Mexican WhiteBoy

by Matt De La Peña

  Danny nods. “Yeah.” He puts on a smile.

  Uno nods, slowly turns back to the game. The next Padre hitter cracks one high into the air, toward left center field. The crowd rises as the ball carries all the way to the wall, but at the last second the center fielder reaches up from the warning track and snags it for the third out. The air is let out of the stadium. Organ music comes on over the PA.

  Uno reaches down for his soda, takes another long sip. As he puts the soda back down he gives Danny an intentional elbow to the ribs. “Oh, damn, D. My bad.” He spreads out, knocking Danny’s arm into his own lap. “You is kinda all up in my space, though.”

  Uno palms Danny’s head, shakes it around a little and lets go. “Lighten up, D,” he says.

  Danny puts on a bigger smile.

  “You know, I been watchin’ the game real close,” Uno says. “And trust me on this, you better than some of these pitchers right now, man.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Danny says.

  “Trust me.”

  But for the first time in the past three years he doesn’t care who’s better than who at pitching. It doesn’t matter anymore.

  4

  The second Danny gets home he ducks into the bathroom, locks the door behind him. He paces back and forth in front of the mirror, trying to think. He rips his shirt over his head and stares at his frowning face in the mirror, his thin neck, skinny brown chest. His face is so scrunched up in confusion it looks like he’s about to cry, but he’s not. Doesn’t feel the urge to cry at all. In fact, he doesn’t feel anything. He’s hollow, like the sound inside a seashell. He holds up his arms, scans all the scars on the pale inside part. Then he digs his nails into his left one, watches his face in the mirror. But he can’t feel anything. He digs deeper, draws blood. Nothing.

  It’s not that his dad’s in jail. It’s that nobody told him. Like he’s a little kid. He digs into his arm even deeper.

  There’s a knock on the door. “Danny?” It’s Sofia.

  “I’m in here,” Danny says, and he digs deeper.

  “Open up, cuz.”

  Danny still can’t feel the pain. He’s numb. Not even a real person. Needs to get deeper. He opens the medicine cabinet, shuffles through pill bottles, ointments, half-used tubes of toothpaste. Grabs a pair of tweezers.

  “Danny, open the door.”

  He holds his left arm against the sink and runs the sharp part of the tweezers across the inside. Goes back and forth in a straight line. Back and forth again. A thin trickle of blood starts creeping out.

  “Danny!”

  He goes back and forth with the tweezers, again and again, staring at himself in the mirror, until the pain finally shoots up into his brain. He grits his teeth but then a strange sense of calm comes over his face. It hurts. He feels it.

  “Danny, open the door. I’m not playin’!”

  “One minute,” he says. His eyes bug out when he looks down at his arm, sees the thick line of blood now flowing. He drops the tweezers in the sink and turns on the water full blast. Washes the blood off. Scrubs the wound with soap and then puts it under the stream of water again. But the line of blood comes back even thicker. It’s all over the sink now, too.

  “Open the door, Danny!”

  “One second.”

  “Open it now!”

  He reaches out for the toilet paper roll, pulls a wad and holds it to his arm. Rinses out the sink. His arm hurts. He feels it. The blood is quickly soaking through the toilet paper so he wads up some more, a second layer. Sofia’s pounding the door now. She shouts: “Open the fucking door, Danny!”

  Danny opens the door and tries to scoot past Sofia, into her room, but she shoves him against the wall. Takes his arm and pulls the toilet paper away from his wound. She makes an awful face and looks up at him. “Jesus, Danny. What’d you do?” Tears start forming in her eyes, one falls down her cheek. She doesn’t wipe it away. She pulls him into her room and lays him on his cot, closes the door.

  “Jesus, Danny,” she says again.

  “I’m sorry,” Danny says.

  Sofia shakes her head. Another tear darts down her cheek. She pulls a towel from her closet, holds it against his arm. Stares into his eyes. She shakes her head again. “But you didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  Danny closes his eyes. Opens them.

  “Danny!”

  “What?”

  “You don’t got nothin’ to do with him bein’ in trouble.”

  Danny tries to sit up, but Sofia pushes him back down.

