After Us Page 3

  Dad packed up the things that mattered to him. His clothes. His television. His tools. Certainly not us. Not Mom. Or me. Or my three sisters.

  He took his things and piled them into his convertible like treasured jewels that he couldn’t live without, and he left. I was eight.

  I have to go, he’d said.

  Please stay, I’d begged.

  I didn’t understand. Dads were supposed to stay with their families.

  How long will you be gone? I’d asked.

  But I knew. Even as young as I was, I knew that day would be a day of lasts.

  We weren’t close, Dad and me. He worked eighty-hour weeks. Left before I woke, came home after I went to bed. But Sundays, I’ll always remember Sundays. Those were the days he stayed home. Sometimes we’d have his attention, my sisters and me, but it was never for a good reason. If we had his attention, it was because we’d done something wrong. Attention from Dad meant he’d be yelling at us, punishing us. Mostly, Sunday was game day. He preferred yelling at players on the television, a life that wasn’t filled with dress up and cooking at tiny play ovens and teaching us how to ride bikes.

  Still, it didn’t make things easier, his abandonment.

  I need to go now, he’d said that last day, desperately trying to pry my little hands from his arm.

  Why? was my last question.

  Do you know what love is, Melissa? he’d asked me.

  I wasn’t so sure that I did.

  Dad took a step back.

  Some day you will, he’d said.

  He needed to do this for the love of his life, he’d said.

  Which wasn’t Mom.

  I watched him leave, a million unshed tears gathering, gathering, gathering. Too many for my heart to handle. Too many for my eyes, too.

  So down they fell.

  That would be the last time I cried for him. The last time I ever saw him.

  And he’s such a liar, because I’m older now and I still don’t understand. I look at Mom and think about the crinkles like creased paper at the corners of her eyes and mouth. She earned those lines. She laughed good and hard for many years to get them. She toughed it out day after day, even though not all of it was smiles. She stuck around while Dad traded us for a life with fewer responsibilities, while he substituted us for a young girlfriend with no kids. I look at Mom’s million-watt grin, almost blinding, and I listen to her laugh, so contagious. And all I think is:

  Beautiful.

  So, no, Dad, age didn’t help me understand your betrayal.

  But it did teach me that I never want to be like him. And that we’re better off without him.

  A loud voice shatters my memories.

  “Shit. Stupid stove.”

  Monica’s cursing from the kitchen brings a smile to my face. Not an abashed smile. Not a smile that tries to hold back. But a full-blown smile.

  I turn the corner.

  Everyone’s here. Mom, Megan, Monica, and May. Riffling through drawers. Mixing a salad. Preparing dinner.

  “God, Monica, you suck at cooking,” I say, entering the kitchen.

  Monica tries to glare at me. The gesture is ruined by her laugh.

  “Shut up. I’m getting better,” she replies, holding up a pan of burnt something.

  “Really?” I say, teasing. “What’s that supposed to be, anyway?”

  She looks at me like I should know what’s underneath the black crust.

  “Green bean casserole.” She frowns at her creation, trying to puzzle it out. “But I think the cheese was in a little too long. When should I have taken it out?”

  “About twenty minutes before it looked like that,” I say.

  She gives up and grabs a serving spoon. Begins scraping hot, burnt goo into the garbage. Two oven mitts on her hands. Two eyes staring at me.

  I want to remake the casserole because it’s tradition that we have it. I don’t want to miss out because my sister cooks worse than anyone I’ve ever known. But I wait for Monica’s approval.

  “Might as well,” she says, reading my mind. “You always make it the best, anyway.”

  I quickly wash my hands and get to work cooking beans.

  “Hey, Lissa,” May says, hugging me. “Good to see you again.”

  It’s good to see her, too. Eyes the same shade as mine. Like the ripest blueberries. She’s the one whose features are the most like my own, though we all look alike. Blond hair. Short. Muscles slightly defined by exercise and sports.

