9781988256184-epub2 Page 8

  “Manuela?” asks Mrs. Brandt. “Can you tell me what an isosceles triangle is?”

  “Okay,” Manuela answers. “Two sides of the triangle are equal.”

  “See, Ruby?” Mrs. Brandt is drawing the triangle on the board as I lean forward to get a look at it.

  It seems like Judy, Harriet, and Manuela know exactly what Mrs. Brandt is talking about and I’m the only one who doesn’t have a clue what an isosceles is. I feel like I’m back in my dream with Gordy, trying to read numbers on a chart that make no sense. If this is the kind of stuff I’m supposed to know for Levitt’s standards test, I’ll never pass.

  I squint, trying to figure out the spindly chalk numbers on the board. It’s even harder to concentrate when you’re hungry—let alone starving to death. Mrs. Brandt is talking about measuring angles and plane figures and something else called obtuse angles, but all I can think about is lunch. They had toast and juice for breakfast with scrambled eggs and I had to pinch my hand the whole time I was sitting at the table. Manuela didn’t seem to mind nearly as much but she hasn’t been at it for two days. She didn’t even drink water but I had three glasses—and could have had more.

  A right triangle has one right angle. An equilateral triangle has all three sides that are the same. And old isosceles was named for a Greek guy—at least that’s what I heard. I don’t even know where I heard it but I think it may be true. I’m starting to get really dizzy and it’s not even ten o’clock. Plus my head is hurting from yesterday’s fight, and there’s a good-sized bump starting to swell, just like I thought it would.

  “Ruby?”

  Mrs. Brandt is calling me and everyone else is staring. I look up.

  “Do you want to try drawing some of these triangles?”

  I shrug.

  “Why don’t you try?”

  I get up and walk to the board on shaky legs.

  Mrs. Brandt hands me a ruler. When I hold it up to the board, she tells me to hold it higher.

  As soon as I start drawing the triangle, I can feel my hands quivering. Judy and Harriet start to laugh behind my back.

  “Harriet?” Mrs. Brandt says, but I can’t hear anymore. I have to put the ruler down because the ground goes soft and wavy and it’s all I can do to keep standing.

  “Ruby!”

  I’m lying on my back and Judy’s screaming. I’m starting to get used to those screams, which sound like someone in a horror movie. Mrs. Brandt is calling for help and Manuela is leaning over me.

  “Don’t worry,” she whispers. “It’s working.”

  I close my eyes. Only instead of carrying me upstairs, which is what they should have done, someone throws water at me.

  Harriet.

  I sit up.

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it, dummy.”

  “I’m not a dummy.”

  “You sure seem to be.”

  “Harriet!” Mrs. Brandt rushes toward us with Rose at her side.

  “Leave that child alone,” Rose is saying.

  Mrs. Brandt helps me to my feet and walks me back to my desk. “What’s wrong, Ruby? What’s the matter with you?”

  “She hasn’t eaten since she got here,” says Rose.

  “Nothing?” asks Mrs. Brandt.

  “Not so I’ve seen.”

  Mrs. Brandt squats down to look at me. “What are you doing?”

  I slide into my seat, looking down at my lap without answering.

  “Ruby?”

  I look at Manuela, who shakes her head.

  “What’s going on here? Rose?” Mrs. Brandt asks.

  “I don’t know, ma’am,” says Rose. “They’re all upset when they come here.”

  “Well, she has—you have to eat, Ruby. You can’t learn if you don’t eat.”

  She looks like she’s expecting me to say something. But I don’t.

  “All right,” Mrs. Brandt sighs. “Do you know what happens to people who stop eating?”

  I shake my head.

  “You get dizzy and tired—like you are now. But then your body gets cold and won’t function properly. Your stomach starts hurting and then bloats up like a balloon. And if you still don’t eat, it gets worse. You start losing your reason—and your ability to talk and think. Finally your kidneys go—and believe me I’ve seen it happen like that. When that happens you can’t go to the bathroom normally because you’re in what they call renal failure—”

  I want to stop listening but she goes on and on.

