Chapter 32 - I'll Be a Home for You

Chapter 32

bread cut with a stranger’s knive is seldom tasty

JJ

If I said my mom knocking on my door at seven a.m. on a Sunday woke me up, I’d be lying, because I never fell asleep. Instead, I sobbed and screamed into my pillow, recalling yesterday’s argument with Aang.

However, what she does achieve is making me groan and slither out of my bed onto the floor. I spend some more time sobbing and screaming into the rug before getting up.

I grab the clothes Mom insisted I wear today: a black skirt and her old white shirt embroidered with flowers. Perfect for Sunday church! She would never have made me go to church in Poland. She didn’t even go herself. But being here has made her desperate to do Polish things, and celebrating Catholic holidays is clearly one of them.

In church, I put all my effort into not falling asleep. I sneak peeks at Mom, but even the priest’s monotone voice can’t stop her from enjoying the mass. When ksiądz comes over with holy water to bless our wonky palm, I can’t stop thinking about how happy I was telling Aang about all of this. I blink the tears away before my parents spot them.

After the service, I sit on the bench outside, waiting for Dad to grab the car, while Mom’s standing on the steps of the white church, chatting with strangers in Polish. I drum my fingers against the wood.

I could join the conversation. But what’s the point? They’d first assume I can’t speak Polish. Then would come the little tests. Where in Poland? How long? And somehow, even after I pass their little pop quiz, they’d still launch into patronizing explanations of what they’re talking about. Ethnic gatekeeping at its finest. What’s the point of joining them if it’s going to hurt?

Because sitting on this bench hurts more.

I dig my nails into my thighs. There’s no winning.

“It’s you.”

I look up. A blond girl is standing in front of me. Even without the cheerleading makeup on, I recognize her. “You’re the one from the State competition.” The one who was flirting with Aang.

“I’m Kaycee.”

“Okay, sure … What are you doing here?”

She points toward the lawn, where an elderly couple is laughing with a younger copy-paste version of Kaycee. “Grandad claims you can only do Palm Sunday in this church. They don’t bless the palms as well anywhere else.”

“I didn’t mean at church—wait. You’re Polish?”

She shakes her head. “No, my grandparents emigrated. But we still do all the stuff. My last name is Vishnevsky.” She pronounces Wiśniewski wrong. Without the soft v, nyev, and skee. Also, since she’s a girl, it should be Wiśniewska.

I’m about to correct her, but an image of Aang flashes in my head. His face, when he struggled to pronounce the dishes during Chinese New Year.

I let go of her abysmal pronunciation and just say, “I see.”

“Can I sit here?” She points to the bench.

I scooch over.

Laughter erupts from the group in front of the church. Kaycee balls her hands into fists.

“You okay?” I ask.

“They’re talking about the latest Polish election. I tried to join in, because I followed the news with my grandpa, but they didn’t take my Polish seriously.”

My mouth falls open. “You speak Polish? You?”

Immediately, my throat scorches with acid.

My tone. People used the same one with me when they didn’t believe I spoke Polish. And I’ve just done it to someone else. Bile rises in my throat. It’s so easy for the judgment to escape, so easy to doubt someone’s claim to an identity … Oh god, I think I’m about to throw up in front of her.

Kaycee shrinks. “Not really—I mean technically, yeah, but everyone always tells me I have a horrible accent. I sound so American.”

This is bizarre. Kaycee, with her long blond hair and light blue eyes, is an Eastern European standard come to life. But she sounds different, so she’s out. I could not sound more Polish, but I don’t look it, so I’m out. Who gets to claim this stupid identity?

“So …” Kaycee tilts her head. “What are you doing here? I’ve never seen you around before.”

“My mom wanted to come this year. She’s Polish.”

Why do you hate your own identity?

I hesitate, but the words fight their way to the front of my tongue. “I’m also Polish. Born and raised.”

She slaps her hands on her thighs so hard, I jump up. “I knew I wasn’t crazy! There was a tinge of how my grandparents sound in your voice. But I was like, no way, this girl has to be American.”

She might as well have punched me in the stomach.

This should make me ecstatic. But the pain spreads from my core to every cell in my body. I pull on my curls. If that’s what I wanted to hear, but now it isn’t, then what do I actually want to hear?

I pull harder, my hair follicles protesting. I don’t know what I want. I don’t know. I don’t know. Strands of my hair are leaving my scalp, flowing away in the wind as I rock back and forth. I don’t know. I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what to do.

“Would you want to talk in Polish?” Kaycee asks quietly. “It would be nice to practice with someone my age. Since we’re here.”

