Brightside, Mark Tullius [philippa perry book .TXT] 📗

IT WAS WINTER AND I was in kindergarten, my very first day. The bell rang and class began. Miss Parker assigned us seats. Corey thought I smelled like a girl. Tameka asked to be moved because her dad told her never to trust a honky. Jennie thought I looked weird and stupid.

I knew all this before naptime, and it only got worse.

I’d been hearing other people’s thoughts for a few months, but never this many at one time. Miss Parker had told us to be quiet, to try and fall asleep. The ones who couldn’t would just lie there and think. A million voices blasting straight into my head. It was like standing behind a jet engine. I covered my ears, mashing my palms until I thought I’d crack my skull, but that’s not how thoughts entered me. They just shot in, and I screamed. Miss Parker ran over, thinking I was having a nightmare. She saw my pants covered in piss. Some kids laughed, they all thought I was a baby.

I kept my hands over my crotch. Miss Parker told everyone to be quiet. She took my hand. Her skin was dry and scaly, covered in chalk. She took me to the bathroom to get cleaned up. She said there was a change of pants in the teacher’s lounge. This sort of thing happened a lot. I remember my little pecker rubbing against the corduroy because the school didn’t carry underwear. Miss Parker had to cuff the legs because they were too long. I wondered how many other peckers had touched this zipper.

Miss Parker held my hand again, her skin cutting into mine, and we went back to class. The kids were quietly thinking I was a retard, except for Steven, probably the only Chinese kid in Columbus. He thought the other kids were jerks, but he just sat there, said nothing. I would’ve done the same.

When the day finally ended, I waited for everyone to leave the room then slipped on my red rain boots because Mom said comfy winter ones were a waste of money. I put on my puffy blue jacket that was my Hulk jacket when I wore Dad’s green sweatshirt over it and growled at the mirror. I left my gloves in my pocket and headed to the door. I hoped it wasn’t too cold out. I hoped I wouldn’t have to wait long. Mom had promised she wouldn’t forget. But she said not to worry enough times for me to know better.

The snow was coming down hard, the sky a dark cloud. I put on my gloves that were only just mittens, the kind without fingers because they were cheaper.

Over half the class had already been picked up, their parents waiting out front. The rest of the kids were lined up along the fence with Miss Parker folding her arms and hopping up and down looking like a skinny Big Bird. She had the same puffy yellow hair, too, but hid most of it under her brown hat with the giant ear-flaps.

She said it was the rule to wait by the fence, but there were kids spilling out by the street. I headed over to the end, squeezed in between Steven and the giant mound of snow.

Steven was dressed for success, a bright blue snow coat and matching vest, a light blue button-down beneath it. No one had told his parents dressing like that came later in life. Maybe they knew Steven’s life would be a short one.

He never looked up from his six-inch tall Superman, the strongest man on the planet.

I had both hands in my jacket pockets, holding each other and my belly because the lining was ripped and Mom didn’t sew. I kicked away a circle of snow. My boots were too thin and I was going to be there a while.

Steven aimed Superman at the ground and thought, Melt this with your heat vision.

“What?” I said.

“I didn’t say nothing,” Steven said.

“Sorry,” I said.

I’d learned to apologize when I mistakenly thought someone had said their thoughts out loud. People got angry when I didn’t. They called me crazy.

Every night I prayed for God to make it go away, but it was always there, the noise inside other people’s heads. I never listened on purpose. Never reached in and stole people’s thoughts, like some believed. For me, it’s like hearing a person’s true voice, the things they really believe. It’s a whisper from six feet, a scream at just inches. The more focused the thought, the louder it gets.

You know that silent awkwardness when someone is holding their tongue, stewing in anger after someone does something awful, because they don’t want to cause a scene? Well, for me, it’s like being face-to-face with a wailing psychopath. An endless scream of all the horrible things people really want to do to each other.

Back then I was still getting used to it. Part of me wanted to turn to Steven and see if his lips were moving. The other part was smart enough to know the things he was thinking weren’t things anyone would say. He was pointing Superman at Corey, the kid who thought I smelled like a girl and that Steven was a fucking chink.