  “Then all the other organs stop functioning and your liver starts to shut down. In fact all of you goes down—like a zombie. All you can do is lie in a hospital bed. Do you really want that?”

  I look at her. “No.”

  “Then why aren’t you eating?”

  I want to say, “Give me something now!” But Manuela jumps in front of me.

  “She is on strike,” Manuela says. “We both are.”

  Mrs. Brandt turns to look at her sharply. “What?”

  “A hunger strike.”

  Mrs. Brandt turns to me again. “Ruby? Is this true?”

  “Yeah.”

  She leans toward me, raising her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”

  I want to tell her about Gandhi and Chavez and protesting for my rights. But I’m tired and hungry and I know whatever I say won’t sound right, so I look at the floor.

  “Ruby?” says Mrs. Brandt. “What do you hope to gain by this?”

  “Attention,” says Manuela.

  “WHAT?”

  “People need to know we are here and do not want to be,” Manuela continues.

  Mrs. Brandt folds her arms. “Do you really think people don’t know where you are?” she asks.

  “We have the right to be home with our families!”

  Mrs. Brandt draws closer to Manuela. “The only thing you have, my dear, is us. And if you don’t obey the rules—”

  “It’s not against the rule to hunger strike,” says Manuela. “And if people start to hear about this and it goes into the papers—”

  “It’s NOT going to get in any paper,” says Mrs. Brandt.

  “But what if it does?” retorts Manuela.

  “Why don’t we see what Mrs. Levitt says?” Mrs. Brandt replies.

  “I’m not going to eat,” I say. It’s not much but it’s all I can muster.

  “Are you nuts?” Harriet calls out, but her voice sounds distant and muffled. “She just said you’ll lose your mind!”

  “Not to mention your kidneys,” Judy says.

  She keeps talking but it’s getting harder to hear her. I look at Manuela, who’s staring at me like I’m her hero or something, which is hard because I’d do anything right now for a piece of toast even if it had no butter. The only thing good about any of this is that it’s keeping Mrs. Brandt from her triangles, but that’s the only thing. At least all this hunger stuff makes you sleepy, and when you’re sleepy you don’t think about eating.

  “Ruby?” Mrs. Brandt says, but when I turn to look at her, Judy screams again—which is how I know I’m hitting the floor.

  13

  Voices and Visitors

  THE CLOSET DOOR is opening and closing, but I can’t see anyone. There’s a picture of a duck on the opposite wall with a green head and brown feathers, and next to it is a tall glass cabinet with what looks to be medicines inside. I’m guessing this is the infirmary. But the closet door seems to be moving all by itself and gives me the creeps.

  Voices are coming from the hall outside but I can’t hear what they’re saying. After a while they fade away and the closet door opens again. I try to sit up but I’m exhausted. Out of the corner of my eye I see a dark shape walking toward me and then I look up.

  “Manuela?”

  She puts her finger to my lips and slips something
in my mouth. It’s dry and wrinkly and makes me want to puke. I try to spit it out but Manuela spreads her hand over my mouth.

  “Raisin,” she whispers. “Chew.”

  Is she crazy? I’m supposed to be on a hunger strike.

  “Must not get sick, amiga. That means friend, yes? Now, eat the raisins and we don’t tell them. But hurry—chew.”

  She puts a few more in my mouth and before I know it I’m eating the most incredible-tasting raisins I’ve ever had in my life. I used to hate raisins but these are amazing. They must have a chocolate coating or something because they’re so tasty and sweet. I’m sucking them in so hard I practically inhale my cheeks, but then we hear footsteps and Manuela pulls away.

  “Ruby?” Someone calls my name in the room next door. Manuela shoves a small box into my hand and scampers into the closet. I slip the box under the pillow and close my eyes as the footsteps get closer.

  “She’s asleep,” a deep voice pronounces. Someone kneels next to me.

  “Ruby?” It’s Rose. I keep my eyes closed and lie there, still as a statue.

