Burn Baby Burn

by Meg Medina

  “Ese niño es la candela,” she mumbles. “He’s brilliant, but that school has never known what to do with him.”

  I lay the letter on the table, my stomach suddenly queasy at the smell of Ajax in the humid air. I don’t want to spend one more second thinking about Hector and his problems.

  “It says you have to request his summer-school site by next week,” I say.

  Mima stops scrubbing and stares at me.

  “Summer school? How do they think I’m going to get him to summer school if he won’t go to regular school during the year? Are they stupid over there at the Board of Education?”

  I shrug. “What can I tell you, Mima? He has to go.”

  “You’ll have to talk to him,” she says.

  There’s a long pause, my finger traveling to my throat. “No,” I finally say.

  Mima puts down her sponge and turns to me slowly. The truth about my brother hangs in the air between us, electric.

  “No?” she says. “You’re his older sister, and you know he listens to you better.”

  “That’s not true,” I say. “He doesn’t listen to me anymore, Mima, and you know it,” I say. “He doesn’t listen to anybody. He’s totally out of control.”

  Mima turns back to the sink and starts scrubbing harder.

  Tell her, a voice inside my head screams. Say it.

  Mima is in a cloud of steam as she talks. “You’re too young to understand, Nora. Boys go through these things,” she says. “It’s hormones. Then they become good men, believe it or not. He’ll meet a good woman one day who will straighten him out.”

  I think about my bullet-hole neck, about how my head bounced against the brick wall.

  “Good men don’t hit their mothers and sisters, Mima.”

  Mima stops what she’s doing and glares at me, and just like that, the rest of my words shrivel on my lips. I’ve broken the unspoken rule: Don’t name it. Don’t see it.

  She points at some bills folded under the napkins. “See that? He told me to buy food with it this morning. He’s starting to think, Nora. It’s not hopeless.”

  I stand up and count it. Fifty dollars. It’s what I earn in a whole week at Sal’s. And this isn’t “help.” He’s demanding something to eat and he’s showing off. Mima won’t see the difference, though.

  I ball the money in my fist.

  Mima’s eyes get wide. “¡Cuidadito! That’s good money! We need that!” She snatches it out of my hand.

  “Don’t you wonder where he got that from, Mima?” I whisper. “Where does a kid who doesn’t work come up with fifty dollars?”

  But Mima just turns back to the sink. “He’s helping, Nora,” she says. “He has a part-time.”

  “Part-time? He works about as much as he goes to school!”

  “¡No seas una fresca!” she hisses. “You’re making me crazy. I’m going to end up in the loony bin from you two.”

  “And he’s going to end up in jail. He’s doing bad things — and you know it, or at least you’ve thought about it.”

  “Cállate ya con las mentiras, Nora.”

  I lower my voice and step even closer. “I’m not telling lies, but maybe you are. Why did you tell the fire investigator that Hector was home when he wasn’t?”

  She doesn’t answer.

  “¿Por qué, Mima?”

  She throws down her sponge and turns to me. “What do you want, Nora? You want us to get thrown out of here? You want your fancy friends to point at us and say ‘Those are the lowlifes with a troubled kid’? I hope you never have to raise kids alone, niña, especially not ungrateful ones. You don’t know how good you have it! This part of Queens is nice. This apartment you hate so much is actually a lot better than what you could have, oíste? You could be living like an animal in the Bronx.”

  She’s out of breath and red in the face.

  There’s a long silence between us. I think of the biting and kicking that’s already going on. We’ve already stopped being human. Mima just doesn’t know.

  “Soy una buena madre, Nora, even if you don’t think so. All I’m asking is for you to stand up for your flesh and blood, to have patience as he grows up. What kind of daughter won’t help her own mother at her time of need?” Her eyes fill up with tears.

  “Mima —” I say.

  “A good sister doesn’t abandon her brother, either,” she tells me. “She helps him. She protects him and guides him. If you don’t do that, it’s you who’s the disgrace.”

  That afternoon, I tie on a cameo choker with a black velvet ribbon. Then I head to Kathleen’s.

