Ask the Passengers

About the two Latino freshman girls: The parents don’t even speak English. This is America, isn’t it? Franny Lopez is third-generation American, and her parents don’t even speak Spanish. Michelle Marquez’s mother has it bad enough without having to learn a second language. Mind your own business.

About my family: Did you see they have birdhouses all over their yard? I don’t know about you, but that’s inviting bird shit, and who wants bird shit?

They say: It’s just not natural that he makes his girl use a hammer.

Maybe this sort of thing happens in your town, too.

“Wish you could come to Sparky’s with us tonight,” Kristina says.

“I’ll live without a root beer float until next summer,” I say.

We’re a block from our houses, in the prettiest part of town. I used to think the two-hundred-year-old redbrick buildings were so cute, you know? I used to think the cobblestone town center was quaint. It was different and new. And kinda forced on me, but it was cool, too, once I got over the initial shock.

“I can totally bring you a root beer float, you know. Not sure why that’s only occurring to me now,” she says. “What’s better than Sparky’s except Sparky’s room service?”

“That would rock so much, I’d owe you something big. Like maybe an ear or a toe or something,” I say.

She laughs. “You don’t have to give me your toe, dude.”

“Oh. Good,” I say, pretending I’m relieved. “I was planning on using mine for stuff later today, like walking. And standing upright.”

Kristina laughs again and even snorts a little. But then she gets that worried look on her face as we approach her house. “Do you think people know?” she asks. She’s so random.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” I say.

“I wish I could be as sure.”

“Don’t worry. No one knows.”

“You’re not bullshitting?” she asks.

“No bullshit. Promise. I am the ears of this town. No one knows.”

2

AUBERGINES, FOYERS, AND THE HORSE WHO LIVES UPSTAIRS.

WHEN I GET HOME and put my backpack on the desk in the quiet room, I hear Mom’s rolling office chair carving tracks into the wood floor upstairs. She rolls to the east side of the office and then rolls back. Each push makes a series of loud clopping sounds, as if there’s a dancing horse upstairs.

My mother wears expensive high heels all day while she works, even though she works at home. She wears full business attire, too, and makeup and earrings and has her hair perfectly styled, even though nobody ever sees her. When she breaks for lunch, she clip-clops downstairs to the kitchen and then clip-clops back upstairs—back straight, eyes focused just above the horizon, as if she’s still in New York City, walking down Park Avenue, being a big, important art director. When I hear her clip-clopping, I am immediately annoyed. At everything. At Unity Valley. At her. At this house and how I can hear her upstairs because the house is a million years old and there’s no insulation between ceilings and floors, unless you count centuries-old mouse nests.

We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for my grandmother dying. Mom’s mom. She used to tell Ellis and me stories about growing up where there were cornfields and hills to roll down. On our last visit to her Upper West Side apartment, Gram mentioned to Mom and Dad that the house Gram grew up in—one of the oldest on Main Street in Unity Valley—was up for sale.

Even though Gram lived her whole adult life in New York City, she was buried back in Unity Valley, next to her mother, my great-grandmother. We drove by the house fifty times the week of her funeral, and one time we stopped the car and Mom got out and talked to a person walking down the sidewalk. The lady said, “They’ll never get what they’re asking. The place is too small, and the market is too slow.”

That’s all it took for Mom to call the real estate agent.

“It’s rightfully mine,” she’d said. “I remember visiting my grandmother in it when I was little, and always wishing I lived there,” she’d said. “We won’t move permanently, but we should buy it. It’s like an heirloom. I finally have a chance to buy it back into our family.”

So she did. A year later, when I was ten and Ellis was nine, we moved. Now we’re small-town girls. Except that we aren’t. And Mom is a hometown girl. Except that she isn’t.

Clip-clop, clip-clop, clip-clop. She descends the steps, and I start to unpack my books onto the quiet-room desk to get ready for the trig homework I’ve been avoiding all day.

“How was your day?” she asks Ellis, who’s been sitting in the kitchen this whole time but hasn’t said hello.

“I’m starting against Wilson tomorrow,” she says.

“I suppose that’s good, is it?” Mom never played sports. So, Ellis’s field hockey is her introduction to words like starting, varsity and shin splints.

“It’s great,” Ellis answers.

“How great? Will we see you on the front page of the sports section soon?”

Ellis rolls her eyes. “It’s great for me. And the team. And maybe it means Coach Jane will start me more often.”

“I can’t understand why she doesn’t make you the star of the team. This whole fairness-to-seniors idea is so silly. If they backed talent no matter what age, it would get them further.”

I’m still in the quiet room playing invisible, but I want to explain to Mom that you can’t make a player star of the team by better advertising or better shelf placement, the way she does with her clients’ products.

“I think it’s fair to let the seniors start,” Ellis says.

“Well, it won’t help you get your name in the paper, so you’ll have to forgive me if I disagree,” Mom says. “Help me make dinner?”

Ellis deflates and claims homework time in her bedroom. Mom goes into the kitchen to make dinner without asking me how my day was, even though she knows I’m here.

The quiet room is technically the foyer. In our house, you pronounce that correctly.Foy-yay, not foy-er. We call it the quiet room because as long as the horse isn’t dancing upstairs and the door is closed, it is the quietest room in the house. It’s where my mother hopes to read classic novels again one day when she isn’t working nine days a week, and it’s where I do my homework because Ellis plays loud music when she works in her bedroom and I can’t concentrate. And I need to concentrate because trig is killing me.

the two Latino freshman girls: The parents don’t even speak English. This is America, isn’t it? Franny Lopez is third-generation American, and her parents don’t even speak Spanish. Michelle Marquez’s mother has it bad enough without having to learn a second language. Mind your own business.

