by Nancy Rue
“Mudgie — come smell — tuna, big guy!”
She walked every inch of the yard, waving the can until the smell made her stomach icky.
“He must be out hunting,” Dad said finally.
“No, that’s Artemis’s job.”
“I don’t know that anybody ever told him that.” Dad held out his hand. “Come on in, Luce. He’ll be back.”
“Will you wake me up if he gets here in the middle of the night?”
“Absolutely not,” Dad said as she joined him on the steps. He slid his arm around her shoulder. “Mudge can’t stay away from you, champ. You’re his whole reason for living.”
That didn’t make Lucy feel much better. She was sure she wouldn’t sleep at all, though she did, and when she ran out to the century plant in her pajamas at sunrise, there was no Mudge.
Dad didn’t promise her he’d be waiting for her when she got home from school. Lucy knew he couldn’t. They didn’t make those kinds of promises to each other. She just added that to her list of knots for God to untie and went off miserably to school.
At least soccer practice was good. Carla Rosa showed off her new skills for Mr. Auggy, and even Gabe passed the ball to her once.
“You’re playing like a team,” Mr. Auggy said. “You’re going to show those Pachucos what time it is now.”
“Pachucos?” Lucy said.
“That’s slang for being from El Paso — it’s their team name.”
Dusty touched Lucy’s shoulder and grinned at her. “Bolillo.”
“Did you just call me a name?”
“I called you an Anglo — you’re not Hispanic and you’re not Indo. You’re bolillo.” Dusty got her lips close to Lucy’s ear. “You’re my favorite bolillo.”
Veronica folded her lanky arms. “I can’t believe you’ve lived here since you were, like, four, and you never learned any Spanish.”
“I know quesadilla — machaca — asada — ”
“What is this, a restaurant?” Gabe said. “Could we just play soccer?”
“Yeah,” J.J. said.
And then everyone looked as if the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote had just shaken hands.
“What about this for our team name?” Mr. Auggy said. “Los Suenos.”
“Lame,” Gabe said. “It’s just the name of our town.”
“Right. The Dreams.” His eyes got misty. “If this isn’t a dream come true, I don’t know what is.”
“The Los Suenos Dreams,” Lucy said.
“Then it’s Spanish and English.” Dusty said.
“Guess what?” Carla Rosa looked at Veronica. “I love that!”
“You are so cute!” Veronica squealed.
The boys all looked at each other like silliness had just reached a new level.
Nobody had to be reminded to get water when practice was over. The afternoons were warmer now that March had begun. Lucy even asked Mr. Auggy if she could put her sweatshirt in her cubby before she went back to the portable. He told her to hurry because the bell had already rung and she didn’t need to run into Mrs. Nunez.
Lucy swung happily into the cubby hall, which should have been empty, and stopped. She could feel her mouth fall open so far she could have given Veronica a run for her money. Her cubby hole was once again hurling forth its contents, only this time the culprit was caught in the act.
“Januarie!” Lucy said.
Her voice echoed in the emptiness, and Januarie’s chubby self startled and tripped over Lucy’s backpack, which lay gaping on the f loor. She sat down hard beside it.
“It was you!” Lucy said.
“I hate you!”
The Chihuahua was growling as if she would snap off any hand that came near her. Lucy went to Januarie and put hers down anyway.
“Leave me alone!”
“I won’t.” Lucy squatted beside her. “You’re the one who did this before, aren’t you?”
“No.” Januarie squeezed her eyes shut.
“You can’t make it go away,” Lucy said. “It was you.”
“Yes.”
“Why? Why did you do it and then tell me it was Dusty and Veronica?”
“Because I hate you.”
“I’m not so crazy about you right now either, but I don’t go throwing your stuff around and — ” Something dawned on Lucy. “And tell people you said things about me that you didn’t say.”
Januarie opened her eyes and said, “Huh?” Lucy knew she wouldn’t be able to resist for long.
“You said somebody told you that I said you were too fat to play soccer. Only nobody said that, did they? You made it up.”
