Alice Austen Lived Here Read online

  “Puh-leeeeeease?” They drew out the word, batting their eyelashes the whole time.

  “I love you, you goofus.” Jess laughed as she spoke, and handed them the first slice of cake.

  They placed a bite in their mouth and sank into a kitchen chair with euphoric ease. “Caaaaaaaake.” They took another bite and made more noises of delight. After bite four, they refound words. “Oh, Jess, thank you. This is scrumptious.”

  “Happy birthday!” said Jess. “I love you.”

  “I love you too.”

  “I hate to break the moment,” I said, “but, uh” —I pointed my finger at my mouth—“cake?”

  Soon, all three of us had slices (Val was on their second) and even Evie got a taste of cream cheese frosting on her tongue. She banged her hands on her high chair tray with delight. She was right—it was fantastic.

  “Should we sing now that you have cake?” I asked.

  “Nah,” said Val. “I don’t need all that.”

  “But twenty-five’s a big deal,” I pointed out. “You’re a quarter of a century old.”

  “When I was your age, birthdays were everything. I didn’t just celebrate my half birthday—I used to celebrate every month. Nothing big, but I would make a sandwich, light a candle on top, sing to myself, and blow it out. I felt so old when I turned thirteen. And fourteen. Fifteen was terrible. Sixteen was okay, but seventeen couldn’t finish fast enough. I couldn’t wait to turn eighteen. That was a big one. And then it was over and I was on the other side of it and nothing had really changed. No halo on my head or nothin’. After that I was in college and hanging out with people of all sorts of ages, and, I don’t know, it just kind of mattered less. I had a huge bash for my twenty-first birthday. But since? I’ve just been in my early twenties.”

  “Not anymore!” I pointed out.

  “True. That’s why Jess and I are going out with some friends for drinks this weekend. But other than that, it’s just another day.”

  I almost asked if I could come along, but then I realized that drinks didn’t mean soda, and I was glad I’d kept my mouth shut.

  Jess cleared her throat with mock indignation. “Well, if it’s just another day, maybe I shouldn’t have bothered with a cake.”

  “That,” said Val, hugging their plate close to their chest, “is NOT what I’m saying.”

  I was tempted to eat a second slice, but if I went upstairs too full for dinner, Mom would go on about how she should never have let me go downstairs for cake in the first place, and that was not worth a second slice, especially not when there would still be some left the next afternoon when I visited again.

  I gave Evie a squeeze, put my dishes in the sink, and fuzzy slippered my way back upstairs.

  I didn’t think I’d ever be the kind of person who didn’t “make a fuss” about their birthday, but still, I’d learned a heck of a lot from Jess and Val, and not just about old punk bands. If they’d been my only friends, I might have understood Mom’s concern about their age. But I had TJ, who I saw just about every day.

  TJ stayed over at my place most weekends that their family was in town. TJ’s family was much bigger than mine—they had four siblings while I was an only child, and I had one less parent around. Mom had mostly been single since she broke up with my dad when I was a toddler, and she said she was happier not to worry about dating. Me, I was happy not to have an older brother who teased me when I took a long time in the shower, or a little sister who came in and messed with my things. TJ had both of those, plus an older sister who acted like a third parent, and a baby brother who screamed while TJ was trying to do their homework. An older sister, an older brother, a younger sister, and a younger brother. One of each, heteronormative people tend to say. TJ called them the Littles and the Bigs. It was a lot.

  If we didn’t have so much fun together, I might have thought TJ only stayed over for the chance to take a shower without anyone banging on the door or running a load of laundry that used up all the hot water. But we always had a great time reading graphic novels, listening to music, and talking for hours about everything and nothing. The food wasn’t as good as at TJ’s—TJ’s dad was a chef, after all—but at least you didn’t have to fight for the serving spoon.

