“Thanks be to Jesus,” Rose says as she lifts the crucifix back up and places it on the wall.
141
“SIA!” NOAH COMES RUNNING DOWN the stairs and reaches me. “God,” he says, putting the tips of his fingers on my neck.
Omar’s just behind him. “Who the hell was that?”
“No idea,” I mutter. My voice feels like it’s made of broken asphalt.
“Please tell me you got it to work,” Rose says to Noah, walking up, keeping her eyes on the woman’s body.
“I think so. But they, Sia, when we got there, they’d already been around. They freaking fried the surveillance system. Everything is toast, except for one old camera. I hooked up the adapter to the older monitor, we started recording somewhere between her, you know, admitting she doesn’t care about people living or not and trying to choke you to death.” He exhales, his breathing hurried. “God, I’m so glad you’re okay. And Rose,” he says, turning around. “Remind me to never cross you.”
“I wouldn’t mind crossing her,” Omar mutters, scribbling notes.
I grab his notebook and slam it shut. “Hey!” he yelps.
“You don’t get to be pervy,” I say, shoving his papers into his chest. “Especially with what we’re going through right now. Got it?”
“Yeah, yeah, okay. Sorry,” he says to Rose, who ignores him.
“Did you get the footage, Noah?” Rose’s eyes are still on the woman.
Noah gives a half shrug. “I put it, if we did get it, I put the file on my flash drive. I’ll have to check it later.”
The doors of the church are thrown open, and two well-suited men are flung inside, followed by my parents.
“Just say it,” Dad screams. “Say that there’s been nonconsensual experimentation on people out there.”
“We keep telling you,” the blond one says, on the floor, his arms out. His nose is bloodied. “We were only told to apprehend and recover.”
The dark-haired man stands, buttoning his jacket. “You!” my dad says, turning to him. “I know you know something.”
“What I know, Mr. Martinez, is that you and your wife have assaulted a dozen or so agents of the United States. I’m within legal bounds to arrest you immediately.”
“Oh, yeah? How are you gonna do that? She’s taken your guns, your—” He’s cut off by the gasp of my mother, who stares at the silver-haired woman.
“We need to get out of here, Luis,” Mom says. Her face is pale and her eyes are wild.
“What is it?” Dad looks around. “What happened here?”
“Who is she?” Rose asks Mom, pointing at the woman.
“That’s—” Mom pauses. “You know how I said there’s no single Voldemort? Well, I changed my mind. Her right there, she’s Voldemort.” She looks up at us, raw fear in her eyes. “Which means we’ve got to move. Ahora.”
142
WE’RE UP FRONT WHEN ROSE pulls up with one of the teal choir vans. “Ladies and gents,” she says, rolling down the window. “Take a seat, will you?”
We run up, Noah’s hand in mine. Omar takes the front seat, my dad hops in the way back. Mom and I scramble into the middle. As Noah pulls off his backpack, we hear a yell. I turn and see Cruz Damas walking up, his fist in the air.
“What do you think you’re doing, Rose Sarah Damas?” he yells. “You get out of that car right now, or so help me God…”
Rose is frozen, but her brown eyes meet mine for a split second. “You don’t have to do this,” I tell her. “You could give me the keys.”
She shakes her head. “I’m not staying.” She repeats it for Mr. Damas. “I’m not staying, Daddy. God wants us to love our neighbors as ourselves? That’s what I’m doing.” We’re all inside now and she hits the gas. When we pass him, he’s jumping up and down, screaming, the veins on his head bulging. I give him a cheerful wave.
143
“NO OFFENSE, LENA,” ROSE SAYS as she turns to the highway, “but that woman wasn’t quite on Voldemort level. Didn’t take much to knock her out, I mean.”
“It didn’t take much for her to just about wring my neck, either,” I say, putting my hand on my throbbing throat.
“The government—those scientists—drugged her for years. She must still be weak.” Mom twirls a lock of hair in her hand, something she’s always done when she’s thinking. “But that one in particular, she’s—” Mom pauses, closing her eyes as if in prayer. “She’s dangerous. I can’t believe they let her out.” She glances at my neck. “And she’s getting desperate, from the looks of it.”