“You were starting to like them more than me!”
Lucy stopped with her next words halfway on her lips.
“You let them play with you guys even though they were mean to you, but you wouldn’t let me play and I’m always doing stuff for you!”
Lucy now knew what a Chihuahua must sound like when it was locked in a cage. She sat all the way down on the floor beside Januarie.
“I always shared my sandwich with you at Pasco’s,” she said. “And I let you sleep in my bed with me when you couldn’t sleep at your house because your dad was yelling. And every day I rode my bike slow to school so you wouldn’t be left behind.”
“But you wouldn’t let me play soccer with you.” Januarie turned a now tear-striped face to Lucy with more knots than Lucy had room for on a page. “And you love soccer more than anything or anybody in the whole world!”
She struggled to stand up, and Lucy stood up with her.
“You’re gonna tell on me now, aren’t you?”
“No,” Lucy said. “Not if you put all this stuff back in my cubby. And if you come home with me after school.”
Januarie whimpered. “You want me to?”
“Yeah,” Lucy said. Because she felt a tug inside, and she wanted to see if it was pulling her to the right place.
She filled Dusty and Veronica in before Januarie joined them for the walk home.
“That little brat,” Veronica said.
“Why does she do stuff like that?” Dusty said.
Lucy had no idea, but she was sure what she’d already discovered about Januarie’s dirty work wasn’t even half of it.
“You guys want to help me with something?” she said.
They both nodded. Lucy just finished telling them what she had in mind when Januarie waddled up, face darkening when she saw them.
“All of us girls are getting together,” Lucy told her. “You too.”
At least she didn’t declare her hatred for Lucy and stomp off.
Mora was there when they all arrived, and she gave Lucy a cold look as they gathered at the table. Inez put a plate of sopapillas and butter in front of them and cocked a sharp eyebrow at Mora, who didn’t even flinch. That would have made Lucy confess things she hadn’t even done.
“Hey, Mora,” Veronica said, as planned, “do you have your electronic diary with you?”
“Yes.” Mora pointed a butter-covered finger in the air. “I don’t let it out of my sight anymore since somebody tried to get into it.”
Veronica’s lip went into gear. “Nuh-uh!”
“Hello! Like, three times — ”
Lucy watched Januarie out of the corner of her eye. She squirmed on the chair like it was full of f leas.
“Don’t you have to have a password to get into it?” Dusty said, also according to the script.
“Yes!” Mora was full of exclamation points today. “And the only people who know it are me — of course — and Lucy.” She directed a finger at Lucy like an accusation. “And you — ” The finger went to Dusty — “And you — ” Veronica — “and — ”
The New Mexico desert couldn’t have been more silent than Lucy’s kitchen was at that moment as Mora stabbed her final finger at Januarie. And Januarie couldn’t have looked guiltier than if they had caught her with the electronic diary in her hand.
“What’s my password?” Mora barked at her.
“Consuela!” Januarie plastered her hands over her mouth and burst into tears. “Only I didn’t say it right.”
Mora flattened her upper body on the table, hands slapping the top. Veronica nearly jumped into Dusty’s lap.
“What were you thinking, you little — ”
“Mora,” Inez said.
“I want to know why she tried to get into my stuff!”
“I know why.”
They all turned to Lucy. She put her face close to Januarie’s crumpled one. She kept her voice quiet, the way Mr. Auggy did. “You wanted her to think I did it, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Because you saw me getting to be friends with her too.”
Januarie nodded and snuff led up what was now trailing out her nose.
“But Januarie,” Lucy said, “I don’t let Mora play on our soccer team.”
“I don’t wa — ”
Lucy kicked Mora under the table. While she was protesting, Lucy got even closer to Januarie.
“Did you think that was going to make me like you more?”
“I would be your only friend again!”
Januarie f lung her chubby arms on the table and let her face fall on them. Lucy was sure she had never seen anyone cry that hard.