  “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  “I know.”

  Sofia presses a hand to his forehead. “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong, cuz.”

  Danny can feel the pain in his arm. He closes his eyes. Opens them.

  “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  “I know.”

  “Listen to me!” Sofia shouts. “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  “I must have,” Danny says.

  “No, you didn’t.”

  Danny takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. Opens them.

  “You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  This time Danny closes his eyes and keeps them that way. Sofia tells him he didn’t do anything wrong over and over. In his ear. Occasionally touching a hand to his forehead. And then she goes quiet, too. She just sits there with him, holding the towel against his arm. And after a while she falls asleep, her head heavy against his towel-covered arm. Her breaths long and deep. And soon Danny falls asleep, too, lying on his back on the cot. And when they wake up the next morning, neither says a word about what happened.

  The Last Hustle of the Summer

  1

  Danny and Uno sit side by side on the Coaster. Outside their window the North County coastline flashes by: Torrey Pines, La Jolla, Del Mar, Solana Beach, Cardiff by the Sea. Danny eyes the campsites through the long chain-link fence, the little beachside restaurants and surf shops. The quaint motels and record shops and sleepy beachside parks. How long has it been since he’s seen this side of San Diego? The peace and quiet. The white people living in comfort. He has on his Vans, a pair of baggy jeans and a long-sleeved button-down shirt to hide the bandage on his arm.

  Uno elbows him. “I’m bringin’ shit full circle on you, D.” He pulls his new Padres cap tight over his forehead. The bill flat as a pancake and set slightly crooked. Tag still dangling from the top.

  Just then the Coaster pulls up to a palm-tree-lined stop and the doors slide open smooth. Uno looks out the window, at the name of the stop, then down at a piece of paper where he’s scribbled down his notes. He leaps out of his seat, clutching his duffel bag, and grabs Danny by the shirt and they both slip out of the train car just as the doors slide closed.

  It isn’t until Danny’s standing on the familiar platform, the Coaster scooting away behind his back, that he recognizes where he is. Leucadia. He’s never taken the train here.

  As he and Uno start across the parking lot toward the street, he thinks about how different things will be next school year. He feels so much older now. More experienced.

  And suddenly it dawns on him what Uno’s up to. He stops dead in his tracks, says: “Kyle Sorenson?”

  Uno laughs and stumbles ahead. After standing there a few seconds Danny follows.

  They turn left onto Santa Fe, and Danny feels it wash over him—he’s back home. They pass familiar fast-food joints and gas stations filled with white people, the giant nursery that runs flush against the freeway underpass where groups of faceless Mexican men hover in the shadows, hoping for work. There’s such a division in Leucadia. The wealthy white people and poor Mexicans. He’s never really understood how separate the two races are until now.

  2

  Danny and Uno walk up the long driveway of Leucadia Prep, find the entire baseball team still on the field. Coach Sullivan’s there. He’s messing with the bill of his cap and barking instructions at one of his pitchers. A kid named Barker’s hitting off a
tee in front of a squatting assistant coach. Roger and Joe are taking turns fielding grounders and firing to first. Marcus is in shallow right field stretching out his back with the help of a female trainer.

  But most importantly, Kyle’s there. He’s wearing an Atlanta Braves practice jersey and demonstrating his trademark batting stance to a couple younger players.

  Danny and Uno walk right up to the fence along the third-base line, Danny’s old spot, and watch.

  After a few minutes, Coach Sullivan blows his whistle, signifying the end of practice. All the players hustle toward the mound and huddle around their coach. Sullivan looks over a clipboard and then addresses his team in a low, deep voice.

  Uno points through the fence at Kyle. “That him?”

  Danny nods.

  They watch Kyle walk up to the huddle squeezing a Gatorade bottle, the green stream of liquid arcing into his open mouth.

  “How’d you know he’d be here?” Danny says.

  Uno smiles. “You know I got my sources, D.”

  Danny nods. He’s surprised to find that he doesn’t feel even a little bit nervous. He feels calm. Maybe it’s taken real life getting so real for him to realize baseball’s just a game.

