by Nancy Rue
“Warm milk,” Inez said. “We will drink it with nutmeg.”
“Oh,” Lucy said. The book was really boring into her now. She inched it out and propped it beside her.
Inez folded her hands neatly. “I write in a book. It is — hmm — it last a long time.”
“Yeah,” Lucy said with surprise. “I’m going to keep this forever.”
“Good.”
It didn’t seem right not to say something back.
“Sometimes I write about what I don’t like.”
“God wants to hear about that, yes.”
“God?” Lucy said.
“My book is sometimes how I talk to God.”
Lucy put the book on top of Marmalade, who didn’t budge, and fingered the gold leaves. “I didn’t know I was talking to God.”
“You tell the truth when you write?”
Lucy pulled the book to her chest. Inez almost smiled.
“I see that you are. We must protect our secrets.”
At the moment, Lucy wished only a password would open the Book of Lists. And yet, it didn’t feel like Inez was going to grab it from her.
“If you write honest thoughts, you talk to God. Your thoughts they have been answered?”
“Huh?”
“Look. Think.”
Inez glided off to the kitchen, and Lucy f lipped through the pages. Aunt Karen hadn’t moved to Australia yet. Lucy still missed her mom. Although she had to admit she couldn’t make flan or machaca or make the Bible better than Disney, she could get along without Inez just like she did before. Right?
But she no longer wanted to f lush the soccer team down the toilet. She didn’t really have an attitude anymore. And most of her reasons for hating school weren’t that true now.
That was because of God? Even though she’d never thought of him while she was making her lists except to blame him for all the rotten stuff?
“He thinks of you,” Inez said.
Lucy looked up with a start. Inez put a cup of something that smelled amazing into her hand.
“When you think of him also, that is even better.”
Lucy looked down at the last thing she’d written.
“God can tell me what kind of girl to be?” Lucy said.
“He has already.”
Lucy leaned in, ready to ask, ready to listen. But the back door opened, and Lucy heard Dad’s cane tapping on the floor. Inez said, “We are here, Senor Rooney.”
Dad appeared with his coat still on and his face drawn into straight lines.
“Luce, you still up?”
“Sleep escaped me,” Lucy said.
Dad smiled, but there was no sunlight. He sank into his chair, and Lucy joined him on the arm, leaving Marmalade and the Book of Lists on the Napping Couch.
“They won’t pay for our equipment, right?” she said.
“It’s worse than that, I’m afraid, champ.”
How could it be? She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear.
“A big corporation has offered to buy the property where the old soccer field is and put a gas station there.”
“We already have a gas station.”
“This is going to be the gas station to end all gas stations, evidently. There will be a grocery store, a Pizza Hut — ”
“We don’t need that! We have Pasco’s and Mr. Benitez’s!”
“This’ll be for travelers passing through,” Dad said. “They plan to open up a major road from the highway. It’s a big deal.”
Lucy stood up. “They can’t take our soccer field, Dad.”
“They can if the town of Los Suenos sells it to them. The council says we need the money to fix our roads, improve our schools.” He sounded like he was reading something from a paper. It wasn’t Dad being convinced, and Lucy’s heart plummeted all the way to her belly.
“Nothing is going to happen yet — the council hasn’t decided. But needless to say, they weren’t eager to put up the money for soccer equipment if there isn’t going to be a field to play on.”
“That’s not fair!”
“You are absolutely right.” Dad felt for Lucy’s hand and then dropped his to the arm of the chair. “But whoever promised us fair?”
So that was it. Her dream was gone before it ever emerged from the mist of her mind. Lucy felt so heavy all she wanted to do was lie down. She picked up her book and headed down the hall. Soft footsteps followed her.
“Make the list for God about this,” Inez said. And then she disappeared down the yellow rug.
What was God going to do about it?
Lucy headed into her room and tripped over Mora’s bag stuffed with dance equipment. It irritated Lucy right up the back of her neck.
Mora lived in a big town. She got to do what she wanted because people cared about kids there. How was Lucy supposed to get people like Mr. Benitez to vote for cleats?
