THE LOUD LAUNDROMAT

The conversation that changed my life took place in a loud but nearly empty laundromat.

I was 13. The day was a school day.

I just got suspended for disturbing the class and an altercation I had with the class bully.

I will remember this day for the rest of my life.

As me, my mother and my younger sister enter the laundromat, I can feel the separate sets of eyes from separate machines glance at us.

All eyes were on the black and blue lump under my right eye.

I can still feel the swelling.

“I didn’t know you can fight,” said Amy, my younger sister.

“I didn’t want to fight,” I said.

“I don’t know why you’re the one that got suspended,” my mother said as she smiled.

“What should have I have done though?” I said, still frustrated as I clenched my fist.

“Maybe if you can focus on one thing at a time you wouldn’t get in trouble so much,” Amy said with a smirk.

“Just relax, my little man,” my mother said, bending down to my eye-level. “You did just fine. Can you please get some change for us while me and Amy find some good machines to use?” She hands me some bills, pats me on the head, and sends me towards the machines.

I can remember the anger vanishing as my mother walked away with my sister and a bag of clothes bigger than her.

We went to the laundromat right after my mother picked me up from the Dean’s office.

My emotions were everywhere, yet my mother remained calm and steady.

From the moment she woke up, to the moment she laid back in bed she remained the same.

As I returned with the change, our machines start their turn of loud commotion, my mother sits my sister down with the coloring book and said to me, “This isn’t the first time is it and don’t lie to me.”

“No, but this is the first time it turned into a fight. I got distracted and he punched me!”

I remember thinking of how I wanted to hit him harder than I did after I got sucker punched. Maybe then suspension would have been worth it.

“Well, I can’t send you back to be fighting so we have to figure this out before we leave the laundromat.”

I remember how confused I was in that moment, the emotions bubbling as my heart roared over the sounds of damp clothes rotating from different corners of the bright laundromat.

“But I tried everything, I told teachers and they told me to ignore him, I asked him to stop, I gave up my lunches, what haven’t I tried?” I said as my tone changed to a frustrated yell.

I looked at my mother calm and collected.

“Was it really worth your attention?” she said calmly.

“I don’t know, most likely not,” I tell her as my nerves calm again.

I pull out some classwork and finish the paperwork in silence.

I sit there and think about how I’m the only one who gets picked, I am the only one in class who can’t work done because someone is humming too loud.

Quite some time passes as the clothes is ready to be folded and bagged.

As we’re getting ready to leave, my mother looks at me and said, “I watched you complete your entire weeks’ worth of work while you were here, my mother pated my head again, do you think you can focus on what do next time?”

I remember thinking about how loud it was, yet I was able to concentrate and block out the rattling machines.

I looked to my mother and said, “Yup. I think I have one more option to try. I’m just going to try to remain calm and go back to work and if he doesn’t like that and I must defend myself I know I have a cool mom to pick me up.”

She smiles at me and hands me a coin for the toy machine.

From that day on she only picked me up from school early if I was sick.

I never really got in trouble with my father when I got home that day, in fact he was happy I fought back.

The bully left everyone alone once he saw he had no one left to entertain any more.

It was quite sad when the semester ended and he was the only one to fail.

I realized that day any time it gets too loud all I must do is stay calm like mom.

Justin Trinidad was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. He worked at sea most of his early life, from being a junior deckhand on sailboats to executing aircraft control on warships. Justin has sailed around half the world and back with books in his hands and many stories to tell. Now, he begins his literary journey.