Stanzi Has a Paper Clip
Gustav is building a boat. I can see it every day except on Thursday because that’s family therapy night. When I talk to Gustav about the boat, he doesn’t tell me it will be better than a stupid human. He tells me it cannot drive itself.
Gustav’s boat is red, just like his helicopter. He’s decided that he wants to be in my coffin dreams again and asks if he can have the biggest coffin. I tell him yes, but I don’t tell him that in my coffin dreams since we flew back, I dream us in a double coffin. I make a note to change it to queen-sized so we both have more room.
Mama and Pop now make dinner together and last night they made carnitas and they were delicious. Gustav ate with us, and Pop and he get along great. Mama avoids Chick’s Bar because once she came out of her formaldehyde, she said she never wanted to smell like that again.
We threw away the master list. It’s in a landfill now. Probably the one over by the highway. You’re welcome to it if you want to one day see the looney tunes.
There are still intruder drills once a month. Red buttons. Test weeks. Banned books. Dress codes. Assessment. Detention. We can’t get away from it. Letters make letters make letters make letters. It’s a chain of command. A line of duty, a battle chosen.
Gustav has chosen the battle of building an invisible red boat. I have chosen the battle of remembering what I wanted to forget. Lansdale has chosen the battle of being an honest, short-haired girl. China has chosen the battle of being right side out.
We’re alive. We have words and shapes and ideas. We will throw them at you when you do not believe. We will throw our love and our hate and our failure and success. We’ll split in two right in front of you and be our best and our worst. We’ll lie and tell the truth.
But we are alive.
And no one has the answers.
And we all sent the bomb threats.
We did it so you would believe.
We believe.
Somewhere in every mind is an opening to crawl through.
Somewhere in every body there are eighty-nine cents’ worth of chemicals walking around lonely.
And somewhere in every idea there is a hole that fits an unbent paper clip.
You just have to find it.
Reset. Reset. Reset.
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