Papi stared with a steel glare. Rodrigo lowered his eyes.
“Well…I’m waiting,” said mi papi.
With his head down, Rodrigo stood, went to the kitchen, and grabbed a damp towel. A moment later he was down on his hands and knees scrubbing up blood.
“And I mean every last drop. If there is even a speck of red…” Mi papi didn’t need to complete his sentence. Rodrigo understood exactly what he meant. Papi then turned to my two younger brothers Oscar and Miguel.
“Hijos, vengan aquí,” he commanded. My brothers looked up with terror in their eyes. Papi led them into his bedroom. They followed along silently.
“I want both of you to clean up the mess in here,” Papi ordered. My brothers looked around, confused.
“Uhm, what mess?” Oscar finally asked.
“This one,” answered Papi, and with one giant swing of his Roberto Clemente baseball bat, mi papi smashed mi ama’s television set into a million pieces. Glass flew everywhere.
Though she was seated in the living room, the violent crash from the bedroom caused Ama to jump back in gigantic fright.
“Now get going,” mi papi ordered. “And if your grades in school don’t improve in the next few weeks, both of you will taste the belt, me entienden?”
My brothers leaped into action, terrified of what might happen to them next. Once the two of them had started working, mi papi stepped out of the bedroom and stared fiercely at Ama. She sat with Tía Luna on the couch, shaking with fear, wondering what—or who—mi papi was going to break next.
“Your television seems to have a small technical problem,” Papi explained. “Looks like no telenovelas for a while.”
His message was clear: stop using Sonia as a servant. Mi ama said nothing; she just kept her head down. Papi went to the front door and opened it.
“This is a doorbell,” he said to Tía Luna. My aunt was so scared, the fat on her neck jiggled. “And this is how you use it,” mi papi explained.
He pushed the little button. Bing-bong.
“Sometimes, when people do not answer, it means they are not home,” mi papi continued. “And even when it looks like there are people at home, sometimes they’re really not. Do you understand this technology?” he asked.
Tía Luna nodded and looked at the floor.
“Then why don’t you try it the next time you come over?” mi papi suggested as he held open the front door. He waited. It took Tía Luna a moment to realize that he was kicking her out of the house. Slowly she pushed her fat butt off the couch, picked up her purse, and exited without a word about Jesus, the devil, or the future of our burning souls.
“Thank you for visiting,” mi papi said as he closed the door behind her. “We look forward to seeing you soon.”
He then spun around.
“Sonia,” he barked in a firm voice. It was his loudest command yet. I looked up, ready to be scolded like everyone else.
“Lo siento,” mi papi said gently.
I paused.
“I am sorry,” he repeated. “Truly sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, Papi,” I answered in Spanish. “It’s mine.”
“No!” he snapped. “It’s not. Don’t ever think like that. It is not your fault.” He stared across the room at mi ama. “It is ours,” he said. “It is ours.”
I saw wetness forming in mi papi’s eyes. Of all the jobs he did, he’d always felt that job number one was to be a great father, and right then I could see that he felt that he had failed.
“I…I never realized,” mi papi said, shaking his head. “With all the time I was working, I thought I was making things better.” He paused. “But I was not.”
He looked down at the floor. “I was not.”
I wanted to say something to him, to let him know that it was okay, that things would be all right and that he really was a great papi. But I could tell he didn’t want to be comforted at the moment. It was like he wanted to experience the pain, as if he deserved it, for some reason. A teardrop fell from his eye. I could do nothing other than let him experience the great hurt. But I felt sad for him. So sad that I wanted to cry myself.
“Mañana,” Papi added, wiping away a tear. “Tú vas a la escuela,” he told me. He looked over at mi ama and repeated his words. “Tomorrow, Sonia, you go to school and finish what you need.”
My mother didn’t look up.
“And I promise, mija, if it takes me to my last breath, I will make things right,” he said. “I will make things right.”
It was only the second time in my entire life I had seen mi papi cry, and the first time had only been a few hours earlier when he was about to strangle my drunkle in the middle of the street. But I saw him cry a third time, too. At my high-school graduation.
The event was incredible. Mi entire familia came, and each of them beamed with pride. Even Rodrigo was proud of me. Dios mío, he even wore a tie.
