MAKE BELIEVE
Though I loved our new house on Dahlia Street, really loved having Mama home all the time after she finally quit working, thought it was okay having a stepfather, and was real excited about having a new baby brother or sister maybe by the time school started in September, there was still something missing. I didn't think about it too much, especially during the day when I was busy playing with Robert and Joey, and Carolyn when I had too. And in the evenings when Mama had time for me when Luis was working I didn't think about it much either. But every night at bedtime, I'd start getting this really sad feeling that was hard to explain even to myself. The best I can explain it feeling like is it felt kind of like what maybe a person would feel if they were lost on a deserted island all by themselves. That's mostly how I felt once I was in bed and Mama had kissed me good-night and shut the door almost all the way closed, like I was alone in the world.

    And it didn't matter if there was a light on in the hallway so my room wasn't all the way dark or not. I still felt alone. My skin would crawl with it. And it wouldn't have helped calling Mama either 'cause she wouldn't have done what I needed. Mama hardly ever touched me, like to hold me or hug me or kiss me or jush kind of pat me like Grandma and Unk use to do all the time. Mama didn't believe in stuff like that: I guess she thought that'd make me a big baby if she did it too much and maybe she didn't know what too much would be so she didn't do it hardly at all. Mostly the times I remember Mama kissing or hugging me was when she'd leave for work, and now she didn't work so she didn't have a reason to kiss me good-by, and when she tucked me in bed at night. About the only other time she ever touched me was when she spanked me, and I guess I'd been pretty good since we'd moved to the Big House 'cause I'd hadn't gotten a spanking for a long time. If I had called Mama to my room and told her I felt lonely, she would have told me not to be silly, the house was full of people and I wasn't alone, so turn over and go to sleep.

    Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if I could have gone over to Grandma and Unk's more, but Mama mostly wouldn't let me leave our block then. Once in a while, when Mama had to go somewhere and I wasn't in school, she'd let me go to Grandma's while she was gone. That would be really nice 'cause Grandma would get all excited to see me and she'd hug me a lot and make a big fuss over me. But then after a while she'd ask how Mama and Luis were and then it'd get uncomfortable 'cause Grandma didn't like Mexicans and she thought Mama was stupid to marry one. If Unk was home, or any other grown-ups, Grandma wouldn't say much, but if it was just me she'd ask a lot of questions and I wouldn't know how to answer. I didn't like talking about Mama and Luis, but I didn't want to get Grandma mad either. And usually it was just Grandma there 'cause Mama didn't let me go to Donax Street much on days when she knew Unk would be home. I think that was partly why I was so lonesome, 'cause it was really Unk more than anybody that I missed. Unk knew how to hug me and make me feel like the most important person in the world better then anybody, and he never asked questions much. He just like being with me and I like being with him and that was enough for both of us so we didn't need to talk much.

    And I couldn't talk to Mama about how much I missed Unk 'cause she always got mad when I talked about Grandma or Unk no matter what it was I said. So mostly I didn't talk to Mama about them. And I didn't tell them either how much I missed them, especially Unk 'cause he would have got those sad eyes that always made me feel so bad deep down inside. Besides, I knew there wasn't much Grandma and Unk could do about Mama letting me be with them more; I was Mama's kid, not theirs. It got so bad, though, that lonely feeling at night, that I had to do something and I don't think we'd been at the Big House more then maybe a month when I finally figured out what to do to make it better. What it was I did was make believe.

    At first I just did make believe in bed. I'd pretend I was real sick and in the hospital and everybody would be there to see me before I died. And they would fill up the room 'cause everybody included all of Grandma and Unk's family that I knew, or knew of, which was a lot of people: Annabelle and Bob, Leo and Bobbi, of course Grandma and Unk, and other people I couldn't see real clear 'cause I didn't know them but I knew they were part of Grandma and Unk's family like Homer and Maxine and Woodrow and Dewey, and maybe even Unk's sister Ruth. And of course Mama was there too though Luis never was. And everybody would all be crying and especially Grandma and Mama. Unk wouldn't be though, 'cause me and Unk never cried; he'd just have those really, really sad eyes so I'd know if he could have he would of been crying. And I wouldn't be crying either 'cause I was being very, very brave while I was dying so Unk would be proud of me. But I almost would cry at the part where Grandma would kind of fall on my bed crying real hard and hug me as tight as she could and beg me not to die. And usually that was the part where I'd fall asleep, with Grandma hugging me real close.

    For a long time that make believe was good and every night that's how I'd go to sleep. But then there started being too many questions. Like, what was I dying from? How come the doctors couldn't save me? Would they really let all those people in my room if I was really dying? And I guess it just got boring too, after a while. So I made up a new make believe, and this time not all of it was in bed so it took more time too.

    The new make believe was about being in a car accident. I never did decide whose car I was in, but nobody else ever got hurt with me so maybe I got hit by a car. But anyway, I'd lay on the hallway floor by my bedroom door and wait for the ambulance. It'd come and get me and take me to the hospital which was my bed. For a while the doctors would work on me, then they'd kind of shake their heads real sad and leave the room. A nurse would pull the blankets up real tight under my chin, then she'd look sad at me too and leave the room like the doctors did. Then everybody would come in and it was almost like the first make believe except this time I knew I was dying from getting hit by a car and the doctors couldn't save me for sure. And it would end the same way, too, with Grandma hugging me close as I fell asleep.

     Later I did make believe about the Sisters at St. Charles, and especially about my second fourth grade Sister. I loved her and the make believe was that something happened to Mama and I became an orphan so Sister Mary Christopolus talked the other Sisters into letting me live at the convent with them and they all made a big fuss over me. All the time they'd be holding me on their laps and hugging and feeding me a lot of food 'cause that's what Sisters do. Then when I went to Emory Elementary I did make believe about Mrs. Reinbolt and later Mrs. Wallace even though they never were my teachers. I especially liked the make believe about Mrs. Wallace in sixth grade 'cause in that one I'd be an orphan lost in a snow storm; I'd never been in snow before and this make believe was really different 'cause we never got snow in San Diego. Then in Junior High I did make believe about the Dean of Girls, Mrs. Whitaker. For some reason all my make believe was about women 'cause I didn't like to do it about men except for when I first started and I'd do it about Unk. He was the only man I ever did make believe about. But there was always a woman I knew, mostly teachers, that I could do make believe about. And I learned after a while that I had to do the make believe 'cause otherwise the lonely feeling would get too bad and then things would be gray, which happened later anyway. But even during the gray times, once I started the make believe at the Big House I never stopped doing it; I still do it now even though I'm not little any more. It's just to make sure the gray doesn't come back to stay forever.

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