The Grief Keeper

by Alexandra Villasante

  “Well, that’s me,” I say lightly.

  I was the one who made a big deal of not knowing enough about Gabi’s new friend. Now I have no idea what I’m supposed to ask her.

  “Will your parents be at your house during the party?” I ask.

  “Um, yeah. And my mom said Gabi could sleep over too—if that’s okay with you.”

  I feel Gabi watching me, her face stubborn and hopeful at the same time. I think about everything she’s seen and lived through. More than any child should have to in a lifetime.

  “I think that will be all right,” I say slowly. When they jump and squeal loud enough to wake up ten generations of the dead, I tell them, nicely, to go somewhere else.

  Rey, who has been quiet, gives a half snort, half laugh. “Have fun, Gabs. Don’t do anything that requires stitches!”

  When Rey turns back to me, she’s holding up the Cedar Hollow DVDs. “Okay, so season three, right?”

  I smile. “Yes, but first I need a shower,” I say, climbing out of bed. I remember when wearing the same clothes for weeks was so normal that I didn’t even notice. Now I feel dirty after just one day. I hope I don’t smell.

  “It’s cute the way we’re reversing our roles here, you know?”

  I look at her blankly.

  “I’m bringing you tea, and you’re sick in bed and probably stinky.” She takes another cookie off the tray. The cookies are disappearing fast. “Try not to flash me, okay?”

  “Flash?”

  “You know,” she says, pretending to open her shirt. I blush hard and almost run to the bathroom.

  * * *

  After a long shower with the water as hot as I can withstand, I come out wrapped in towels. Rey is on her phone but glances up at me long enough to say, “No flashing,” I think because she knows it embarrasses me. I grab clothes out of the closet and run back to the bathroom. I dress and put powder on my ankle before putting the cuff back on. I am mostly myself and calm when I come back out. My tea is cold on the tray, and there is half a cookie left for me.

  “Sorry,” Rey says, looking at the nearly empty plate. I laugh.

  Rey opens her computer and puts the first disco into the machine. “I had to find my dad’s old laptop with the disc drive—that’s how old this shit is.” The little tray disappears into the computer, and it slowly comes to life, the image from the beginning of Cedar Hollow filling the screen.

  “Dad told me why you left El Salvador.”

  I look at her. “I told you that. Because of Gabi.”

  “Yeah, but I didn’t know it was because people killed your brother and want to kill you. It’s crazy. Like something out of a movie.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Rey puts her hand on my arm. Through the fabric of my T-shirt, her hand feels as hot as una plancha. “I’m glad you got here safe.”

  I can’t explain how we aren’t safe—how I don’t know if we’ll ever be safe. How I don’t know, right now, if Mamá is safe with Tía Rosa, or if she is someone else I should be worrying about. Because of all that, I stay silent. We watch the third season of Cedar Hollow on the bed, shoulders touching so we can both see the small screen of the computer that Rey balances on her knees, then on a stack of pillows. It isn’t a very comfortable thing, but I realize that I’d rather be uncomfortable and close to Rey.

  We watch as Amber finds her mother sitting at their kitchen table and confronts her for drinking too much after losing her job.

  “You can’t just sit there and wallow in self-pity, Mom!”

  I think about Mamá in her bata sitting at our kitchen table, worrying about Pablo as if it were another one of her jobs. Pablo, who was almost never home, would sometimes appear late at night or early in the morning. He was the head of the family now, and he was taking care of us. Money would appear on the table to prove his words. Then he’d leave, and Mamá would still sit, crying as silently as she could.

  “Hey. You okay?” Rey says gently. A tear rolls down my face. I didn’t even know I was crying. I am so close to Rey that I can see the veins behind her ears, the soft, blonder-than-blond hair on her head. She smells of cotton and warmth. She brushes her fingers over my face to wipe away the tear. I feel fragile and light, a soap bubble in the air.

  “I’m happy,” I say, which is not the right answer. I should have said “I’m fine” or “I’m okay.” But it was the true answer.

  “Making a mental note: Cries when happy. Okay, got it,” she says, turning back to watch Amber and her mom declare that they’ll always be there for each other.

