Each Tiny Spark

by Pablo Cartaya

  I think about what Gus’s dad told me, and just listen.

  “And if I turn around to look at what he’s doing, or if I call Abuela to see where she’s at, then I could lose focus on this job, you see?”

  “Yeah!” I say at full volume.

  “Then mistakes can happen,” he says. He turns toward the street and pushes the sander against the door. The screech blasts my ear and makes me jump back.

  “You see?” he asks, taking the sander off the hood. He puts it on the workbench, pulls down his mask, and slides the goggles on top of his head. “You turn away from what you need to do, and you can hurt your teammate.”

  I lift my goggles too, and pull down my mask. Papi brushes off some of the leftover paint chips with his gloves. There’s a slight burned smell in the air.

  “You all right?” Papi asks, picking up the sander again.

  “Yeah.”

  We’re both quiet for a moment as the sander rests peacefully on the workbench.

  “We had tower guard at some point during the night,” he says out of the blue. “I’d sit there in the dark, four hours some nights, trying to communicate with the local military that shared the tower with us.”

  “Oh,” I say. He’s talking about his deployment. I try my best to act casual and not interrupt him so he’ll keep talking.

  “Got pretty close with some of those fellas. Had green tea and flatbread most nights. I always wanted the last shift. The one right before breakfast. I’d be up in that tower at three in the morning just looking out into the expanse.”

  “Why did you like that time of day, Papi?”

  “I wanted to be awake at the quietest, darkest moment.”

  Dad stops. It seems like that’s all he’s going to say, so I work up the courage to ask him another question. My heart beats fast as I open my mouth.

  “Was it cold?”

  “Yeah, it got pretty cold up there. Hey, let’s move over to the quarter panel and inspect.”

  And just like that, I know it’s over.

  “Okay,” I say, feeling deflated.

  After about an hour of working mostly in silence, we decide to take a break.

  “A milkshake sounds pretty awesome right about now,” Papi says. “Want to walk over to Jimmy’s Diner and grab some mint chocolate chip with double fudge and sprinkles?”

  I’m part excited and part nervous. I want to go with Papi, but I also know that Mami would never let me have a milkshake after what the doctor recommended. But it’s been so long since I could do this with him, to hang out like we used to, so I decide I should go for it.

  “Definitely,” I say, following him out of the garage. I hope Mami doesn’t text, or worse, video call while I’m drinking my milkshake!

  He takes my hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. For the first time since he’s returned, I see my dad smile. Really smile.

  I smile back because life’s pretty good right now. I have a social studies project topic that I picked without Mami’s help and Dad trusts me enough to help him fix a broken car. Bonus: mint chocolate chip milkshakes.

  I’m in such a good mood the next day at school that I decide to ask Clarissa again if Gus can come to her party.

  “I mean,” she says, out of breath, “doesn’t he live really far away? In Park View or something?”

  “Yes. Well, just at the edge, but yeah. I’m sure his dad could stick around to pick him up afterward.”

  “I don’t know, Emi Rose,” she says. “I’m fixing to invite the whole pep band after my triumphant debut at the pep rally. They all said I did an amazing job.”

  “You sounded great,” I say. “Only one fart sound out of the mellophone.”

  “You’re funny,” she says, not laughing. “Anyway, it’ll seem strange if he comes when I didn’t officially send him an invite, you know?”

  The bell rings.

  “But I’ll think on it,” Clarissa says. “That fair?”

  “Sure.”

  “All right, talk to you later.”

  She starts to leave, then swings back around.

  “Hold on a minute. How’s your daddy doing?”

  “He’s okay,” I say. “We worked on a car together yesterday.”

  Clarissa flinches. “Well . . . how nice for you.”

  We both look around. I try to think of something else to say.

  “And we talked,” I tell her. “A little, but it was nice.”

  Clarissa’s face sags. “My daddy used to get real quiet whenever he’d come home from a deployment.”

  I can tell the tears are about to pour out at any moment.

  “You okay?” I ask.

  “I’m fine,” she says. “Sometimes you remember everything all at once, you know?”

  “Yeah,” I say, but really, I’m wondering if she asks about my dad to have a reason to share things about her own. That’s not a bad thing. I just wish she’d be honest.

  She turns slowly and leaves for real this time.

  I know Clarissa would like Gus if she just gave him a chance. He doesn’t have family in the military, but he’s caring and funny and a great listener. I think Clarissa could use someone like that in her life.

  * * *

  After school, Gus and I walk toward Park View to Don Carlos’s Grocery Latino. Gus is carrying a huge travel bag along with his regular backpack.

  “What’s in the bag?” I ask.

  “Wardrobe and props,” he says, with a mischievous look.

  “Oh, Clarissa might invite you to her party,” I say.

  “That’s nice, I guess, but like I said, we’ll probably be at the movies.”

  “What if you convince Barry to go? And Lacey will totally love it if Chinh shows up!”

  “I don’t want to get their hopes up. Besides, Chinh has a super-strict curfew and Barry and I planned to do some storyboarding, and afterward, I was going to help him with his project.”

  “Oh, he needs help?”

