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I have English and I don’t feel like going to class. Something about the possibility of seeing myself throw makes me edgy / nervous / panicked. My phone vibrates when I’m ten steps from the classroom door / bell about to ring / don’t even know the title of the story I was supposed to read last night / stuck in a never-ending rotisserie family meeting.
My English teacher is at the door, greeting students like he always does / fist bumps and high fives. He sees me / I see him / I can’t go in.
Freeze! Nobody move.
As I walk through the hallway of motionless high school students, I see they are all anomalies, too. Tasha Kirsch is an anomaly of friendship / is friends with everyone / even me. Kevin is frozen mid-flex / an anomaly of self-adoration of his biceps. That tall kid who sings in the choir / his range is impossible from falsetto to baritone / an anomalous pharynx. Heather Flake is totally vaping weed tucked into the entrance to the girls bathroom / straight-A student / runs most clubs / is completely baked / anomalous stoner. Abnormal is what high schoolers do, no matter how normal we may seem / it’s our job.
The minute they put us in this building we’re expected to be something we aren’t. Interested / engaged / athletic / baby grown-ups with the will to be social and succeed in life. The building acts factory / as if it can turn out capable adults, and it will. Adults like Richard / our rifle / normal on the outside / interiorly, needs an exterminator. Adults like our sister / an assortment of bombs / an anomaly to the truth. Adults like Mama and Daddy / broken and shamed for nothing but being human / having never been given human skills / Plutchik’s Clock. This building is a swimming class that only teaches its students how to float on their backs / keep heads above water / no bayonets / unprepared for a full-frontal attack / life / but I know how to multiply fractions.
I find an empty classroom and sit at the desk closest to the door and play Len’s footage of my throw. It’s a minute long. I watch it ten times / ten minutes / my form isn’t that bad / I just look determined. I close in on the jav as it flies / look for myself / I am there, next to the jav / flying. I am also still on the field next to Coach Aimee and Giselle, watching it fly.
The only thing anomalous about this throw / ability / determination is the fact that I don’t want to be like anyone else / want to throw like anyone else / want to walk like anyone else / you get the picture. The only thing anomalous about me / Truda Becker / is that it took me too long to show anyone what I was made of / now they think I’m made of magic.
I start time again and go to English class / my only option / can’t hide all day / fist-bump on my way through the door.
The story we were supposed to read was about a kid who was determined to hurt his parents by failing, but only hurt himself / propaganda / propaganda / always a moral to a story that no one is actually living.
GROWTH MINDSET II
I don’t even like being on the track team / quit seven hundred times today in my head.
We stretch in the gym / the gym is propaganda / banners and trophies from things that don’t matter / energy confined by painted lines.
“Meet on Tuesday,” Coach Aimee says. “Who’s ready to beat their own numbers?”
When everyone yells “I AM!” I mouth the words / quit track team again.
We move outside for some running and sprinting and my spikes feel heavy.
Carrie walks with me. “I had that feeling again today,” she says, “like time slowed down or something. My fingers tingled. I asked Henry if he felt it, too. He sits next to me. He said he felt like throwing up all of a sudden.”
“Bummer. I hope you didn’t catch anything from him,” I say.
“So you don’t feel it at all?”
“No. When was it?”
“At the beginning of first period,” she says.
“Right after we sent the letter?”
“Yeah.”
I say, “That letter had me jumpy all day.”
“Ellie thinks we’ll get in trouble,” she says.
“We might.”
“You don’t seem to care,” she says.
“I live in a plywood tilt-a-whirl, Carrie.”
“Yeah. I guess that’s hard,” she says. “I mean—to care about anything else.”
“I care, but I don’t care about Nigel. He gets what he earned, you know? Just like the rest of us.”
I did / didn’t mean for that to come out so curtly / Look at me.
Carrie notices something is wrong / I start running laps.
* * *
—
My eye contact / nothing but the jav. I stare at it even when Coach Aimee is talking about new throwing order. I think she says the new throwing order is that I go last.
So I go last.
My form still resembles a choking water fowl. I throw it clear into the woods. Probably about three hundred and twenty feet. Coach Turner is a proud-grandfather type / Aimee plays the part of a jealous sibling.
“Hot damn!” he says.
“Go get it,” Aimee says, and points to the woods beyond the shot-put area.
I walk into the woods and it’s not like I imagined / a lot of trash on the ground / remnants of small parties. There is a pair of panties / an empty six-pack / a soggy hamburger roll.
As I walk back onto the field and around the outside of the track toward the throwing area, I see Giselle, Kelly, and Petra spike-throwing and shoulder-rolling / tumbleweed of angry girls with ponytails. I keep my eye on the jav / it is no longer me.
x equals how I was the jav so I could fly.
x equals how I can fly by myself.
TEENAGE CHILL SPOT
“Don’t disappear today,” Carrie says to me. “We’re going to McDonald’s.”
