Mexican WhiteBoy

by Matt De La Peña

  Uno nods, riveted. That’s exactly right, he thinks. Even the people who don’t talk about money are thinking about it. Because everybody’s poor. Every one of his friends. Their families.

  Senior takes a roll of breath mints out of the pocket of his khakis, unwraps it and pops one in his mouth. He wads the wrapper up and shoves it back in his pocket. “Take a look around you, son. Everywhere—it’s the same goddamn thing. Some old union cat and his wife are sittin’ at the kitchen table right this second, balancin’ they checkbook. Scannin’ overdue bills, highlightin’ dates shit gets turned off.

  “Across the way some little Mexican girl’s openin’ up a fashion magazine. The one she keep hidden under the bed. She turnin’ to page a hundred and fifty-one. Pullin’ out a secret stash of cash and countin’: ‘Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, fifty-five, fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight.’ She’s restackin’ them bills over and over, in order of value, but it still ain’t enough to get her hair done. Not like the little white girl in the magazine. The actress. She flippin’ to that dog-eared magazine page again, studyin’ the picture. Lookin’ at herself in the mirror, runnin’ a couple fingers through her nappy-ass hair.

  “Your little stepbrother Manny. He at the Arby’s down the street mopping a soda spill near the patio exit. The new owner just enrolled in a program where they send you partially retarded cats to work part time. He gets a tax break from the state. Gets cheap labor and a write-up in the local paper. Looks like a hero. Your little bro’s mopping away until he spots an abandoned quarter, reaches down for it. When some white broad walks by with a pipin’-hot meal deal he holds the quarter out and tells her: ‘Excuse me, miss? Who lost this quarter, miss?’

  “But the woman just shakin’ her head, Uno. She hurryin’ past. Know why? ’Cause she scared of this little retarded Mexican with a mop.”

  Uno searches his head for connection. His brother doesn’t work at Arby’s. Is he just saying that as a figure of speech?

  Senior slaps the bleacher, says: “And here I am with my firstborn. Just gave the boy a ten-spot. So he could go get hisself some lunch tomorrow. ‘Something with vegetables,’ I tell him. ‘Gotta fuel a young mind with the right nutrients. Can’t fly a rocket ship to the moon with the same juice you pump into a lawn mower.’ But he ain’t even hear me. My own son. Shades drawn on his daddy. And why? ’Cause he programmed to hear what rich white folks tell him in the media. And he thinkin’, ‘Nah, Dad, I watch sports and BET and rap videos.’ But who you think program that bullshit, Uno? Ain’t no Miguel from down the block, Jack.”

  Uno straightens up a little, says, “The media?”

  “The white media.”

  Uno nods his head.

  “Gotta figure out what you is, baby. A jet rocket? Or a lawn mower? You ever heard of a self-fulfillment prophecy, Uno?”

  Uno looks to the clouds for a sec, then turns back to his dad and shakes his head.

  “It’s when a person thinks of hisself in a certain way until it comes true. You ask me, that’s the same thing as jumpin’ off a bridge, takin’ your own life.”

  “I wouldn’t never jump off no bridge, Pop.”

  “Better not, boy. Not even in a metaphor way. That’s a deadly sin in two books. God’s and mine.” Senior breaks a smile, first one of the day.

  Uno nods, looks out over his high school football field again. He knows deep down he would never kill himself. He likes being alive. Even if he knows the things that happen to him aren’t always good. It doesn’t matter. He wants to be alive. And not only that, he wants to see who he is. Like somebody from the outside can.

  “Look, I set the number high, Uno. Five hundred bones gets your ass to Oxnard. But I did that shit for a reason. Everybody in National City wishes they had more. But wishes don’t pay the bills, do they? You wanna pay the bills, you gotta get out there and work. Who you gonna be, son? A wisher? Or a worker?”

  “A worker.”

  Senior nods. “That’s good, boy. Now get out there and work. Don’t just talk about it, be about it.”

  Senior grabs Uno’s head, gets him in a playful headlock. “You gonna be all right, boy,” he says. “Watch.”

