Big Feelings
The Zipper at the Door
The fish chart hung by the window, with a magnet for every name. All week it had been Nadia’s turn. But this morning the arrow pointed at P for Priya, not N for Nadia. Priya tapped three pinches of food onto the water. Nadia watched and said nothing.
At lunch, Ellie sat two seats down, next to Priya, laughing at something Nadia didn’t catch. The seat beside Nadia stayed empty. Ellie wasn’t leaving her out. She’d just picked another chair. Nadia ate her sandwich. Rudi hummed the line-up tune: three notes, wrong, as usual.
Two spelling words Nadia had been sure about came back with red circles. “Write each one five times,” said Ms. Doyle, while everyone else got the paintbrushes out. Enough. Enough. Enogh. Rub, rub. Enough. By the time she’d done all ten, the painting had started without her.
At pickup time, Ms. Doyle crouched by the coat hooks. Nadia had been such a good listener today! Such a help tidying the shelf! She gave her a star sticker. Nadia said thank you, stuck it on her sweater over the missing button, and went to find her coat.
Dad was at the gate with the stroller. One wheel squeaked, but only on left turns. Sam was asleep, one sock half off. A stick of bread poked out of the grocery bag like a tiny flagpole. “Good day?” said Dad. “Good day,” said Nadia. It was almost true.
The neighbor’s cat was on the wall again. Nadia said hello to it, out loud, like always. It didn’t answer, like always. Dad shoved the stroller through the gate one-handed, the bag bonk-bonking on his knee, and Sam’s sock finally fell off altogether.
At the front door, Nadia’s zipper caught on the loop of red lining, the same old place. Zzzt. Stuck. Really stuck. Dad’s hands were full: stroller, bag, one small sock. “Nearly there,” he said, for the second time. Nadia yanked again. The zipper didn’t budge.
Four small things had happened today, and only Nadia knew there were four. The zipper wouldn’t move. Dad’s hands were full. And everything that hadn’t come out yet was standing right there at the door with her.
What does Nadia do?
Every choice costs something. Let’s see what.
Pull hard at the zipper and cry
Nadia pulled the zipper so hard the lining tore a little more. Then she cried, really cried, so hard her whole chest shook. Dad couldn’t put anything down fast enough, stroller in one hand, bag in the other, so for three long seconds he just stood there while she cried at the door.
Dad dropped the grocery bag on the step, bread and all, and got right down, one knee on the cold stone. Sam woke up and joined in, a smaller, grumpier noise underneath Nadia’s. The neighbor’s cat left the wall in one leap. It would be back tomorrow. It always was.
Inside, door shut, zipper still stuck, Nadia sat on the second stair and cried out the whole day: the fish, the empty chair, the two words five times. Dad sat on the stair below with Sam squashed between his knees. He didn’t ask her to stop. He didn’t ask why. Not yet.
When she’d gone quiet, it was really dark, and the bread was still lying on the step where it had landed. Dad went out and got it. One end had a dent in it now. He snapped off the dented bit and passed it to her. Nadia ate it on the stairs, coat still on.
Go still and say nothing
Nadia’s arms just stopped. No more pulling. No more anything. Dad noticed the quiet before he noticed the zipper. He didn’t say “What’s wrong?” He tipped the stroller onto its back wheels and reached over with one free finger to try the zipper himself.
It wouldn’t move for Dad either. So he scooped Nadia up sideways, coat and all, and bumped the stroller over the step with his free hand. Sam, still strapped in, watched the ceiling float past upside down between his feet.
Nadia sat on the end of her bed, one arm out of her coat, one arm still in, the zipper stuck exactly where it had stopped. Downstairs: the faucet running for Sam’s bottle. Cabinets opening. Cabinets closing. Further and further away.
With her free arm she pulled her fox out from under the pillow and tucked it inside her coat, half-zipped over both of them. She didn’t cry, exactly. She sat there a long time, quiet in a different way than at the door, with the fox warm against her. The four things were still all hers, for now. Then Dad called up the stairs that dinner was ready, and Nadia went down with the fox still inside her coat.
Tell Dad one real thing from today
“Priya fed the fish and it wasn’t even her turn!” Nadia blurted. All she could see of Dad over the stroller was his knees, so she said it straight at his knees. Grumpily, as if his knees had fed the fish. They hadn’t. His knees had been at the store all afternoon.
Dad blinked. Then he put the grocery bag down on the step, bread and all. He hadn’t done that for the zipper. “That was your turn,” he said. Not asking. Just checking. “It was on the chart,” said Nadia. Her voice wobbled on chart.
With the bag down, Dad found the loop of lining and wiggled the zipper free while Nadia kept going: the two spelling words, five times each. He got the zipper all the way. He got about half of what she was saying.
They went in together, Dad hauling the stroller backward over the step, Nadia still talking: missing the start of painting, the brushes. She didn’t mention the empty chair. That one could wait. But now Dad knew about the fish. One of the four.