I still stumble over my words.

my tongue twists and tangles as I fight my way through vowels

consonants diphthongs and everything in between --

                    take a breath.

                        start again.

this language is one I had clung onto as a child,

clumsy fingers grasping desperately lest I lose it

never to be found again.

I was taught only one alphabet in school;

the other, I burned into my memory night after night

                                                                                    just to spell my own name.

I am to be praised and ridiculed in equal measure --

        shouldn't you know how to speak it by now?

                oh, you can't read that? what a shame.

                        are you sure you're really a [REDACTED].

even my own father, confident in his whiteness, his privilege,

tells me to study the language I've spoken since birth,

the language he doesn't know,

as if I hadn't cried and spoken in whispers and shouts,

as if I hadn't fought to keep my mother's language close to my chest,

                                                         as if I hadn't been looked down on enough yet.

you'll have to take a proficiency test if you want to live here,

he tells me during the longest five hours of my life,

where my rage boils over and I realize

I am not a daughter to him.                

                                                                        I am an object to be shown off.

so I plaster on a smile and mix it with a grimace,

layer thinly veiled insults onto him in the only language he knows

then turn around and speak with full confidence to an employee

who say nothing of my stumbles and halts and treats me like

I am meant to speak their tongue.

this is the language of my family,

                                                    (the one that matters at least)

this is the language of convenience

                                                     (fit for a country I wish to leave)

                it'll take more than the world's judgement to keep me quiet in either one.

even if I stumble over my words when I say that.

I was eight when I held my first baby (my little cousin). It’s also when I received my favorite stuffed animal of all time, PJ. He was a dark brown dog stuffed with beans or rice that eventually started leaking through holes my mother would sew shut for me. He had white ears that turned gray over time and a black nose which he lost at some point in our short life together. He was well-loved…

When I was 16, my mother, PJ and I did a “grand tour” of Europe: England, France, Switzerland and Italy. In Italy, during a flurry of packing for an early morning departure, I left PJ snuggling under the sheets in a hotel in Florence. We were on the bus traveling to our next destination when I realized he was not in my possession. I was devastated. I cried for hours that day. When we stopped in Assisi, the tour guide, Francisco, said he would call the hotel and see what he could do. Our fellow travelers tried to comfort me, Miss Sunshine, saddened that my customary smile was submerged in tears.

We arrived in Rome in time for dinner that evening. During the meal, just before dessert was served, Francisco proclaimed victory: The hotel where poor PJ had been left behind had found my well-loved friend and sent him along with another tour group heading in the same direction. They had arrived just minutes before and dear Francisco had PJ in his hand. When he held him aloft for all to see, the room erupted into laughter. They couldn’t believe the sad excuse for a stuffed dog was what had caused the ocean of tears that day.

I didn’t care. I ran up to Francisco and hugged him as I grabbed PJ and hugged him, too.

Sadly, a year later I left him tucked in a bed in Petersburg, Virginia and though my mother tried to retrieve him, that hotel said he could not be found.

I like to think another little girl in need of a silent friend that swallowed tears and comforted broken hearts found him and loved him well.

She twitched, woke, and looked in the space between the worn curtains. Drifted off, won’t sleep tonight, she thought. She pushed the old green quilt off and herself out of the recliner toward the kitchen and knew there was less hurt in her back. She entered the little galley and turned on the stove and the faucet and filled the kettle. The teabag was open and in a cup without a thought.

What time was it? She looked at the clock. Not late enough to force herself to lie in bed. What had to be done tomorrow? The mail, the store, make calls? The kettle whistled. She poured the water and wondered about the girls. They get colds so much at that age. Maybe in two weekends. She’d call Deb tomorrow to plan. Not a hundred miles but always too hard to make it work. The idea of moving came again for the moment it took her to think would Deb like it, even Jimmy?

She poured and turned and her foot kicked the little dish on the floor. So she hurried back to the chair and sat and looked at her crossword and crochet and the television then stared at the floor for a long time and sipped. Supposed to make sleep come sooner but never does. Tom never liked tea. Could have coffee after dinner and still be asleep by ten every damn night. She used to resent it. She remembered staring at him. The kids tearing the house apart, Eric’s crazy dog barking, the bedwetting and laundry and school lunches and dishes and baths and fights over homework. And then it would be done for the night and the house would be quiet and she would lean back on the headboard and know it wouldn’t come. The room was always so silent and still except him breathing away like clockwork. She could have smothered him. Of course he’d never wanted anything crawling around at two in the morning. That’s how he put it.

Until it did come, in the apartment. The quiet was fine here. Worse aches and longer days and rolling and half waking but she finally slept. She pulled the quilt up over her lap and sighed. A few strands of gray caught her eye in the green threads so she pushed it back over the side of the chair to the carpet. Should vacuum and wash everything anyway. No point waiting around. Besides, she finally felt up to it. The knees, sure. But the back was better. Almost good for once. A week without shifting all night.

She drained her cup and set it down on the side table. Tomorrow. I’ll take care of it all tomorrow. The dish, the box, the dirty carpets. Its time. She stared at the wall and the darkness between the curtains. There was stillness and nothing to move for so she hoped to drift a while at least.

The sound of a train and the whitsle of the wind, thats all most people could hear but especially not the conversation between Jon and I. His fists were clenched shut as he stood next to me at the train station. "I've never felt this way before... Its just weird to me ok..." He said to me as my train pulled up to the station dock.

"Listen I need to go back home, my family needs me right now and I have..." I started, but with excitement and intensity he interupted me again with a raised hand.

"Just stay one more day... You’re the only guy that I've ever... Well..."

The intenseness of this moment could make a good movie scene... The weather was beautiful and the sky was full of heathy clouds. Children playing in the station, running around paying us no mind as he stood above me... desprate. "I can't stay... I'm the medical providor for my family and you know they don't work with outsiders... I can't stay."

"Damn it" Jon's voice sound exhausted for some reason, as if he was giving all his effort in a long run. "Christian, just one more day."

The bellman now checking to see if any other passingers were running late looked over in our direction as I got up. "I can't."

"But, I love you..." He said words I didn't know would stop me from getting on that train... My mind raced and I didn't really know what to do.