“What do you mean? What the hell is she?” I say as we slow. Up ahead, there’s a line of cars.
Mom bites her lip. “I don’t know if you’d believe me, m’ija. But she’s not—she’s not like us.”
“Mom. Explain. Please. I mean, she attacked me. I have a right to know.”
And of course, this is when Omar has to butt in with his highly necessary commentary. “She’s a Nordic, isn’t she? The blonde lady? I knew it, I knew from the second she went superspeed like you! I mean, ’cause of the light hair, I thought she might’ve been a Flatwoods monster at first, but she’s way too hot for that. She’s gotta be from the fucking Pleiades. The Pleiades, you hear that Noah?”
“Sorry to interrupt,” Noah says. “Because, yeah, I really do want to hear more about the Pleiades. But up there? That security checkpoint is even tighter than TSA. They’ll search the vehicle. For sure.”
I narrow my eyes at all the men in SWAT team uniforms, holding massive guns. “What the hell are they playing at? I thought they wanted you alive, Mom.”
“They do,” Mom says. But even she sounds unsure.
Rose clears her throat. “Guys, do you want me to turn around, or—”
“No.” Mom crawls over the console, nudging Noah to the side so she can sit by me. “I’m gonna do something when we get close. No one panic, okay?”
“What the fuck are you doing, Lena?” Dad says, his hand on her shoulder.
“You won’t see us for a few seconds. But act normal.” She turns to me. “You ready, mamita?”
144
I HAVE NEVER WONDERED WHAT It’S like to be a shadow. Before today, I might have thought it was like becoming a piece of paper, all flattened and weightless, getting knocked around by even the gentlest wind.
But as Mom grabs my hand, we, suddenly, are nothing like flesh or paper. We become liquid, spilled across the car seats.
It’s like I’ve become everything I’m not. And as I sense the fabric of the seat I’m poured upon, I know there are universes in each and every stitch.
I’m vaguely aware of Rose telling the officer that she’s driving us out to practice at St. Matthew’s. I know his eyes reach over the space where we were, where there is nothing but the back seat, all a shade darker now. He opens the back, moves some equipment around with the barrel of his gun next to my father. He slams the door shut with a nod and lets us go.
145
WHEN WE SLAP BACK TO our bodies, I feel like I’M going to vomit. I take deep breaths and count the cacti out the window until the sensation passes.
Mom’s worse off. Her skin is gray and she’s hyperventilating.
“Lena, what do you need?” My dad’s hands are all over her.
“Water,” my mom says with a whisper.
We search the car, come up with a half-full plastic bottle. Mom downs it and requests more.
“Holy fucking shit,” Omar says. “You went into invisibility mode and I didn’t even have my phone out! Can you do that again, Mrs. Martinez?”
“Look, kid,” Dad says. “I get that Lena wants you to document this. But you need to shut the hell up and help me find more water. Now.”
Omar gulps, nodding, and they check under the car seats. Pero nada.
Mom still looks sick, weak, and wilted in Dad’s arms.
“We’ll hit the gas station in about ten minutes,” Rose says.
146
WHEN ROSE AND I FIRST ha
d milkshakes at Maude’S by ourselves, no parents, I looked around and whispered, “We’re the only brown people here.”
Rose looked at me very carefully before responding, “Sia. You and I are very different shades of brown.”
When we got our licenses for the first time, I started to see what she meant. Rose gets pulled over three times more often than I do when we’re just trying to make our way to school. Once, when taking a walk in downtown Phoenix, a rotted-cigar-smelling seventy-year-old man grabbed her ass and growled, “Not bad for a negro.”
Yeah, I know all that shit went down with my mom and the McGhees and I’ve been called spic and razorback and wetback a lot. But when Rose and I split up at stores, she’s the one who’s followed.
That’s precisely what happens when she and I make our way through the gas station, grabbing water and protein bars and fruit and chips. The tall bald man at the register jumps up and breathes down her neck the whole time. And you know what? I just can’t take this crap right now.
