Miss Meteor

by Tehlor Kay Mejia

  It’s absurd, but I do. And I know she doesn’t mean guns. “Roger,” I say, already heading for the stairs where all the firepower we’ll need is waiting in the form of three supremely pissed off Quintanillas.

  Lita

  IT’S ENTIRELY POSSIBLE that, between the three of them, Chicky’s sisters know almost every secret in Meteor. And they’re how I know that something happened between Chicky and Junior, even if none of us knows exactly what.

  So Chicky would probably threaten me with what’s left of Fresa’s ribbon wand if she knew I was doing this. But she needs all her friends, whether she knows it or not, and that includes Junior Cortes.

  Especially Junior Cortes.

  I find him behind the Meteor Meteorite Museum, touching up a board that’s a perfect replica of a Rothko No. 61. He’s never done with a painting until it’s out of his hands.

  “Mr. Cortes,” I say, “I am here to request your presence at an urgent convening of . . .”

  “Before you get through whatever speech from Henry V you memorized,” he says, “I’m gonna stop you.”

  I sigh. “Please?”

  He sighs back. “Lita.”

  “She needs you right now,” I say.

  “You’re either wrong,” he says, standing up from inspecting the paint, “or that’s news to her.”

  “I’m right,” I say. “I promise.”

  “Then why are you here instead of her?”

  The question steals the words from my mouth.

  “I appreciate what you’re trying to do,” Junior says. “But it’s not the best time for me and Chicky to be in the same part of the desert.”

  The words pinch, but I can’t blame him. I know something about Chicky putting distance between her and people she needs.

  “Thanks for listening,” I say.

  He gives me a tired nod.

  On the walk over to the Kendalls’ house, I keep trying to think of something that might have changed Junior’s mind, words I could’ve said.

  But I learned a long time ago that Chicky closes herself off against anything she doesn’t want to let in, like desert ground gone hard during a drought.

  I breathe in and tap on Cole’s window.

  It slides up.

  “Wow,” he says, leaning on the sill. “I can’t figure out if you’re brave or have a death wish.”

  “I’ve been asking myself the same thing since I entered this pageant,” I say.

  “Sorry about earlier,” he says. “About you having to climb out a window. If it makes you feel any better, my mother tends to have that effect on people.”

  “Look.” I hold my hands up between us, to get him to hear me out. “I know the Quintanilla sisters and I apparently threw a bike at your head . . .”

  “Except that didn’t actually happen,” he says.

  “Exactly. So . . . we’re . . .” I know I’m not making sense even as I say it, but before I can keep rambling Cole stops me.

  “Just let me get my shoes on,” he says.

  I lead Cole to the stretch of desert with the cactuses I know best. The rainbows. The beehives and king cups. The purple and tulip prickly pear.

  For half of the way there, I wonder if we’re gonna have to go looking for Chicky. It’s been years since she came to one of the cactus birthday parties. She probably doesn’t remember the way anymore.

  But then I see her, her cropped hair and her tall frame against the post-sunset sky.

  She’s there, among the cactuses, turning to them one at a time like she’s greeting them each by name.

  Chicky

  MY SISTERS DON’T believe me when I say I know, without being told, exactly which part of the desert Lita wants to meet us in.

  “The cactuses?” Fresa says. “We live in New Mexico.”

  But with the entire town of Meteor likely cursing the day I was born and a literal evil villain trying to destroy my family’s livelihood, I don’t have the energy to explain what I know about this particular part of the desert, or the way it holds everything remaining of my friendship with Lita like drops of water after a rare desert storm.

  Instead of all that, I just say, “I need you guys. Please.” And I must look pretty bad, because they just follow without giving me any more grief.

  All the way to the little patch of dirt Lita and I staked out as our own when we were eight years old, I wonder why it’s always so hard for me to say those words.

  When we get there, I panic for a minute. Lita isn’t here. Fresa is already rolling her eyes, and I pretend not to see Uva pinch her arm to keep her quiet. I walk a little ways away from them, and—probably also thanks to Uva—no one follows me.

