I don’t want to tell her about my chest feeling so sore. It’s like a hard ball right near my heart, and that can’t be good. My nana has always claimed that you can die of a broken heart. I’m betting this much pain so close to my heart could kill me. I don’t want my mom to worry about me. She’s already too stressed out and tired every night from her job.
She resumes petting my head, and this makes me feel calmer.
Finally, she pulls away a bit. “Maybe things will get a little better for Wolf.”
“What do you mean?” I say, so glad for the change of topic.
“Maybe a new member of the household?”
“What do you know?” Any information about Wolf should be told to me right away! He’s my friend. I have a right to know. I sit up quickly and scrunch my eyebrows together. “Well?”
“Ay, Alex, it’s not that big of a deal. Who knows? Maybe nothing will come of it.”
“Come on, Mom. What?” I say, exasperated.
“When I called his house tonight a woman answered,” she says and smiles. “I know you told me not to intrude, but I just had to ask who she was.”
Usually, I don’t like my mom getting involved with my friends. She can be so embarrassing! But in this specific case, my rules are suspended because I’m dying to know the answer.
“Oh my God, who is she?” I’m desperate.
“She’s Wolf’s dad’s new girlfriend.”
Whoa. “He’s in love with someone new?” I’m outraged. “Doesn’t he still love Wolf’s mom?”
“As you said, it has been two years.”
“That’s not long enough.” I’ve seen what stepmothers do to kids in every single fairy tale. And I can’t bear for Wolf to be hurt.
“Alex, do you always have to be so dramatic?” She holds my hand and rubs it softly. “Who knows if they’ll stay together? But if they do, maybe Wolf will have more of a home again. That house seems so sad ever since his mom died.”
“Yeah, that’s kind of true,” I say, and reach down and hold her hand. “And maybe he would get more birthday presents? Do new girlfriends buy stuff for kids?”
“Alex,” my mom sighs, “the love is what’s important.”
“Oh, I know, for sure,” I agree. “But I think Wolf would be okay with having more gifts to open, too.”
chapter 7
THE SECRET WEAPON
When Diego’s dad leaves for work the next morning, Wolf and I are ready and waiting for the arrival of the enemy soldiers. We wait and wait, and wait some more. I check my watch (10:30 a.m.) against the times I’ve logged in our war journal and conclude that something must be very wrong.
“Psssst. Captain McCann.” I try to get his attention. The truth is that even though Wolf looks serious and ready for war with the binoculars to his eyes, he usually ends up daydreaming. I get up, walk over, and yank on his leg.
“Hey!” I startle him. “Sergeant Salazar, what are you doing out of position? What if they start bombing us?”
“I don’t think they’re coming today. It’s pretty late.”
“What if it’s a trick?” His eyes quickly return to the binoculars, scanning the muddy war zone.
“It’s possible, but we could hop back into headquarters pretty quick if we needed to.”
We climb out of the trench and lie down on its edges in the hot sun. My eyes are closed, but the insides look bright red. I feel like a lizard, quiet and warm and still.
Wolf nudges his foot against mine, giving me friendly little kicks.
“What?” I say.
“What are we gonna do now?” He’s antsy, all dressed up for battle with nobody to fight.
Suddenly, Diego’s front door slams. We leap back into the trench, practically falling on top of each other and all our stuff.
Before we can get into position, we hear Diego laughing.
“Haha! Scared you!”
“I was not!” Wolf yells back, even though he’s still scrambling around in the bottom of the trench. I climb back up the ladder to take a peek at what we’re facing.
“You should’ve seen how fast your bodies flew into the ditch,” Diego says. “It was pretty funny.” He’s wearing swim trunks and strutting over to the dented-up black vw with Tony. The car looks terrible, but Tony’s still driving it all over town.
“It’s not a ditch,” Wolf says, offended. “It’s a trench. As deep as the ones they had in World War II. Unlike the little hole you guys got in your yard.”
“Well, you enjoy your trench today, Rambo Boy,” Diego answers. “I’m off to the park for swim lessons.”
