chemicals, no big deal, easy to ignore.
He also said: Did you win the lottery?
And I said: No.
And he said: Yes you did! You won trillions of lotteries! First you won the lottery of the Big Bang, and then you won the lottery of evolution, and then you won the lottery of me and your mother being assigned to the same dorm in college, and then you won the lottery of our ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends being fools, and then you won the lottery of us falling in love and getting married. Not to mention the lottery of the United States of America and a loving middle-class family.
And I said: Oh.
And Dad said: So I don’t want to ever,
ever
hear you say that you’re unlucky or unfortunate or
anything
. Understand?
And now I’m sitting here in the Selva Café, wondering: Do I still have to feel lucky all the time, even after The Weirdness?
After the dinner plates are cleared, we sit in silence as Mom slurps the last drops from the mango daiquiri Ken/Neth ordered for her.
“Well,” she says, the first word any of us has said in a long time,“I guess I’ll be doing that Relaxation and Restoration yoga retreat after all.”
“Relaxation and
Rejuvenation
,” Ken/Neth corrects. “Why, that’s great, Sylvia!”
“It sounds like just about what I need right now. Besides, it’s not as though I have any other reason to be here,” Mom says, her teeth clenched.
What about being with
us
? I want to yell.
“Except of course to spend time with the kids,” Mom says, as though she’s reading my mind, “but it’s important for them to have Spanish lessons anyway.”
“Spanish lessons?” I say. This is the first I’ve heard about any Spanish lessons.
“Wha?” Roo says.
“Oh,” Ken/Neth says, “did I not mention that the Villaloboses can hook us up with a babysitter who also teaches Spanish? I’ll go tell them after dessert that we’d like their babysitter starting tomorrow morning.”
Um,
hello
, I’ll be thirteen in September—I can take care of me and Roo, obviously! But I don’t say anything out loud. We’ve already had this fight a bunch of times. I am
so
sick of babysitters. Mom sometimes tries to call them “companions,” as though that’ll trick me into not realizing what they are. We had two different babysitters in Denver this spring, sometimes a spacey college girl and sometimes a cranky old lady.
“Your minds are so malleable now, girls,” Mom says, pushing her empty daiquiri glass away. “You need to take advantage of that. Now’s the time to master a new language. It’s too late for me to learn Spanish. I’m not even going to try.”
“Malleable?” I say.
“So we can say things to each other in Spanish and you won’t understand?” Roo says.
“Flexible, capable of learning easily,” Mom says to me, and then “That’s exactly right” to Roo.
Okay, well, this trip just got more awful, if that’s even possible. Dad doesn’t care about us anymore, Mom would rather do yoga than be with her daughters, Ken/Neth is annoying me more with each passing second, nobody seems to think I’m old enough to baby-sit Roo, and now we have to study Spanish?
“Hey, Roo,” I say, “let’s get outta here.”
She looks at me. Mom let her order coconut ice cream, which hasn’t come yet.
“First can I—” she starts, but I glare at her and she goes, “Okay, yeah, let’s get outta here.”
“Sure, whatever you want,” Mom murmurs, not even noticing that I’m trying to be mean by abandoning her at the dinner table.
But even once Roo and I are back in our room, away from Mom and Ken/Neth, I don’t feel much better, because now Roo is being annoying.
“Poor Dad,” she says. “This is bad.”
“Poor Dad?” I say. “More like poor jerk.”
“Dad’s not a jerk!” Roo protests. “He’s just having problems is all.”
“Yeah,
jerk
problems,” I say.
“Please stop saying that word.”
“You mean
jerk
? Jerk, jerk, jerk.” I can’t help myself. I know I’m
He also said: Did you win the lottery?
And I said: No.
And he said: Yes you did! You won trillions of lotteries! First you won the lottery of the Big Bang, and then you won the lottery of evolution, and then you won the lottery of me and your mother being assigned to the same dorm in college, and then you won the lottery of our ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends being fools, and then you won the lottery of us falling in love and getting married. Not to mention the lottery of the United States of America and a loving middle-class family.
And I said: Oh.
And Dad said: So I don’t want to ever,
ever
hear you say that you’re unlucky or unfortunate or
anything
. Understand?
And now I’m sitting here in the Selva Café, wondering: Do I still have to feel lucky all the time, even after The Weirdness?
After the dinner plates are cleared, we sit in silence as Mom slurps the last drops from the mango daiquiri Ken/Neth ordered for her.
“Well,” she says, the first word any of us has said in a long time,“I guess I’ll be doing that Relaxation and Restoration yoga retreat after all.”
“Relaxation and
Rejuvenation
,” Ken/Neth corrects. “Why, that’s great, Sylvia!”
“It sounds like just about what I need right now. Besides, it’s not as though I have any other reason to be here,” Mom says, her teeth clenched.
What about being with
us
? I want to yell.
“Except of course to spend time with the kids,” Mom says, as though she’s reading my mind, “but it’s important for them to have Spanish lessons anyway.”
“Spanish lessons?” I say. This is the first I’ve heard about any Spanish lessons.
“Wha?” Roo says.
“Oh,” Ken/Neth says, “did I not mention that the Villaloboses can hook us up with a babysitter who also teaches Spanish? I’ll go tell them after dessert that we’d like their babysitter starting tomorrow morning.”
Um,
hello
, I’ll be thirteen in September—I can take care of me and Roo, obviously! But I don’t say anything out loud. We’ve already had this fight a bunch of times. I am
so
sick of babysitters. Mom sometimes tries to call them “companions,” as though that’ll trick me into not realizing what they are. We had two different babysitters in Denver this spring, sometimes a spacey college girl and sometimes a cranky old lady.
“Your minds are so malleable now, girls,” Mom says, pushing her empty daiquiri glass away. “You need to take advantage of that. Now’s the time to master a new language. It’s too late for me to learn Spanish. I’m not even going to try.”
“Malleable?” I say.
“So we can say things to each other in Spanish and you won’t understand?” Roo says.
“Flexible, capable of learning easily,” Mom says to me, and then “That’s exactly right” to Roo.
Okay, well, this trip just got more awful, if that’s even possible. Dad doesn’t care about us anymore, Mom would rather do yoga than be with her daughters, Ken/Neth is annoying me more with each passing second, nobody seems to think I’m old enough to baby-sit Roo, and now we have to study Spanish?
“Hey, Roo,” I say, “let’s get outta here.”
She looks at me. Mom let her order coconut ice cream, which hasn’t come yet.
“First can I—” she starts, but I glare at her and she goes, “Okay, yeah, let’s get outta here.”
“Sure, whatever you want,” Mom murmurs, not even noticing that I’m trying to be mean by abandoning her at the dinner table.
But even once Roo and I are back in our room, away from Mom and Ken/Neth, I don’t feel much better, because now Roo is being annoying.
“Poor Dad,” she says. “This is bad.”
“Poor Dad?” I say. “More like poor jerk.”
“Dad’s not a jerk!” Roo protests. “He’s just having problems is all.”
“Yeah,
jerk
problems,” I say.
“Please stop saying that word.”
“You mean
jerk
? Jerk, jerk, jerk.” I can’t help myself. I know I’m
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