  “Hey, May.” Smile. “How’s volleyball this year?”

  May’s played since I can remember. She made the college team, no problem. And her scholarship has helped ease the family’s financial burden. Though dorms still cost money.

  That we don’t have.

  “Good.” She begins breaking off bean tips and tossing the inedible ends away before she adds the beans to the boiling water. “I thought my first year of college would be hard. Transitioning, you know how it goes.”

  “Hey, little sis,” Megan says, coming to my side.

  Megan’s the oldest at twenty-one. Followed by Monica, May, and then me. We’re all one year apart, but Megan’s always been an old soul. I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen her wear anything casual. It’s always pencil skirts and blouses, heels, and her hair in different updos. Even her pajama sets match.

  Now graduated, she’ll be in town more often. She landed a job at a local advertising group. Her bossy, organized personality fits perfectly in a place like that. I’m happy for her. She’s found somewhere that she belongs.

  I wish I could belong. Go to college like her. I applied. Got in. An acceptance letter came from the community college down the street, the cheapest path. The plan? Earn my associate’s degree and transfer to a university afterward, if I want. If I have more money then. But unfortunately, all that had to wait.

  Serving drinks helps pay for things I need. Like ridiculously high monthly medical bills.

  Doctors and hospitals and surgeries.

  Extra cash—hard to come by—goes straight into a savings fund. I won’t start school until I have enough for both years. I don’t want to go and then run out of money.

  “Hey,” I say.

  Mom smiles at us the way she does when she sees everyone together. It’s a smile reserved for when she’s truly happy.

  “I got it, Mom,” Megan says, grabbing the knife from Mom’s hand, chopping the carrots for her. Megan looks out of place almost, with her elegant attire, but I know she shops bargain and thrift stores, not name brand.

  Megan gives Mom a gentle hip bump, shooing her out of the kitchen. “Go relax.”

  Mom deserves it. A moment alone, a moment to breathe. To not work grueling shifts. She picked up where Dad left off. She raised us alone and never complained about it, not once. She’s not afraid to discipline, to love, to be there. She’s everything I hope to be one day.

  Because I know no one stronger.

  Mom doesn’t object, mostly because arguing with Megan is a losing battle. While we make dinner, she takes a seat on the couch. It’s the least we can do after the years she’s given us.

  While the beans boil, I slather the bottom of a cooking dish with mushrooms and cream. They leave a gooey mess on my fingers.

  So messy, so messy. My broken life.

  Megan’s watching me carefully. Something she’s been doing lately, the couple of times she’s visited.

  “Stop staring,” I sigh, not bothering to look up.

  “You know I have to ask.”

  I wince at her words. I anticipated this. The onslaught, the inquisition that. Never. Ends.

  “No, you don’t.”

  May gives me a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. She’s been the best about everything. Not pushing me to talk. A beacon of light in a sea of dark.

  “Have you been to the doctor recently?” Megan asks.

  They know what I’ve been through. We don’t keep secrets. Doesn’t mean I want to rehash.

  “Stop.” I pack as mu
ch punch into the one word as possible. It doesn’t stop Megan, but it slows her down.

  The lines between present and past blur.

  “You’re going to be okay,” the doctor says. “Breathe deeply.”

  There’s a mask over my face. A calming drug is being introduced into my lungs. My back is against a bed that’s soft like memory foam.

  “Scared,” I manage to say, though even that one word is difficult. My mind wants sleep.

  And then I do the weirdest thing. I laugh. Nothing about this moment, about being wheeled into the hospital operating room, is funny. But these drugs, they make it seem okay for a minute. And I’m laughing because every other ceiling tile is a mural of something relaxing backlit by bright lights. A palm tree, sand touching water, airy clouds.

  I’m thinking that the idea of painting the ceiling is brilliant because it does calm me. It makes me happy. It’s obviously meant for the patients, lying flat, looking up.

