Cemetery Boys

by Aiden Thomas

  Maritza laughed. “Yeah, sure,” she said moving closer. “They’re friendly.”

  Luca immediately put down his skateboard and dropped into a squat, small arms in long sleeves held out to his sides. Donatello and Michelangelo bowled Luca right over, knocking him off his feet. He was practically swallowed up by the large dogs as they nudged and licked at him happily.

  As he laughed, hands giving them both a good scratch, Donatello’s lolling tongue gave him a particularly good swipe. It slicked back Luca’s mass of light brown hair, revealing a large scar running down the side of his face. It was a patch of marbled skin.

  Yadriel’s heart made a hard thump in his chest. He’d seen scars like it on Maritza’s dad’s arm. Burns.

  She noticed, too, the grin on her face slipping to a look of shock.

  Julian didn’t say anything.

  There was a lot about Julian and his friends that Yadriel still didn’t know.

  When Julian remained silent, Yadriel said, “I don’t think he wants us to see Rio.”

  Luca stared up at Yadriel with his large deep amber eyes while Michelangelo lapped at his ear. “So you can hear him? And see him?”

  Yadriel nodded. “Yes.”

  Luca looked around, twisting his fingers together. “Where is he?”

  Both Yadriel and Maritza looked at Julian.

  Julian stood there, motionless as he watched Luca. Even his silence was loud. His stillness was unsettling. Yadriel didn’t like it. He almost preferred Julian yelling to this.

  Luca searched the empty air, squinting, even venturing to take a step closer. “Can he hear me?”

  “Yes, he can hear you,” Yadriel said softly.

  Hesitantly, Luca held out his hand. “Can he touch me?”

  Julian’s expression was slack, his spine bowed and eyes dull as they studied Luca. He stepped forward and reached out. His hand hovered just above Luca’s. Yadriel held a breath as Julian’s face pinched in concentration.

  Julian lowered his hand, and his fingers slipped right through Luca’s palm.

  Luca shivered, his arm quaking inside the large sleeve, but otherwise didn’t react.

  “It doesn’t really work like that…,” Yadriel said as Julian stepped back and turned his head away.

  Pink bloomed in Luca’s cheeks. He dropped his hand to his side and rubbed his arm. He gave that apologetic little smile again.

  “Fine.”

  Julian’s voice was so small, at first Yadriel wasn’t sure he’d heard right.

  “Really?” Yadriel asked, trying to get a look at his face, but Julian kept it turned away. Instead, he gave a jerky nod.

  “What?” Luca asked, looking around again. “What’d he say?”

  “He said yes,” Yadriel said. The relief crashing over him felt so good, he smiled.

  Luca smiled back. “I could meet you guys tomorrow morning, give you the night to think it over?”

  “It would need to be the afternoon, we’ve got school.” Yadriel nodded toward Maritza.

  “Oh, right. Afternoon, then.” Luca nodded. “Where should I meet you? Do you live nearby?”

  “Yeah, I live there,” Yadriel said, motioning through the large gate. The lights were on in his house. The church loomed on the other side.

  Luca’s eyes went wide. “You live in there? Whoa, no wonder you can see ghosts.”

  Maritza laughed.

  Yadriel grinned and bit back the urge to correct him.

  “I’m Maritza, by the way,” she cut in. “And that guy is Yadriel.”

  “Oh.” Luca’s eyes did that quick little dart to Yadriel’s chest.

  On instinct, Yadriel curled in on himself, tightly crossing his arms as heat crawled up his neck. He hated that glance, and he hated the mix of embarrassment and shame that came with it.

  “I’m Luca.” His lips tugged in a lopsided smile. “But I guess Jules told you that already?” He laughed. “Okay, well I’ll meet you guys here, then, tomorrow afternoon.”

  Julian straightened as Luca hopped onto his skateboard. “He can’t walk back on his own, it’s dark out—”

  “Do you need somewhere to stay the night?” Yadriel asked quickly. He was already housing one boy in secret, he didn’t think he could handle another, but Julian was right—it was dark out, and if someone was going around picking off kids from the street—

  “You could stay at my place,” Maritza offered, toying with her rosary. “I bet if I talked to my parents—”

  “Oh, no, that’s okay!” Luca waved her off, rubbing at the back of his neck. “My parents live a few streets over—”

  Yadriel saw Julian tense.

