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  Call Me Athena copyright © 2021 by Colby Cedar Smith. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews.

  Andrews McMeel Publishing

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  www.andrewsmcmeel.com

  ISBN: 978-1-5248-6545-0

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2020943392

  Editor: Patty Rice

  Art Director/Designer: Holly Swayne

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  This book is a work of historical fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Certain long-standing institutions and public figures are mentioned, but the characters in the book are a product of the author’s imagination.

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  For my grandmother and her six great-grandchildren.

  Mary

  Detroit, Michigan

  1934

  Grief

  consumes

  like a brush fire.

  It begins

  with a glowing cinder.

  You think

  you can smother it

  with your boot.

  As you tap

  and kick and stomp,

  it spreads

  across the grass.

  Once the spark grows,

  it has a will

  of its own.

  It changes everything

  in its path.

  All you can do

  is stand there.

  With a useless

  bucket in your hands.

  As you watch

  the entire field

  burn.

  I wish

  I could spin my body

  so fast

  it could rotate

  the earth.

  I wish

  I could reverse

  the months, the days,

  the hours.

  Go back

  to the beginning.

  I wish

  it could have been

  me.

  Mary

  Detroit, Michigan

  1933

  They say

  twin souls

  can communicate

  without talking.

  Marguerite and I

  never stop.

  Not even

  when we’re asleep.

  I put my head

  next to hers.

  I imagine her thoughts

  traveling faster

  than the speed of light

  into my brain.

  All the static

  vanishes

  and we become a radio

  tuned to the same

  frequency.

  I wake to a swarm

  of mosquitoes

  tickling my cheek

  and buzzing my ears.

  I swat them

  from the air.

  You’re breathing on me.

  I open one eye

  and see her.

  I’m still asleep.

  So am I.

  Good.

  We close our eyes.

  After a moment,

  I feel a tickling on my cheek again.

  Are you awake?

  My sister is as warm

  as a log on a fire.

  She fuels me.

  We walk down the hall

  into the crowded

  living room.

  Shield our bodies

  from our three

  long-limbed

  younger brothers,

  who snap

  and twist

  against each other.

  Cerberus,

  the three-headed dog,

  guarding the gates

  of the underworld.

  They look up

  and greet us in unison,

  Good morning!

  before they rush us.

  John puts me in a headlock

  and tugs my braid.

  Gus wrestles

  Marguerite to the ground

  while she kicks

  herself free

  until my dad

  looks up

  from his newspaper

  and yells

  STOP!

  Or I’ll send you back

  to the old country!

  Sometimes

  I wish he would.

  Our apartment

  is as small

  as a rabbit den.

  Just like rabbits

  my parents keep adding

  new babies

  that take up space.

  I look at my mother.

  Hands over her eyes,

  wondering

  what to do

  with her brood.

  Her belly swells

  with yet another

  mouth to feed.

  Why did my parents come to America?

  If I had

  a quarter

  for every time

  I asked this question,

  I’d be richer

  than Henry Ford.

  Mama ladles the batter

  for crêpes onto the pan

  and turns it—just so.

  With one flick

  of her wrist,

  she flips

  the thin

  golden pancake

  onto the plate.

  The first one there

  gets the crêpe.

  So you have to be fast.

  My brother Jim

  wins the prize

  and slathers it

  with strawberry preserves.

  Rolls it and eats it.

  All hot

  and gooey.

  Not me.

  I just keep grabbing

  and grabbing

  and placing the crêpes

  in my lap.

  After breakfast,

  I will hide them

  in my drawers

  underneath

  my folded clothes.

  It’s good to have

  a crêpe on hand

  when you need one.

  And a few

  for your sister

  too.

  My brother John

  leans back.

  His hands crossed

  behind his neck.

  His dirty boots

  on the table.

  Ρεμάλι! (Remáli!)

  Slob!

  My father cuffs him

  on the back of the head

  so hard

  his teeth rattle.

  Gold tokens

  in a slot machine.

  John sits up

  and smirks

 
as if someone

  has made a joke.

  I half expect him

  to spit gold coins

  into his cupped hands

  and scream, Jackpot!

  Just to spite

  the old man.

  Mary!

  I look at him sideways.

  Yes, Baba?

  I can’t remember

  the last time

  he addressed me.

  Dimitris Nicolaides came to the shop.

  He asked about you.

  My mother’s eyebrows rise

  as her lips form

  into an “O.”

  I can hear the silent,

  O, Mary!

  O, what luck!

  She clasps her

  hands together.

