Life, After

by Sarah Darer Littman

  There was still a part of me that wanted to say that I didn’t do it for her, I did it for Jon. But the better part of me just said, “De nada,” as I continued into the principal’s office to meet my fate.

  Chapter Twelve

  NORMALLY, I WOULD HAVE BEEN suspended for hitting another student, according to Principal Williams, but since there were “mitigating circumstances” in my case (namely, Trevor being such a complete idiota, although he didn’t put it in exactly those words), he let me off with a warning. He did, however, call my parents. I begged him not to—I told him that my parents were already under a lot of stress because we’d only recently immigrated and that I’d never been in trouble before and please, couldn’t he just give me extra homework or something, but no, he insisted on picking up the phone.

  Papá was furious. I could hear his raised voice coming through the receiver from where I was sitting across the desk. I think Principal Williams even felt bad for me when he put down the phone.

  “You did the right thing by sticking up for Jon when he was being bullied by another student,” he said. “But, in hitting Trevor, you crossed a line. We have a zero-tolerance policy against violence here at Twin Lakes High School—as I said, had there not been other factors involved, you would have been suspended.”

  I stared down at the floor, unable to meet Mr. Williams’s eyes. Whatever rightness I felt about hitting Trevor was gone, replaced with dread about what would face me when I got home.

  “Next time, call on a teacher or an administrator for help,” Mr. Williams told me, before sending me back to class.

  I was suddenly a minor celebrity—“The Girl Who Hit Trevor”—but I wasn’t able to enjoy my new social visibility, because I was sick at the thought of having to face my parents.

  A snail could have crawled faster than I walked from the bus stop to our apartment. With good reason—Papá was waiting to berate me as soon as I opened the door.

  “Brawling at school? My daughter? The disgrace of it! What has happened to you since we came to this country? As bad as things were in Argentina, at least my daughter didn’t behave like a common fishwife!”

  “But, Papá—”

  “Don’t but, Papá me! Go to your room until Mamá gets home!”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but he glared at me so angrily I was afraid he was going to hit me. He wouldn’t even give me a chance to explain. Even though I’d always been a good daughter and done the things he and Mamá expected of me, he automatically thought the worst. My eyes filled with angry tears, and in that moment I hated him. I stomped down the hallway to my room and slammed the door as hard as I could, so hard the books fell off my nightstand.

  So much emotion was pounding my head and twisting my gut that I felt like I might explode with the force of it. I paced the narrow space between the beds a few times, my hands shaking, until finally I threw myself on the bed and gave in to angry tears. I tried to remember what it felt like to love Papá, to remember the days when it seemed like he loved me, but all I could feel was anger and frustration.

  When my sobs calmed down to hiccups, I figured I’d better try to make a start on my homework before Mamá got home, because I knew the rest of the evening would be filled with “discussions” about my behavior and lectures about what a terrible daughter I was.

  I’d finished everything except for math when Sarita came bounding in.

  “Hi, how was your day? Papá says you’re in Big Trouble!”

  She leaped onto my bed, crushing my math homework.

  “Sari! Careful!”

  “Sorry.” She shuffled her bottom off my papers and tried to iron the creases with her hands. “But are you? In Big Trouble?”

  “In a way, yes. But it wasn’t really my fault. And Papá wouldn’t listen.”

  “Like Papá EVER listens.”

  Sari knew way too much for a kid her age.

  Later, when my mother got home, I heard her shout from the kitchen.

  “DANIELA! ¡VEN ACÁ!”

  “Guess it’s time to get yelled at again,” I sighed.

  “Wait!” Sarita exclaimed. She ran to her bed and reached under her pillow for the worn, silk-edged scrap of material she slept with.

  “Here, take my Baba with you for luck,” she said, crushing it into my palm.

  I hugged her, trying to ignore the tears that threatened to escape my eyes.

  “DANI!”

  “That’s Papá. I’d better go.”

