CeCe marveled at the bigger kids as if they were mythical wonders. The big kids in their building were older, high schoolers mostly. These were little kids, but still bigger than her. Their laughter boarded the bus before their bodies, and CeCe was mesmerized by the music of their banter about videos and bug bites and older sisters and lunch money. They all looked in CeCe’s direction before choosing their seats, but none of them spoke. She didn’t know the stranger rule applied to other kids.
CeCe looked up at her mother after the twelfth stop, to make sure her eyes were still looking at these close-up things. CeCe knew her mother was being held down by the Sad when her eyes seemed to be searching for only faraway things. Her mother’s eyes were still seeing the close-up things. In fact, her mother’s eyes were sharp, moving slowly from one passenger to the next. CeCe could tell from the hard lines of her jaw that her mother did not plan to love school like CeCe.
The bus rounded the corner of a lush, expansive park. The older children began to bristle with even more excited chatter. This must be it. Neil Armstrong Elementary School, where Ms. Boylin said CeCe would learn more numbers, the names for more colors, new places, and, most importantly, how to read. CeCe began to fidget in her seat, too, as they pulled into the yellow school bus queue.
The front of the school had a large, arched portico with letters that CeCe would later learn spelled “Neil Armstrong Elementary.” The buses spilled children and mothers onto the pavement. Big kids raced under the archway and into the school. CeCe’s feet wanted to run, too, but they were arrested with an unfamiliar panic. She didn’t know what to do. Ms. Boylin said she would know what to do once she got to school, but she didn’t. There weren’t any instructions pressed into her brain. She started to get scared about her new school.
CeCe felt her mother give her hand a little squeeze and CeCe looked up to see her mother’s eyes still sharp, looking down at her. CeCe felt better, less like a wind might sweep her away. She followed the gentle pull of her mother’s hand away from the portico and toward a loose cluster of other mothers and kids. They were small, like CeCe, gathered around a tall man with a billow of sandy curls.
The fun-hair man was named Mr. Neumann. He was the principal, the person in charge of Neil Armstrong Elementary School, CeCe understood, the same way their apartment manager was in charge of all the mail and rent and shoveling and broken door handles. Mr. Neumann explained to the eager mothers how the vice principal usually welcomed the younger classes, but she’d fallen at home that morning and broken her ankle.
“I’ll do my best to fill in for her,” he was saying, “but I’ll need to make sure the hallways are clear for the first bell. The upper elementary students are excitable on the first day.”
Mr. Neumann was not as fun as his hair, CeCe thought. He wore brown slacks, a white dress shirt, and a steel-blue necktie, and she wondered how someone with such soft, springy hair didn’t smile more. CeCe folded in closer to her mother and was relieved to feel her mother’s hand rest on her bare shoulder. Looking around, CeCe noticed her classmates’ stares. Their eyes were blue, hazel, amber-brown, and green. They didn’t have any smiles in their eyes, either. CeCe pressed harder against her mother.
Mr. Neumann spoke stiffly to the mothers about pickups, parents’ day, and the hours for the school nurse. Looking at his watch, he turned to walk toward the school, waving a hand for the small group to follow. They trailed him through the wide double doors and into the school. He stopped in front of a room with a number six affixed to the door. He rapped lightly before opening.
Inside, a slender young woman with long, wavy red hair kneeled beside a bin filled with colored blocks. As she stood to her full height, CeCe felt the woman’s smile get bigger until it filled the room. CeCe felt her first surge of genuine excitement. This was her teacher. This was their classroom. CeCe was really in school.
CeCe entered the room with the rest of her class, stepping gingerly onto colorful tiles as if the floor might collapse beneath her tiny sneakers. She turned to see her mother halted at the door. Her eyes were moist. CeCe’s smile froze.
Her mother raised her hand to CeCe and mouthed, “I’m OK.” She smiled to CeCe, the biggest CeCe could remember in a long time. CeCe bolted toward the door and barreled into her mother with her very best hug. A few other kids did the same, and the mothers were pleased. Their teacher, Ms. Lapham, invited all of the children to join her at the front of the class, where they waved good-bye together to all the mothers.
At 12:15, as promised, Ms. Lapham’s class wiggled in an almost-straight line on the sidewalk where Mr. Neumann had gathered them that morning. Mothers retrieved their progeny one by one, dispersing into station wagons and sedans and onto yellow buses. CeCe saw her mother waiting, picking absently at her fingernails until she spotted CeCe’s caramel face in the row of vanilla crème.
CeCe’s mother held out her hand and CeCe held tightly, and they walked to their bus in silence. Her mother had caught the city bus to the school, like she said she would, and CeCe was relieved to have her there. Once they were settled into their seats and the yellow bus had pulled itself around the ball field, CeCe’s nestled into the crook of her mother’s arm. They watched the green lawns peel away to concrete in silence until they dismounted in front of the record store once again. The newspaperman was already gone for the day.
“So . . . ” her mother began once their feet were on the sidewalk, “how was your first day of school?”
“OK,” CeCe replied, looking down at her sneakers peeking from beneath her green rainbow dress.
“Did you learn any new songs?”
CeCe shook her head no, her new green barrettes dancing above her shoulders.
“Was your teacher nice?”
CeCe nodded emphatically, shaking the green barrettes.
“Did you make a new friend?”
CeCe’s barrettes quieted. They crossed through the small lobby of their apartment building and to their front door. CeCe knew her mother didn’t move quickly anymore, but this time, she really wanted her mother to hurry. This time, CeCe needed her mother to move like the pee-pee dance. CeCe needed her to swing open their door so she could place her feet back on their floor. Sit on their couch. Hold her crayons. She didn’t like being on this side of their door anymore.
As her mother fumbled with the lock, CeCe’s small shoulders began to tremble. She felt the quiver work itself from inside her sneakers, up her knees, through her tummy, around the collar of her green dress, and into her thick plaits. She thought, again, of the block letters on her dress tag. Maybe the other kids had excluded her from games and turned their chairs away from her because they knew her dress really belonged to a girl named Lorraine. Her mother had said no one would know, but CeCe could tell they had figured it out.
The first fat tears rolled down CeCe’s cheeks as her mother held open the door. CeCe wanted to race inside, but could not force her feet to move. She was seized by a gale of tears, and her mother had to take her hand to pull her into the apartment. CeCe collapsed onto the couch into her mother’s lap. They stayed that way for a long time, until CeCe’s peals diminished to whimpers. CeCe didn’t know she had so many tears inside her.
Just like Mama.
As CeCe regained her breathing, she felt her mother’s hands on her shoulders gently pulling her upright. Her mother’s eyes weren’t as sharp as they’d been that morning, but they were looking down at CeCe. Close up. With a smile hanging faintly on the tips of her lashes.
“What’s the matter, CrimsonBaby?” her mother asked.
“Nobody wanted to be my friend,” CeCe started, feeling her lip begin to pout again, the wails begin to mount again. “They were so mean, Mama. I didn’t do anything to anybody!” CeCe’s small brown face was slick with tears.
“Nobody, CrimsonBaby?” her mother asked. Her voice did not thicken, unaccustomed to the race of adrenaline, but her body responded to her child’s tears. “Not even