Maybe it’s because the
y didn’t
have
to like me. Teens were an odd bunch. They were incredibly self-centered. It made me think back to my own teen years, and how I thought the world revolved around me and my life. I learned on the streets that wasn’t the case. Still, I don’t think I fully internalized the fact that I wasn’t the Center of the universe until these teens came into my life and they became the Center. I realized suddenly how much they meant to me.
“Elle!” I was broken from my musings by the tinkling bell voice of Penny. “You’re back! I’ve been so worried. We hadn’t seen you and then your friend called to say you’d be out for a few weeks. I feared the worst.”
I had Chris call Penny at some point in the hospital. I figured it would help keep Genesis from feeling like she had to answer all the questions. Though no one should know that she
knew
any answers.
“Oh yeah, I’m feeling better. Not one hundred percent, but I should be well enough to cook next week on Wednesday again. I had a friend help me bring some food from the restaurant tonight.” I nodded to
José in the kitchen.
Penny pe
eked her head in and saw José serving the kids, Genesis by his side helping out.
“Holy macaroni. Who is that?” Penny whisper
ed.
“
José. He works in the kitchen with me. He carried the food in.” I felt like I’d turned him into Baby from Dirty Dancing, only he carried a pan of chicken alfredo pasta, not a watermelon.
“He’s cute!
Are you dating him?” Penny’s eyes lit up like Christmas lights.
I laughed. “No. I never date the guys in the kitchen. So, if
you’re interested,” I trailed off. Penny blushed. Yeah, she would never make it with José. Not that he was a player. Well, I didn’t think he was a player, but I was pretty sure Penny was a little on the prudish side for him.
“Oh no, I couldn’t.” She put both her hands over her eyes in embarrassment. Yeah, no
, she couldn’t hang with the likes of José—sex on legs. Wasn’t gonna happen. “I’m so glad you’re back. The teens have really missed you.”
I felt my eyes water.
Not now, Elle. Keep your shit together!
“Thanks. I’ve missed them too. I’m gonna go sit with them for a while, OK?”
“Go ahead. I’ll finish stuff up in the kitchen. No dishes for you tonight.” I mentally laughed, beca
use I couldn’t outwardly laugh at the fact that she was
so
going to scope out José!
I went and sat with the kids. The girls caught me up on all the gossip in their lives. The boys let me beat them at a few hands of Spades. (I won fair and square, but I let the
m think whatever they wanted.) It was nice to be back with them, everything felt natural, like I hadn't even been gone. I looked up to see José watching me from the kitchen and I nodded at him. He just smiled, I had no idea what his smile was all about, if anything. Eventually, I got tired and told the kids I had to go. This was the most excitement I’d had since I woke up in a hospital bed.
I said my goodbyes to all the teens, promising to
be back the following Wednesday. The girls begged me to bring José back, and I laughed, not making any promises. Penny hugged me again, a little too tightly, making me hold my breath as my side stung with the pressure she put on my stitches. I sucked it up because I didn’t want her to know I had a gun shot wound under my shirt.
When we got to the car, I was exhausted.
José held the passenger door open for me, and we were silent for most of the ride home. It wasn’t until we’d pulled up at my place that I broke the silence.
“Thanks. I really appreciate everything you did in there,” I told him.
“Ah,
cielito
, it’s no problem. I’ll see you tomorrow? You still trynna go to County?”
“Yeah. What time?” He’
d called to find out when I could visit and to get me on the list. José had been a big help this past week. Aaron would’ve told me I owed him a blow job. I think that was one major difference between women and gay men. They actually
liked
giving head, while I mostly did it because I wanted it in return.
“I’ll get you around noon. They said we could visit at two, but to be
there in time to fill out paper-work and shit.”
I nodded. “Thanks, José. I really appreciate it.”
“Hey, it’s my pleasure. You need help getting in?”
“No, I’ll be OK. Larry ain’t in there is he?”
José laughed. “No. He’s closing tonight. You want me to get that key back for ya?”
I grumbled no and thanked him once again. I got inside and Chris was passed out on the couch. I popped a pain pill and fell into bed, fully dressed. I was out in minutes.
******
José
picked me up the following day at noon as promised. Again, he came in the Honda, which I was grateful for. The exertion from the previous night at the Center had wiped me out and I’d woken up in bed with my clothes on. It wasn’t the first time I’d fallen asleep in my clothes—though I was usually drunk—but normally I’d wake up in the middle of the night and strip down to naked. Last night, that hadn’t been the case, but at least it didn't have nightmares.