“Sure, right,” Wolf says. “You’re just scared.”
“Don’t worry,” Diego assures us. “You’re on tomorrow, bright and early.”
They drive off and we’re left alone in the muddy street.
“Oh, man. What are we gonna do now,” Wolf says, disappointed.
“Time for the secret weapon,” I say. “Which can only be used in very desperate circumstances.”
“What is it?” Wolf looks up at me with huge eyes.
“My nana. Let’s go ask her for a plan. She’s always got good ideas.”
“Seriously? That’s your secret weapon? What can your grandma do?”
Despite Wolf’s attempts to crush my faith in my nana, I lead the resistant soldier inside the house and to a spot in front of the TV in the living room. My nana looks up at us in a daze, as if we just walked out of her TV show.
“We’re bored,” I announce.
“The kitchen needs cleaning,” she suggests.
Beside me, I know Wolf is rolling his eyes and thinking I told you so.
“No, Nana, I mean something fun.” I’m not explaining properly. “You see, we’re in the middle of a war outside, and we only get a few hours of rest before we have to go back to battle, so we need to make the most of it and enjoy ourselves right now.”
Wolf is shaking his head like I’ve totally lost my mind.
“Oh,” my nana says, sitting up straight. “You’re right, Alejandra. You must use this time wisely.” Her eyes are focused now. “Have you already hidden your riches and drawn up your maps?”
“No,” Wolf and I say in unison.
“But Nana, we don’t have any riches,” I add.
“Everyone has riches that must be hidden before the enemy arrives,” she assures me. When I look into her eyes, they are round and still, and I know she’s gone back into one of her stories.
“During the revolution,” she begins, “we had to be very careful. My grandfather was a shoemaker, and mi mamá and mis tías helped out in his shop. We were pretty poor, but even in war, people need shoes, soldiers especially. Both the government and the revolutionary soldiers would come to my grandfather’s store, because marching all over the desert wears boots out pretty quick.”
By now the TV is far away, and we sit down on the floor in front of my nana. Wolf is looking up at her with his mouth half-open and I can tell he’s in Chihuahua, in northern México, with my nana.
“The banks were a mess, and every day we didn’t know how much the money would be worth. Even if you saved up your coins and bills, the rates changed so often that they might be useless from one day to the next. So we traded a lot. Mi abuelo would fix someone’s shoes, and they would pay him with eggs or corn or beans or flour or cheese or milk. If he was making them a whole new pair of boots, we might get a chicken. It was great to be able to eat, but you needed to have something extra put aside, just in case something terrible happened. Back then, there weren’t any fancy stocks or bonds or retirement funds for when you got old or hurt. Like when my own nana had to go for surgery in the city and the family had to raise the money for the doctor. The only thing you could save, that never lost its value, was jewelry.”
“No offense Doña Salazar,” Wolf says, “but I don’t really like jewelry.”
“Me neither,” I add, while pushing my fingers through the long, brown, shaggy carpet.
“Don’t you
like your sparkling gold cross, Lobito?”
He reaches up and holds it between his fingertips. “Yes, but that’s God,” he explains, “not jewelry.”
“I see.” My nana nods. “And the jewelry during the war, it wasn’t always jewelry either, it was more like money.” She touches the gold hoops in her ears. “Unless you came across something really pretty.”
“But how could they calculate how much a necklace or a ring was worth?” Wolf asks skeptically.
“Sometimes the soldiers would pay for their boots with a little silver ring or a gold cross. Sometimes their mothers or wives would bring an earring or a few links of a chain necklace to help them out. My family saved any bit of gold or silver we got from them. When we had enough, we’d trade them in at a jeweler for a gold coin. We had to hide the riches well. There was a lot of stealing then, and if our town was bombed, we had to hide in the church for protection, and then anything could happen to our house.”
My nana leans over like she’s telling us a secret. “We would go out late at night so the neighbors wouldn’t see us. I was the lookout. Mi mamá and mi abuelo would dig a deep hole in the yard and place a little sewn bag of the gold or silver inside the earth.”