  Any uncertainty I felt about this being the right place evaporates when the twilight glow backlights the only friends Lita and I had in elementary school. Hell, they may be the only friends I have now . . . If they’ll even have me after all this time.

  Then I realize this is my life now. I’m wondering if a group of spined succulents still want to be my friends. “Pull it together, Quintanilla,” I say under my breath.

  But it’s been a hard day, and I can’t help laying a hand on the tallest of the bunch, right in the spot where some animal rubbed off her spikes years ago. “Hey, Señorita Opuntia,” I say, quiet enough that my sisters won’t hear. “And you, too, Señora Strawberry. Sorry I missed your last birthday party.”

  Her blossoms, their color fading a bit in the lavender glow of a waning desert sunset, seem to glare accusingly at me.

  “Fine, fine,” I say, chastised. “I guess I’ve missed more than one.”

  But as their long shadows melt into the dusk, I realize I’ve missed a lot more than cactus birthday parties over the past few years. Almost like praying, I walk between them, speaking their names in low voices. Lady Barbara Fig, Violeta Prickly Pear, and her cousins Tortita and Señorita Tulipan. The rake of the bunch, Graham Cholla, was always trying to flirt with the pretty primas until Lita told him it wasn’t polite.

  When she got it into her head to give them all birthdays, Lita begged me to borrow Cereza’s astrology book and figure out their signs.

  “They can’t tell us who they are,” she said. “But don’t you think they’ll be thrilled if we find out for ourselves? They’ll have to stay our friends after that, right?”

  So we sat on a striped blanket, with my dad’s homemade churros in a paper bag and prickly pear lemonade in a glass bottle, and for many nights just like this one we read their charts and told their stories to each other.

  But that seems like a lifetime ago.

  I walk back toward my sisters, feeling heavy and sad and slow. There’s still so much to do to fix what we broke, and right now, I’m not the least bit sure we can do it.

  Lita and Cole’s silhouettes are just visible as they walk toward us, shoulders nearly touching. I try to focus on the fact that I have five people on my side tonight, rather than on the fact that a tall, long-haired silhouette is notably missing.

  And that I’m not sure if it’s his fault or mine.

  Lita

  I CAN TELL Chicky doesn’t want me to catch it, her face falling when she sees Junior isn’t with me and Cole.

  “He really wanted to come,” I blurt out. “But he was mixing the perfect sunset color, and he was at just the moment of finding the right balance between orange and pink.” I let out a nervous laugh. “And you know he can’t go anywhere in the middle of that, right?”

  Chicky gives me a weak smile, and I can tell she appreciates the lie.

  But she doesn’t believe it.

  “Just so you know,” Uva says. “Apparently we’re all half of West Side Story.”

  “Sharks or Jets?” I ask.

  “Not important, Lita,” Cereza says at the same moment Fresa says, “Um, Sharks, obviously.”

  “Well, I heard,” Chicky says, “that we surrounded Cole with our motorcycles behind Selena’s.”

  “And then cast an evil spell on him?” Uva asks, squinting into th
e last of the light. “Yeah, I heard that one too.”

  “I heard we had an evil plan to make sure Meteor Central High has no chance at this year’s championship,” I say, toeing the dirt.

  Cole groans. “This would be funny if it weren’t so not funny.”

  I cringe. “What are we gonna do about Selena’s?” I ask. “And the Bradleys, and—”

  “Stop,” Cereza cuts me off. “That’s not for you to worry about.”

  Uva crosses her arms and shoots Fresa a look. “Well, you were right about one thing. They are gonna be talking about this for years.”

  “Okay, not helping,” Cereza says. “Cole, if we’ve done anything to . . .”

  “Stop it,” he says. “This was an accident. I just had the same conversation with this one.” He shrugs toward Lita.

  Cereza sighs. “But if there’s anything we can do . . .”

  “If any of you apologizes one more time,” Cole says, “I’m signing each of you up for the Christmas pageant decorating committee.”

  That shuts all of us up. We’ve each witnessed Mrs. Kendall berating teenagers and little old ladies alike for putting the wrong kind of tinsel in the holly garlands.