  TJ and I spent most of our time together at school though. Lunch alone was forty-five minutes a day. If you counted the classes we took together, which were almost all of them, we spent about twenty-four hours together at school in a normal week. It wasn’t all fun time, which only made it feel longer. And no class was as long as US History with Watras.

  The Monday after Val’s birthday, TJ and I were groaning that weekends should be at least three days long when the bell rang and Watras clapped his hands. “If you are not in your seat, you are now late.” It was funny how the same teachers who declared that “the bell doesn’t release you; I do” sure did have a lot of faith in the bell that started class. None of our other teachers took attendance, but Watras insisted on beginning each lesson by pulling out his old red attendance binder.

  He was a teacher, so technically, he was Mr. Watras, and that’s what students said when they talked to him, which they did as little as possible. But when they were talking about him? It was just Watras, unchanged since he’d sprouted from the primordial ooze, marking dinosaurs late for not having evolved on time.

  After a homework check, Watras launched into a long speech about a bunch of dead rich white guys fighting over how to run the US government after the Revolutionary War. It could have been interesting if Watras wanted to explore the contradiction of saying you fought the British for freedom while having slaves work the land you stole from the Indigenous people who had been here and free for thousands of years before you, but he didn’t bring any of that up.

  Instead we got twenty of the most boring minutes on record, tied with every other time Watras gave what he called a “traditional lecture,” which happened at least twice a week. Everyone was supposed to take notes on “the important parts,” but he wouldn’t tell us what the important parts were. If you had questions, you had to hold them until he was done “so as not to disturb the flow of the lecture.” Even if you were confused. And if, when he was finally done talking, you did tell him you were confused, he would either say “I’m about to explain that,” or “I’ve already explained that”—neither of which was helpful.

  Traditional lessons usually ended with a “traditional question-and-answer session,” and if no one had Qs for him to A, Watras had some of his own to prove that you hadn’t been taking good enough notes. This time, Watras wrapped up after three questions, with a full five minutes left in the period. There was a wisp of hope in the air that perhaps he had misread the clock and would release us early.

  The wisp dissolved when he said, “Before we end today, I want to let you know about an exciting project we’re about to embark on.”

  Most of us held our groans. A few were less subtle.

  “It’s popular these days to talk about how we’re all different and unique,” said Watras.

  The word unique didn’t sound good coming out of his mouth. My stomach gave a twist.

  “And we are, of course.” Watras said this like someone had told him to. “But we all have a commonality.” He paused for effect. “We’re all … New Yorkers.”

  “Tell that to my cousin Eli from Brooklyn,” Josh called out. “He’s always saying that New York City is made up of four boroughs and a sidekick.”

  A few kids laughed, and Abe said, “Brooklyn can bite my—” but the last word was covered up by a loud cough from Watras.

  “Interborough squabbles aside, you should all be proud to live in one of the greatest cities in the country, if not the world. And a city that is providing you a rare opportunity, because Borough Hall is commissioning a new statue for the base of its steps to look out on New York Harbor, and the subject for that statue will come from a young Staten Islander.”

  Cara raised her hand, but Watras waved it down, which was his way of saying that he was going to keep speaking and, as usual, would only take questions when he was done. He clapped his hands together in a rare display of enthusiasm. “Isn’t that exciting?”

  No one but Watras looked excited.

  “I, myself, have a great many ideas for historical figures I would like to see grace the steps of Borough Hall, but the maximum age for entrants is fifteen, and I’m just a shade over that.” Watras laughed as if he had just told a joke. He explained that entries needed to include an essay about the local and personal significance of the subject, a proposed statue image, and a letter of recommendation from a teacher.

  “So your assignment is to create an entry for this contest … and then my assignment will be to write the letter of recommendation for the project that is awarded the highest grade and enter it into the borough-wide competition. Your essay and image will also count as your semester partner project. I expect you to approach this task with the proper reverence and maturity. No contemporary subjects.” He looked over the room, as if expecting applause. When none arrived, he said, “Now that I am done, are there any questions?”