But she wanted that more than anything. And if nobody else was going to do anything about it, how could it hurt to ask God? He’d done a few things lately, maybe —
She took a f lashlight out of the toy chest and sat up on her bed. With the light clamped between her propped-up knees, she wrote:
Lucy licked at the tears that trailed over her lips. And then she wrapped her arms around her book and fell asleep with the lists — and maybe God — up close to her heart.
Mora hogged the bathroom the next morning, and Lucy barely had time to brush her teeth, so she was not in a good mood when she slammed out the back gate. When Januarie said, “I have to tell you something,” Lucy said, “You know what? I have important things on my mind.”
Januarie whimpered and ran off. If she’d had a tail, it would have been between her legs. Lucy barely had time for a guilty pang before Carla Rosa and the boys, minus J.J., were on her at the bicycle rack.
“Tell them I’m not lying,” Carla Rosa said. “ ‘Cause, guess what, my father’s the mayor.”
Lucy hitched at her backpack. “Did she tell you her dad said some big company wants to buy our soccer field?”
“Aw, man — then it is true.” Oscar pounded his fist on the bike rack and then winced.
“Way to go, lame-o,” Emanuel said.
Lucy stared at them. She hadn’t heard them talk like that in weeks. Because of Mr. Auggy. Because of soccer.
“Buzzzz,” she said.
“Who cares now?” Oscar said. “If we ain’t got no field — ”
“Why is everybody being all gloomy?” Lucy said.
Carla Rosa jiggled the big sequins on her hat. “Guess what? YOU look gloomy.”
“I’m not gloomy. I’m mad.”
She stomped toward the portable with the rest of them behind her.
“What’s the difference?” Oscar said.
“Gloomy means you’re giving up. Mad means you’re going to do something about it.”
“So what are we gonna do?” Emanuel said.
It no longer surprised Lucy when he talked. That was because of soccer too. Which was why she stopped at the bottom of the portable steps and looked at them all with her jaw set.
“I don’t know yet, but we’re not giving up.”
“Guess what?” Carla Rosa whispered.
She pointed up at the door. Mr. Auggy and J.J. stood there. It was the first time J.J. had looked at her in weeks. A knot tied up in Lucy’s throat. God, Inez had said, would untangle your knots.
“You’re not giving up, are you?” Lucy said.
“No way,” Mr. Auggy said. “J.J. and I were just talking about that.”
He looked at J.J., who shrugged and shifted his eyes to the steps. But at least he didn’t curl his lip at Lucy and move away from her like she had head lice.
“We’ll talk about it at recess,” Mr. Auggy said. “I want the whole team there.” He nodded at Lucy. “That okay with you, captain?”
She wanted to know what he was thinking right NOW, but she agreed — and then practically held her breath until lunch. Dusty and Veronica met her at the cafeteria door.
“You didn’t come to the cubbies this morning,” Dusty said.
“Hello — we needed to talk to you,” Veronica said.
“Oh,” Lucy said. She didn’t know that was supposed to be a regular thing.
Dusty looped her arms around Lucy’s elbow and put her lips close to her ear. “I think something bad is going to go down at recess.”
“You mean, what Mr. Auggy is going to tell us?” Lucy said.
“Huh? No. I mean Gabe.”
Veronica crowded to her other side. “He said he is going to kick J.J.’s tail because he’s getting too good on the team.”
“Gabe wants to be the best,” Dusty said into her right ear.
Veronica tugged her left arm. “I don’t even like him as a boyfriend anymore.”
“When’s it going to happen?” Lucy said. She was already craning her neck to look for J.J., although he hadn’t come into the cafeteria for over a week.
“While we’re practicing.” Dusty shook her head. “That’s hideous.”
Lucy broke away from them. “We have to tell Mr. Auggy.”
“You mean like tattle?” Veronica’s lower lip took a plunge. “I am so not doing that.”
“Mr. Auggy won’t do anything,” Dusty said. “Nobody ever does anything to Gabe. He’s the sheriff ’s kid — ”
“Who cares?” Lucy turned to the door. “I’m finding Mr. Auggy.”