About my family: Did you see they have birdhouses all over their yard? I don’t know about you, but that’s inviting bird shit, and who wants bird shit?

They say: It’s just not natural that he makes his girl use a hammer.

Maybe this sort of thing happens in your town, too.

“Wish you could come to Sparky’s with us tonight,” Kristina says.

“I’ll live without a root beer float until next summer,” I say.

We’re a block from our houses, in the prettiest part of town. I used to think the two-hundred-year-old redbrick buildings were so cute, you know? I used to think the cobblestone town center was quaint. It was different and new. And kinda forced on me, but it was cool, too, once I got over the initial shock.

“I can totally bring you a root beer float, you know. Not sure why that’s only occurring to me now,” she says. “What’s better than Sparky’s except Sparky’s room service?”

“That would rock so much, I’d owe you something big. Like maybe an ear or a toe or something,” I say.

She laughs. “You don’t have to give me your toe, dude.”

“Oh. Good,” I say, pretending I’m relieved. “I was planning on using mine for stuff later today, like walking. And standing upright.”

Kristina laughs again and even snorts a little. But then she gets that worried look on her face as we approach her house. “Do you think people know?” she asks. She’s so random.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” I say.

“I wish I could be as sure.”

“Don’t worry. No one knows.”

“You’re not bullshitting?” she asks.

“No bullshit. Promise. I am the ears of this town. No one knows.”

2

AUBERGINES, FOYERS, AND THE HORSE WHO LIVES UPSTAIRS.

WHEN I GET HOME and put my backpack on the desk in the quiet room, I hear Mom’s rolling office chair carving tracks into the wood floor upstairs. She rolls to the east side of the office and then rolls back. Each push makes a series of loud clopping sounds, as if there’s a dancing horse upstairs.

My mother wears expensive high heels all day while she works, even though she works at home. She wears full business attire, too, and makeup and earrings and has her hair perfectly styled, even though nobody ever sees her. When she breaks for lunch, she clip-clops downstairs to the kitchen and then clip-clops back upstairs—back straight, eyes focused just above the horizon, as if she’s still in New York City, walking down Park Avenue, being a big, important art director. When I hear her clip-clopping, I am immediately annoyed. At everything. At Unity Valley. At her. At this house and how I can hear her upstairs because the house is a million years old and there’s no insulation between ceilings and floors, unless you count centuries-old mouse nests.

We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for my grandmother dying. Mom’s mom. She used to tell Ellis and me stories about growing up where there were cornfields and hills to roll down. On our last visit to her Upper West Side apartment, Gram mentioned to Mom and Dad that the house Gram grew up in—one of the oldest on Main Street in Unity Valley—was up for sale.

Even though Gram lived her whole adult life in New York City, she was buried back in Unity Valley, next to her mother, my great-grandmother. We drove by the house fifty times the week of her funeral, and one time we stopped the car and Mom got out and talked to a person walking down the sidewalk. The lady said, “They’ll never get what they’re asking. The place is too small, and the market is too slow.”

That’s all it took for Mom to call the real estate agent.

“It’s rightfully mine,” she’d said. “I remember visiting my grandmother in it when I was little, and always wishing I lived there,” she’d said. “We won’t move permanently, but we should buy it. It’s like an heirloom. I finally have a chance to buy it back into our family.”

So she did. A year later, when I was ten and Ellis was nine, we moved. Now we’re small-town girls. Except that we aren’t. And Mom is a hometown girl. Except that she isn’t.

Clip-clop, clip-clop, clip-clop. She descends the steps, and I start to unpack my books onto the quiet-room desk to get ready for the trig homework I’ve been avoiding all day.

“How was your day?” she asks Ellis, who’s been sitting in the kitchen this whole time but hasn’t said hello.

“I’m starting against Wilson tomorrow,” she says.

“I suppose that’s good, is it?” Mom never played sports. So, Ellis’s field hockey is her introduction to words like starting, varsity and shin splints.

“It’s great,” Ellis answers.

“How great? Will we see you on the front page of the sports section soon?”

Ellis rolls her eyes. “It’s great for me. And the team. And maybe it means Coach Jane will start me more often.”

“I can’t understand why she doesn’t make you the star of the team. This whole fairness-to-seniors idea is so silly. If they backed talent no matter what age, it would get them further.”

I’m still in the quiet room playing invisible, but I want to explain to Mom that you can’t make a player star of the team by better advertising or better shelf placement, the way she does with her clients’ products.

“I think it’s fair to let the seniors start,” Ellis says.

“Well, it won’t help you get your name in the paper, so you’ll have to forgive me if I disagree,” Mom says. “Help me make dinner?”

Ellis deflates and claims homework time in her bedroom. Mom goes into the kitchen to make dinner without asking me how my day was, even though she knows I’m here.

The quiet room is technically the foyer. In our house, you pronounce that correctly.Foy-yay, not foy-er. We call it the quiet room because as long as the horse isn’t dancing upstairs and the door is closed, it is the quietest room in the house. It’s where my mother hopes to read classic novels again one day when she isn’t working nine days a week, and it’s where I do my homework because Ellis plays loud music when she works in her bedroom and I can’t concentrate. And I need to concentrate because trig is killing me.