Okay, mi papi had forced him to, but still, Rigo was proud. I could also tell he was sad too. He sort of looked regretful the whole time, like, if he had known the pride he could have brought to himself and la familia by earning his diploma, he would have tried harder in school. And now that he was out looking for jobs, he saw there weren’t very many things he was qualified to do. Vacuuming cars at the local car wash for minimum wage was the best he could come up with. At least he had stopped selling drugs. But when he saw me wearing a cap and gown in our school colors, he knew he had no one to blame but himself. I didn’t know if mi hermano was going to turn the pain of this lesson into a positive force that would motivate him to get his act together, but I hoped so. After all, as Mrs. Javellano had said to me, it’s never too late. But after taking a few photos, Rodrigo walked away to be alone with his thoughts and he was pretty quiet the rest of the day. Though he had been a real jerk to me for years, I still felt bad for him.
My younger brother Miguel, on the other hand, was bouncing around like a Mexican jumping bean. He particularly loved the tassel on my graduation hat.
“Take another picture,” he told mi papi as he pulled off my graduation cap and put it on top of his nine-year-old head for like, the eleventh time in a row. “Take another picture of me and Sonia.”
I leaned in and smiled once again as the flash went off. Seeing my younger brother goof around with my graduation cap filled my heart with joy. For the first time in his life, I—a girl—was his role model. And something told me that he too would one day wear a tassel of his own.
“Geraldo, ven aquí,” I said, quickly pulling him by the arm. “And bring the camera; I want you to meet someone.”
I dragged Geraldo through the crowd and positioned myself right behind Tee-Ay so she would bump into me with her next step.
“Oops, excuse me,” she said, colliding into me.
“Hello, Tee-Ay,” I answered.
“Sonia,” she said with a big smile on her face. We hugged. “So good to see you, girl. What is up?”
“Well,” I told her, “I am starting community college in the fall.”
“Amazing,” she said with genuine happiness for me. Tee-Ay had never been one of those fake girls in high school who smiled all the time and told you nice things but then talked trash about you behind your back. She had always been a true friend.
“I mean, I know it’s not USC, but—”
She cut me off. “Don’t even think like that, Sonia. Really, that is awesome.”
“But I won’t be able to take a full load of classes ‘cause I need to work at my cousin’s auto shop as a bookkeeper for some money, but…” I continued. I knew that making the investment in going to college would be the best money I’d ever spent. In one of those home studies packets I had even seen a chart explaining how people with college diplomas usually made at least a million dollars more over the course of their life than people who didn’t go to college. But still, it wasn’t right that mi papi had to work so hard to support me now that I was out of high school. The cash I was earning, along with Rigo’s small income, helped make
it possible for mi papi to take an extra two nights a week off so that he could stay home, relax, and spend some time on the couch with his familia.
“Well, you know how it is,” I said to Tee-Ay.
“Sonia,” interrupted Geraldo, eager to get a good shot of me and Tee-Ay. “ Una picture, una sola, come on.”
“Geraldo, ven,” I said, ignoring the camera and waving him closer. “I want you to meet one of my best friends in the whole world. This is Tee-Ay, the girl I told you about.” I turned. “Tee-Ay, this is my boyfriend, Geraldo.”
It was the first time I had used the word boyfriend to introduce Geraldo. Tee-Ay stared at him in a daze, like she had never seen such a hot guy in all her life. I knew how she felt, though. Geraldo was absolutely gorgeous and I had been starting to notice other chicks checking him out, even when I was standing right next to him. Girls were such bitches. Of course I got jealous, but once, when Geraldo saw me getting snippy, he pulled me aside and said, “Sonia, I only have ojos for you, amor. Remember…it’s been written.”
Then we kissed. It was magical. The tenderness in his lips was so gentle, and the trueness in his eyes was so pure, it became for me the moment in my life when I realized that someday Geraldo and I would be married. He was the love of my life, and I was the love of his. We were two people with one soul.
It really was like he had always said: It has been written.
Incredibly, the fairy tales were correct. Principe Charming does exist. And he’s smoking-hot, too.
“Very nice to meet you,” Geraldo said to Tee-Ay in his usual suave, gentlemanlike manner. He extended his hand in warm greeting.
“Hi,” Tee-Ay said, trying to pretend she was all calm, cool, and collected.
“Congratulations on your good news,” Geraldo said to her. “Sonia has told me many nice things about you. I hope that maybe one day we can all go out for a lunch. It will be my treat.”
