Skyscraping (10 page)

I don’t wait for the elevator,

I fly down flights of stairs,

almost crash into Adam’s parents in the lobby.

Adam’s mother,

caramel bob,

coral nails,

his dad in a suit.

They kiss me on the cheek,

tell me they hope to see more of me.

I kiss them back blindly,

thunder booms outside.

Feather clouds swallowed

by a crashing, storming sky.

The

North

Star

may

be

constant

but

it

is

still

four

hundred

and

thirty

light

years

away

from

those

floating

lost

and

stranded

here

on

Earth.

I walk the blocks,

rain drenching my hair, my clothes

down to my underwear,

I think I remember

knowing this boy,

that he was someone

who made me feel safe.

That he was someone

I so often agreed with.

Now he is someone

who has shamed me.

Shamed my family.

I walk the streets,

trying to remember,

block by block,

drop by drop,

who I am.

Soaking wet, I arrive home.

Mom asks if I’m okay,

I lie, say
yes, thanks,

pour myself into a hot bath.

Scrub until I can no longer

feel

Adam’s touch

or

words.

Next day, wake up,

don’t want to waste energy, time

on Adam, who obviously

doesn’t love, respect me.

Doesn’t know anything about my father.

I will Adam’s words to

float out of me,

out my window,

sink all the way down

to the bottom

of the Hudson.

Where they belong.

Before school, Mom takes us to get TB tests

to make sure we didn’t catch it

from breathing in Dad, orbiting his space.

The doctor gives us a sheet, what to watch for,

what could grow.

I wonder how scared Dad was when he had his HIV test,

long ago.

Wonder who went with him. Mom. James.

Or if he went alone.

April and I clutch hands,

hold each other up as we

breathe deep,

lock arms,

march in.

I enter Astro late,

Mr. Lamb’s talking about Carl Sagan.

A quote of his on the board, underlined:

We are made of star stuff.

Mr. Lamb goes on to say, whether or not any of us believe

in something spiritual, we are connected,

we all share matter.

I slide in next to Dylan.

Write him a note:

Is this astronomy or philosophy?

He writes
same thing,

asks how I’ve been.

Look down at my injection site, so far nothing’s grown.

Shrug, not sure what to say. Thoughts of Adam come too close.

Look at Dylan, push them away.

Write a note to Chloe,

an apology for ditching her for Adam.

Draw Dylan a doodle of a girl,

me,

floating above it all,

head shaped like a star.

He takes my pen,

Spot Chloe down the hall,

walk toward her,

note in hand

pass it over

till the school psychologist

gets in my face.

Blocks my path.

A bombardment.

You’re spending your free period with me,

she commands,

drags me to her room,

down a tunnel, second floor.

Says Mom called,

told her how sick Dad is.

I fold one hand into another,

don’t look at her.

In my head

I curl up into a ball.

Spin fast through the sky.

Feel the wind in my eyes.

Focus on the veins in my hands.

Intersecting highways.

Wish I could ride them

away from here.

She asks if I’m listening.

I nod, find a split end. Pick it.

Her volume increases,

tells me she can’t force me to talk about it.

But she knows, from experience, that being honest

and open with people, no matter what you’re feeling,

can make a difference. Make things better.

I don’t say anything—

wasn’t I honest, open with Adam?

That made things worse.

I focus on my fingernails now,

how fast they keep growing.

Can’t stop time from changing anything,

bit by bit, cell by cell.

Can’t stop time from flying.

She finally lets me go, a last plea,

that she’s here

if I need her.

Before I go,

think of Dad,

will myself

to stop and

look up

into her eyes,

surprised

to find some kindness

floating in them.

I

take a deep breath and

ask—

tears unexpectedly forming

in the corners of my eyes—

if when I’m gone

she’ll be here

able to help

my sister.

I.

Almost two days since the test,

three since Adam freaked out on me,

and since I lost my virginity.

At least none of us have shown any sign of TB,

wonder what James’s skin would show,

wonder if he’s sick.

After school,

we sit in the waiting room,

the nurse wheels Dad

down the hall.

Tall, blond,

all cheekbones,

clothes hang off him.

Two lesions on his forehead.

A disease that hides,

then eats people alive.

We follow behind,

past a child with a broken leg,

a pregnant woman breathing loudly.

II.

Outside.

Several empty cabs pass us by.

Do they see the lesions? Are they scared?

One stops.

I wonder,

does the driver care that Dad’s here,

breathing, in his space?

III.

We struggle into the lobby,

James holding up one side of Dad,

Mom, the other.

We share the elevator

with the woman from 14B.

She doesn’t look at Dad.

Doesn’t look at his lesions

or his skinny, bruised arms,

the way he cannot hold himself up.

She ignores all of us.

Finally, home.

Dad looks at his nightstand,

scattered with crystals—

blinking hopes of healing—

his own shelf of tiny purple cities.

Says okay, he’ll try the herbs.

Relief and fear

pulse through my veins.

April smiles wide.

Mom tells us nice work, they’re beautiful,

fetches Dad tissues for his coughing,

James rests in the reading chair,

Dad lays down to sleep.

W
ANING
G
IBBOUS
M
OON
, 20
D
AYS
L
EFT

Next day, in the cafeteria,

pick at a bagel, Chloe and Dylan

at the diner together.