  “I’ll just stay there tonight.”

  Before Yadriel could think of something convincing to say, Luca was already rolling down the sidewalk and around the corner.

  For a moment, all three of them stood there, not saying anything.

  All the ferocity Julian had shown earlier seemed to have drained out of him. And, to be honest, Yadriel felt too exhausted to be combative, either. “Julian—”

  He spun on his heel and glided right through the iron bars of the gate.

  Yadriel sighed.

  Maritza shooed him. “Go on after him. I have to go home before my mom kills me.” She gave a short wave before Donatello and Michelangelo pulled her down the street.

  Yadriel raced through the headstones to catch up to Julian. Voices came from the church, and he could see through the windows that the brujx had gathered inside. Warm light spilled from the open doors of the church, washing over the steps and path lined with marigolds. A couple of stragglers made their way into the church.

  He remembered what his dad had said that morning, that they were having family dinner. Had he meant a meeting? Or was this an impromptu gathering?

  Either way, he needed to get Julian safely into his room before he could figure it out. At first, he thought Julian was just going to barge into the house, but he stopped at the door and waited for Yadriel to catch up.

  Tentatively, he opened the door a crack and listened. No music, no voices. Everyone must’ve been at the church already. He waved Julian in and ushered him up the stairs. “I need to go to the church,” Yadriel told him as he pulled his phone out of his pocket to check his messages. “Lita is going to kill me if I…” He trailed off.

  Julian hadn’t acknowledged him at all. He went right up the stairs.

  “Hey,” Yadriel said, watching him from the foot of the steps.

  Julian looked back over his shoulder.

  Yadriel frowned at him. “Are you okay?”

  Julian gave him a withering look.

  It was a dumb question. He was dead—he’d been murdered—and he was worried about his friends; of course he wasn’t okay.

  “Yadriel?” said a voice from the kitchen.

  He froze. The floor creaked. His eyes widened in alarm, but he didn’t have to warn Julian. He disappeared up the stairs and around the corner before Catriz stepped into the living room.

  “There you are,” Tío Catriz said with a sigh. “Your dad sent me looking for you.” He frowned and glanced around the empty room. “Who were you talking to?”

  “Uh.” Yadriel held up his phone. “Just Maritza.”

  Tío Catriz watched him for a moment, for three heartbeats longer than was comfortable, but then his mouth curled into a smile. “You two really are attached at the hip,” he said with a chuckle and a shake of his head.

  Yadriel laughed along with him, maybe a little too loud.

  “Come on,” he said, waving for Yadriel to follow him. “Your dad called a meeting with everyone. Even the outcasts,” Tío Catriz added with an amused grin.

  “Yeah.” His attention was pulled back to Julian. “Let me just ditch my backpack real quick?” Yadriel asked, already inching toward the stairs.

  Tío Catriz nodded. “The black sheep might as well show up fashionably late,” he said, smoothing down the front of his dark button-up shirt.

  Y
adriel hurried to his room.

  Julian sat on the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees and hands fidgeting.

  Yadriel tossed his backpack onto his desk. “Are you okay?” he asked again, a bit tersely.

  “I’m fine,” Julian replied, not even bothering to look at him.

  Crossing his arms over his chest, Yadriel considered him for a long moment. He was annoyed with Julian, but he also felt bad for him. The two emotions were at war with each other, making it difficult for Yadriel to sort through. He just wanted to help. Not only Miguel, but everyone, including Julian and his friends, but things were just getting more complicated and difficult. He wished Julian would cut him some slack.

  Then again, he probably needed to cut Julian some slack, as well.

  Yadriel tried putting himself in his shoes. How would he be handling this, if he was suddenly killed and woke up as a spirit? If he couldn’t speak to his friends and family? If he thought they were in danger?

  Yeah, he definitely wouldn’t be handling it well. Probably about as well as Julian. Maybe worse.

