Hush by Jacqueline Woodson Page A

the cake this year. No singing “Happy Birthday.” That’s all behind us now. Lulu and I always found some way to be together on our birthday. Me, her and all of our friends. I want to call her now, say Happy birthday, girlie. Hear her say Right back at you. Same day, a few minutes apart. Less than five pounds. You think we were together in another life? she asked me once, her head on my shoulder.
    Yeah, I said. And then we traveled together to this one. Another life. Another time. Lulu.
    When I get to the University of Wisconsin, me, Lulu and Grandma will make up for all the birthdays we missed.
    This morning, my father came into my room at dawn and said Happy birthday, copper penny. And for a moment, somewhere between waking and dreaming, I believed my father was well again and that we were back in Denver.
    When I woke up, and saw we were still in this place, that my father was back at his chair by the window, I said Pennies aren’t made out of copper anymore! Don’t you know that?!
    Daddy nodded, his eyes spilling over with sadness.
    Sorry, I said.
    I sat on his lap even though I am way too big for it, and Daddy put his arms around me, saying I know, sweet Toswiah. I know.
    He smelled liked dirty clothes. I swallowed. He’d never smelled this way before. His hair was grown out and uncombed and his hands trembled when he hugged me. When he’d first started being this way, the Feds had given Mama the name of a therapist to take him to. But Daddy stopped going or Mama stopped taking him—I don’t know which. I hugged him tighter. He was right there but slipping away from me.
    Daddy stared out the window without saying anything. I wanted to tell him he did the right thing, that it was better this way. I lay my head on his shoulder. It felt bonier than I remembered. His legs felt bony, too. Outside, the sky was off-white, like a dirty sheet had been laid across it. The words didn’t come. We just sat there like two empty bags of skin and bone . . . staring at the dirty-sheet sky.
    When was the last time you laughed, Daddy? I wanted to ask him. It feels like a hundred years ago.
    Sometimes I’m so afraid in this place. Last night, we had Fruity Pebbles for dinner and only a little bit of milk. It feels like every day the world falls a little more apart. Once I had a mother and a father and we were all happy. Some days it felt like me and Anna in the world all by ourselves. And the world we’re in doesn’t make any kind of sense anymore.

    “WHAT YOU NEED TO DO IS GET UP OUT OF THAT chair and get looking for a job,” my mother says now.
    Outside, it begins to rain softly. The sky drops a bit closer to the ground. Daddy’s eyes move slowly from the rain to Mama and then back again.
    “A job,” my father says, his voice breaking. “A job?”
    “Yes,” Mama says. “You’ve been sitting at that window like some sick old man for all these months. Play-time is over. You should have thought about all you’re thinking about before now. Made some other choices.”
    “Do you regret the choice we made?” he asks softly.
    Anna lifts her face from her math textbook and looks at Mama, her eyes wide. “Say it,” she whispers. “Say it!”
    I’d give a thousand tomorrows, she said one night. I’d give a whole ten years of my life to be back in Denver the way we used to be.
    Mama lifts her Bible to her chest and hugs it. After a long time has passed, she says,“You did the right thing.”
    Anna curses under her breath and turns back to her homework. This morning she gave me the autumn-colored sweater, kissed me on the forehead. Her lips felt strange. Good strange.
    “I know how to be a cop,” Daddy says. “I know what’s right and what’s wrong.” He looks at each of us and nods. “Right and wrong,” he says again, then turns back to the window.
    “And I knew about Denver and teaching there,” Mama says. “But all that’s behind us now. Jehovah has a plan, and we have to—”
    “What plan?!” my