I would’ve gone too

if I could find the courage to tell them:

My dad is really sick.

He has less than

three weeks left.

I take deep breaths,

eat small bites,

don’t think about how much time I’ve wasted

hurting rather than helping.

After school, after Peer Mentorship,

Gloria’s coming.

After school, a plan.

Focus in on Dad,

while there’s time.

Dad, head in Mom’s lap,

her reading
The Byzantine Empire
aloud.

She’s got tissues, water glass, pill.

April and Gloria come in together,

we all gather round.

Gloria says TB

used to be called consumption,

it consumed from within.

Says we need to strengthen the body,

the lungs specifically,

thank goodness, she says,

Dad doesn’t have pneumonia too.

She says he needs more vitamin D

to help slow the progression of KS,

acupuncture can help with that too.

I take notes as she speaks.

She pulls out more bottles:

Astragalus. Mint. Green tea.

Then: bananas, oranges, pineapple juice.

Dad raises his eyebrows,

we catch a smile between us,

a New Age Mary Poppins,

Gloria with her big black bag of remedies.

She asks if we’ve ever

heard of custard apple,

breaks open a green pale bumpy fruit

with her hands.

Tells April to fetch a spoon for Dad.

As he tries this strange fruit, the herbs, the juice,

I wonder if we can stop time from consuming him,

consuming us.

I wonder if we try hard enough,

we can stop time

from       flying.

Days march on

grains mount

pills swallowed

breathe in

out

tick

tock

try to slow

the falling

sands.

Mr. Lamb says a blueshift means

that an object is moving toward

the observer.

The larger the blueshift,

the faster the object is moving.

Time is only speeding up.

The principal and I have

a disciplinary check-in.

When I get there, it isn’t just her—

Mom’s there

in a dark blue suit,

pen and notepad ready,

like she’s auditioning

for the role of a sitcom mom.

The principal says

according to teachers

I’ve been coming to class,

turning in homework,

I seem to be back on track.

Mom apologizes for my past behavior,

says that this year’s been stressful,

that Dad’s been given very little time.

I tell the principal that she doesn’t have to worry,

that I know life is precious,

I want a future I can be proud of.

The principal shakes my hand,

says she’s glad to have me back,

hopes my dad gets stronger soon.

I look at Mom, who smirks a little,

both of us wondering what part of

very little time

the principal doesn’t understand.

Mom, in blue, comes closer still

like she wants to hug me goodbye.

I let her touch my shoulder,

wonder if someday soon

I’ll feel like moving closer.

That night Mom, still in her suit,

asks if she can come in,

sits on my bed.

I shrug. Turn a bit in my windowseat.

She says she wants to tell me something:

She didn’t only go to Italy for work,

she left because Dad fell so hard for James,

she didn’t know how to exist

on the periphery of their love.

She says Italy was amazing, she learned

more during that year abroad than she had in her

whole life as an artist. But when she got

that call from Dad

she gave it all up.

I came home when he got sick.

I came home because he needed me.

Then I knew, someday, we’d be sitting here.

Counting time.

I look at her.

I came back to be with you.

To be with your sister.

As a family.

She says she’s sorry for how much she missed that year.

And all the other times she hasn’t been around.

I ask her if April knows the truth,

she says she will talk to her too.

I used to imagine she saw us as a train

she could ride at will,

instead of a station,

fixed, every day.

I wonder now if maybe

a family is neither of those things

but something stable,

yet always changing,

because the people inside it are.

I move from the windowseat.

Don’t hug her or thank her,

but I do ask her

where on earth

she found that suit.

She laughs.

After she leaves,

I find the buried broken fish

in the bottom of my closet—

carry the pieces to the bathroom sink,

wash them one by one,

lay them gently

to dry

on the ledge.

L
AST
Q
UARTER
M
OON
, 18
D
AYS
L
EFT

Dylan calls,

he misses me,

can he come over.

So little time left

before school is over.

I take a breath,

say okay.

When he arrives,

I try to walk him straight to my room

but he stops—

looks around—

touches every piece of art:

Dad’s masks,

Mom’s glass creatures,

says my parents are

sort of geniuses.

Dad calls out, asks who’s here,

tells us to come say hi.

I pause.

Dylan smiles at me

sideways.

We plunk down the two steps to the living room.

James there too.

For now,

another day,

another round of chess.

Dylan says

he likes James’s Alice in Chains shirt,

Dad asks Dylan about college.

I watch Dylan’s eyes

scan Dad’s hollowed face,

his hair sticking up,

small lesion scabbing his mouth.

Steer Dylan to my room,

we pull out Connect Four.

I’m red. Dylan’s black.

About to put my first piece in—

he blocks my hand, holds it,

says
Mira, I’m so sorry.

Why didn’t you tell us?

I say
I didn’t know how.

Then I say to myself, as much as to Dylan:

The HIV’s progressed to full-blown AIDS.

He’s dying.

Tears in his eyes,

Dylan says
I know,

he has a cousin

who has it too.

I tell him I’m sorry.

Suck in my breath.

Tell him my parents

have an open marriage.

He nods.

Tell him Adam

thinks it’s all disgusting.

Dylan says

Adam’s a jackass.

We play the game,

drop

pieces in.

As the chips fall and land,

truth fills the space between us,

and, one by one,

red over black under red,

my heart lifts a little,

we both win.