  Her mind slowly opening

  a cedar dowry chest

  as she prepares

  to make

  my wedding bed.

  A husband.

  An old, rich, Greek

  husband.

  To put me

  in my place.

  Your eyes are the color of cultures clashing

  she says,

  as she kisses me between my lashes.

  The dark brown

  of the Greeks

  mixed with the stormy gray

  of northwestern France.

  My eyes turn green

  with anger.

  Oh, Mary,

  calm yourself.

  You must

  get used to the idea

  of marriage.

  Marguerite pats my hand.

  Her eyes calm

  as a fox.

  Liquid pools

  of the sweetest

  amber.

  My eyes glow

  like a serpent.

  The sixteen-year-old girls

  in our town

  are precious candies

  waiting

  in a crystal dish.

  The boys

  get to reach in,

  choose

  whichever treat

  they want.

  Marguerite

  will be taken

  by a man

  from a good family.

  She is sweet

  and brings a smile

  to your mouth.

  When I talk,

  boys look like

  they’ve bitten

  on something

  bitter.

  I imagine I’m pulling on a silk dress

  with a feathered boa

  and matching slippers.

  Instead,

  I squeeze into a wool dress

  that is two sizes

  too small.

  The fabric

  barely buttons across

  my growing breasts.

  I am filled with defeat

  even before I arrive

  at the battlefront.

  School.

  I tuck

  mother’s rouge,

  a secret,

  into my pocket.

  Secure my stockings

  with hidden red ribbons

  around my thighs.

  A little color

  just for me.

  I try to fix my hair

  never sleek

  and kept.

  A dark-brown,

  wild, tickling

  monster

  that longs

  for the inside

  of my mouth.

  I’ve always felt

  a woman’s power

  is in her hair.

  The problem is

  I have more of it

  than most.

  And I have no idea

  how to tame it.

  We climb down the stairs

  pass through

  our father’s store

  and enter

  the busy street.

  Our neighborhood

  smells like

  trash

  metal and oil

  ammonia

  slaughtered chickens

  and roasted goat meat.

  Folks

  from Greece,

  Romania, Poland, and Mexico,

  and many Black families

  who’ve come up from the South

  inhabit

  the row houses and duplexes

  along our street.

  Most of our neighbors

  came to Detroit

  because Ford

  paid his workers well.

  $5 a day.

  Word spread far and wide.

  My mother says

  I’ll never have to travel

  to learn

  the ways of the world.

  The whole world lives in Detroit.

  For twenty years

  the factories fed

  and nourished

  every part of this town.

  Food on the table.

  Money in the schools.

  Doctors for the sick.

  Every morning

  the citizens

  walked in one direction

  toward the factory floors.

  The River Rouge.

  Animals gathering

  at the watering hole.

  Detroit drank deep.

  Sustenance.

  Now,

  water is scarce.

  We pray the source

  won’t run dry.

  Marguerite and I hold hands

  as we pass the lines.

  Neighbors wait

  in the courtyard

  of the

  Sacred Heart Church.

  A nun

  ladles soup

  into wooden bowls.

  The priest rips bread

  and places it

  into waiting mouths.

  A woman stands

  on a soapbox,

  speaking so vehemently

  spittle flicks

  from her teeth.

  I say to you, it is easier

  for a camel

  to go through the eye of a needle,

  than a rich man to enter

  into the kingdom of God! 1

  It’s difficult to decide

  where to look.

  A town

  of weathered tents

  lines the streets.

  Families living

  in the dirt.

  Women beg

  for coins

  with their children

  on their laps.

  Children

  so thin

  you can see their bones

  through their

  worn shirts

  skin peeling

  from sitting in the sun

  teeth brown

  from hunger.

  A hollow-cheeked man sits

  underneath a cloth banner

  that reads,

  Hoover’s poor farm.

  He holds a cardboard sign

  painted with angry words

  about our last president.

  Hard times are still Hoovering over us. 2

  His son

  stands beside him.

  He bounces a ball

  and chants,

  Little Pig, Little Pig, let me in!

  Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin!

  Then I’ll huff and I’ll puff

  and I’ll blow your house in! 3

 
; Folks know

  once you

  find yourself

  sitting on the road

  in Hooverville, 4

  it’s hard

  to get back

  on your

  feet.

  I hear a rumble behind us

  I look up

  to see a boy

  my age.

  Driving

  a brand-new, red

  Ford Cabriolet.

  Through the open cab

  I can see

  his pinstriped suit.

  He looks

  as if he has never had

  to worry.

  Curly blond hair

  bounces

  as he speeds