Barely Missing Everything

by Matt Mendez

  JD reached into the back seat for his other forty. Cracking the seal, he took a long drink. He kept watch as his old man was let inside, the living room light flicking on for a few moments before the house went dark again. Damn.

  “Let me ask you a question,” Juan said, thumping on his forty—already halfway done with it.

  “Go for it,” JD said, not actually wanting to answer shit. He felt oddly invisible watching his father living another life, like he and the rest of his family no longer existed. Like he was a ghost.

  “What the fuck are we doing here?”

  “Seeing what my old man is up to?”

  “But . . . why? You’ve been so outside of your mind lately.”

  “Really?” JD wondered. ’Cuz he felt the opposite, like he’d been buried inside his own head. “How?”

  Juan drummed harder. “Well, running from cops; staring down Los Fatherless, who were aiming a shotgun at us; and fucking with Coach until he had no choice but to kick you off the team. Those things.”

  JD took a second to think, and took another swig. He wanted to know who the woman was. He wanted to see what she looked like, but more than that, he wanted to know about her life, to find out what made her so special that his old man risked his own family—everything—for her. “Are you saying we shouldn’t break into the house and take a look around?”

  “We should not do that,” Juan said, staring at him in disbelief. “That’s not a thing, dude.”

  “You’re right, we can do it later . . . and to answer your question, I just want to know why. Why my old man did what he did. He just left us, man. His family. It’s hard to explain.”

  Juan slumped back in the passenger seat and they went quiet, each taking pulls from their forties. JD could feel the booze, felt suddenly tired and light-headed. Outside, the sky seemed massive and unbearably dark, the stars scattered across like spilled salt, tiny and insignificant. He thought about Glory Road, the sound of conversations and music that had poured out from each bar, and he wondered how trash like him could ever get to be the kind of person who belonged in places like those.

  “I found a letter at my house,” Juan said, his head now pressed against the passenger window, probably buzzing hard. “From a guy on death row.”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “It was to my má. I guess he was her boyfriend or something.”

  “Well, that’s fucking weird,” JD said. “But I don’t get what that has to do with my old man’s sidepiece and him ditching me and the rest of the family.”

  Juan looked at JD. Both hands were clenched around the steering wheel. “Well, I’m beginning to think that death row inmate might be my father. They dated around the time my má got pregnant. He got locked up before I was born. It makes sense. The timeline. Why my má wouldn’t tell me. So, I get a little of what you’re talking about.”

  “Fuck. I’m sorry. I’m an asshole.” JD took a long final chug, the warm and bitter beer glugging down his throat until the last foamy stream was gone. Of course Juan knew what JD had been going through. Having a father with another life had been his life story. “What are you gonna do? About this guy? Your maybe dad?”

  “I don’t know. I was thinking I want to go and, you know, see him. The dude’s scheduled to be executed next month. On Valentine’s Day.”

  “Fuck.”

  Juan was shifting in his seat, probably uncomfortable with everything he was saying. “What if he is? My dad, I mean. I just wanna know, you know?”

  JD stared into the narrow opening of his empty forty, avoiding looking at his friend. Juan’s face was desperate and pleading and exactly the way JD felt since leaving Glory Road. “Just ask her. What would be the point in hiding the truth from you now?”

  Juan bounced his head against the headrest. “I don’t want to ask her. If this guy is my father, he is also a murderer. It makes sense that she didn’t want to tell me.”

  JD thought about that, about how terrible it must have been for Juan to have wondered all these years about who his father was, to have dreamt up all sorts of scenarios and reasons for why he was gone and how he could one day come back. No way did any of them include him being a murderer on death row. “Doesn’t she owe you the truth, though?”

  “No, not anymore . . . I think after everything I’ve done lately, the least I owe her are her secrets. I can find the truth out on my own.”

  JD exhaled loudly. “Dude, again, I’m sorry about your ankle and you being arrested. I’ve been fucking up—”

  Juan grabbed his arm. “Look, man, I said we were good. After finding out about this, I don’t really care. But I need to ask you a favor. A big one. I need you to drive me to Livingston, Texas. I have to know if this guy is really my dad. I have to see his face and ask him.”

