I am up in my tree. The sky is spotted with stars — JD used to say stars are vanilla freckles on the darkest chocolate face. I look into that face for a sign of a smile. A night breeze moves the leaves.
The leaves in my tree are green-gold, but you can’t tell at night. Not unless you scrunch down so the streetlights shine through — the streetlights in front of our house — Mama’s and my house.
Mama says it’s not right for a girl like me to be out climbing trees — ‘specially at night, and me only nine years old. I can just see her standing there in her nylons on the scratchy grass in our perfect, tiny yard. Her hands would be on her hips, each one holding one of her grown-up-lady shoes from work. Her big sweet face looks up at me. It wrinkles itself into a get-outta-that-tree-right-now-Young-Miss look. Even though my name’s Antoinette, that’s what Mama calls me, “Young Miss.”
I would climb down and say “Sorry Ma’am.” Mama’s big on Ma’ams — it’s just the way she is.
Mama puts a big soft arm around me, and we head for the house. Can’t you just hear her say, “ooh, ouch,” in a squeaky voice as we walk over the scratchy grass? We would laugh and go inside and order next door for Chinese.
Here I am stuck on the top bunk. The ceiling is too close — all those little bumpy pointy things. They feel like dirty chalk. If Deandra hadn’t gone and broke her leg she’d be sleeping up here and I’d get the bottom bunk.
Up in my tree I can see the whole city. It sparkles out there, so far away ‘cause our place — Mama’s and my place — it’s up in the hills. We got a lot of land around us ‘cause that’s the way Mama likes it after a hard day at the office.
She says, “Who wants to be sleepin’ surrounded by a million folks they don’t know, in a million hotels and apartments, and that ratty old downtown shelter, too?”
Downtown’s full of nothing but people and you can’t even see the stars at night. I should know.
We got lots of stars at our place — Mama’s and my place. Every so often at night Mama comes and wakes me up. She stands there by my bed, all tall and spiky. The beads in her braids say click-click. She takes my hand and says, “Come on out here, Netnet.” She calls me that sometimes.
We walk out in the yard in our lacy nightgowns. “Look at all them stars,” she says, and we just stand there and shiver together, Mama and me, knowing it’s nice and warm inside.
There’s a little river making its water-noises in back of the house, and all the frogs are croaking a nightsong, and there’s even a firefly out by the shed. Mama’s big on nature. That’s just how she is.
Are Frances and Deandra gonna keep moving around all night? All those plastic crinkle sounds keep me up. I stay still as I can so I don’t make any plastic crinkles, myself. Most rules in this place are okay, but not the plastic sheet rule. Plastic sheets are for babies.
In my tree I look down at my watch. It’s on my left wrist. I told Mama I didn’t need a watch so nice, but she insisted. She said “Little Toni Girl” — that’s what she calls me, you know, it’s short for Antoinette. She said. “Little Toni Girl, anyone pretty as you ought to have a pretty watch.” Then she put that watch on her credit card. I don’t know which one. She’s got ‘em all: Visa. MasterCard, American Express — she’s what you call one of those golden customers.
I think about how I shouldn’t be climbing trees wearing my new watch and nice clothes. How I should climb down and go in the house. I should go to my room I don’t even have to share with anybody, and look through all the clothes in there for some tree-climbing clothes. I think I should, but I don’t. I just sit up here and study those vanilla freckles.
Maybe when I climb down tonight I’ll go inside and read. There’s books in our house — Mama’s and my house — whole big wooden bookcases like at the library, with those little numbers and everything. They’re all filled up with piles and piles of books, and me and Mama read ‘em all the time.
Mama’s so smart she’s always reading. Did I mention she’s got glasses? Mama loves books so much she’s got some of those gold-frame glasses. Mama says keeping her hair so short and wearing those gold glasses make her look dignified. I like that — having a dignified mama.
Sometimes Mama just sits in her big soft chair and reads all night. And so do I — right next to the fireplace — we got us a nice fireplace, you know. That’s where I read all those books, next to Mama’s big chair by the fireplace.
“Yeah?” I say.
It’s Deandra. I thought she was sleeping.
“Girl,” I say, “you shoulda gone pee before you went to bed.” I climb down and help her stand up. I hand her the crutches and she clumps on down the hall. I go back up the metal ladder and try to keep the crinkles quiet.
Frances is breathing soft and slow over in her bed. The toilet flushes down the hall. Deandra clumps in and leans her crutches against the ladder. She crinkles a lot when she gets in bed, but she’s got that big cast so I try not to get too mad at her.
JD used to say only little monkeys climb trees, but really he just knew he was too big. A man that big could never climb a tree, so he was just grouchy about it. If he hadn’t eaten all those pancakes every morning and bought himself double-triple french fries and left all that trash in the van maybe he would’ve got skinny enough to climb a tree. Then he wouldn’t have to go calling me a monkey.
