“I have a couple of ideas.” Mariela fiddles with her braid. “There’s this special potion that my father brought me, all the way from England—you know, where Merlin’s from?” She drums her fingers on Betsy’s desk. “If you know how to use it correctly, it can make you invisible.”
None of us say anything. Her fingers suddenly stop and hover over the paper, and she intently studies our faces. “Why—do you guys have any suggestions?”
We don’t. Not right then. Not with Ms. Simón looking up, getting ready to open her mouth and say, Mariela, could you please move your chair back to your seat? Not with Katrina peeking up from her notebook, glaring as she watches Mariela smile at Stephanie, arms sprawled over Betsy’s desk, head tipped toward La Flaca. Not the right time or place.
However, there are certain things we’d like to show her first.
—
First is the time machine. Mariela examines the gleaming engine parts approvingly, the black leather control sticks, the giant dial where you can set the day, month, and year. “Ancient Egypt,” she says, running a fingertip across the steel doorway, wrinkling her nose at the dust. “I’d like to see some velociraptors—are they really as smart as they say?”
—
On the run from the Nazis, we show her the attic hiding room. Our flour sacks are full of family photo albums and rolled-up wads of cash. She listens intently, holding the candlestick up high. “Quick,” she hisses, “this way!” She hurriedly guides us through the secret passageway, pulling the bookcase away from the wall with great heaving gasps.
The fifth-grade girls snicker as we run past them, staring at us with exaggeratedly open mouths. “God, what are they doing today?” one of them says.
(Following Mariela, listening to her instructions, we can ignore them more easily than ever. More easily than with Penelope, even.)
—
In Siberia, we try to show her the giant tundra, the icy river where we scoop fish out of the water with our enormous paws, the endless steppe where we go antelope hunting (antelope are, as everybody knows, Siberian tigers’ favorite food). But she just shakes her head: “I have a better idea.”
She herds us into giant pens, where we stand shoulder to shoulder. She swings the enormous gate shut, locking us in. Pacing, keys jangling at her waist, she explains: Here, we’ll be the main attraction of a brand-new park. It’s open to visitors of all ages and nationalities—that is, until things suddenly go terribly wrong. As she flips the switch that deactivates the electric fence, she instructs us how to flee from the gamekeeper’s bullets, how to terrorize naïve park guests and stalk stray goats.
“That’s not how Penelope would do it,” Stephanie says in a low voice, but at the same time the recess bells rings, so if Mariela does hear her, she gives no sign.
—
“Hurry up, now,” she says, tapping her foot as we scramble to put away our pencils, retie our sweaters tightly over our belly buttons. “This way please.” We clamber to the top of the monkey bars and listen as she explains how her newly redesigned time machine works. In order to activate it, we now have to jump off the center of the monkey bars, holding hands. If we skin our knees on the ground, or split open the palms of our hands, or scream loud enough to cause Recess Monitor Adriana to come running over and get us all in trouble, well, that’s not exactly Mariela’s fault, is it?
(Penelope never used the monkey bars—she liked the swing set, where fewer people tended to congregate. There was less of a risk that way. No chance of the fifth-grade girls wandering up to us, mouths twisting in amusement. Saying things like Wow, wait. Aren’t you guys a little too old for Let’s Pretend?)
“Is it too much to ask for your attention now, please?” Mariela asks, in a voice that sounds just like Ms. Simón’s, when we start flicking sticky yellow butterfly eggs off the bars or pinning dried cicada shells onto our shirts.
“What do you think ‘Mr. B’ stands for?” she says as we read over her epic poem, flipping through the pages of her latest draft. “Mr. Blow Job? Mr. Boobs?”
“That’s rude,” La Flaca says, looking up sharply.
“No it’s not,” Mariela says. “It’s sex. It’s natural. Is a natural part of life rude?”
“When you say it like that it is,” La Flaca says.
Mariela just smiles and wiggles her index finger deep into La Flaca’s ribs.