  Cara raised her hand again before asking, “What do you mean, a subject? Like a math statue or something?”

  Watras shook his head. “Can anyone explain to Miss Zimmerman what I mean by subject ?”

  “Like a person or whatever,” said Liz.

  “Not like a person.” Watras huffed with the exasperation of someone who has been bothered by inanity too many times to be surprised but isn’t willing to let said inanity pass without note. “A subject is a person. In this case, a figure of local note. And no, not a note like you pass in class, Cara. I speak of a person of distinction. Someone who is meaningful to Staten Island, and ideally someone who is meaningful to you pe
rsonally. That doesn’t mean you have to be related to them.” Watras smiled at Sarah, who bragged to anyone who would listen that she was a direct descendant of Alexander Hamilton. “But that you see yourself in them in some way. Tell us why the rest of Staten Island should appreciate them too. Any other questions?”

  “What’s contemporary?” asked Jason.

  Watras sighed to say both that he’d known the question was coming and that it was too annoying that we didn’t know to have told us in the first place.

  “Contemporary refers to the now. So, no Alyssa Milano. No rappers.”

  “What about Randy ‘Macho Man’ Savage?” asked Rebekkah. “He lived on Staten Island.”

  “Who?”

  “The wrestler. He died in 2011. Does that count as not contemporary?”

  Watras pressed the pads of his index fingers to the bridge of his neck and muttered something to himself. “No, Rebekkah. No Randy Savage. No Sammy the Bull either.”

  “Who’s Sammy the Bull?” asked Rhyan.

  “You betta be cay-ful askin’ questions.” A few kids laughed at Anthony’s impression of a thick Italian American accent. “Sammy da Bull, he don’t like peoples askin’ no questions they’s don’t need da answahs to.”

  “That’s enough, De Niro. My point is, no one from this century. They can be from politics, arts, culture, science, even sports.” Watras eyed Rebekkah. “But go back. Do some research and learn some history.”

  Watras answered a few more questions with the same tone of mild irritation until the bell rang, and he shooed the class off to “go bother some other teachers for a while.”

  “Ugh,” I said the moment I reached TJ’s desk, but TJ pointed their eyes over at Watras to say let’s get outside first.

  Once we were in the din of the hallway, TJ shouted, “WORST.”

  “PROJECT.” That was me.

  “EVER!” We shouted it together.

  To be fair, this was not the first time that TJ and I had called an assignment the worst project ever. It wasn’t even the first time that year. But just about any history project was automatically worthy of consideration for the title, and this one sounded especially dreadful. Even the fact that it was a pair project and we’d get to work on it together didn’t make it much better.

  “I’m not doing a project on a straight white man,” said TJ.

  “Me either.”

  History was full of straight white men and even most of the people who weren’t straight pretended they were. So we were supposed to find someone cool from history and they were supposed to be important to Staten Island?

  It wasn’t just the worst project ever—it was the most impossible project ever.

  The more I thought about it, the more I wanted our project to be about someone queer. I did a little googling on queer Staten Islanders, but not much came up. One article said that there were almost no statues of LGBTQIAP+ icons in New York City, much less Staten Island. Another said that fewer than ten of more than one hundred fifty statues of historical people around the city were women, and I was willing to bet that the remaining one hundred forty plus were all men. I was glad I would be seeing Jess after school on Tuesday. If she didn’t have any ideas, Val certainly would. Val had been born on Staten Island, and they were always talking about queer history.

  I left my shoes at the door and found Jess in the living room, feeding Evie. She was stretched out in her cozy recliner with a thick purple blanket draped over her and Evie, so that the top of Evie’s head barely peeked out from under it and Jess’s breasts were covered. Jess had taught me to say breast the first time she fed Evie when I was around. We practiced saying it together, and then she gave me homework to say it at home in front of a mirror until I could say it without hesitating, whispering, or giggling, the same way I’d say arm or knee. Breast.

  “Hey, Sam.”