  “He’s workin’ out with these guys till the team and his agent agree on a deal. You know he tryin’ to get like twenty-five mil, right?”

  They remain against the chain-link fence studying Kyle. He looks pretty much the same. Maybe a little thicker from lifting weights.

  “Sick school,” Uno says. “Everything’s brand-new, man. Check out that field.”

  Danny tries to look at his high school field from Uno’s perspective. And what he sees is almost embarrassing. It’s too beautiful.

  Uno pushes away from the fence. “Follow my lead, D.” He unlatches the gate and struts out onto the field holding his duffel bag.

  As Danny passes through the gate after Uno, the circle of players stack their hands, shout “Team!” and break their huddle. Most of them head directly for the pile of bags near the third-base dugout. Coach Sullivan hangs near the mound for a bit talking to a couple younger players. When he spots Danny and Uno walking onto the field he loses his train of thought and trails off.

  Uno tosses his bag down in shallow left and holds his catcher’s mitt out for the ball. Danny tosses the baseball to him and backpedals several yards. He and Uno throw the ball back and forth in silence, aware that the entire Leucadia Prep team has turned to watch them.

  Coach Sullivan starts toward left field. He stops a few feet away from Danny and Uno and watches, arms crossed, a curious smirk on his face.

  After a few minutes he says: “You’re back, huh, kid? I asked some of the guys about you, but they said you were transferring schools.”

  A few guys catch up to their coach.

  Danny tosses the ball back to Uno, shrugs.

  “D ain’t transferrin’ nowhere,” Uno pipes up, snatching the ball out of the air and tossing it back. “He comin’ right back here for his junior year.”

  Sullivan nods, glances at Marcus. “Well, that’s good news. We said we were gonna try it again, right?”

  “Anyway,” Uno says, tossing the ball back to Danny, “we fittin’ to challenge your boy.”

  A kid named Joe turns to the team catcher, Marcus. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Marcus looks to Uno. “What do you mean, ‘challenge’?”

  “I’m puttin’ money on D strikin’ out your boy.”

  Coach Sullivan raises his hands and backs up slowly. “Whoa there, big fella,” he says. “Now, I didn’t hear that last part you just said. Matter of fact, I’m gonna go sit up in the bleachers right about now, look over some of my practice notes.” He turns to Marcus and shrugs, walks off the field.

  Marcus waits until Sullivan’s out of earshot, says to Uno: “How much you talking about?”

  “Thirty bones,” Uno says.

  “Yeah?” Joe says. “Who you wanna challenge?”

  “Mr. Big League.”

  “Kyle?”

  Uno nods, catches a toss from Danny. “All he gotta do is put it in play ’fore D strikes him out. That’s it. A fair ball.”

  The guys all look at each other, snickering. Joe motions toward Uno. “This guy for real?”

  Uno pulls a wad of money from his front pocket, peels off a twenty and a ten and holds his money up. “I got a Jackson and a Hamilton says how real I is. Less you wanna make it two Jacksons. ’Cause we could do that, too.”

  “You guys don’t wanna mess with Ky,” Marcus says to Danny. “You know that.”

  “He wouldn’t be into it, anyway,” Joe says. “He’s about to be in the bigs.”

  Barker steps to Uno. “You even know where you are, dude? Kids at this school find twenties under couch cushions. Why would he do it?”

  “Shut up, Barker,” Marcus says.

  “What? I’m just telling him. How’s he supposed to pitch in that shirt, anyway?”

  Marcus turns to Danny again. “You don’t really wanna challenge Kyle, do you?”

  Danny glances at Uno and then goes back to Marcus. “Yeah,” he says. “I do.”

  Barker’s eyes go wide. “He speaks!”

  Joe megaphones a hand around his mouth, yells: “Hey, Ky! Dude, you’re gonna wanna hear this!”

  Uno looks at Danny. A little grin comes over his face and he punches the inside of his catcher’s mitt.

  Barker looks to Marcus, says: “Dude, I thought he was a deaf-mute.”

  “Didn’t say a word all through tryouts,” Roger says.

  Marcus turns to Danny. “Since when did you start talking?”

  Uno spits, says: “Check it, yo, does your boy wanna throw down or what?”