I let go of my curls. Yeah, I can do that.

She was right. She has a shocking American accent. But I can understand her, and that’s all that should matter. I speak more slowly on the long words. She sometimes uses an English word when she can’t think of a Polish one. We talk about cheerleading, because we don’t have any other shared topics of conversation. She wants to go to the University of Alabama, specifically for their cheerleading program, but it’s insanely competitive. I tell her that my friend’s mom used to be an Alabama cheerleader, and I can put them in touch.

“Really? You’d do that for me?”

“Obviously. Less competition for cheerleading teams on the East Coast.” I say East Coast in English. It’s faster.

Kaycee laughs. “Girl, you’re so right. But don’t think for a moment that will stop me from trash-talking you next year.” She winks. “And it won’t stop me from flirting with your backspot.”

My hands tighten on the bench.

She arches an eyebrow. “Territorial flyer thing or just a boyfriend thing?”

“No, he—I don’t actually know. We’ve kissed, we’ve been on dates, and I like him so much, but I did something stupid, and he said awful things, and then I responded with something horrific …”

Kaycee’s eyes light up. “Start from the beginning, I beg you.”

“Okay, so—” I stop myself. She looks way too eager to hear about my problems. “How do I know you won’t use it against me?”

She looks around. “Because we’re in the house of God?” Her lips twitch.

I snicker, and she bursts out laughing. “I couldn’t even pretend for a minute. No, clearly if I use it against you, I won’t get my Alabama contact.”

“That’s true.”

She motions with her hand. “Go on, then.”

I start with the first day of high school, go through Women’s Day, the sophomore year argument, the Valentine’s Day kiss, and finish with relaying yesterday’s Boston trip.

“Okay, girl, I understood about fifty percent of what you said because you were speaking real fast and my Polish is not that good.” She flicks her hair off her shoulder. “But in my opinion, you’ve made life too hard for yourself with all the thinking.”

“Huh?” I stare at her. “That’s all you have to say?”

She shrugs. “I’m not your therapist.”

A shadow looms over us. “Kaycee? Is this your girlfriend?” An elderly woman dressed in a pastel-pink suit with a flower brooch stands behind us. She has short grey hair and glasses. For a second, I’m convinced my grandmother is standing in front of me, and I almost jump up to hug her. Until Kaycee reminds me that this is not my grandmother.

“Babcia! You need to stop asking that about every girl in my proximity.” Kaycee buries her face in her hands. “She’s just a fellow cheerleader. Also Polish. This is … actually, I don’t know your name.”

“Józefina.” My grandma would have a stroke if she heard me call myself JJ. For some reason, I’m convinced this woman would have one too. I extend my hand for a handshake.

She raises her eyebrows. “Józefina?”

I nod, my insides bracing for a hit.

The woman laughs and shakes my hand. “Poor thing,” she says in Polish and looks at her confused granddaughter. “Józefina is an old person’s name. It’s as if your mother named you Getrude. Let me guess, named after your grandmother?”

My insides warm. “Yeah, named after my grandmother.” Grandmothers. “The second part of my name is actually Ibifubura. After my Nigerian grandmother. So Józefina-Ibifubara.” And since we’re already here, might as well add everything up. “Józefina-Ibifubara Wyróżnicka-Johnson.”

“A powerful name.” Kaycee’s grandmother pats me on the shoulder. My chest tightens. My grandma used to say that.

She turns to Kaycee. “We should go. Your grandad needs a toilet.”

“Give me one more minute.” When her grandmother walks away, Kaycee leans over. “Listen, Józefina.”

“Józefina-Ibifubara.”

“Józefina-Ibifubara,” she repeats. “Yes, you made life harder for yourself. Because that guy? Obsessed with you. At the September football game, I was shouting at him, basically doing cartwheels to get his attention, and he didn’t even notice. His eyes were following you everywhere like he was your bodyguard. At State? When you showed up while I was talking to him? He lit up like a Christmas tree. It was nauseating.” She rolls her eyes. “Just date a hot guy who’s clearly into you and let go of the philosophical crisis.”

I chuckle. “Sounds pretty simple.”

“It is.” She eyes me. “But you can’t stop me from flirting with him. He has too much of that hot nerd energy thing going on.” She waves and walks away.

“Thanks, Kaycee!” I shout after her. “But I’ll beat you up if you go near him!”

“I just know he’ll find that so fucking hot!”

On our way home, we drop Mom off at the hospital. There was a car accident on the highway, and they need her to conduct emergency operations. At least she got to go to church.

You’d think I’d get sad, but that’s the reality of our lives. I’m proud of my parents. They raised me as best they could while helping others. And I want to dedicate myself exactly the way they do. I wonder if whoever I end up with will understand that.

