Your House Will Pay

by Steph Cha

  Miriam hadn’t made that drive in two years. That was the problem, not that Grace lived in Granada Hills. They rarely saw each other because Miriam had stopped talking to their mother and refused to come home.

  Before the fight—if you could even call it a fight—it was unusual for Grace to go a full week without spending time with Miriam. They were close even for sisters, growing up sharing a bedroom, keeping each other’s secrets. But then Miriam had cut ties with Yvonne and started dating Blake, and more and more now, Grace found herself marveling at how little they had in common. They didn’t get each other’s choices, lifestyles, goals, jobs, or loved ones. There were times Grace felt this distance between them like a cold wet breath at the nape of her neck.

  “Just stay out tonight,” said Miriam. She arranged her face into an expression thick with sisterly concern. “You look kind of drunk already. Blake can drive your car back and you can sleep over.”

  “Okay,” said Grace.

  Miriam looked surprised that she’d given in so quickly and without objection, and then she smiled and squeezed Grace’s hand. Grace didn’t especially want to stay out late with Blake, or sleep in his guest bedroom with the industrial metal bed frame and the posters of his drug show, but she missed her sister.

  Grace was texting her parents to let them know her plans when someone appeared beside their table. He was a tall middle-aged white man with round wire-rimmed glasses, dressed like a cool professor, wearing a flannel shirt and a beat-up leather messenger bag. He touched Miriam’s shoulder with the tips of his fingers.

  She straightened, noticing him for the first time. “Oh, hi,” she said. “Jules.” She seemed uncharacteristically flustered, getting halfway out of her chair to shake his hand, making him step back a foot or two from the table.

  “I thought that was you,” said the man. “I was just at the Alfonso Curiel memorial. Did you hear about that?”

  “I was there,” she said.

  “I,” not “we.” Grace looked around and found Blake at the bar, talking to the bartender. Maybe that’s why Miriam was acting so stiff. Blake had a jealous streak, and she might be trying to lose this guy before he got back.

  “Then you saw the Western Boys showed up?”

  Grace thought of the angry-looking white guys in polo shirts. That had to be them.

  “I did,” said Miriam.

  “I’m writing about them, for a project about white supremacy and racial violence in California. Actually, I’m glad I ran into you. I know you have thoughts on this. Maybe—”

  “Sure,” said Miriam, cutting him off with an agreeable smile. “You have my email, right? I should be free to talk during the week.”

  “Great. I’ll follow up.” He stayed standing where he was, like he wasn’t quite sure that Miriam had dismissed him. “How’s your mom doing?” he asked.

  Grace tried to catch her sister’s eye—it was an odd question; there was no way this white man knew Yvonne—but Miriam didn’t turn to look at her. Something moved across her face. A flash of panic, Grace was sure of it.

  “Fine,” she answered. “Listen, it was good seeing you.”

  “You, too.” He smiled at Grace. “Is this your sister?”

  Another strange question—they didn’t even look that much alike. She felt drunk all of a sudden, the air seeming to shift around her.

  Grace was about to introduce herself when Miriam answered for her. “Yeah,” she said. There was something steely in her voice now, bordering on hostility.

  The man picked up on it. “I’ll email you.” He looked at Grace again, his gaze lingering a couple seconds too long. “It was nice to meet you,” he said, and walked away.

  “What was that about?” Grace asked, watching the man sit down alone at a corner table and pull a red Moleskine notebook from his bag.

  “Nothing. Sorry. I just didn’t want him talking to you.”

  Grace hadn’t gotten a creepy vibe from him, at least not in a sexual way. The man was even older than Blake.

  “Who is he?”

  “Just a writer I know.”

  Blake came back to the table with Grace’s cocktail and more Japanese whiskey for him and Miriam. Grace thanked him and drank, this screwdriver going down like juice. She waited for Miriam to mention the writer, but she never did, so Grace didn’t bring him up either. They drank instead, and Blake and Grace quizzed each other about their jobs—mostly for Miriam’s benefit, but it was nice of Blake to pretend he was interested in the pharmacy. Grace bought a fourth round and started feeling a little euphoric. She was even warming up to Blake. It was obvious he worshipped her sister, and he was only actively annoying like 10 percent of the time. Maybe even 5 percent.