“You didn’t hear it from us,” Veronica said.
“Lucy — ” Dusty said.
But Lucy didn’t turn back. This was why she didn’t trust them — because when it came right down to it, they would always be loyal to their own.
And so would she.
Lucy tossed her sandwich in the garbage on the way out and tore for the field, hoping Mr. Auggy would be there, setting things up. But she didn’t find him. There was only J.J.
And Gabe.
They stood facing each other in the middle of the tiny soccer field. Even as she got closer, neither one of them seemed aware that she was there. She could see their nostrils flaring like trumpets, but nothing else about them seemed small. They weren’t little boys anymore.
“Why don’t you just leave it?” J.J. said.
“Can’t.”
J.J. didn’t ask him why. He just took a step forward.
A step forward. J.J. never went toward Gabe. He always backed away.
Lucy was about to take a step herself, when Gabe said, “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”
Please, J.J. Listen to him.
“I want to finish this,” J.J. said. “I’m done with you dissing me. I’m as good as you.”
“Not at soccer.”
“At everything.”
Lucy watched as Gabe turned into a statue — stiff and hard as if he were made of cement. But his eyes were all too alive, and they glittered like f lint in the sun. His face went a paler shade, and Lucy noticed for the first time that Gabe had tiny coarse hairs growing on his chin. He took a jerky step toward J.J., and Lucy waited for J.J. to lower his chin that half inch that said, “I know you’re stronger than me. I know I got nothing.”
But J.J. didn’t lower his chin — that chin that was hairless as a peach and not nearly so tough-looking as Gabe’s. She wanted to yell for him to run, duck, do something to get away from the heavy body that hurled itself at him and flattened him to the ground.
At first, all she could see were Gabe’s boxer shorts sticking out of the top of his sweats as his shirt came up. Lucy had the urge to laugh, as if it couldn’t possibly be happening. It must not be a real fight if she wanted to laugh. They even growled like Mudge.
But as they rolled over once, then twice, so that Gabe was still on top, the laughter strangled in her throat. Gabe pulled his fist back behind his head, which was a vicious red all the way down to his scalp. He was going to jam it right into J.J.’s face, and J.J. wouldn’t fight back. She knew it.
And then Gabe bucked as if he was on a bronco, and suddenly he was on his back with J.J. sitting astride him. J.J.’s Adam’s apple pumped up and down, up and down, and he breathed so loud Lucy could hear the air heaving in his chest. He was on top of Gabe — and Gabe wasn’t moving. Even Gabe’s face was frozen in an open-eyed startle.
J.J. cocked his fist back, face muscles working hard as he breathed. Gabe’s eyes finally awakened, and he turned his head.
Bust him, J.J. Get him back for making you feel like dirt —
Don’t do it, J.J. They’ll never let you off like they will him —
Lucy felt like she was one big knot. Still, J.J. sat on Gabe with his arm tense as steel, threatening with his eyes. Where was God with his big untying fingers?
Gabe struggled. J.J. pinned him with his legs, with one arm. His muscles stood out, shiny and hard, like they belonged to someone else, not the boy across the street she had to protect from bullies. With the knot growing in her throat, she put her hand over her mouth. She couldn’t stop it this time.
But there was somebody who could. Lucy whipped around and ran into that very person. Mr. Auggy put his finger to his lips and turned his eyes back to the boys. Other kids gathered, but nobody said a word — not with Mr. Auggy there watching too.
What was he thinking?
Lucy felt a tug at her sleeve. “Make him stop,” Januarie said. “J.J.’s gonna get killed!”
Lucy looked back at J.J. He didn’t look like he was in any danger from Gabe at all. He still had his fist cocked back, but as she pleaded with him silently, J.J., don’t, don’t, he opened his fingers and pressed his f lat hand on Gabe’s shoulder.
“It’s over,” J.J., said into Gabe’s stricken face. “I’m as good as you, and I’m done provin’ it.”
He didn’t even wait to see if Gabe would answer. He just stood up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and took a step back. And then he reached his hand down.