“That’s so sad,” Veronica said.
“It’s tragic.” Mora shook her head. “If I knew she was going to get hysterical, I wouldn’t have said anything.”
“That is not why she cries, I think,” Inez said.
Lucy rubbed her hand across Januarie’s back. “Don’t cry, Januarie. We’re friends again.”
“Not when you find out the rest!” she wailed into her arms.
“What ‘rest’?”
“Something worse!”
“What could be worse than invading somebody’s privacy?” Mora looked at Lucy. “By the way, I didn’t totally think it was you. You don’t even know how to turn on anything electronic — ”
“I took Mudge!”
Lucy froze, hand still on Januarie’s shoulder.
“I took him to my house so you would think he was lost and I would bring him home and you would think I was all wonderful — only now I can’t find him! And you love him better than all your other cats — ”
Lucy pulled Januarie up by the shoulders and twisted her to face her. “Where did you put him at your house?”
“In the garage — ”
“What I want to know is how you got him there.” Mora looked warily at Marmalade, who was sleeping on top of the clothes dryer.
“Your cats are evil.”
“I put tuna in my mom’s laundry bag and left it by that plant he hides under and he crawled in and I pulled him home.”
“You did that to Mudge?” Lucy said.
“It didn’t hurt him. And he was mad when I got him to the garage and I ran and then when I went back to get him he was gone.” The tears started again.
“Wow,” Dusty said. “I’ve never been in J.J.’s garage — and no offense but — ”
She didn’t have to finish. With all the junk that lived at J.J.’s, inside and out, it could take days to locate Mudge, and by then —
“Senor Mudge will not starve,” Inez said. “He can live from his fat for many weeks.”
Januarie gave another juicy sniff. “I put some cans of tuna in the garage.”
Veronica gaped at her. “You’re a lot smarter than you look.”
“I’m stupid!”
“You know what — hush up.” Lucy got up and grabbed her jacket.
“You are going where?” Inez said.
“I’m going in to look for Mudge.”
“I’ll help,” Dusty said.
Veronica got up too, but Januarie practically threw herself in front of the back door.
“You can’t! My dad’s home!”
“So?” Mora said. Even she was digging in her bag for her jacket.
“So — no one goes.” Inez jerked her head toward the table. “We all sit down and we eat.”
“Does J.J. know?” Lucy said to Januarie.
She shook her head. “Don’t tell him. He’ll lock me in the garage!”
Maybe he should, Lucy wanted to say. But she closed her mouth and nibbled half-heartedly at a sopapilla, and when the girls were gone, except for Mora, who was busy changing her password on the diary, Lucy sat on the front steps to watch for J.J. She tried not to think about Mudge in that garage full of tires and old refrigerators and everything else that wouldn’t fit in the front and back yards. The only good thing was that if anybody did try to grab him, he would turn their arm to shreds.
“You are talking to God about Senor Mudge.”
Inez stood above her, holding Lucy’s ratty jacket. Lucy moved over so she could sit down. Inez put the jacket around Lucy’s shoulders as if it were a fine mink stole.
“I wasn’t talking to God yet. I was trying to figure it out myself.”
“Still you think backwards. Ask God first. He gives you the answer. Then you know.”
Lucy poked her elbows onto her knees and rested her chin in her hands. “How do you actually know that, Inez?”
“I learned from Ruth.”
“In the Bible?”
“Mmm.”
“I don’t get it.”
Inez folded her hands in her lap in that tidy way she had. “Did Senora Ruth plan each thing? Did she know Senor Boaz will provide more leftovers for her and protect her from the young hombres?”
“No.”
“Did she make herself beautiful for Senor Boaz so he will fall in love with her?”
“No. She didn’t even think he would notice her.”
“Senora Ruth only obeyed.”
“But I don’t know what to obey, Inez,” Lucy said.
“The heart of God.”
“Huh?”
Inez nodded toward the Clucks’ house. The shadows of the junk were long and crazy, like the jumbled pieces of a puzzle no one could possibly put together.