  “You’re fucking kidding me,” he said, breaking Grace out of her buzzed trance.

  She looked up, wondering if that writer guy was coming back. But he was still at his corner table, eyes on the entrance to the bar. He was seeing what Blake was seeing: a half dozen of those Western Boys, smirking as they filed in, their faces splotchy and pink and filmed with sweat, their uniforms more rumpled than they’d been at the memorial but still recognizable. This was a hipster habitat, and they stood out like penguins on a savanna—which had to be the point.

  They looked around, sticking their chests out. The whole bar was watching them—Grace saw heads swivel, heard conversations drop—and they knew it. One of them stepped forward and walked over to the bar, the others following behind him like chicks. He was the leader of their troop, about thirty years old with a square, meaty head and thick biceps, the sleeves of his polo tight around them.

  Miriam shook her head, reading something on her phone. “This is a meet-up,” she said, tilting her screen to show them a Facebook page. “They’re doing a ‘libtard bar crawl.’”

  Grace looked back at the weird writer, watching from his corner with a pen and notepad in hand. He’d known they were coming here. If Miriam hadn’t spazzed out on him, he would’ve given them the low-down, not that there seemed to be much to it.

  “I should punch them in the face,” said Blake.

  “All of them?” asked Grace.

  “They have some fucking nerve.”

  “Who are they exactly?”

  “Right-wing losers,” Miriam answered. “They think Americans should be white, women should be in the kitchen—you get the picture.”

  “Why were they at the memorial?” Grace had barely wanted to go, and she thought the kid’s death was a tragedy. She didn’t understand how people could feel anything but sorrow over the killing of a teenage boy, and strongly enough to leave the house to go bother the mourners. They reminded her of those crazy GOD HATES FAGS people—angry, stupid white people picketing funerals.

  “Because that’s one of their loser things. They show up anywhere they think they can trigger the libs. That’s an end in itself.” Miriam finished her drink and stood up. “I’m gonna let the doorman know.”

  Grace watched her sister march toward the door with an uneasy feeling. “Wait,” she said. “I’ll come with you.” She followed her, leaving Blake at the table to fume.

  The doorman was a brown guy, Latino or maybe Filipino, so bloated with muscle that he almost looked fat. He lit up when he saw Miriam.

  “What’s up?” he asked, like they knew each other. Now that Grace thought of it, there’d been some banter when he carded Miriam. He was probably half in love with her.

  “Hey,” said Miriam. “Those guys who just came in—do you know who they are?”

  “I saw the hats,” he said, with a shrug. “But I can’t bounce people for wearing hats.”

  “They’re a hate group. Like the Southern Poverty Law Center has them on their list.”

  “The Southern what?”

  Grace touched her sister’s arm—Miriam wasn’t going to convince this guy to throw out six paying customers because of some list no one had ever heard of.

  She went on anyway. “They’re not just here to drink, you know? They came to
cause trouble. I think this is the third bar on their list.”

  “All I see them doing is ordering drinks in silly uniforms.” He was starting to sound annoyed. Miriam did that to people sometimes—she acted less cute than she looked, and the gap threw them off.

  “Can I talk to the manager?”

  “And tell him what?”

  “I just think he should know there are Nazis at his bar. What he does with that information is up to him.”

  He sighed. “Look, just let them have their little club meeting.”

  “Their Nazi club meeting.”

  They kept their eyes locked, waiting each other out. Then the doorman’s gaze shifted. “Go back to your friends,” he said.

  The club leader was behind Grace, so close his voice made her jump. “Is there a problem?” The hope on his face was disgusting.

  Grace willed her sister to keep her mouth shut.

  Miriam didn’t even hesitate. “I didn’t come here to drink with the Simi Valley Hitler Youth.”

  “We’re not Nazis.” The way he said it made Grace think he had to make the denial often.

