It was probably only a matter of seconds, but it felt like a full minute passed, maybe more, before Garrett finally let me go, sending me stumbling back onto my ass.
“That’s what I thought,” he said. “Fucking none of your business.”
He kicked a spray of pebbles in my direction, then turned around and looked at Maribel, who was still standing basically in the same place she’d been the whole time. “I’m not done with you,” he called to her.
He picked up his skateboard and started walking out toward the road, through the gravel.
I brushed myself off and walked over to Maribel. “Are you okay?” I asked.
She nodded.
“Don’t pay attention to him,” I said. “He’s a jerk.”
And then we were just standing there, and the rain was still drizzling like static, and I didn’t know what to do next.
“Are you going home now?” I finally asked after a traffic jam of silence.
“I’m waiting for my mom.”
I looked up and down the length of the building, but besides Maribel and me, no one was around. “Where is she?” I asked.
“Who?”
“Your mom.”
“She meets me at the bus.”
“Do you think she’s in your apartment?”
Maribel shook her head. “I’m meeting her here.”
What was I supposed to do? I didn’t really want to stand out in the rain with her for who knew how long. Maybe Micho or Benny would walk out and one of them could keep her company. After another minute, though, it was still just her and me, so I said, “Well, let’s wait on the fire escape at least. It’s covered, so we can get out of the rain.”
As soon as we sat on the metal fire escape landing, Maribel slid her backpack off and pulled out a green notebook. She snapped the cap off a pen and started writing, hunched over the paper.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“My notebook.”
“You’re doing homework now?”
“I’m writing.”
“About what?”
She shrugged. “The doctors told me to write.”
“Like, stories?”
She didn’t answer.
“I just finished the new Percy Jackson book, The Titan’s Curse. Have you heard of it?”
Again, nothing. I couldn’t even tell if she was listening to me, but for some reason now I wanted her to. I wanted her to pay attention to me.
“I write sometimes,” I went on. “Like, I might write, ‘Note to self: Do not touch a habanero pepper, even if your best friend dares you to.’ ”
Unexpectedly, she smiled. “Habaneros are hot,” she said. It was the kind of smile that could wreck a person.
“No kidding,” I said. “I learned the hard way.”
I couldn’t see her eyes because of her sunglasses, but I had the feeling she was staring straight at me.
Then I heard a voice calling her name. Screaming it in panic.
“My mom,” she said. She dropped her notebook in her bag and the two of us grabbed our things and walked out to see Sra. Rivera darting across the parking lot like a wild animal.
“Mari!” she said when she laid eyes on us. Her hair was falling out of its ponytail and her face was flushed. She ran to Maribel and put her hands on Maribel’s cheeks, turning her head from side to side, examining her.
“She’s okay,” I said. “I saw her when she got off the bus. I was just talking to her for a little while.” I figured there was no reason to tell her about Garrett. I had taken care of it, hadn’t I? And she would only freak out if she knew. That’s how parents were.
“Maribel?” Sra. Rivera said, looking for confirmation of my story. “You’re okay?”
Maribel nodded, and even though Sra. Rivera looked skeptical, she took Maribel by the wrist, leading her up to their apartment while I stood there in the spitting rain and watched them go.
After that, something between Maribel and me changed. I felt this weird protectiveness over her, so on Sundays after church, instead of hiding away in my room like I used to, I made it a point to sit next to her on our brown couch, attempting to have quiet conversations with her and telling stupid jokes in an effort to make her smile again like I had that one time.
One Sunday, while our parents debated the meaning of Father Finnegan’s homily that morning, the doorbell rang. When my mom got up to answer it, Quisqueya was standing at the door with a coffee cake in her hands. Ever since the Riveras had moved in, my mom hadn’t shown as much interest in Quisqueya as she used to, preferring instead to spend her time with Sra. Rivera. I didn’t blame her. I’d never understood why my mom hung out with Quisqueya at all, except that my mom craved friends—any friends—as a way to keep her from feeling lonely here.