  Indranie comes in and, seeing us scrunched up on the bed, frowns. Rey pauses the show so Amber’s laughing face is frozen on the screen.

  “Gabi told me you guys were hanging out together.”

  “What’s wrong with two lab rats hanging out, in the name of science? It’s not against the rules, is it?” Rey says.

  “Not exactly against the rules, no,” Indranie says. She puts a tray of Olga’s food on the nightstand. She feels my forehead and smiles that there is no fever. “How are you feeling, kid?”

  “I’m better. Just tired. Rey is taking care of me,” I say.

  “I can see that,” she says, raising an eyebrow. “This is from Dr. Deng. He says you just need rest and this will help you sleep.” She puts a tiny white pill next to my bowl of stew. “But you have to take it after you eat. Olga says you haven’t eaten much today.”

  I shrug. It doesn’t matter. I want Indranie to leave so we can watch more Cedar Hollow in peace.

  She walks over to Rey’s side of the bed and kisses her on the cheek. “You’re looking better too. That’s good news. Your dad is out of town, but he’s back tomorrow. He says he texted you.”

  Rey nods toward her phone. “Yeah, it was about a thousand emojis long. Did you teach him how to do that?”

  Indranie smiles. “I may have mentioned that emojis have some credibility among today’s youth.”

  “You set him up. I admire that about you.”

  Indranie laughs and says she’ll check in on us later. We eat stew and fresh bread and watch disaster after disaster hit the people in Cedar Hollow. It never occurred to me that maybe they were even unluckier than our family. But, so far, no one has tried to kill Amber and Aimee.

  Right before the last episode of season three, Gabi comes in, brushes her teeth, and puts on piyamas. I hadn’t realized how late it was. Gabi climbs into the bed between us.

  “Can I watch too?”

  “You hate this show, remember?”

  “Then can I get you to watch Top Gear again?”

  “Sorry, Gabi. Hanging out with the lab rats means watching Cedar Hollow, right, Aimee?”

  “That’s correct, Amber.”

  “Why are you Amber,” Gabi asks Rey, then turns to me, “and you’re Aimee? They both look the same to me.”

  We both exclaim that this is completely false, that they are deeply complex characters.

  “They do look a little the same from the back,” I say, noticing how they both have the same hair color.

  “We didn’t decide who was who,” Rey says. “It sort of just happened, right?”

  I nod.

  “Aimee’s shorter. That’s why you’re Aimee, right?” Gabi says.

  “I’m not short,” I say.

  “Chaparra,” Gabi snorts.

  “What does that mean?” Rey asks.

  “Shorty,” I say.

  Rey and Gabi laugh over my insistence that I am not short, only average. I’m glad Gabi isn’t so angry with me anymore.

  “Rey is Amber because she’s the leader,” I say. And she’s the most beautiful.

  Rey groans. “Season three is Amber leading Aimee from one mistake to another, like she’s the Pied Piper of terrible choices. No thanks.”

  Gabi asks a
lot of questions about Amber and Aimee for the first five minutes of the episode, and Rey answers them patiently. I watch them together. It should amaze me that Gabi is so comfortable with Rey, but it doesn’t. Gabi is made of something strong, flexible, and good. I am made of stone, at least that’s what it has felt like. Now I feel my insides loosening, letting go of fear just a little bit. It feels dangerous to be soft, como mantequita. What if I forget how to be hard when I have to be?

  The disc ends and Gabi gets up, stretching. I go to the bathroom to brush my teeth and take the pill from Dr. Deng. When I come back, Gabi is asleep on her bed and Rey is waiting for me in mine.

  “Hey, Aimee,” Rey says.

  Rey and I lie down on the bed facing each other. She takes my hand again, and a shiver stops my heart. She kisses my forehead, and I hold my breath.

  “I don’t feel like dying tonight,” she says.

  She’s smiling, though her eyes are growing heavy, her body relaxing into sleep. I feel like an animal tracked by a hunter, not knowing if it is better to leap backward or jump forward. The answer isn’t in Rey’s eyes, as kind and soft as they are. The answer is in Liliana’s eyes. Her voice.