  Uno laughs as he slips his old man’s grip. He looks up at him and nods. How does his pop know all this stuff about life? He didn’t used to be like this. Is it ’cause he spends so much time going to church now? Is it the biographies? Or is it living up in Oxnard with his new family? He wishes his moms would take the time to talk to Senior. So she could see it for herself. She doesn’t know anything about who he is now.

  When Senior gets up, Uno gets up, too. And both set off in the direction of Uno’s apartment.

  2

  A few days later, Uno’s sitting on the curb outside his place picking at the web of his beat-up mitt. It’s been almost three weeks since his old man told him he needed five hundred bucks, and he still doesn’t know how he’s gonna come up with it. At least not before the end of the summer. He wants to work, it’s just nobody will hire him.

  He looks up, watches a few little Mexican kids huddle around a dead possum a few yards down the sidewalk. Watches the kid without a shirt poke at the little corpse with a stick and his boys back up, laughing.

  Uno goes back to his mitt. He put in applications at a mess of places, but nobody’s called him back. Not one restaurant, one clothing store, one shoe shop. Not even the coffee shop outside the mall that always has the “Now Hiring” sign taped to the door. What’s up with that? The pot at last Saturday’s derby was crazy fat, over thirty bones. Kids were coming out of the woodwork with their two bucks. And when it was his turn to pick up the bat he rose to the occasion. Hit ten dongs, his personal record. Too bad Sofe’s cousin hit fifteen. Six that cleared two houses.

  Uno shakes his head, pulls his hand out of his mitt to scratch the back of his head. What’s up with that kid? Uno wonders again.

  He stands up, brushes the dirt off the back of his jeans, then spots Sofia wandering out of her apartment complex lugging a bulging backpack.

  Uno and his boys can always make out Sofia by her walk. It’s the perfect mix of fading tomboy and budding diva. When they were all kids, she was one of the guys. Talked as much head as anyone, threw down if somebody got in her face. But over the past few years she started hanging out more with the girls. And the less time she’s spent with dudes, the more time dudes have spent noticing her.

  3

  He breaks into a slight jog to catch up. Halfway up the hill he yells out: “Hey! Yo, Sofe!”

  Sofia turns around, waits on him.

  “Sofe,” Uno says, a little out of breath. He slows to a walk. “Where you goin’, girl?”

  “Me and Carmen are goin’ bladin’,” she says, pointing to her pack. “What’s up with you?”

  Uno shakes his head. “Nah, Sofe, I’m tryin’ to figure out how to make some money. My pop got me on some deadline shit, man.”

  “Yeah?”

  Uno slaps his mitt with his right hand. “But how I’m supposed to get a job if don’t nobody call me back?”

  Sofia reaches down to adjust one of her flip-flop straps. She slips her foot out, slips it back in. “I heard Foot Locker’s hiring.”

  “Tried ’em already.”

  “What about the coffee shop?”

  “Ain’t got one call, Sofe. And you know why, right?”

  “No, but I’m sure you’re about to tell me.”

  “It’s ’cause my ass is half black. It ain’t right.”

  “That’s not true, Uno.”

  “Seems like it. I been out droppin’ applications for a week straight. Nothin’.”

  Sofia looks up the hill, says: “Wanna walk with me?”

  Uno nods and they continue up the hill together. At the top they veer into Las Palmas Park and cut across the empty parking lot to the walking trail. Sofia tosses out a couple more ideas, but nothing sticks. She switches her backpack from one shoulder to the other. Uno tucks his mitt under his arm and picks up a cou
ple of rocks. He lobs one of them into a tree.

  As they approach the potholed road that leads to the baseball field, Sofia points and says, “How much you wanna bet my cousin’s down there right now?”

  Uno looks at her strangely. “He go to this place?”

  “Every day.”

  “Stop lyin’. Why?”

  “I swear. He works on his pitching. He’s so good for a reason. He’s totally obsessed about baseball.”

  “Yeah?”

  Sofia nods and then stops walking. “Hey, you wanna go check him out for a sec?”

  4

  The two of them march down the hill with the broken-up concrete, toward the ice plant bank. When they round a group of bushes near the right-field fence, they find Danny firing a fastball toward home plate. Watch him reach into his bucket for another baseball and go right back into his windup.

