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Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Howard, Max.
Title: Fifteen and change / Max Howard.
Description: New York : West 44, 2019. | Series: West 44 YA verse Identifiers: ISBN 9781538382592 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781538382608 (library bound) | ISBN 9781538383308 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Children’s poetry, American. | Children’s poetry, English. | English poetry. Classification: LCC PS586.3 F548 2019 | DDC 811’.60809282--dc23
First Edition
Published in 2019 by Enslow Publishing LLC 101 West 23rd Street, Suite #240 New York, NY 10011
Copyright © 2019 Enslow Publishing LLC
Editor: Caitie McAneney Designer: Seth Hughes
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer.
Printed in the United States of America
CPSIA compliance information: Batch #CS18W44: For further information contact Enslow Publishing LLC, New York, New York at 1-800-542-2595.
To hope and all things with feathers
Focus. Remember what it felt like to be invisible. Teacher looks around the room. He’s going to call on somebody. I’ve done it before. Think. Focus.
All during math class I try to be invisible. Focus. Remember what works. Remember hunting deer with Dad in the tree stand. Quiet. Still. The teacher’s eyes flick over me like he doesn’t see me, like I’m invisible. Teacher calls on some girl: Sarah, what do you think?
is named Sarah.
At my old school
back in Blue Way, Wisconsin,
all the girls were Maddie.
All the boys were Jake.
All the boys here are Jake, too.
People think my name is Jake.
It’s not.
It’s Zeke.
Sometimes Zekers.
I wish Paul would just swear. But he’s Christian so he won’t. Instead he calls my mom a BRITCH. He says it’s a joke. Her name is Britney. Brit. Britch. Get it? My mom laughs. Paul says, Shut up, you dumb britch.
Close the door to your room. Lie down. Keep the light off. Pretend you’re not there. Pretend you don’t hear Paul’s video game sounds. Shooting. Explosions. He’s playing CS:Go on Steam. Paul gets mad. Yells at the computer, Oh, you little britch. Britch, I’m gonna kill you.
One night Dad and I took the canoe out. The air was cold. The water was warm. Fog rolled off the lake. It hung so thick between us I couldn’t see my dad. He couldn’t see me. I sometimes forget what he looks like now. I have to go on Facebook to find his picture. He lives back in Wisconsin. He posts a lot of selfies, sometimes with a fish.
is someone else.
is someone else. Godzilla from the 70s. I delete all my selfies. I don’t mind being red haired, skinny, freckled, fourteen and a half. I mind having my picture taken. I mind being seen.
I’d never ridden a city bus. Cars, yes. School bus, yes. Trucks, yes. Tractors, yes. Snowmobiles. Four-wheelers. I’d never been inside an apartment. Houses, yes. Trailers, yes. Boats, yes. Campers, RVs. Tents, barns, pole sheds. Ice shanties. Never an apartment.
If all apartments are like Paul’s apartment, then apartments smell like hot dog water. Silverfish squirm in the bathtub. The sink burps. The couch farts. Or else it’s Paul sitting there eating string cheese.
The vacuum broke at the motel. My mom didn’t want to tell her boss. He might make her pay for it. So she picked up lint hair Cheetos with her fingers. But she got to watch Say Yes to the Dress while cleaning the rooms. She says, Some of these brides are so beautiful— like butterflies