  “Right now?” JD cranked the engine and flicked on the lights. If Juan meant right now, then right now it would be. Juan had always had his back, and now was time to do the same. Even if it meant acting outside of his mind.

  “No, not right now. Right now, let’s go home. But before they kill him. No bullshit. You’ll go. You’ll drive me. You’ll do this with me.” A couple of revs of the engine sealed the deal.

  JD nodded. “Yeah, man. I promise. We’ll be like Thelma and Louise, just a couple of bitches on the road looking for answers.”

  “Man, sometimes I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about.”

  • • •

  Before leaving, JD placed their empty forties on the side piece’s porch—Juan agreed the move classed the place up. JD maneuvered back through the neighborhood, trying to go back the exact way he came. The second forty was hitting, and barely minutes into the drive, Juan passed out. JD tightened his grip on the wheel, trying to focus on the blurring road ahead. The streets were empty, so all JD needed to do was get to the 54 and from there to Central—once in familiar territory, he could make it home without a problem.

  Approaching a red light, JD cruised to a smooth stop and waited. He kept his eyes on the traffic signal, the bright light unchanging. He couldn’t see any oncoming cars but knew taking the light was asking for the cops. So he waited. And he waited, and waited. He began hearing a faint rubbing sound, at first like a single grasshopper rubbing its legs, but the sound grew quickly, the rubbing transforming into a nightmarish swarm of locusts, the buzzing causing instant pain in JD’s head. Lurching forward in his seat, JD realized he wasn’t sitting at a red light. The car was speared into a cement-encased lamppost. He was now deathly sober, a rush of adrenaline surging. Shit! He must’ve fallen asleep at the wheel!

  Juan unbuckled his seat belt.

  “Fuck,” Juan said. “You okay?”

  “Yeah, fuck,” JD said, doing the same and hopping out of the car.

  The front wheels were propped on the curb, the front bumper was smashed, the hood was buckled up from the lamppost, and fluids were pouring from the radiator. The lamppost, at least, looked fine.

  “What the hell happened?” Juan asked, rubbing his forehead.

  “I guess I fell asleep,” JD said in disbelief, trying to piece together what had happened.

  They were in front of an air force recruiting office, the slogan, AIM HIGH, painted on the window.

  “How do you feel?” JD said.

  “All right, I guess,” Juan said, looking at his hands for blood. None. At least there was no blood.

  “Let’s get this piece of shit off the curb, then.”

  JD and Juan heaved the Escort down from the curb, the heap settling on the asphalt. JD grabbed his insurance and registration from the glove compartment and gingerly picked up his video camera—it looking undamaged—before locking the doors. Even with the dented hood, when the fluids dried, the car would look like any other boring hooptie parked in a boring strip mall parking lot. No reason for anyone to panic about it being there.

  JD looked at Juan’s ankle.

  “Can you walk?” JD asked.

  “I’ve been doing it
all day,” Juan said.

  “We don’t want to be here if the cops come.”

  Juan hesitated. “What about your car?”

  “The air force can have it.”

  LIVING THE DREAM

  (CHAPTER EIGHT)

  Juan dreamt of the shotgun. Of the lowrider cruising by slowly and deliberately. Of a blast exploding from the barrels, fire and smoke and the smell of burning. In the dream he hadn’t ducked, instead watching as the buckshot spread and sprayed across his chest, the metal pellets ripping into his skin and muscle. Smashing into his bones and knocking him to the sidewalk. He could feel the hole where his chest used to be with his hands, reaching inside the cavity of warm jelly and broken bone edges. There was another blast. JD dropped beside him, his face smeared away, as if wiped with a hot jagged rock. Blood quickly pooled, warm and sticky. Eddie hovered over them, praying, or maybe screaming, a terrified look on his face, eyes bulging. Blood continued pooling until it rose high enough to drown out sound. Then Juan woke up in a strange bedroom with bare white walls, and for the first time in his life, Juan prayed, not knowing any of the right words but begging to never see that Cutlass or those dudes again.

