Something in Between

by Melissa de la Cruz

  Finally I get a text.

  I’m so proud of you. Your father wants to know if you’ve met the President yet and if so, see if he will pass a bill to keep the neighbor’s cat off the lawn.

  Whatever, Mom. I love you, I write, smiling.

  We walk along a semicircle path, cross a street, and pass through the World War Two Memorial, where I see Royce again.

  His dark eyes meet mine, but I turn away as soon as he starts walking toward me. I pretend to be interested in what Suzanne is saying.

  How can everything change so fast?

  Because he’s not for you, I tell myself. You’re not from his world, and he wouldn’t understand yours.

  It’s not just that he’s rich. It’s everything. Carrie is just one example. What did his brother say? You’re not his usual type. So what was he doing with me, then? Slumming? A booty call? I wish I had more experience with boys so I could figure it out.

  I follow close behind Suzanne past the Reflecting Pool and toward the Lincoln Memorial. I look back at the water and see the monument perfectly reflected upside down. I think it looks like a great sword in the earth and wonder why anyone would put it there. Suzanne reminds us of the 1963 March on Washington, when a quarter of a million people gathered around the pool for one of the greatest speeches in modern history.

  Suzanne has part of the speech memorized and recites it as we walk. “I still have a dream, a dream deeply rooted in the American dream—one day this nation will rise up and live up to its creed, ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’”

  I’ve always loved that speech, was so proud to be from a country that produced Martin Luther King, Jr. But now I know better.

  We’re not all created equal. There are the Carries and Royces of the world, high up in their gated mansions and their fancy schools, and then there’s me and my family, who are just struggling to keep our footing. Though our paths may cross momentarily, maybe it’s better to stick to our own circle, so we don’t get hurt when we crash into each other.

  Because that’s what’s happening here, isn’t it? I’ve crashed into Royce, and I’m bound to get hurt.

  13

  True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else.

  —CLARENCE DARROW

  THE GROUP TOURS the Jefferson Memorial after a boxed lunch of plain sandwiches and potato chips. I’m not angry at Royce anymore, just sad and confused, and now I miss my family. I just want a bowl of Mom’s adobo and to pinch Danny and Isko on their ears. Just the other week I was feeling homesick for Manila, but now I can’t even imagine going back. LA is my home.

  I walk inside the memorial. It’s magnificent. Bright lights illuminate a passage from the Declaration of Independence etched into the stone of the dome. While the other students walk around the statue, I read the inscription. As I begin reading, I start to tear up again.

  There are those words again:

  We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.

  That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

  But who really gets to pursue their happiness? Do those words even apply to me anymore? My family moved here for a better life, a chance at the American dream. Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, it says on the bottom of the Statue of Liberty. That was us. America is a beacon of hope around the world, promising a better way of life, if only you can make it here.

  I’ve been thinking about the scholarship. I may be here enjoying a tour of the Capitol and looking forward to meeting the president later, but I keep getting a sinking feeling in my stomach as I look at all these gorgeous buildings. If I can’t accept the scholarship to go to college and later grad school, then what’s the point of all this? If my family can’t live without fear of losing their home and having their entire lives uprooted, then my coming here hasn’t done anything to make our situation better.

  I tune in to what Suzanne is saying. “Thomas Jefferson was just as important to this country as George Washington. Consider the immensity of this statue. Now think of the immensity of just one of the documents he wrote and how it influenced not only the creation of America, but both you and me this very day. This man wrote the Declaration of Independence. Can you get any more important than that? This is the challenge we all face. What can we do to better ourselves and this country? What can we do to be remembered? Who do we want to be?”

  The group moves on, but I linger, and I hear a step behind me. I glance sideways. It’s Royce. We’ve been shadowing each other the whole tour. I was acutely aware of where he was the whole time, and he must have been aware of me too, because here he is now, even though I was pretty cold to him back there. I feel bad for blowing him off earlier.

  “I know what I’d do,” he says.

  “What’s that?” I say, still staring at the statue. Trying not lose my resolve, I count eight buttons on Jefferson’s vest.

  “I’d tear that statue down and put up one of me,” he says.

  I snort. “Of you? That’s sort of egotistical, don’t you think?”

  “Not at all,” Royce says. “I think I’d look pretty good. I wouldn’t have that hipster haircut though.”

  “Ha.” I let out one single laugh, then purposely cut it short.

  “You don’t believe me?” Royce asks.

  “No,” I say as I walk around the statue. I’m not looking at Royce, but he follows me anyway. I kind of wish he would leave me alone. He makes me feel too many things—excited, angry, sad, happy. Ugh.

  “Do you know why I’d want a statue of myself?”

  I shrug like I don’t care.

  He tells me anyway. “Because it’s something my dad will never have.”

  I feel myself softening. “What makes you so sure there won’t be one of him?” I ask. “Maybe he’ll have one twice as big. You never know.”

