Come On In

by Adi Alsaid

  A teacher, Mrs. Orán, had told Ayelén that such dedication was commendable, but had she considered the need for moderation?

  The teacher didn’t understand, but Padrino did. Now he wanted to take all that away because his ego was wounded.

  Her father glanced at Ayelén, and as if they’d rehearsed the next step, she grabbed her father’s hand.

  Padrino’s face hardened. The spark of struggle in his eyes intensified.

  “Farid, think about it,” he pleaded. “Our abuelo Amir arrived in this country with a hand in front and another behind. He didn’t speak a word of Spanish, and he built this house with his own hands. Did he do all that for nothing? For your daughter to run away when things get hard here? The country needs all of us. La patria se hace trabajando. And the United States isn’t a place to send a girl like her alone. Believe me. I watch the movies and the news, Farid. In the United States, everyone is on their own.”

  Her father’s voice was strong when he said, “Ayelén will never be on her own. She will always have us. At least she will have Helena, the boys, and me.” He looked at Ayelén. “Let’s go, hija.”

  The little cousins, Nadia and Selena, stood quiet by the door, their eyes like wet river stones, shiny and dark. Ayelén knelt to hug them, hoping this wouldn’t be the last time.

  * * *

  In the months that followed, Ayelén and the whole family threw themselves into preparations for her trip. Her ancestors, Abuelo Amir and Abuela Elizabeta, and all the others whose names had been lost, had crossed the oceans in ships for which they sometimes had a ticket but most times did not. She’d fly in an airplane, with the cheapest ticket they could find, the one that stopped in every country in Latin America, slowly inching its way north.

  “Keep la yerba in the original package at all times in case the police think it’s something else,” Helena reminded Ayelén when they were repacking her backpack the night before the trip.

  Ayelén nodded and wrapped the yerba package in the plastic wrap her family had never dared splurge on before. Unlike her ancestors, who’d arrived with only the clothes on their backs, Ayelén had a small suitcase and a backpack into which she stuffed as many of her belongings as possible. But although she asked her departed abuelos for instructions, they wouldn’t tell her how to pack the memory of jasmín del Paraguay and fireworks exploding on Noche Buena, or the taste of Helena’s canelones with red sauce that she made on special occasions like farewells. She didn’t know how to bottle the scent of Lautaro’s hair after playing fútbol in the rain. Or the touch of Francisco’s tiny five-year-old hand on her face.

  “And remember to put your documents in the leather pouch,” Farid said.

  The leather pouch had been a gift from Lucrecia at Transatlantic Travel. The travel agent had smiled first in surprise and then in admiration and at the end in plain congratulations when Ayelén had shown up every month with a white envelope hidden inside her math book to pay the plane fare, bit by bit.

  All night long, a parade of family and friends, close, distant and twice removed, came to leave good wishes, all they could afford, to the first girl in three generations to leave the tree and branch out on her own. Although no one said it at the time, they left with the seed of wonder and possibility. That night, boys and girls all over the city dreamed that maybe they too could do impossible things. Mothers and fathers lay in bed, eyes wide open, thinking upon their lives and the dreams they’d forgotten in the day-to-day struggle of making things work, of rebuilding the country when it kept falling apart time after time.

  Ayelén lay in bed too, waiting for a call from her padrino to send her off with his blessing. But although they’d finally paid the overdue bill, the phone stayed silent.

  In the morning, the benteveos sang before the sun came up and burned the fog; fall was creeping in just in time for Easter. Ayelén got up to share the last mátes with her parents before the boys woke up. They drank the tea with sugar. Life already had too much bitterness. There wasn’t time for more last-minute advice.

  Ayelén worried that she was betraying her family and country for having the outlandish dream of testing her boundaries and seeing how far she could go, but she had to be stronger than her doubts and unfurl her wings.

  “Remember who you are,” her father said.

  The truth was that she wasn’t sure who she really was. Wasn’t that why she was leaving? To find out?

  When Helena wasn’t looking, the boys gifted their sister their favorite Ferrari Hot Wheels, the ones they’d gotten for Christmas like three years ago that still looked brand new. Her brothers watched with wonder as she headed downstairs, followed by a train of neighbors, who waved goodbye.

  At the Rosario international airport, the family closed their eyes and huddled for a whispered prayer that Helena offered with contained emotion. She was trying so hard to remain strong. When Ayelén opened her eyes, she saw her cousin Daiana running in her direction, her black hair whipping behind her. Ayelén hugged the sister of her heart for the first time since Santino’s baptism. In the look they shared, they tried to tell each other that the years of competition had been the most fun they’d ever had. That although the journey was taking them in seemingly opposite directions, they were both moving forward. They were both so young.

  “Send me pictures and call me when you arrive,” Daiana said, pressing a piece of paper into Ayelén’s hand. “I know it’s expensive, but my friend Florencia said there are calling cards. She’ll be there when you arrive—”

  A speaker announced Ayelén’s flight, but Ayelén nodded so that her cousin would know she was grateful beyond words for Daiana connecting her to a friend who was studying in Utah, even though their fathers hadn’t been talking.