—
She stands next to us in line, arm draped over our shoulders or wrapped around our waists, while we look around nervously, making sure the fifth-grade girls aren’t staring: The worst possible thing ever would be to have the word lesbian whispered in our direction. Mariela keeps reaching for our hands to hold in line, though, like she doesn’t ever hear them, like she wouldn’t even care. Mariela says we should come to her house for a sleepover. She says we just have to. We absolutely must. Will our parents let us? Can you ask permission? When can you do it; when will we know? We can sleep in her living room on the couch cushions. Her father won’t check on us, not once. We can read her American comic books, make prank phone calls, and tell the maids to order all the pizza and cake we can eat. Did she tell us about the time that she answered the phone before the maid got to it, and as a joke she told the voice on the other end that her father had gone on vacation with the paramilitaries? “What’s a paramilitary?” La Flaca says, but Mariela just scrunches up her empty packet of Doritos and says that the voice on the other end of the phone did not find that very funny, no indeed. And if her father’s not home, she can sneak us into his study and show us where he hides one of his guns, in a cardboard box under some VHS tapes. She once found photos of naked women in there too. “Breasts and vagina,” she says, pinching Stephanie’s arm until she winces. “I swear to God!”
“What are you guys talking about?”
It’s someone else’s voice this time, someone who’s not us. We look around in alarm, gripping onto the monkey bars so that we don’t slide off. It’s Katrina, staring up from the ground. “Can I come up too?” she says, curling her fingers over the ladder.
“Sure,” Stephanie says, still rubbing her arm. But Mariela swings a leg back and forth so that Katrina has to back away to avoid getting hit in the face by her flip-flop.
“Sorry,” Mariela says. “Siberian tigers only.”
(It sounds scary when she says it out loud like that—like it’s a secret she’s not afraid of sharing. Something special that’s ours and no one else’s.)
Katrina flips her hair over her shoulders, the same way as the fifth-grade girls. “Who cares,” she says. “You’re a bunch of kindergarten babies anyway.”
As she walks away, Mariela shouts after her: “If you don’t start minding your own business, Katrina, I’m going to give your name to the FARC!”
Later, filling her tray with french fries, Mariela says that she doesn’t care that Katrina’s father was killed by the Americans. No, she isn’t sorry one bit. Men like him deserve it. Wait, you didn’t know about him? Oh, everybody knew. Are you saying you didn’t know? He got gunned down by the CIA, just like Escobar, running for his life on the rooftop. Where have you been living these past few weeks—on Mars? Don’t you know anything about what’s going on in this country; can’t you see for yourself what it’s really like? Picking at her tiny cup of Alpinito yogurt, Stephanie asks, “What’s the FARC?” but Mariela just frowns and doesn’t answer.
You know what we should do, Mariela says. We should come to her father’s ranch in the countryside. Come on the weekend; come this weekend! Remember her birthday parties in kindergarten? The way she invited every single person in the class? Everybody came; don’t you remember? She scans our faces, touches our elbows, voice rising. Remember the swimming pool? Remember Carlitos? Baloo? Candy Bird?
We shake our heads and back away. Dig holes in the ground with our shoes. We don’t remember. We can’t get permission. We can’t come; this weekend we’re busy. She quickly looks away, pulling her fingers into a fist, mouth twisting like she’s
just bitten into an extra-sour piece of mango.
That afternoon she can’t stop rushing us along. She pulls us past the open cage doors, points out the failed electric fence. “Look out,” she whispers, “here they come!” There’s the slaughtered security guards, the smashed-up army jeep, the trembling pond water. We’re going to have to run for our lives. We’re going to have to be extremely sly and sneaky if we want to have any chance of surviving at all. And as her eyes dart everywhere, we turn in circles, trying our best to see the same thing that she can—the danger all around us. As she ducks and crawls, throwing her arms fearfully over her head, we can’t help but nervously glance over our shoulders. We search the sky, scan the football field, strain our eyes. We look everywhere, as though there’s truly something out there that we need to watch for, and if we just stare long and hard enough we’ll be able to see it—but of course we never do.