  You know I stay with Pablo so I can see you, right?

  Liliana’s voice repeats in my head like a curse.

  So I can see you.

  “Come shopping with me, hermanita. You know what your brother likes,” Liliana says, her hip against our screen door. Before Liliana, I never cared what Pablo’s girlfriends wore or did. But I let Liliana pull me down the street to the market stalls. I leave Gabi home with Mamá. I feel guilty for leaving her, but not enough to stop me. I buy her a rainbow-colored hair bow to make it up to her.

  Liliana wants me to try on a thin top, the kind she likes to wear that shows her belly. It’s yellow with little black stars and moons. She stands, half dressed, in the curtained part of the stall that sells ropa de fiesta. I won’t take off my top, even behind a curtain, in the market stall. I won’t buy shiny bracelets or lipstick, either. Those decoraciones aren’t for me; they feel heavy, annoying. On Liliana, they make her look more beautiful still.

  She doesn’t believe me when I tell her how beautiful she looks. She laughs, threading her arm through mine, and leading me past the stalls selling cazuelas and mosquito coils, shawls and candy. In the coming weeks, Liliana will show up at our door often, ready to take me out. I never ask where Pablo is or why they aren’t together. I’m just happy to have Lilí to myself.

  I bribe Gabi not to tell anyone where I go. “It’s our secret, Gabi. I’ll bring you back a treat.”

  Gabi nods. “Our secret.”

  But Gabi has her own secret. One night, as we travel through Mexico in a coyote’s truck, sleepless and sick with panic, waiting to see if they’ll leave us behind or shoot us for making too much noise, Gabi tells me how Antonio would take her a pasear—to places she was not allowed to go without me or Mamá. And to places where you needed money, to Galerías, or all the way to La Gran Via. They’d go in Antonio’s car, instead of having to take buses. She called Antonio her other big brother, and Antonio wouldn’t let her get out of his car until she gave him a kiss. Often, Pablo would be there. He would let it all happen.

  “I had to tell you. It’s my fault Pablo died. I didn’t know Antonio was tan malo. He was always nice to me. And he was Pablo’s friend.” My sister’s eyes are dry yet swimming in fear. She confesses that night because she thinks we’re going to die.

  “It’s my fault,” she says again.

  I hold her close, making us both as small and quiet as I can, and tell her she’s wrong. It’s Antonio’s fault. Antonio killed Pablo, and Antonio is dead. That’s the end of it. It’s over and in the past.

  But the past is here with me now. I can’t get it out of my mind, no matter how hard I try. Despite being flooded with shameful memories, I don’t pull away from Rey. I don’t move. I wait for sleep because it has to come. It is the only mercy I can expect. But when sleep does come, it is a ball of fire.

  Chapter 21

  The music is too loud. A machine on stage pumps out clouds of smoke. Strobe lights turn the smoke colors—from pink to blue to orange. A boy is next to me, dancing to the music. Every few minutes, he looks back at me, to see if I’m all right. Once, he leans in close and yells in my ear, “Having fun?” I nod that I am, and my body dances too. I don’t like the music much, but I like being with this boy. I like the feeling of people around me and everyone having a good time. A pretty girl with short black hair smiles and winks at me as she dances past. I grin because it’s been a long time since a pretty girl—any girl—has flirted with me. The air tastes good, like electricity and sugar. I don’t know what it is, but then I do know. It’s happiness. I’m happy to be here, just here. There is no one missing and nowhere else I want to be.

  An explosion splits the room, cutting off the music. There hangs a second of perfect silence before someone screams. An accident, I think, something wrong with the equipment or lighting. The boy’s hand grips mine hard, and he pulls me forward. Behind me, smoke pours out of a hole in the wall. We are leaving because there is something wrong. The boy is looking back at me. “I’m okay,” I shout. I’m okay. Then, in front of him, made just for him, another explosion splits the room into silence and chaos. I stumble to my knees. My hand is still outstretched, but it’s empty. Where is the boy? I cough and cough, my ears ringing. The band is gone from the stage, and someone pushes past me, knocking me to the ground.