“Can I help you with something?” I ask him.
He blinks at me and sort of slows his walk. “You all find what you’re looking for?”
“We’re fine. We don’t need assistance or a chaperone. Got it?”
The man stares, openmouthed.
“Sia,” Rose warns beneath her breath.
The bells to the front door chime before I can respond. I turn. It’s Omar.
“Do they have any Twizzlers?” he asks.
I shrug, keeping Racist Raymond in my peripheral vision. “I don’t know. Find them yourself.” I turn and furrow my brow. The clerk’s stopped stalking Rose, but now his eyes are narrowed right on Omar. The veins in his neck look like puffy state lines.
The clerk marches right up to Omar and shoves him with a pink, pale hand to the shoulder.
“What the hell!” Omar yells.
“We don’t have any Twizzlers and especially not for you.” The man takes two long steps toward Omar, until Omar can probably smell his nasty Red Bull breath.
“That’s not really an answer, man,” Omar says, wringing his hands.
“God in heaven,” Rose murmurs behind me. The man pushes Omar until he’s right on the front door.
“You can’t just push a kid around like that!” I say. “Stop touching him.”
“There,” the man says, ignoring me, pointing at a piece of paper taped to the window. NO SERVICE FOR TERRORIST, it reads. Seriously. Whoever wrote it couldn’t even be bothered to make it grammatically correct.
“I’m an American citizen,” Omar says. Even from here, I can tell he’s shaking. “I was born here.”
“You all think you’re gonna change us. Change America. Well, you’re not. So get out before I grab the revolver behind my—”
“Jesus Christ!” I yell. “Leave him alone!”
Now Racist Raymond turns to me.
“Get out,” I tell Omar, but he shakes his head emphatically.
“You need to go, too,” the man says. “Before I call ICE on your pretty ass.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” I try to make my voice hard, but he’s getting closer. I close my eyes, searching for a prayer. Which saint is the one for teenagers who can’t get a fucking break thanks to old, pathetic assholes like this guy?
But there’s a crash and I jump back.
Omar’s kicked the jerk’s knees from behind, and now the man thrashes on the ground.
But Rose kicks him back down as he tries to get up. “Come on, Sia,” she screams. “We gotta move!”
We all run for the door, our arms full of unpaid merchandise. And, unwise as it may be, I actually stop for a split second to grab a jumbo pack of Twizzlers on the way out. I mean, what the hell.
I flash both middle fingers at the store as we leap into the van.
147
“WHERE ARE WE GOING?” ROSE asks when we get back in. Her voice is still at a scream.
“What happened?” Dad asks, but now I see Racist Raymond stomping out with his revolver.
“Rose, just go!” I yell.
She slams on the gas and we’re back on the road, a cloud of dust behind us.
“Keep going this way, Rose,” Dad says. “We’re going to Liana’s.”
“Abuela’s?” I say. Mom’s gulping water as she nods. I settle back in my seat and she takes my hand. “Makes sense,” I say. I’m still breathless.
“Sia. What the hell just happened?” Dad asks again.
I lean back, still catching my breath. Noah puts a hand on mine. Finally, I turn toward Dad. “The same old fucking shit.”
148
BEFORE I CAN FINISH THE story, Omar denotates. He was shaking so much, I thought he’d, like, need to punch at the walls and chairs with his fists, maybe yell. But no. He erupts with tears. The kind that you’re so freakin’ furious you can’t hold in. I’m very familiar with the sort. He swipes at his face so hard to wipe them away, it’s like he’s slapping himself.
My mother cautiously, slowly, leans into him, hand on his shoulder, the same shoulder that old white man had pushed. And Omar melts into her, his whole body convulsing.
“They’re the reason,” Omar chokes, “my mom can’t even go to the grocery store without being called a terrorist. And she’s a veteran, man! Fought her ass off in Afghanistan.”
I put my hand on his, my fingertips resting on his nails. His skin is so smooth.
