In the three months before school starts, I could grow about half as much. Talk about insane. Nobody would ever call me Bitchslap or mess with me ever again.
For a second I think steroids, but then I play his video. He’s in a private gym, talking directly to the camera. As if reading my doubtful mind, he mentions he’s completely steroid-free.
“I got these results by giving my workout one hundred and ten percent. A lot of you have been asking for the exact diet and workouts I did to prepare for my new role. Click below to check it out.”
It’s a calendar PDF, the days marked with a numbered workout. A bunch of exercises I’ve never heard of, including the sets and repetitions, fill several pages. At the very end is a list of muscle-building foods to eat.
The information I need to make this happen is right here! I’m going to join a gym and transform this body!
Dad can’t say no. Why would he?
I search for more transformations. Teen bodybuilders get my attention, especially the results they share after three months. Eye-popping, jaw-dropping results.
Kids at school take way longer to put on size. What’s up with that? They must not be training the right way, like Van Nelson does in the video. They damn sure aren’t eating lean meats, egg whites, oatmeal, and green veggies. They wolf down pizza, nuggets, and vending machine junk like everybody else.
That’s not me anymore. My protein-packed diet will be on point and I’m going beast-mode in the gym, giving each set my all.
I get up and take off my shirt for my before photo. Looking in the mirror, my first thought is that I hate my pathetic body.
That’s okay, I remind myself. I’m finally doing something about it.
I snap away, taking pics from various angles, hitting the same poses as the other guys online.
Then I stare myself down one last time. Make a pact with myself.
You’re really going to do this, David. For the next three months you’ll eat clean and be all about your goal. You’ll become so unrecognizable that people won’t even believe you were that scrawny kid in the slap video.
This summer you will become the new David Espinoza.
5
Eighty-six days until school begins
MY MOM started a Saturday breakfast ritual that we’ve kept up after her death. During the week our morning routines were, and are, too hurried for us to sit down to eat.
On weekdays I do Gaby’s hair and serve her cornflakes—always pouring the milk because she’s a spiller and I don’t have time to clean up. Dad handles Gaby’s school stuff. Makes sure she has her homework, packed lunch, and everything else in her My Little Pony backpack.
On weekends we have time to ease into the day.
While Dad takes a shower, Gaby and I are making French toast. After she dips both sides of the stale bread slices into the egg and milk mixture, I drop them to sizzle in the big pan. The cinnamon and vanilla, the sweet smell of my favorite breakfast, is really torturing me.
My first muscle meal ever is in the microwave. Eight raw egg whites in a ceramic bowl and a large mug filled with half a cup of oats with one cup of water. According to Van Nelson, they can be cooked all together that way.
Lucky for me we happened to have those ingredients at home already. I gotta buy more, including stuff our kitchen has never seen: lean steak and skinless chicken breast. Vegetables like kale and broccoli. Carbs like brown rice and quinoa.
The diet plan calls for eating double. Normal portion sizes, six meals per day instead of three, to feed the muscle. Stuffing my face all day, plus the gym membership, is definitely going to put a dent in my savings.
I flip the French toast and press start on the microwave for my own breakfast.
Dad comes in showered and ready for work, T-shirt and cargo jeans stained with grease streaks and splotches. “Did you join a new weird religion?”
Gaby looks at me and cracks up.
Since I can’t afford face surgery or walk around in a mask, I did the next best thing. Got rid of my hair with Dad’s mustache trimmer.
“Somebody recognized me this morning,” I tell him. “You were wrong about it not being a big deal.”
As always, he made me mow the lawn early, in full view of passing traffic. Jaime down the street, riding shotgun in his mom’s car, yelled “Bitchslap!” loud enough to hear over the mower. His mom smacked him upside the head for cursing.
“I think he sort of looks like a baby bird,” Gaby says, and cracks up again. “Big head and tiny body.”
“Good one,” I tell her, glad she’s not pressing for details about why I wanna change my look.
She can’t find out about the video. I need at least one person whose image of me is not tainted by that slap.
I set down their plates and go back to get my meal before joining them.
“What is that?” Dad zeroes in on the white, gelatinous disk on my plate. It sort of looks like shiny plastic and is perfectly round. Only the steam rising from it makes you think it might be food.
I explain, and Dad sets down the syrup he was pouring to say, “Let me get this right. You used eight eggs for your breakfast and threw out the yolks?”
“I’ve read that this is the perfect meal before a workout.”
By “workout” he’s no doubt thinking about my weekly run with Karina—another Saturday-morning ritual for me. But this morning when she called I reminded her I’m not ready to be that exposed in public unless it’s necessary.
“I’ll buy more eggs with my own money,” I add, so Dad doesn’t lose his mind.
He doesn’t believe in throwing food away. Gaby can get away with leaving a few bites because Dad finishes it for her.
“This kid, throwing out food.” He shakes his head, still incredulous. “Your own money, Flaco.”
I wonder how many weeks until I outgrow that nickname.
I slice banana onto my oatmeal, the only sweetness I’m allowed. Banana is excellent for my glucose reserves, which need to be full for an effective workout, according to what I read last night. I spoon some into my mouth. It’s not horrible.
“I wanna join a gym today.”
Dad chews and considers me with interest. Then, instead of saying no right away, he takes another bite of food.
Weird.
In this house, new ideas are met with resistance or at least a barrage of questions.
He swallows that second bite before saying, “If you want to, that’s fine. It’s summer and you have extra time.”
What just happened? That was way too easy. As if he’s been waiting for my announcement. Maybe he’s wanted me to bulk up and stop being flaco.
Dad lifts another forkful to his mouth, syrup dripping from the bite of French toast.
I ask, “Can Gaby go with you to work today?”
“Of course. During the week you can go early and get back by seven forty-five, before I go to work. Or go when I get back from work.”
My plan this summer was to drop Gaby off at the auto shop whenever I wanted to hang out with Miguel or Karina, which would be most of the summer. Now I’ll be hanging out with Gaby more than anybody else.
The last few summers, Mely took care of Gaby, along with her own two kids. She was Mom’s best friend, a stay-at-home mom and seamstress who lived on the other side of our backyard fence. Gaby played with her neighbor buddies all day and it didn’t cost us a thing.