CrimsonBaby,” her mother said.
CeCe let her mother rock her side to side on their couch.
“It’s going to be hard, but I want you to try not to stay angry with the kids in your class,” she said. “A lot of them were taught the wrong way to treat people.”
“They were?” CeCe asked, her brow crinkling at the thought of her mother or Mrs. Castellanos teaching her anything wrong or upside down.
CeCe’s mother nodded, wiping away tears with the whole of her palm.
“Some grown-ups are rotten on the inside,” her mother said. CeCe thought her mother’s voice felt far away this time, instead of her eyes. “Still so full of hate and teaching it to their babies now. Monsters. Hateful monsters.”
“Ms. Weathers?” a feathery voice lilted behind CeCe and her mother. It was Friday afternoon, the last day of their first week at Armstrong.
They turned to face Ms. Lapham, her long dark waves pulled back in one long French braid. CeCe beamed up at her teacher. Her mother, weary, responded with a faint and placid smile.
“You can call me Carla,” CeCe’s mother said, placing both hands on CeCe’s shoulders.
“Oh, thanks, Carla,” Ms. Lapham said, smiling sheepishly. “You’d be surprised at how many parents aren’t comfortable with first names.”
CeCe’s mother raised her eyebrows and gave a slight nod. In spite of her soft tone, CeCe could feel her mother’s fingers growing tense as the draped over her shoulders.
“Carla,” Ms. Lapham continued, nervousness now lacing the edges of her voice. “Would you mind if we went inside to chat for a moment? There’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”
CeCe felt her mother begin to move and then decide not to commit. Her fingers were firm on CeCe’s shoulders. CeCe looked up and saw her mother’s head swivel slowly to look around them. Children were chasing one another beneath the portico, two teachers stood in the front doorway talking, parents were calling their children into station wagons, and a few mothers were standing close by, like they were hoping to hear a secret.
CeCe’s mother turned to face Ms. Lapham.
“We can talk here.”
“Oh,” Ms. Lapham blinked. “Well, um . . . what I wanted to talk with you about, um, is that a, um . . . situation has unfolded this week.”
CeCe’s mother nodded for her to continue.
“It seems CeCe may have, um . . . taken something she, um . . . heard at home out of context and, um . . . it’s become something of an, um . . . issue among the children.”
As Ms. Lapham fidgeted with the drawstrings of her peasant blouse, CeCe turned toward the sound of movement. She watched the other mothers inching closer, trying to get nearer to the secret her mother was getting from Ms. Lapham.
CeCe’s mother was quiet, but CeCe could feel her mother’s body harden.
Ms. Lapham cleared her throat, her eyes also taking in the encroaching mothers.
“CeCe seems to think some of the other children are, um . . . half-monster, and it’s turned into quite the firestorm with the other families.”
CeCe’s mother turned now, slowly, to face the other mothers. They were out, CeCe thought. Caught moving, like red light, green light.
“Nothing out of context,” CeCe’s mother spoke over her shoulder.
The other mothers were no longer pretending not to eavesdrop. CeCe watched them gasping, looking to one another, crossing their arms, moving ever closer. Ms. Lapham continued.
“Yes, well, the children were upset because CeCe was so . . . convincing . . . about the whole monster business. Many of them—”
“Let me guess,” Carla interrupted, returning her focus to Ms. Lapham. “Many of them went home crying? Like my daughter has done every day?”
CeCe looked up at Ms. Lapham. She felt her stomach tighten in perverse anticipation, like knowing the jester would leap from the jack-in-the-box at any moment. One more crank of the handle. One more. One more.
The mothers bristled and mumbled. Ms. Lapham’s face was a deep red.
“Here we go,” huffed a mother’s voice.
CeCe felt her mother’s torso turn. CeCe turned with her to see the other black mother, Mrs. Johnson, yank her purse strap to her shoulder and summon for her kids, the twins in CeCe’s class.
“Michael? Michelle?” the other mother called. “Let’s go.”
CeCe felt a low rumble against the back of her head. She felt her mother’s hands leave her shoulders and turned to see her mother crossing her arms and turning to face Mrs. Johnson.
“Please go,” CeCe’s mother said. “You’re the worst of them all.”
“Excuse me?” Mrs. Johnson said, tugging again at her purse strap as she turned to face CeCe’s mother.
“I expected these white folks to be themselves,” CeCe’s mother said without flourish, “but it’s inexcusable that the black woman didn’t teach her black children to embrace their only black classmate.”
Mrs. Johnson leveled a look of contempt in their direction. “I don’t have to—”
CeCe’s mother slowly turned away. Her full back faced Mrs. Johnson and her hands returned to CeCe’s shoulders.
“Is there anything else?” she asked Ms. Lapham in a slow, level tone.
“I suppose not,” Ms. Lapham said with a swallow. CeCe watched her teacher’s eyes flit from mother to mother. “I just, um . . . wanted to . . . um, that should be—”
“Don’t turn your back when I’m talking to you!” Mrs. Johnson said, her barbed words lobbed from behind their heads and landing in the middle of them all with a thud. CeCe peeked past her mother’s hip to see Mrs. Johnson moving toward them. She wasn’t a big woman, but to CeCe she looked like she was filled with hard metals and glass. Her facial features and limbs jutted with sharp edges of bone. Even the corners of her eyes and mouth pulled upward into points. CeCe didn’t doubt Mrs. Johnson had a monster inside of her.
“Who do you think you are?” Mrs. Johnson continued, stepping around them to assume the space where Ms. Lapham had stood. CeCe watched her teacher scurry into the school building. The circle of other mothers began to drift backwards.
CeCe’s mother did not move. She kept her fading eyes on the woman.
“What makes you think—” Mrs. Johnson had raised a finger to continue her rant.
“No,” CeCe’s mother said, with a definitive, single shake of her head. “I’m not helping you dance for these people.”
“Now, you listen to me,” Mrs. Johnson began, her body wilting into a familiar curve of hands on hips and neck on a slow rotation. CeCe pressed herself into her mother’s legs as Mrs. Johnson continued to raise her voice at her mother.
“I said no!” CeCe’s mother shouted. “I’m not about to help you shuck and jive for these white folks!” CeCe snapped her chin upward to look at her mother. She’d never heard her mother yell before. Now she was afraid, not for what could happen next but for the final dregs of energy she knew had escaped her mother at that moment.
“Don’t worry,” CeCe’s mother continued, reaching for CeCe’s hand and leveling her voice again. “You can still be their token darkie.”
The collective gasp inside the portico seemed to suck in all of the wind, weather, and energy circling the elementary school.
“Ladies!” a man’s voice approached them. CeCe turned to see Mr. Neumann and Ms. Lapham dashing into their circle.