  I have to find the boy. But there are too many people running, too much screaming for me to think. Someone steps on my hand with their boot, crushing my finger. I pull my painful hand into my leather jacket. Not my jacket. My brother’s jacket. I was cold, and he let me wear it. I hunch down in the jacket like a turtle in a shell, as if it can protect me. I cover my head with my arms.

  I think I hear someone screaming my name, but it could be my mind playing tricks on me. I uncover my head long enough to see if I can find the boy. He always comes for me. He never leaves me behind. There are other people lying on the ground. Bodies, I think, but then recoil from the word. How much time has passed? An hour? Two minutes? Another boom vibrates through the world, shifts the ground under me, and I’m paralyzed again. Something lands hard across my legs. I raise my head to see that it’s a girl. She wears a T-shirt with the name of the band we’re seeing. She’s covered in blood, and her eyes do not blink. This scares me more than the smoke or the explosion or the boy I can’t find.

  I use strength I didn’t know I had to pull myself out from under the dead girl and roll toward the stage, where part of the black velvet lining has come apart, revealing a space. I crawl into it, under the stage, and scream his name, even though no one can hear me. Where is he?

  * * *

  “Her eyes are open.”

  “Yes. But she is completely unresponsive.”

  Indranie’s and Dr. Deng’s voices float in the dark.

  “Can that happen with your eyes open?”

  “Yes. Her optic nerves are not passing information to her brain. She is locked in.”

  “This isn’t supposed to go this way,” Indranie says nervously.

  Are my eyes really open?

  “She’s breathing and her pulse is only a little slow. I’m giving her an NMB reversal agent. That will hopefully bring her out of this catatonic state.”

  I hear glass bottles tinkling, and I remember visiting Papá’s work when I was little. The Pepsi bottle crates being stacked made a grinding sound, rough glass against rough glass. It made my teeth hurt.

  “Did you take the cuff off?”

  “No.” Dr. Deng’s voice is cold.

  “Are you out of your mind? That’s what’s causing this!” There’s panic in Indranie’s voice. I have never heard her sound so distressed. I wonder if I am dreaming.

  A large hand, damp and warm, touches my arm.
I feel a needle pinch my skin.

  “Calm down, Indranie.” Dr. Deng’s voice cuts through the fog of my mind. “We don’t know anything other than you found her like this an hour ago.”

  “We can make a pretty good guess,” Indranie says angrily.

  “We won’t get another chance like this. Think of all the people this will help. Think of Rey. Do you really want to stop the experiment now?”

  Indranie is silent.

  I tell myself to get up. But nothing moves except my heart, which beats like it wants to jump out of my body, leaving me behind. I wish I could cry, but I can’t. I will stay like this forever. God will find me like this on my last day, unmoving. My eyes suddenly sting unbearably. Water leaks out of my eyes, and I can’t even blink it away. Then, finally, the ceiling comes into focus, whiteness instead of blackness until I can see.

  “Marisol. What happened?”

  It takes me a long moment to move my mouth to answer Indranie.

  “I—” My voice crumbles to dust. Indranie helps me sit up and take a sip of water. I am so tired of being in this bed.

  “I saw Riley die.”

  Dr. Deng, for once, is looking at me with intense interest.

  “Can you describe it?” he asks.

  I describe it as if I had been there. In a way, I have.

  “Did Rey tell you that’s what happened?” Dr. Deng asks urgently.

  “No. She never told me. She was going to, but we got interrupted.”

  They exchange glances instead of words.

  “It’s the cuff,” I say. “It has to be. It’s finally working.”

  “Working?” Indranie asks. “That’s not working. That’s malfunctioning.”

  Dr. Deng sits on the bed across from me. He avoids my eyes. “It is working. Better than we could have expected.”

  “Peter,” Indranie says, “this was not what we discussed.”

  Peter? He doesn’t look like a Peter. He looks like—well, like his first name is Doctor and his last name is Deng. Peter is such a friendly name, and Dr. Deng is definitely not friendly. I have lost the thread of their conversation, so I try to catch up, to push away my tiredness.