“I would love to have lunch sometime,” Tee-Ay responded, then she looked at me with a twinkle in her eye. “But it will have to be french fries—”
“And a Diet Pepsi,” I said, finishing her sentence. We both laughed.
“Well,” Geraldo answered, not getting the inside joke about our old tradition, “it is a strange lunch, this one you talk about, but if that is what you wish, okay.” Then he stepped back and lifted the camera. “Now, how about a picture?”
Tee-Ay and I pressed our cheeks together and smiled, and Geraldo took a picture that I still have today—it just came out so perfect. Tee-Ay and I hugged again.
“I am so proud of you,” she told me.
“And what do you expect me to say about you?” I replied. “Lunch for sure?” I said.
“Fo’ sure!” she answered. Our lifelong friendship had been rekindled, and we knew that we would be there for one another for the rest of our lives.
Si, high school graduation had been a very proud day for me. But my schooling did not end there. Two years later I ended up graduating with an Associate of Arts degree from a two-year community college and was then accepted to a four-year university. When I got the news, I raced to the woman who had been there for me my whole life. Or at least my whole second life. She cried like I was her own daughter.
“You make my heart want to burst, mija” Mrs. Javellano said as she gave me a big hug. Though I had already graduated high school, we had made it a point to share cbampurrados vainillas as often as we could.
“I could not have done any of this without you,” I replied, holding the college acceptance letter. “You were the one who showed me the way.”
“Yes you could have, Sonia,” she replied. “And you would have, too. What’s that your papi calls you—tortuguita ?”
She looked at me and smiled. There was deep warmth in her eyes. And then a hint of concern.
“Mija, ate things better yet with your ama?” she asked.
I paused.
“No,” I answered. “Not really.”
Though mi papi and I remained as close as ever, my relationship with mi ama had never really healed. A part of me never forgave her for all the things she had done to me growing up, but another part of me didn’t want to live the rest of my life being angry at her either. I guess the way she raised me had been the only way she knew how. I try to be polite to her nowadays when we see each other, but we’re definitely not close. Looking back, I don’t think we were ever close. That hurts me. However, I have a feeling it will help me later in life. Especially in my career. My theory is, just like you can’t be a good cook unless you really like to eat, you can’t be a good family therapist unless you come from a screwed-up family.
That’s what I want to do, become a family therapist. And heck, when you consider all my whacked-out relatives, I might end up being the best family therapist that ever lived!
That’s funny. But maybe I shouldn’t say that. Really, I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings.
So, after two years at community college and with the support of Mrs. Javellano, mi papi, and Geraldo, I made a plan for what I was going to do: finish my bachelor’s degree, get a master’s degree, and become a licensed counselor.
I guess, ultimately, I just like to help people.
Plus, I’ll make a solid living too. There would be a good salary, I’ll invest in a 401K retirement plan, and I’ll get covered by proper health insurance so I can go see real doctors instead of rude nurses at overcrowded public clínicas.
But most important, on the last Friday of every month I’ll be able to give Maria a reason to wait in an incredibly long line. After all, there’s a deaf little girl down in Mexico who’s going to need all the support I can send.
I guess es verdad what my people say…Familia es todo.
Family is everything.
Also by Alan Lawrence Sitomer
The Hoopster
A Teacher’s Guide—The Hoopster
Hip-Hop Poetry and the Classics
Hip-Hop High School
Homeboyz
The Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez
Nerd Girls—The Rise of Dorkasaurus
Nerd Girls—A Catastrophe of Nerdish Proportions
Caged Warrior
Noble Warrior
ALAN LAWRENCE SITOMER was California’s 2007 Teacher of the Year. In addition to being an inner-city high school English teacher and professor in the Graduate School of Education at Loyola Marymount University, Mr. Sitomer is a nationally renowned speaker specializing in engaging reluctant readers. He received the 2004 award for Classroom Excellence from the Southern California Teachers of English and the 2003 Teacher of the Year honor from California Literacy. Alan's previous books include Caged Warrior, Noble Warrior, The Hoopster, Hip-Hop High School, Homeboyz, The Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez, Nerd Girls—The Rise of Dorkasaurus, and Nerd Girls—A Catastropher of Nerdish Proportions. Alan is also the author of Hip-Hop Poetry and the Classics, a text being used in classrooms across the United States to engage disengaged students.
The Secret Story of Sonia Rodriguez Page 19