Taneesha Never Disparaging Read online

  I had changed into a purple sweatsuit and the smell of stewed tomatoes, onions, garlic, and veggies had me ready to eat. Wiggling my toes, I noticed that the pot of pinto bean soup simmering on the stove warmed every part of our small kitchen including the wooden floor underneath my lavender bunny slippers.

  “Taneesha, chant clearly,” Mama said. Dark brown like Daddy and I, and curvier than either of us, she had a short, salt-n-pepper afro and wore a beige sweater. Her favorite pastime? Nagging me. “You were mumbling, sweetie,” she said. “When you chant, enunciate. Each word has a meaning.”

  Whatever.

  I didn’t even say anything to that. Mama mentioning chanting reminded me that I was more than a little irked about the fact that Nam Myoho Renge Kyo failed me big time in school that day. I mean, I’d poured my guts into chanting not to be nominated and where’d that gotten me?

  Anyway, even without chanting, I’d thunk up an excellent plan on the way home. I held back before I rolled it out, though.

  I started slurping up soup, waiting for the perfect moment. If I worked it just right, I could get my parents to give me what I needed.

  I looked from Mama to Daddy and took another slurp. Pinto beans and lots of carrots, zucchini, yellow squash, and chunks of tomatoes and onions. The weather outside made soup perfect for dinner. We had salad too, with romaine lettuce. I’d sliced the cucumbers and tomatoes and radishes for it.

  “Marsha laid off two nurses today,” Mama said. “Beverly and Drew.”

  “Well, you saw it coming, didn’t you?” Daddy, the lanky man that everybody says I get my skinniness from, had a micro ’fro, not nearly as grey as Mama’s, and was still in a white business shirt. He’d lost his tie, though. “You said last week somebody was up next,” he said.

  “Yeah. But I guess I hoped I was wrong. Two people, though. I didn’t see that coming.”

  They kept talking like I wasn’t there. That was okay; I needed time to practice my lines in my head.

  “But if you’re down two nurses, that’s going to put a lot of pressure on you.”

  “Who’re you telling?”

  Daddy looked at Mama. “Things will pick up, honey.” He reached across the table and put his hand on top of hers. “Thanks for hanging with me, Alima. Business has just been slow but it won’t stay this way. I promise. Then you won’t have to work all these hours.”

  Mama smiled at him. Her eyes looked into his and her face got deep red. “More chanting, baby,” she said.

  “Always.”

  That was good. They were getting all loveydovey. In a good mood—the perfect mood to say “Yes” to anything the one and only daughter they’d prayed for years and years to have asked them to do.

  “Oh, Taneesha—” Mama said, without taking her eyes off Daddy, “before I forget, we’re going to church this Sunday.”

  “Okay,” I said, even though I knew she was so all into Daddy’s eyes that she probably didn’t hear me.

  I slurped more soup and thought about Granddaddy’s church, the church Mama and I went to, where people called Granddaddy “Elder” Ross instead of “Mr.” Daddy hardly ever came with us on those Sundays because he went to Buddhist men’s meetings instead.

  At church, my head always wound up knocking against Mama’s arm because I’d nod off to sleep. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stay awake the whole time.

  I jabbed my fork into my salad, speared lettuce, tomato, and cucumber on it, and shoved it all into my mouth. I love ranch dressing.

  Chewing, I thought about how Mama took me to Granddaddy’s church so I could “learn my roots” and I remembered how the whole thing got started.

  I was maybe six or seven at the time. Wearing a blue jean jumpsuit, I’d had been laying stomachdown on the living room carpet at Big Mama and Granddaddy’s house watching That’s So Raven on cable. (We don’t have cable at home so it’s a perk of going to my grandparents’.) Anyway, Granddaddy and my mother were sitting on the other side of the living room from me. Big Mama was in the kitchen, cooking.

  Deep brown and slim with yellowish-grey, fuzzy hair, Granddaddy sat in his easy chair wearing his usual: silver-wire-rimmed glasses, light brown slacks, a whitish shirt, brown suspenders, and black slippers. His same humungous Bible with gold letters stamped on its black leather cover lay open on his lap.

