Have a Blessed Day, Sweetheart

“I’m there, God. It’s me, Iris,” I whisper, standing in front of the bedroom mirror like I’m practicing something I don’t fully understand yet.

My reflection looks back at me like it knows more than it’s telling.

“Iris! If you don’t get your butt downstairs right now, that bus is gonna leave without you!” Grandma’s voice slices through the house from the bottom of the stairs.

“I’m coming!” I shout, already grabbing my backpack.

I take the stairs two at a time, nearly slipping on the last one. Grandma is standing in the kitchen doorway, hands on her hips. There’s flour on her apron and a tired kind of love in her eyes that she tries to hide behind her scolding.

“You move like a hurricane,” she mutters, pressing my lunch bag into my hands.

I lean in and kiss her cheek. “I’ll be good.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” she says, but she’s smiling.

Then I’m out the door.

The screen door slams behind me so hard it rattles the frame.

The bus is already rolling forward when I get there.

“Move it, kid!” the driver yells. “I don’t run a taxi service!”

“Sorry, Donny!” I call back, jogging up the steps just in time.

Inside, the air smells like old plastic seats and someone’s cheap perfume.

Lorence is already there.

He always is.

He leans into the aisle as I pass. “Hey, freak.”

I don’t look at him. If I don’t look at him, he doesn’t exist. That’s my rule.

“Don’t start,” Casey says quickly, patting the seat beside her. “I saved you a spot.”

Casey is my best friend. She looks like she stepped out of a magazine someone rich would read. Pink ribbon in her hair. Clean white socks. Like life doesn’t stick to her the way it sticks to other people.

“You dressed up?” I ask, dropping into the seat.

She tilts her head. “It’s picture day.”

My stomach drops so fast it feels like it disappears.

I forgot.

Grandma said this year mattered. Sixth grade. First year of middle school. The year I was supposed to look “right” in a picture she’d frame and put on the wall like proof that everything was okay in our lives.

“Oh no,” I whisper.

Casey laughs. “You’re dead.”

“I’m so dead,” I whisper back.

At school, everything feels louder than usual. Locker doors slamming. Shoes squeaking. Voices bouncing off walls like they don’t belong to anyone.

Before class starts, I ask the secretary if I can call Grandma.

She hands me the phone like it’s fragile.

My fingers shake a little as I dial.

Grandma picks up on the second ring.

“What now?” she says immediately.

“Grandma… I forgot picture money.”

Silence.

Then a long sigh.

“I was about to leave for bingo,” she says.

“I know,” I say quickly. “I’m sorry.”

There’s a pause again. I can hear her breathing on the other end. Slow. Heavy. Like she’s deciding whether to be mad or just tired.

“You and your mama are the same,” she says finally, and her voice changes a little when she says mama, like it hurts her tongue.

I don’t answer.

“I’ll drop it off,” she says. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Okay.”

Another pause.

“You look pretty this morning,” she adds, softer now. “Smile big, Iris. I want to see those teeth in that picture.”

“Yes, Grandma.”

She hesitates.

“I got a frame picked out,” she says, like that settles something inside her.

Then she hangs up.

I hand the phone back.

“She’s bringing it,” I tell the secretary.

“That’s good,” she says gently. “You look nice today.”

I smile automatically, like I’ve practiced it.

But I don’t feel nice.

I feel like I forgot something important about myself and I can’t remember what it is.

Lunch comes fast.

Casey and I run outside like we always do, across the cafeteria doors, past the noise, past the rules, into the open air behind the school.

The grass is dry and patchy. The basketball court is cracked in long white lines like old scars.

“This is the best part of the day,” Casey says, unwrapping her sandwich.

“For sure,” I agree.

I take a bite of peanut butter and jelly. It sticks to the roof of my mouth.

Then I hear it.

A sharp sound. Like something falling wrong.

We both freeze.

“What was that?” Casey asks.

I point without thinking.

The PE shed.

Something is moving on the roof.

Not big. Not loud anymore. Just… desperate.

