#5 China Cat (I’m The Manager)

that either, but she couldn’t relax. She stayed up all night. Finally, the man sneaked in and then just stared at her a long time before leaving. She didn’t know who it was. As soon as he left, Carole came in and looked at her stuff. Cora wasn’t lying. ‘…well…’ she said out loud, ‘…looking never hurt no-one…’

The trouble started when Carole went ahead and moved stuff. At first, she just touched stuff, but then she started moving it toward her side, on the sill, a quarter of an inch at a time. It was a plant. It was the only thing that belonged to her, and that was only because Carolyn’s husband had given her a seed. They both had a wall of windows on their side. The trouble was that, by the time, she finally got it, she put it in her drawer. Carole never watered it, and it got no sunlight, so it died. China didn’t want to get beat up, so just asked for another seed.

By the time she was six, the weird night guy was touching her. She just let him. At first, it was only her feet, but then it became her knees. It kind of felt good. By the time she was ten, he crawled into bed with her. She liked that. By the time she was twelve he wanted to put things inside her. She didn’t like that. He did it anyway, and she was pretty sure everybody knew about it, but it kept him quiet, and out of their hair. Meanwhile, Carole kept stealing and killing her plants. She kept asking for seeds and planting them in disposable cups. Carole’s drawer must be full of dead plants. China listened to Cora, answered, endured Carole and the weird man, and listened to the hall people.

‘…help…help..help…’ she said in the littlest voice but China heard it the loudest. Another woman said ‘… help me…help me…help me…my arm is broke…my foot…my foot…you ran over my foot…I’m choking…I can’t breathe…help me…help me…help me…I can’t cut…’ Every once in a while, she heard something clatter to the floor. People would swear. A man said, ‘…I’m gonna kill you…I’m gonna slit your throat…’ Sometimes he made a motion that made everyone out there scream and cry. There was a lot of that out there; screaming, crying, and swearing. The constant grind of pencils being sharpened was the background. Some times she heard a guttural voice, ‘…do I know you…’ He was polite but dangerous, and by now, she knew it to be the voice of her man. When it was out there, it wasn’t in here. Some times there was a fight. ‘…you took my spot…I always sit there…get outta my spot…there’s no room for you…’ She always heard the dragging sound of a chair, starting after supper was cleared up, or sometimes the thumping and screeching sound of a fight. They slept all day and stayed up all night. That’s why Carole belonged out there. Every time there was a new person, there was a scuffle, and every time there was a scuffle there was screaming, crying, swearing, and chair dragging. ‘…no music…play some music…I don’t want to hear his taste in music…’ Once someone brought their own music so they took it away. All they ever played was the same jazz recording over and over again. Some guy thought he was the boss. ‘…I’m the manager…yer fired…go home…git yer stuff … git in yer chair… git outta here…yer fired…grab yer stuff…go home…sit down there…I’m the manager…’ He kept yelling. It was like a jungle out out there. That’s what she told herself; she was sleeping next to a jungle. China listened to the jungle noise every night until she fell asleep.

China didn’t know what was wrong with Carolyn to make her not walk but she knew it was bad. Carolyn had a husband, who came to visit her, but he was mean, and she was better off without him. Sure, she was forgetful, but he hobbled in, dwelled on it, and talked to her snotty. They had four girls, while only one, the youngest, ever came to visit, and that was every few months. They only lived down the street. The husband