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Home of the Brave

Holtzbrinck Publishers

    SNOW

    When the flying boat
    returns to earth at last,
    I open my eyes
    and gaze out the round window.
    What is all the white? I whisper.
    Where is all the world?

    The helping man greets me
    and there are many lines and questions
    and pieces of paper.

    At last I follow him outside.
    We call that snow, he says.
    Isn't it beautiful?
    Do you like the cold?

    I want to say
    No, this cold is like claws on my skin!
    I look around me.
    Dead grass pokes through
    the unkind blanket of white.
    Everywhere the snow
    sparkles with light
    hard as high sun.
    I close my eyes.
    I try out my new English words:
    How can you live
    in this place called America?
    It burns your eyes!

    The man gives me a fat shirt
    and soft things like hands.
    Coat, he says. Gloves.
    He smiles. You'll get used to it, Kek.

    I am a tall boy,
    like all my people.
    My arms stick out of the coat
    like lonely trees.
    My fingers cannot make
    the gloves work.

    I shake my head.
    I say, This America is hard work.

    His laughter makes little clouds.


    OLD WORDS, NEW WORDS

    The helping man
    is called Dave.
    He tells me he's from the
    Refugee Resettlement Center,
    but I don't know what those
    words are trying to say.

    He isn't tall
    like my father was,
    and there is hair on his face
    the color of clouds before rain.
    His car is red
    and coughs and burps
    when he tries to make it go.
    Doesn't much like
    the cold, either, he says.

    I smile to say I understand,
    although I do not.

    Sometimes Dave speaks English,
    the tangled sounds
    they tried to teach us
    in the refugee camp.
    And sometimes he
    uses my words.
    He's like a song always out of tune,
    missing notes.

    To help him,
    I try some English,
    but my mouth just wants to chew the words
    and spit them on the ground.

    We are like a cow and a goat,
    wanting to be friends
    but wondering if it
    can ever be.


    QUESTIONS

    We drive past buildings,
    everywhere buildings.
    Everywhere cars.
    Everywhere dead trees.
    Who killed all the trees? I ask.

    They're not dead, Dave says.
    This is called winter,
    and it happens every year.
    In spring their leaves will come back.
    You'll see.

    He turns to smile.
    His eyes are wise and calm,
    the eyes of a village elder.
    Your family will be happy
    to see you, Dave says,
    but he doesn't mean my truest family,
    my mother and father and brother.

    I don't answer.
    I reach into my pocket
    and feel the soft cloth
    I carry with me everywhere.
    Blue and yellow,
    torn at the edges,
    the size of my hand,
    soft as new grass after good rain.

    Dave asks, When did you last see
    your aunt and cousin?

    A long time ago, I say.
    Before the camp.

    I can tell that Dave
    has many questions.
    I wonder if all America people
    will be so curious.
    My mouth is going to get very sore,
    stumbling on words all day long.

    We stop at a light
    hung high in the air,
    red and round
    like a baby sun.
    How was the airplane trip?
    Dave asks in English.
    When I don't answer, he tries again,
    using my words:
    Did you like the flying boat?

    I liked it very much, I say.
    I'd like to fly such a boat
    one day myself.
    When Mama comes,
    we'll take a flying boat
    around the world.

    Dave turns to look at me.
    You know, Kek, he says,
    we aren't sure where your mother is.
    His voice has the soft sting of pity in it.
    We don't know if she is—

    She's fine, I tell him,
    and I look out the window
    at the not-dead trees.
    She will come, I say,
    and this time
    I use my words,
    my music.


    WHAT THE HECK

    We drive down a long road
    with many fast cars.
    Still there are buildings,
    but sometimes not.
    I see a long fence
    made of old gray boards.
    And then I see the cow.

    Stop! I yell.
    I feel regret in my heart
    to use such a harsh sound
    with my new helping friend.
    Please stop, I say,
    gently this time.

    What? Dave asks.
    What's wrong?

    Did you not see her?
    The brave cow
    in the snow?
    Dave glances
    in the looking-back glass.
    Cow? Oh, yeah. That used to be
    a big farm. Lot of land around here's
    getting sold off now.
    But that farmer's hanging on.

    I don't understand his words,
    but I can hear that he doesn't
    love cattle as I do,
    and I feel sorry for him.
    I twist in my seat.
    The don't-move belt across my chest
    pulls back.

    Oh, what the heck? Dave says.

    I have not yet learned
    the meaning of heck,
    but I can see that
    it's a fine and useful word,
    because he turns the car around.


    GOD WITH A WET NOSE

    We park by the side
    of the fast-car road.
    Walking through the snow
    is hard work,
    like wading across a river
    wild with rain.

    The cow is near a fine,
    wide-armed,
    good-for-climbing tree.
    To say the truth of it,
    she is not the most beautiful of cows.
    Her belly sags
    and her coat is scarred
    and her face tells me
    she remembers sweeter days.

