Running
Page 11
“What did you do now? Give me the phone, Mariana. You can’t keep playing these games.”
The car stops completely, enough for him to look me in the eyes.
“Jesus. Is it that bad?”
“For me, or for the campaign? Like you care about anything else.”
“Just give me the phone, Mari.”
He’s not supposed to call me that. Only my family and close friends call me that, and Joe doesn’t even pronounce it right.
But nothing is really mine anymore.
I throw the phone at him. It lands by his foot next to the brake, and as soon as he bends down to get it, I jump out of the car and run.
sixteen
I’m completely winded by the time I get to school. Even though I got out of Joe’s car only half a block away, my heart’s pounding harder than it does in PE. I slow down, trying to look a little less desperate as I get to the main doors.
The best way to describe Grove High is that it looks as if it’s going through an identity crisis. The entrance is covered in red brick and surrounded by thin, tall palm trees that lean into one another like they’re telling secrets. The second story looks nothing like the first. It’s all cement walls and blue-tinted windows framed in gray metal, like someone built a new floor without caring if it matched the original.
I’ve been walking through these doors without pause all year. Now I brace myself for whatever awaits on the other side as I approach them.
The images of my bare back and my pixelated torso won’t stop flashing through my mind. In the car I didn’t have time to notice, but now I wonder how detailed they are. If you zoom in, would you see the line of freckles on my back that Mami says look like Orion’s belt? When I was little she used to trace them until I fell asleep. She’d tell me to wish on the stars I carry, to never forget that they are a part of me.
As I step into the main hall, a gust of air hits me and people’s faces turn to look at me, one after the other after the other. I wish on every star and every freckle on my body that I could disappear.
The a/c clicks off. I hear whispers crackle, loud yet indecipherable. To my right, by the giant trophy case that displays Papi’s Senate portrait smack in the center, Stephanie Lyndon pulls her ponytail loose and shakes her head, never taking her eyes off me. Her friends, whose names I don’t know, are huddled behind her and look away when I try to meet their eyes.
I keep my head down and keep walking. The floor is lined with linoleum—three pale pink squares for several randomly placed white and gray ones—and it looks thin enough to crack beneath me. Up ahead, Patrick Franco leans against the lockers and smirks. True to stereotype, he’s wearing one of those V-neck Abercrombie sweaters with a stiff white shirt collar jutting over his chin. His dirty toes bulge out of his plastic green flip-flops.
“Bro.” He smacks Jorge on the chest with the back of his hand. “Mira la modelo. Nice pictures, Mari.”
To their credit, a couple of people hesitate to react for maybe half a second. But all that means is everyone erupts into laughter at once. It’s like he gave them permission. Jorge gives me a slow and squinted look, the kind that feels like a million tiny hands slithering over my skin. I wonder what Vivi would say if she knew her ex was looking at me this way, but a part of me is glad she’s not here to see it.
Boys whistle and ask me for more. Girls jeer and look me up and down. Some guy I’ve never met before stands in the middle of the hallway, covering his torso and yelling “Uy, a camera!” before striking an exaggerated pose with both hands on his hips, chest pushed up and out. Someone else shouts, “Vote for my Papi,” in a high-pitched, baby-like voice.
Later, I’ll probably think of the most pointed, perfect words to throw back at them. But right now, I feel like my voice has left my body, and all I want to do is run after it.
I keep walking. People I kind of know become busy looking for something in their lockers or backpacks when I try to meet their eyes. I look down at my phone and notice the screen is lit bright green with texts from Mami, Papi, and Vivi. I debate reading them, knowing they’ll only make this nightmare worse.
Breathe. Blink. Breathe. Visualize yourself overcoming.
I focus all my energy and attention on the door at the end of the hall, trying to imagine myself stepping through it. Just then it opens and its handle clangs, loud and sharp. A gust of wind pushes against my face.
Jackie Velez walks through the door that was supposed to be my escape. Not this again. Please, not now.
