Behind the Dumpsters she lights her first cigarette of the day, which is normally the best one but they haven’t been tasting right lately. Soft chemical bloom on the roof of her mouth.
Why do some walruses in Washington, DC, who’ve never met the daughter care what she does with the clump? They don’t seem bothered that baby wolves are shot to death from helicopters. Those babies were already breathing on their own, running and sleeping and eating on their own, whereas the clump is not even a baby yet. Couldn’t survive two seconds outside the daughter.
The walruses are to blame for Yasmine.
Who sang at church.
Whose church was African Methodist Episcopal. Whenever the daughter went to services with the Salters after sleepovers, she felt strange.
Yasmine said: “Well, Matts, I feel strange all the time.”
Ignorant white girl.
It starts to rain. The daughter lights a second cigarette and decides to skip math, even if it means annoying Mr. Xiao, whom she does not want to annoy and who’ll say, next time he sees her, What the hell, Quarles? Nouri Withers will be in math, and who needs a glimpse of that mess. She closes her eyes, sucking, rain pittering on her lashes.
“Trying to get cancer?” Ro/Miss is standing right in front of her.
“No.” The daughter grinds the cigarette under her boot.
“Pick that up, please.”
The daughter tucks it into her peacoat pocket to avoid the inelegance of walking over to the Dumpster and struggling to lift its crusty lid. Her peacoat is going to reek of dead cigarette.
“Tell me what’s going on, Mattie.”
“Nothing.”
“You’ve never gotten a B minus on a quiz before.”
“I studied the wrong chapter.”
“Are you still upset about the whales?”
The daughter spits out a laugh. Looks across the soccer field at the jagged evergreens, the sky darkening behind them.
“You can talk to me, you know. I’ll help if I can.”
“You can’t,” says the daughter.
“Try me,” says Ro/Miss.
I’m too scared to go to Canada because of the Pink Wall but the witch went to jail and I need a plan and I don’t have a plan and what would you do if you were me?
But what if it’s in her teaching contract—mandatory reporting of child abuse and, in her case, child murder?
The daughter is not a murderer.
They’re only cells, multiplying.
No face yet. No dreams or opinions.
You didn’t have a face once either.
Ro/Miss reports her, and Principal Fivey kicks her out of Central Coast Regional.
Math Academy not thrilled about that.
Colleges not thrilled about that.
Mom and Dad least thrilled of all.
“I have class in a minute,” she says, “and Mr. Xiao said he’s going to rip the next person who’s late a new turd cutter.”
“Emotional health takes priority. I’ll handle Mr. Xiao.”
Maybe she can.
“It’s nothing,” says the daughter.
“Try me.”
Ro/Miss wouldn’t care if it’s in her contract. She’s fiercer than that.
The daughter says, still watching the trees: “I’m pregs?”
“Oh Jesus—”
“But I’m taking care of it.”
“In what way?” snaps Ro/Miss, engine-red, freckles pulsing like brown stars.
She’s angry?
“It’s being dealt with,” says the daughter.
“How can you be smoking?”
How can she be angry?
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Oh really?”
“The smoke won’t—”
“What do you plan to do, Mattie?”
“Terminate,” says the daughter.
Ro/Miss frowns.
“It’s just an embryo, miss. It can’t make an offer on a house, even though it has the legal right to.”
Not even the littlest twist of a smile at hearing herself quoted. “What happens if you get caught?”
This is not the Ro/Miss she loves.
“I won’t get caught,” says the daughter, buttoning her peacoat. The rain is coming down harder.
“But what if you do?”
“I won’t.”
What happened to the Ro/Miss who says we have better things to do with our lives than throw ourselves down the stairs?
“You know they’ll charge you with a felony? Which means juvenile detention until you’re eighteen, then—”
“I know, miss.”
She would be sent to Bolt River.
Who is this monstrous imposter?
Ro/Miss pushes back her parka hood and starts raking all ten fingers through her hair, scalp to ends, scalp to ends, like an actor playing a mental-hospital patient.
“I got the name of a termination house,” lies the daughter. “It’s supposed to be good.”
Raking, raking, scalp to ends. “Are you kidding?”
“Um, no?”
“Term houses charge a shit ton,” says Ro/Miss, “and take shortcuts because nobody, obviously, is regulating them. They use out‑of‑date equipment, don’t disinfect between patients, administer anesthesia without”—the first bell rings—“training.” The fingers stop, mid-rake.
“Please don’t tell my parents or Mr. Fivey?”
Tears in Ro/Miss’s eyes. As if this moment needed to get any worse.
“Are you going to tell them?” bleats the daughter. “Please don’t!”
It is weird to be scared of a person you’ve always been the opposite of scared of.
Ro/Miss pulls her hood back up. Tightens the drawstrings around her scrunched, streaming face. “I won’t.” She wipes her eyes with a parka sleeve. “This is just—This is really, I don’t know—”
“It’s okay,” says the daughter, touching her elbow.
The elbow stays against her hand.
Ro/Miss blinks and shudders.
They stand hand to elbow for what feels like a long time. They are both getting soaked and the daughter’s arm starts to hurt.
The second bell rings.
She says, “I have math?” and unhands the elbow.
“Sure. Yes.” Sniffles. “But Mattie …?”
The daughter waits.
The teacher shakes her head.
They walk together along the soccer field, not talking, and up the steps, not talking, and through the blue doors.