  “I doubt that—there always seems to be someone mad at him. Don’t you follow the news? They say he’s a surefire deal breaker on most things. He may be the house majority leader, but he’s not inventing a new America, or writing some declaration of anything that’s going to change the ideals we’re built on. He’ll never have an ‘I Have a Dream’ type speech either.”

  “Now you’re being harsh,” I say, though I’m not sure how much I like his father either. The group heads out for the steps, and I should really follow them.

  “I’m just telling the truth. I’m tired of being in his shadow. You have no idea what it’s like.”

  “And you have an idea of what my life is like?”

  I start to walk away, but Royce catches my arm. “I didn’t say that,” he says. I look up at him. His eyes are sincere. Soulful.

  “You didn’t say it, but you were thinking it,” I respond. “You don’t know how hard I had to work to be here. You and your rich friends think this is all a joke, some kind of boring sixth-grade field trip, but it’s not.”

  “I don’t think that,” he says. “And my sixth-grade field trip was to Sacramento.” He tries not to smile.

  “Whatever.”

  Royce glances over at Carrie and her crew, who have stopped on the steps now and are pretending not to stare at us. “Is that why you’re mad at me all of a sudden?” he asks quietly. “Because I know them?”

  I shake my head, even though he’s got it on the nose.

  “I can’t help who I am,” he says. “Or who my family is. Who my dad is. Or who I’ve grown up around.”

  I know. I know that, just like I can’t help who I am and who my family is—or isn’t—but I don’t tell him that.

  Last night, we didn’t do anything more than kiss and talk...and talk and kiss...okay...a whole lot of
kissing. I’m not upset about that—it’s more that I know I’m nothing to him and won’t be anything to him. I’m just some girl he met during another boring event in D.C. He’s probably been with so many girls.

  “Carrie Mayberry said you’re a player,” I blurt. And to be honest, wasn’t that what I thought too? Even before Carrie said it? When I looked on his Facebook page?

  “She said what?” he says.

  I start to walk away, but he catches my arm. “Are you serious? Are you really going to judge me based on something Carrie Mayberry told you about me? Even after last night?’

  “What about last night?” I snap.

  He looks around, his hand still on my arm. We’re practically alone, save for a few tourists. The award group has left the monument and is milling around the bottom of the steps. He stares at me. “You didn’t think...” He can’t seem to finish a sentence.

  My cheeks are so hot, I feel like smoke is coming off them. Is he really going to say it to my face? That it was nothing to him? That it didn’t mean anything? Maybe he’s right and I’m overreacting. We just kissed after all.

  “Nothing,” he says, clearly irritated. “Forget it.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” I shake his hand off.

  Now it’s his turn to look angry. “No, you don’t know anything. If you didn’t think last night was amazing, then there’s nothing I can do to change your mind. I feel like I’ve known you all my life even if we just met. I’ve never told a girl I’m dyslexic, or that I used to have so many tutors everyone called me names and made me feel stupid. I’ve never been with anyone who didn’t care who my father was, or wasn’t using me to get to him.”

  I’m staring at him. My head is spinning. “Royce...”

  His hands are in fists by his side. “But for all I know you have a boyfriend back home, and you’re the one who’s playing me.”

  I’m so shocked I can’t respond for a moment. “You’re worried about me?”

  “Why not? You’re beautiful, smart, funny,” he says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

  “You think I’m beautiful?” I whisper in disbelief.

  He blushes. “I think you’re incredibly beautiful,” he says, his voice low and husky like last night.

  I don’t have low self-esteem and I know I’m pretty, but no boy has ever told me I’m beautiful. It’s so romantic, I almost swoon.

  “You must have a dozen guys trying to date you, if you don’t have someone already. So yeah, I’m worried about you,” he says defensively.

  “Well, you shouldn’t be. I have no one but you.” I don’t mean to sound like a loser, but I also don’t want him to think I just kiss every guy I meet at a party.

  “Really?” he asks, raising his eyebrows, and his eyes are lighting up again.

  “Yeah.” I’m softening. God, he is a sweetheart.

  “So you ‘have me,’ do you?” A small smile begins to form on his lips. I want to touch them again, the way I did last night, when I traced them with the tips of my fingers. So I do. My fingers flutter and he reaches for my hand, holds it in his and presses it to his lips. “I can’t stop thinking about last night,” he says when he releases it and puts his arms around me.

  “I can’t either,” I say.

  “I couldn’t wait to see you,” he murmurs. I can smell him, that earthy, masculine scent underneath the sharp clean smell of soap and aftershave. I want to breathe it in forever. And this time, it’s my turn to pull him close. I pull him by his lapels so that he has to lean down.

  “I woke up thinking about you,” I tell him. It’s strange—before last night, we barely even knew each other, but now he’s so important to me. When I reach up to kiss him, he meets me halfway, and soon we’re kissing at the Jefferson Memorial.

