—an excerpt—
Rain soaks the day at one hundred percent. One hundred percent precipitation, one hundred percent dampness, darkness, dreariness, soaked-to-the-bone-ness.
“I can’t go, Nana,” I say. “It’s raining waterfalls.”
My fear steams up the front door window. I draw a spooky fish.
My grandmother sneaks up behind me. I turn and her turtly neck flops forward. She stares at me like a bubble eye goldfish. “It’s a one-block walk,” she says in our language.
“You mean swim,” I grumble.
She chuckles; hobbles back to the kitchen.
“Nana, listen,” I say. “I really can’t go. If I step outside, I am guaranteed misery, one hundred percent misery. A sea of images snapped by my enemies will flush out my retinas, my feet will eat mud, leaden drops will IV themselves into my veins, I will wither in stink, a deluge of flotsam will drag me to the depths of my tears, then the kids that called me out on my ugliness will set up a haunting station on the bottom of the ocean, chances are, chances are.”
Nana doesn’t respond. I think she is deaf. Or she is under the water with my parents, complaining about my complaints.
“Chances are it will never stop!” I shout. “Even if I turn into a photosynthetic alga or a Nanoarchaeum equitans, I’ll drown in their hatred. I will lose my intelligence, my self-confidence, my ambition, become unfit for college, for kissing, for growing tough and wise like you.”
Nana glances back; clacks her tongue: “Enough.”
I open the door. I show her my fate.
Shhh…Shhh…Tempestuous waves rise and twist like venomous sea snakes, like my torturous classmates, pouncing, paralyzing, and implanting their poison: your looks, your weirdness, your unworthy roots.
“Chances are I am doomed,” I say.