“Is that a bird?” I say.

Casey is already standing. “It’s hurt.”

“We should get a teacher,” I say automatically.

But she’s already walking.

So I follow.

There’s an old ladder leaning against the shed like it’s been waiting there for something like this.

Casey grabs it immediately.

“I’m going up,” she says.

“Be careful,” I say.

“I always am.”

She climbs.

Slow. Careful.

Then she stops.

“Oh my God,” she whispers. “It’s a baby eagle.”

My breath catches.

It’s small. Too small. Its wing hangs wrong, like it forgot how to be a wing.

“It’s okay,” Casey says softly. “We’re gonna help you.”

“Don’t touch it yet,” I call up. “You don’t know what’s wrong with it.”

“I know enough,” she says.

And then—

“WHAT are you doing back here?”

Lorence.

Of course.

He walks around the corner like he owns the place.

“Get down,” he says to Casey.

“No,” she says.

“I said get down.”

“I’m helping it,” she says, voice shaking now.

I step closer to the ladder.

“I’m holding it,” I tell Casey. “Go slow.”

That’s when he shoves me.

Hard.

The world flips.

I hit the ground and taste dirt.

Before I can get up, he’s already pushing past me.

Casey comes down quickly now, scared.

“Leave it alone,” she says.

He laughs. “You think you’re some kind of hero?”

He climbs.

Fast.

Too fast.

“Iris, stop him!” Casey yells.

I grab his leg.

He kicks me off like I’m nothing.

“You’re disgusting,” he says without even looking at me. “Both of you.”

Then he looks down at me.

And smiles.

“You really think you can be a girl?” he says. “Just because you say it?”

Something inside me goes very still.

“I am a girl,” I say.

He laughs like that’s the funniest thing in the world.

Then he swings.

The office smells like paper and sanitizer.

Everything feels far away, like I’m watching someone else’s life through thick glass.

“Sweetheart,” Ms. Henley says, pressing a cold cloth to my cheek. “You shouldn’t have been back there.”

I blink.

“It wasn’t just me,” I say. “He hurt Casey too.”

She nods slowly.

“I know. We’re handling it.”

“Is the bird okay?” I ask.

She pauses like she wasn’t expecting that question.

Then she smiles a little.

“They called wildlife rescue,” she says. “It’ll be okay.”

Something in my chest loosens.

“Good,” I whisper.

Four weeks later, I don’t open the envelope on the bus.

I don’t open it in class.

I don’t even open it walking home.

I hold it like it might disappear if I look too soon.

“Grandma!” I call as soon as I get inside.

She’s in the kitchen again. Always in the kitchen. Always making something out of flour and time.

“Lord, child, what now?”

“I got them.”

She turns slowly.

Her hands are already wiping on her apron before she even moves.

We sit at the table.

The silence is heavy.

“Okay,” she says. “Let me see.”

I turn it around.

For a second, she doesn’t speak.

Then she gasps softly.

“Oh, Iris…”

My stomach tightens.

“I look weird,” I say quickly.

“You look real,” she says.

That’s when I notice it too.

The bruise is still there. Faded now, but visible. A shadow on my cheek.

I wait for her to be upset.

Instead, she reaches across the table and takes my hand.

“You see this?” she says, tapping the picture.

I nod.

“This is the kind of picture people don’t forget,” she says. “Because it tells the truth.”

“I didn’t smile right,” I say.

She laughs through her nose.

“You smiled exactly right.”

I don’t understand that.

But I feel it anyway.

Something steady.

Something like pride.

That night, I lie in bed again.

The house is quiet.

Even Grandma’s footsteps have softened into sleep.

“I’m there, God,” I whisper.

I don’t say my name this time. I don’t need to.

“I think I’m figuring it out,” I say.

I think about Casey holding the ladder.

About the eagle breathing again.

About the moment I didn’t step back.

“I think I’m okay,” I say quietly.

Outside, the night doesn’t answer.

But it doesn’t feel empty either.

And for the first time, I believe that might be enough.