There are two others down on the court with him.
Angel starts screaming, but doesn’t stand. Instead he pulls a gun from his pants and starts shooting back.
“Fucking move, Guera,” Vee tells me again, yanking my arm. “I can’t leave you here. Let’s go. He’s got himself, don’t trip. We have to move.”
I tear my eyes away from Angel as the sirens approach. It feels wrong to leave him, but my heart is in a thick knot. I’m scared. Everything is happening so fast, I just do what Vee tells me.
A group of us run. I follow blindly, focusing on my breath and my feet pounding on the pavement. Finally I hear them trying to figure out a place to hide. Their words are rushed, but not frantic, choosing the best place from a list they already know.
“Fuck, I hope Toño got Angel’s glock. He didn’t have anything else on him right, Guera?” Veronica looks at me, waiting for my answer as we slow to a walk behind a 7-Eleven. It takes me a minute to realize she’s talking to me.
“I have no idea. I didn’t even know he had a gun.”
“Shit, I guess we’ll have to wait and see. We need to get to Kim’s and stash our shit before we go to the hospital and find out how the guys are.”
The sound of their conversation grows distant as I let myself sink onto the curb, and bury my face in my hands.
“Pull it together, Guera. You can’t do this now!” Vee snaps and gestures for me to get back on my feet. “Go with Ro to the hospital. We need to take care of some things.”
I don’t get any more details on what they’re going to take care of, and I don’t care. The hospital sounds like a safe place to be. So I nod and follow Ro who tells me it’s not far. I’m amazed at how casually they split up, not much different than deciding where to hang out for the night, but apparently this has happened before. They all seem to know what to do and where the guys will end up.
She tries to soothe my silent tears as we walk the alleyways, staying out of sight. “They just got his leg, Guera. Trust me. He’s had worse. It’s going to be all right. He was shooting back so he’s okay. I’m sure Toño got his gun, and he didn’t have anything else on him.”
When we get to the hospital, the cops are everywhere.
“What if they’re looking for someone with my description?” I ask Ro, stopping a ways off. “You know? Because of Littles?”
“They can’t prove anything,” she says tugging me along. She says it so convincingly I want to believe her, but deep down I’m sure they could.
I pass by several policemen with the terrifying feeling they know everything.
None of them give me a second glance, but I’m a sweaty mess by the time we get inside.
As we wait on squared off matching chairs, Ro must sense my paranoia. She spends the whole time explaining that if Littles were dead, there would be a shit ton of flowers and balloons on that bench. We’d know. Word spreads quickly, even amongst different gangs. She makes a good point.
When we finally find out Angel’s room number, we head up the elevator. The door is open, but before I get a chance to see him, a nurse ushers us away.
She’s a young bubbly blonde, and I’m immediately jealous.
“He’s not ready for visitors.” Her ponytail bobs as she shakes her head. “The waiting room is around the corner.”
I plant my feet and peer around her trying to see. “Is he okay, though?” I ask. “Where was he shot?”
“He’ll be fine,” she chimes, like a high school cheerleader. Then she closes the door in my face.
They make us wait another hour to see him, but Ro isn’t as programmed to follow rules as I am. She sneaks up to the door and cracks it enough to hear what’s going on.
“It was his leg, like I thought,” she reports back. “They’re taking him for an x-ray to see if the bone is broken.”
I melt into the blue plastic seat, both relieved and disappointed that we’ll have to wait even longer to see him.
“You can go home if you want,” I tell her.
“What? No way. As soon as that dumb-ass Barbie is out of there, I’m sneaking in.”
I light up at the idea. “Really?”
And that’s exactly what we do.
“Hey, Guera.” Angel sits up straighter and winces as he adjusts. “How’d you like the game?”
I can’t tell if he’s serious, but I laugh. “It was a little intense. Are you okay? What happened?”
His hair has lost the shiny, gelled spike and is laying flat, but I kind of like it that way.
