Freshman year math class was in a giant classroom divided with thin curtains. You could hear precalculus behind you, geometry here in the room we sat in. Blinds broken, Mr. Man read the textbook aloud, and we read the book silently. Mostly, it was a quiet class, save for the days with substitutes, the days where even Mr. Man couldn’t drone on anymore.
I answered his questions, I did. But I wanted to goof around, too. To finally speak on something besides the textbook, and so, with the A/C rumbling above, I let myself in on the joke I overheard.
The kid, his glasses round beneath his crew cut, scrunched his face until his white skin went pink.
“You speak English?”
I turned back to stare through the cracks in the blinds, my cheeks burning. My fingers, tugging on the rips in my jeans. He laughed with his buds, surprised I wasn’t a foreign exchange student. If only I was that exotic, don’t you think?
But how can you tell me now that I always pull the race card? It’s them, first. You know it. It’s always been them, first.