I almost say no, but remember that I don’t want to go home. Nothing wrong with home—Mama and Daddy and Richard will be there. Maybe Carmichael. I love all those people. But the boxes / I am done with splinters / family meetings.
I text that I won’t be home until ten and then promise not to look for a reply / look at my callused hands and think about how many nails I’ve pulled / how much time I’ve spent disassembling Daddy’s project / whatever it is.
WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW ABOUT THE BOXES
Daddy knew he was losing a battle /
was unprepared for the ambush.
The boxes are frenzy.
The boxes are safety.
The boxes are structure.
The boxes are magic / erase memory
the way Mama talks to dead cats—
the boxes are a scam /
fake love affairs.
Nothing will be right
until the boxes are gone.
Because it’s Friday night, McDonald’s is packed with other teenagers from our school and the neighboring school district. Carrie and I wait in line and the tall kid from school—the choirboy with the anomalous pharynx—works there and smiles at me / reminds me that every person in the place might recognize me.
And so they should. Today I threw a javelin into the woods and broke my own world record. Usually I want to disappear / instead / I look him right in the eye and smile. He smiles back. The feeling I have after this exchange is something I am not used to / confidence.
I grew it myself.
Carrie and I keep exchanging looks because it’s too loud to talk. There must be fifty loud teenagers in the space in front of the counter. She hands me her phone, where she’s typed I’m sorry about what I said Wednesday at lunch. I nod and check my options.
Carrie could be lying to me.
Carrie could be telling the truth.
It doesn’t really matter.
She types more into the phone. That tall guy just gave you the love eyes.
I grab the phone / write back Stop trying to get me to like people just because they smile at me. We wait and wait and finally land in front of the giant choirboy / order / pay / receive / find a table near the back door. I see people looking at me / stand up straighter / push my shoulders back / refuse to be ashamed of being Truda Becker anymore.
The insect is still there / is simply too tiny to matter.
* * *
—
I’d planned on having a conversation with Carrie in her kitchen when she invited me out. I didn’t know she’d planned to eat here / no place for a conversation.
But she tries.
“So is your dad’s art project, like, also a carnival ride or something?”
I can’t answer her because I’ve just taken a huge bite of my Big Mac.
“Because the other day, it didn’t look like it was working right,” she says. “I mean, if it’s a ride or something supposed to be fun. You looked terrified.”
“Let’s talk about it at your house,” I say.
“We can’t go to my house,” she says. “My parents are there.”
“We can’t just go to your room?” We always just go to her room.
“They told me not to come home until ten.”
“Oh.”
“I can’t tell if that’s normal or not,” she says.
I shrug. I almost suggest we go to my house / forget we don’t have bathrooms anymore.
We eat and listen to the conversations around us. No one is staring or noticing me the way I feared they would / it’s okay to be good at something / set a world record / eat a Big Mac. Carrie looks at her phone.
She says, “Len and Eric want to meet up somewhere.” She checks her school email. “Still no reply from the school board.”
* * *
The stadium is quiet at night / no party in the woods / no arguing field judges. The moon is rising and it’s getting dark slowly—stars pop out one by one.
“I think they should have answered by now,” Len says.
“I don’t,” Eric says. “It’ll probably make my mom cry. She cries enough.”
“My dad will take care of it,” Ellie says.
“They’re being quiet to scare us,” I say.
“Doesn’t scare me,” Len says.
“Nothing scares you,” Carrie says.
“Do you think we should enter phase two before Monday?” Len asks.
“I think we should wait,” I say.
“Why?” Eric asks.
“Because by Monday, everything could be different,” I say.
Eric pulls out his ukulele and strums some chords and Len and Ellie talk for a while and Carrie sings a little to Eric’s song and I stand up and stretch my arms to get rid of the tension / ready me for the nails I’ll pull tonight.
We chill out for an hour or so / debate phase two. For twenty minutes, they’re all for phase two / shaming Nigel in the town square / internet. The following twenty minutes they lean toward waiting until Monday. Every time they ask me what I think / I think we should wait. To understand anything is to understand energy. Every time I say “I think we should wait,” there is energy.
Twenty minutes later / Len dares me to throw a javelin / hands one right to me.
We walk down to the field / Len pulls out his camera / I say no cameras.
I start my run from as far back as I can / bounce / three steps / throw. My friends / hands over their eyes / squinting / no halogens / searching the darkness. It is gone / the jav is gone / beyond the woods / beyond the highway on the other side / beyond the Target department store and the place where Daddy buys meat / beyond the residue / beyond state lines / beyond the oceans / beyond this plane / my mother could talk to it now, if she wants.
Psych Team takes a final vote.
We will wait until Monday.
SOLUTION
Daddy and Mama are on the front lawn when Carrie drops me off at ten. They’re sitting on lawn chairs as if they’re enjoying a sunny day in Miami. It’s only forty-five degrees out here and I’m positive that the house has finally collapsed on itself and I will have to sleep outside for the night / the car is gone / wonder where Richard is.