  “Fancy,” she says when she opens the door. “But isn’t it kind of hot for velvet?”

  I touch the cameo to make sure it’s in place. “I’m celebrating my college acceptance.” I hold out the envelope and paste on a shaky smile.

  “Cool!” She takes the letter and gives me a puzzled look as we step inside. “Why the gloomy face, then?”

  My throat gets bottled up with all that I can’t tell her. I take a deep breath of their house, hoping my borrowed family can ease me.

  “I’m going to miss you in the fall,” I say.

  Before I can stop myself, I start to cry, so Kathleen hugs me tight.

  “Come on, Hormone Queen,” she whispers. “We have all summer to dance.” Then she pulls me up the stairs to her room.

  You don’t have to watch many cop shows to know there’s always a weak link in a crime chain. In this case, it’s Matt. All those years attending Catholic school have to mean some kind of conscience, or at least a fear of pissed-off priests and their paddles.

  I’ve been on the lookout for him for over a week, and finally I spot him dragging trash bags to the Dumpster.

  “Where you off to?” Sal calls as I storm out the door.

  “Back in a flash,” I tell him. “I need some Band-Aids.”

  I jog down the street and slip into the alley. Matt has already tossed in the first bag.

  I walk up behind him and snatch the marker out of his back pocket before he can reach for it.

  “Hey —” he says, whipping around.

  At most, he’s a freshman, all freckles and gangly limbs. I just know he’s an altar boy, too, though probably the kind who sneaks sips of wine.

  “Shut up,” I say, stabbing his puny shoulder with the marker.

  “What the hell are you doing?” he asks.

  “Me? Nothing. But I know what you’re doing.”

  He stands there, unsure.

  “What do you think your mommy and daddy will say when they find out you’re stealing ludes from Mr. Farina to make a quick buck?” I ask him.

  Matt’s face turns bright red.

  “I’m sure the priests at McClancy would love it, too. Not to mention Sal, who’ll be only too happy to use his golf iron on your skull.”

  He tries to sidestep me, but I block him.

  “If I see you screwing around with the trash again, Matt, you’re done.”

  I swear, it looks as if he’s going to cry as he hurries out of the alley.

  The next day, Mr. Farina announces a sudden personnel change.

  “Matt called to say he’s quitting — can you believe it? Now I have to train a whole new kid. What’s the matter with young guys today?”

  I should have expected it.

  “I need to talk to you.” Sergio pulls his car over and turns on his dome light. Sal is already gone, and the shops are all closed. I straddle my bike but don’t budge.

  “I’m not going to do anything to you,” Sergio says, reading my mind. “Get in.” He flips the power locks.

  “What do you want?” I ask.

  “I want to talk to you about Hector.”

  Five minutes, I tell myself.

  His ashtray is crammed with butts, and the car reeks of smoke. I glance around, imagining the crevices where he might keep his supplies. For all I know, I could be sitting on a huge stash of drugs right now. I keep my hand on the door handle, just in case.

 
; “Make it quick,” I say. “You might have heard, there’s a shooter who likes couples in cars. I’d really hate to die with you.”

  “Still bitchy,” he says, sighing.

  “Your point?”

  “Why are you butting into what’s none of your business?”

  “My brother is my business, even if he’s a jerk. And he doesn’t need to be stealing Lemmons for you.”

  He puts his arm over the back of my seat. “Lemmons?” he says innocently. “What are those?”

  I glare at him and move a little closer to the door. “Very funny. I found out about your setup. And if I found out, somebody else is going to find out eventually. Then what? Prison?”

  “Such a pessimist, Nora. That’s never going to get you anywhere.”

  “Bottom line: fire Hector.”

  “Who says he works for me?”

  “Look, I get it. You want to make a buck, and people want your stuff. You’re not scared of jail? Fine. Go. It’s none of my business. All I ask is that you leave Mr. Farina alone, and that you cut Hector out of it. Why is that so hard?”