“They got me on the leg pretty good. I won’t be able to board for a while, but at least I won’t be in a chair. They’re gonna give me crutches and want me to stay overnight.”
The sheets are covering his legs, but my eyes still search for the place the wound might be. I can’t imagine what it feels like to get shot.
“Cops had some questions,” he continues, “but I’m not a rat. Kept my mouth shut, so they left me alone easy enough.”
“What about the gun?” I whisper, almost mouthing the words in complete silence.
“Toño has it. No worries, baby. We have a system.”
“Well I’m just glad you’re okay. I was freaking out.”
I stay with him for a while, talking about what happened while Ro makes it her job to check on the other guys. We laugh about how she’s probably sneaking around the hospital mission-impossible style wearing nurse’s scrubs.
“You’re not supposed to be in here,” the cheerleader nurse says as she enters.
“Oh, I thought it was okay now,” I lie.
She gives me a look, like she’s heard that before, and I decide not to push it.
“See you soon,” I whisper to Angel before I duck under her laser beam stare.
CHAPTER 12
Lucy
IT’S AROUND 9 P.M. when I hear a rock hit the back bedroom window where I’m watching TV. I know my grandpa couldn’t have heard it with his breathing machine, and Grandma, Mom, and Ruth are in the living room talking about school plays or something stupid. I get out of bed and peek out the faded floral curtains. To my surprise it’s Angel. His smile is wide, despite the fact he’s on crutches.
I crank open the rusty handle.
“How’d you know I was back here?” I whisper through the screen.
“The curtains are kinda see-through. I was creepin’.”
I smile. “I thought you were Ro.”
“Yeah, that was the plan. I wanted to surprise you.”
“Well, I’m just glad you’re out of the hospital. I was getting worried. It’s been three days.”
“Think you can sneak out?” he asks.
“Mom! Ro’s here. I’m going outside for a sec,” I yell down the hall. Nobody responds, which is what I was hoping for.
I slip out the back door. It smells like trash outside because the dumpsters are overflowing. A yellow streetlight hangs over the mound of garbage, illuminating the heap of diapers and broken black plastic bags.
Angel doesn’t seem bothered by it. He stands close to me in the shadows, and we talk by the trailer for a while. He tells me all of his gory hospital stories. Once he was shanked in the stomach, and they had to put forty-three stitches in him. Another time he had the bones in his arm shattered in five different places. He was shot in the left lower back but was lucky because it only went through skin. His most painful experience was when he had his collarbone broken and his pelvis cracked after four guys jumped him and beat him with a bat.
I can’t believe the things he tells me. I secretly hope he’s lying.
We start walking, on our way to his apartment, when we see Veronica and her boyfriend, Omar, across the trailer park. They wave at a young boy and his mother who stop under the streetlight to say hello. The boy looks no older than five. It’s a hot night and he’s wearing shorts but no shirt. His Mexican skin is dark from a summer tan. He squats next to them, collecting pebbles from the ground as his mom talks. She looks like a teenager herself, too young to
have a child, but the boy keeps calling out for her.
“Mom! Look at this one.” She doesn’t respond to him, even as he holds stones out for her to see.
From this distance the four of them could be anyone. They could be four normal people with normal lives, but this is the barrio, and nothing is normal here.
Angel stiffens at my side as the car from the park shooting pulls into the circular drive. Its headlights shut off in a quick blink.
“Shit,” he whispers.
My feet start pedaling backwards. I think of Littles. What if they’re looking for me? If they see me...
“Vee!” Angel screams before he pulls me down in a rough jerk behind a hedge. My heart goes crazy. I stay still, but inside I’m wildly afraid. My mouth goes dry. It’s hard to swallow.
He peeks over the leaf wall and starts shaking his head.
“They didn’t hear me.” He grits his teeth. “Shit.”
I can’t help it. I have to look.
It takes about three seconds for a guy with curly black hair to roll down the window and pop off two shots. The tires smoke and screech as the car speeds off, and Angel and I flatten our backs against the side of a trailer so we’re not seen.
