Jacqueline finally sat down. “You got the gist of it from them letters, didn’t you?”
Sylvia took her position on the floor. “You read them too?”
“I may be able to keep a secret, Sylvia, honey, but if you think I was able to contain my curiosity and not look into that box, I’m sorry, but your expectations of me are too elevated. I’m made of flesh also. I had to know what I was dealing with, but I kept that box good and hidden all those years in the garage so your mama wouldn’t find it. It was me who put it in his closet for you to find after he passed.”
Sylvia shuddered. LeRoy didn’t have a clue who his real father was. He had a phantom in his mind, the soldier who died in Vietnam, a hero, perhaps. A man who had joined the forces for idealistic reasons. Maybe LeRoy had also wanted to join the military as a way of getting close to him: the father that never existed.
The theme tune to Jacqueline’s soap rang loudly through the living room. “My show’s just started so it’s eleven. Sylvia, honey, you better get a move on or you’ll miss your plane.”
Excitement and hope suffused Sylvia’s bloodstream. She was on her way to find Grace!
CHAPTER 31
Grace
Grace was feeling lonely. She sat on the beach with Hideous Teddy, counting the seventh wave. Once, her dad had told her how the biggest wave often came every seven times. Seven was her lucky number. Maybe because her birthday was the seventh. The 7th of September. She knew she was five and three-quarters. Well, almost five and three-quarters.
She was bored. She played the Great Bird Ziz with Hideous Teddy but he didn’t find it funny—there was no expression in his big, black, plastic eyes. She didn’t find it funny, either. It wasn’t the same playing the Great Bird Ziz without her dad. He could make it swoop down from a great height and bite her bottom, or suddenly flip up into the sky again, snapping its beak (her dad’s long scary fingers and thumb), and then eat a big chunk right out of her thigh! Or her foot. Or even her big toe. The Great Bird Ziz liked juicy toes. But Hideous Teddy just sat there, dumb, not laughing at all, sand all over his shiny yellow fur. She brought him to the beach so he would lose his Factory Farmed look. Poor Hideous Teddy, she’d even taken him swimming. He tried surfing, too.
Even though Hideous was ugly, she loved him. It wasn’t his fault. She’d love him double to make up for it. And he was only Hideous because she liked the word. He wasn’t really hideous—how could he be when he was her true friend? Unlike some people with names beginning with L.
Lucho wouldn’t let her go in the water when he was busy. Busy = surfing. All he did was surf, surf, surf! The whole day long. Even when it was pouring with rain! When he wasn’t surfing, he was sleeping. And there was no way to wake him in a million years once his head hit the pillow.
She had nobody to play with. There were no other children nearby. Just surfers. Some of them were American and they had a funny language that even she couldn’t understand, like “dude” and “bitchin” and “bogus.” She heard one of them say “touries with mouries,” and found out they were talking about tourists doing body surfing and getting in the way of the real surfers.
She knew that Lucho thought she was getting in the way, too. He spent all his time with a French girl now. Grace heard him talk to her about going down to Peru to “catch some waves.” Where was Peru? Grace had caught waves with Lucho. At night. They went swimming by the moon, and the ocean lit up with little green sparkles like emeralds and diamonds. When you splashed they landed on your shoulders and hair like jewels as if someone had waved a magic wand. Every time a wave whooshed over them, the sparkles flew in the air like butterflies with lights on their wings. It was the prettiest thing she had ever, ever seen. Like sea fairies. Lucho said it was the microscopic creatures that the whales lived on that lit up only at night. He said they were called Fósforo and Plancton, and were lit up by the moon.
But now Lucho only played with the French Girl. They were speaking bad English to each other because the French Girl couldn’t speak Spanish. She wondered what Mama Ruth would think of Lucho kissing another woman. The French Girl . . . her name was Elodie. Hell O.D. She was pretty but she didn’t smile much.
She smoked cigarettes instead.
Grace got up from her position under the stripy shade of her favorite palm tree. She had eaten two mangoes, and a fruit that looked like a potato but had her favorite color pink inside, and three quarters of a papaya, slurping the juice that had dribbled all over her body. She loved papaya. Almost as much as pineapples which were sweeter here than back home. Now she was sticky, like a toffee apple that had been licked all over, and she had sand stuck to her. She felt all rough like a cat’s tongue.