She looks right at me, her eyes narrow and her jaw tight. She’s nearly half a foot taller than me; her stance is so purposeful it makes me want to step aside as she approaches.
“Hey!” she yells.
I stop walking and she closes the space between us. I’ve never felt so small and yet so conspicuous in my entire life.
“You think this is funny?” She’s still yelling, loud enough for the whole school to hear, even though she’s inches away from me. “You think this misogynist attack on Mariana’s body and privacy is funny?” Her gaze shifts away from me and scans everyone around us. “Your laughter makes you complicit. So does your silence.”
I have zero clue what’s going on anymore—should I be scared? Relieved? Jackie has this badass-hero vibe that makes everyone want to be around her and no one want to piss her off. Her words are like an invisible chancleta being thrown through the hall. Nearly everyone stands up straighter, pretends to look busy, and scatters within a few seconds.
“You okay?”
I shake my head no and say yes. “But you hate me,” is all I manage.
She looks confused and then amused. Her face is bright and striking and contains every emotion at once. “Says who?”
“All those things you wrote. About my father . . .”
“Are you your father?”
“No, but—”
“Then why would you think I hate you?”
She’s actually waiting for me to answer. All I’ve got is a sad, half shoulder shrug and what I imagine sounds like a toy Chihuahua whimpering.
Jackie laughs and smacks open the door again. “Come on. I wanna show you something.”
seventeen
We cut through the courtyard and walk to a far-off corner of campus I’ve never been to. We pass the picnic tables where the varsity baseball team congregates. Not too far from them, a row of kids lie face-up on the thick cement plant beds. They’ve all got headphones on and they’re using their backpacks as pillows. Out of instinct, I look across the courtyard for Vivi beneath the stairwell, but of course, she’s not there.
“Where are we going?” I ask Jackie. I’m going to be late for first period. She’s walking and dodging clusters of students so fast, it’s hard to keep up with her. I follow her past the black box theater and through a narrow navy door I’d always assumed was for faculty. The small hallway we’re standing in is lit by an amber light that’s much warmer than the rest of the school’s fluorescents. It’s like we’re not even in Grove High anymore.
“This used to be where the drama program did lighting and sound, before they built the new auditorium,” she says, opening one of two doors in the hallway. “Ms. Sepulveda let us take over the space for PODER.”
It’s at least two classrooms long, and instead of a back wall, there’s a large purple curtain that hangs from a high ceiling with exposed silver air ducts and lighting equipment. All the other walls are covered in posters, banners, and stickers. A black-and-white print almost as tall as I am says INTERSECTIONAL FEMINISM IS THE ONLY REAL FEMINISM. An LGBTQ rainbow flag is pinned to the wall next to another flag with blue, pink, and white stripes, and a postcard below it says #TRANSISBEAUTIFUL. There are filing cabinets covered with stickers that say SAVE THE EARTH, SAVE OURSELVES. A pile of flyers for women’s rights and voting rights are arranged in two tall, neat piles on top of it.
The room is a strange mixture of order and chaos. The far left corner looks like something out of the arts and crafts section of
Target, stocked with letter cutouts, foam poster boards, and super thick Sharpies in every color imaginable. The smell of acrylic paint fills the air.
“Pretty cool, right? I know it has a very postapocalyptic bunker vibe, but we’ve been working on brightening it up.” Jackie points to the beanbags and couches arranged in the center of the room. There are stacks of books on a square white coffee table, and a tall lamp with an extension cord duct-taped along the floor to the wall. “You can borrow any book you want.”
“What is this place?”
“It’s our center of operations,” Jackie says nonchalantly. “Ever since I nearly got expelled at the beginning of the year.”
Oh. It’s all starting to make sense now. “This is the space they gave you for your protest club?”
“Activist group. Though we do protest sometimes. It’s not a bad word, you know. You don’t have to whisper it, Mariana.” She smiles in this oddly maternal way that makes me feel like a naive freshman.
