* * *
Dante and I sat on the front steps and stared out into the darkness. Dante took off his shoes. “When we were joking around on the phone, you didn’t know what ‘laudable’ meant, did you?” I didn’t even have to look at his face to know he was wearing that I’m smarter than you are look.
I decided to ignore that tone that I was becoming familiar with. “No, I don’t think I’d ever heard that word. Didn’t have a clue. But now I’ve added a new word to my lexicon.”
“Lexicon?”
“Lexicon,” I repeated. “Laudable. It means worthy of praise. From the Latin ‘laude.’ To praise.”
“Well, look at you, Aristotle Mendoza.”
“Yeah, Look at me.”
“You’ll be talking like a dictionary in no time.”
“No fucking way,” I said. “No fucking way.”
* * *
Dante walked me to my truck. “I’m kissing you right now.”
“I’m kissing you back,” I said—then drove away.
Thirty-One
Dear Dante,
All I can think of is you. All I can think of is what it will feel like sleeping next to you. Both of us naked. What you will feel like as I kiss you and kiss you and kiss you and kiss you. And I’m so scared. I don’t know why I’m so scared. I’ve never been so excited or so happy or so scared.
Are you scared too, Dante?
Please tell me that you’re scared.
Thirty-Two
I DIDN’T SLEEP ALL NIGHT. I couldn’t. Dante. Dante. Dante.
When the dawn was breaking, I went out for a run. I could taste the salt of my own sweat as it ran down my face, and I thought about my own body. Maybe my body was like a country and if I was going to be a cartographer, the first thing I was going to have to do was map out my own body. And map out Dante’s while I was at it.
When I was in the shower, I whispered his name. Dante.
Dante, Dante, Dante. He was like a heart that was beating in every pore of my body. His heart was beating in my heart. His heart was beating in my head. His heart was beating in my stomach. His heart was beating in my legs. His heart was beating in my arms, my hands, my fingers. His heart was beating in my tongue, my lips. No wonder I was trembling. Trembling, trembling, trembling.
Thirty-Three
MY DAD’S TRUCK WAS ALL packed with all our camping gear. Dad wasn’t about to let me take my own truck. We’d had a discussion when I’d gotten back from dinner at the Quintanas’ house. “That thing’s fine for driving around town, but you need something reliable.”
“You’re saying my truck’s not reliable, Dad?”
“You’re looking at me as if I just insulted you.”
“Maybe you have.”
“Don’t overinvest your identity in that truck,” my mother said.
“You sound like you’ve been hanging out with Mrs. Quintana.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
Me and Dante, neither one of us would ever succeed in out- stubborning our mothers.
* * *
Mom handed me a paper bag filled with burritos she’d made while I’d been out running. I looked in the bag and stared at the burritos wrapped in foil. “What kind?
“Huevos con chorizo y papas.”
I couldn’t help but smile. She knew they were my favorite. “Greatest mom ever,” I said. She combed my hair with her fingers. “You and Dante be careful. Come back to me safe.”
I nodded. “I promise, Mom, I’ll be careful.”
She kissed me—and made the sign of the cross on my forehead. “And have fun.”
My dad handed me the keys to his truck. “Don’t wreck my truck while I’m gone,” I told him.
“Wise guy.” He handed me some money.
“I have money, Dad.”
“Take it.”
I nodded. My father was giving me something. And it wasn’t money he was giving me. It was a piece of himself.
They waved at me from the porch as I started up the truck. Legs was looking at me as if I’d betrayed her by not taking her with me on the camping trip. Yeah, well, she didn’t look all that miserable as she sat between my parents. I mean, Dad loved that dog almost as much as I did.
I waved back at my parents.
They seemed so alive, my mom and dad. They seemed alive because they were alive, alive in a way that most people weren’t.
* * *
Dante and his parents were sitting on the front porch as I drove up in front of his house. As soon as I pulled up, Dante bounded down the steps, backpack and all. His parents waved at me. “If you run into any trouble, just get to a phone and call us collect.”
“I promise,” I yelled back.
I noticed Mr. Quintana was hugging Mrs. Quintana and kissing her on the cheek. He was whispering something to her.
As Dante climbed into the truck, he yelled back to his parents, “I love you.”
I liked that Dante’s parents acted like they had just gotten married. There was something about them that made me think they would be forever young. Dante was like them. He, too, would be young forever. And me? I already acted like an old man.
I turned on the ignition, and I was smiling or grinning, I don’t know which. Dante slipped off his tennis shoes, and he said, “I’ve been writing a poem for you. I haven’t finished it yet—but I have the ending. ‘You’re every street I’ve ever walked. You’re the tree outside my window, you’re a sparrow as he flies. You’re the book that I am reading. You’re every poem I’ve ever loved.’ ”
I felt as though I were the center of the universe. Only Dante could make me feel like that. But I knew better—I would never be the center of the universe.
Thirty-Four
ONCE WE GOT ON THE road, I pointed at the bag on the seat. “There’s some burritos in the bag. My mom made them.”
“Your mom’s awesome.” He handed me a burrito and took one for himself. He pulled off the foil and grabbed a napkin from the bag. He took a bite and then another. “These are fucking brilliant.”
“Yeah, they are,” I said. “My mom made the tortillas last night.”
“Homemade tortillas? Wow. Will she teach my mom?”
“What if she doesn’t want to learn?”
“Why wouldn’t she want to learn?”
“Because they’re work. And once people get wind of the fact that you know how to make them, you’re screwed. My sisters, they said, ‘Oh, hell no.’ They buy them.”
Dante smiled. “Well, maybe your mom will teach me how to make them.”
“Sounds great to me. You can make as many tortillas for me as you want.”
“Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. You think I’m going to be making tortillas for you all the time? Oh, hell no. You can buy yours at the store.”
“You probably wouldn’t be very good at making tortillas, anyway.”
“Why do you say that?”