  Uva speaks next. “I heard Simon Alter saying Lita set this whole thing up because she knows how close Kendra and Cole are, and she just wanted to rattle Kendra.”

  “Oh, brother,” Cole says under his breath.

  “What?” I ask.

  Cole runs a hand through his hair. “Kendra.”

  “What about her?”

  Cole takes a breath deep enough for me to see him pulling it in and blowing it out, like he’s trying not to get angry. “If there’s anyone who’s helping to blow this out of proportion, I’m betting it’s her.”

  He starts walking off.

  “Are you okay?” Uva asks.

  “No, I’m not okay.” He turns back. “I’m gonna fix this.”

  “Cole,” Cereza says. “It’s not your job to fix anything.”

  “Maybe no one cares what I have to say about the rumors,” he calls back, but doesn’t stop. Now he’s walking backward. “But I am not letting my sister feed them.”

  He turns back around.

  And with that, with one boy off to squabble with his sister and one boy refusing to come near Chicky, it’s just me and the four Quintanilla sisters standing among my cactus friends.

  “This isn’t over,” Cereza says, and I wonder if she’s wearing out those words on me.

  I try to rise to Cereza’s faith. “At least the meet and greet doesn’t require a talent. And it’s somewhere we all know.”

  All sisters cringe at once.

  “It is at Selena’s,” I say, “isn’t it?”

  “Try was,” Fresa says.

  Uva’s look is almost pitying. “The pageant voted to change the location.”

  “Those fuckers,” Fresa says. “It wasn’t enough to deny me the crown, now they move the one event we have this week to a car dealership?” She puts disgusted emphasis on those last three words.

  My stomach drops.

  Our small town has one car dealership, owned by a family with enough power and enough money for countywide ad space.

  “No,” I say.

  “I know,” Chicky says.

  “NO,” I can’t help repeating.

  “I know,” Chicky says. “What are we gonna do?” She’s asking her sisters more than she’s asking me.

  This morning I found the stardust continuing its spread over my stomach and hips. I couldn’t wear a two-piece right now even if I wanted to. But right now, with what I’ve done to the Quintanillas and to Cole, I feel like my bones themselves are turning into stardust. I will crumble at any second.

  “We have to figure something out,” Chicky says. “I don’t care if we have to start catering at the hospital. Fresa, I don’t care if you have to flirt with a skywriter. We have to do something.”

  Cereza holds up a hand. “One problem at a time.” She turns to Lita. “Yes, the meet and greet is gonna be somewhere you don’t know.” She turns to her sisters. “Yes, it is going to be at the business place of the family who is probably our mortal enemy now.” She looks at all of us. “But we are going to conduct ourselves with the elegance and class befitting our places in Miss Meteor’s history.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Chicky says under her breath.

  Uva snaps her a look that shuts her up.

  Chicky kicks at the dirt in protest. Fresa folds her arms at her older sister rejecting her dreams of revenge. Uva’s weariness is so obvious it makes my own shoulders feel heavy. And I probably look nauseated at the thought of putting on a pair of borrowed heels and walking through the freshly Windexed doors of the Bradley Dealership.

  “If they’re our enemies”—Uva’s stare stays on Chicky—“what better chance to keep an eye on them?”

  Chicky

  MY PARENTS DECIDE to keep the diner open the night of the Fiftieth-Annual Meteor Pageant and Talent Showcase meet and greet, even though there’s absolutely no way anyone will be ordering tostada burgers and yucca waffle fries tonight.

  “Good luck,” my mom tells us as my sisters crimp and curl and apply false lashes and generally transform Lita into something that won’t look out of place at the southernmost outpost of Meteor proper: the Bradley Dealership.

  Mom still hasn’t said anything about the reason for the change of venue, but she knows we know, and we know she knows we know, and it’s all really awkward and sad.

  No one else hears her say goodbye over Cereza’s order-giving and Fresa’s backtalk and Lita’s occasional yelps of pain, but I hug her for all of us. For the sorry I can’t say because we’re not talking about it.

  She lets go sooner than I do, and it’s maybe the worst I’ve ever felt in my life.