Chris was gone when I left, leaving a note saying she worked until
ten that night and would be back after that. I was about to tell her that it was time for me to start sleeping alone. Everyone had been stopping by to keep me company or “lift my spirits.” I was lifted. Now I needed some privacy. Maybe after Friday movie night with Chris and Aaron, I’d let them know I was fine. And Larry and I were most definitely having another conversation about his key that he didn't hesitate
at all
to use.
I got into José’s car, not bothering to let him come to the apartment door, or even open the passenger door. I waited by the window, and as soon as he pulled up, I
walked outside. Getting in the car, I asked him to wait a minute before we drove off.
“Do you think you can translate something for me?”
José looked at me like I was crazy. “What did you come up with in the last twelve hours that needs translating?” I handed him Genesis’ letter. “Uh, Elle. This letter is opened. Is it written to you?”
“No.”
“Who wrote it?”
“One of the teens.”
He opened up the letter and scanned the four pages of curly, pink, sparkly handwriting.
“Did you open this?”
“Yeah. I read some of it, but there was a lot I didn’t understand. There’s some English thrown in there, but most was Spanish, and there were all these words that weren’t in my Spanish-English dictionary.”
José
shook his head and laughed under his breath. “Of course these words aren’t in your dictionary. Half are bad words, and half are abbreviations or made up slang.”
“Well, can you read it or not?”
“Oh, I can read it. My question is who wrote it, who’s receiving it, and why isn't it sealed?”
“Easy. Genesis, one of my teens, wrote it for Fernie, who we are going to visit, and it’s
not sealed because I opened it.”
José
didn’t laugh under his breath. He full out laughed. “You crazy woman. Why did you open a letter that wasn’t meant for you?”
“Cuz I wanted to know what it said.”
Duh.
He shook his head at me. “You’re nosey.”
“Uh, yeah. It’s not like I’m pretending I’m not. You invite me over and I'll look in your medicine cabinet, and I'm not trynna lie about it. So what does it say?”
José
took a moment to scan the letter once more. “Basically, she’s saying she loves him and forgives him. She’s never loved someone before, but she knows what she feels for him is love. Blah, blah, blah. She’ll find a way to see him, and then she begs him to wait for her.”
Huh
? “That’s all it says? There’s like four pages there.”
“Eh, sh
e rambles on about love a lot and there was some dirty stuff I chose to skip over.” He gave me a pointed look, one that said
I’m not reading seventeen year old smut
. “And then she asks him to wait for her for a good page and a half.”
He passed me the letter back. I folded it up and slipped it back in the envelope that I’d made no attempt to open on the sly
. We drove to see Fernie in relative silence, only making a passing comment here and there. It was one of the things I loved about my kitchen guys. They weren’t like women who forced you to talk. I was nervous going into this, and when José asked me about it, I avoided the question. That was enough for him. He didn’t push it, not like a woman would have.
Chapter
5
I’d never been to County Lock-up as a detainee, but I had been inside as a visitor. They didn’t hold people in
there too long. It was purgatory, a waiting place until you were sent to your final destination. Options included the penitentiary, out on bail, or in Fernie’s case, back to your home country. If you were only in for the night, they held you in the bullpen. I’d never seen it, but I was told it was a big cell with lots of people in it. People who stunk, were high, violent, loud, crazy, and all around fucked up.
Fernie was in a cell since he was spending longer in
purgatory than most, waiting for his deportation papers to be processed. I was still a bit fuzzy on this whole deportation thing. I was more hung up on the coke situation, running through a million reasons Fernie got himself mixed up in drugs, and couldn’t come up with any reasonable answers.
I waited in a visiting area for a guard to bring him out
, and as always, it sucked. The room wasn’t exactly Pine Sol fresh, and I wondered if they made the chairs as uncomfortable as possible on purpose. And God forbid you touch the table top. Marlo, in one of his
Life Lessons from Gary, Indiana
told me to take wet wipes any time you visited someone in jail. I didn’t follow his lesson the first time, and I walked out with sticky arms from touching the table. This time I pulled the wipe out as soon as I sat down.
It felt like forever
that I waited for Fernie to come out. I had no idea what I was going to say. I practiced some spiels in my head, but they all sounded lame. I was running though what I thought was the least lame when Fernie was brought out. He was in the standard orange jump suit. Had he been younger and a citizen, he’d be in juvie, but since he was seventeen and awaiting deportation, he went in as an adult. So orange it was. The guard removed the handcuffs and stepped to the side of the room. No privacy in County.
“Sup, Elle?” Fernie asked, rubbing his wrists and having a seat.
“Sup? How you doing in here?”
“OK.”
“Yeah?” I prompted him to say more.
“Yeah.”
“Here. This is from Genesis.” I handed him the letter, hoping it would get him talking.”
“Thanks.” He didn’t even comment that it was open.