  Mama sat across from him, barefoot, on the plastic-wrapped, white couch. She had on an orange and yellow tie-dyed African dress with no sleeves.

  “Alima,” Granddaddy had said, real even, “I don’t care what you do or don’t believe. Taneesha needs to know how we do.”

  When I heard my name, I kept still, tuned up my ears, glued my eyes to the TV—and pretended I wasn’t eavesdropping.

  “I’m not going to be around forever. It’s just like the sun. It’s high in the sky at noon, but come around four o’clock, it starts to set. There isn’t anything we can do about that.”

  At that, I couldn’t help it, I turned and looked at my mother. She seemed ready to speak. But then, it was like she changed her mind.

  “That child needs to learn her roots,” Granddaddy said.

  Mama stayed quiet, like she was thinking hard.

  I went back to staring at the TV but I couldn’t even really see it. I couldn’t hear it either. I wished I hadn’t heard what Granddaddy had just said about the sun setting and everything. I wished he hadn’t said it, but I knew he had.

  Ever since that day, Mama and I’ve been going to church. But only once a month, not every Sunday the way some people do.

  I speared another forkful of salad and thought about one time when I was moaning about going to church and Mama said, “Taneesha, it’s good for you to learn what other people believe. It takes all kinds of people to make world peace. Not everybody’s going to be Buddhist.”

  I laughed a little, real dry, just thinking about that one.

  Mama and Daddy looked at me for a second, then went back to their ogling.

  Not everybody’s going to be Buddhist? Who had Mama been kidding? Mostly nobody’s Buddhist. How could I not know that little fact when everybody else’s religion is advertised all over the place—even on money?

  Plus, what had Buddhism done for me lately? Today, for example? If the catastrophe Carli had set in motion was going to be undone, it wasn’t Buddhism that was going to undo it. It was me, Taneesha Bey-Ross.

  Speaking of which, it was about time to work my plan. My parents had stopped talking. No telling how long that would last. I put down my fork, cleared my throat, and dived in.

  CHAPTER 3

  BONKED ON THE HEAD

  Carli nominated me for class president.” “Good for you, Taneesha! I think you’ll make a fine president,” said Mama, snapping out of her lock-eyed trance with Daddy all like Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother had just said, “Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo!” She had this big old grin on her face.

  Was she out of her mind?

  “But—”

  “I think you’ll make a good president, too, sweetie.”

  “But—”

  “In fact, I think you’ll make a great president,” Daddy continued. “Think of being class president as preparation for when you have the big job: Taneesha Bey-Ross, President of the United States.”

  “Get real, Daddy.” Why had I even bothered to tell them about this? I knew why: I needed their help.

  “No, I’m serious,” he said, dabbing the corner of his mouth with his napkin. “You’re a natural leader, Taneesha.”

  Who in the world was he talking about?

  “There’s only one problem: I don’t want to do it. I wish Carli had asked me before she nominated me.”

  “Well,” said Daddy, “did you tell her that?”

  “No.” How could I? That would’ve hurt her feelings. She seemed so happy about gearing up for my campaign.

  “She can’t read your mind, you know,” Mama said, as if she was reading my mind. “Are you going to tell her how you feel?”

  �
��I don’t want her to feel bad. I think she was trying to be nice.”

  “So what are you going to do?” asked Daddy. He slurped a spoonful of soup.

  I felt a little sweaty. This was it. Time for me to spring my plan on them. Ready… Set… Go! “I was wondering if you could kind of, sort of—write me a note.”

  They looked blank. Like they hadn’t understood me.

  “A note saying I can’t be president.”

  Still nothing.

  “And what would our reason be,” Daddy said, finally, “in this note, for saying you can’t be president?” On “president” he did this one-raisedeyebrow thingy he does a lot.

  Did I know my parents, or what?

  I had my comeback all ready:

  “You could just say I have too much homework to do it. It’s true, you know. I have lots of work. I wouldn’t want my grades to slip because I’m trying to do too much. Being president is a big responsibility.”