  Joe meets Kyle halfway, catches him up as they continue toward Danny and Uno.

  Kyle stops a few feet from Danny and folds his arms Coach Sullivan style.

  “Remember this guy?” Joe asks him.

  Kyle looks Danny up and down a couple times and shakes his head.

  “Come on, Ky,” Marcus says. “He’s the kid who used to watch us practice all last year. Remember?”

  “I don’t think so,” Kyle says. “Maybe.”

  “One of the only wetbacks they let in the school,” Barker says, turning to Joe and Marcus. “How could you forget?”

  Uno stops his arm in the middle of his throwing motion and points at Barker. “Careful, money. I can’t have nobody disrespectin’ my boy’s nationality like that.” Uno turns to Kyle. “Yo, let’s squash the whole reunion scene, man. I don’t care how much signing bonus you ’bout to get, I got forty bones says my boy D could strike your ass out.”

  A smile breaks over Kyle’s face, and he stares Danny in the eyes. Without looking away, he says: “All right. Give the money to Marcus to hold.”

  Danny stares back. He feels no sense of fear whatsoever. There’s a newfound calm inside his head. He can sense it. Something has changed.

  Barker pumps his fist and points at Uno, says: “Get ready to lose your life savings, dude.”

  3

  Danny locks in on Uno’s first sign: fastball. He nods, grips the baseball. Fingers the seams. He glances at all the guys leaning against the dugout, watching. Goofing on each other. Pointing at a pack of passing girls. He glances at Coach Sullivan sitting at the very top of the bleachers, arms spread on the bleacher behind him, hat resting halfway up his thinning hair. His two assistants chatting a bleacher below. One of them pointing at something in the newspaper.

  Danny goes into his windup, fires a two-seam fastball that screams out of his fingertips and pops Uno’s waiting mitt, just off the plate.

  Kyle watches Danny’s first pitch all the way into Uno’s leather, hardly moves his bat off his shoulder.

  Uno tosses back, drops a second sign: curve.

  Danny pulls in a deep breath and nods. He searches his stomach for butterflies but there’s nothing. How can he be this calm? He’s pitching to Kyle Sorenson. He goes into his windu
p, delivers a looping curve in the dirt.

  Kyle doesn’t bite on that one, either.

  Uno traps the errant pitch and stands up out of his crouch, takes a couple steps toward the mound. He brings his mitt up to his cheek and says: “You cool, D. Remember ’bout the train!” He tosses the ball back and returns to his spot behind the plate.

  One of the guys on the fence calls out: “Thought you wanted to challenge him, dude! Throw a damn strike!”

  Somebody else yells: “Kid’s scared to death! Look at him, he’s shaking like an epileptic!”

  Everybody laughs.

  Danny reads Uno’s next sign and nods. He fires another fastball, this one heading for the black of the inside corner.

  Kyle takes his first rip of the afternoon. He swings with malicious intent, but a little too early—drives a laser into foul territory on the third-base side. The batted ball sends Kyle’s teammates scattering out of the way, ducking for cover, as it smashes off the face of the home dugout and skips into left field.

  “Strike one!” Uno calls out from behind his borrowed mask.

  Danny watches the ball roll all the way to the fence, ricochet off the chain-link, and die a spinning death just inside the warning track. A foul ball, counts as a strike. But it’s also the best contact anybody’s made against him all summer.

  Danny turns, fishes for Kyle’s eyes, but Kyle cuts away, studies the barrel of his bat. Tucks it under his arm and pulls at both batting gloves.

  Uno reaches into his bag for another baseball and tosses it out to the mound. Lays down another sign: slider.

  Danny nods. He’s got a strike on Kyle Sorenson. A third of the way there. But having watched him all season, having studied him, he knows Kyle’s actually better once he’s down a strike or two. Danny glances over at the section of fence he used to stand behind. Watching. Writing mental letters to his dad. If only he knew all that bragging and boasting was getting sent to a prison. His dad wouldn’t have come home no matter what he wrote in those letters. Because he couldn’t.

  Danny goes into his windup and lets go of a nasty slider, a pitch that bottoms out at the very last second.