My American Self

My guinea pig is American. It might be funny to think about it that way but he lives in a cage in America, which is in my house, which is also in America. In order from smallest to largest, my guinea pig’s world looks like this: cage, bedroom, house, street, town, state, America, North America, world, Milky Way, universe. So he is a citizen of Massachusetts and a citizen of the universe, but being an American is the middle point of his personal identity.

When people meet my guinea pig they refer to him as Mr. Foster until they get to know him. At a certain point, which I determine, they can call him Paul. If he poops in your hand it counts as knowing him. If he pees in your hand (and you forgot to put the towel down), that counts as knowing him, too. You could forget the towel even though the stack is right there by the cage, and people say all the time, Hillary, put the towel down, just spread it out, it’s easy. The pee feels warm at first but then cold and sticky, and it can even make you cry. Not full-on cry, but your eyes might burn. If you go to the kitchen to get string cheese and my guinea pig hears you and starts squeaking like a fire alarm for leprechauns, and then instead of string cheese you open the crisper and get a handful of kale, and take the kale to Mr. Foster, well I’d consider that knowing him too and you could call him Paul.

I’m standing in front of my whole fourth grade class, and I’m telling everyone all about this stuff. It’s my turn to do a presentation on One Kid’s Life Livin’ In America and How That Kid Gets By. I don’t know if that’s the true name of the assignment, but it’s near enough to it.

So I’m telling everyone about Paul Foster and suddenly Daniel Horn says, Hey Hillary. I say, What? But it’s sort of strange because I’m up front of the class at the time, and we’re trying to have this sort of personal conversation.

“Didn’t you sort of notice nobody else went up there talking about their dumb rat?” he says. “You’re supposed to talk about your American self. Not your American rat.”

“He isn’t a rat, though,” I say. “He’s a guinea pig. He’s from a wild herd in Washington State and now he’s here in Massachusetts. So he’s been all over the country, actually.”

I made up that first part, about Washington and all that. Paul Foster is just from the pet store in Concord. But what does Daniel Horn know anyway?

“That’s wrong,” Daniel Horn says. “Guinea pigs aren’t wild in America. They’re from South America. And people eat them.”

I stammer up a storm trying to get a word in, that my guinea pig is American just like Daniel Horn is American even though the Horns came from Canada originally, because Daniel lives here now, not in a cage but in a house in Massachusetts. Even if Paul Foster came from South America once, long ago, it doesn’t matter, because he’s here now. And anyway some people from South America consider themselves Americans because there is America in the title. I try to explain all of this but Mrs. Stunkmeyer steps up and tells Daniel Horn to quit interrupting during my presentation, but then Daniel Horn just sits there with his mouth all crooked, so what am I supposed to even do?

So I don’t really remember where I was or anything, and I’m messing up. Mrs. Stunkmeyer says, Okay, Hillary, this wasn’t really what we asked you to talk about. And I guess I don’t get it so I sit down.

Everybody else has some big thing about how because they’re American it means they’re free and can celebrate religion or something like that, though I never saw them do anything much religious here in school, except for when Mrs. Stunkmeyer jammed her finger in Daniel Horn’s desk trying to get a frog out of there and called out for Jesus Christ the Lord.

At the end of class I’m gathering up my Visual Materials for the project, which are pictures of Paul Foster doing tricks and eating a bunch of alfalfa for Thanksgiving, when I realize the rest of the class is gone and it’s just me there.

“Hillary, come here for a sec,” Mrs. Stunkmeyer says.

I grab all my stuff in a hodge-podge and go to the front of the room.

“Listen,” she says. “I know you got a little confused up there, and Daniel wasn’t helping the situation. But since you really seem to have an interest in animals, how’s about you be the care keeper of the class mouse?”

Germ is the class mouse and no one likes him much. He sort of sits in the back and when people have to get oak tag from the supply cabinet they bump into desks trying to get a wide circle around him because he doesn’t smell too great. But I’ve never had a helper job in fourth grade so this is really a big deal.

“Yeah, sure,” I say. “I’d really love that.”

“Would your mother mind?”

“No, never.”

It’s Friday, so the job starts now.

I end up heading out of school carrying this big wire cage with a mouse in it. And it’s hard to carry it straight on so Germ kind of flops to this side and that as I go. Sometimes the wood shavings go to the side with him and it’s like an avalanche this way and then an avalanche that way, with Germ surfing the top. I see Daniel Horn waiting for the bus with a bunch of kids.

“Hey Hillary, nice boyfriend,” he says.

“Thanks,’ I say. “We’re getting married soon.”

Then, I wander into the parking lot and find my mom’s station wagon and she rolls down the window before I even get there saying, Hillary, for heaven’s sake!

But my mom doesn’t really mind much once you get the chance to explain it to her properly, and I take the old mouse home and put his cage in my room on the floor next to the towels and Paul Foster.

For the first part of the weekend, it’s fine. Germ and Paul Foster look at each other through the double wires and sometimes Paul Foster squeaks less for the refrigerator and I can’t say why. Otherwise, there’s really not much difference in life. On Friday night it’s hard to sleep because Germ is squirreling around in his shavings and I can’t get the sound out of my ears. But on Saturday night I’m so tired from not sleeping on Friday that it doesn’t even bother me.

Then on Sunday I get a phone call, which I don’t think I’ve ever gotten before, besides from my grandma on each of my birthdays. And that’s just boring because it’s the same thing every year. Once I even wrote out all the answers for the call in advance so I wouldn’t have to think. They were: I am good, it feels great, a party with family, thanks for the money, bye. But this time it turns out it’s Daniel Horn on the phone, which is weird.

“Hey Hillary. Just calling to see how your new boyfriend is.”

“He’s my husband, I told you,” I say. “We just got married about five minutes ago.”

“Oh, swell. Is he buddies with your other rat?”

“You mean my guinea pig,” I say. “And no.”

“Well that seems like you’re wasting quite an opportunity there. Maybe you should acquaint them with each other and see if they’re good buddies or not.”

“I doubt it,” I say, and hang up.

But then, I guess because it’s Sunday and I guess I’m pretty bored, I decide maybe old Daniel Horn is onto something. So I take Germ by the scruff of the neck and put him down in the shavings with Paul Foster. I should have just stuck through the dreary day but I’m no good at waiting anything out. As soon as I put Germ in there I realize I’ve messed up, but I don’t do anything to stop it, even though there’s plenty of time, because things happen so slowly. First Paul Foster freezes up, and then Germ nips his nose. Then Germ runs under Paul Foster’s low-slung stomach. Then the squealing starts, and soon Germ is lying stiff in the shavings and there’s no blood but I know he’s dead. I pick him up before he’s hardened and throw him out the window because I can’t stand to look at anything dead.

So then I just sit there. If there wasn’t this whole other cage it would be okay, but the other cage shows there was another animal that now there isn’t. So I don’t know what to do. I go outside and find Germ under my window. I look at him, bright white in the grass, and I think about how all his life just a bunch of fourth graders hated him, and now he’s dead and no one cares.

Then the sky gets purple and Germ gets brighter in the grass, and I’m looking at him and looking at him and he doesn’t look right so I kick some dirt on his fur to dull him down. And then I make the hard decision. Tomorrow I’ll put Paul Foster in the cage and bring him into school, so the fourth grade class will have a pet whether they appreciate a pet or not. And I know it will be lonely at home without Paul Foster, and I know people won’t listen when I tell them that he’s American, too, and that they have to get to know him first before they call him Paul. I’ll tell them when they can. I’ll keep them waiting, but eventually, I’ll tell them when.