Help Wanted

by Gary Soto

  Help Wanted

  Stories

  Gary Soto

  * * *

  HARCOURT, INC.

  Orlando Austin New York San Diego Toronto London

  * * *

  Copyright © 2005 by Gary Soto

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or

  transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,

  including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and

  retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work

  should be submitted online at www.harcourt.com/contact or mailed

  to the following address: Permissions Department, Harcourt, Inc.,

  6277 Sea Harbor Drive, Orlando, Florida 32887-6777.

  www.HarcourtBooks.com

  First Harcourt paperback edition 2007

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

  Soto, Gary.

  Help wanted: stories/by Gary Soto.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Ten stories portray some of the struggles and hopes of

  young Mexican Americans.

  1. Mexican Americans—Juvenile fiction. [1. Mexican Americans—

  Fiction. 2. Short stories.] I. Title.

  PZ7.S7242H45 2005

  [Fic]—dc22 2004007510

  ISBN 978-0-15-205201-0

  ISBN 978-0-15-205663-6 pb

  Text set in Meridien

  Designed by Linda Lockowitz

  H G F E D C B

  Printed in the United States of America

  * * *

  In memory of Graciela Olivar,

  a bilingual teacher who loved her students

  * * *

  Contents

  Paintball in the Wild [>]

  Sorry, Wrong Family [>]

  Yeah, Right [>]

  How Becky Garza Learned Golf [>]

  The Cadet [>]

  The Sounds of Love [>]

  Teenage Chimps [>]

  The Sounds of the House [>]

  One Last Kiss [>]

  Raiders Nation [>]

  Paintball in the Wild

  Michael Ortiz wiped the steam from his eyeglasses and turned off the iron. He held up the top of his military uniform. The creases in front were sharp. He felt pleased with himself, a cadet in seventh grade and with the rank of corporal. He had been in cadets only since the beginning of school and by October he already had two stripes, plus three ribbons for drill, hall patrol, and conduct.

  The conduct one was special because he used to be moody before he joined cadets. In sixth grade he sat through all his classes with his chin in his hand, his eyes half closed, and a yawn from boredom building up at the back of his throat. His grades were Cs and Ds. Sometimes he got into fights, but he usually thought they were just too much trouble.

  Now he was a year older. His body said so. He was two inches taller.

  "Sharp," he said to himself. The hot iron answered back with a sigh and a burst of steam.

  He hung the shirt over his pants, already ironed, and pinned his ribbons back onto his uniform. He undid them when he noticed they were a little crooked over his shirt pocket. He petted the ribbons. He fogged the bars with his breath and polished them with a Kleenex, careful not to undo the creases on the front of his shirt.

  When he heard his mother holler from the kitchen, he turned away from his uniform. "¡Miguel! ¡Miguel, teléfonooooo! ¡Apúrate! ¡Ya! Tenemos que comer."

  Michael, born Luis Miguel, wished that his mom could speak English, but she was in her own world, a world that remained rooted in Mexico. He loved her deeply and would never tell his mother to please learn English like his father had. His father was so proud that he would stop at telephone poles just to read posters aloud in an accented mutter.

  "Voy, Mami," Michael answered back.

  He hurried out of his bedroom and took the phone from his mother. His nose twitched when he smelled breakfast—papas and huevos con weenies. The little weenies were marching in the fry pan. Breakfast was almost ready.

  "Hey," Miguel said. It was Trung, his classmate from Jackson Junior High and a corporal like himself but with one more ribbon than him—a bivouac ribbon because his platoon got to go camping and learn how to use a compass. Miguel made no bones that he was jealous of that extra ribbon on Trung's shirt. He had repeatedly told his friend that he would have gone on the weekend bivouac except his mother didn't like him staying at anyone else's house. When he'd tried to explain that they were camping outdoors, she still remained firm. That evening he pouted in his room with the lights out. Not even the sight of his uniform could perk him up.