“Wait, Nana,” I interject. “I thought you said it was dangerous to dig up the earth.”
“Oh, hmm.” She taps her finger on her chin. “It’s okay to dig up a little bit. If it’s for treasures, then it’s all right. Especially if you only use your hands.”
“Are those real rules, or did you just make them up now?” I ask.
She waves my question away and turns to Wolf to continue her story. “Mi abuelo would ask mi mamá to draw a careful map showing exactly where we would have to dig later to get the riches back when we needed them. She would make beautiful maps, tracing the shapes of the buildings, the plants, the rocks, the anthills, even the little alcove where the cats would hide—everything. She was good at drawing, even though she had terrible eyes and had to hold the paper right up to her face. Then we’d hide the map in our bible, in the Old Testament, because we didn’t know anyone who liked reading the Old Testament.”
Her eyes sparkle a little as she tells us the next part. “Sometimes I didn’t need the map, though.” She grins proudly. “One of my tías taught me how to see the tiny lights that shine above buried treasure.”
Now that she has finished her story, she gets up from the couch. “Wait here a moment.”
Wolf and I sit with our mouths hanging open, looking at each other.
“Do you think it’s true that she can see tiny lights above buried treasure?” he asks. “Would she teach us to see them,
too?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so.” Much as I love my nana’s stories, I can never tell which parts are actually true.
We sit up straight when she walks slowly back into the living room. She hands each of us a silver dollar.
“Something to start your savings.” She smiles. “Remember to bury deep and draw your maps well.”
Wolf and I run to my room, where I dump my marbles out of the small tin box I keep them in. It used to be filled with lemon drop hard candies that my tía Hilaria, my mom’s sister, gave me for my birthday. We put our coins together inside the box. I add my violet cat’s-eye marble that I won after six rounds of play over two lunch periods. Wolf pulls a picture of Rambo from his wallet and throws it in. I carefully cut out a photo of Hawkeye from the front page of a TV guide and add it, too. Wolf digs around in his backpack, and then hands over a small figure of a knight wearing a royal-blue tunic with a silver helmet and visor. It’s one of his favorite toys. I look up at him to make sure he really wants to bury it, and he nods solemnly.
I write a note that informs whoever finds and opens the tin that The contents of this box belong to Alex and Wolf. Returnable to 3618 Muscatel Ave. Thank you.
My mom says people are more willing to do things for you if you’re polite.
chapter 8
BLOOD
Once our tin is filled up, Wolf and I head to the garage to search for a shovel. The garage has not been used for a car since I’ve been alive. One side is Johnny’s sound studio, and the other is a giant collection of half-smashed old cardboard boxes filled with glasses, books, records, Christmas decorations, and anything else my mom doesn’t want to see in the house anymore. There is also a bunch of wood and equipment that used to belong to my dad. Me and Johnny would get in big trouble if we used Dad’s tools when he was around, but my mom hasn’t cared what we do in here since he left. You can find all kinds of weird, cool stuff, as long you’re willing to dig through spiderwebs.
When I open the garage door the light’s already on. Johnny is sitting in the far corner, next to the hole Tony made in the wall. He’s holding his bass.
“Get out,” he orders.
“You don’t own the garage,” I say smugly.
“I think I told you to leave,” Johnny counters.
“Wowwww.” Wolf is looking up at all the posters of women with his mouth hanging open.
“Yuck,” I say.
I don’t like Wolf looking at Johnny’s posters. I don’t like any guys looking at women’s pictures. Actually, that’s the only thing I don’t like about Hawkeye Pierce from M*A*S*H. He’s cool in every way except that he looks at women, which is kind of creepy.
Johnny sees that I’m uncomfortable and laughs. “You’re going to look like that too in a few years.”
“Gross! Shut up,” I tell him.
“Whatever, Alex. You’ve got girly posters in your room, too,” he accuses.
Wolf turns and stares at me. My cheeks get hot.
“Wonder Woman is not a girly poster. She’s a warrior,” I defend myself. “And besides, Lynda Carter and Linda Ronstadt are both part Mexican, just like us.”