    My father would not have stood
    for such a weary old woman in his herd,
    and yet to see her here
    in this strange land
    makes my eyes glad.
    In my old home back in Africa,
    cattle mean life.
    They are our reason
    to rise with the sun,
    to move with the rains,
    to rest with the stars.
    They are the way we know
    our place in the world.

    The cow looks past me.
    I can see that she's pouting,
    with only snow and dead grass
    to keep her company.

    I shake my head. A cow can be trouble,
    with her slow, stubborn body,
    her belly ripe with milk,
    her pleading eyes that shine at you
    like river rocks in sun.

    An old woman comes out of the barn.
    She's carrying a bucket.
    Two chickens trot behind her
    scolding and fussing.
    The woman waves.

    Just saying hello to the cow,
    Dave calls.

    Let me know if she answers,
    the woman calls back,
    and she returns to the barn.

    We should go, Dave says.
    Your aunt is expecting us.

    A little longer, I say.
    Please?

    I know cattle are important
    to your people, Dave says.
    Again he tries to use my words.
    A man I helped to settle here
    taught me a saying from Africa.
    I'll bet you would like it:
    A cow is God with a wet nose.

    I laugh. We wait.
    The wind sneaks through my coat.
    My teeth shiver.
    I take off a glove
    and hold out my hand,
    and at last the cow comes to me.

    She moos,
    a harsh and mournful sound.
    It isn't the fault of the cow.
    She doesn't know another way to talk.
    She can't learn
    the way I am learning,
    word
    by slow, slow
    word.

    I stroke her cold, wet coat,
    and for a moment I hold
    all I've lost
    and all I want
    right there in my hand.


    WELCOME TO MINNESOTA

    It's growing dark
    when I say good-bye to the cow
    and we go back to the car to drive again.
    At last we park before a brown building,
    taller than trees.
    Its window-eyes
    weep yellow light.

    Under a street lamp,
    children throw white balls
    at the not-dead trees.
    Snowballs, Dave explains.
    A smiling girl throws
    one of the balls at Dave's car.
    He shakes his head.
    Welcome to Minnesota, he says.

    We climb out of the car.
    The snowball girl's face is red
    and her long brown hair is wet.
    Hi, she says. I'm Hannah.
    You the new kid?
    I'm not sure of the answer,
    so I make my shoulders go up and down.
    Catch, she says,
    and she throws a cold white ball to me.
    It falls apart in my hands.

    I follow Dave across the noisy snow.
    Two times I slip and fall.
    Two times I rise, pants wet, knees burning.

    Take it slow, buddy, Dave says.

    Tears trace my cheeks like tiny knives.
    I look away so Dave will not see my shame.
    How can I trust a place
    where even the ground plays tricks?

    Inside, we climb up many stairs.
    We walk down a long hall,
    passing door after door.
    Dave knocks on one of them,
    and behind it I hear the
    muffled voices of my past.

    Much time has come and gone,
    but still I know the worn, gray voice
    of my mother's sister, Nyatal.
    I hear another voice, too,
    the sound of a young man,
    a strong man.

    The door opens
    and my old life is waiting on the other side


    FAMILY

    I'm hugged and kissed
    and there is much welcoming
    from my aunt.
    She's rounder than I remember,
    with a moon face to match,
    her black eyes set deep.

    My cousin, Ganwar,
    shakes my hand.
    I have learned about shaking hands.
    At the camp they taught us how:
    be firm, but do not squeeze too hard!
    Still, when Ganwar grasps my hand
    we are like two calves in the clouds
    pretending we know how to fly.

    The man's voice belongs to Ganwar,
    and he has my father's height now,
    though Ganwar is thin and reedy
    where my father
    was sturdy with strength.
    His eyes are wary and smart,
    always taking the measure of a person.
    Six long scars line his forehead,
    the marks of manhood
    I watched Ganwar and my brother receive
    in our village ceremony.
    How jealous I had been that day,
    too young for such an honor.

    I try hard not to look at
    another scar,
    the place where Ganwar's left hand
    should be,
    round and bare and waiting
    like an ugly question
    no one can answer.

    The night Ganwar lost his hand
    was the night I lost
    my father and brother,
    the night of men in the sky with guns,
    the night the earth opened up like a black pit
    and swallowed my old life whole.

    My aunt holds my face in her hands
    and I see that she's crying.
    I know her to be a woman of many sorrows,
    carved down to a sharp stone
    by her luckless life.
    She isn't like my mother,
    whose laughter is
    like bubbling water from a deep spring.

    I look into her eyes
    and then my tears come hard and fast,
    not for her, not for my cousin,
    not even for myself,
    but because when I look there,
    I see my mother's eyes
    looking back at me.

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Excerpted from Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate. Copyright © 2007 Katherine Applegate. Excerpted by permission of Holtzbrinck Publishers.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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