  My parents were both sitting stiffly on the worn sofa in the living room. Mamá looked exhausted, and I felt a twinge of guilt that I was another problem for her to carry on her already burdened shoulders. But then anger layered on top of guilt like frosting on a cake. Why should I feel guilty for helping Jon? Would it have been better to have just walked away and done nothing?

  “Dani, Papá tells me the principal called and said you hit a boy in school today and that you were almost suspended.” She sighed heavily. “I cannot believe this of you, Daniela. We did not raise our daughter to behave this way.”

  “But, Mamá—”

  “¡Silencio! Don’t interrupt your mother!” Papá shouted.

  I clenched my teeth so tightly I got a throbbing pain at the back of my head, but it was the only way I could stop myself from shouting that they were both wrong, that they were being unfair; I had to bite back the question that pounded in my brain: Why won’t you just listen to me?

  Mamá was droning on and on about how she was working her fingers to the bone and getting varicose veins in her legs, all so that Sarita and I could have a better life, and would it kill me to stay out of trouble so she could sleep at night without worrying and…

  The phone rang, cutting off her recitation of all my faults. Mamá got up to answer.

  “Yes? This is Daniela’s mother…You want to thank her—for what?…I see. Yes, she is a fine girl. Yes, her father and I are very proud. Thank you very much for calling, Mrs…Nathanson, yes, it was a pleasure to speak with you, too. Good-bye.”

  My mother put down the telephone and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Daniela, why didn’t you tell us that you intervened to save this boy, Jon Nathanson, from a bully?”

  I couldn’t believe she was asking me such a ridiculous question, when neither she nor my father would let me tell my side of the story. It was so ludicrous it was almost funny. I clenched Sari’s Baba in my fist and the anger and frustration I’d been holding inside me all afternoon burst out.

  “Because you wouldn’t listen! Because every time I tried, you told me to be quiet or to go to my room or not to interrupt. Because you and Papá just assumed the worst about me, even though I’ve never been in any kind of trouble before at school, ever.”

  My mother stood there, a stricken look on her face. My father sat on the sofa, staring at the carpet.

  “I work so hard to be good at school and good at home. I do my homework and help with Sarita and dinner and try to do as much as I can to help you, Mamá, because…”

  I couldn’t say it. As much as I wanted to name the thing that blanketed our house with misery each and every day, to throw it into the room and force everyone, but mostly my father, to deal with it, I just couldn’t.

  “Why don’t you ever listen to me?” I asked instead. “Why can’t you just trust me?”

  My mother sat down, heavily, on the sofa, and wiped a tear from her eye.

  “I’m sorry, querida. I’m sorry we didn’t give you a chance to explain.”

  I looked at my father, waiting for him to apologize, but he sat next to my mother, resolutely avoiding my gaze. I wanted his apology even more than my mother’s; I just wanted to hear him say desculpame, “I’m sorry,” but I knew deep down that all I was going to hear was silence. I swallowed the disappointment, and it lay heavy inside of me.

  Chapter Thirteen

  TREVOR WAS ABSENT FROM SCHOOL the next day. He was suspended, because it wasn’t his first bullying offense. When I walked into Langua
ge Arts, Jon was sitting at his desk writing in his notebook as usual, but he looked up and greeted me with a big smile.

  “You were awesome for hitting Trevor yesterday,” he said. “Thanks.”

  “I shouldn’t have hit him,” I said. “But I had to get your notebook back. They shouldn’t have taken it.”

  “No, they shouldn’t have,” Jon said, closing the cover and stroking the book lovingly. “It’s private property.”

  Someday, I hoped Jon would trust me enough to show me what was in there.

  After class we walked down to the cafeteria together for lunch. We were sitting at the table talking about Hamlet when Jess walked up. To my astonishment, she sat down with us.

  “Hi, I’m Jessica, Jon’s twin,” she said, as if I didn’t already know the identity of my tormentor. She held out her hand for me to shake.

  I couldn’t believe that after all the scornful looks and nasty comments, she was acting as if we’d never met, like none of it ever happened. I felt like telling her to go away and leave me alone. But then I looked over at Jon, who was sitting there with a big grin on his face. He was innocent of all this and he was my friend. So I took her hand and shook it and said, “I’m Daniela. But you can call me Dani.”