Once home, I take out the dusty Felix, Net, i Nika book collection from my closet. I trace my finger over the Biblioteka Józefiny-Ibifubary38 stamp my grandma gave me for my seventh birthday, which graces the front page of every book I own. Besides the ones I bought in the US, naturally.

I go to my closet, take out a pink wooden box, and dump everything out of it. I grab a small black container that falls out. The stamp is there, but the ink has dried up. I run to the car. Fifteen minutes later, I’m back from the shop with fresh ink. I go through all my new books—mainly textbooks on English and American history—and I stamp. And I stamp. And I stamp. Biblioteka Józefiny-Ibifubary. I push most of the textbooks to the back of the bookcase and put the eighteen-book Felix collection at the front.

And then I call my grandmother.

She answers immediately, her neon-pink sweater filling the frame. “Józia! So happy to hear from you!” she says in Polish.

I open my mouth to answer, but Babcia’s background gets my attention. Like muscle memory, the smell of antiseptic hits my nose. I would recognize those cyan walls anywhere. I spent too much of my childhood playing in those hallways while my parents were working. “Why are you in the hospital?”

“I’m just having a check-up.”

“For what?”

“A broken leg?”

“You broke your leg?” My stomach drops. “When? How?”

“I fell down the stairs. Like two months ago?”

“Two months ago? Why didn’t you say anything? I’m going to book the summer flights; you need help. Have you organized physiotherapy? I’ll do that when I’m back.”

“And … that’s exactly why I told your mother not to say anything.”

“What?” I sit on the floor. “Why?”

“I wanted you to come back to Poland because you wanted to be back here. Not because you felt obliged to.”

“Babcia …” I choke out.

“Listen, I actually have to go. I got to the hospital two hours ago, and it’s finally my turn for the check-up. But I’ll call you later, okay?”

Don’t go. “Okay.”

“Kocham cię, Józia. And you don’t have to come back just for me, you know?” She hangs up before I can tell her I love her too.

I start wailing.

I’m terrified. I’m terrified of going back to Poland. When they used to tell me to go back where I came from, the answer to that was easy. I never came from anywhere else. But now? After three years in America, there’ll be a sliver of truth in their words that makes my stomach churn.

My teeth are chattering, and I can’t control the shaking of my hands to the point that my phone falls out of my grip.

My dad knocks on my door. “Ibi, you okay?” he asks in Polish.

I open the door. “No,” I say through sobs.

His brow knits together hard. “What evil has befallen this household?” He switches to English.

When emotions overwhelm him, my dad transforms into an English wordsmith. Nigerians walked so Shakespeare could run, he likes to say. Once, he lost a ten-dollar bill in a park and spent the entire day muttering that his village people had finally located him.

He surveys my puffy eyes. “Is it the boy? Has he become an enemy we have to slay?”

I’m so surprised I stop crying. “How do you know about the boy?” I ask in Polish.

Dad rolls his eyes and switches from English to Polish. “Your mother and I are busy, not stupid. You’re aware you’re in trouble, right? You know what the dating rules are.”

I groan. They didn’t notice when I was dating Brad, so I didn’t think it’d be obvious this time around.

“He must make an appearance in this household soon. We’ll make him a Polish–Nigerian feast. Unless we have to finish his life first.”

“There’s no need to kill him.” I’d be the dead one if my parents found out he’s already been over. In my bed. When they weren’t here. Abort the thoughts. Abort before Dad guesses them from your facial expression. I dry my cheeks with the back of my hand. “The food? He’d love that.”

“Excellent. A point in his favor already. He needs only three million more.” He takes in the state of my room. “So if it’s not the boy, then what’s wrong?”

I study his green Nigerian football shirt and the orange headscarf he wears around the house when his bald head gets cold. On impulse, I ask, “Why haven’t you gone back to Nigeria?”

Dad blinks.

“Why haven’t you gone back home?” I sniff, new tears forming in my eyes. “Please tell me.”

He walks around the mess on the floor and sits on my bed. He sinks into the pink comforter. “I haven’t seen my home in three decades. I’m scared that when I go back, it won’t be my home anymore. I will be more European, more American, more Western. I don’t have the Nigerian passport anymore. I forget more words in Kalabari than I remember. Outside of Nigeria, people don’t know that. I’ll say I’m Nigerian, and they won’t doubt that claim. But in Nigeria? They’ll see right through me.” He sighs in defeat. “I don’t want them to take my Nigerian-ness away.”