  Her family gathered around her like chicks before the first gust of a storm, but Ayelén was ready to fly.

  Her mother composed herself first and gently pushed her toward the escalator.

  “Chau, chau!” little voices cried.

  “Te queremos!”

  “Make us proud!”

  And last, “Don’t forget us!”

  Her mother had told her not to look back. And so, like the maligned woman of the Bible story she’d studied in Sunday school, Ayelén fought the temptation to take one last look.

  Before she stepped on the escalator, she lost the fight and turned around.

  Love blazed in the faces of her loved ones.

  Ayelén didn’t turn into a salt statue, but salt rose in her throat, and although she’d never seen the sea in her life, some part of her DNA remembered that tears tasted like sea water, the same sea that had brought her family to this land. This land she was now leaving.

  Beyond the little huddle, Padrino looked at her with tears in his eyes. Ayelén waved him over. He hesitated for a second, and then as if he were wading through cement, he made his way to her. So did her father.

  Ayelén took Padrino’s hand and her father’s. “It was never a competition. Remember, a victory for one is a victory for all.”

  Both men lowered their heads, chastised. The weight they’d put on her shoulders was too hard for a kid to carry. When they let go of her hands, Padrino said, “You earned it all. Now go and be happy. We’ll be cheering for you.”

  * * *

  Once, Ayelén had asked her mother how she’d learned how to be a mother, how she’d learned what the twins’ cries meant and how to soothe them. Her mother had laughed and confessed she’d been pretending since day one.

  “Fake it till you make it,” she’d said and continued making perfect gnocchi balls for Sunday dinner.

  Fake it till you make it—that’s what Ayelén tried to do.

  She faked confidence until she reached customs somewhere in Texas.

  When the immigration officer asked her where she was going, she tightened her fist around her talisman: Daiana’s note with little drawings from Na
dia and Selena, hearts that united a stick figure labeled Ayelén to a giant heart labeled Your familia.

  In a clear voice, she replied, “I’m starting college next week.”

  Maybe the brown-skinned, young immigration officer saw all the dreams flashing in Ayelén’s eyes. Without more questions, he stamped her passport and smiled. “Come on in,” he said. “Welcome to the United States.”

  She could manage only to mumble her gratitude. She was in a daze.

  When her final flight arrived in Salt Lake City and there was no sign of her ride, she pretended a primal fear wasn’t clawing at her chest. She pushed it down, until she calmed herself enough to buy a calling card so that she could dial the phone number Daiana had given her so long ago, when they’d both been young girls sunbathing on a rooftop without a care in the world.

  “Hola?” said a young girl’s voice, and her heart leaped. Ayelén hadn’t been away for more than fourteen hours, and she already missed the sound of her language on her people’s tongues.

  “Florencia?” Ayelén asked. “It’s me, Ayelén, at the airport.”

  A pair of little boys were playing by the telephone, and she had to look away from them, pretending she didn’t miss her little brothers with an intensity that made her weak.

  “I’m almost there,” Florencia said. “I’ll meet you at baggage claim!”

  Ten minutes later, Ayelén was laughing with Florencia, a girl she’d never met before, but who, after a tight hug, already felt like a friend.

  With Florencia, there were two boys, Argentine transplants too. One was tall and dark haired and talked nonstop—Mauricio. The other, Gabriel, smiled shyly. In the car to Provo, where the school was located, Ayelén realized he wasn’t really shy. Although he’d been born in Buenos Aires, he didn’t speak that much Spanish.

  The kids in the car pointed at every landmark, translating on the spot, filling her in on all the info she’d need to start out. She hardly knew more than their names and the fútbol teams they supported, but inside her, the voice of her ancestors told her this was a good start.

  The Wasatch Mountains, still covered in their white winter coats, towered along the highway. She tried to memorize everything so that when she called her family, she could tell them every detail. In a way, they would be with her, seeing through her eyes.

  She had her family supporting her from afar, an anchor and wings, all at the same time.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Yamile (sha-MEE-lay) Saied Méndez is a fútbol-obsessed Argentine American author who loves meteor showers, summer, astrology, and pizza. She lives in Utah with her Puerto Rican husband and their five kids, two adorable dogs, and one majestic cat. An inaugural Walter Dean Myers Grant and a New Visions Award Honor recipient, she’s also a graduate of Voices of Our Nations (VONA) and the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program. She’s a founding member of Las Musas, a marketing collective of women and nonbinary Latinx children’s authors. Find her online at yamilesmendez.com.

  WHEN I WAS WHITE

  Justine Larbalestier

  DEDICATION

  For Mikki Kendall

  SYDNEY, 1932

  Never knew I was white til I met Joshua.

  I was sixteen and knew nuthin.

  “My money’s as good as anyone else’s, miss,” he said.

  My mind was elsewhere, gazing out the shop front, past the onions on strings, the tinned pears, the rack of magazines, imagining meself dancing like Irene Castle, skirts flaring around me like wings, and Vernon’s hands on me waist, swirling me round and round, and everyone clapping.