  “I’ve never had to clarify that I’m not a Nazi,” said Miriam.

  “Whatever you think we are, we’re just having a drink. You’re the one trying to get us kicked out.” He shook his head and smiled. “Come on, it wasn’t that long ago when businesses discriminated against people like you. No blacks, no Jews, no Chinese allowed.”

  She scoffed. “You can take off your hat; you can’t take off your skin. What do you have, like a fourth-grade education?”

  “I went to Berkeley,” he said, crossing his arms.

  Grace could tell that caught Miriam off guard. She had a great respect for pedigree.

  The bouncer cut in. “That’s enough flirting. You,” he said to the troop leader. “Don’t give me a reason.”

  “I’m just defending myself.” He raised his hands and backed away with exaggerated deference.

  “You’re giving them what they want,” said the doorman. “When else does a girl like you give a guy like him the time of day?”

  She ignored the peace offering. “The manager should know. Trust me. That guy didn’t come here to have a quiet drink.”

  Blake started talking as soon as they got back to the table. He practically rattled with manic energy as he showed them his phone. There was a tweet on the screen, with a grainy video of the Western Boys laughing at the bar: At @TheCrookedTail with @MiriamMPark and who shows up but these fascists. They just got here. Come help us let them know they’re not welcome in our LA. #WesternBoysNightOut.

  “I posted this five minutes ago, and it has over thirty retweets already.” Blake had more than twenty thousand Twitter followers, a fact he’d managed to drop in front of Grace at least five times. “I guess they were at Bells & Whistles earlier. There’s a hashtag going. They left before they could get chased out, but there was a group heading over to confront them. Now they’re coming here.”

  Grace felt a bolt of fear flash through her drunkenness. “Are you serious? Who?”

  Blake was grinning, unable to hide his excitement. “Whoever wants to come. DSA people, activists, probably a few gawkers who are just bored on a Saturday night. Some people from the memorial, too. We weren’t the only ones who noticed those douchebags.”

  She pictured them gathering, not just thrill-seeking self-righteous white guys but pissed-off black people. If these Western Boys made Blake mad, who knew how bad it might get when people with real grievances showed up?

  “Jesus, Blake,” said Miriam. “I know they’re pathetic, but pathetic white men tend to have guns. This could get really ugly.”

  Grace was relieved—her sister, at least, had a tiny bit of sense. “We should leave,” Grace said.

  “What?” Blake huffed. “We can’t leave. We need to stand our ground here, guys.”

  They both looked at Miriam, and Grace felt the room spin around her as she willed her sister to take her side. Then Miriam grabbed Blake’s hand. “These fuckers spent their Saturday protesting a murdered teenager’s memory,” she said. “I’m not letting them chase me out.”

  She’d made up her mind—Grace could see it, and she knew that once Miriam made up her mind, Grace could exhaust herself fighting, and never gain an inch.

  “Well, I’m going home,” she said.

  “You said you’d stay over tonight,” Miriam protested.

  “That was before you guys started a Wild West showdown.”

  “Can you even drive?”

  “I’m fine. I’ll sober up.”

  “Are you sure? You’re not mad at me, are you?”

  Miriam squeezed her hand, and Grace thought of all the reasons she should be mad at her sister. She was letting Grace leave the bar alone drunk, to get mugged or raped or crash and die on the 5, all so she could take part in some moronic turf war. She’d let Blake take over their first night together in weeks, their precious sister time sullied with his whiskey and smarm. She’d cut off their mother and severed the family, and Grace still didn’t understand why. Grace caught a crashing wave of confused, inebriated emotion. She had to steady herself against Miriam to keep standing, to stop herself from weeping.

  “I just want to go home,” she said, hugging her sister. “Please try not to get yourself shot.”

  She had a hell of a time finding her car, and as soon as she got behind the wheel, she knew there was no way she could drive back to the Valley.