“Oh,” Quisqueya said, peeking inside, “I didn’t know you had company.”
“Did you tell me you were coming over?” my mom asked.
“No, but … Well, there was a time when I didn’t have to make plans to see you.”
“I didn’t know if I’d forgotten.”
“I see.”
“Do you want to come in?”
Quisqueya peered into our living room. Sra. Rivera waved.
“No,” Quisqueya said.
“Maybe tomorrow morning?” my mom offered. “I’ll be here if you want to stop by.”
Quisqueya shrank a little and twisted her lips. “Maybe,” she said.
My mom was still standing with one hand on the doorknob. When neither Quisqueya nor my mom said anything else, my dad yelled, “Have a good day, Quisqueya!”
“Yes. Well,” she said and walked away. I watched her pass by our front window on her way back to her apartment.
My mom closed the door and said to my dad, “You’re so bad.”
My dad said, “You’re lucky I didn’t ask her to leave the coffee cake!”
The conversation turned to politics after that, which was all anybody had been talking about lately. The elections had happened a few weeks earlier and everybody we knew had been pulling for Barack Obama. Since she’d become a citizen, my mom had voted in every election—local and federal. She never missed a single one. She would come home and say, “Well, I did my duty. May the best man win.” This year, she’d been the first in line at her polling place. She’d worn her American flag sweater, and I’d seen her praying before she walked out the door that morning. “A little extra insurance can’t hurt,” she’d explained, crossing herself. “En el nombre del Padre, y del Hijo, y del Espíritu Santo. Amén.” When she came home she said, “Well, I did my duty. May Obama win, because if it’s McCain, I will shoot myself.” And then she glued herself to the television all day long to watch the returns.
Even my dad, who, whenever politics came up, usually dismissed the entire topic with his patented line, “All politicians are equally corrupt,” showed an interest this year. A few times I even caught him watching the news segments about Obama in the evenings, after he got home from work.
It seemed like everyone in our building was excited. I’d seen José Mercado totter outside one day and plant an Obama/Biden sign in the grass bordering the parking lot, and Fito, who usually had a thing against signs (he’d taken down Benny’s Phillies banner at the start of last year’s baseball season), let it stand. Micho made sure that all of us who were documented were registered to vote, talking about how important it was that Obama, a black man who looked like no other U.S. president and who had family that came from different places, could possibly lead our country. It meant that we, who also resembled no other U.S. president and who also had family from faraway places, could one day rise up and do the same thing.
“I don’t think his ears are so big,” my mom said.
“His ears?” Sra. Rivera asked.
“He keeps saying they’re big, but I think he’s very handsome.”
“That’s why you voted for him?” my dad said. “Because you think he’s handsome?”
“Yes, Rafael. That’s why I vote for one politician over another. Because he’s handsome. Are you crazy?”
My dad glared at my mom for a second, then emphatically put his feet up on the coffee table, something that my mom hated. “We’ll see,” my dad said.
“We’ll see what?” Sr. Rivera asked.
“We’ll see what he does for us. I like him, okay? But I don’t know if he’s going to be who he said he would be. Politicians will say anything to get elected. For some reason with this guy, I believed what he said. I believed he believed what he said. But we’ll see. The first thing he needs to do is get the economy out of the sewer. No one comes to the diner anymore. No one has money to eat out.”
“And now there are pirates,” my mom said.
“Pirates?” Sra. Rivera asked, alarmed.
“From Africa,” my mom said. “Black pirates.”
“That’s awesome,” I said.
“They’re hijacking ships!” my mom said.
I pictured guys with beards and eye patches and peg legs. I still thought it was pretty awesome.
Sr. Rivera said, “But here? It’s safe, no?”
“It’s not as safe as it used to be,” my dad said.
“But it’s safe,” Sr. Rivera pressed, like he wanted to be reassured.
“Yes,” my dad said. “Compared to where any of us are from, it’s safe.”