  They sit on the hill together, behind Danny, out of sight. Uno sets down his last rock, says: “He do this shit every day?”

  “Every day.”

  “Damn.”

  “Right?”

  They watch Danny in silence for a few more minutes, then Uno clears his throat. “Yo, Sofe.”

  “What’s up?”

  “I meant to tell you, man. I apologize, you know. For jumping your boy a few weeks back. I just…you feel me? It messed with my head seeing my brother’s face all bloody like that.”

  Sofia nods without taking her eyes off the baseball field. “Especially when my cuz kept hittin’ ’em over the roof, right?”

  “Nah, Sofe. That didn’t have nothin’—”

  Sofia faces him. “Come on, Uno. You act like I don’t know your dumb ass.”

  Uno looks at her for a sec, a blank look in his eyes. Then he picks the rock back up and flips it over in his hand. “Look, the shit didn’t exactly put me in a good mood, all right?”

  “That’s what I thought.”

  “I’m tryin’ to reach a certain number, man. And I was countin’ on them derby pots. Then along comes Sofe’s damn cousin, out of nowhere. Jackin’ tennis balls out like it wasn’t nothin’. I was like, ‘Who the hell is this cat?’”

  Sofia puts her hand on Uno’s and then takes it off. “I know, Uno, but he’s family.”

  Uno nods. “I got you, Sofe. I’m sayin’, for real, I’m sorry.”

  Sofia nods. They both watch Danny fire another fastball and then walk toward home plate with his bucket to collect balls.

  Uno tries to imagine being out here alone. Every single day. No friends or anything. And then he thinks back on something his dad once said. About how studying the Bible taught him to love himself. Taught him to look inward for companionship. Taught him to actually look forward to spending time alone with himself. He turns to Sofia, says: “Yo, Sofe, you ever think about goin’ to church?”

  Sofia turns to him with a look of surprise. “Me?”

  “Yeah. You believe in that stuff?”

  “Oh, man, I don’t know. I mean, I definitely believe there’s something out there. I don’t know what, but something. Or else—I don’t know.”

  “What?”

  Sofia sits there for a second before answering. “I don’t know. It’s just, sometimes I wonder if there’s even a point. We wake up every day, go to school, do homework, eat dinner, talk to our friends, go to sleep, and then wake up and do it all over again. It’s like this story my teacher was telling us. About the guy who spends all day rolling a boulder up a hill and then, when he gets to the top, he just lets it roll back down. That myth or whatever. I mean, what kind of shit is that? What’s the point?”

  Uno nods, turns back to the field.

  After a long silence Sofia says: “Why’d you ask me that, anyway?”

  Uno shrugs. “I don’t know. It just popped in my head.”

  Sofia shrugs, too, and they both go quiet again.

  5

  Uno watches Danny step back onto the mound. But the kid doesn’t go right into his windup this time. He looks up, watches a big bird that’s circling in the sky. Stands like that for a long time. Neck all craned upward, ball hanging limp in his right hand. Eventually Danny turns his attention back to the plate, but he doesn’t go into his windup. He just stares at the backstop. Or the plate. His body frozen like a statue.

  “What’s he doin’?” Uno says.

  “You got me,” Sofia says. “Do you think it’s kind of weird he comes here all alone?”

  “Seems like it’d be boring. Especially ’cause he ain’t got no catcher.”

  “My dad thinks he’s antisocial. And he says it has something to do with his own dad leavin’ so suddenly because of all this stuff that happened.”

  “What’s weird is how he don’t barely talk. And when he does you can’t even hear his ass.”

  Sofia turns to face Uno. “Yeah, except when he saved your ass from my uncle Ray. He shouted that shit out, right?”

  Uno smiles. He picks up a stick, breaks it in half. Rubs the two ends together. “What happened to his dad?”

  “Long story,” she says, shaking her head. She turns back to the field.

  They both go quiet for the next couple minutes. They watch Danny resume pulling baseballs from his bucket. Watch him go into his high-kick windup and fire pitch after pitch at the backstop. Finally Sofia breaks the silence. “I’m sorry about Manny bein’ gone.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you at least get to see him?”