I started humming my ABC’s, occupying my mind, blocking Steven out.

It wasn’t long before Brenda’s mom drove up. Then Darryl’s. Then Jennie’s. The next time I counted there were only five of us left.

Steven turned to me and held out Superman. Steven’s eyes were so squinted I could barely see the black. He was thinking he should have stood up for me after I’d pissed my pants. “You can borrow him,” he said.

I didn’t know what to say. I almost asked if he could hear my thoughts, because I’d been watching him play with that toy and wanted it for myself. But I’d learned that was a good way to get laughed at. I just nodded and said thanks.

A shiny black Mercedes pulled up to the gate. Miss Parker called Steven by his real name, Hong, even though he’d asked her not to that morning.

That got Corey started. Bigger than most of us and blacker than all, he ran over and started doing his gorilla impression, pounding his chest, stomping snow everywhere. He shouted, “Hong Kong, Hong Kong.”

Steven’s face got red, but he didn’t say a word about how he was going to jump in the car and have his father plow right into Corey. Then Corey slanted his eyes and unleashed his ching-chang-ching talk. Steven figured Corey was jealous of the car. He had no idea Corey was jealous of the stone-faced woman staring straight ahead in the backseat. Corey’s mom had died of tuberculosis.

If I’d been bigger, braver, I would have said something to defend my very first friend, but I knew Corey would turn on me, ask me where’s my diaper. Despite the cold, my feet freezing so bad they might crack, I had a warm feeling in my chest and didn’t want to ruin it. Soon, Steven was out the gate, climbing in the front seat of the Mercedes.

In the next few minutes, Corey and the rest of the kids were picked up and gone. It was just me and Superman. The bone-aching cold. Miss Parker.

Miss Parker told me to stay where I was, that she’d be right back. I had nowhere to go and was used to waiting so that’s what I did. She went into the classroom and came back out a few minutes later. Instead of heading back to the gate, she walked up to me, touched my puffy blue jacket and put her face real close.

Miss Parker had a face that made you pay attention. That’s what Dad said to do. Pay attention to it. Miss Parker smoked cigarettes when she was a kid. She’d be a Miss forever.

Having anyone’s face just inches away wasn’t easy, but I didn’t flinch. I just stood there, waited for her to talk. I’ve always been shy, have a hard time looking people in the eyes, but I looked Miss Parker in her murky blue ones because she’d been nice to me, gave me the corduroys and told all the kids that if anyone else laughed they’d be sent to the principal’s office.

Miss Parker gave her half-smile, spoke out the right side of her mouth. “Your mom didn’t answer, Joey. Is there another number I can call?”

I shook my head no. Mom had more important things to do than worry about me.

“Is there anyone else that can come get you? Maybe your dad?”

No one called Dad when he was at work. I wouldn’t be first. I told Miss Parker no, held Superman tight and tried to stomp the cold right out of my boots.

This poor kid, Miss Parker thought. I’m going to have to deal with this for the rest of the year.

Miss Parker didn’t know what to do. She’d never been stuck with a kid this long and never in the cold. The cold made her bones hurt, but she pretended it didn’t.

I showed her Superman and pointed at his S. “He’s made of steel.”

Miss Parker walked me over to the gate. “That’s nice.”

I’d given up on Mom, but had an idea. It wasn’t as cold when I was moving and it was just four blocks to my house.

A blue car passed by the gate, went through the intersection and pulled to the curb halfway up the block. Miss Parker had her back to it so I pointed at the car and said, “There she is.”

Miss Parker had no reason to doubt me and was already thinking about the space heater beneath her desk. “Tell your mom she needs to pick you up right here from now on. And tell her we can’t wait so long.”

I looked both ways and ran across the street. When I got to the other side I slowed down. I didn’t want to get to the car too quick. It wasn’t a Buick.

A fat man with humongous black boots pushed himself out of the car like it was a clown trick. Miss Parker didn’t see because