That was it? If I was hoping Fernie would get the ball rolling, I was clearly mistaken. I was going to have to be direct. I put my elbows on the table, and reached out to Fernie, resting my hand on his forearm. He stared at it, expecting me to say something, and when I didn’t, he looked up to me and I saw a different person. In that moment, the mask of indifference fell, and I saw the boy that Fernie still was. I inhaled a breath, his youth and innocence catching me off guard. How easy it was to forget he was only seventeen. He righted his face quickly, and put his mask back on, firmly in place.
“So tell me what’s going on.”
“You know what’s going on. I got caught with all that blow. Now they’re sending me back to Mexico.”
“Why were you handling cocaine in the first place?”
Fernie shrugged. Oh hell no. You don’t shrug to the master shrugger.
“Were you doing it for the thrill or the money?”
“The money. Why would I do it if I didn’t have to?”
I took my hand off his forearm, removed my glasses, and rubbed my eyes. The florescent lights and this conversation were giving me a headache. I wanted Fernie to just spill it, and he was
n’t. Though, I wouldn’t either, I'd make someone pull it out of me.
“
What did you need the money for?”
“Food. Clothes.
You know, stuff to live.”
“Did your parents have money for that stuff?”
“No.”
That was it?
One word? Again, I was the queen of the one word answer, and short and choppy answers were exhausting. I wanted to scream
just tell me what the fuck is going on
, but I knew that wouldn’t work. It would piss me off were I in Fernie’s shoes, and most likely he’d close down, just like I would. I had to tread lightly, but I was starting to reach my boiling point.
“Fernie. Please, gimme something here. Help me understand.” I was practically begging
by that point.
Fernie shook his head at me, like it was so obvious and I was the dense one. “You don’t get it, do you
, Elle?”
“No. I don’t
. I want to, and I fucking don’t.” I threw my hands in the air and let them fall back to the table with a thud. I was exasperated, and the F bomb dropped out, despite the fact that I was making a pointed effort not to cuss.
“
Pinche guerritos que no saben nada
.”
I understood enough of that to respond accordingly.
“You’re right, I don’t know, so tell me, Fernie.”
He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “You white folks don’t have any idea what it’s like for us. I didn’t
choose to come here. My parents brought me when I was a kid. I barely remember Mexico.”
“You weren’t born here?”
I vaguely recalled Genesis telling me that when she mentioned he was going back to Mexico. I didn’t get it at the time though.
“Now she’s catching on.” Fernie copped an attitude. Respectable Elle was gone.
“Fernie, I fuckin' give a shit about you. I don’t know if you get that.” I stood up and pulled my shirt up an inch, peeling back the tape covering my stitched up wound. His eyes got big. He knew what happened. He was fucking there, but he hadn’t seen me since J carried me away to the hospital.
I covered the
dressing, taped it back down, and sat in the uncomfortable chair again. “So cut the bullshit, and tell me what the fuck’s going on. Why were you fucking around with coke?” Yeah, all attempts to not cuss had gone out the window. We were in
keep it real
mode.
Fernie leaned forward, and lowered his voice again. “Fuck, Elle. I’m sorry. I forgot you took a bullet for me. I’m pissed. I don’t want to go back
to Mexico.” His face scrunched up, anger mixed with remorse playing across his features. Taking a breath, he laid it out for me. “I don’t have a social security number. I ain't got papers, Elle. My whole family is here illegally. My dad does some construction with his cousin under a fake number. My mom was cleaning houses for cash, but that fell through. She couldn’t find work, and we needed money.”
“Did they know what you were doing?”
“No. I was hoping to just give them some money. You know, a 'lil bit each month to help out. I was gonna make up some bullshit lie about where it was from.”
“You didn’t get that far did you?” Fernie shook his head from side to side. “You snort too much to pay back your dealer?” He nodded his head up and down. I wasn’t sure what was worse, selling or using.
“I’m not like you. I can’t go to college and get a job. What else am I supposed to do besides sell drugs? I don’t want to be like my dad, working all the time for shit pay. I thought I could handle it and make easy money.”
I leaned back and gave a brief laugh.
“There ain’t no easy money, Fernie. With or without papers, easy money is like the gold at the end of a rainbow. Folks chase that shit, but never find what they’re looking for.”
We both were silent for a moment. He was right. I didn’t get it. Not until that second. Fernie had shit for options.
“Are there other teens at the Center that don't have papers?”
He laughed
, not under his breath though. He straight out laughed, though it wasn’t a funny laugh. It was more of a
sad, but true
laugh. “I think Ramón is the only one WITH papers.”
Fuck, that many? All my teens we
re in this fucked up situation?
“Well, how do I fix it?”