  Uno tosses the sticks back into the grass. He doesn’t answer. He looks over his shoulder and spots a Mexican dude with a Padres cap watching Danny from on top of the hill, his arms folded. He nudges Sofia, says: “Yo, Sofe, you know that guy?”

  Sofia turns to look where Uno’s pointing. “Nuh-uh,” she says. “Why?”

  “I thought I seen him watchin’ your cuz pitch at the fair, man.”

  Sofia shrugs. She looks at her watch and gets up, says: “I should go meet Carmen. She’s probably waitin’ on me.”

  Uno gets up, too, and they both climb back up the hill toward the main park road. The sun’s almost directly over their heads, and the air is warm and dry. Uno notices the big bird is still circling in the sky.

  “We’re supposed to meet over there,” Sofia says, pointing to the tennis courts.

  “Cool,” Uno says.

  They give each other a quick hug and wave their goodbyes, and then Sofia heads down the narrow path, toward the tennis courts. Uno continues down the road a ways, in the opposite direction. But as soon as Sofia’s out of sight he spins around, heads back toward the baseball field.

  Uno Interrupts Danny’s Workout

  1

  Danny tosses his mitt down next to the mound, takes a seat on a patch of dying grass.

  After every ten buckets of balls he makes himself do a couple sets of sit-ups and push-ups. A few nights ago he came up with a theory. Maybe one of the reasons he was mentally weak at the Leucadia Prep tryout was because he was physically weak. Maybe the two are directly related. Even if it’s just a confidence thing. Sure, he could throw a lot harder than anybody his age, but that wasn’t because he was strong. It was because he had long arms. Because he’d stumbled into the perfect pitching form for his particular build. Truth is, he could only do about eight pull-ups in gym class.

  That’s when it hit him. If you think you’re strong physically, you’ll probably be stronger mentally. And though he doesn’t have access to a weight room, or even a set of dumbbells or a pull-up bar, he figures a bunch of sit-ups and push-ups will probably do the job.

  He lies on his back on the grass, folds his arms and starts in on another set of crunches. This is his first time doing any type of strength training. And even though it’s only been a few days, he already feels more cut. He’s been checking his abs and arms in the mirror before going to bed, and something’s definitely happening. Is it really possible to change the makeup of his body in only two weeks? Maybe not. But if he thinks he can, what difference does it make? If he thinks he’s strong
er, he is stronger.

  Danny flips over and starts in on some push-ups. But after five, out of the corner of his eye, he spots somebody sliding down the ice plant slope. A black dude in jeans and a white T-shirt. Shaved head.

  Danny cuts short his set and sits up. It’s Uno. He watches the guy rip down the hill, mitt in hand, and land perfectly on his feet.

  2

  Uno looks up, gives Danny a head nod.

  Danny nods back, picks up his own mitt and hops to his feet. Watches Uno unhook the rusted latch on the gate and step through, relatch behind him. Watches him stroll out onto the field, looking over both shoulders. As he nears the mound Uno shoves his hands in his jeans pockets and clears his throat, says: “Hey, man.”

  Danny says “Hey” under his breath and studies his mitt.

  Uno looks around at the field and shakes his head. “Know when’s the last time I played ball here?” he says.

  Danny shakes his head, pulls the baseball out of his mitt and grips it in his right hand for a sec. Then he drops the ball back into his mitt.

  “I was twelve, man. Little League semifinals. I played catcher. Even made the all-star team that year.”

  Danny looks up the hill. Nobody else is around. He wonders what would happen if there was another fight right here, with no one to break it up. What would he do?

  Uno shakes his head, staring in the direction of the backstop. “Yeah, man. Caught a foul tip off the mask.” He looks at Danny. “But it spun the shit around on my face, right? Must’ve been mad loose or somethin’. And the metal wire of the mask broke my damn nose. It didn’t hurt that bad at first, but I flipped when I saw blood streamin’ down my shirt. I was twelve, man. I didn’t know if I was hurt real bad or somethin’. So I pulled off the mask and held my hands to my face and fell my ass on the ground.”