  “I just wanted to thank you again for standing up for Jon yesterday,” Jess said. “You were incredible. I mean, slapping Trevor Richards in the face! I wish I’d been there. Forget that—I wish I’d done it myself! That guy is such a creep, and he’s been hassling Jon for years.”

  I felt like I was in one of those alien films where the person looks exactly the same on the outside, but within that familiar exterior lies some strange being from another galaxy. Except in this case, the strange being was a distinct improvement on the usual Jess. Still, I was uneasy with the sudden change.

  “So, Jon said you moved here from South America somewhere,” Jess said. “Chile or something.”

  “Argentina.”

  “Oh, like, Don’t cry for me, Argentina?” she sang.

  I was really starting to hate that song. I was beginning to hate the very mention of the film Evita. No matter what Principal Williams said, I was tempted to punch the next person who mentioned it to me.

  Instead, I somehow managed to lift the corners of my mouth into the semblance of a smile and said, “Something like that.”

  “So, it must be really different here, huh?” Jess said.

  Talk about the Understatement of the Year.

  “Yes, you could say that.”

  “Like, how so?”

  How to even begin? How to compare the wide boulevards of Buenos Aires with the suburban streets of Twin Lakes? How to describe the noises and the smells; the silent shuffle of the mothers of Los Desaparecidos as they marched every Thursday outside the Casa Rosada in the Plaza de Mayo; the noise of the street protests, the cacerolazos? How to tell this girl who seemed to lack nothing about how proud people like my father lost their businesses and ended up begging for food from the church?

  I didn’t think there were enough words to make Jess understand “how so.”

  Fortunately, Jon and his encyclopedic knowledge of my native country saved me.

  “Well, for one thing, because Argentina is in the Southern Hemisphere, it’s summer there when it’s winter here,” he said.

  “Seriously?” Jess asked. “Cool fact, Jon-boy.”

  She took a bite of apple, and then leaned over and winked at me.

  “So, Dani, tell me the truth. What are Argentinean guys like? Are they hot?”

  Images of Beto, so vivid and colorful they almost took my breath away, flashed through my brain in a silent montage, and I felt a wave of intense longing crash over me. “Yes…yes, they are…hot.”

  Jess looked at me intently. “Are you okay? You look kinda…sad all of a sudden.”

  I didn’t want to talk about Roberto, especially when I hadn’t spoken to him, when I hadn’t heard his voice saying my name, when I didn’t even know if there was still an us, if he was still my novio. But Jon and Jessica were looking at me, waiting for an answer.

  “I miss my novio, my boyfriend. He lives in Miami now. I don’t know when I’ll be able to see him again. I haven’t even spoken to him on the phone since he left Argentina.”

  “Seriously?” Jess exclaimed. “No wonder you’re depressed! We have to change that right away.”

  She rooted around in her purse, whipped out a cell phone, and flipped it open. “Call him.”

  “What?”

  “Go on! Call him—what’s his name anyway?”

  “Roberto…but…”

  “Go on, Dani,” Jess urged. “Call Roberto. You know you want to.”

  The cell phone was beckoning to me like the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. Don’t touch it—you can’t pay her back for the cost of the call. I looked over at Jon, who nodded his head, telling me I should go ahead. Don’t do it! What if you call Roberto and he doesn’t want to talk to you? What if he’s already found someone else?

  With trembling fingers, I reached out and took the phone from Jess’s hand. She grinned.

  “There you go, Dani. Just call me Cupid.”

  “What?”

  “Cupid,” Jon explained. “In Roman mythology, he was the god of love. You know, the one who shot arrows at people and is always on Valentine’s cards—not that I ever get any,” he added in an undertone.

  I resolved to send Jon a card on Valentine’s Day.

  “Oh, yes,” I said. “Cupido. Thank you, Cupid,” I told Jess.

