They sit at home eating dinner.
Lucy looks at her plate and wonders why
She wonders why mom is always angry when she cleans
She wonders why dad is always tired when he comes home
She wonders when they’ll be able to own a dog and name him cupcake
“Ma, cuando nos vamos a mover de casa?”
“Que cosas dises?! Esta es tu casa”
“Pero quiero pintar mi cuarto amarillo y tener un perrito”
She frowned at her plate, she was frowning at the world.
In the bathroom, Lucy cries. Because she doesn’t want them to see her cry, to barge in a room and ask, “y ahora porque lloras?!”
In the bathroom Lucy could lock the door without having her family ask why
Lucy cried because her mom didn’t give her answers, she just said no.
She knew there was more. Their house was not a family house. There house was a building and people lived upstairs and downstairs.
In car rides, going down North Ave. there is a big house on Wrightwood.
I want to live there one day.
A big house for me and my family.
Cupcake running in the front lawn
No one telling us anything.
Lucy left the bathroom and sat back at the table.
She finished her food and took her plate to the sink.
“Maybe mom’s mad because I don’t wash my dish?”
She washed her plate and turned off the water,
“Si bas a lavar un plato nomas, mejor no laves ninguno”
She yelled in the morning to get us up,
She yelled at night to put us to bed.
Lucy learned to cry in silence.
So that her unanswered questions would not wake her sister
“Why God? Why do other people have more money? Why are other people always happy and my family always fighting? God I promise, if you make my mom and dad happy I will pray to you every night. Thank you God, En el nombre del padre, del hijo, del espíritu santo, amen”
Some Days they were happy,
Dad would take us to the park, I would play with Sophie and Roberto and it would be fun.
But other days they would fight again
And i didn’t know what to tell God,
Because mom always said, “no digas nada malo de dios”
I wished on a shooting star
I threw a penny in a fountain,
I wondered what people said to god for him to hear them.
Lucy went to her room where Sophie was.
“It’s okay Sophie, when I grow up, i’m going to move us to that big house we saw. You’re going to have your own room and Robert will too and me too an you’ll paint it any color you want and we'll have a dog and we’ll name it cupcake and mom and dad will laugh with us and watch movies, okay Sophie? It’s going to be okay, when I grow you’ll see”