If Trump Wins...

I published this last September. I wasn't far off, I don't think.

Tiffani, who I normally can’t stand because (a) she’s so up herself, and (b) because Jayrelle, who I wanted to get busy with, liked her more than me, had this new app from something called DSA. She was like, “It’s lethal (which, if you’re old or CFZ (a clue-free zone), is like mega-amazing, and pronounced lee-THUL). “If one of your teachers says something good about like gays or lesbians or trans or socialism,” Tiffani says, “you can like report them and they’ll like investigate,” and everybody at our table in the cafeteria was like eating it up with a spoon, especially Jayrelle, who was like trying to look down her blouse while she said it, but what else is new? 

Everybody was like,”Oh, I’ve so got to get that,” and getting their phones out like they’re on fire or something. Everbody except me. I said, “I’ve already got more apps than I know what to do with,” but nobody noticed, so on Monday, when everybody said they’d like installed it, I had too. DSA turned out to stand for Dissension Suppression Agency, one of those new government things President Trump dreamed up. 

Before Jayrelle, I was into Mr. Joyner, who I’ve got for social studies, because he’s like 23 or something, and hot. He either goes to the gym six times a week, and spend a lot of time there, or has like amazing genes. And gray eyes, and I’m like consumed by lust by a black person with a white person’s eyes, but maybe he’s gay because I was just about like bellowing, “Let’s get busy!” at him in body language but he didn’t seem interested. You know who he did seem a little interested in? Becca Lange, who everybody like despises because she’s everything all at once — cute and athletic (as in star of the girls varsity basketball team) and nice and mega-smart, as in straight A’s probably since the day she was born. So just for fun I used the DSA app to report him for telling us that in the early days of the country white people were like super awful to Native Americans or whatever. Teachers aren’t supposed to say anything like critical about white people anymore.

It was lethal how easy it was to send the message. All you have to do is click in a few boxes. The first pages is like Who do you wish to report, and then you choose between Teacher, Parent, Neighbor, Friend, and Acquaintance. Then you choose between a bunch of like options Something Said in Your Hearing, Something Someone Told He/She Heard, Something on the Social Media.

So far, so good, but then like three weeks went by, and Mr. Joyner was still up at the front of the classroom, never noticing me (I don’t raise my hand in class because I’m not a showoff, at least academically LOL), looking like he must be like leaking precum he was so pleased with something that bitch Becca had given had said, and being like infuriatingly hot, as usual. I deleted the app from my phone. But then the Monday after Thanksgiving, there’s no trace of Mr. Joyner. Instead, there’s this mousy little female teacher with thick legs and ugly glasses trying to like ingratiate herself to us, announcing that Mr. Joyner has had to like retire from teaching for personal reasons, whatever that means. And I’m like ecstatic.

At least until I run into Mr. Joyner at Walgreen’s a week or so later when I go there to like replenish my supply of false eyelashes. If he was a 10 in the shirt and tie male teachers are like required to wear at Sanderson High, he’s a 12 in a wifebeater. 

I’m guessing he’s on his way home from the gym. He looks a little like sheepish, but he’s pleased to see me, and remembers my name and everything, and asks how I’m doing. I tell him I’d be doing a lot better if he asked me out, and it’s like somebody flicked a switch. He stops smiling that million-watt smile he has, and like winces. He says he doesn’t think that would be appropriate. He says, like really formally, “It was nice seeing you, Chanel, but I’ve got to get home and get my dog walked and fed.” And I’m so like humiliated I wish the floor would open and like swallow me. 

I’ve lived alone with my dad, who’s like a freelance graphic designer since Christa (I called my mom by her first name) died of breast cancer almost three years ago. My dad could hardly be more CFZ, and we don’t like interact very often. He spends most of his time on line in his little study, probably looking at mail order bride sites, and I spend most of mine on line in my bedroom, with headphones on. Naturally he chooses the night of the day I get humiliated by Mr. Joyner at Walgreen’s to come in and try again to Repair Our Relationship, as he puts it. He’s a lot less slobby than usual, as though he’s like thinking of going somewhere. but when I tell him I’ve had a hard day, and that I like need some alone time, he looks all loving and compassionate, which makes me a little nauseous, if you want to know the truth, and reaches for my hand. 