  I looked hard at those two’s faces, trying to read their expressions. And it seemed to me as if they were both fixing to laugh. At me.

  Mama smiled.

  Is she really going to help me out? Do I actually have a note on the way?

  Then a chunk of my blue sky fell down and bonked me right on the head. Hard.

  “Taneesha, I think you need to chant,” she said.

  Here we go! I hated having my problems, and I had plenty, boiled down to one word: “chant.” If chanting worked so much, how come it had bombed in school that day?

  “Mama, I don’t need to chant. I need help. Didn’t you hear me? I just want a little note. I told you how hard school is and everything. But all you two can do is laugh at me and tell me to chant!”

  I couldn’t stand how my parents threw chanting into everything. Sometimes it drove me nuts. It was like they couldn’t hear me or something. Like they were talking robots that only went “Chant, chant, chant” no matter what I was saying.

  “We weren’t laughing at—”

  “Oh come on, Daddy! Yes you were. You two always act like I’m a joke or something. Just once I wish you’d listen to me.”

  They looked at me like I was speaking gibberish.

  “Okay,” Daddy said after a moment. “We’re listening.”

  I breathed in deep. “Like I said, I just want a note explaining everything. It doesn’t have to be long. I just want you to tell Mr. Alvarez that this isn’t a good time for me to try to run for anything.”

  I looked from Mama to Daddy, holding my breath, hoping to hear the one word that would make my life a little less crazy: “Okay.”

  But, looking at their faces, I started feeling like the band-leader on a sinking ship—frantically waving my baton while I was going down fast.

  “You don’t even have to write it,” I blurted. “I’ll write it and sign it!” I hadn’t meant to squeak. It just came out that way.

  “Honey,” Mama said as if she was talking to a baby or something, “You’re a big girl. Eleven years old. You can speak for yourself. Just tell Mr. Alvarez how you feel.”

  “But—”

  “You just need confidence, Taneesha,” Daddy said, all tender. “The way to get it is to keep chanting and doing your best.”

  They just didn’t get it. I was drowning. Drowning, dagnamit.

  “But—”

  And all Daddy could say was: “Remember, Nichiren said, ‘A coward cannot have any of her prayers answered.’”

  Whatever that meant.

  “But—”

  “When you forget who you are, Taneesha, you’ve got to chant harder,” said Mama. “I think that’s the problem. Your evil twin’s just working on you.”

  Now she had to go talking about that.

  “It’s like I always say, everybody’s got an evil twin yanking their chain. Your evil twin’s job’s to make you feel small—like you’re not big as the universe. And she never takes a vacation. Your job’s to remember you’re all that and then some.”

  I dropped my shoulders. Didn’t she see? The problem was, I didn’t feel like “all that.” Right then, I felt like one big nothing and her and Daddy acting like whatever I said didn’t matter just made me feel nothinger.

  But I knew I’d be wasting my time if I told them any of that. I knew they wouldn’t have heard a word I said. They’d only go, “Chant. Chant. Chant.”

  “Let’s chant after dinner, okay?” Mama said.

  It would have been funny—only it wasn’t.

  Tears came.

  “That’s okay, Mama. I got a lot of homework.” I pushed my chair away from the table. “I’m done eating.” I stood and picked up my dishes.

  Seconds later, I stood at the sink and rinsed silverware, plates, and bowls in the sink.

  Watching white salad dressing and tomato-red broth swirl down the drain, I felt Mama and Daddy staring at me.

  I stacked everything into the dishwasher.

  I didn’t need to see their faces to know they were sticking to their decision—even though I was dying.

  I dragged my feet into the hallway.

  How could they have possibly thought that tacking Nam Myoho Renge Kyo, or some dusty old quote from Nichiren—the ancient Japanese guy that made chanting famous—over my jumbled-up feelings would do any good? That’s what I wanted to know. They’d have had better luck slapping a Band-Aid over the crack in the Grand Canyon.

  “Taneesha,” Mama said. “We love you.”

  “Yeah, right,” I muttered.

  “What did you say?” Daddy asked in a warning voice.

