“But Mamma-Jamma—” I start, hoping the silly nickname will coerce her to give in.
“If you open it, it’ll spoil too fast.”
“That bread old and hard!”
She licks her fingers as if she’s devouring a plate full of sticky barbecued ribs and points to the cupboard. “Back.”
“Sandwich look like concrete block,” I mutter.
“You need to be saying ‘yes ma’am’ like a respectful young woman. None of this backtalk and Mammer Jammer pass the hammer business.”
I shove the jar away. “Joke as stale as this food.”
“Hush.” Over her shoulder, the radio plays a dreary love song. I can’t ignore the dull ache in my belly. Slam bam it is. I slump back into my chair and take a sandwich, then look over at the arts camp pamphlet on the side of the beige filing cabinet. I push the glasses back onto my face and the front of the brochure clicks into focus. A circle of girls on a beach on the front taunts me. I bet they wouldn’t be eating stale sandwiches for Sunday dinner. My gaze slides to my bag, where the application is waiting to be filled out.
“Nia?”
I look up at my mother at the other end of the table. “Yes ma’am?”
“I asked if you’re almost finished with the paper for today. Mr. Rahming’s niece is coming at three for me to help her with her reading.”
I turn back to the monitor, glowing white. “Pretty close.” My eyes drift over to the pamphlet again. “Mummy, you thought any more about if I could go to that art camp this summer?” I force my voice to sound casual.
She reaches for the newspaper. “Why would you want to spend the summer away from your friends?”
“Well, KeeKee’s applying too,” I say. My mother scratches her chin and turns to the business section. Something about this is odd. She doesn’t like my friends. “It’s a chance to experience more of the Bahamas,” I add, trying to sound patriotic.
“Come.” She tosses the newspaper down. “Pass the brochure, let me see.”
I spring up out of my chair too fast to be nonchalant and snatch the pamphlet off the cabinet so fast the magnet holding it in place flies across the room. “It’s just a short ferry ride away—”
“Where is it, exactly?”
“Somewhere on Paradise Island. They have dorms and it’s all girls, you do creative arts—”
“I don’t know what other type arts there are,” she interrupts.
“Culinary arts, maybe.” I rummage in my schoolbag for the application form and rest it on the table beside the pamphlet.
“Since when is cooking an art?”
I bite back an argument and focus on the matter at hand: get to this camp, out of the house, and out of this neighborhood.
“They do writing, painting, sculpture, dance, theater—you have small classes in your own specialty, and they have an on-site farm where they grow their own food—”
“Organic and tended by angels, no doubt.” My mother scans the page. “Only one page on this application?”
“You include a sample of your work to it so they can see. That’s the most important part.”
“And I suppose you’ll be submitting the newspaper.” Mummy glances up at me. “I told you it would come in handy, one of these days.” She flips the paper over to scrutinize the back. “Who’s judging the submissions to this seasonal nirvana?”
I ignore her sarcasm and push on. “It’s a whole committee. Mr. Lewis from the Nassau Journal, Mrs. Strachan from the university’s art department, Ms. Morris from the art gallery, Mr. Wright, Mrs. Symonette—”
“Mr. Wright?” She looks up abruptly.
“Um…” Why would you call his name?, I think, mentally kicking myself as she scans the list of organizers.
“Timothy Wright, architect at Gibson & Associates.” My mother scowls, then tosses the paper down. She gets up, her back to me as she opens the cupboard. “That’s KeeKee’s daddy.”
“But it’s a great opportunity, it would look good on a college application, I could learn independence and maturity and—”
“And bring world peace, and end global hunger.” She bangs a glass down on the counter.
End nasty sandwiches, I think. I bite my tongue. “So can you sign my application for me?”
“Nia, what makes you think I’m sending you out of my sight for six weeks with no one around who I know—”
“But I told you, KeeKee’s gonna be there.”
“Is that meant to comfort me?” Her voice drifts back to me over the clink of glasses, then the sound of water pouring over ice.
I try again. “That’s six weeks you don’t have to worry about me—”
“If you think sleeping out with strangers is a way for me to worry less—”
“You aren’t even gonna think about it?”
She sets a glass of water down beside me. I don’t want a drink. I want out. I want something other than the cloying routine of a Sunday afternoon spent with her and her papers and her glasses of water and her cold sausage sandwiches. I want something more than writing this stupid Pinder Street Press. That’s her dream, not mine.
“It’s after three,” Mummy says, as if she can read my mind. “Let’s get the paper finished off, please.”
“But—”
“I’m done talking.”
I grit my teeth and thump down in front of the computer. I scroll through this week’s stories without really seeing them: something about Danny across the street, who won a martial arts trophy; a summary of the protest we went to in Rawson Square; a school essay on Dame Doris Johnson that I had to tweak into something half fit for other people to read; a piece on the school band playing this Thursday. The paper’s always been so everyday, so unimportant. So small. Even the protest seems faraway now. Up the road, the boys shoot hoops in front of Riccardo’s house. A trail of kids have filtered into the road, bellies full and feet freed from tight church shoes. How big a deal could what happened on Friday, here and downtown, really be?
Mummy comes and peers over my shoulder, then taps her finger against the screen. “Read this. What you wrote about the protest.”
I sigh. “ ‘There was a group of people who got together in Rawson Square to opposition against—’ ”
“To protest against, or oppose.”
“ ‘To oppose against—’ ”
“Listen, girl. To oppose. Start the sentence again.”
“Mummy, you ain ga even answer me?”
“Girl, your head too much in the clouds to see news if it knocked you right in the eye. You doing your work or you nagging me?”
I want to snap back that this paper was her idea all along. Instead, I bite back those words. “Please can I go? Please, please, please?” I fling my arms around her neck. “Can I?”
She squirms away, but relinquishes a grudging laugh. “I’ll think about it—”
“Yes!” I jump up and down and accidentally knock the chair. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” I hug her again until she wriggles free.
“Ease up, I said I’d think about it.”