Joseph Young

Oh, That Magic Feeling

My mom is in the bathroom filling the tub. From where I’m sitting in the dining room, I feel how much that water weighs as it thumps down from the faucet. It’s heavy. And it’s hot.

She goes to the living room where my sister Lena is sitting on the yellow couch. Lena is trying to put her skinny knees up to her face, but the belly is too round and big. I can see the belly button push through the clingy gray leotards, and it makes me sick feeling. I hate that.

My mom gathers an armload of my sister’s music albums, most of them with a black guy on the front with a big shiny afro. She looks at Lena and goes over to her. "Ugh," she says, and she pushes my sister’s one leg closed with her knee. "Have some modesty, why don’t you?"

My sister looks at her like she’s got a machete in her eye but she doesn’t move. I’m thinking she’s trying to stop my mom from what she’s going to do, but then Lena talks. "Stupid, smelly bitch," she says. "Mind your own business." Her lips are real pink from the gloss.

My mom throws back her head and laughs at the white ceiling. "What do you think I’m finally doing, little girl?"

Still with the records in her arms, she walks through her bedroom to the bathroom, and then I hear a big splash. She squeaks off the water and comes back. She picks up another pile and takes them in too.

From where I’m pretending to read, I watch Lena. Finally, after she’s been fighting for a long time, I see a tiny bit of water in her eyes. My mom comes back in the living room, and she sees it too. That tight bunch in her neck goes down.

"Oh, Lena," she says. "Who do you think this is for?" The room gets all quiet, and for a second I get scared she’s going to go over and hug Lena. But then, I’m so glad, she doesn’t. Shaking her head, she picks up the last pile of records, carries them away, and splash they go.

Lena now decides to get off the couch and run towards the bathroom, her big stomach barging. Quick, I put my book down and head up the stairs. Just as soon as I push the button on my bedroom doorknob, I hear the screaming again, and some thumps. But up here it’s a little more far away, like on television.

I go over and reach behind my white dresser, scared for a minute my mom has gotten it too, but then I find it. It’s got a little dust on the album cover, so I blow that off. I look at the guys with long hair. On the street where they’re walking, there’s some funny cars, which Lena once said were English. Up in the blue sky near the corner it says "Carl" in Magic Marker, who was my dad.

In my closet, I’ve got the beanbag chair set up. I plug in my sister’s old record player, and I put the record on, covering my ears with the big, spongy headphones. As the record goes around, the guy sings a lot of weird things: Any jobber got the sack, Monday morning turning back. Keeps a ten bob note up his nose. Boy, you’re going to carry that weight.

It’s dark there in the closet with the door almost closed, with just one little beam of light coming in. The guy sings and he says it again, Boy, you’re going to carry that weight. It makes me feel so strange. It’s kind of like all the darkness bumping around the closet comes right into my head. When the record ends, I put it on again. As long as the guy sings, it’s okay in there and I stop listening to the always noise of my blood.

Joseph’s work has appeared previously in Literary Potpourri, Small Spriral Notebook, and The Urbanite.