  “I’m going to do my homework.”

  I kept dragging.

  I heard Mama say something about not needing all this stress right now.

  She didn’t need stress? What about me? I was the one who was doomed—doomed to go back to Hunter Elementary tomorrow totally noteless.

  CHAPTER 4

  BLOODY & BEATEN ON BERNARD

  Fifth graders,” said Mr. Alvarez, “in the North Cleveland City School District all students have the option of participating in Take Your Child To Work Day. Your parents must sign the note I gave you so I’ll know if you’ll be in school next Friday or not.”

  It was Monday morning and a full week had crawled by since Carli had nominated me for president. As usual, my life wasn’t satisfied with just being bad, it had to get all horrendous on me. Plus, the report I’d gotten from Weather.com the night before had been wrong. It wasn’t “partially cloudy” it was just plain old cloudy—again.

  “Please raise your hand if you’ve already talked to your parents about visiting their places of employment next week.”

  A few hands went up, including Carli’s. I’d always loved the navy blue jumper with silver heart-shaped buttons she was wearing—dresscode with class. But I didn’t love it enough to forget that she was pretty much responsible for ruining any chance I might have had of having a happy fifth-grade experience.

  While Carli looked all cute, raising her hand in her classy jumper, a girl in boring black jeans and a white blouse, sweater, and pair of sneakers, hid her very un-raised left hand in her lap.

  I rolled my head upward blasé-style. My eyes followed the every-which-way patterns of the twenty geometry mobiles hanging from the ceiling—one from each student in the class. Each mobile was a mix of colorful shapes. Raspberry octagons. Orange hexagons. Aquamarine pentagons. Some shapes were made by gluing strips together. Others by cutting—the same as how you cut snowflakes and rows of dolls out of paper. No two designs were exactly alike. My mobile was mostly different shades of purple, my favorite color. I followed it with my eyes while it swayed a little in a breeze I didn’t feel. I watched those mobiles like they were the only thing in the world, determined to do everything I could to sweep Take Your Child To Work Day right out of my mind. I hadn’t said one word to my parents about that particular event. And I wasn’t going to. Skipping school for a day sounded fun, but not if it meant I had to mingle with people I didn’t know. Some people are natural min
glers. I knew me; I wasn’t one of them.

  “Sorry, I can’t get the candy from my aunt.” Carli said, while we walked up Bernard Avenue after school on one more afternoon without sunshine—me in my puffy silvery-purple coat, Carli in her pink one.

  “What candy?”

  “For your campaign, girl. Come on, get with the program. Election day’ll be here before you know it.”

  “Oh. That candy,” I said, wishing I had a time machine so I could go back to the morning of the day Carli nominated me. At home, I would have run a thermometer under hot water and drank food coloring to make my throat look red. It worked once on picture day. That time, I stayed home with “the flu.” If I had done it again, I could have avoided the whole election thing because absent kids couldn’t be nominated.

  “Carli?”

  “Yeah?”

  I opened my mouth. But then, I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t tell her that I didn’t want to run.

  “What were you saying about candy?”

  “My aunt’s in the hospital. She had to get a hip operation. So she can’t make it.”

  “Make what?”

  “The candy.”

  “Oh. Right. Well, that’s okay.”

  “Yeah. You’re a strong candidate. You can win without candy. Everybody likes you and you really do have all those leadership traits Mr. Alvarez’s been talking about.”

  “You’re funny, Carli.”

  “I’m not trying to be funny. Sometimes I don’t think you see how much, um… how much… um… potential you have.”

  “Like I said, you’re funny, Carli.”

  “No. You’re funny. But I like you anyway.”

  At that, I had to laugh. We both did.

  “So anyway, I’m going to help my father in the pharmacy next Friday. What about you? You going to your father’s job or your mother’s?”

  “Neither.”

  “How come?”

  “Don’t want to. It’ll probably be boring.”

  “Your parents don’t mind if you don’t do it?”

  “Don’t know. Didn’t ask them.”

  “But they have to sign the note—that’s what Mr. Alvarez said.”

  “I know.”