Excerpt: SAYING GOODBYE

Saying Goodbye is the story of Tia Gonzalez, a 15-year-old Washington Heights native, struggling with the death of her father. She is forced to attend summer school after failing 9th grade and will do anything to escape her grief including using HappyHaters, an app where she earns points by ridiculing her peers. Ultimately, Tia must learn how to find joy in the things she once loved and real connection in the face of loss.

*

When I get home I take the bread out and cut off the moldy parts before I make myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Afterward, I lie on the couch and wait for the AC to kick in. I remember when my dad used to cook dinner. I remember his pastelon with sweet plantains, cheese, and carne guisado. My mom and dad used to alternate cooking depending on their schedules. My mom made a pot of white rice for every meal even if it wasn’t her turn. I drift off thinking about food.

  I wake up to the sound of the key turning in the lock. It’s 10:00 PM and my mom is arriving home from work. I lift my head up to look at her as she walks in. She has dark circles under her eyes. Her black slacks that used to hug her hips sag around her thighs and her white blouse slips off her shoulder.

  “Hi, Mami,” I call out. “Are you hungry?”

  She sits on a chair. “I am,” she says as she pulls her shoes off. “Are you? What did you eat?”

  “Not much. I’m still hungry.”

  She opens the fridge and shakes her head. “Let’s order from Malecon,” she says. “It’s Friday. I just got paid. You want the usual?”

  My usual is pollo guisado, white rice, and pink beans.

  “Yup.”

  “I’ll have the same. Order for me while I change,” she says. “I have cash.”

I set the table while my mom changes in her room.

When she comes back, she’s wearing sweats and one of my dad’s old t-shirts that says Puertorriqueño Hasta La Muerte. I always thought that was funny to say—Puerto Rican until death, as if we have a choice. Now that my father’s dead, I wonder if he is still Puerto Rican. Do we become something else when we’re dead? Do we become white? It would be funny if everyone became Puerto Rican. I picture my English teacher, Mrs. Johnson, transformed into an old Doña in that smelly scratchy red sweater she always wears, making everyone read the bible instead of To Kill a Mockingbird.

The outside door rings and my mom yells, “Who?” into the intercom. She buzzes in the guy from Malecon. When he comes up, she pays and then takes all of our food out of the bag. Even though I set plates on the table, we eat hungrily out of the takeout containers. It feels good to finally feel full.

“I was hungry,” my mom says.

“Me too,” I say. “When do you eat?”

“I try to in between jobs, on the train, or during my break,” she says. “It’s hard though, especially in the evening.”

We continue to eat in silence for a while until she asks me about my day, but when I start to tell her about how Joanne got caught on her phone at summer school, I can tell she’s not really listening because she stares off in space and then looks at me and nods her head. This is what it’s like talking to my mother.

“So then after that, I robbed a store because I didn’t feel like doing my homework,” I say just to see if my hypothesis is correct.

She nods her head and says, “Oh.”

Why does she even bother talking to me?

“Why?” I have an edge to my voice and she looks at me startled out of whatever dreamland she is in.

“What?” she asks.

“Why do you even ask me about my day if you’re not going to listen?”

“What?”

I roll my eyes at her and get up and take my plate to the kitchen. Where did my real mother go? I want her back. Even if she wasn’t fun when my father was alive, at least she paid attention to me. I seal off my leftover rice and chicken and put it in the fridge.

She follows me into the kitchen. “I’m sorry Tia, I’m just so tired right now. We’ll catch up tomorrow.”

“Whatever. You act like you don’t have a daughter anymore.” She winces when I say that, but it’s true. “Anyway, aren’t you working tomorrow?”

Usually, on the nights she works, I do the dishes. But tonight I don’t. She can do them. I go to my room. I wish she would say something—call me back, yell at me, apologize again, or say she’ll listen this time. When I leave my room to go to the bathroom, she’s asleep on the couch sitting up with her head flopping over.

I’m reminded that I’m alone again. Joanne is at home with no phone and Jason is probably out and about. Who knows where? I shut my door and log on to HappyHaters, but the only thing I can see is my mom, on the couch, sitting up, her head flopping over like she’s asleep on the bus. I log off and walk back to the living room. Her head has fallen back and it’s leaning on the back of the couch. I go into the hallway closet and grab my favorite blanket and gently push her down on the couch so her head is on the pillow. Then I grab her legs and move them so she’s laying down. She curls on her side like a baby. After I cover her with my green furry blanket, I go back to the kitchen and wash the dishes. There aren’t that many, just a few forks and knives and the coffee cups from breakfast.

When I log back onto HappyHaters, I tell myself I don’t care and try to see if I can find Jason. Maybe I can finally catch up to Joanne with my points now that she’s suspended. I walk around HappyHaters and see an image of one of the popular football players who’s really good looking. There’s a sign over his private area that says Guess which one is mine? There are different vegetables to choose from. An eggplant, a potato, a celery stick, and a baby carrot. I want to ignore this one, but I remember Joanne saying the more stupid or disgusting the scenario, the more likely it is you will earn points. I earn ten points since it’s a popular vote.

Finally, you get some points. I get an alert that Joanne has logged on.

Her voice comes in through my ear pods and it feels like she is right next to me.

What the hell? How are you even here?

I’m happy to see you too!

I thought your mom took away your phone.

She went to her boyfriend’s house. She said us kids were giving her a headache. She left my phone with Abuela and she’s asleep.

  I follow her around and vote on the same things without thinking.

  Did you find out how long you’re out of school for?

  I’ll be out for 3 days. I wish it was longer. If I miss any additional days or get in trouble again, I’ll be kicked out of summer school.

  Three days! That sucks. I’m gonna be all alone.

  You’ll be all right. We can hang out after school.

  We watch a dumb video of a kid from the soccer team picking his nose and eating it. There’s a group of boys with sagging pants on the corner of 175th and Broadway, all laughing at a boy whose pants are sagging so low they fall around his ankles and he can barely walk. There are more little dicks, girls with padded bras showing before and after shots, worst hair and worst butt contests. We both laugh. It’s easier to laugh at people when I’m with her. I start to feel like a normal teenager.

*

Diana Quiñones is an 8th grade English teacher in the Lower East Side by day and a writer by night. Collaborating around language arts as a practice of justice, she is an alum of VONA, Las Dos Brujas, One Story, Kweli, and Catapult, and loves exploring social justice with her students as a way of helping them unearth the power of language and the written word. Born and raised in the Bay Area, she now resides in New York City’s Washington Heights where she is completing her first novel. She spends her “spare” time communing with the trees and spending time with her family.

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