  “All right,” I say when we catch our breath.

  “All right what?” he asks, still cupping my face in his hands.

  “After I meet the president this afternoon.”

  Royce looks confused. “What about it?”

  “I’ll have two free hours before the farewell dinner.”

  You can get a lot of kissing done in two hours.

  14

  My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants. We were strangers once, too.

  —BARACK OBAMA

  THE PRESIDENT IS taller than I expected and more handsome in real life than on television. He greets us in the Oval Office. Each group has five to six minutes with him. He’s smiling the entire time and acts interested in everyone.

  “You must be Jasmine de los Santos,” he says when he gets to me. I’m shocked that he knows my name. I’m not even wearing a name tag.

  “That’s me, Mr. President,” I giggle. I can’t help it. I’m too giddy.

  “What’s so funny about your name?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I just can’t believe I’m getting to meet the president.”

  I’m totally starstruck. I’ve never been so pumped to meet anyone in my whole life. After he finishes shaking my hand, I ask him how he knows my name.

  “I was a student just like you,” he says with a smile. “I read your scholarship essay. What was the title again?”

  “‘Something in Between,’” I say. I’m in total disbelief that the president remembers something that I wrote.

  The president continues talking about my essay. “My father was from Kenya. Growing up, I think he felt some of the same things that you wrote about in your essay. And I did too. There are times when being biracial feels like living in two different countries at the same time. I never thought I would even see the inside of the Oval Office, to be honest.”

  Wow, the president is like me; he even said so. “Do you think I could sit in your chair?” I ask.

  The president looks taken aback but he smiles gracefully. “You mean right now?”

  I laugh. “No. Not that way. I mean, do you think someone like me could be president? I know I wasn’t born in the United States so that will never happen but...”

  All of a sudden the president gets serious. “You know, Jasmine. The law—as it is now anyway—may prevent you from doing certain things you want to do. But don’t ever let an accident of birth keep you from what you want to do with your life.”

  It’s almost like he knows that I’m undocumented.

  The honorees behind me look annoyed that I’m holding up the line, but I know this might be the only time I ever get to talk to the president. “Can I ask you one more question?” He nods. I take a deep breath. “What do you think is going to happen to the immigration reform bill?”

  “Ah,” he says, shaking his head. “This may not make you feel better, but I find that the public stances of politicians on these things don’t always match their personal ones. They use these kinds of bills to make statements about themselves. It’s not always about what’s good for the country.”

  “So you don’t think the bill will pass,” I say quietly.

  “Whether I think the bill will pass or not isn’t the point. It’s that people like you—brilliant, young, educated minds—will turn the tide of some of this country’s backward thinking. This country depends on you. You know, America has a long way to go, but we’re still sending top-notch kids like you and the other honorees to best schools in the nation. And you’re all going on to do great things. Whatever you do, it will make a difference.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President, thank you so much,” I say in disbelief as he turns to greet another student.

  I want to text Mom, but I can’t just yet, because the Secret Service is holding our cell phones. I want to scream. I want to do another victory lap. I just had a meaningful conversation with the president of the United States. I feel like I’m in this surreal state, levitating above the room, looking do
wn on myself, at everything, at the president by his desk, at Carrie, who’s grinning just like me when she meets him.

  We’re all equals in here. The president doesn’t care about private schools or public schools or where we come from. He cares that we care, that we’re trying our best, making something of our lives, and most of all, that we’re not giving up, even if threatened with obstacles completely out of our control.

  If only I could convince the entire Congress of those things too.

  * * *

  Like clockwork, after I get my cell phone back, I get a text from Royce.

  royceb: how did it go with the Big Man?

  royceb: did he know your name? I love when he does that.

  jasmindls: Yes he did and I have a new crush, sorry.

  royceb: huh, I might have to do something drastic then.

  royceb: and the Secret Service ain’t no joke.

  jasmindls: Don’t worry I’ll visit you in prison.

  royceb: will you bake me a cake with a file in it?

  jasmindls: Better. I’ll jump out of the cake.

  royceb: now you’re talking.

  jasmindls: Like Marilyn Monroe and JFK.

  royceb: she baked him a cake?

  jasmindls: No she sang him happy birthday. In a tight dress.

  royceb: uh huh, I could live with that.

  jasmindls: Perv.

  royceb: You started it!

  jasmindls: Let’s get going then!

  jasmindls: Your two hours start now. Where should we meet?

  * * *

  At the restaurant there’s a view of the street from the table, which is surrounded by potted trees with little lights in them twinkling everywhere. Royce arrives while I’m sipping water from a glass. He picked the place, told me to meet him there. He asks if I like his choice and I tell him I do.

  “It’s like Titania’s garden, don’t you think? With all the lights?” he says.