“People suck,” I say. “All of them.”
He gives me a half smile. Chin lined with tears. And red, red eyes.
149
WHEN RUMORS CAME OUT THAT migrant children were being taken from their mamis, their papis, put in cages like zoo animals, with no windows, and, for days at a time, no food, the white people couldn’t believe it. I guess when your skin is light enough, you get to cast the benefit of the doubt like a spell or something. I bet it helps them sleep easy at night, that white witchcraft.
We knew better. We knew because we have cousins and mamis and tíos and abuelos and amigos who picked tomatoes and strawberries and avocados, who were chained or sprayed with things that made their babies come out without their jaw bones. Beaten, raped, treated worse than perros. We knew those white people never, ever gave a shit about us or our children. We knew better.
And as I watch the crisp line of sand and sky, I think about those babies on the border, locked up, dreaming about Mami’s milk, crying so hard they can’t breathe. And all the people out there, defending it. Saying those bebitos are getting what they deserve.
I don’t know what it’s gonna take to make them care about brown people if they treat brown babies like that, you know?
Sometimes I imagine the return of Jesus. Imagine the look on their faces when they see his skin, browner than juniper and driftwood and hot summer sandstorms. The day they realize God looks more like us is the day they become atheists, one by one, as though they ever believed in the love of Christ to start with.
150
“GOOD GOD,” ROSE SAYS. “THERE’S a cop behind us.”
We all whip our heads around, jumping when we hear that little beep-beep of a siren.
“Calm down,” Dad says. “Just act normal, Rose.”
I’ve know Rose’s dad has made a point to tell her a hundred times what to do if a cop pulls her over. This is how I know, deep down, that he does love her. I can hear his commands now. Put the license and registration on the dash, hands on the wheel, high, so they can be seen from the window. Move slowly. Make your voice nice and gentle. There might be more, but I kind of tune Cruz Damas out after about four minutes, no matter the topic. Dad has said similar warnings to me, along with the command, Don’t ever let the police hear you speak Spanish. No matter how brown they look.
Despite all those lectures, Rose seems completely freaked now. “What do I do?”
“Pull over.” Dad’s holding Mom against him, covering her face.
“I bet that asswipe at the store called them,” Omar mutters.
We’re parked now.
I glance up—Rose’s hands are high. Everything is on the dash. I’m glad she’s got her wits back.
“Mom,” I say. “Can you make us like shadows again?”
“I can’t, m’ija. I’m too weak.” She coughs and sips water. “They didn’t just give me powers, you know. They messed me up.”
“With the experiments?” Dad looks so worried, I want to hug him.
Mom shrugs. “Well, the experiments didn’t exactly end when it turned out I was a success.”
“Jesus Christ,” Noah says, whipping his face toward us. His skin is green. “It’s my dad.”
151
SHERIFF MCGHEE WALKS AS THOUGH he’S the master of the universe—legs widened, stride slow, shoulders back. I don’t get it. He looks like a hairless pug, with the same depth of vocabulary. What’s all that confidence for?
He leans on his hip in front of Rose’s window and lifts his aviators. “I got a call about a disturbance at the Silverline Mini-Mart gas station.” He narrows his eyes in the sun. “The owner said he was assaulted by a couple of, uh—” He glances at Rose again. “License and registration.”
As she slides the items toward him, slowly, just like her papi told her, McGhee scans the van. His eyes widen over my father. And then they bug the fuck out over Noah.
“What the hell are you doing here, son?” McGhee snarls. “Out. Now.”
Noah glances at me, and back. “No.”
“Son.” The sheriff is all pink now, huffing like the Big Bad Wolf. “Don’t you make me get you out. That’ll be all sorts of trouble for you… and your friends.”
“Don’t threaten him,” Dad says, his jaw so sharp, I feel like he could cut McGhee right up with it if he wanted.
“Keep your mouth shut! Or I’ll shut it myself, Martinez.”
“Do you beat your other son, too? Or just this one?” Dad holds his stare, and the sheriff actually blinks in surprise. Shit.
Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything Page 17