Johnny smirks. “If you don’t like it, leave.”
Wolf looks at the ground and plays with his belt loops. I tug his arm and point to the other side of the garage, which has the tools we need. “Let’s get the stuff and get out of here.”
“Right,” he says, and follows me.
I dig around the tools on the far wall and find a shovel that I hand to Wolf. He briskly brushes the cobwebs and dirt off on his pants. I grab a watering can and start to head out.
Wolf takes a step to follow me and his foot smashes into something. “Ouch!” He bends down and examines the object.
“It’s the little fence we had out by the rosebush,” I explain. “The city told us we had to take it down ’cause it would be in the way of the new sidewalks.”
“No, it’s not,” Wolf says, tracing his fingers along the length of wooden boards. “It’s a raft.”
“Me and Johnny were the ones who took it down,” I tell him. “It’s a fence.”
But Wolf, as usual, isn’t listening and has come up with his own idea. “It’s a fishing raft,” he declares. “Someday this summer we’ll take it to Legg Lake and catch our dinner.” He’s smiling now. “Or maybe we could get our parents to take us all the way to the ocean on a weekend to give it a try.”
“Okay, sure, Wolf. Now can we go?”
Maybe it could be a raft, but when Wolf gets a really awful idea I try to change the subject. I believe this to be a really awful idea because: 1) That fence would be too heavy to drag to Legg Lake; and 2) There is no guarantee it would float on the water. I hope he forgets to bring it up again.
We scan the landscape from our trench and decide that the best possible location to bury our riches is right by my dad’s pink rosebush. The thorns will keep curious people away. We don’t have the luxury of working in the middle of the night (our parents would kill us), so we plan a distraction. As Wolf digs the hole, I wet the dirt with the watering can and shape it into mud balls. This way, if anybody is watching us, they will think we’re just building up our store of ammunition and won’t have any idea about the treasures down below.
It’s so bright and hot outside that the air looks warped where
it touches the driveway. I’m thankful for the cool mud between my hands, and let it squirt out around my fingers. I watch Wolf digging with all his strength, but the hole only gets an inch deeper. The earth is hard here, and it will take him a while to dig deep enough. He needs time for the water to seep in and soften the dirt. Time to talk, I decide.
“So your dad’s got a new girlfriend?”
Wolf looks up, surprised, and then a moment later he understands. “Your mom told you?”
“Yeah.” I’m caught.
“How does she always find out about everything?”
I shake my head. “No idea. That’s why I always worry about getting in trouble. Somehow, she always knows.”
“Totally.”
“Is his girlfriend nice?” I ask.
“Sure, she’s nice enough. Sometimes she even cooks dinner and brings a video for us to watch.”
“You like her?” I pull out more dirt and wet it.
“I don’t know,” he says softly, moving the shovel around the edges of the hole. “It freaks me out to see my dad with someone else.”
“For sure.” I think about my mom. “When my mom got a boyfriend I used to put the TV on really loud to drive him crazy. Remember?”
“Not the same thing.” Wolf plunges the shovel hard into the ground.
“I know. I just mean if I was that mad without anyone dying, I bet you’re super mad.”
Wolf puts down the shovel and starts scooping out the mud with his fingers. “That’s part of the problem. I don’t feel mad. I don’t feel anything.”
“Yeah,” I say, because I don’t know what else to say.
“It’s like when my leg falls asleep, and I hit it, but I can’t feel it.”
This is when I like Wolf best. When he talks to me. The only other person he gives that to is the school counselor.
The grown-ups at school make Wolf go to this blonde lady who is supposed to listen to all his sad feelings about his mom. It is the only thing the school does to him that he likes. Ms McIntyre smiles a lot and wears skirts, sweaters, and short leather boots. She looks into your eyes and asks how you are, and then she waits and listens to the answer. I like to run into her in the hallway because she is kind, but the way she waits and listens for an answer makes me nervous. I always tell her I’m late for something and take off. But Wolf smiles back at her, and he tells me later how pretty she is. Wolf started using the word “feel” after he started talking to her.
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