  “Just with animating some of the slides for his presentation,” Gus says. “He’s a great writer, and he has all this cool knowledge about trees and insects, especially from around here. For his project, he’s doing a scavenger hunt of Merryville Woods, where people have to find native trees like beech trees, Southern sugar maple trees, and, my personal favorite, the loblolly pine.”

  “Why is that your favorite?”

  “I like the name loblolly.”

  “Kind of tickles my tongue when I say it.”

  “And,” Gus continues, “Barry has pictures of strange bugs to look for, like the sphinx moth, the American copper, and the pill bug, which Barry calls the roly poly because it curls up into a little ball when you touch it.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah, Barry’s really smart. But all teachers ever focus on is that he doesn’t test well.”

  Maybe that’s something Mrs. Jenkins could help Barry with too. I wonder if she already knows.

  “Anyway, tell me how it goes.”

  “Can’t your dad drop you off?”

  “Look, I don’t think Clarissa wants us there, Emilia. She doesn’t exactly hide her dislike.”

  “I think it’s just a misunderstanding. If you two got to know each other better, maybe you could become friends.”

  “I don’t want to ask my dad for that. He likes to get home right after work to be with Daniela.”

  “I wish I had a sister or brother that my parents could worry about instead of me,” I say. “Being an only child, I have my mom and Abuela and even my dad in my business.”

  “Must be nice,” he says. “Having all that attention.”

  What Gus just said is true, but it stings a little.

  Gus kicks a rock along the sidewalk like a soccer ball. It rolls awkwardly off the pavement and into the gutter. He goes to look for it
but stops himself before he reaches the drain.

  “Hey, remember It? Pennywise is one of the best horror creatures ever.”

  “I couldn’t even finish it,” I tell him. Who could blame me? It is a story about a horrible child-eating clown.

  “Pennywise fed on fears. When kids stopped being afraid, he couldn’t harm them anymore.”

  “Still terrifying. I never want to see that movie again. Ever.”

  “I’ll think about it,” Gus says, moving back to the sidewalk. “About Clarissa’s party, okay?”

  “Awesome. Thanks, Señor Gus.”

  “De nada, señorita,” he replies, only bowing slightly as he continues to walk.

  We follow the road to Park View. The path is dotted with garbage.

  “I never noticed how dirty it is over here,” I say.

  Weeds are overgrown. There are a few soda cans and candy wrappers littered about and graffiti sharing messages of my one true love.

  “It’s like the sanitation department gave up after Main Street and just went home for the night,” Gus responds.

  “Tourists aren’t going to come here!”

  “Maybe people will decide to clean up after your tourism guide.”

  The track curves around two parts of town, like it’s telling two stories. One with mostly redbrick buildings, little shops, and monthly festivals, and the other a place where messages of love are mixed with garbage.

  We’re both silent for a bit as we walk deeper into Park View. Two kids play on the swings at a playground surrounded by trees. Someone who might be their grandpa takes turns swinging each kid.

  “Hi, Mr. Jackson!” Gus waves.

  Mr. Jackson turns around and takes a moment before recognizing Gus.

  “Oh, hello there, young man!”

  Mr. Jackson waves and quickly gets back to pushing the girl who’s swinging toward him at that moment.

  “Mr. Jackson takes his granddaughters to the park every afternoon,” Gus says. “They live in that house right over there.”

  Gus gestures like a tour guide while he tells me what he knows of Mr. Jackson’s story.

  “His wife passed away last year,” he continues. “He moved in with his daughter and son-in-law and when they’re at work, he watches over his granddaughters.”

  “He seems happy.”

  “He is,” Gus says. “But his knees aren’t so great anymore, and walking his grandkids to Park View Elementary is a trek for him. Everyone thinks it’s too far, but he’s stubborn.”

  “Like my abuela.”

  “Yeah, kind of, I guess. Anyway, it’d be way closer for him to walk his grandkids if they went to Merryville Elementary.”

  There are a few parked cars on lawns just past the playground.

  “It’s so cramped here that there’re hardly any parking spaces,” Gus says. “But we have the best block parties.”

  “I’ve been to some of them. They’re so much fun.”

  “Especially the ones Barry’s family throws. His dad’s barbecue is the tastiest in Merryville. Probably all of Georgia. And his biscuits, oh my gosh, it’s like, that’s what God above wants on Sunday after church. Mr. Johnson’s homemade biscuits and gravy.”

  “Wasn’t he going to open a restaurant?”

  “It fell through. Something about the loan got messed up.”

  “That’s too bad,” I say, admiring the tall oval-shaped trees lining the street.

  “Barry says that’s the Southern sugar maple, a smaller cousin of the bigger, more famous maples out by Canada and the Northeast.”

  “Ours may be smaller, but they’re mighty,” I say. In the autumn, these trees look like the sun has kissed them and turned their leaves into flames.

  “You know,” Gus says, changing the subject. “Sometimes I think Clarissa is nicer to you because she thinks you’re like her.”

  “She just has trouble making new friends. She likes things to stay the same.”

  “Yeah, maybe. Is that why she’s talking smack about the redistricting?”

