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“¡NIÑOS, VALI, ERNESTO!” Mami shouted from the kitchen, pulling me out of my dream as I sobbed for Papi all over again. This was why I didn’t want to even try to sleep, especially without Mami lying next to me. It was too easy to get sucked into any of those brutal memories. “¡Vengan! ¡Rápido!”
Ernie stumbled out of the closet Mami had repurposed as a little bedroom for him. It was tight quarters, but at least it was his own. Which was a blessing, even if it stank of old socks in there.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. His long eyelashes blinking fast as he tried to figure out why I was in tears. He was hugging Señor Cebra—the purple-and-white-striped stuffed zebra that he’d been sleeping with since he was born. I sometimes forgot my little brother was only eight years old. It was easy to do, since he had Papi’s genes and was already up to my chin. Ernesto Palmero, Mami called him, because he towered like a palm tree.
“Nothing. It’s okay,” I told him.
It wasn’t okay. Nothing about this world was okay.
But maybe I was just too used to living a lie to say anything else.
CHAPTER 3
Ángel de Dios, mi querido Guardián, me presento hoy ante ti para agradecerte y pedirte que siempre estés a mi lado, para que guies, ilumines y gobiernes mi vida.
It was just a few minutes past dawn now. Mami’s ajiaco was still simmering on the stove, and I was still smoldering with questions, but we had to keep going. Somehow, it was a weekday and I could hear people in our apartment building turning off alarms and opening doors, and we had to do that too, to keep up with the charade of our lives here.
Ernie and I stood next to Mami as she offered a morning prayer in front of her altar. It wasn’t so much an altar as a wooden shelf that she’d nailed to the wall above our kitchen table. On it were all the people Mami treasured most— a yellowing photograph of my abuela and abuelo, some ridiculously awkward school pics of me and Ernie, a palm-sized portrait of la Virgen.
My favorite picture was in a smaller oval frame—the one tucked behind an ivory crucifix. It was of me and Papi at the beach, just after we’d arrived in California. Papi loved going to the ocean, howling into the wind. The photo was a little blurred, but I could still make out his fingernails, wide and flat like weathered seashells. His shaggy beard was just giving way to a hint of a smile, and his T-shirt clung to his chest with sweat. I looked like I couldn’t have been more than five at the time, decked out in my blue-and-white polka-dotted bathing suit. Papi was holding me up on his shoulder like a trophy. But really, he was the prize.
Today as I stared at that picture, everything in me shook. Mami’s votive flames looked too close to Papi’s beard, and la Virgen wasn’t even watching over him.
“What if San Diego is still under attack? Or all of California?” I whispered. Mami ignored me, continuing with her prayers. But maybe I did have a sense of defiance in me after all. Or just a searing, unstoppable pain from having my papi stolen from me and murdered all those years ago. “They could deport Tía Luna,” I said louder. “They could come here next.”
“Shhh. Tenemos que tener fe,” Mami said.
Te imploro desde el fondo de mi corazón que por favor protejas a nuestra querida Tía Luna. En tu dulce nombre, Amen.
As she finished her prayers, she dug her worn knuckles into the tops of my shoulders, trying to knead out all my knotted worries. I had to squirm away from her, though. I felt like if she pressed too hard, she would unleash a storm of tears and terror that I’d never be able to overcome.
“It is okay,” she told us. “We eat breakfast.”
She started cooking a pan of huevos pericos. I had to admit, it did smell comforting. And I knew we were very lucky to have eggs, tomatoes, onions and the occasional hunk of cheese from McAuley’s farm, especially when there was no fresh produce or dairy for sale around here. The three of us sat down and tore into our food. It was like we were filling up all those holes and unanswerable questions with this meal. As Mami chewed, I saw the muscles in her cheeks clenching and releasing; her eyes focused only on her food. I didn’t know how she kept it all together. How she fed and clothed us while our world was being demolished. I couldn’t decide whether this was resilience, or foolishness.
“Okay, al colegio!” Mami said as she swallowed a last bite of egg. She blew out her candles, scooted back from the table, and watched us eat a few more forkfuls before giving us our orders for the day.
“Dishes dried before you leave. Make sure the door is locked. Stand up straight, respect your teachers.” As she spoke, she planted kisses on the top of both our heads and then pulled three different bags over her shoulders. They were filled with her uniform, her lunch, her hairbrush, and probably another crucifix.
“You’re going to work?” I asked, totally confused.
“Sí, and you are going to school,” Mami instructed. “We’re safe. We going to be okay. Oh! And Ernesto, after school, you go to fútbol and wait until Vali comes to pick you up, yes?”
“Soccer, Mami,” he corrected her.
“Fútbol,” she insisted. “¡Adiós! Y tranquilos que todo va estar bien.”
I think she really believed that too. She enunciated everything in her imperfect English, her voice clear and firm so I could hear her resolve.
“Love you, Mami!” Ernie called after her, even though she was already out the door. Then he turned to me and said, “The bathroom’s mine.”
With water rations, every drop counted. The person who took the first shower got the longest shower. On any other day I would have fought my little brother for those extra drops, but again, this wasn’t any other day. I was still sitting at the table, stunned by Mami’s blind optimism.
“Go for it,” I told him.
Though after waiting ten minutes for Ernie to finish up in the bathroom, my bladder and I regretted that decision. Through a crack in the bathroom door frame, I could see my little brother posing in front of the mirror, staring at his reflection.
“Hey!” he yelped as I pushed open the door. “A little privacy?”
I had to glue my lips together so I didn’t bust out laughing. He was trying to tame his crazy hair with a wet comb, some gel, and what looked like a squirt of toothpaste. Ernie definitely had Papi’s mane—dark, wild, and unmanageable. It now had a minty sheen to it too, with some of his curls shellacked down, but most of the back still sticking up in tufts.
“Wow. Someone special you want to take to snack time?” I teased. As if anyone in his second-grade classroom would notice.
“Whatever,” Ernie shot back. “Your face looks like snack time.” Which didn’t make sense at all. But on this day after, or day before, or whatever we were now calling this darkness disguised as a school day morning, I was grateful for my little brother getting me to laugh.