She buried the fruit skins under the sand. She knew that was not Littering because, her Real Mom promised her, it was natural. It was okay to throw Natural things away if you were in the countryside and you could hide it in bushes. The sand, she decided, was as good as a bush. Candy wrappers, though, were not allowed. She hadn’t had any candy at all in Knicker Agua. Mama Ruth told her they made chocolate here from cocoa beans but she hadn’t seen any chocolate at all. Not one single bar.
Grace decided to have a shower to wash off the sticky sand. She knew how to work it and had learned that it was best to get there before it got dark because the water heated up from the sun all day and would still be hot. It was solar-powered. But first, she thought, she would go and tell her secret pen about her day. Mama Ruth had told her how she was going to make a million on the book she was writing, and Grace thought that she could also make a million on her own book. If she had a million she could get her mom’s DNA and make her come back to life like they did with the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. That was another movie her dad let her watch before her mom told him it was too grown-up for her. But Grace was grown-up. Kind of.
If she wanted to make a million dollars selling her book, though, she’d have to think of a story first. And she’d have to do it soon. Then she could buy her own surfboard. And her own plane to fly to go and see her dad in Saginaw, or wherever he was.
Grace skipped along the hot sand, feeling it between her toes, hopping fast so her feet didn’t burn. She saw a big black iguana look at her sideways with his big bulging eyes His floppity neck was held up by strong arms—not legs but arms—like a knight in armor from a storybook. She asked herself how old he was. The oldest animal she had ever seen. More than five and three-quarters, for sure.
She rushed to the cabin but remembered that her secret pen was being recharged at Angela’s. What would Angela be cooking tonight? Silly question. Red beans and rice. Gallo Pinto. But with what? Quesillo with avocado? Cajeta de Coco? Angela liked cooking as much as Lucho liked surfing.
She ran over to Angela’s house. Angela had electricity. Although, Grace still preferred her and Lucho’s Three Bear’s Cabin. She didn’t think it was fair that Hell O.D. was obviously trying to be one of The Three Bears. Why should she get to sleep in the cabin? How could she be a Bear when she smoked so many smelly cigarettes? Or worse, maybe she thought she was Goldilocks herself! Goldilocks with dark brown hair.
Grace stood in the doorway, feeling angry about Elodie, but soon forgot when she smelled something sweet wafting from a big orange bowl. Angela was cooking a dessert.
Angela looked up. “Hola mi corazón. ¿Dónde está Lucho?” Angela was always asking where Lucho was. Grace wondered why Angela bothered, when she knew the answer.
“Con el surf.”
Grace slipped into the little house. There was a painting on the wall of green hills and a waterfall. Very different from the palm trees and beach here. There was a big table in the middle of the room, with chairs, and an old ripped-up sofa in the corner with its stuffing coming out. Sometimes Grace would take an afternoon siesta on it.
“¿Y tu mamá. Todavía en Rio?” Angela asked, still stirring her cake mixture.
“Sí.”
Angela raised her eyebrows with disapproval. “¿Y la francesa?”
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br /> Grace knew what Angela was thinking, Angela didn’t like Elodie, either.
“¿Cuando vuelve tu mamá?” she pressed.
Grace wished she knew the answer. Maybe Mama Ruth would never come back. “No sé.”
Angela continued stirring the mixture with a huge wooden spoon. “Cuántos años tenés? Seis?”
She was pleased that Angela thought she was already six. Well, it wasn’t really a lie to say yes. She was almost six. “Sí.”
“Vos debés estar en la escuela no acá solita en la playa.”
“Sí,” Grace agreed. Angela was right. She should be at school and she was bored with being all alone on the beach. And now that Hell O.D was taking up all of Lucho’s time . . .
She’d seen the children on the yellow school bus, the girls in their white socks and blouses, their navy blue skirts. She could be like them. She could do math and make friends.
“¿Dónde esta la escuela?” she asked Angela, her eyes burning with curiosity.
“Hay una pequeñita en El Viejo y una mas grande en Chinandega.”