  “I’ve only heard her mention it once. But I’ve been kind of focused on my dad lately.”

  “Well, it’s not just her. I heard some kids at school talking about how bad it’s going to be if Park View kids come to Merryville next year.”

  “What’s so bad about it?”

  “I don’t think they care about Park View. I mean, look at how much our sanitation department cares,” Gus says, motioning to the ground. “The district doesn’t stop to think that it might be worse for the Park View kids.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s like when I moved from Alabama. I didn’t know anybody and I had to get used to the way the school worked. Now imagine if, on top of that, nobody wanted me there. That’s what it’s going to feel like for any kid from Park View if they have to get transferred.”

  I’ve gone to Merryville schools my whole life. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I had to suddenly move to a completely new school. I probably wouldn’t like it at all.

  “Anyway, since your project will take people to Park View, maybe it could bring some attention to the neighborhood. Get people to talk about it.”

  “Maybe. I like your project because it will be so fun,” I tell him while crossing the street.

  “It will be fun to shoot, but I hope it shocks people too,” he says.

  “It’s going to be great,” I say.

  “So is yours,” he tells me. “It’s different. Off the beaten path, as they say. Not like Chinh. He’s doing his on the sporting venues in town, starting with the football field.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he wants to try out for football next year and he’s sucking up to Mr. Richt.”

  We both laugh.

  “Grocery store up ahead,” Gus says. “But first—”

  Gus pulls out his camera and starts filming. “I think we can shoot part of the movie here. It can be like the start of El laberinto del fauno.”

  Gus became obsessed with Guillermo del Toro after seeing Pan’s Labyrinth. It’s not really a movie for kids, but Gus’s tita let him buy it because he only showed her the English cover and she thought it was about Peter Pan. It is not about finding Neverland. There are monsters and a really scary creature that has eyes on his hands.

  We watched it on Gus’s iPad in Abuela’s office one day last summer, tucked in next to the shelves of oil and hanging car fresheners for sale. Gus got a headphone splitter so we could listen at the same time. The movie terrified me, and Gus tried to make me feel better by telling me the story behind it.

  “It’s an allegory for the Spanish Civil War,” he said.

  “That pale man with the eyes on his hands is so creepy!” I told him.

  “Guillermo del Toro created him to show how he feeds on the helpless and doesn’t want to share his riches,” Gus said. “This is what I want to do with my life, Emilia.”

  “You want to feed on the helpless?”

  “No, silly,” he said, laughing. “I want to make movies.”

  * * *

  After some test shoots, we reach the edge of town where there’s a strip mall.

  “¡Por fin llegamos!” The store’s sign comes into view—the large blue D in DON and the even bigger C in CARLOS’S followed by LATINO GROCERY STORE in cursive white letters underneath.

  The lot has a few cars and trucks parked with several people strolling in and out. Waiting for us on the other side of the lot are the automatic sliding doors.

  The first thing we see when we walk through them is the familiar display of meat with various types of sausages and steaks lined up neatly. The signs identifying each meat are in Spanish first and English second. Chorizo is the only one that just says chorizo. I guess that delicious, slightly spicy sausage doesn’t need a translation. You either know what i
t is, or you don’t.

  Don Felix is there and greets us both.

  “¡Hola, chicos!”

  “Hi, Don Felix,” we say at the same time.

  “¿Todo bien? ¿Tus padres, eh, tu abuela, Emilia?”

  “Sí, Don Felix.”

  “Muy bien, muy bien.” He throws a piece of beef on the counter.

  “Dile a tu abuelita que tengo lomo de Argentina,” he says, smiling.

  “Okay, Don Felix,” I reply. “I’ll be sure to tell her.”

  Don Felix nods and hums to himself while expertly slicing meat.

  “What’s up with the massive grin?” Gus asks.

  “I think Don Felix has a crush on my abuela. And I think, by the way Abuela acts around Don Felix, she might feel the same.”

  “A little romance in the twilight of their lives, huh?” Gus says. “Que cute.”

  There are various piñatas dangling from the ceiling alongside colorful papel picado.

  “Do you think people actually buy those piñatas?” Gus asks.

  “Why would they hang them up there? Somebody must buy them.”

  I’ve never been here without Abuela hurrying me down the aisles, so I make a point of taking my time to look around. There is a whole wall of Goya products. You can buy beans in cans or beans in bags—red, black, brown, and some white ones with a little black dot in the middle. With so many colors, why does Abuela only buy the black beans? They’re not my favorite.

  On a shelf, I spot a whole bunch of dried peppers in bins lined up in several rows.

  “Tita makes birria with those ancho and guajillo peppers,” Gus says. He points to the black chile and dark red pepper next to it.

  “Oh my gosh, the beef in her stew falls apart in your mouth. And with her warm corn tortillas to dip in the spicy broth. That’s probably my second-favorite dish in the world next to lechón asado,” I tell him. “Mr. Johnson’s barbecue is right up there also.”

  “For sure,” Gus says. “Hey, do you remember the time I wanted to help Tita, but I didn’t use gloves to handle the peppers and I burned the side of my eye?”