“Why don’t you tell me what’s up, kiddo?” he says. “It wasn’t that long ago that you always told me when something was wrong. Maybe I can lighten your load a little bit.” He gives me a smile that makes me want to burst into tears, and to try to break my iPhone in his face. “What is it about ‘I’m not in the mood’ that you don’t understand?” I like demand in my cruelest voice, and you should see the look on his face. I am so close to bursting into tears and throwing my arms around him, like I’m nine instead of almost 14.

He gets up off the edge of my bed and sighs and says, “i’m going to be out for a few hours, kiddo. Will you be OK?”

I like surmise that he’s met somebody on line. I wonder if he’s taught himself Ukrainian or whatever. “No,” I snark, “I’m almost 14 years old, but I’ll just fall completely to pieces if Daddy goes on his little date.” 

I wouldn’t blame him for hating me, but I doubt it would be as much as I hate myself. The look on his face!

But I have the house to myself. I can get on line on his computer and maybe get some dirt on Mr. Joyner, something I can hurt him with. (Phones are good for sending text messages, but not for doing research.) When I go into Daddy’s study and touch his mouse what to my like wondering eyes should appear on the screen but this Photoshop thing he’s working on. It’s President Trump looking all gross and flabby. “Hail the mighty gladiator,” it says. I get it. I saw the little video on TikTok of some gross old wrestler dude calling President Trump a gladiator and then ripping his shirt off. 

My dad’s thing makes fun of President Trump. It’s actually pretty funny. I’ve seen bags of marshmallows that look more gladiator-y than President Trump does in his golfing outfit. But you know what I do? I take a picture of my dad’s meme with my iPhone, and then go back in my room and think about how much Mr. Joyner hurt my feelings, and play a prank to take my mind off how bad I feel. I reinstall the DSZ app and send them the Gladiator meme, and Daddy’s name, and our address. You don’t have to, but I fill in my name.

It makes me feel good, but only like temporarily. After a few minutes, I’m sobbing.I picture Mr. Joyner getting busy with that bitch Becca, and afterward, when they’re like lying side by side, gazing into each other’s eyes, he tells her what I said, and Becca laughs. 

I wake up the next morning feeling bad about my prank, but like before, nothing happens. Daddy hasn’t like disappeared or anything. I ask how his date with his mail order bride went, and get the look he gives me when I’ve been like gratuitously cruel. “She thought I was too old for her,” he says, totally like dejected. I guess I feel sorry for him or whatever, but I’ve got my own fucking horrible life to worry about. Tiffani dumped Jayrelle, and now he’s asked me out, but how is it going to look if I hook up with someone Tffani dumped?

The day it gets around school that Jayrelle dropped out because he was like too humiliated to be seen by everybody, I get home from school, and Daddy doesn’t call, “Welcome home, kiddo,” as I’ve never been able to stop him from doing, when I walk past his study. After a couple of hours, I go in there, and there’s no sign of him. But there’s an envelope on his keyboard. It says Dissension Suppression Agency in the upper left corner, and an address in Washington, DC. I’ve got like a sinking feeling. 

“For having denounced your treasonous parent,” the letter inside says, “your country would like you to enjoy a week at the Trump Resort of your choice. Please find a voucher enclosed. With the help of conscientious young people like yourself, not constrained by outmoded conceptions of filial fealty, our country can retain the greatness we regained when President Trump became President-for-Life.”

It goes on to say that, because I’m under 18, I’m like required to make an appointment within 72 hours of receipt of the letter with a DSA Foster Care Coordinator, which will hook me up with like a foster family or whatever, “until such time as the parent or guardian you bravely denounced has been rehabilitated.”

There’s also a postcard of President-for-Life Trump looking a lot younger, hotter, and less like obese than in real life, but can we pretend I haven’t just said that?