  "You gonna be ready?" Trung asked.

  They were going to a paintball war in the foothills outside Fresno. He was going to tell their teacher, Mr. Mitchell, the cadet commander at school. Maybe this outing would count as a bivouac.

  "Nine-thirty," Michael said. His eyes looked up at the clock over the refrigerator. "You gonna lend me the stuff?"

  The stuff was a gun and goggles.

  "Yeah, like I said." Trung reminded Michael that it cost twenty-five dollars, plus there were paintballs you had to buy. At least a thousand rounds were needed for the day. He also reminded him to bring drinking water.

  "I got water," Miguel answered. Earlier in the week he had biked across town to an army surplus store and bought an authentic canteen. He liked that it was dented and imagined that bullets had ricocheted off its side. "And I got the money." A rich uncle from Los Angeles had sent him fifty dollars for his birthday.

  Michael hung up the telephone. He stared at the frying pan, then at his mother, who asked, "¿Dos huevos?"

  He held up two fingers, then saluted his mom—he just couldn't help himself. He was a military boy.

  Michael sat in the back of Trung's father's truck, with his knees up to his chin. Although it was a sunny morning, he was cold in the whipping wind. He was wearing only a flannel shirt, flecked with paint that he figured would work as camouflage. His tennis shoes were also flecked with paint.

  He turned to Trung. "It's cold."

  "You should have brought a jacket," his friend answered. The collar of his own jacket was flapping like a sail.

  "You didn't tell me." But Michael knew that was a poor defense. A cadet, he knew, should be prepared for all kinds of weather conditions. He was glad that he had brought water. He patted his canteen and touched the front pockets of his pants, where he had stashed candy bars and pumpkin seeds. He closed his eyes, wrapped his arms around his chest, and rode out the cold.

  A half hour later the back window slid open when the truck pulled off Highway 41. Trung's brother, True, and his friend Tran, were in the cab, each of them cradling the gun barrel with one hand and fingering the trigger set on safety with the other. True said something in Vietnamese to Thing. Their father said something, too, and it sounded like he was angry.

  "What did your father say?" Michael asked. They were approaching the paintball war ground called No Man's Land.

  "He said be careful."

  To Michael it sounded like a lot of words just to say be careful. In Spanish it was simply cuídate.

  When the truck stopped, the two boys gathered their equipment and jumped out of the back, landing like ninjas. Michael felt ready for combat and was already searching the trees for snipers.

  "Thanks, sir," he called to Trung's father, who was going fishing while the four boys went to war. Bright fishing lures hung from his vest like war medals.

  Trung's father said something long and maybe angry at Michael. He grinned sternly and showed his ruined teeth. The truck pulled away, stirring up dust over the gravel road. The taillights flashed
like gunfire when he braked at the end of the road. Then the truck turned left and was gone.

  "What did your dad say?" Michael asked.

  "He said that his father died in the war." Trung had shouldered his equipment.

  It was too late to say that he was sorry. He didn't know that Thing's grandfather had been in the Vietnam War. He saw Trung in a new light. Maybe Trung deserved that bivouac ribbon after all on account of his grandfather getting killed. Michael's own grandfather had gotten his foot crushed by a forklift, but that didn't count as much.

  "Let's go," Trung said, with his hand already in his pocket, searching for the twenty-five-dollar admission. They approached the front office. A woman with a tattoo of a butterfly on her throat sold them tickets and six cartridges that held the paintballs.

  "How about candies?" she asked. The butterfly on her throat seemed to flap its wings when she spoke. Her breath was anything but candy. It smelled sour.

  Michael knew that the candies were overpriced. And he already had some candy in his pocket, enough to give his blood a good blast of energy. But he wanted to be friendly and said, "Okay." He bought a Milky Way.

  Their hands were stamped and the four boys entered the gated area, where they walked down a dusty trail. At the end of the trail they came across three white men wearing T-shirts that said VIETNAM VETS. They were sitting on top of a picnic table, loading their guns. The men locked hard stares on the four boys.