  Sergio reaches over my legs into his glove compartment where he keeps a carton of Camels and, disturbingly, a handgun. My heart pounds, but I pretend I don’t see it. If this is supposed to scare me, though, it’s working. What the hell is he doing with one of those, anyway? And more important, is it a .44?

  He pulls out a pack of smokes and taps it against his knuckles before pulling one free.

  “I’m not the one who needs money, Nora. He is. And by the way, Farina isn’t the only pharmacy in town, babe.”

  I take a breath to calm myself.

  “Come on, Sergio,” I plead. “Use somebody else to build your empire. Why not one of those fine specimens at the Satin Lady?”

  “Drunks,” he says, lighting up. “Very unreliable.” He takes a long drag and blows a long stream of smoke.

  “Okay, fine, think about yourself, then: the cops aren’t going to go easy on you when they find out you lured two minors into stealing pills. I hear life sucks in prison, Sergio. Maybe you should consider what I did a favor.”

  He picks some tobacco off his tongue and smiles pleasantly. “Wow, Nora. I didn’t know you cared so much about me,” he says. “I’m touched.”

  “Glad to hear it. And I’m touched that you care about Hector’s money troubles. The thing is, I can’t let you screw him up any more than he is.”

  Sergio throws his head back and snorts. “News flash: your bro is already screwed up, Nora.”

  “Are we finished here?” I ask.

  He strikes a new match and leans toward me, holding it to my face until it burns to his dirty fingers. His voice goes steely, his lips practically brushing my cheek. “Do us both a favor, Nora. Don’t make a problem for yourself. I have some stories I can tell, too. The kind that can get a pyro and his family thrown out of their building for good.”

  I don’t dare say a word, too afraid that he’ll tell me what I already suspect about Hector and the fire. Where would we go if we got thrown out?

  Sergio holds my gaze as he reaches for my face. His stained fingers linger on my neck.

  “Don’t,” I mumble, but all I can think of is the gun in the glove compartment, how easy it would be for either one of us to reach for it.

  I pull away, but not before he bites my lower lip hard enough to break the skin.

  “Sweet,” he says, laughing when I flinch.

  I reach for the door handle and jump out of the car. But just as I slam the door and turn to grab my bike, a tall figure steps out of the dark.

  Adrenaline jolts through me until I see who it is.

  “Christ,” I say. “You scared me.”

  Pablo looks from me to Sergio’s car as it pulls out.

  “Having fun, Nora?”

  I have to jog to keep pace with Pablo as he storms down the street to reach his car. He’s obviously gotten the wrong idea.

  “It’s not what it looks like.”

  “It looks like my girlfriend was hanging out in a car and kissing another guy.”

  “It’s not another guy. It’s Sergio. Gross. I was talking to him for a minute, that’s all, not hanging out.” We reach the Camaro, and I slip in front of the driver’s-side door before he can unlock it. “What are you doing here, anyway? You’re supposed to be off.”

  He stares straight ahead, fuming. “I finished my last exam tonight. I came to surprise you and see if you needed a ride.” He crosses his arms. “I can see you’ve got that covered, though.” He tries to nudge me out of the way, but I have my butt pressed against the door lock. “Move.”

  I don’t budge. “What’s that supposed to mean? I wasn’t getting a ride. I had to talk to him about something important.”

  “Like what?”

  I hesitate. How would I even begin to explain this mess? “It’s private.”

  “Private,” he repeats. “You keep a lot of things private, you know that? Get out of the way, please, Nora.”

  “I was sitting in a car with someone! What’s the big deal?”

  “You’re too scared to spend any time in a car with me, right? I’m glad to see he helped you get over your fear.”

  My temper is roiling through my veins now, spilling over from Sergio to Pablo. “Don’t make fun of me, and stop having this fit.”

  His eyes flash in anger. “This. Is. Not. A. Fit. This is me deciding not to get played by some chick acting like a —”

  The breath goes out of me as I wait. “Like a what?”

  “Move, Nora.”

  “Like a what, Pablo? Some chick acting like a what? Say it!” I shout.

  He takes a deep breath, like he’s counting. But I don’t give him the luxury of space.

