Bream Gives Me Hiccups Read online

  But Dad’s new girlfriend, Izzy, is not dumb and she is definitely not prettier than Mom: she has short hair like a man and weird teeth and wears men’s clothes, like dirty boots and ripped jeans. And she runs a big company that builds houses for poor people who lost their homes in a hurricane. When Dad moved to New Orleans, he started building houses for Izzy’s company as a volunteer and then fell in love with Izzy, which seems hard because of her hair, teeth, and clothes, but I guess she was easier to love than Mom, who was always yelling at him. Now, Izzy and Dad run the company together and take care of Izzy’s son, Edgar, who is five years old and not a good person.

  And Izzy definitely didn’t like Dad for his money because they lived like homeless people if homeless people were allowed to have homes and still be called homeless. Their house was really ugly and small and rotting and their backyard was overgrown with weeds and broken potted plants. I thought it was interesting that they lived like this because their job is rebuilding other people’s houses. It almost seemed like they were punishing themselves for not losing their house in a hurricane.

  And it was weird to see Dad in his new life. He looked older and younger than I remember. He had a beard and his face was tan and wrinkly, but he also seemed calm and his body seemed like it had more energy in it. And I think I never saw him smile before but it was actually kind of creepy because it was a familiar face doing an unfamiliar thing. And when he hugged me I felt a little weird because it felt like a stranger was hugging me. He squeezed me really hard and held me for a long time, but not in a way that felt like he meant it, but in a way that felt like he was trying to make up for the last year when he didn’t visit or hug me once. I tried to pat his back because I thought it might end the hug but he just started patting my back. Then we were both just squeezing each other and patting each other’s backs, but I was doing it to end the hug and Dad was doing it to keep the hug going.

  Dad said that Izzy was out building a poor person’s house and that she would be back in time for lunch, which was going to be a crawfish boil (surprise, surprise!) in the backyard. Then Izzy’s son, Edgar, came running through the house like a dog that just got let out of a cage. He was five years old but he acted much younger and was very dirty and didn’t make eye contact and always had some dried snot hanging out of his nose that he sometimes licked by sticking his tongue high out of his mouth and trying to reach the snot. Seeing this made me nauseous.

  I thought I might feel jealous of Edgar because Dad was now taking care of him and not me, but when I saw Dad with Edgar I just felt sad for Edgar. Dad seemed to pretend Edgar didn’t even exist. He just let him run around the house knocking into things and he didn’t even introduce him to me. And I started to remember that Dad used to act the same way to me but I never noticed it because he was my dad and I was used to it. I guess sometimes it’s easier to see how people act when it’s not happening to you.

  When Izzy came home, Dad tried to give her a hug but she said, “I’m filthy,” and walked straight into the bathroom. When we heard the water turn on, Dad turned to me, smiling in an embarrassed kind of way, and said, “That’s Izzy.”

  All three crawfish lunches were the exact same experience: Izzy and Dad talked about the poor people whose houses they were rebuilding and how sad the hurricane was while Edgar ran around us, holding the dead crawfishes like they were monsters trying to attack us. Dad and Izzy just ignored Edgar, which was probably the reason he had no social skills, but they also ignored me, which just made me feel left out.

  Dad never asked me anything about myself or school and he definitely didn’t ask about Mom. The only thing he would say to me was “Can you believe that?” after he would say something sad about the hurricane, like how many people drowned or why the government didn’t like the black people because of racism.

  And I thought it was strange because a part of me wanted to be angry at Dad for not asking me about myself, but I also felt guilty being angry at him because he was ignoring me to talk about something sad. And I guess I felt like he was doing a good thing by rebuilding the houses, but I thought it was weird how he felt so much for the strangers in New Orleans but nothing for me who is his son.

  And then I started thinking about Mom, who is kind of the opposite of Dad. She spends every day doing selfish things and doesn’t help anybody who’s poor, and when we pass a homeless person on the street, she holds her nose like she might get sick if she smells them. And she’s not even that nice to me, but at least she treats me like I exist.

