and laughter, the yelling or loud trash-talking from Nicky G. or one of the rent collectors from Seventh who’d started coming around too. I’d lie there and imagine being a different kind of kid, one who could walk downstairs and open the front door and yell at them all to just get the fuck out. And when they wouldn’t, I’d jerk the men to their feet one at a time. They’d swing at me, and I’d duck and then start hurling punches and kicks like Billy Jack, smashing bones and severing arteries, all with my hands and feet.
Instead I stayed in my room and waited for the sun to go down and for them to drift off, two or three at a time.
Still, some would come around at night. Once, close to ten o’clock, Mom lay on the floor in front of the TV in her work clothes, a pillow under her head, her cheap coat covering her like a blanket. A knocking echoed from the front door and Nicole got up and answered it. I was sitting in a wicker chair. I was half asleep, but there was a mild electrical current telling me that I should have gone to the door, not my ten-year-old sister.
She walked back into the room. Her back was held erect with her scoliosis brace, her chin resting on its plastic collar. “It’s Glenn P. He wants to talk to Suzanne.”
Mom opened her eyes. “Well you tell Glenn P. to go take a flying fuck.”
Nicole turned and walked through the hall to the door. I could see her red hair pulled back over the rear collar of her brace. “Um, my mom says for you to go take a flying fuck.”
If Glenn P. said something back, Nicole didn’t repeat it. She locked the door and walked back into the living room and sat down with her homework.
ONE RAINY afternoon in April, I came home to another full house and I went straight upstairs and there was Kip L. and Donna H. coming down the narrow hallway. He was half a foot taller than I was but lighter, his skin white, blue veins and capillaries standing out in his arms and hands. People said he shot heroin, and I was sure that’s what he and Donna H. had been doing up here, maybe in the bathroom, but her halter top was unbuttoned and beneath the flared hem of her hip-huggers were bare feet. As she passed me in the narrow hallway she smelled like sweat and Kip L.’s leather jacket.
They didn’t say anything, and I didn’t either. Then they were back downstairs and I walked into my room. Rain pattered against the window. The only light was gray and shadowed, and I flicked on the overhead bulb. Lately I’d been making my bed some mornings, pulling the top blanket or bedspread tight at the corners. I could see it was still made but rumpled, and there, in the middle of my mattress, was a spot of wetness the size of a quarter.
ONE WEEKDAY morning I’d somehow woken before anyone else and went down into the kitchen to see what there might be to eat. Usually the inside of the fridge was nearly empty shelves, but I was reaching for its handle anyway when I heard the hissing. I turned to see the blue flames of the front burner. It had been going all night. Inches away was a greasy Burger King bag on a stack of dirty dishes, and I rushed over and switched off the gas. The air was warm and smelled like scorched metal.
That night, long after everyone was in bed, I lay on my mattress
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