Free Girlchild by Tupelo Hassman

want to tell her the truth because her eyes are wet with it anyway, but her hand stays strong as iron around my chin, and the truth will be too loud for the soft clean snow pushing up against the window, too dirty, and so I only tell part of it, the part that she already knows from looking at me, “Just scabs.”
    It is the stupidest lie I ever told, because I’m crying so hard there’s no way I’m honest, and now Mama’s crying too. Her eyes shine brown and bright and it’s scarier than any screaming fit she’s ever thrown. She doesn’t cry like me at all, her face doesn’t crumple or splotch. Mama sits still and straight and starts talking in a low voice about heaven, hell, and the Hardware Man, and that’s when I know I fucked up. I must have said something because she knows.
    They grew fast under my fingers that won’t stop picking and tearing at skin whose redness reminds me of hot breath and stubble, and then it comes to me that “Just scabs” are the first words I remember saying since school started this year that weren’t to Viv or about her, the first words that aren’t “I feel sick” at Ms. Hyatt’s desk. But maybe I’ve been talking other times. There must be words I’m losing with all the time that gets swallowed in the dark. Maybe words have been slipping out the whole time, too quiet to hear except in my own mama’s ears, and this must be right because she takes my tissue away and hugs me, good and soft and not like metal. She pulls me in like she never does, says words that I’ve never heard, that I can barely make out through tears and held breath and her voice in my hair.
    Mama’s “shhhh” sounds clean like cotton and it works away at my apologizing until the morning’s quiet again like she likes it, except this morning for the sound of her voice, the drip of her coffee onto the linoleum. “This is my fault.” Mama’s kisses fall cool on my torn skin and she says it again, “This is all my fault and I’m going
to take care of it,” and then she says “girlchild.” My night name hums in the morning air like the sound of the refrigerator coming on during a scary dream, gives me something to grab onto, something that makes sense, because what she says next sure doesn’t. Mama hugs me harder and her words turn hot as prayers on my neck, her words burn into my skin, “You’re my heaven and hell-flower, girlchild, and you’re gonna grow anyway.”

flicker
    T he hardware man’s house is empty. carol is gone and now i stay at grandma’s when mama is on swing and grave
    the hardware man’s house is empty and his truck is gone. and now i go to grandma’s during mama’s shifts and there is nothing wrong with me if i just would stop covering my mouth all the time but under my hands there are scabs but the scabs would go away if i just stopped covering my mouth all the time
    i did not say good-bye i did not say anything to anyone but can i go to the nurse and grandma has bag balm in a green tin with red roses and ms. hyatt is soft with me when i ask can i go to the nurse and the nurse is soft too takes my hand down from my mouth holds it in hers when the thermometer makes me cry i want to go home
    they stay away from the whole swing set because i’m there and i hold one hand over my mouth and swing with the other hand. i rise away
    opening my fist she throws away my tissue gives me a new one from the box and i am hot. i will throw up. the thermometer under my tongue. there are phone calls. mama comes and she is worried but she misses work too much misses too much
    the hardware man’s empty house his truck gone carol in it and
me at grandma’s when mama is working swing and grave but when the nurse calls mama comes
    i will hold my breath i will throw up i will fall down i will pee my pants i’ll bite the thermometer in half and eat the glass i’ll do whatever nurse needs to pick up the phone and bring mama here.

surge
    T he lights in my head start staying on long enough