  “Miss, I’m leaving this money on the counter and taking the gum. Damn it. I need change. I’m pretty sure I’m giving you too much. Look—I don’t want trouble, I want to pay with your nonsensical money—what is a farthing?—and go, miss?”

  He snapped his fingers.

  I blinked. Daydream scattered.

  “Sorry?” I stared at the handsome brown-skinned foreigner in front of me. Me cheeks went hot. His eyes were dreamy.

  “Thank you, miss,” he said. His smile made his eyes dreamier. “I’ve always thought so too.”

  “Thought what?”

  “That my eyes are dreamy.”

  I never said that out loud, did I?

  I bloody did.

  “What’s your name, miss?” he asked, leaning over the counter. His teeth was white and not a one missing.

  “Dulcie.”

  “Dulcie. Pretty name.”

  It were when he said it.

  “Tosh. It’s dead common.”

  Like me. I’d always wanted a fancy name like Violet or Esmeralda.

  “You’re not common, sugar. With those big green eyes.”

  I laughed at his fib.

  There weren’t enough water to wash that morning. The dress I was wearing used to be my aunt’s, and her boss’s before her, and the only reason I’d eaten was cause old Mister Wong hadn’t caught me swiping cheese and bread yet.

  I was common as.

  He wasn’t. He smelled like peppermint, his hat sat at an angle and weren’t shiny from age.

  “How old are you?”

  “Twenty,” I lied. “You?”

  “Twenty-two,” he said. “Not many customers.”

  He picked up the gum, turned it around, set it down. His fingernails were neat, with no dirt under them.

  “They’re at work, if they’ve got it, and if they don’t, they’re out looking or still asleep.”

  “What kind of work?”

  “Making clothes or at the brewery. No one’ll be in here for hours.”

  “Fortunate for us.”

  Fortunate. He was dead posh.

  “You talk funny,” I said. “Like the movies. Whatcha doing here?”

  He leaned forward to whisper, “I’m lost.”

  I giggled.

  He saluted. “Joshua P. Desmond Irving the Third. At your service.”

  “The Third? You an African king, then?”

  “If I am, will you kiss me?”

  Me face got hot and other bits of me too. “I’ll kiss ya either way,” I said, and I did.

  He tasted like vanilla and laughter. He made me heart beat so fast I was woozy.

  * * *

  When we walked down the street together I was dead proud. Joshua was handsomer than any of the Hills fellas.

  I didn’t mind Tiny Bruce yelling at us.

  Johnno O’Rourke.

  Tommy Newton too.

  Calling us a bunch of names I’d never heard.

  They said it weren’t natural, us being together. Me Irish, him dark.

  But I reckon they was jealous.

  Joshua tightened his hand on mine and muttered about this godforsaken city in this godforsaken country.

  He didn’t like the Hills. He didn’t like Sydney. He didn’t like Australia.

  I reckoned they was all right but I’d never been nowhere else.

  * * *

  Three weeks after he startled me out of me daydream, he pulled me into a new one: Joshua asked me to scarper with him.

  “Too right, I will.”

  I kissed Ma goodbye. I thought she was gunna be filthy but all she said was, “Send us some jingle soon as youse get some.”

  I weren’t gunna miss her neither. She weren’t much of a mum and we was skint. Four of us in one room: Ma, her latest fella, the new baby, me, and only me with steady work.

  Her new fella was handsy. Wouldn’t miss him a bit.

  I’d’ve gone anywhere with anyone. But someone as dreamy as Joshua? That were a bloody miracle.

  He told me not to bring any clothes. He’d sort it.

  * * *

  On the boat he told me about his home, Harlem.

  I’d never
heard of it.

  He told me about his people promenading along the avenue—Seventh Avenue, that is—in their Sunday best, wearing furs, hats, gloves, strutting and striving.

  “Furs?” I asked, though I wanted to know what strutting and striving was. “Like in the movies?”

  “Like in the movies.”

  Everyone danced to jazz in nightclubs.

  People in the Hills danced to jigs on sawdust-floored pubs, then, after six o’clock closing, out on the street.

  “Is jazz like a jig?”

  “A little bit,” he said, but I could tell it wasn’t. Joshua was laughing at me. I didn’t mind. He could do anything he liked long as he didn’t send me back to the Hills.

  “They won’t mind me not being dark like you?”

  “You’ll be black.”

  I stared. I was an Irish bluey: red hair, green eyes, porridge-pale, freckle-coated skin.

  “No one’s gunna believe I’m black. Look at me freckles!”

  “My freckles.” He pointed at his nose and cheeks. “What are these?”

  “They ain’t freckles like mine.”

  “Don’t say ain’t.”

  What else were I supposed to say?

  “Sorry, Dulcie,” he said, kissing my cheek. “Habit. Bad habit. It’s just, well, if you don’t want to seem common, you shouldn’t talk common.”

  I was common.

  Irish too. I couldn’t decide to be a whole different Dulcie cause Joshua said so. Though I’d give it me best if it’d keep him from chucking me.