  ¡Chihuahua! Michael thought. They're real soldiers. He had imagined that there would only be kids their age, but as they stepped into the wooded area he saw more adults. For the first time, he felt scared. He took off his glasses, fogged the lenses with his breath, rubbed them clean, and put them back on his face. Two more men appeared out of the bushes, their faces painted green and black.

  "How come there are so many grown-ups?" Michael asked in a whisper.

  "They like it," Trung answered. "They get to be kids again."

  It didn't make sense to Michael. But he had a bigger worry. "Does it really hurt when you're shot?"

  Trung had told him that the paintballs did hurt, but he hadn't really believed him. Even when Trung lifted up his shirt and showed him the bruises. But then he was thinking that maybe they did hurt, like a rubber band shot at you at close range.

  "Okay, newbie," Trung took Michael's gun away. He began to load it with a fifty-round cartridge.

  Newbie was like rookie, and Michael didn't like the word. But he didn't say anything as he watched Trung load and then unload the cartridge. He handed the gun to Michael and said, "Okay, you do it."

  He slipped in the cartridge, but struggled to take it out—he had to use a thumb to undo a latch.

  "You'll be dead if you don't go faster."

  "It's my first time!" Michael scolded.

  "That's why you a newbie." He next explained how the game of paintball worked. You made teams of ten on each side, sometimes more, sometimes fewer. "If you get hit," Trung warned, "don't take off the goggles. Just stay still or you'll get hit again. Here you have to lie on your belly."

  Michael swallowed. He had to ask again. "Does it really hurt to get hit?"

  "Only in the leg." Trung then added that it hurt in the arms, too, and the butt. But you would deserve it if you got tagged in the butt. What was it doing in the air? Why were you running away? Only guys who ran away got tagged there.

  "I ain't going to run away," Michael countered. But he could see himself running away. He could see himself dead in the field, a vulture picking at his entrails.

  "Let's go, homey," Trung said after he attached the air hoses that supplied power to the gun.

  Michael followed his friend. He lowered his eyes and watched his goggles swing on his chest—left, right, left, right—to the rhythm of his march. They were headed to the center of the field, where a paint-splattered flag hung limp as laundry. Trung told him that the object was to get the flag. The side that first pulled it from the ground was the winner.

  Truc and Tran had skipped down earlier to the center of the field. They were smiling and eager to get started. But Michael, a cadet, was all business. For him war was war, even if it was paintballs and not bullets flying through the air.

  "How many rounds do you got again?" Michael asked.

  "Two hundred," Trung answered. "And you got fifty, remember?"

  Doscientos, he wondered in Spanish. He saw in his mind two hundred bodies scattered across a field and a vulture on top of each one of them. With each tug of flesh, the vultures gripped harder and flapped their evil wings.

  But he let the image go. He was about to ask why his gun held only fifty rounds, then he remembered he was using Trung's old equipment. Trung had every right to have the better gun.

  The three Vietnam vets were in the center of the group, and one of them was attaching knee pads. He was trim, and his jaw was dark with a day-old beard. He stared at True and Tran, who said something in Vietnamese. The boys quieted, however, when the vet answered back in Vietnamese. He laughed at the boys and shaped his fingers into a gun and shot them.

  The boys pretended they were shot. They laughed and raised their guns up at the vet.

  "Don't point until we're on," one of the other vets snarled.

  Truc and Tran lowered their guns.

  Teams were made up. It was the four boys plus six high school kids, all friends in matching dark clothes, against the vets and seven other men. To Michael one man seemed as if he might have served in World War II. He was old; his front teeth and hair were gone. But he had ears, Michael noticed, and they were hairy. They were like earmuffs without being earmuffs.

  Michael followed his squad and the barking of their leader. They immediately learned his command name: Squirrel. They headed two hundred yards up the hill, and the squad of older men headed in the opposite direction.