  I guess if I was a homeless person from New Orleans, I would like Dad more than Mom. But I’m just a kid from the suburbs and that’s not my fault.

  And that’s why I’m giving the crawfish boil and Dad and Izzy and Edgar 213 out of 2000 stars.

  MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

  Yesterday we took a class trip to the Museum of Natural History, which is a place where you’re supposed to learn about history but all you really do is look at dinosaur skeletons and eat lunch. And it’s so strange because it’s really sad to see the dinosaur skeletons because not only are those dinosaurs dead but all dinosaurs are dead. It was kind of like visiting a cemetery, but instead of everyone being buried, their bones were above the ground and held together like they were still trying to be alive.

  But instead of feeling sad for the dinosaurs or just being quiet like you’re supposed to do at a funeral, all the kids were making jokes and acting stupid. And even though the dinosaurs were scary and would probably eat me if they were alive, I started to feel bad for them.

  The woman who works for the museum explained that there were three different kinds of dinosaurs: some were carnivores, which means they ate the other dinosaurs, some were herbivores, which means they were nice and didn’t eat each other, and some were omnivores, which means they ate everything. Billy, a kid in my class, is an omnivore because he will literally eat anything on a dare. Last week, he ate an entire pack of gum, even the wrapper, and then threw up and got to miss gym.

  The dinosaurs were also very mean to each other. They would fight and use their mouths and teeth and claws to attack each other. The Tyrannosaurus Rex was the meanest one. He looked the meanest and his name sounded the meanest and he ate all the other dinosaurs. The one who was the nicest was the Apatosaurus because he was really big but he had a tiny little head and he never ate any other dinosaurs. And I thought it must have been scary to be an Apatosaurus because he just wanted to be nice but there was probably a lot of pressure to be mean because he was a dinosaur.

  All the kids wanted to take pictures in front of the dinosaur skeletons and they were laughing and making stupid faces like they were imitating the dinosaurs. I started to imagine the dinosaurs coming alive and watching the kids do this in front of their dead bones and I suddenly got angry for them. I asked the museum lady if I could go to the bathroom and she said it was okay and that I should meet everyone back in the Museum Cafeteria. Usually we’re supposed to bring a buddy to the bathroom but I didn’t really feel like I had a buddy, so I went alone and waited in the stall until lunchtime.

  In the Museum Cafeteria, everyone got dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets, which were like regular chicken nuggets but formed into the bodies of dinosaurs. I thought it was strange to eat dinosaur-shaped chicken because the dinosaurs were dead and it felt like we were making fun of them by eating their bodies in fun-looking shapes. So I just got a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and then Billy called me a faggot, which means gay. I wanted to tell him that he’s a faggot too because he was eating the body of a dinosaur, but I didn’t want to say the word “faggot” because it sounds mean so I just looked down at my sandwich and sort of lost my appetite. I think if Billy was a dinosaur he would be a Tyrannosaurus Rex and I would be an Apatosaurus and I wouldn’t try to hurt him but I would also not be bullied because the Apatosaurus is much bigger than the Tyrannosaurus Rex.

  On the bus ride home, everyone was texting each other the pictures of themselves doing funny things in front
of the dinosaurs. Mark Schwartz made it look like he was picking a Stegosaurus’s nose by standing close to the camera and sticking his finger up. Madison Greenwood was pretending to dance with a Triceratops’ leg. Even Matthew took a picture doing a split with his arms stretched out like a bird underneath a Pterodactyl. I thought it was weird because Matthew usually behaves better. Sometimes he does bad things to fit in, but I think this is probably because he doesn’t fully know which dinosaur he wants to be yet.

  Everyone was laughing at the pictures together and I started to feel a little lonely, like I wasn’t involved with the group or like everyone was laughing at a joke that I couldn’t hear. And I thought that maybe I should have eaten the dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets and taken a picture in front of a dinosaur doing something stupid. I would have been uncomfortable for a few minutes but it would mean that I would have been able to fit in with my friends. Or maybe I would have had a bathroom buddy. Or maybe I wouldn’t have had to hide in the bathroom at all.