  Yadriel sighed. “I have to go to church. There’s some big meeting going on.”

  When Julian didn’t respond, he headed for the door but then paused with his hand on the knob.

  “One thing, though.”

  Julian glanced up.

  “If you ever throw a tantrum like that again, and I have any reason to think you’re going to hurt someone, especially Maritza…?” Yadriel pulled Julian’s necklace out from under his hoodie, letting the St. Jude medal dangle from his thumb. “I’ll throw this and you down the sewer. Got it?”

  Julian’s ears burned bright red. He nodded, shoulders hunching.

  “Great.” Yadriel left the room and closed the door with a snap.

  TWELVE

  All the brujx were gathered in the open-air courtyard behind the church. Receptions were held there, from weddings to birthdays. Archways were cut into the stone, painted the same color as the church. It was filled with long tables covered in serape runners and centerpieces made of tissue-paper carnations in clay vases. Dozens of colorful papel picado were strung up overhead along with paper lanterns.

  Tables laden with food were set on the outer edges between the pillars. There was pan de muerto, rice, beans, and large aluminum platters filled with ropa vieja. The shredded beef cooked in spices and red peppers was one of Lita’s specialties.

  Lita had ushered all the young brujx to a designated table and put them to work. Eight brujx from ages six to fourteen worked on crafts for Día de Muertos. Molded sugar skulls were waiting to be decorated. Crates full of freshly picked marigolds, chrysanthemums, and deep purple magenta were stacked neatly to the side, making the air smell like sweet apples.

  Yadriel followed his tío and grabbed a plate of food before moving toward the crowd surrounding his dad. Everyone’s expressions were tense, their voices lowered as they spoke. He saw Tío Isaac, but he was easy to spot. Tall and broad, he stood at least a head higher than everyone else. But there was no sign of Tía Sofia or Paola.

  Balancing his plate with one hand, Yadriel pulled out his phone with the other and thumbed out a message to Maritza.

  Everybody’s at the church. Where are you?

  Maritza’s response was almost immediate.

  Being held hostage. They’re making me try on dresses. Send help.

  Yadriel snorted.

  Sending thoughts and prayers.

  Yadriel’s dad stood in the center, mustache ruffled and head swinging back and forth as he was bombarded with questions.

  “Enrique,” Tío Catriz called. He pointed down at Yadriel, and his father had to get on his toes to see him.

  Yadriel shrank as everyone turned to look at him.

  His dad let out a relieved sigh, and Yadriel gave him a guilty smile. He squeezed through the sea of brujx to get closer.

  “Where have you two been?” his dad asked, voice edged with frustration, though he mostly just sounded tired.

  Yadriel felt another pang of guilt. His dad looked exhausted, his eyes bloodshot and ringed with dark circles. How many hours of sleep had his dad gotten over the last twenty-four hours? It couldn’t have been much.

  “Sorry, Dad,” Yadriel said, because he was. He hadn’t meant to worry his dad. He had enough on his plate without Yadriel causing him more stress.

  “You keep running off and coming home late,” Enrique said, like it was a question.

  Yadriel tried to think of an excuse. What would Maritza say? “I just—”

  “He was with me, hermano,” Tío Catriz said, his smile apologetic as he placed a hand on Yadriel’s shoulder. “We were having a heart-to-heart, lost track of time. We didn’t mean to worry you,” he explained with gentle sincerity.

  Yadriel stared up at him, surprised.

  Enrique frowned, deep creases wrinkling his brow. There was something churning behind his eyes, but Yadriel couldn’t quite place it. He got the feeling his dad didn’t like that answer, but then he gave a short nod.

  Luckily, Yadriel wasn’t going to get lectured, at least not at the moment. His dad had bigger matters to tend to.

  “How could there be no sign of Miguel?” a younger bruja asked, and the group devolved into more arguing and questions. They converged around his dad again, pushing Yadriel and his tío to the outskirts.

  “Thanks for that,” Yadriel said to Tío Catriz. “You really didn’t have to cover for me.” The last thing he wanted to do was drag anyone else into this mess he’d gotten himself into, especially his tío.