“Chin Anne Dega,” Grace repeated to herself. School, she decided, was a brilliant idea. Her Real Mom would be so proud of her in a Knicker Agua Uniform.
Tomorrow she would go to Chin Anne Dega for her first day of school. She could catch the bus. She knew where she could find coins to pay the fare.
Maybe then Lucho would miss her.
GRACE SAT ON her chair at the restaurant table, swinging her legs. In the end, Lucho decided they would go out instead of eating at Angela’s. The sun had just set and the sky was a dark purple, streaked with orange. They were all speaking English but Grace hardly understood a word because all the expressions they were using were strange. Everybody was eating barbequed fresh fish and drinking cold beers. There was Lucho, Elodie, an Australian, and two Americans. All men, except for Hell O.D and her. Grace didn’t speak because she didn’t know what to say. They were all yelling at once and she wondered if anyone understood each other at all, because nobody was answering anyone’s questions.
The Australian said to the table, “Have you been to the Island yet? La Isla? It’s just a short boat ride away. The Island has two breaks that have high performance waves on all tides. The waves are maybe a little less peaky and hollow than The Boom but it’s a rippable, sectiony wave that works from about chest high to double-overhead and sometimes offers barrel sections—”
“Yeah, man, but,” replied the really skinny American with tattoos—who looked to Grace like a stretched-out, painted Totem pole—“you can’t compare La Isla to The Boom, dude. I mean we have world-class beach break tubes here, and an excellent left point. There are nearly always three to four decent peaks up and down the beach, plus—”
“Shame it usually blows out by ten every morning,” Lucho said.
Bore. Ring, Grace thought. Would this conversation ever end? She wished she had some children her age to play with, instead of listening to this surfy talk.
Then the other American, the one with super-blond hair said, “Yeah, but hey, aren’t you glad you have time for an afternoon siesta? I’m kinda surfed out by noon, dude.”
Elodie flicked her lionish hair. “Has anyone been to San Cristobal, zee volcano?”
Grace was pleased that everyone ignored her question. She had seen the volcano from a distance on the taxi journey to the beach when they first arrived, but she didn’t say so because she doubted anyone would hear her. Besides, she was still too scared to speak English because of the whole Heaven problem with her mom—Lucho might tell Mama Ruth. That volcano, she remembered, was amazing. Great puffs of blue-black smoke rose from the center, billowing up like a fire that hadn’t caught alight. It was the largest volcano in the country. That was something to show her dad when he arrived. Mama Ruth said she was “working on it.” What did that mean? She knew he’d love it here and could spend all day with his camera, photographing animals. They could go walking together by the streams and watch for the crocodiles in the dark green mangroves. The crocs were clever and it was really hard to see them because they were the same color as the estuary and they hardly moved.
Once, with Lucho, when they went kayaking (it seemed donkey’s years ago now), Grace saw a big round eye looking straight at her. It blinked slowly and she was sure the croc was saying, “Come, come in for a swim and I’ll eat you for my dinner.” Lucho told her that the crocs lived alone and each one was master of his own bit of mangrove. That mangrove the local people called “La Cuna”—cradle in Spanish. La Cuna, because so many different species were growing up there. That outing they went on was before Lucho met Hell O.D. She’d ruined it all, and Grace wished he’d never set eyes on her. Elodie said she was “bored of seeing animals” and wanted to go somewhere else! How could anyone be bored of that? That’s why Grace called her Hell O.D. Apart from the fact that that was the way her name sounded, Elodie was too blind to see how beautiful everything was.
Grace decided that Knicker Agua must have been the first place on the Planet that God created when he was busy with his seven days. It had to be because no other place had so much life. There were sea turtles, iguanas, millions of fish—even jumping ones—butterflies, crazy-colored crabs, millions of creepy crawlies, and every insect you could imagine. And, of course, dogs, pigs, chickens, and other more usual creatures that she’d seen in America. She hadn’t come across raccoons, coyotes, and bald-eagles here, like in Crowheart, but she was sure they must be around somewhere.
Grace watched Elodie out of the corner of her eye. Her enemy chewed one last mouthful of the barbequed dorado, scraped her plate noisily, then lit up another cigarette. She flicked her hair again and rested her pretty head on Lucho’s shoulder.