“Poor little one.”
“I don’t mean to be hateful,” Lucy said, “but I’m not thinking Januarie’s such a poor little one right now.”
“The heart of God does. That is what you obey. Senora Ruth stayed with Naomi. She gave Naomi the baby.”
“What baby?”
“The baby she had when she married Senor Boaz.”
“She gave it to Naomi?” Lucy turned to face Inez. “Why?”
Inez tapped her forehead. “Remember? Senora Naomi had no one left to take care of her. No sons, no grandsons. Now, yes — that baby of Ruth.”
“Wow.” Lucy pulled at the fleece that stuck out of the rip in her jacket sleeve. “I could never be that unselfish.”
“You are already. You give your childhood for your father. You try to protect the boy J.J.” She looked deep into Lucy with her wise eyes. “You are an old child. You do not know, but you have the heart of God.”
Lucy wasn’t so sure about that, but she dug back to something Inez said before.
“So, God thinks Januarie’s a poor little one, so I should too?”
“That can be, yes.”
“But I just don’t get how she could even think up that stuff to do to me.”
Once again, Inez nodded toward the house across the street. The shadows were longer now, and a light had come on behind one of the sheets in the downstairs window. It was such a confused, sad-looking house compared to Lucy’s.
“We act as we are taught,” Inez said.
Who taught Januarie to be mean?
Well, du-uh, Mora would have said. Why did J.J. and Januarie have to run to her house and call Mr. Auggy when their dad yelled, unless there was something worse than yelling going on? That was the thing Dad and Mr. Auggy didn’t tell her the night she hit her head.
“Is she going to grow up to be mean like her father, then?” Lucy said.
“If she will have others to love her, no.” Inez unfolded her hands and stood up. “What we love — that must c
ome from the heart of God.”
Lucy sat on the steps for a while after Inez went inside. She heard Mora inside squeal, “I have this fabulous idea, Abuela — listen to this.” The rest was told in whispers, which was fine. Lucy could only think about Januarie — and Mudge — and what she loved — until J.J. appeared around the corner, hurrying with his head down. She stood up and called to him.
He kept walking, backward, so she ran to him, and with her eyes darting cautiously to his house as she talked, she told him all about Januarie.
“You think Mudge is still in my garage?” J.J. said. He was still edging toward his house, and Lucy knew why.
“You better go,” she said. “Januarie said your dad’s home.”
His eyes opened wider, as if suddenly he knew that she might know what went on in that house surrounded by a fortress of trash.
“Don’t yell at Januarie,” Lucy said. “She gets yelled at enough.”
J.J. gave an almost invisible nod. “I’ll find Mudge, I promise.”
She didn’t watch him go into his house. She just hurried back to her own where she would smell melted cheese and hear Mora chattering and know that her dad was coming home. She planned to hug him the minute he came in the door.
19
Mudge wasn’t back under his plant the next morning. J. J. promised that he was looking every chance he got. Lucy promised God she would try to have a heart like his and be nice to Januarie.
At least there was the soccer game to think about — and it was only one day away.
The banners that hung over the highway and Granada Street were even more beautiful than Veronica and Dusty’s notebooks, proclaiming Los Suenos Pride Day and announcing the match — El Paso Pachucos vs. Los Suenos Dreams.
“What does ‘vs.’ stand for?” Carla Rosa wanted to know.
Nobody laughed at her. J.J. explained it like she wasn’t a moron who should know that by now. He got a ding-ding-ding for that.
Every shop on Granada Street and even those along the highway had f lowers in the windows and game tickets for sale inside. Mr. Benitez and Pasco were having a competition for who could sell the most. In Lucy’s mind, Mr. Benitez was a total winner because the uniforms were, as Mora had predicted, fabulous. When the team was all lined up in them on Friday afternoon after their final practice, modeling them for Mr. Auggy, right down to the cleats and shin guards they had been practicing with all week, he grinned way past the small smile, all the way to his earlobes.