Fernie got all serious on me. He was a man, not a boy, when he said, “You don’t. This is it for us. Genny’ll end up cleaning houses like my mom, with some other guy to take care of her now. I’ll go back to Sabinas.” He shrugged. “
Asi es la vida
.”
“What does that mean?”
“Um, it’s like, that’s life, you know?”
I nodded. “Yeah. We’d say
such is life,
I think.” Fuck. I felt helpless. And all my teens were in this situation. Fuck! I got up and paced. “There’s nothing I can do?” I sounded desperate. I was. “Nothing?”
“Naw, man. Like I said,
asi es la vida
.” He sat back, as if he was OK with the situation. I think he’d accepted it. I on the other hand—hadn’t. Far from it.
“FUCK!” I stood up, and kicked the most uncomfortable chair in the world over.
It hit the ground, the sound echoing off the brick walls. I grabbed my side, the sudden movement sending sharp pains radiating from my toes to my ears. Fernie shot up to keep me from falling. The guard rushed over and grabbed Fernie. It was a total cluster fuck.
“I’m sorry,” I
told the guard, holding my hand up for him to let go of Fernie. “I’m sorry. I’m OK. It won’t happen again.” The guard nodded and let go of Fernie, walking back to his post against the wall. Fernie righted the flipped over chair, and helped me sit back down. I was holding my hand over my wound. Fuck, that hurt.
“I’m sorry, Fernie. I didn’t mean to lose my shit.”
“No one’s cared for me who didn’t have to by blood. And even some of my family could give a shit about me. You took a bullet for me.
I’m sorry
I keep forgetting.” He was silent for a minute, staring at the ground. He finally whispered to himself, “
Chingada madre
.” Still looking at the floor, he asked me, “Why’d you do that?”
I assumed he meant take that bullet so he didn’t have to.
“Because you matter.”
Fernie gave a sardonic laugh. “I don’t matter, Elle. To your government, I’m just another brown face without papers.”
I scooted my chair forward, still holding my side, and reached my other hand out to Fernie. Laying it on his shoulder, I told him, “Fernie, you matter to me.”
He looked up from the floor. “So that’s why you saved me?”
I shrugged, because I didn’t know how to explain to him that I didn’t realize until I heard that gun cock how much these kids mattered to me. They weren’t fragile or weak, but to me they were my cubs, and the lion in me was compelled to protect them. I ran my hands into the front of my hair, grabbing a chunk of curls between my fingers. I pulled it, as always, just a little too hard, just so it hurt enough to refocus my pain onto my scalp, instead of in the pit of my stomach where it was currently residing.
“How old were you when you came here?”
“I don't know. Five or six, I guess.”
“Fuck.
Genesis said you were ten.” He’d spent over half his life in the states, and now they were shipping him off like an animal, instead of a kid. “You got family back there?”
“Yeah. I got my
abuelita
. My grandmother. And my Tío Oscar. He’s my uncle.”
“What are you gonna do there? Will you go to school?”
Fernie shrugged. My shrug—a shrug that spoke volumes. He knew this was a possibility. I’m sure at some point he figured out his options in life, or lack thereof. I felt like the helpless white girl who was just now figuring this out. I fisted the hair that was still in my hand, giving it another tug. I wanted to growl at somebody.
“Don’t trip, Elle. It’ll be straight. Abuelita has the farm from my abuelito—my grandfather. And T
ío Oscar helps out with the animals and stuff. I’ll go kick it with them and help out.”
“You’ll be separated from your family? From your parents and your siblings?”
The government was going to break his family up?
Fernie clasped his hands behind his head, tilting it towards the ceiling. He prayed, or possibly cursed, to
God in Spanish. My eyes welled up with tears. Fuckin’ A. I wasn’t trynna be crying up in County. I wiped the drops at the corners of my eyes with my shirt sleeve.
“Well, this pretty much sucks,” I said with a laugh, followed by a sniffle. “Maybe someday I can come visit?”
Fernie stopped his praying/cursing and looked me in the eye. In a low voice, he told me, “Yeah. Abuelita would like that.”
And that was that.
I lost one.
I lost one of my cubs.
A deep pit had been forming in my stomach. It was heavy with failure as I said my goodbyes to Fernie. Failure of the American government to know about so many kids like Fernie and do nothing. Failure on my part, because I’d been cooking for these kids for six months, yet was unaware of their precarious situation. They were just kids trying to live life, go to school, achieves something—all the things the American Dream promised, but not for these kids—not for
my kids
.
******
José was waiting outside when I got done. He was leaning up against the Honda. It was like a scene out of one of my favorite books, visions of Lexie waiting for Ty filled my brain. Only the rolls were reversed, and José didn’t have Lexie’s awesome Charger.