I was born to world-famous parents—my father a notorious rapper and my mother a favorite Pedro Almodovar star. My parents can do almost anything they want. Swim with whales. Buy a town. Name a kid Universe. On talk shows they say their two halves have made a whole. On TikTok they say I am their “Universe.”
I want to believe them, but why have I been left behind in a restaurant, a gym, backstage, and at a graveyard when my great grandmother was buried on a drizzly summer day. It’s because even their bodyguards are famous, they sign stuff, pose for photographs, forget about me. A printed note used to be pinned to my collar or stuffed in my pocket, until at three I memorized my home address and our very private phone numbers. They considered a microchip, but I suspect someone warned them of child abuse.
School is a chore. Everyone wants my parents’ autographs and the teacher keeps my permission slips in an envelope labeled “Universe: Parents.” The school discourages their attendance at Parent-Teacher conferences because of traffic jams and photographers shredding wall displays of art projects, yelling, “Which ones are by Universe?” Another problem—everyone wants to be my friend, so I don’t have friends, I have followers. I give them new names: Pickle, Sink, Boom, Pressure Cooker, Mars, Blister, Lift-Off, Couch. Teachers complained which got me called into the principal’s office. No, no, he did not want a conference with my parents. After school we play Minecraft. It is almost an equalizer.
I follow kids with odd names on TikTok, and Instagram. I might form a club. The Zappa kids, now grown up—Moon Unit, Dweezil and Diva Thin Muffin—could be Honorary Members. Other celebrity kids Founding Members: Cosmo, Pilot Inspecktor, Gravity, Bear Blaze, Sparrow James Midnight, Lyra Antartica, and X Æ A-12—Elon Musk’s son. I’m only nine so I’ll have to wait to form an NP 501-C 7. Can you tell that I’ve come to like my name? Can you tell I’m smart, maybe a genius?
When dad’s on tour and mom’s on set in some remote village, Rolando-D drives me to see Ms. Pence. We pretend it is an art lesson though I don’t draw houses with swimming pools, security cameras and automatic gates. I’m a Jr. NASA scout with autographs from the Attemis astronauts who flew behind the moon, so I draw solar systems. Circles are easy and so are oblong circles for a planets’ paths. I use black a lot. I can see Ms. Pence thinking “too much black.” She doesn’t understand.
Today, is Take Your Child to Work Day. My friends are all missing. I’m missing my parents who are at work elsewhere busy being famous. So, this time I draw an alien—lightbulb head, two huge, slanted eyes, bulbous fingers. “Tell me about this figure,” Ms. Pence says. I can tell she is pleased that she recognizes the alien. So, I tell her the aliens know I am one of them. I say someday they will come for me. I draw a spaceship with legs and tiny windows. I tell her it might be soon. I sign my drawing with a big “Universe” so she’ll put it in the right file. Like a clue.