  Then I went to dial and with a sinking feeling realized that I didn’t know Roberto’s number. I didn’t even know if he had a cell phone. I stared at the keypad, my eyes filling with tears, the disappointment almost crushing me.

  “Go on, Dani—what’s the matter?”

  “I…I don’t know his number.”

  I handed Jess back her phone, buried my face in my hands, and cried. The day before, I would have died rather than cry in front of her, but at that point I didn’t care.

  Jon patted me on the back awkwardly.

  “Don’t cry, Dani. We can call information or look it up online or something.”

  People in the cafeteria were looking at me, and I knew I was making a scene, but I couldn’t stop crying. To have that hope, for one brief moment, that I might hear Roberto’s voice saying my name, that I might finally be able to speak to him and feel some connection again and then to have it taken away because I didn’t know his stupid phone number…it made me realize how far apart we really were.

  Then I felt Jess’s arm around my shoulders.

  “Come on, Dani. It’ll be okay. We’ll get his number, somehow. And when we do, you can borrow my phone and talk to Roberto for as long as you want.”

  She handed me one of the postage-stamp-sized cafeteria napkins so I could wipe my eyes.

  “Seriously. As soon as you get his number, just let me know. It must suck having to move so far away from each other. I bet you really miss him.”

  Something in the way she said it made me feel like she really understood what it meant to miss someone, and I actually felt a moment of connection with her, something I never would have thought was possible.

  “Thanks. That would mean a lot to me. Because I do miss him—very much.”

  I dabbed my eyes with the tiny napkin, but I knew I always looked awful when I cried.

  “Well, I better go. I don’t want to be late for my next class.”

  “Bye, Dani,” Jon said. “And remember, Miami is only one thousand, three hundred twenty-five miles from Twin Lakes. Buenos Aires is more like five thousand, three hundred miles, so Roberto is actually only twenty-five percent as far away as he could be.”

  I never failed to be amazed at how Jon knew such facts, by the encyclopedic knowledge contained in his brain. And I knew in his own way he was being very sweet, trying to make me feel better about Beto’s absence. But…

  Jess rolled her eyes and we both burst out laughing.

&nb
sp; “What’s so funny?” Jon asked.

  “You, brother Jon,” Jess said. “You’re just funny sometimes, without really meaning to be.”

  She grinned at me as I walked away.

  In the servicio, or the “bathroom” as they said in English, which I found puzzling because there was no bathtub, I splashed cool water on my face and tried to make sense of the fact that I’d just sat at a table, had lunch, joked, and even cried in front of Jessica Nathanson, the person who had probably done more to make my life miserable at Twin Lakes High than any other person. She’d even offered to let me use her cell phone to call Roberto, because she understood that I missed him, and she’d comforted me when I cried.

  I’d just locked the door to a stall when I heard the bathroom door open.

  “…saw you and Jon having lunch with that weird girl from Brazil. What’s all that about?”

  I held my breath, even though they must have realized there was someone in the bathroom because the stall door was closed. My heart started to beat faster because I recognized the voice as Coty’s and she was obviously talking about me to Maybe She’s Evil After All Jess.

  “She’s not from Brazil. She’s from Argentina.”

  “Whatever.”

  “And she’s not weird, you know.”

  I take that back. Maybe she was still Not Quite So Evil.

  “She so is, Jess. C’mon, she hardly has any friends and she walks around in all of your old clothes. I mean, doesn’t that freak you out just a little bit, seeing her wearing your outfits? It’s like she just raided your closet or something.”

  “It wasn’t her that raided my closet—it was my mom. I can’t blame Dani because Mom goes off on these give-everything-away-to-charity binges whenever she starts getting sad about…well, you know.”

  No, I don’t know. What does Jess’s mother get sad about?

  “I guess. But I still think she’s a little weird.”

  “I don’t know. I mean, the girl hit that bullying moron Trevor Richards. She can’t be all bad,” Jess said. She was one stall over from me and I was afraid she’d recognize my shoes under the wall, but she was too busy talking to Coty to notice.