  The doctor and nurses have stopped wheeling me. They’re looking down with serious faces and I want to tell them to look at the ceiling, too, because I think that might make them happy like me.

  Why am I here again? I’ve forgotten. And I’m too sleepy to care anymore.

  “Can you count to ten, Melissa?” the doctor asks.

  “One, two, three, four . . .”

  Blink.

  “I only ask because I care,” Megan says.

  She doesn’t need to explain. “I get that.”

  Please stop.

  The thing is, I don’t like to think about it. The incident that changed my life in the wake of Faith leaving. The surgeries. My mind clamps down and refuses to think about it. I need to let it out one day. I just don’t know how.

  “Are you okay, at least?” Megan asks.

  I whirl around. Face etched in stone.

  “Would you be okay if it happened to you?”

  Megan has the decency to look embarrassed.

  The beans are done, so I layer them in the casserole, not caring that they’re too hot. Not giving them time to cool.

  “And the scars?” Megan asks.

  I hate the scars.

  I hate the reality of what put them there.

  I place the dish in the oven. “I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

  I don’t mean to snap at her. But I can’t deal with it yet. Maybe ever. I don’t know. I’m trying. I really am.

  “Give me time,” I say, softer.

  As I move on to mashing potatoes, Megan nods. Mouth in a pressed line like she wants to say more, but will honor my request for space.

  “Can I at least ask about Faith?”

  Megan will always ask. Her personality is as calm as a puppy on caffeine. She’s been this way since Dad left. The oldest, forced to grow up too fast. Forced to take on responsibility far too young.

  “Sure,” I say, because it’s the lesser of two evils. “She’s reclusive. Not talking too much. Still having trouble with everything. Understandably.”

  Megan nods again.

  “Have you told Faith what happened to you?” May asks.

  I wasn’t expecting May to say anything. Her question catches me by surprise, which is maybe why I answer honestly.

  “No. She has enough to deal with.”

  Megan doesn’t push anymore. Nobody pushes. I go back to cooking in a stretch of silence that screams against my grated nerves. Reminds me of a truth I don’t want to face. It upsets me that life is this way.

  Unfair.

  It’s frustrating to try and understand why families come apart at the seams like old, worn jeans that people throw away for new ones instead of cherishing them and keeping them for the history that made those rips. It’s draining to think about people who, through no fault of their own, are dealt a bad hand.

  But then I realize that we are not permanent. None of us.

  And life doesn’t owe us anything.

  4

  javier.

  A clock on the far wall ticks to the tapping of my foot. I’m anxious. Watching seconds turn into minutes turn into hours, and all the while my life is swirling down the drain. These pieces of me are being wasted in a pointless class I’m sure I’ll never use. Ethics. Really? Whatever. It’s almost over.

  I’m in a plastic chair under fluorescent lights that barely illuminate the paper in front of me. I’m holding a pencil with an eraser that’s worn down to bits.

  Like my patience.

  I am wondering why any of this matters. Summer school. A teacher at the front of the room who obviously doesn’t want to be here—or so says his slouching position and the book he’s holding in front of his face. So says his silence and his numerous head swivels toward the clock.

  What happened to the cool teachers who inspire students? The guy sitting at the front of the room? He is not that teacher.

  He’s given me and the other six people in this class an assignment to complete. Words blur into paper as white as my clenched knuckles. We have five minutes to finish. Five agonizing minutes until I don’t have to be trapped in this room with windows we’re not allowed to open and voices we’re not allowed to use.

  I wonder about the other people jailed in here with me. What happened to them? They missed credits, obviously. ¿Pero por qué? Were they lazy? Sick? Not able to keep up?

  Or were they like me? Attending a funeral. Getting family affairs in order. Not able to concentrate for shit in a classroom because every day a murderer is walking the streets. Who knows.

  All I know is that Wink’s free when he shouldn’t be.