  A low murmur answers her. I hear the words bad and can’t, and then something about a hospital. It’s definitely a man talking, and must be the director, Mr. Sinningson. I try to peek but don’t want him to catch me.

  “I know, sir,” says Rose.

  “Don’t keep saying ‘I know.’”

  Rose’s dress swishes as she turns, following the man out. Their voices soften in the hallway. I turn around to reach under the pillow and pull out the box of raisins. I’m trying to squeeze my fingers into the box but I can barely get one or two out that way so I rip the box open, swallowing everything except the cardboard, which I have to stop myself from devouring, too.

  Manuela pokes her head out of the closet.

  “It’s okay,” I whisper. “They’re gone.”

  “Give me the box.”

  “Huh?”

  “Want them to find it?”

  “Oh,” I say. “Here.”

  She pockets it.

  “Hey, Manuela. You got any more?”

  “Not now,” she says. “But I look.”

  “Well, hurry back, you know? I’m dying here—”

  “Raisins will stop the dying,” she whispers. “I see what I can do.”

  “You got water?”

  She points at the sink. “See?” I nod.

  “Give me a leg up,” she says.

  “What?”

  “I’m going out that way,” Manuela says, and I follow her eyes upward to the window. She climbs onto my bed but I’m too weak to give her a boost so she pulls herself up and then whispers, “Psst!” I look up to see Manuela holding up her thumb and smiling like she’s in a Robin Hood flick. “Doing good, amiga,” she says, but slides out the window before I can respond. I hear a couple of thuds and then a tapping sound.

  “Manuela?” I call, but there’s no answer. I call again. Nothing. About a half minute later I hear a series of taps and lean back against the pillows, staring at the duck on the wall. How is Manuela climbing through windows when I feel like sleeping all the time? Does she have more raisins than I do?

  “Ruby?”

  The door swings open and I look up to see Harriet, with Judy close at her heels. She strides up to the bed and leans over me.

  “You’re scaring them silly. You know?” Harriet whispers.

  I turn on my side, watching her and Judy. “It’s a protest,” I say.

  “Whatever it is, it’s making them crazy,” Harriet says.

  “Is it hard? Are you hungry?” Judy asks.

  “Of course it’s hard,” Harriet snorts.

  “I just want to know,” Judy whispers as the door flies open. Rose rushes in, followed by Mrs. Levitt.

  “Here she is,” she says. “See?”

  I turn my head as Levitt pushes past Harriet and Judy. She’s wearing perfume today, and a tweed suit with a high collar. The perfume is way too strong, and even though I’m not eating much, it’s starting to make me nauseous.

  Mrs. Levitt kneels next to the bed. “How are you today, Ruby?”

  “Okay.”

  “You have to eat something. You know that, don’t you?”

  Harriet pokes Mrs. Levitt. “What’s going to happen to her?”

  “Don’t push, dear.”

  “If she dies, it’s your fault.”

  “Now, now,” says Mrs. Levitt, but I can see her hands are shaking.

  “You’ll go to jail,” Harriet continues.

  Mrs. Levitt leans closer to me. “I’m sure Ruby won’t let that happen.”

  The only other time I saw Levitt shaking was in our apartment before she took me away. I remember thinking she really cared about me, and wonder what she’s thinking now.

  “Ruby, I can’t let you go on this way,” Levitt continues.

  “But you can’t stop me either.”

  “What?”

  It’s not until she answers that I realize I was talking out loud. Levitt’s voice is rising now, sounding almost like Nell-mom when she’s worried. “I am not going to tolerate this, young lady.”

  I turn around to face her, and suddenly I’m not nauseous at all. Because I’m not looking at Mrs. Levitt, social worker. I’m looking at someone who wants to be in charge but isn’t anymore. Not today.

  If she dies . . . you’ll go to jail.

  I prop myself up on the pillow so I can move closer to her. “You know what?”

  “What?” Levitt says.

  “I’m not going to eat until I get out of here. And you know what else? You can’t make me.”