  Catriz chuckled. “I won’t tell if you don’t,” he said with a wink.

  Yadriel smiled back. He wished the brujx treated his tío better. He was a good man and always looked out for Yadriel. Even if it sucked to be a brujx reject, at least he had his tío Catriz to go through it with. Yadriel wondered if things would change once they saw he was a brujo. Would it put a wall between them? Would Tío Catriz be upset? He didn’t think he would be.

  At least, he hoped not.

  “Eat, sobrino,” Tío Catriz told him, nudging Yadriel with his shoulder. “And try to stay out of trouble.”

  Yadriel didn’t need to be told twice. He was starving and immediately began shoveling food into his mouth. He slowly wandered around the group of brujx deep in conversation, trying to listen in and gather any information that might be useful.

  “Did Claudia and Benny go to the police?” Tío Isaac asked, his deep voice easily cutting through the chatter. “Has Miguel been reported as missing?”

  Yadriel’s dad nodded, raking his fingers through his mustache. “They did this morning, but it didn’t go well.” The corners of his lips tugged down.

  “How do you mean?” Diego asked. He and Andrés had squirmed their way into the middle of the group, as if they were very important and needed to be at the center of the discussion.

  Yadriel rolled his eyes and took another large bite of ropa vieja.

  “Claudia and Benny don’t speak English very well,” Enrique explained. “They kept asking for an interpreter, not wanting to miss anything important and so they could give the police as much information as they could. Of course, that was complicated on its own, since they couldn’t say they knew Miguel was dead without explaining how they knew it,” he told the group.

  Murmurs rose.

  Yes, Yadriel could see how that would make things difficult.

  “But the officers didn’t bring in an interpreter and just kept asking them questions.” His dad shook his head. “I’m not sure what happened, but by the time I got there to help, the police were completely brushing them off and started asking if Miguel was a legal US citizen—if they were.”

  The murmuring turned angry, and so did Yadriel. Over the last few years, more and more people in their community—brujx and otherwise—had been deported. Families were split apart and good people were torn away from their homes. People were fearful of the police and scared to seek out help when they needed it.

>   The brujx tried to band together and close their ranks. As a community that was already so close-knit and stuck to their own, it only exacerbated their fear of outsiders.

  “They got scared the police would find a reason to deport them, so they left. I’m not even sure a police report was actually filled out, but they’re too frightened to go back.”

  Catriz shook his head slowly, the corner of his lip curling in distaste. “Awful.”

  “Santa Muerte, los ayude,” an older brujo muttered, crossing himself.

  “Miguel will return on Día de Muertos,” a young woman insisted. “Then he will tell us what happened.”

  “But what if he doesn’t?” asked another, and they all broke out into more questions until it was just an unintelligible cacophony of voices.

  Yadriel gripped his empty plate, suddenly feeling sick to his stomach. The only new information they had was the police hadn’t found Miguel’s body, which wasn’t much to go on. He was still missing. They still needed to find him.

  Even if Día de Muertos was only two days away, there was no way Yadriel was just going to sit around, twiddling his thumbs until Miguel showed up. And if he didn’t come back, then his spirit was somewhere, tethered and trapped. He hated the idea of Miguel being stuck somewhere, unable to contact them. Where had he ended up that no one could find him? It wasn’t like there were wells to fall down in East LA. There were no cliffs to be tossed off. If a building or something had collapsed, they would’ve heard about it on the news.

  Gone without a trace. Just like Julian.

  Yadriel was certain that wherever one was, the other was, too. He and Maritza did have a leg up on the rest of the brujx. They at least knew where Julian had gone missing, and tomorrow they would see if Donatello and Michelangelo could track him from there.

  “Oh, good, you’re finished eating!”

  Lita’s voice pulled Yadriel from his thoughts.

  Before he could even respond, she’d taken the paper plate from his hands and pulled him toward the table of younger brujx. “You let them worry about Miguel,” Lita said sternly.

  “Lita,” Yadriel said sharply. He didn’t want to get lumped in with the kids doing arts and crafts. He belonged with the adults. “I’m not a kid—”