Lucho had his arm around her. “Has anyone surfed Hemorrhoids?” he asked.
“Yeah, me, man,” said the tall skinny one, grinning and opening another beer. “I was pretty stoked the first time. It’s like a heavy, hollow, and totally unforgiving wave, dude, breaking on shallow and urchin infested reef. But if you know what you’re doing you can airdrop the takeoff and get like barreled for several seconds there.”
But the blond didn’t look so happy about it. His white eyebrows scrunched together in a big bow tie. “You can get seriously hurt surfing that wave. It can be mean, man.”
“The only trouble is,” the tall one said, “that Hemmi’s only got one peak, a small take-off zone and can get too crowded.”
Grace yawned. Bore. Ring.
The blond one shook his head. “I don’t know, man, it’s not just the crowds. I only caught one wave. I broke a board, cut my face with my fin getting rolled, and had multiple hold-downs. Way better here, dude, it’s got a really hollow, consistent wave. When it’s working and if The Boom is breaking clean and you know how to drop in and hold your line it’s so sweet. I mean, it’s an all-out, thumping A frame that is sure to get you pitted—”
“What got me hooked originally,” the Australian added, “when I came here, was surfing those awesome empty barrels, yeah, and watching pelicans swoop down in trains and glide off the lip with stiff afternoon off-shores—”
“Cool,” Elodie said, trying to join in the conversation.
The word pelican caught Grace’s attention. She’d seen herons too. There were so many birds here. All different colors: scarlet-red, yellow, green—there were parrots, too. She loved watching the pelicans fly in groups with their long beaks. They didn’t look like regular birds, but prehistoric. Maybe there would be pelicans in Chin Anne Dega, too.
While the others continued with their Surfy Language, she imagined tomorrow—how school was going to be. She’d need some extra money to buy herself the blue and white uniform. She thought she might know exactly where to find it. It wouldn’t be stealing exactly—spending money on school was better than wasting it on cigarettes.
With all her excitement, Grace knew it would be hard to sleep tonight.
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, Grace woke up at the sound of the cocker
el who lived somewhere up the beach. She had never seen him, but every day, before dawn, he would call out.
She could hear the waves lapping and slapping the beach. The sound was so lovely that she wanted to slumber back to sleep but she knew there wasn’t enough time for that. She had to leave before Lucho came back from surfing, or he wouldn’t allow her to go.
She sat up in bed, yawned like a lion cub and rubbed her eyes. They had pushed the two single beds together, Lucho and Elodie. Elodie was still fast asleep. Lucho was still surfing—morning was best at The Boom. Grace looked at her enemy. Elodie wasn’t so terrible, she decided. Elodie did smile at her once at dinner last night when she took her photo and asked her what her favorite color was. Grace told her it was pink but now she wasn’t sure. She’d seen a parrot, bright, bright turquoise and yellow. The colors together were sooo beautiful. It wasn’t the same as paints or crayons. The feathers were turquoise but if you looked closely there were other blues and greens, like tiny dots all joined together that made up the whole big color. She wondered if these birds knew how pretty they were.
Anyway, from now on, her favorite color was not pink anymore, but turquoise.
She slipped out of bed without making a sound and tiptoed to one of the chairs, where her shirt was hanging over the back. She pulled it over her head. She put on her shorts. Then she snuck over—her feet soft on the concrete floor—and ruffled through Elodie’s bag, without making any noise. She took out some coins, as many as she could find, and put them in her shorts pocket. Still on tiptoes, Grace took Hideous Bear from her bed and tucked Carrot up under the sheet. She owed Hideous Bear an adventure and some extra attention—he would come with her to school. But Carrot needed to get a little extra sleep and, anyway, he’d be with Lucho and Elodie so he wouldn’t get lonely.
Finally, Grace slipped her feet into her flip-flops, and with quiet, giant paces, left the room.
Outside, it was already warm but not yet hot. She looked at the ocean and saw the stripy yellow colors of sunrise streaking the sky to a clear blue. Not being able to hold it in much longer, she ran to the toilet to do a pee. Her ears were pricked but she couldn’t hear the pig. He was a late riser. Lucky, she thought, or his angry grunts might wake Hell O.D.
Stolen Grace Page 20
