SandScript 2021

“Were you reading, again?”
I paused. I wanted to lie.
“Yes, mother.”
“Oh, come on, Tennyson. Go
outside. It’s too nice of a day to have
your nose in a book.”
“But I don’t know anyone here,
yet.”
“I don’t know anyone here, yet,
mother.”
“Yes, mother.”
“Go knock on doors and try to find
a friend. Now.”
I was six years old.
“Yes, mother.”
The apartment complex was
vast, an exhaustive expanse of somber
sidewalks and mansard roofs. I held my
breath every time I raised my fist to a
door. Doors and doors and doors. Never
knowing what was behind them. Who
was behind them.
“Do you have any children my age
I can play with?” I asked.
A few of the adults looked stunned.
Most were annoyed, waving me off with
the back of a hand. I was hot, tired, and
still alone, so very lonely. I decided to try
one last apartment.
A girl my age opened the door
and I held my breath. Her beauty was
peculiar. Exotic, I thought they called
it. Her hair was black tinsel, a decorative
frame of pixie around the whitest skin,
pure as puffs of fresh cotton. Her eyes
were not simply oval-shaped, but rather
crescents of eggs that had been flattened
by the ballast of her creamy lids and thick
black lashes.
I had seen her before at school,
sitting on the edge of the playground,
alone, separated by not only pillows of
air but a palpable line of demarcation
— she was a foreigner. Her inability to
speak English was apparent not only in her
speech, but in her body language. The
way she looked at the ground. The way
she wore shiny patent leather shoes and
dresses when the rest of us wore Izods and
deck shoes. Looking back, I see the irony,
walking around in leather and rubber,
as if in protection. But not her. She
didn’t know the dangers of living in this
neighborhood. In my world.
We sat on the floor of her bedroom,
both of us flush with the excitement of our
new friendship.
“Kyoto,” she said as she pointed to
her chest.
“Kyoto,” I repeated.
She shook her head.
She said her name again, but I
didn’t notice any difference from the way
I said it.
I tried again and this time when
she shook her head, she smiled. Her teeth
were so very white, the pink rose of her lips
blossomed as she stressed the area of her
name that I mispronounced.
“Kyoto.”
I got it. The k and y were said
as if they were one, their own special
consonant, not a blend of two.
She walked over to her dresser
and grabbed a small, pink book with a
colorful cat on the front. Hello Kitty. The
Japanese character that was so popular
in the late 70s. The doll I had asked Santa
for Christmas. The character in the book
I’d asked for my birthday. The feline on
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