One of the girls is screaming. I can’t tell if it’s Vee or the young mother, but someone must be hurt. The scream is a high-pitched cry that makes my gut sink.
Angel moves to get a better view and I follow.
Vee is fine, but the boy...
His mother is cradling his limp body. There’s smeared blood all over his bare chest. I can’t stand here and watch. I have to do something. His mother’s screaming bores into my bones. It’s nightmarish, the kind of sound that jolts you from a dream.
I lurch forward, but Angel drops one of his crutches and grabs my arm. “Don’t! You can’t get involved. We have to move. They could come back.”
I duck behind the hedge again, unable to hold it in anymore. My hands grip the tops of my knees as I start to break down, but Angel ushers me on, speaking so fast I can barely understand. “We have to move. We can’t stay here. They’ll be looking. They know they didn’t get us. That’s why the driver sped off. They would have stayed to make sure one of us was hit.”
I turn into a heap of tears when we reach my grandparents’ back porch. There was so much blood. There’s no way he’ll make it, and if that’s true, I just saw someone die. A child die. The reality of something so horrific makes me sob harder.
Angel just watches me cry, waiting for it to pass as we crouch on the side of the stairs out of sight. Eventually he starts talking, maybe because he’s uncomfortable and I can’t stop the tears.
“...This is life on the streets. This is our reality. We don’t know anything else. It’s what we grew up with. My brother, my dad, my mom, my sisters, we’re all in it.” I think about what my family would say if they saw or heard about any of this. “Watch the news,” he continues. “This shit is everywhere. Not just here.”
“I know,” I admit weakly. “I’m just not used to it.”
The sound of sirens grows in the distance.
“It’s not like it’s outta nowhere. We’ve been fighting with them farther back then I can tell you. Those fuckers killed Omar’s youngest brother like a month ago. So Omar killed two of their guys. They’re just retaliating, that’s all.”
That’s all? I nod, trying to accept what he seems to feel is completely justified.
“I think you should go back inside,” he says. “I’ll be here first thing in the morning. We’re just going to hang at Leti’s tomorrow.”
“Okay.” I wipe my face with the bottom of my shirt, trying to pull it together. “Hanging out sounds good. I think I need a break from all this craziness. I’m going to go insane if anything else happens.”
“Well go sleep it off and we’ll talk more tomorrow. Try not to think about it.”
“Will you check on the boy?” I ask, still thinking of the way his arms hung outward as his mother held him.
“Don’t worry about it. Those fucks will get what’s coming,” he says. “See you in the morning.”
He kisses me one last time before he leaves. When I step back in the house, I listen down the hall. They’re watching some kind of reality show. Nobody has a clue what just happened. I turn off the light to the back room and sit on the bed in the dark. The sound of the TV murmurs through the wall, and the droning of its superficial bullshit feeds the rage already smoldering in my chest. My jaw clicks as I clench my teeth. I’ll never get the image of that boy out of my head.
I hope Omar kills those guys.
CHAPTER 13
Mom
I FIND MY COURAGE somewhere in the Lucky’s parking lot with a trunk full of groceries. In that hollow silence of the car, alone with my fear, I’m forced to decide. Things can’t keep on like this forever. I need some finality. Mostly I need to be free of the guilt I have for not going back. I’m done being a coward hiding behind the possibility of returning.
My cell phone waits for me in the cup holder. I pick it up and dial, clearing my throat so I don’t sound weak. This should be easy. He hasn’t called. He doesn’t care. Just cut the loss and be done.
Only it’s a thick rope to cut. Layers of time have bound us together. But people change. He’s changed. And my life has become a dark place for dreams to collect like cobwebs.
“Yello.”
I don’t speak, but he knows the sound of my breath.
“Rachel?”
I don’t know what I’m expecting. For him to answer drunk off his ass, maybe. But his voice is soft, almost desperate.
I stay silent.