“No, I didn’t mean it like that. I just . . . didn’t know.”
“It’s fine. I get what you mean. And yeah, I think they figured if they tucked us away to some forgotten corner of the school, we’d go quietly. It’s worked out really well, actually. They stay out of our way and Ms. Sepulveda is super supportive when we need her. She was at the first Women’s March in DC, and now she helps plan the one here.”
All I remember about the Women’s March is that Papi took us all to church to pray the country would unite again. I was eleven, and after mass, we stayed home with the TVs off, as if the power had gone out. Mami checked her phone several times, though. I saw her sneaking glances at it in the pantry.
I’m about to ask Jackie why she brought me here when the door opens and two students I’ve never met before walk through. One of them is an Asian girl carrying a purple duffel bag and the other is a Black guy with a stack of white postcards that he hands to Jackie.
“Here. Registered eleven at last night’s game. And senior pictures are starting next week, so we’re gonna set up a booth there,” he says.
“ ’Kay. I’ll drop these off after school. Mari, this is Didier.” Didier waves with one hand, then Jackie points at the girl standing next to him with the duffle. “And this is Cristina.” Cristina smiles but doesn’t really look at me.
“It’s Mariana,” I say.
“Right, sorry,” Jackie says, looking like she’s on the verge of smiling. “Crissy and Didier have been registering students to vote too. You probably saw them at the booth the other day.”
“Oh. Maybe . . .” I wish Jackie hadn’t brought that up.
Cristina smirks and I realize she probably already recognized me. She’s wearing shimmery eyeshadow that sweeps a fine dust of glitter across the tops of her high cheekbones. It’s the perfect shade of lavender against her light brown skin.
She opens the duffle bag and Didier starts going through its contents, which crinkle and crunch. He’s nearly as tall as my dad, but much leaner, and the way he goes through the bag reminds me of a dancer, because even when he’s bent over, his posture is perfect.
“Oh my god, Crissy! You got Sublimes?!” Except he says it in a Spanish accent—su-bli-mez—and pulls out a square candy bar wrapped in silver with dark blue letters. He grins and I notice he has a thin, stubble-like mustache, and his jaw muscles bounce in and out as he chews.
“I have a whole maleta-full back home,” Crissy says. “Take as many as you want. Here. Try one, Mari. They’re from Peru.”
“It’s Mariana,” Jackie reminds her.
“Whatever, sorry.” She holds the candy bar out to me, but I’m too worried I’ll be late for class to eat anything.
“No, thanks. Did you just get back from vacation there?”
She takes a deep breath and seems to hold it inside. Every time she smiles it looks pained and fake, like she secretly hates me. “I was born there. And my brother was just . . . he lives there.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean—”
“It’s fine. People always act surprised that there are Chinese people who are Latinx.”
“No, I get it,” I say. “My great-great-grandfather was part Chinese and Irish. And Cuban.” Crissy tucks a loose hair behind her ear and raises one eyebrow as she smirks at Jackie. Oh god, I’m making this awkward, right? “It’s nice that you get to visit. I don’t even know what kind of candy is Cuban candy.”
I try to imagine a childhood full of trips to my grandparents’ birth country. Papi always says the only things his mother brought with her were the clothes on her back and a few pictures of the family standing outside their house. It’s a different kind of leaving when you can’t go back. Meanwhile Crissy has luggage stuffed with so many sweets even her friends have their favorites.
Didier shakes his head. “Your dad really took the whole assimilation thing to heart, didn’t he?”
“Dude,” Jackie says.
“What? I’m not saying it’s his fault. Just that it’s sad, that’s all.”
“My dad’s really proud of being Cuban. And American,” I say. Papi says this catchphrase all the time, though sometimes it’s reversed, depending on where he’s giving his speech. I’d never thought about that until now.
“Don’t tease her. She’s been through enough today,” Jackie says.