  This is what I’m thinking about when I should be doing classwork. I can’t help it. I haven’t focused since mi tío called to tell me Diego was gone. Eight months ago. My grades have dropped to failing. And I can’t find the energy to care.

  Wink got away. He bested la policía. Probably figures things are fine as long as he stays far from the cops.

  But he doesn’t know.

  He doesn’t know that I remember him.

  He doesn’t realize that I’m coming for him.

  And maybe that’s okay. Maybe that works better. Maybe surprise will be my greatest advantage. Because I am a storm, brewing. Waiting for the right moment. I am the tornado that will drop out of nowhere and destroy everything that Wink has built.

  Slow at first, then swirling faster. Momentum in the form of anger. Winds that lash out like whips, striking each of them, one by one.

  I scribble answers to the ethics questions, but my mind is elsewhere.

  The assignment is titled “Justice.”

  I almost laugh at the irony.

  Justice. They want to talk about justice? Justice would be Wink suffering the same fate he dealt my cousin. Justice would be the police pursuing Wink and not just letting the case drop. The Cuban government ending El Cartel Habana and not getting paid by its top members to overlook criminal activity would be justice. What does this high school class know about justice?

  Justice is what I’ll serve to Wink on my own terms.

  Only two more weeks of meeting every Tuesday and Thursday. Only a handful of days until I’ve made up my credits. A high school diploma will be my reward. Mi mamá insisted that I get one. She reasoned that living in the States for the last five years has rained down opportunities that our homeland, Cuba, never would have. Now me and my eleven siblings have a chance at an education. She didn’t want me to waste this chance. Why not go to school for free, she’d said. Not graduating was not an option.

  Especially since she never graduated.

  Mi papá had other reasons for wanting me to graduate. You can get a good job, he told me. You don’t have to live on the streets of Cuba anymore. You don’t have to struggle for food and fight with your fists to survive. You don’t have to carry a gun and make hard choices like: Will I join a cartel today, or will I die?

  You can be sure that you’ll eat every day and you will never have to beg. You can lock your door and know that you won’t hear the pop, pop, pop
of a gun going off at night, ending a life outside your walls, because that’s what happens all the time in Cuba. You have freedom here in the States, mi papá said. Don’t throw that away was the message.

  And it’s true. Things are different in America. Sure, America has dirty streets and drugs and violence. But America also gives people the option to live a clean life and go to school and make something of themselves. So I get what my parents are saying. I understand that this education, and the paper that says I’ve earned it, can mean something. But I’m not sure how much that matters now. My focus is elsewhere. A sheet of paper saying I graduated will never bring Diego back. It will never exact revenge on his killer. It will never find Wink for me.

  Not everything is as easy as a sign-on-the-dotted-line and thank you and your application has been accepted and I’ve reviewed your resumé and welcome to your new job where you’ll make money and live happily. Because it doesn’t work like that. Diego’s death has opened my eyes to the darker side of America.

  It’s a vision that cannot be undone.

  One hour later, I’m sitting at the beach in board shorts the color of gunmetal. I’m drinking water because Melissa won’t serve me alcohol. This job is good for her and she doesn’t want to lose it, she told me.

  Melissa’s sitting next to me. I’m using every ounce of my control to not stare blatantly at her suit, which is a one-piece but somehow sexier than all the bikinis around me. Maybe because it’s different from the normal attire. Or maybe because of the girl wearing it. But whatever it is, I can’t stop looking at the neon yellow-and-brown tiger-striped suit; it looks shredded because of the slits that move from the top of her ribs down to her belly button. Goes with the tiger theme. Dips low on her back. Has cutouts on the side that show her hips.

  At the sight of her, I’m dying.

  My body is having a hard time staying in check. It wants to respond to her wearing that. Sitting so near. Smelling sweaty, faintly like salt. Somehow sweat smells deliciously good on her.

  I force my eyes to look anywhere else.

  Ten minutes is the time she has to spend with me, on break.

  “Do you remember?” I ask, staring at the water.