B0061QB04W EBOK (48 page)

When I returned to Abuelita Chinta’s house after visiting my friends, Mago was angry at me. “Where have you been?” she asked. “I’m the one who brought you here, remember? You can’t just do what you want. I wanted to leave for Acapulco today. I’m so sick of this place. Now look at what time it is.”

“I wanted to spend time with my friends before we left,” I said.

She pointed to the shacks on the other side of the canal where Meche lived and said, “I don’t know why you want to be over there with that trash.”

“What do you mean ‘trash’? Have you forgotten this is where you
come from?” I was so furious, and before I could stop myself, I pushed her.

“Just because I used to live here, it doesn’t mean that I still need to be friends with these people,” she said, pushing me back. “Let them dare call me a little orphan now.”

“You conceited brat,” I said, pushing her even harder.

Next thing I knew, Mago and I were pulling at each other’s hair and tumbling to the ground.

“Reyna, Reyna, leave your sister alone!” Mami yelled. But I couldn’t stop. I didn’t know why I was so angry at my sister.
How could she just sever the ties that bind us to this place, to these childhood friends of ours who weren’t able to escape this poverty like we did?
I was so angry at her for quitting college and ruining her chances for a successful life. Now I realized that we owed it to
them,
our cousins, our friends, to do something with our lives. If not for us, then for them, because they would never be able to. I understood so clearly now why Papi said there were so many people who would die to have the opportunities we had, who would kill to get their hands on a green card. Mago’s and Carlos’s refusal to see that angered me more than anything.

“Stop! Stop!” Mami said. And finally I did. Mago looked at me as if she didn’t know me. I ran into my grandmother’s house crying and feeling ashamed. For the first time in my life, I had raised a hand to my sister.

How could I stop myself from feeling sad that Mago no longer cared about Mexico, that she didn’t think of this place as special because it was once our home? Her home was now the United States. Unlike me, she had no accent when she spoke English. Now I knew why that was. Even in her speech, she was trying to erase Mexico completely.

I didn’t know if I ever could. Or would want to.

20

A
COUPLE OF WEEKS
after we’d gotten back from Mexico, Mago said, “Gaby and I are looking into renting an apartment together.”

“Really?” I asked, looking away from the TV where I had been watching
Anne of Green Gables
on the Disney Channel. “You aren’t leaving me, are you?”

She shook her head and threw a pillow at me. “How can you think that? Of course I’ll take you with me. We can leave here and finally be in a place where we can be happy.”

I threw the pillow back at her so that she wouldn’t see how relieved I was. I knew she had forgiven me for the fight we’d had in Mexico.
She said she understood, but for a second there, I thought she was going to tell me she was leaving without me.

I turned back to the TV and continued to follow Anne Shirley on her adventures. I wanted to be like Anne, strong, adventurous, pretty, and smart. I wanted to have her imagination and her way with words. But most of all, I wanted to live in a beautiful place like she did. Like me, Anne had lost her parents when she was little, and as a little orphan, her childhood had been very difficult. But Anne got lucky when she was adopted by a brother and sister who let Anne be who she wanted to be, who learned to love her and praise her for her talents, and who were not afraid to tell her that they were proud of her.

Sometimes, I would imagine getting adopted by Marilla and Matthew, too. I knew they would have been proud of my accomplishments. Like my latest one—where I had been chosen to be the assistant drum major of Franklin’s marching band now that I was in my senior year. Since the drum major was a Jehovah’s Witness, and his religion didn’t allow him to participate in most of our events, it was me who designed the field formations to the music Mr. Quan had chosen for us to learn. It was me who led the band to second place in a competition held at Wilson High School. It was me who led the band at the 1992 Highland Park Christmas Parade on Figueroa Street. Even though the parade route was only a ten-minute walk from my house, my father had not come to see me march.

This is why I was jealous of Anne. Because, unlike me, she had people who noticed even the smallest of her accomplishments.

The weeks passed with no news about an apartment. That spring semester of 1993, I enrolled in track and field. I didn’t really like running, but Mago did. On the weekends we would go to Franklin to jog around the football field, and she always left me in the dust. I thought that if I practiced every day at school, I would get faster so that I could keep up with my sister. So far, track and field hadn’t made me faster, but it had gotten me a boyfriend!

His name was Steve, and he was two years younger than me. He was fifteen, and I was seventeen. But he was so cute I didn’t care what anyone said about me dating a freshman. Even though he
was younger, Steve tried to act older than me. He would tell me he wanted us to make love, to be each other’s firsts. I would tell him no, absolutely not! I wanted to be a virgin when I got married, as Mago wanted to. Besides, I told him that soon he and I might not be together anymore. If Mago rented an apartment too far from Franklin, I knew I would have to transfer, never mind that I was in my last semester of high school. I would follow my Mago to the ends of the earth if I had to.

A week later, while we were getting ready for bed, Mago said that she and Gaby had found an apartment in La Habra. I didn’t know where that was, and how far from school it would be, but before I could tell her that anywhere was fine with me she said, “Nena, I won’t be able to take you with me.”

I sat down on my bed and looked at my feet, not knowing what to say. I thought about my quinceañera, about receiving communion when I wasn’t supposed to.
Here it is,
I thought.
Judgment Day. Please, don’t take away my Mago, God. Punish me in another way, if you must. But don’t take her from me.

“Why?” was all I managed to say.

“The manager doesn’t allow extra people in the apartment. Gaby already has her son, and her aunt is also going to be living with us so that she can babysit. With me that makes four.”

“But I could share a room with you, just like we’ve always done.”

“I know, but they won’t allow more than four people in the apartment.” She stood up from her bed and came to sit with me. “Besides, Nena, you have two and a half months to go before you finish high school. It wouldn’t be right to pull you out now and transfer you to another school. I’m sorry, Nena. I really wanted to take you with me.”

“Then stay,” I said, clutching her hand. “Like you said, I’m almost done with school. In June I could start looking for a job, and we can rent a place together. We can even take Betty with us. Be a family.”

She stared at the floor and shook her head. “I can’t stand being here anymore. I feel that I’m going to go crazy. I want to live my life in peace, do what I want without having to explain anything to anyone.”

I thought about her new boyfriend, Victor, whom she had met at
La Opinión
. I knew she hated it that Papi didn’t let her go out much. Now that Carlos had married and left home, Papi had been even more vigilant with us girls. I knew Victor was one of the reasons why Mago was so desperate to get out. Like Carlos, she was also in love, too in love to put up with our father’s restrictions and house rules. But how could she not wait for me to graduate so that we could leave together? She put her arm around me, and we stayed like that for a long time. She didn’t say when she was leaving and I didn’t ask. I kept hoping that maybe, just maybe, things would change.

A few days later, I knew that it was for real when Mago broke the news to Papi. “You’re such an ungrateful daughter. After everything I have done for you, ¿así es cómo me pagas?” He said that she just wanted to be able to go out with as many men as she wanted without anyone telling her what was right or wrong. He banged his fists on the table and stood up. “If you leave this house,” he told Mago, “you will be dead to me. I won’t ever want to see you again.”

Mago didn’t say anything. We stayed at the kitchen table long after Papi had left.

“Stay with us, Mago,” I said, grabbing her hand. “Stay with
me
.”