  “What is it you want to call me, Pablo? A ho? Is that what’s on the tip of your tongue?”

  I shove him as hard as I can, and it sends his car keys flying.

  “Don’t use your hands on me, Nora.”

  “Believe what you want to believe,” I hiss. “But you don’t get to trash me because I’m sitting in a car with someone. You want to know what I was acting like back there with Sergio? Like a freakin’ savior, not that you’d understand one thing about my life.”

  I get on my bike, but Pablo grabs my handlebars. The muscles in his arms are bulging as he holds the bike still.

  “Let go.” I wrench my handlebars hard to one side, but he hangs on, staring at me. “I said let go, Pablo.”

  “I wouldn’t call you that,” he says quietly. The corners of his mouth are turned down. “I’m sorry. My temper got ahead of me.”

  “This isn’t about your stupid temper. It’s about respect. Move.”

  But he holds firm. “Be fair. How would you feel if you’d seen me with some other girl in my car? You’d let it go? You wouldn’t wonder if I was lying to you? What am I supposed to think? You won’t even explain except to say ‘It’s private.’”

  I can’t help him there, of course. I tell a thousand little lies about my life every day so I can feel like a normal person.

  “Well, you don’t have to wonder anymore,” I tell him. “I am a liar, Pablo. And good people like you don’t date liars, right?”

  I yank my handlebars free and take off.

  “Nora!” he calls.

  But I don’t look his way. I push with all my might along the dark streets, swerving between cars and running through red lights. I speed along, remembering how Hector and I used to race each other. Then and now, with every push forward, my heart is nearly bursting.

  If ever I have been grateful to get out of Flushing, it’s this Memorial Day. Hector must have gotten wind of my chat with Sergio. I found my best lip glosses burned to ashes in the bathroom sink as a thank-you note. From the looks of it, I think he used Mima’s Aqua Net as a torch.

  Anyway, Kathleen and I are actually enjoying our first-ever taste of freedom: a parent-less beach getaway in Breezy Point. Kathleen calls this a graduation present from God, even though
it came our way because of lousy news: my fight with Pablo, and Mr. Mac’s friends ending up in the burn unit.

  The Everard Baths near the Empire State Building burned to the ground this past week. One of Mr. Mac’s firefighter friends got hurt when the walls crumbled on top of him. If that wasn’t bad enough, a couple of days later, the Atlantic Lacquer factory exploded when paint thinner ignited and turned everyone inside into human torches. Mr. Mac grew up in Brooklyn and knows some of the people who got hurt.

  We were sure that our plans for a beach weekend were gone until Kathleen piped up.

  “Why can’t Nora and I do an overnight at the bungalow on our own?” she asked her mother.

  At first the answer was no, but Kathleen dug in, arguing like an attorney about how safe Breezy Point is, since you have to pass through the guard gate. The she delivered her clincher: “Nora is nursing a broken heart, Mother. She needs this. Besides, we are days away from graduation and a week from legal adulthood. It’s time to let us breathe.”

  And so here we are, lying side by side in the sand. It’s sunny and only in the high seventies, perfect weather. Stevie Wonder is singing “Isn’t She Lovely” on the radio.

  “Am I turning orange?” Kathleen asks.

  I lift myself to my elbows on our beach blanket and look over. Even if she were the color of a cantaloupe, no one on this beach would care. Her hair is sandy and bleached, and her legs stretch forever from that yellow bikini. When we brought out our cooler, one of the guys tossing a Frisbee saw her and smashed into the lifeguard stand.

  “Just your palms a little,” I say. We had to buy her QT quick tanner on the drive over to Breezy. My skin gets deep brown with baby oil, but hers turns the color of boiled ham every time.

  “So. Deep question. Do you think I should do it with Eddie?”

  I look over. “Do what?”

  “Sex, for God’s sake. Are you slow?”

  I won’t lie. I’m shocked. “Like, soon?”

  She shields her eyes and looks at me. “Yeah, maybe.”

  I study the clouds for a second. “You don’t like him that much, do you?”