Boys in Gilded Cages Read Online Free Page A

unsafe standing on the gutters for more than a few
seconds. If she had wings she’d fly the fuck out. The sky matched
the color of the once-copper steeple, and her mother wondered
aloud, as she exited the SUV, what that meant for the weather.
    Marcia shoves her bulky glasses up towards
her eyebrows and looks up, pretending to care. “Looks cold,” She
says. Both of her parents, in unison, shoot her an impatient
glance.
    Her mother gently shoves the small of her
back to guide her toward the sanctuary door. Janessa and Vanessa,
two skinny white bitches from school who hate Marcia, smile at her
as she pretends not to notice.
    “ Marcia,” her mother
snapped. “Those girls are smiling at you. Say hi or something. Be
polite.”
    She finally makes dreadful eye contact with
the two cunts and creaks out a grin. They look at her with
ridicule, a dare to engage them. They’re making fun of her and all
of them know it. Marcia, a chubby, and up until this point, home
schooled Cuban dork with a thick accent. They, Goddesses with big
tits and loose hips that gleefully sink ships.
    “ Hello.”
    “ Hi Marcia,” Janessa let
out in a chuckle. “Hello, Mrs. Cruz.”
    “ Hello, young lady.” Her
mother’s accent was thicker than Marcia’s. It embarrassed her
deeply.
    “ Hello, Mr. Cruz,” Marissa
said seductively. My father glared at her coldly. “Hello, Misses,”
he said firmly, as they marched into the sanctuary. Marcia is
pretty sure she heard Marissa say something about her father’s cock
being big because he’s Cuban and the two cunt twins bursting into
laughter, but she figured it was probably just her being paranoid.
Marcia’s father seemed to have heard something similarly
inappropriate because he looked at her reflexively.
    “ Do you know those girls?”
Her mother asked.
    “ Not really,” Marcia said
flatly.
    Her father said nothing.
    The sanctuary walls were covered with
particle board from the seventies and the blue-green shag carpet
was something her brother Juan would adore as ‘kitschy and campy’.
There were a lot of kids running around, a few years younger than
Marcia, and their dads were in overalls and some in sweat pants,
most of the moms had frosted hair and be-jeweled sweaters. Juan
would have a field day.
    The woman with the frostiest hair of all
stood up and stuck her hand halfway up, and all of the kids entered
a trance and sat down and shut up. She smiled.
    As she lectured and preached, Marcia kept
the corner of her eyes on her parents, seated to her left and
right. She wanted to get a feel of what they thought of this place,
and more importantly, a female preacher. From what I understood
about the Baptist faith, female preachers were discouraged, and
from what I knew about Catholicism, female priests didn’t
exist.
    Vanessa and Janessa were seated four empty
pews behind her, whispering and giggling. Marcia automatically
imagined that she was the object of their ridicule, though she
couldn’t hear what they were saying. Marcia kept waiting for
Reverend Queen Frostyhair to conspicuously clear her throat to get
them to shut up, but she ignored them.
    On the drive back, Marcia kept waiting for
some conversation between her parents that indicated whether this
was the church for them, but they were silent. The only time anyone
said anything was when Marcia stuck her head out the window.
“Marcia, the heat is on!” She rolled up the window, and Marcia
heard her father lock it from the driver’s seat.
    That night, she went to dreamless sleep and
the alarm clock failed to wake her.
    The SUV smelled of the casserole Marcia’s
mother brought to church that night and it occurred to her that she
hadn’t eaten breakfast, for which she imagined would her growling
stomach would humiliate her during her second period class.
    The sun was out in full force, and the muggy
atmosphere made Marcia sweat her makeup off. Her mother, ahead of
her on our way to the car, turned around and looked at her like