“We are watching for meteors,” Daddy says.
I look around. “The backyard would work a lot better. Can’t see anything with these streetlights.”
“We like it here,” Mama says.
They are holding hands between chairs, and Daddy is drinking a glass of red wine.
“We are finding solution,” Daddy says.
I enter through the me-shaped hole. Our house is still carpet-on-the-west-wall / 270 degrees turned. With Daddy outside / holding hands / Richard out for a drive / it’s the perfect time.
SPLINTERS
I pull nail after nail after nail. Psych Team will wait until Monday / I will not. Daddy’s boxes must go / today / tomorrow / before I have to shit into a bucket again.
I hear Richard arrive home and soon after, I hear Mama and Daddy come inside and the three of them talking in the kitchen. I work near box #9 / her room / her not-room / attempt to collapse it from underneath / seems dumb / willing splinters / reward for destroying the remote controller.
Splinters / are / reward.
Box #9 is a power station / nuclear / the energy has a half-life of forever.
It’s just memories / memories are the insect / just one sting can kill you / depends on the bug. My flying / jav / Paleolithic removed the bug. I’m not sure what to do with the rest of my family / will have to find their own bugs on their own time. This is how I will save them / I will open box #9 and let the energy out.
Daddy will cry / the house will turn / Mama will stop being a mothering yo-yo.
Richard will find a way to remove the screwdriver from his back.
* * *
—
When they’re all in bed, I take a break / kitchen / ham-and-cheese sandwich and Daddy’s home-fried potato chips. I stretch my arms and neck and back / drink milk out of the carton.
An hour later, the noise is impossible / interior of box #9 collapses / Mama always said she wanted a guest room. I freeze time / just to stand here and be satisfied.
While time is frozen, I move my way through the hallway to my room / pulling nails. Box #8 is already done / the bathroom. I take a left toward the silent living room / box #2 / no air in the vents and no wind outside / the world is frozen. I start in the corner and stand on the kitchen table to reach the high nails.
I hear a noise behind me / turn around.
Daddy is in the kitchen, cutting a piece of crumb cake / has his toolbelt on / not sleepwalking / can’t see me. I freeze / like everyone else in the world right now / thanks to me / this is weird.
Cleanup
DADDY’S BREAKFAST SOFTWARE
Carmichael arrives at sunrise. Daddy makes him breakfast / alarm clock for the rest of us / smells so good, we arrive with our hands out.
“Carmichael asked for breakfast burritos!” Daddy says.
We sit around the kitchen table, still in the living room on plywood so it doesn’t fall through the floor / wall. We eat small, delicious, homemade tortillas filled with God. I stare at the corner where I stood only hours ago while time was stopped, watching Daddy carve a midnight snack. I look from the corner to the kitchen.
Daddy explains that it’s cleanup day. “Sunny day with nice warm to clean our things,” he says.
“I’m starting with Tru in her room,” Mama says.
“I will work with Richard,” Daddy says.
Carmichael smiles. I look from the corner to the kitchen. Then Daddy.
Corner / kitchen / Daddy.
x equals Freeze! NOBODY MOVE.
He’s mid-sentence when everyone freezes. He only notices I did it at all when I start time again / nearly instantly / looks like a glitch in his software.
But he knows / and I know / we try to avoid eye contact but end up staring at each other. He must know about all the other times I did it / didn’t say a thing. Daddy / an anomaly like me / can stop time / I don’t understand this and I don’t want to.
INSIDE OUT
“We can’t even keep the bed?” I ask Mama.
“Not for now. Not inside.”
I sit on it and even though my window is sideways / my sockets are in the floor and ceiling / “Ooo!” / emptying my room feels like I’m moving out before it’s time.
We put my clothing into black bags. Mama puts them in her car for organizational purposes, she says, but every cell in my body thinks she will kidnap my clothing / replace it with skirts with bells on the edge. I ask myself what Robert Plutchik would do.
“Can we talk?” I ask.
Mama is standing, and I motion for her to sit.
“I don’t trust you,” I say. “I want to trust you but I don’t.”
“I’m not going to leave again,” she says. “My shaman told me to stay and heal the family.”
“Can you really do that kind of thing?”
“Yes.”
Look at her / more serious than ever.
“But you still don’t trust me,” she says. “Which is smart. I walked out of here at the worst time. For you. For your father. For your brother. I was selfish, I guess, but I would have never survived had I stayed.”
She looks even more serious now. I don’t know what to say. Everything I ever thought about her is mixed up with everything I ever heard about her / I heard a lot.
“You want to heal but you’re not sure if it’s time,” she says. “If you heal too soon, the bad energy could come and fuck it all up again, right? But if you wait, you could lose your chance at being happy in the here and now of your life.”