“No.” My heart breaks. “Not you too.” I collapse on the other end of the bed. “You were supposed to be safe from this feeling.”

“Why?”

“You were born and raised there. You look Nigerian. You cook Nigerian food every week, you speak Kalabari to yourself, and you were definitely on your way to watch the Nigerian football team just now. You are Nigerian.”

Dad grabs my childhood bison plushie off my bed and bounces it on his knee. “How much of it do I do because I am Nigerian? And how much of it do I do because I want to feel Nigerian? I don’t know. I think when we move away from home, culture feels more and more like a performance. We do it because we want to be. Not because we are.” He points around my room and finally at me. “You obviously know that. All of this screams performance of an American teenager.” Before guilt can settle over me, he points at himself. “Just as much as this screams performance of a middle-aged Nigerian man.”

My eyes fill with tears again. “But your performance makes you happy.” I see it in the way he prepares the food, in the way he smiles while listening to songs, and in the care he takes with his clothes.

“Well, what performance will let you be at peace with yourself?”

Not pretending to be an American. The assimilation costs too much. My brain rejects the accent and the customs like a bad transplant. The energy to maintain it costs me a piece of my sanity every day. They can go fuck themselves with their Fahrenheits, lack of kettles, and prescription drug advertisements.

But to say I’m Polish? It means accepting that my life will always include questions, justifications, and explanations.

And Nigeria … she gave me the warm brown skin that immediately labeled me as hers in the eyes of Polish people. Even when I tried to cut her out.

I curl into a ball on my bed. “There’s no peace. The rules of performance are too confusing.”

The New York collage hangs proudly above my desk. “Can I just go to Columbia and become a New Yorker? That’d be easier than this whole Polish Nigerian business.”

“It definitely would be.” Dad strokes my hair. “For your mom and me, the rules of performance are pretty easy. They were set up by people who look like us. But I think we raised a daughter who is brilliant and strong enough to take on the responsibility of creating something new. It’s a heavy duty, but it’s also a great freedom. To be able to leave a mark on what it means to be Polish Nigerian. To define a new culture. For yourself and for those who’ll come after you. Because they will.”

I hug myself tighter, my knees digging into my chest. “I don’t trust myself. I’ll get to Columbia and take the easy way out.”

“Then don’t go to Columbia.”

I gasp, flying straight up. “If I repeat that to Mom, she’ll divorce you.”

Dad rolls his eyes. “I didn’t mean never. I’m not of an unsound mind. But I once talked to a nice Asian lady at the supermarket who told me about White kids whose minds haven’t qualified for university yet. Apparently, they take something called gap years to fix themselves. Maybe do that? Go to Poland for a year, be with Grandma?” He tilts his head. “Well, you’re technically half White, so maybe six months will be enough.”

“You’re advising me to do a gap year?” I blink. “And you’re calling me mentally unstable?”

“I’d never make a diagnosis without supporting evidence.” He kisses me on the forehead. “The longer you stay out of Poland, the harder it will be to go back. And the pain of not going back will get worse. Consider if it’ll be worth it. Now, get your room in order. It’s a disgrace to the eyes of your parents.” He switches to English for his dramatics.

I switch too. “I beg forgiveness for the shame I’ve brought upon this household.”

“Well said.” He cracks up. “You’re also grounded for two weeks for dating a boy we haven’t met.” He stands up. “I’m going to fry us plantain.”

“What? But—”

“Be grateful it’s only two weeks. Can’t wait to meet him!” He shuts the door on his way out.

I groan. They have met Aang before, but technically, that doesn’t matter. He’s back to the factory setting of boy equals suspicious.

I get off the bed and clean up the mess, putting the stamp with the fresh ink on my desk. I brush over the bookmarks. The rough, dried-out flowers soothe my skin. Kaycee’s advice rings in my ears: Forget the heavy stuff, date someone hot, don’t complicate it. But dating him would be so much better than that. Aang’s presence creates pockets of peace in which I don’t have to chase the elusive feeling of worthiness, because I already have it.

How would it feel to be with him in Poland? How would he feel with me in Hong Kong? How would it feel to experience those places together, protecting each other from the feeling of not being enough? How would it feel to go about creating that whole Polish Nigerian culture, always safe in his arms to make mistakes?

My fingers tighten on the bookmarks.

Huh.

Maybe my dad and the Asian lady from the supermarket were onto something.

My dad comes back with plantain. The slices are soft, sticky, perfectly caramelized, and they melt in my mouth.

I ask Dad to braid my hair into cornrows as I eat. I don’t mention it’s because my maybe-boyfriend once said he liked them.

38 The Library of Józefina-Ibifubara