  And I guess it’s like what the dinosaurs had to do. They probably didn’t want to always be so angry and they probably definitely didn’t want to eat each other, but I guess, if you want to be part of a group, you have to make compromises sometimes. And I guess, in that way, we aren’t that much different from the dinosaurs. And even though we think we’re better and smarter because we wear clothes and speak English, maybe we’re all just trying to fit in even though it means we sometimes have to do things that make us uncomfortable. That’s why I’m giving the Museum of Natural History 1109 out of 2000 stars.

  THE ASHRAM AND MOM

  Over the weekend, Mom took me to an Ashram, which is a place that stressed-out people go when they’re rich. We were supposed to stay for the whole weekend but we ended up sneaking out in the middle of the first night, which sounds like a bad thing to do but it was also the most fun thing that Mom and I ever did together.

  When we first arrived at the Ashram, I knew we probably wouldn’t last the whole weekend. There was a sign at the front entrance that said, REPEAL YOUR VANITY, RELEASE YOUR POSSESSIONS, RELEARN TO LIVE. I knew Mom would not want to do any of these three things. We had just spent the whole week shopping for sexy yoga outfits for Mom to wear at the Ashram and she was definitely not planning on repealing or releasing any of these.

  I don’t even know why Mom wanted to go to the Ashram. She kept saying that she just needed some “Me Time,” which seems like a strange thing to need, but even more strange because Mom spends every day taking “Me Time” because she has no job and drinks alcohol every night to go to sleep.

  But Mom put on a fake smile, which has become her only kind of smile, grabbed our suitcase, and said, “Wake me up when it’s over.”

  The Ashram was made up of several buildings that were kind of like old-timey cabins surrounding a big pool. At the front was a check-in building and, when Mom and I entered, there was a woman behind the counter who had dreadlocks for hair even though she was a white woman. I could see Mom hide a face of hatred for this woman, especially when the woman said, “Namaste and welcome to the first step toward inner harmony. Our spiritual founder, Satchidananda, once observed, ‘Truth is one, Paths are many.’ Nonetheless, we were rated as the best ashram in the Northern Lakes region by Wellness Magazine two years in a row. Welcome, Namaste.”

  I could sense right there that Mom wanted to escape from what she quickly realized was a kind of prison, but she smiled a fake smile again and said, “Namaste, thank you, we’re checking in.”

  The white woman with dreadlocks proceeded to tell us about the Ashram and the rules we had to follow, which all sounded like things that Mom hates. We had to wake up every morning at 5:45 for a satsang, which is a meeting with the other guests of the Ashram. Mom asked if she could just send me to the meeting to take notes and report back, but the woman said that it was mandatory, which is one of the words that Mom hates.

  The woman also said that we were not allowed to use our cell phones and that we had to put all of our “material possessions” into a “Trust Locker,” which were little cubbyholes. Mom said a “Trust Locker” is something that is called an oxymoron, like “Happily Married.” Then she laughed in a kind of fake way and the woman and I just stared at each other waiting for her to stop.

  Mom then asked the woman, “What happens if someone steals our stuff from the Trust Locker?” And the woman said, “Then you’ll be one possession freer.” Mom nodded and said, “I think I’ll just hold on to it for now.” And the dreadlocked white woman said, “I’m sorry to hear you’re still bound.”

  Our room was near the back of the Ashram and next to the large pool. The pool, the woman explained, was “clothing optional.” And apparently, everyone in the pool chose the “naked” option, and Mom and I could see their privates as they sat around the pool, casually talking to each other like they weren’t naked.

  It was actually disgusting to see all of the men and women with their weird penises and floppy breasts. I normally would have found it funny to see naked people in a pool outside my room, but for some reason I just felt really strange looking at them, like when you walk in on someone going to the bathroom.

  Mom and I finally got to our room and closed the door. Mom stared at me in a really intense way like we just got out of a war together. I wanted to tell her that we should leave, that this place was scary and weird, and that she could have “Me Time” at home if she wanted to and that I would promise not to bother her all weekend or ask for anything if she would just take me home.