Didier covers his mouth and gasps. His eyes turn soft as he looks at me. “Shit, I totally forgot. Honestly, whoever took those pictures should be in jail for like, child pornography or something. And the blog that published them?! Ooh. Your family should sue them.”
Crissy takes out her phone and starts scrolling as she pops a hard candy into her mouth. “You know . . . I doubt that would work. This gossip blog posted them, and they’ll probably take them down but by then everyone will have screenshots. And any journalism outlet with half a legal team wouldn’t dare publish them. But they’re reporting on the fact that they happened because, well . . . it is newsworthy. I mean, it’s the elections and you’re—”
“Okay, we get it, Miss Future Pulitzer.” Didier turns his attention to the nutritional facts on his chocolate bar wrapper.
“Crissy’s on the newspaper staff. She’s one of my best writers,” Jackie explains.
My face grows warm just thinking of the blog post headlines. I feel like I’m back in Joe’s car, smelling the green pine of his air freshener, seeing my pixelated body on display for the whole world. “I wasn’t naked!” My voice cracks. “And I was trying to make them go away. They made it look like, like I was . . .”
But I can’t finish.
“Asking for it?” Jackie whispers.
I still can’t believe I’m talking to her. About this, of all things.
“Besides, even if you were naked,” Crissy says.
“I wasn’t!”
“Okay, but I’m just saying. Even you shouldn’t be shamed for your own body.”
Even me?
“Look,” Jackie says. “I just wanted you to know we’ve got your back. And that you’re not alone. What you’re going through sucks, and it’s not your fault.” A timid look flashes across her face, and then it’s gone, replaced by that same steeled expression she carried when she rescued me from Patrick Franco and Jorge in the hall. A week ago, nothing scared me more than the thought of being a target of Jackie’s scrutinizing eye. Suddenly now she has my back?
I look around the room. It’s Papi’s version of a nightmare. To him and Mami, Jackie is la malcriada que anda metida en problemas. They think she goes looking for trouble.
“What does PODER mean? I mean, I know it’s Spanish for power, but does it stand for anything?”
“It’s short for People against Oppression Demanding Equality and Resisting,” Jackie says proudly.
“It’s so one of those acronyms you make up after you’ve chosen the word,” Didier says.
“Cállate la boca,” Jackie says, except she’s smiling as she shuts him up.
“Pa fè sa. Don’t act like you don’t know.”
He nods and Jackie loops her arm under his and rests her head on his shoulder. They have an ease about them that reminds me of Vivi and me. “You speak Kreyòl too?” I ask Jackie.
“I mean . . . a little.”
“You don’t spend as much time at my house as Jackie and Crissy do without my mom teaching you a few phrases,” Didier says.
It’s sweet. I think of how Zoey could pick up on some Spanish around Vivi and me if she really wanted to. The only time she’s ever showed interest was before midterms, when she needed help with her Spanish homework. By help, I mean she asked us for all the answers. I pretended to be clueless, but Vivi started messing with her by saying the most Cuban phrases she could think of instead of the more “proper” Spanish her teacher was looking for. Zoey got the hint, and she never asked again. It’s really annoying, though, being treated like I’m her translator on demand.
It makes me think twice about asking Didier what he just said. I’ll figure it out eventually.
“So, what are you going to do?” Crissy asks.
“I don’t know. I haven’t talked to my parents yet.”
“Your parents? No, she means, what do you want to do? About the pictures and everything?” Jackie says.
“Nothing. I just want them to go away. I want people to forget about me.”
“Oh, Mariana.” Disappointment drips from Didier’s voice.
“What?”
“It’s just . . . people are watching you.”
“I know. That’s why it sucks.”
“No, you don’t get it,” Jackie says. “I mean, yes, it sucks now. Because it’s not on your terms. But you can use this. You have a platform so many of us don’t.”
A platform? Jackie sounds just like Joe, only thinking about what she can get out of a situation.