—
And then there’s the morning that we come into the classroom and Mariela’s desk has been moved. She’s now next to Stephanie and in front of Betsy and La Flaca—Penelope’s old spot. It’s like looking into a mirror that shows an old reflection, except the person who’s supposed to be there isn’t. Mariela sits there calmly, hands folded on the wooden surface.
“Ms. Simón said it was fine,” she says. “She gave me permission.”
We stand there until Ms. Simón tells us it’s time to take our seats now, please. We slide off our backpacks. Fiddle with our sweatpants strings, twist the scrunchies on our wrists.
It’s time for News Sharing. Álvaro’s brought an article about how the oldest tree in the Cali city center is getting cut down, because the politicians want to build a parking lot, or maybe a new office building. Sebastián has a story about the most recent soccer game, as usual. And then La Flaca surprises us by raising her hand.
“I’m moving to New York,” she says. “In January.” Her eyes are fixed on Ms. Simón’s face as she speaks. “My grandma wants me to go to boarding school there.”
Stephanie starts coughing, like she’s swallowed too much water. Ms. Simón says that even though that’s not official news, it’s still good of her to share—we’ll certainly all miss her.
As La Flaca lowers her arm, Stephanie leans over. “Since when did you know?” she whispers, and when La Flaca doesn’t answer she waves her hand frantically around her desk, as though swirling the air will be enough to get an answer from her. “Since when, Flaca?”
La Flaca folds her fingers into fists and stares straight ahead.
It’s Katrina’s turn now: Last Saturday she went to the christening party for the mayor’s new baby—he rented out the entire Club Campestre and she and her family were personally invited. She’s talking about tasting her mother’s champagne when Mariela leans toward us.
“I have news to share too,” she whispers. She takes a newspaper clipping out of her notebook and smooths it out across her desk.
Now that she’s sitting so close, it’s as easy as anything for us to see it. It’s a photo from the nightclub section, a dark room filled with people. Mr. B. is dancing on a tabletop, his face bright red, his blond hair a shocking flash in the darkness. He’s surrounded by women in skimpy dresses, bare shoulders, and exposed backs, pale as ghosts. None are facing the camera, but we can all tell without saying it out loud: Ms. Simón is not one of them.
“See what I mean?” Mariela says. “Somebody has to tell her.”
We just stare.
“It’s the truth,” Mariela says. “It’s important that she sees it.”
“Anyone else?” Ms. Simón says, and Mariela immediately raises her hand.
It’s Stephanie who does it. She leans over and yanks the newspaper clipping off Mariela’s desk. Crumples it in her hand before passing it to Betsy, who shoves it deep inside her pencil case. Mariela doesn’t say anything, just stares at us, eyes growing wide.
“Mariela?” Ms. Simón says, frowning, but Mariela still doesn’t speak, doesn’t even shake her head, just stays in her seat as if frozen. Katrina raises her hand and says she still has photos to show from the party, if no one else brought anything to share.
“That’s fine,” Ms. Simón says, still frowning. She can show them tomorrow—it’s time for geography now. “Everybody, please take out your puzzles; spread the pieces out across your desk.”
Boxes rattle as they’re pulled out of backpacks—Sebastián spills half of his pieces on the floor, Katrina’s already picking out her edges. But Stephanie and Mariela still don’t move; they remain frozen in their chairs, looking down at their laps.
—
During recess we play Hindenburg. Standing by the monkey bars, Mariela gives the directions: adjusting an arm here, a leg there, referring to her library copy of DISASTER! The Hindenburg Story when needed. La Flaca the stewardess is pushing the drink cart. Betsy is a passenger by the window. Stephanie is the famous acrobat who breaks his ankle rolling to safety but whose dog burns alive in the wreckage. There are no other survivors.
When it’s time to move into position, though, Stephanie crosses her arms over her chest. “No,” she says.
“Sorry,” Mariela says, not even glancing over. “The dog dies. Stick your arms out,” she says, tapping La Flaca’s wrists.
“I’m not leaving without my dog.”
In one swift motion, Mariela turns and picks the library book off the ground, flipping toward the glossary in the back.