  Levitt’s mouth twitches until she closes it, hard. “We—we’ll see about that, Ruby.”

  “Sooner or later my parents are going to come here. When they find out what’s going on, they’re going to go to a lawyer, if they haven’t already. And the papers. And if you try to force-feed me, I’m going to fight.”

  “Ruby—”

  “My parents will see the bruises if you hurt me,” I say. Those raisins must have superpowers because suddenly I have all this energy. It’s like I’m a firecracker and at any second, I’ll explode.

  “NO one’s going to hurt you, Ruby. YOU’RE the one who’s hurting yourself.” Levitt turns, storming out of the room so quickly the medicines bump against each other in the cabinet.

  “Wow!” says Harriet, inching closer.

  “Show’s over,” says Rose. “Go on.”

  “I’ll go when I’m good and ready,” Harriet says, making Judy giggle. Harriet stares down at me, hands on her hips. “Good luck, Ruby.”

  “Good luck,” Judy echoes.

  “I said get out of here!” Rose yells. “Now scoot.”

  Harriet takes her time leaving, so Judy has to go slowly, too.

  Rose looks down at me, frowning. “Now look what you’ve done.”

  I’m not sure what she means, exactly, except it feels pretty good for a change.

  “They may not be able to make you eat here, but they will in the hospital,” Rose says. “You want that?”

  I don’t answer, and after a minute or two she sighs and walks away. The door shuts behind her and I’m alone. I pull the covers over my head, trying to keep from shivering. Will they really take me to a hospital? Who knows?

  Then again, I’d say Levitt looks too nervous to make me do anything. So this hunger stuff must be working—and now Manuela is doing it, too. At least I hope she is, though it seems like she’s sneaking some morsels here and there. But that won’t put her in the infirmary, and she needs to be. Soon.

  A small brown spot on the pillow catches my eye and I stick out my tongue. I fold the raisin into my mouth like an anteater, but instead of gobbling it down I hold it in my mouth. If I don’t move, it will stay like that for hours, a hot little
pebble of wrinkly-sweet.

  14

  We Shall Overcome

  LIKE CORSO SAYS, this is a cause célèbre, and I think it is whether reporters write about it or not. It’s a story for millions of readers, only there aren’t many protesters—just me, Manuela, Harriet, and Judy, and none of us has eaten for the past two days. Well, I had a few raisins and saltine crackers, and Manuela and I split an apple at three in the morning—but not so anyone knows. We’re all in the infirmary now, with a nurse running around us frantically and the director popping in every few minutes to see how we are.

  When Mr. Sinningson and the nurse mentioned the hospital, I said I’d tell the doctors how they treat us here, and then Harriet started jumping up and down getting excited. “We treat you fine,” the nurse said, and I asked, “Who are they going to believe? Me or you?” She had no answer for that one.

  Meanwhile, Manuela found a book in the library about Gandhi, who laid down in front of zillions of English soldiers running their horses at him. Instead of trampling him and his friends, the soldiers stopped at the last minute because they didn’t want the world to think they were nasty even though they were.

  “This is how Gandhi did it,” says Manuela. “He say when we are violent, it is easy to punish us. When we are protesting in nonviolence, they cannot say we are doing something wrong. What we are doing is protesting with our hunger, because they take us from our families. We do not give up until they let us go home.”

  I can’t say I like this hunger stuff much but I’m starting to see what Manuela means. When you get a lot of people to want the same thing you want, you can make things happen. The thought of this makes me thirsty and I get up to get a drink. I can tell Harriet is watching me as I pull a mug down from the little shelf above the sink and fill it. I turn to Harriet, holding out the mug.

  “Want some?”

  She shakes her head. I drink the water down and it tastes like raisins. I must have raisins on the brain.

  “Why are you still having water?” she asks.

  “Because without water you die in three days.”

  Harriet shrugs. I get the feeling she might have a drink later on, but not so anyone can see. She’s got to be tougher than all of us; at least, that’s how she sees herself.