  But Mom just put on a fake smile and said, “Yoga’s in an hour. And then dinner.” Then she walked into the bathroom and shut the door.

  Yoga was held outside, next to the Penis Pool. Everyone gathered in a really serious way onto Indian-looking mats that were spread out. The mats were damp from sweat and smelled like a wet dog, and we had to take our shoes off, which made me feel gross.

  Mom wore really tight gray spandex pants and a little pink shirt that didn’t cover her belly all the way. And I think she thought she looked sexy in her short shirt, but her belly fat poked out from the bottom and made her look fatter than she actually is, which is not really that fat.

  A man with a long beard who looked homeless was the yoga teacher and he was wearing orange pants and necklaces instead of a shirt. He started by giving a speech about how we have all gathered here today to focus inwardly and relearn to move like a baby, which kind of made me laugh because I pictured everyone there crawling around the sweaty mats like babies. Then he told us that we had to think about the real things in our lives and forget about our material possessions. He told us to focus on the important relationships in our lives and how we are all connected to energy and other people.

  Then he made us all bend down and do weird positions and everyone seemed to know what they were doing, even Mom. And while everyone was bending down with their eyes closed, I stood up and looked around and suddenly realized that I was the only kid in the whole group.

  Then it occurred to me that maybe Mom didn’t actually want me to come here; none of the other people brought their children. Maybe Mom only brought me because, as part of their divorce, Dad agreed to pay for any activity Mom did with me. Maybe that’s why she took me to nice restaurants and on vacations and to the Ashram. I tried to put this thought out of my mind because it didn’t do anything good, but it wouldn’t really leave. The homeless yoga teacher wanted us to focus on our relationships, but my main relationship was Mom and I started to worry that maybe it wasn’t even real.

  After yoga, we had to gather in the biggest cabin for dinner. Everyone was still sweating and smelled like sweat and had sweat on their feet, but I was happy to be done with the yoga and I was really hungry.

  All through dinner, though, I still had the weird feeling in my head that maybe Mom only took me around so Dad would pay for her. I kept telling this thought to go away, but for some reason bad thoughts always stay longer than good thoughts.

  And the food was so d
isgusting. It was all vegetarian, which I usually don’t mind, but it was the bad kind of vegetarian food, where they put so much spice on everything to try to make you forget that it’s not meat.

  The fork was made of a carrot cut into the shape of a fork and we had to eat the fork after eating the meal so that there was no waste. And the bowl was made from seaweed, which tastes like when you accidentally swallow dirty ocean water. Seaweed is something fish might like to eat because they have limited options underwater, but humans have other things that are better like waffles and grapes. But I was so distracted by my bad thoughts that I couldn’t really focus on how gross the food was.

  Mom and I walked back to our room after dinner but we didn’t really talk that much. I think we were both a little homesick and I didn’t want to ask Mom about my fear. I guess I was scared that it might be true and, even if she lied to me and told me that she took me everywhere with her because she loved me, I would probably know that she was lying. Mom lies all the time and it’s usually easy to tell because she over-does it.

  When we got back to the room, Mom said, “Great day, huh?” which was a lie. I almost wanted to cry because I wanted her to at least say, “Yoga was weird. The Indian carpet was sweaty. The Penis Pool is disgusting. And the food was gross.” I wanted her to say at least one true thing but for some reason she needed to lie. And I wanted to say, “No! It was a terrible day. I hate it here.” But for some reason, I felt I had to lie as well. I don’t know why. I think I felt that if I said anything true, I would immediately start crying. So I just said, “Yeah, I love it here.”

  And then we didn’t say anything else to each other all night and we just went to sleep, which was hard for me because I couldn’t get the bad thoughts out of my head. Nighttime can be really scary if you’re worried about something. During the day, there are all sorts of things to distract you, like people and daylight, but if you’re worried about something at nighttime, it seems like it’s the only thing in the whole world.