  After praying, Juan looked around for JD and was both anxious and relieved that he wasn’t in the room. He wanted to ask what happened the night before but was glad JD wasn’t there to see him pray. It slowly dawned on him that he was in Danny’s house—recognizing it from the first time they were there, from the tour. How he had ended up there? The last thing he remembered was sitting in a parking lot in JD’s car—did we crash? His clothes reeked and the pounding in his head was relentless. His mouth was dry like desert dirt. Water. Juan decided to head downstairs.

  “Dude, you are fucked up,” Danny said as Juan poked his head into the kitchen. “First you don’t text me about going out or nothing. Then you drunk call me to come get you at like one in the morning. What is up with that? I thought we were boys.”

  “We are boys,” Juan said, embarrassed. “Where’s JD?”

  Danny glared at him. “Then how come all you can talk about is JD? He kicks your ass and now you’re like his bitch or something. I should beat your ass too.”

  “He didn’t kick my ass, and you haven’t texted me since then, actually. I thought maybe you were busted for the party or shooting the gun. The Sarge might be a dick about either of those things.”

  “Yeah, my bad about that. That day was weird. The good news is my dad is clueless about his guns, and I didn’t even get a ticket or anything from the cops about the party. They thought we were squatting in the house, that nobody lived here. That’s why they came in all hard. The Sarge has no idea, my mom, either. No harm done, really.”

  “Except me going to jail.”

  “Except for that.”

  There was no way the police thought they were squatting, Juan thought. The cops pulled this same move in Central all the time, conjuring up probable cause like shitty street magicians doing card tricks.

  Danny waved him into the kitchen. “Have some cereal . . . and to answer your question, JD’s looking for an old phone he can have. I’m like his personal Craigslist. He’s also freaking out about his car.”

  “So what did happen last night, exactly?” Juan rubbed his face. Danny was sitting at a table in the nook; boxes of cereal, empty bowls, milk, and spoons were set out on the bar. Juan tried to imagine what it would feel like to wake up every day to a space like this, tried to think of a word to describe the feeling but couldn’t, his head throbbing instead.

  Danny recapped the rest of the night for him. JD had somehow managed to hit a lamppost in a strip mall parking lot, then JD and Juan abandoned the wreck and stumbled to a bus stop. Juan texted Danny, called about ten pinche times even though Danny had already agreed to come for them. When he got there, Danny explained how the car hadn’t looked all that bad. Then Juan begged to go home, wanting his má. Crying. Danny texted Fabi—using Juan’s phone—asking if it was okay to spend the night, apologizing for messaging so late. She responded with a smiley face . JD had fallen asleep in the back seat, and they’d had to carry him from the car and dump him on the living room floor.

  “Shit. How did I not remember this?” Juan asked.

  “JD doesn’t either. How much did you guys drink? Anyway, he wants me to take him to get his car this morning. It was dark, and I only cruised by—didn’t want to get busted at the scene of an accident—but the car looked parked, like you two could have stopped there on purpose. I bet that thing starts right up.”

  Juan pressed his hands against his pounding head as Danny chugged orange juice from the carton. Danny had to be right—it wasn’t a big deal, the accident. He didn’t feel sore or like anything had happened at all. The only thing that hurt was the shittiest hangover ever. And his ankle, like always.

  A minute later Juan changed his mind about that—maybe they had been in a serious accident, one with head trauma—because suddenly the badass girl who’d been talking shit to him at the Austin High School quad strolled into Danny’s kitchen and took a seat at the bar. It was like he was hallucinating or something. She glanced at Juan, which immediately made him look at the ground like he was the world’s most easily trainable dog.

  “Toma esto, Roxanne,” Danny said, holding the carton of juice out to her.

  “You two are sad,” the girl said, waving the juice away and looking bored out of her skull. “You make me feel sad.”

  Juan’s brain scrambled to keep up. Was this the prima, Roxanne? “So—so—this is your cousin?” he stammered to Danny. The last time he’d seen Roxanne he couldn’t put two words together, and now he was making the worst second impression imaginable. “I’m actually a pretty fun, happy guy,” Juan pleaded. Ugh, even worse!

  “Is that right.” Roxanne reached for a box of Froot Loops and poured a bowl.

