What Marcus Wrote
Part One: Baltimore
Ruby found her grandson writing COCKSUCKER on particleboard.
Nine years old. Gray pencil, gray wood. Suspended three weeks ago for words the school put in a letter with yellow highlighter.
Marcus hadn't talked since. But he wrote. Everything.
"Where'd you learn that one?"
He pointed at the wall where he'd been practicing. SHIT DAMN HELL BITCH ASS. Like spelling homework.
Ruby was seventy-one. Taught kindergarten until her knees gave out. Never had a quiet child who screamed on walls.
"Your mother know you're here?"
Shrug.
"Show me what else."
He showed her boards. IF IT'S MEANT TO BE IT WILL BE BUT FUCK IT. And: READING PROGRAMS ARE FOR PEOPLE WHO HATE READING. And: MRS. HENDERSON HAS DEAD EYES.
"That's specific."
Marcus wrote: SHE DOES THOUGH
Hardware store. Ruby bought twenty sheets of particleboard. Man at checkout said, "Big project?"
"Anger management."
"Good luck with that."
Garage like a fucked-up art class. Marcus writing. Ruby in a lawn chair pretending to read but really watching this kid turn rage into pencil marks.
EVERYONE IS LYING
SCHOOL MAKES KIDS STUPID
I USED TO LIKE WORDS
That one. I used to like words. Ruby stood up.
"What happened?"
He wrote: THEY SAID MINE WERE WRONG
Part Two: Copenhagen
Nobody would translate Marcus's boards so they just hung them.
Astrid's gallery. Thursday. Danish people walking through, reading American profanity like it was poetry.
FUCK THIS POLITE SHIT
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUCK (the whole board)
QUIET IS JUST RAGE WITH ITS MOUTH SHUT
Woman in a coat that cost a mortgage payment: "This child. How old?"
"Nine."
"Mine stopped at eight. The teachers sent him to so many doctors. You know what worked? Nothing. He started talking when he found people worth talking to."
She sat with Marcus on the floor. They looked at phones together. She showed him something. He typed. She laughed like breaking glass.
"We're trading," she told Ruby. "Curse words. International relations."
Marcus's new board: DET ER LORT
"Danish for?"
"This is shit. But he added something." She pointed to tiny words at the bottom: flowers eat shit to grow
"Is that true?"
"Everything eats shit to grow," the woman said.
Hotel. Marcus on Ruby's phone: they dont look away here
"From what?"
from me
Ruby almost said something careful. Stopped.
Marcus writing on hotel stationary now. Tiny letters.
"What's that?"
to mrs henderson who taught me that silence is scarier than swearing thank you for being so fucking wrong about everything
"You going to send it?"
maybe when I talk again
"When's that?"
when someone listens
He had forty-seven boards now. Ruby had pictures on her phone. Diane would hate this.
Good.
Marcus wrote: grandma was I wrong
"About?"
the words I used
"What do you think?"
He wrote for a long time. Showed her: words are just sounds we agreed mean things but what if we agreed wrong what if fuck is actually the sound of trying really hard and shit is the sound of disappointment and damn is the sound of a wednesday when you realize adults are just old kids who gave up
Ruby sat on the hotel bed. This kid who made philosophy from profanity.
"You know what your real problem is?"
He waited.
"You're too smart for the words we gave you."
He wrote: thats everyones problem
Then: but most people dont notice
Copenhagen morning. Gallery again. Marcus sat with his boards while strangers read his gray-on-gray truth. Some touched their hearts. Some took pictures. One man cried at SCHOOL MAKES KIDS STUPID.
Marcus didn't talk.
But everyone heard him.
