Snap-Shots

Dad told me to turn the sound off the camera, but I pretended I didn't hear him. I like the noise it makes when I take a picture—snap snap! snap snap! It's like an alligator chomping on stuff. I aim the camera at another soldier and imagine my alligator biting his head off. SNAP!

The man frowns at me and says something loud in Chinese. Okay, it's not Chinese, Dad said, it's something else and I was gonna listen, but he said lots of stuff on the plane and I was really close to beating the final boss in my game so I kinda missed a lot of it. But that level was really really hard and I think it doesn't matter if I know what it's called 'cause it's not like I'm gonna talk to anybody! And we're going to three different places and I forget where we are today and Dad made me wear a dress. I'm almost ten and he's making me wear a stupid dress and pigtails, that's called child abuse.

So it's not my fault if I don't know what he's saying. But I do put the camera away in my backpack—Dad can make me wear a dress, but I'm not gonna carry a stupid purse—and smile my best little girl face at him. “Je suis désolée, monsieur!” I say as sweetly as I can without wanting to throw up. “Votre uniforme est très joli! Êtes-vous un général?” French isn't the best choice but it's way better than English. Dad told me to never use English if I can help it, and even then I'm s'posed to talk Canadian.

Plus my Russian's really bad, so I can't do that and Dad says that I sound like a drug dealer in Spanish, which isn't very nice and my step-mom hits him when he says it but I did pick it up when we were in Colombia so he's prob'ly right. But he sounds like he learned it in school so ja!

The guy's still looking pretty mad, so I sniffle. “J'ai perdu ma maman et je ne peux pas la trouver. M'aiderez-vous?” On the last bit, I start crying—really loud, with lots of tears and snot and everything—until I see the first woman with the same hair color as me and grab onto her. “Maman! Maman! Je veux rentrer à la maison!”

I keep bawling until the soldier walks away then run out of there before the woman can ask me any questions. Dad's waiting around the corner in our rental car and I jump in. “How'd it go?” he asks, driving off.

“Twelve photos,” I say, handing over the SD card. “And 600 bucks, please!”

“Mercenary!” my dad laughs, throwing me the money.

I stick my tongue out at him while I count my cash. “Sucker!”

Dad can spy just 'cause he loves our country if he wants, but I want a new laptop.