Elizabeth Acevedo - The Poet X – WINNER OF THE CILIP CARNEGIE MEDAL 2019

First published in USA 2018 by HarperCollins Children’s Books

First published in Great Britain 2018

by Egmont UK Limited

The Yellow Building, 1 Nicholas Road, London W11 4AN

Published by arrangement with HarperCollins Children’s Books, a division of HarperCollins Publishers, New York, New York, USA

Text copyright © 2018 Elizabeth Acevedo

First e-book edition 2018

ISBN 978 1 4052 9146 0

Ebook ISBN 978 1 7803 1844 8

www.egmont.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet.

To Katherine Bolaños and my former students

at Buck Lodge Middle School 2010–2012,

and all the little sisters yearning to see themselves:

this is for you

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright First published in USA 2018 by HarperCollins Children’s Books First published in Great Britain 2018 by Egmont UK Limited The Yellow Building, 1 Nicholas Road, London W11 4AN Published by arrangement with HarperCollins Children’s Books, a division of HarperCollins Publishers, New York, New York, USA Text copyright © 2018 Elizabeth Acevedo First e-book edition 2018 ISBN 978 1 4052 9146 0 Ebook ISBN 978 1 7803 1844 8 www.egmont.co.uk A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Stay safe online. Any website addresses listed in this book are correct at the time of going to print. However, Egmont is not responsible for content hosted by third parties. Please be aware that online content can be subject to change and websites can contain content that is unsuitable for children. We advise that all children are supervised when using the internet.

Dedication To Katherine Bolaños and my former students at Buck Lodge Middle School 2010–2012, and all the little sisters yearning to see themselves: this is for you

PART 1: In the Beginning Was the Word PART I In the Beginning Was the Word

Stoop-Sitting Stoop-Sitting The summer is made for stoop-sitting and since it’s the last week before school starts, Harlem is opening its eyes to September. I scope out this block I’ve always called home. Watch the old church ladies, chancletas flapping against the pavement, their mouths letting loose a train of island Spanish as they spread he said, she said. Peep Papote from down the block as he opens the fire hydrant so the little kids have a sprinkler to run through. Listen to honking cabs with bachata blaring from their open windows compete with basketballs echoing from the Little Park. Laugh at the viejos—my father not included— finishing their dominoes tournament with hard slaps and yells of “Capicu!” Shake my head as even the drug dealers posted up near the building smile more in the summer, their hard scowls softening into glue-eyed stares in the direction of the girls in summer dresses and short shorts: “Ayo, Xiomara, you need to start wearing dresses like that!” “Shit, you’d be wifed up before going back to school.” “Especially knowing you church girls are all freaks.” But I ignore their taunts, enjoy this last bit of freedom, and wait for the long shadows to tell me when Mami is almost home from work, when it’s time to sneak upstairs.

Unhide-able Unhide-able I am unhide-able. Taller than even my father, with what Mami has always said was “a little too much body for such a young girl.” I am the baby fat that settled into D-cups and swinging hips so that the boys who called me a whale in middle school now ask me to send them pictures of myself in a thong. The other girls call me conceited. Ho. Thot. Fast. When your body takes up more room than your voice you are always the target of well-aimed rumors, which is why I let my knuckles talk for me. Which is why I learned to shrug when my name was replaced by insults. I’ve forced my skin just as thick as I am.

Mira, Muchacha Mira, Muchacha Is Mami’s favorite way to start a sentence and I know I’ve already done something wrong when she hits me with: “Look, girl . . .” This time it’s “Mira, muchacha, Marina from across the street told me you were on the stoop again talking to los vendedores.” Like usual, I bite my tongue and don’t correct her, because I hadn’t been talking to the drug dealers; they’d been talking to me. But she says she doesn’t want any conversation between me and those boys, or any boys at all, and she better not hear about me hanging out like a wet shirt on a clothesline just waiting to be worn or she would go ahead and be the one to wring my neck. “Oíste?” she asks, but walks away before I can answer. Sometimes I want to tell her, the only person in this house who isn’t heard is me.

Names Names I’m the only one in the family without a biblical name. Shit, Xiomara isn’t even Dominican. I know, because I Googled it. It means: One who is ready for war. And truth be told, that description is about right because I even tried to come into the world in a fighting stance: feet first. Had to be cut out of Mami after she’d given birth to my twin brother, Xavier, just fine. And my name labors out of some people’s mouths in that same awkward and painful way. Until I have to slowly say: See-oh-MAH-ruh. I’ve learned not to flinch the first day of school as teachers get stuck stupid trying to figure it out. Mami says she thought it was a saint’s name. Gave me this gift of battle and now curses how well I live up to it. My parents probably wanted a girl who would sit in the pews wearing pretty florals and a soft smile. They got combat boots and a mouth silent until it’s sharp as an island machete.

The First Words The First Words Pero, tú no eres fácil is a phrase I’ve heard my whole life. When I come home with my knuckles scraped up: Pero, tú no eres fácil. When I don’t wash the dishes quickly enough, or when I forget to scrub the tub: Pero, tú no eres fácil. Sometimes it’s a good thing, when I do well on an exam or the rare time I get an award: Pero, tú no eres fácil. When my mother’s pregnancy was difficult, and it was all because of me, because I was turned around and they thought that I would die or worse, that I would kill her, so they held a prayer circle at church and even Father Sean showed up at the emergency room, Father Sean, who held my mother’s hand as she labored me into the world, and Papi paced behind the doctor, who said this was the most difficult birth she’d been a part of but instead of dying I came out wailing, waving my tiny fists, and the first thing Papi said, the first words I ever heard, “Pero, tú no eres fácil.” You sure ain’t an easy one.