Hush by Jacqueline Woodson

dreaming, it’s all still here.
    We had been sitting in the bedroom. We could hear Mama and Daddy arguing outside our door. Their arguments had become familiar over the months. In Denver, when they used to kiss, I’d make a face and tell them how gross they were. Now, I would give anything to see my father pull my mother to him and hold her.
    So you just think about the far, far future and do everything you can to make it feel like it’s coming quick. You taught me that. Way back when I thought I could never get through this.
    I did?
    Yeah, Anna said. How could you not remember that? I feel like it saved my life.
    Anna turned back to her science book then. She was studying hard and getting A’s on all her tests. She was making friends at school. Not as many as she had in Denver, but people liked her. It was different here, though. She never brought her friends home or went to their houses. And nobody called. When she wasn’t watching TV or doing her nails, she was studying. There was a college in Massachusetts—Simon’s Rock—that you could go to at sixteen.
    That’s the prize I have my eyes on, Anna said. A full ride there would mean no roadblocks. Nobody saying “We can’t afford it” or “God says blah, blah, blah, blah . . .”
    When she starts talking about Simon’s Rock, I want to say What about me?! And even though I never say it, Anna must see something in my eyes, because she always ends by saying You’ll get somewhere, too, T. You might be a pain, but you’ve got a fire.
    The end-of-lunch bell rang and I headed slowly back into the building. Girls moved around me in groups and pairs, their arms around each other’s waists and shoulders. Two guys in front of me slapped hands, promising to catch each other later, then headed off in separate directions down the hall. I had carried my knapsack out with me to study during lunch. Now I lifted it higher up on my back and thought about Lulu. Some days I could feel her—right there at my side, bumping shoulders with me. The two of us laughing. Lulu. I pulled my knapsack tighter to me and swallowed. Once she had said that my moving away was gonna leave a big hole in her life. Now I wondered if she had found someone else to be close to, if that hole had filled up and closed over. Even though I believed we’d meet again in college, sometimes the missing made me feel unsure. Now I was almost as tall as my mother. I wondered if Lulu had grown, too. Her mother would say Look at Miss Toswiah—getting all tall on us. And Lulu would laugh her laugh while I stood there in embarrassment. I would give anything for that moment. Absolutely positively anything.

14
    IT’S SATURDAY. OUTSIDE IT’S CLOUDY AND cold. The sky’s still that weird silver-gray, the way it never got in Denver. I am fourteen today. When we left Denver I was almost completely flat. That’s not the case anymore. My clothes from last year are too tight. The pants are all too short. The T-shirts curve over my chest in a way that makes the guys at school look twice. When the corner guys hanging out say Hey Neckbone to me, their voices have something else to them. Sometimes they even whisper C’mon over here in a way that makes me walk faster past them.
    The coconut cake is store-bought with nothing written on it. Fed money cake, Anna said when she opened the refrigerator and saw the cake there. Once Mama had been a great cook. Now she cooked like she couldn’t care less about the taste of anything. Fed money everything. The Feds send us a check every month—enough to pay rent and buy food and clothes until Daddy finds work. The money from our house is in the bank. Mama says when the time is right, we’ll start looking for a place to buy.
    Jehovah willing, she adds.
    At night I ask her god to will us to a better place.
    This morning, Mama is leaving, Bible in hand. She’s going to spread the good news of Jehovah’s coming kingdom. Mama’s religion forbids celebrating birthdays. No candles on