  “Hey, Jess. Iced tea?”

  “Yes, please.”

  Jess always wanted iced tea while she was nursing, but I hadn’t ever seen her remember to get some before she started. I pulled two mason jars out of a cabinet, popped three ice cubes into one, and filled them both from the pitcher of home-brewed tea in the fridge.

  “Does it really count as iced tea if you don’t put any ice in it?” Jess asked when I gave her the glass with ice. I don’t like my drinks to be too cold.

  “Does it really count as a joke if you’ve said it ten times before?” I replied.

  “Oooh! Good one! You’ve got some fire in you today.”

  “I do what I can.” I shrugged nonchalantly, but fire was the highest compliment she gave.

  Jess took another sip and then shifted Evie over to the other breast.

  “So, how’s the state-funded brainwashing going?” Jess asked.

  “School? We have to do this report on a historical figure.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  “Sounds like you don’t understand fun very well,” I told her.

  “Sounds like your sarcast-o-meter needs new batteries.”

  I told Jess about the group project Watras had assigned and the research I had done.

  “History is littered with queer icons,” Jess said. “Sylvia Rivera. Bayard Rustin. Even Alexander the Great is suspected to have been intimate with men, though he wasn’t working with our modern notions of gay and straight.”

  “Yeah, but Alexander the Great isn’t from Staten Island, is he?”

  “Fair point,” said Jess. “Let’s check in with Val later, and see what they think.”

  Jess finished feeding Evie and settled her into her bouncer seat. Then we went through Jess’s closet to bag up the pants she wore when she was pregnant and her stomach stretched out wide.

  When Val got home, they gave a kiss to Jess, a hug to me, and then lifted Evie out of her bouncer seat to curl up on the couch with her in their lap. As they bounced Evie up and down, they said “a-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma” and “a-da-da-da-da-da.” Sometimes she would make a sound of her own, like “pbbbbbtttbbbhhh” or “ehhhh,” and Val would copy it back at her.

  After a few minutes, Val lifted their head, as if remembering that the rest of the world was still here.

  “What’s up, Sam!” they asked.

  I told them about the statue assignment and how TJ and I didn’t want to do a project about someone who wasn’t queer.

  “I see the conundrum,” said Val. “There are some subconscious assumptions on the part of your teacher that hypothetically overlaying ourselves onto the past works equivalently for all parties.”

  “Okay, Professor Cutepants, dial it down.” Jess patted Val’s knee. “In commonspeak for the rest of us, please.”

  Val was a graduate student and teaching assistant at The New School in Manhattan, and sometimes it showed.

  “Have you ever heard that time travel is for white men?” Val asked.

  “No,” I said.

  Val explained. “Basically, if a cishet, abled-bodied white guy goes back in time, he’s still a cishet, abled-bodied white guy. He might not blend in. He might not even speak the language, but …”

  “All the times are good times for white guys,” Jess completed the thought.

  “Exactly.” Val continued. “But if one of us went back in time, we could be in trouble. There are plenty of times and places in America when I wouldn’t be welcome because I’m Latinx.”

  “Plus, the queer thing,” Jess said. “I mean, I might be okay, being femme and all, but plenty of places could be bad for a nonbinary gentlequeer like Val.” Gentlequeer was a gender-free way of saying gentleman.

  “Exactly,” said Val. “And it’s not like things were great for women in most times, femme or not.”

  “But what does this have to do with my project?” I asked.

  “For the white boys in your class, it’s going to be relatively simple to find someone from Staten Island’s history to connect with. But for the white girls and queer folk, especially the trans and nonbinary folk, and for all the people of color, there are additional barriers to success. They either limit themselves to the few people who managed to break through in their time or they have to add an extra layer of translation to their process.”

  “A what now?” I said.

  “Val.” Jess’s voice went syrupy sweet. “Are you saying that this project’s going to be easier for white boys because there are so many white boys in the history books to choose from?”