“I can’t lose my family, Rachel. I can’t lose you. I’m sorry,” he whispers. “We can work this out.”
He’s right. We can work this out. I live to forgive, to concede, to sacrifice everything I am on the off chance he’ll be happy. But he won’t. I won’t.
“Is that what you really want, Steve?”
“Yes!” he pleads. “I’m sorry. I should have called, but I was just so mad, and then I thought, maybe I’d already lost you. I thought...” His voice begins to waver, and I can hear the sniffling sound of tears. In seventeen years of marriage I’ve never seen his striking blue eyes gloss over with regret. I can’t believe it. He told me I was lucky to have him, that I was too fat and ugly. He said he’d want a divorce if he could afford it. The man who made me feel worthless innumerable times is crying to me that he doesn’t want to lose it all.
It would be so easy to give in to his tears. To take him back and say it’ll all be okay, but it won’t. I’ve found a strength in myself that I didn’t know existed anymore. I’m not going to stay broken any longer.
“Look, I know you’re upset and this whole thing has been a shock to us both, but you know our marriage isn’t working, and we need to stop pretending it will. I’m miserable, and so are you. You’ve always felt resentful of me and the kids. We kept you from having the life you wanted. I took you from your houseboat on the bay and forced you to come to Massack, settle down and become a father. I knew what your dreams were, and I ignored them. Just like you didn’t support mine. This is your chance to start over again, and mine too. We need to get a divorce.”
There, I said it. The dreaded word...divorce.
A silent tear fell from my cheek, not because I didn’t want this, but because I felt sorry for him. “You know this is the right thing to do. We can’t stay together anymore. I’m not the person you want. You want me to be someone I’m not. I’m still that city girl with dreams of the stage. The student you met in San Francisco. I can’t believe I’ve played the country wife for so long. I can’t go back to that. I’m finally finding myself again.”
“Is this what you really want?” He waits for me to answer, but I don’t. He already knows. “I guess you’re right. Things haven’t been good for a long time.”
His words surprise me. I was sure I’d have to fight my way out from under him.
“Thanks for
understanding.”
He scoffs. “So I guess you’re just going to keep the kids then?” his tone darkens a little.
“Well, school starts next month. I don’t think they should go back and forth—”
“You know what. Fine. Just take them. You’re right. I want a chance to start over, too. Just go.”
And there it is, the Steve I know, creating conflict over something he doesn’t really care about just for the fight. Guilt is our dance, our game. He doesn’t want the kids. He just wants me to feel bad.
“Steve.” I sigh. “You’ve never played any part in taking care of the girls. Now you suddenly want them to live with you?”
“You don’t really care what I want anyway. Just do what you’re going to do.”
“Okay,” I say, wanting to put an end to the conversation. “I’m going back to school. I need to finish what I started and find me again. I’m taking the girls to LA. I applied to school a while ago, just to see if I’d get accepted and I did. I think you should pay child support and help with the kids.”
“Forget it. Find a lawyer and try it,” he tells me. “Besides, even if I did give you money, you wouldn’t last a month in LA. You’ll come crawling back to me, and I won’t save you.”
“So you’re not going to pay child support?”
“We’ll see what happens with the kids. Just do whatever you need to do. And, no, I won’t pay for your trip to LA, but I won’t hold you back either. We’ve been through a lot, and I guess I saw this coming. Take care of them. You may not have been a perfect wife, but you’re a good mom, I’ll give you that.”
“Thanks,” I say, genuinely accepting his backhanded compliment like long-awaited praise.
“Bye, Rachel.”
I hang up the phone with a fresh feeling of possibility. It feels strange to not be upset, sad, or angry. Seventeen years of marriage deserves some tears. Instead I’m elated. He just handed me my freedom.
CHAPTER 14
Lucy
THE SMELL OF EGGS and bacon floats in from the living room as Grandpa calls for me to wake up and brush my teeth. I stumble out of bed and go to have breakfast.
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