  Well, second worst.

  When she’s gone I try to focus. This is just a step on the road to fixing this, and I have to believe we can. I have one job tonight—even if I know it’s just one Uva made up to make me feel better—and I won’t rest until I’ve discovered something about the sleazy Bradleys that will prove useful in the battle ahead.

  Sue me, I was watching a Viking show this morning, I’m full of war metaphors tonight.

  At loose ends until the beauty portion of the evening is over—I let Cereza put mascara on me, and I’m wearing jeans with no holes in them, but that’s as far as I’ll go—I wander into the kitchen and engage in my familiar battle of wills with the phone on the wall.

  To call, or not to call, I ask it for the hundredth time since my fight with Junior.

  The phone still doesn’t answer. Because it’s still an inanimate object that doesn’t know whose fault the fight was or who’s supposed to apologize first or if it’ll even work.

  “Ten minutes!” Cereza shrieks from upstairs, and my nerves start to jangle.

  The Bradley Dealership is basically the underworld. Lita will be busy trying to prove she’s not some kind of barbarian, my sisters will be watching (and hopefully correcting) her every move, and sure I’ll be doing recon but everyone knows that’s not a real thing. I’ll just be the outcast of an outsider family, walking around completely out of my element.

  I pick up the landline, Fresa’s the only one of us with a cell, and she pays for it herself. Priorities, she says.

  My fingers dial Junior’s number by memory, and it only rings twice before I hear the click on the other end.

  “Hello?” My stomach sinks. It’s Mrs. Cortes.

  “Hey, Mrs. Cortes,” I say.

  “Oh, hi, Chicky. Junior’s not here tonight and he left his phone.”

  I can’t tell by her tone whether she’s heard what happened between us or not, but I don’t press the issue. “Oh, okay. Do you know where he went?”

  “I think he said he was going to that pageant meet and greet.”

  My sinking heart is suddenly afloat. “Thank you,” I say, with real relief. “Have a good night, Mrs. Cortes.”

  Wh
en we hang up, I smile bigger than I have all week. Junior and I might be in a fight, or whatever it is, but he would never make me do this alone. I should have known better than to doubt him.

  When I climb into the back of Cereza’s car, sandwiched between Fresa and Uva with Lita up front, I’m suddenly sure everything is going to be okay.

  It only takes seven minutes to drive anywhere in Meteor, so we’re in front of the Bradley Dealership before my hopeful bubble has time to deflate.

  It’s a massive building by Meteor standards, floor-to-ceiling windows, light spilling out of every one into the darkened desert. One of those glass and metal atrocities that reminds you of some fancy bachelor’s coffee table, but somehow with a giant fountain right in the middle of it.

  Yeah. Inside. It’s just as ridiculous as it sounds.

  The event is set up in the showroom, and there are three brand-new Corvettes parked in spotlights right there on the floor—an orange one, a blue one, and a silver one. Meteor Central High colors.

  I look around for a massive shiny decorative vase to vomit in.

  Instead, I see anyone who’s anyone in Meteor milling around through the windows while my sisters arrange Lita’s outfit by the car. It’s casual but classy, according to Fresa. Black pants, tapered at the ankle, a pair of Fresa’s suede booties in charcoal gray, with just a little bit of a heel. The top is Cereza’s, a deep purple flowy thing with a modest neckline, pinned in the back to account for Lita’s height—or lack thereof.

  She looks good, as far as I can tell. Well, I mean she looks like someone else. Which I guess is the point.

  “Okay, ready!” Cereza says.

  “As we’ll ever be,” Fresa mutters under her breath.

  “I don’t think we should all walk in together,” Lita says, stopping us. She has her “I’m on a mission” face on, and no one dares to argue with her. “I mean, we are trying to avoid looking like a motorcycle gang, right?”

  Fresa snorts, but Cereza agrees.

  “I’ll go in first,” Lita continues, like she’s a general in a field tent. “Everyone spread out. Say hello to people who say hello to you, ignore everyone else, and smile. Do one lap, then we’ll all meet up at the punch table to go over our next move, understood?”