“Ulla the Alsatian,” she says. “Brought all the way from Germany as a gift for your children. Killed in the crash.” She places the book back down and wipes her hands off on the back of her shorts, as though they’ve suddenly become sticky.
Stephanie looks up at the sky.
“Maybe,” Betsy says, so quietly that it’s hard to hear, “the dog is in the luggage.” She pauses, saying the next part as fast as possible: “Maybe that’s how she survives.”
Mariela’s shaking her head. “No.” She’s moved on to Betsy now, directing her into the passenger seat, where she’ll sit and wait to be burned alive. “That’s not how it happens. We have to do what’s true. Don’t forget your doll,” she says to Betsy.
Do you die right away when a plane crashes? At what point do you understand what’s happening? Is it the rattling of the overhead bins, the roar of the engines, the screams of the other passengers? What does it feel like, what are you thinking, how can we ever imagine?
Stephanie says, “It’s just a stick.”
Mariela pauses, her hand still resting on Betsy’s arm. Betsy takes a step to the side so that they’re no longer touching.
“You’re pretending,” Stephanie says. “It doesn’t mean anything. It’s a stupid game for babies.”
She’s still craning her neck back, looking at the sky. Betsy lets the stick fall to the ground. Mariela tugs her braid over her shoulder and brushes it against her lips.
This time it’s La Flaca who speaks. “You know,” she says, “it’s gross when you do that.”
“Do what?” Mariela says, but her hand freezes.
“That,” La Flaca says. Stephanie starts swinging her leg, kicking the side of the monkey bar ladder, the metal ringing out like a bell. “It’s really gross,” La Flaca repeats, “when you do that.”
Mariela looks at Betsy, but she’s staring at the stick on the ground as though there’s nothing else in the world she’d rather look at. Mariela traces her braid slowly against her teeth. “Well,” she says. “So what?”
“It’s true,” Stephanie says. “You’re always chewing your hair.”
“Yeah,” La Flaca says, her voice rising. “It’s disgusting.”
Betsy still doesn’t say anything, and Mariela just stands there.
“And you know what else?” La Flaca says. “You better watch it with those Doritos. If you’re not careful, we’re going to have to start calling you Fatty.”
“Fatty!” Stephanie cries out, as if delighted. Even Betsy smiles.
Mariela still hasn’t spoke
n. Recess Monitor Adriana hovers by the brick wall in the distance, hands shading her eyes as she scans the playground. Everything must seem safe. The boys score a goal on the football field, cheers erupting like explosions. The fifth-grade girls sit on the grass, tilting their heads back so that their hair tumbles down like a waterfall.
Except this time it’s not them who are staring. It’s us: Stephanie, La Flaca, Betsy, all of us here together. Standing here and watching, until Mariela finally pulls the braid away from her mouth and lets it drop.
“Time to get ready,” she says as she walks away, leaving us alone to deal with it, all of it, for the rest of our lives.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK
He comes up to her on the dance floor. “Nice purse,” he says almost immediately.
“Nice Charlie Brown sweater,” she says. She actually means it too. She glimpsed him at the bar earlier, talking to his friends, and the black zigzag stripe running around his torso had made her smile, despite herself, into her cosmopolitan.
His name is Tony. He’s a law student at NYU, originally from Maine, now living in Williamsburg. “So where are you from?” he asks as he passes the bartender his credit card.
She says it as the bass drops and the crowd of dancers lets out a cheer.
“You mean, like, Columbia University?” he shouts.
“Sure,” she says. Her purse tonight is made of striped Andean cloth, yellow and red, with blue tassels. It’s big and bulky. People keep brushing up against it as they crowd toward the bar.
“What was your name, again?” he asks.
She looks down at her nails, the perfectly curved white tips of her French manicure. He keeps smiling, as if waiting for her to go on. Instead she leans in close and whispers into his ear, using as much hot breath as possible: “I’ve got some goodies, if you’re interested?”
They stumble outside four hours later, blinking in the watery light like woodland creatures emerging from hibernation. Eventually he runs his fingers through his hair and says, “You taking the A train?”
The Lucky Ones Page 9