  "Let's not get hit by friendly fire," Squirrel said, his goggles already down. His finger was already on the trigger, but the safety was locked.

  Friendly fire, Michael thought. He had heard that before. "Friendly fire," he repeated under his breath.

  "Distance yourselves," Squirrel ordered. "Don't bunch up, and let's be honest. If you get hit, don't wipe the paint off." He scanned his squad until they all wagged their heads in agreement. He then gave them each a code name.

  "You!" Squirrel shouted. He was pointing at Michael. "Stay next to TUrtle." Turtle was one of the high school kids and looked like a turtle with his head sunk down into his shoulders. Squirrel told the four boys that they each had a name—Bird One to Bird Four. Michael was Bird Three. He was glad that he wasn't Bird Four because that would have brought his confidence down. He didn't know Tran, but Michael hoped that he would be better than him at paintball.

  Michael turned to Trung—Bird One—and had the feeling that he wanted to say good-bye. After all, wasn't this kind of like war? He licked his lips and undid his canteen from his belt. He felt foolish. He was the only one with a canteen; everyone else had water bottles stuck in their oversized pants pockets. He drank long and hard, and then placed his canteen in the loose soil.

  "Everyone get their goggles down!" Squirrel ordered. "Connect your hoses if you haven't done so! Safeties off!"

  Michael worked his goggles down over his eyeglasses. They fogged immediately. Squirrel, in frog leaps, advanced toward Michael. He took the goggles off Michael's head and said, "Spit in them, Bird Three!"

  "What?" Michael asked, confused. But when he saw Squirrel's Adam's apple bob as he gathered a gob in his mouth, Michael immediately spit into his goggles. Squirrel told him to rub it in. That would stop the fogging.

  A whistle cried. The battle was on.

  Michael sat down in the leaves, his gun between his legs. He looked down at the valley where the wind stirred the flag. He could see movement in the brush and he heard the click of a gun safety. He then heard TUrtle whisper, "Let's go!"

  Crouching, he followed Turtle, and together they descended the hill that was worn bare from previous wa
rs. Michael looked to his right and saw Trung and Tran following someone called Crow. They were moving smoothly, as if they were born to combat. I'm not jealous, he thought—but he was, for he himself was descending the hill mostly on his butt. Jealousy was quickly supplanted by fear when he heard fire from the other side—a paintball whizzed over his head and hit a tree. Three shots hit in front of him. If he had been in that place, he would already be dead, out of the game. He was glad that he was slow, and glad that Turtle was starting to return fire. Turtle had a gun that spit rapidly.

  "Bird Three," Turtle called. "Left flank, ten o'clock."

  Michael thought, Left flank, ten o'clock. He knew that they were military terms, but could only guess at their meaning. He swiveled his head left.

  Fifty yards away one of the Vietnam vets was crouching near a granite rock. The vet's teeth were shiny, a giveaway. He started to raise his gun.

  "Ay," Michael muttered and backed away on his butt. Dust rose up all around him.

  "Shoot, Bird Three!" Turtle ordered. Turtle himself was firing at movement in a bush. When the fire was returned, Turtle went down on his belly and crawled like a turtle toward the bush. The smoke of dust rose around his body. He stopped to wipe his dusty goggles.

  Michael raised his gun and fired blindly, a round of paintballs cutting through the air. The vet disappeared behind the rock, still alive. The blood from his paintballs dripped on the face of the rock. Michael, feeling a little braver, moved to his right down the hill. He looked back; he didn't want anything to do with the vet—for now.

  Turtle and the guy in the bush were gunning for each other. Michael could see the guy from where he was. He was a man in black, a sort of ninja. Michael thought: I can get him. He began to duck waddle toward the man, who was pinned down by Turtle's fire. The firing stopped, and he could hear both Turtle and the man changing cartridges. Michael wondered if he should wait until the cartridges were in before he fired. He wanted to be fair. He counted to five—that was enough.

  "Now," Michael said to himself.