Gabe shook his head at it, but Mr. Auggy said quietly, “Take it, Gabe. We’re done.”
And so Gabe did, and J.J. helped him up. They didn’t look at each other. Gabe stomped toward the building, and Veronica started after him. But Mr. Auggy said, “Leave it, Miss Veronica.”
She did.
J.J. still stood at the scene of the fight. Nobody else seemed to know what to do. But Lucy suddenly knew she did.
“Ding-ding-ding, J.J.,” she said.
“Oh, yeah.” Mr. Auggy grinned bigger than Lucy ever thought his small mouth would go. “That deserves a ding-ding-ding if anything ever did. That’s integrity, Mr. J.J.”
Other, non-soccer kids mumbled to each other and drifted away as if they were disappointed. Mr. Auggy didn’t seem to notice them. He put out his arms to gather the team.
“You’re ready,” he said when they were all around him — except Gabe.
“For what?” Carla Rosa said.
Oscar and Emanuel were too busy staring — in awe — at J.J. to even respond, until Mr. Auggy said, “You’re ready to play another team.”
“You lie,” Dusty said and then clapped her hand over her mouth.
Mr. Auggy’s eyes twinkled. “No, it’s the truth. I think we have all our differences settled, and we can act like a team now. You’ve had the skills. Now you have the heart.”
“What about Gabe?” Veronica said. “J.J. almost kicked his tail — he’s not gonna give up until he gets back at him.”
Mr. Auggy shook his head, along with all the other boys. “You have a lot to learn about guys, Miss Veronica. We’re not like girls. When it’s done — it’s done.”
Why, Lucy wondered, couldn’t girls be like that? Boys she understood. Girls she still didn’t get. Maybe she just never would.
But they were a team — boys, girls, Hispanic, white — it didn’t matter.
“Who are we going to play?” she said.
Mr. Auggy rubbed the back of his head. “That I don’t know yet. I’ll find another team, though. Let’s just be ready for them.”
“We’ll dominate them!” Oscar said.
>
“Oh, heck yeah!” Dusty said.
She snatched the ball from Lucy and ran, looking over her shoulder. Lucy ran after her, and when she caught up, Dusty put her ear close to Lucy’s and said, “You were right about Mr. Auggy. Someday, I hope I’m as smart as you are about stuff.”
Then she was off with the ball again. Tonight, Lucy decided, she was going to make a list: Things I Probably Don’t Even Know about My Own Self.
“Let’s play soccer!” Mr. Auggy called out.
And so she did.
17
Mr. Auggy was right about boys being completely different from girls.
Lucy and Mora were finishing up their homework late that afternoon when Lucy heard a car pull up at the side curb. Mora flew to the window like she was expecting Hannah Montana. She hiked herself up to the sink and flattened her nose to the glass.
“It’s that cute teacher,” she reported.
“Mora, down,” Inez said.
“And your dad.”
“Mora — ”
“And a boy — cute one — if you like the bad-boy type.”
“Does he have a ponytail?” Lucy said as Inez pried Mora away from the sink.
“Yeah. Skinny. He’s not Hispanic — more like — ”
“Apache,” Lucy said. She had a stab of fear. “Is Januarie with them?”
“Why would she be? Who is he?”
“Mora,” Inez said, “go watch Oprah.”
Mora’s eyes rounded. “You’re not serious.” And then, as if she were afraid Inez was going to change her mind, she scooted out of the kitchen, but not before she took one more gape out the window in the back door.
“Definitely cute,” she said.
Lucy didn’t care if J.J. was cute. She only cared that he didn’t give her the slit eyes or, worse, pretend she wasn’t there. It was hard not to run to her room so she didn’t have to find out.
The back door opened, and Dad caned his way in. He didn’t look like he’d been arguing with anybody, and Mr. Auggy was wearing the smile when he came in behind him. J.J. didn’t follow, though, and Lucy’s heart took a nosedive. Oh well. Inez said everything didn’t always turn out happily ever after.
“Hey, Miss Lucy,” Mr. Auggy said. “J.J.’s out here. He wants to talk to you.”