  It was after midnight, but when she called home, Yvonne picked up immediately. She asked what was the matter, and when she heard Grace slurring, she woke up Paul and said they were coming to get her. She didn’t scold or complain—if anything, she seemed relieved that the problem was so simple, that something could be done. Forty minutes later, Grace sat next to her mother, drooling onto her seat belt, while Paul drove her car home behind them. Her head hurt, pounding with shame and gratitude, bitterness and love.

  Two

  Tuesday, June 25, 2019

  They waited for Ray in the parking lot, standing in a row on the asphalt, exposed to the pouring sun. It had been an hour already, but they held their formation, not wanting to be found in the car, sitting casual with the AC on. Ray would come out searching for them, and it seemed important that they be ready the moment he looked their way.

  It was a nice day for a shaded picnic or a neighborhood stroll, but Shawn was suffering in the settled warmth, and he could see the sweat beading on Nisha’s lip. Even the kids, so upbeat on the drive over, were quiet now, their excitement dampened by the anticlimax of a long hot wait in a dreary parking lot. It was a good thing Aunt Sheila agreed to stay home and get dinner ready. All this welcome party needed was a fainting grandma.

  Dasha held a balloon the size of her torso. It shone in the sunlight, rainbow letters spelling WELCOME HOME on a background of silvery blue. She’d picked and paid for it herself, out of her weekly allowance, and she’d insisted on bringing it to Lompoc instead of leaving it back at the house with the cake and the rest of the party. Shawn saw now why it was worth the trouble. With the balloon and her butter-yellow sundress, she’d be the first sight Ray would see as a free man.

  Darryl stood next to her, his pits sweating in the button-down shirt Aunt Sheila had forced him to wear. The tie he’d loosened on the drive, then taken off altogether. Shawn would help him knot it again later—or Ray, if he remembered how.

  The boy plucked the balloon from the air and flapped it between him and his sister, back and forth, like a folding fan. It squeaked against his fingers, and she started to protest, clutching the slack string ribbon. She gave up and leaned closer instead, on the off chance it stirred up a breeze. They looked like praying angels, thought Shawn, their heads together, watching for their father.

  All around them was concrete and chain link, grim gray spruced up with patches of dying grass. Beyond the parking lot lay the stark, mute buildings that made up the federal prison, where Ray had spent the last ten years.
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  Finally, a door opened in one of the fenced-off buildings, and a man came out alone, carrying a cardboard box. His face turned up and out.

  “It’s him,” said Nisha, standing on her toes. “It’s him!” She waved her arms and shouted. “Ray!”

  He saw them and smiled. Stood taller, walked faster. It was Ray, all right, and for a moment, the sight of him stunned Shawn into something like disbelief. His cousin was wearing a brand-new shirt and smart dark jeans—Nisha had sent the dress-out clothes a month ago. Ray had been vain about his clothes, once upon a time, and it was strange to see him in normal gear again. He seemed to shimmer like a mirage, diligently imagined.

  But he was there in the flesh, and the flesh, Shawn saw, had aged. Not since the last time he’d seen him, just a few months earlier, but since the last time he’d seen him free. It was obvious, outside the timeless space of the visiting room: Ray was a forty-four-year-old man, the end scraps of his youth left behind in an overcrowded cell. There was gray in his hair, and his body was lean, without its former wiry hardness. The tattoos on his forearms had a soft, worn-in look, the black ink washed to a smudgy green. DARRYL and DASHA in large Gothic font, surrounded by patterns and symbols in a dense, thorny thicket.

  Nisha got a spot on his chest, Shawn remembered. LANEISHA over Ray’s heart before they were even married, a rash late-night decision that had panned out in spite of it all. And on his right biceps, another tribute: AVA. Shawn had the same name on the same place. They’d gotten it done together, their friend Tramell inking it in the year Shawn turned fourteen. He’d done their backs, too. The name of their set, BARING CROSS, laid out in a crucifix, crossing at the R. Shawn felt the words glow warm against his skin. It was surreal, seeing Ray free again. Exhilarating and joyful. Yet it came with a heightened awareness of all that had brought them here, the past clinging to them in thin, sticky layers.

  The kids pulled him out of his daze, back into the dazzling present.