  “No seas güey,” Danny said. He raised an eyebrow at Juan. “Yes, this is my cousin. Which makes her a big nobody. I thought JD would be the one making an ass of himself, for reals.”

  “I already know her. That’s all.”

  “You don’t know me,” Roxanne said, pouring milk over the cereal and eating a spoonful.

  “I meant we met already.” Juan’s head was about to split open, which was good—the pain made it hard to talk and say anything more idiotic.

  Then JD showed up, shirtless, and walked into the kitchen holding two smartphones in the air. “Can I keep one of these? I found them in your parents’ room.”

  Danny swung around. “What were you doing in my parents’ room? You can’t just go looking through people’s rooms. I said check my room.”

  “You said they might have some phones,” JD said, looking confused. “Also, I looked up how to switch the SIMs on your computer. It’s easy—”

  Seeing JD with the smartphones reminded Juan—oh shit—of his upcoming algebra test. “Oh, man, you wouldn’t happen to have an extra graphing calculator?” Panic swelled all of a sudden, so he plopped next to Roxanne at the bar and poured himself a bowl of cereal he had no intention of eating.

  “What the fuck?” Danny said to JD, ignoring Juan. “And you want a ride all the way to the Northeast—”

  “Look, man,” Juan interrupted, sounding desperate, he could tell. “I got a test next week and if I don’t pass, I’m kicked off the team. Also, I’m gonna need you to teach me algebra?” Which made him remember Eddie and his deal with Coach Paul. Shit. Shit! Shit!! He searched the room for a clock. He’d told Eddie to meet him at the PAC at nine a.m. The clock on the wall behind Roxanne gave him half an hour to change and be at the gym. He could still make it. “One more thing. Do you think I could borrow some basketball clothes . . . and maybe catch a ride to Austin? I promised Coach I’d help Eddie with the offense.”

  “You’re the worst friends,” Danny groaned and slid down in his seat, seeming to collapse in defeat. “You see this shit, Roxy? Not only am I Craigslist for these fuckers, but I’m Uber, too.”

  “Ánd
ale. Ayuda sus amigos, Daniel. Mira qué tristes son. El tonto y el mendigo.”

  “Los dos son tontos y mendigos.”

  “¡Es más razón!”

  “Fine! JD, I’ll hook up your phone. Juan, I’ll lend you some clothes and drive you all the way to Austin and lend you a graphing calculator, but Roxy can teach you algebra, since she’s suddenly so caring.”

  “You sure it’s not because you can’t add either?” Roxanne said, raising her eyebrows at Danny and scooping another spoonful of cereal into her mouth.

  “Hey, I can at least add,” Juan told her, trying to be cool but finding himself sitting up straight and trying not to look as excited as he suddenly felt. He was pretty sure Roxanne, the girl from the quad, Roxanne the girl with amazing hair and perfect teeth—even if she barely smiled—had just (he hoped) agreed to tutor him.

  “Thanks, D-boy,” JD was saying. “Seriously.” He handed Danny the phones and then moved to hug him. “Bring it in, Danny. . . . Can I still get that ride, though?”

  “And I guess I can tutor this one,” Roxanne said with a shrug, examining Juan. Yes! “I’ll tell you what, primo, I’ll even drive this one to his little basketball appointment—if he showers first.”

  • • •

  They arrived an hour late, finding Eddie walking quickly through the neighborhood with his head down, away from the PAC. Juan rushed out of Roxanne’s Honda and begged him to stay, begged him not to tell Coach Paul how he missed their training. Eddie didn’t seem to care about Juan being late, just explained how he wanted to either be at home or inside the gym. Away from where the Cutlass, the shotgun, could find him, Juan could tell. Surprisingly Roxanne stayed in the bleachers as Juan ran Eddie through the offense, and after the practice she drove them both home. On the way to Five Points, where Eddie lived in a small brick home behind a set of railroad tracks on Pershing Drive, he explained how last night he ran the entire way, bolting through traffic and even jumping between the cars of a slow-moving train, paranoid that gangsters were after him. Juan watched how intently Roxanne listened, heard her explain how normal Eddie’s response was. That he probably needed to talk to someone, a therapist.