But who wants to think about old JD? That was two placements ago. I’m up in my tree now, with its creaky noises when the wind blows like tonight. Right now I’m thinking about Mama and me coming out here to the garden where my tree’s lined up with a whole mess of other trees. We got bananas and pumpkins and kiwi fruits growing in our garden, and all that green grass all over the yard, and our pretty little house all warm and cozy.
Did I say how Mama bought this house here in this neighborhood back when I was born? That way I live here all my life and never have to change houses. All the other houses on the street are nice, but not so nice as ours — Mama’s and mine.
There’s a click-click sound and a whoosh when the front door opens. 11 o’clock. They’re changing shifts. I hear Suzanne whispering to whoever, telling all her little secrets about all of us and whatever happened today. Then she’ll go in the office and write a bunch of notes while whoever is getting settled in. Will it be Joanie Rae? I hope. Or maybe Elizabeth, or that substitute lady with the jingly bracelets?
Deandra is making a snuffly sleep noise and I can’t hear any of those secrets they’re talking about, but I think they’re in the kitchen now, cause somebody’s pouring a cup of coffee. That coffee gets poured a long time. Must be Joanie Rae.
After a few minutes she pops her head in our room. She’s got her favorite monster coffee mug. The hall light shines through her hair.
She walks over to Frances’ bed and looks down. Joanie Rae’s a big woman, but she walks like she’s made of cotton balls. The coffee smell follows her in. Then she turns and reaches out to touch Deandra’s crutches leaned up against my ladder. She shakes her head real slow.
Joanie Rae puts a hand on my bed and says, so quiet, “You still awake, Toni-girl?”
“Yes Ma’am,” I say.
“You know you don’t have to Ma’am me.” She pats my shoulder.
“I know.”
“You just get some sleep,” she says. “You just look out the window at your tree and get some sleep.”
“Yes Ma’am,” I say. “That’s what I’m doing.”
Joanie Rae’s all right.
Nobody else ever climbs up my tree. It’s all mine. Mama had this great idea — she built me a fence around my tree so nobody would come up and bother me. So I don’t have to fight off people like those boys that jump in front of you in line at lunch, or laugh at what you’re wearing. I don’t have to fight off people like Ted at the car wash, or old Mr. Hinkley at Eastside Shelter or Rita’s nasty brother.
Up here in my tree I wonder. I wonder about Joanie Rae. Where does she go when she’s not here? Suzanne talks about where she goes home. She says her man doesn’t treat her good. I wonder about Joanie Rae. I sure hope there’s somebody out there who treats her good.
This morning I am second in the bathroom. The rule is fifteen minutes each, but those older girls fog things up so bad you can’t even read the clock. I like getting done before they’re even up.
When I get back to the room, Deandra and Frances aren’t up yet. I fold my sleeping t-shirt on the bed and slip down the hall. Joanie Rae has the table all set for breakfast. The big bag of pancake mix is on the counter.
“Morning, Ma’am,” I say.
“Hey Toni-girl,” she says. She puts down the papers she’s reading and gives me a hug. I finish up, but she’s still hugging. I guess that’s okay. Joanie Rae’s all right. She smells like coffee and maple syrup.
When she lets go I see her eyes are all wet.
“They’re moving you,” she says. She waves some papers. “Again,” she says, then she throws them down on the table.
I pick up the papers and put them in a neat pile. One is all sticky from the syrup bottle.
“Saint Bernadette’s,” Joanie Rae says. “It’s on the Southside. I sub there, sometimes. The kids call it Bernie’s.”
I keep my eyes on the papers, all straightened up. I put them on the table, right on top of the tired yellow folder that says Antoinette Beeler Jones – that’s me.
Joanie Rae’s voice is high and funny. “I can’t believe it. Lost your mother so young, then the streets, the shelter, and a new placement every year since. Why can’t they let you be?”
I shrug.
Joanie Rae stands there cleaning up her face with a Scooby-Doo napkin, and I wonder if it would be okay to ask. I wonder if it would be okay to wish.
I take in a breath. “Do you think from my new room,” I say, “at Bernie’s? Do you think I can see any trees?”
“Oh God in heaven,” she says, then her face crumples all up and she hugs me again. “They have trees, yeah, they do,” she says in between sniffly cry noises, while she holds me up against her big soft chest.
I never knew Joanie Rae cried. She takes a long, messy breath, then says “You’ll be okay, Toni? You’ll settle in and stay awake half the night there instead of here. You’ll make the best of it, won’t you?” She asks.
I nod my head and say into her chest, “Yes ma’am,” but she just keeps on crying.
- Follow us on Twitter: @inthefray
- Comment on stories or like us on Facebook
- Subscribe to our free email newsletter
- Send us your writing, photography, or artwork
- Republish our Creative Commons-licensed content