Mislaid

by Nell Zink

Noah’s son Ham—so were you. Meg felt very clever as she handed over the birth certificate. The races of the child’s parents were marked right on it: colored and colored. When the clerk saw on the slip of paper that that Mrs. Brown was colored, she glanced up in surprise. But a close look revealed that it was true. Meg’s coarse curls and knobby heel bones were dead giveaways to the connoisseur. The daughter was one of those pallid, yellow-haired black kids you sometimes see. Frog-belly white, no trace of pink, curly tendrils all around her hairline. Probably anemic and undernourished—a lot of rural black kids had worms—but very close to passing. “Was she premature?” the clerk inquired. “She’s so little.” “She’s small, but she can read,” Meg said. “I can spell ‘astronaut,’” Karen volunteered. “That’s a third-grade word,” the clerk said. “You’re very smart for such a tiny little thing. You sure you don’t want to have her be white?” “We’re black and proud,” Meg said. “I’m blond,” Karen objected. “There’s no blond race,” the clerk corrected her. “But it don’t matter. All God’s children attend the very same school. We like to know who’s black so we can help them out with affirmative action and a free hot lunch.”

Give me a break.