Alex’s hand closes around my fingers. He slides off the chair onto the floor beside me, pulling my palm closer so he can study it.
“I want you, Isa. All of you. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
He’s so close I could rest my head against his shoulder.
“I want to be with you through the bad. Not just laugh next to you during the good.” He tells me what his mami told him. That falling in love is easy but fighting for it is hard. “You, this.” He points to the two of us. “It’s worth fighting for.”
I squeeze his whole hand, then every one of his fingers and then his whole hand again, this time cradled in both of mine. He smooths down the puff of my untamed hair.
I curl forward. I want to lean against him. I want to feel him next to me.
He releases my hand. He takes hold of my chin. His lips brush against mine, back and forth, as if to remind me how soft they are, how warm. As if I could forget. My heart beats like bird wings, fast and light. We’re all of us safe. There are no more secrets.
He kisses me—gentle at first, then deeper, harder—all of the hurt and fear of the past days, the past weeks and months, surging between us. I don’t think of anything else. I can’t.
We pull away at the knock on the wall. Merrit’s standing there, grinning down at us.
I draw my fingers out of Alex’s hair. I grip his hands again. “Alex, I’d like you to meet my brother.”
SATURDAY, JUNE 1
ALEX
Papi’s behind the fence. He’s yelling at Robi about a grounder up the middle that he missed. I can hear him from the rec building.
I wait for Robi to go up to bat. I don’t want him or the other boys to see me. I don’t want to take attention from his game.
Robi hits a single. I clap, even though I’m trying to hide. When Robi’s on first, I whistle. Both Papi and Robi turn. Only Papi can come find me in the shade under the awning.
He slaps my shoulder. “Dime. ¿Cómo pasaste la mañana con Coach O’Neil?” he asks.
“Practice was fine,” I tell him. He knows I’m starting in tomorrow’s game against Fordham and that Isa and her brother are coming.
“Tonight you have to get good rest. Take an extra protein drink. Tomorrow is important. Oye, hay un player, a senior, up in Dutchess County at una escuela que se llama Beacon High. He doesn’t pitch as well as you, but they say he’ll be a second-round pick next week in the draft. We’ll see.” He claps me on the back again.
I lift my gaze from the grass. I look him in the face. I’ve been waiting for this, a moment that feels right.
“Mira, Papi. Next year? I don’t want to go straight to the draft. I want to try for college. The Bigs will be there when I’m done.”
Papi steps back. He turns and walks away. He comes close again and when he does, his face is the color of a Red Sox jersey.
“Estupido,” he calls me. “Ingrato.” He hurls spit at the ground. “After everything I did for you.” His finger marks the beat of each word on my chest.
“I’m sorry I disappoint you,” I tell him. “But I’ll be more sorry if I disappoint myself.”
After the game, Robi runs up to me. He looks like he’s not going to stop. He looks like he’s going to run through me or leap up for a hug. At the last moment he brakes. He blinks and grins at me, shifting from foot to foot. He’s getting bigger. He’s eleven now and almost up to my shoulder. I don’t tell him about my decision. I need to tell Mami and Yaritza and Isa first.
Papi says not one word to me the whole walk home. That’s OK. This time, I’m prepared for it.
I put my arm around Robi as we trail Papi through the park. I make a silent promise to myself that I’ll always be here for him. That I won’t ever leave him, even if it means staying local for college. I don’t want Papi doing to him what he did to me. I don’t want Robi thinking there’s only one path for him, to his future or to Papi’s heart. Because there’s never only one path. Or at least, there never should be.
•••
It’s good to be on the 1 train again. It took a few months before I could say that. I’m still seeing the therapist Mrs. Warren found for me. I have the doc to thank for helping figure out what to do about Papi and the draft.
The rocking and the swaying of the train reminds me what I miss about this ride. I half expect to see Bryan hanging on one of the rails, begging Danny for his last taco. But Bryan’s playing up in the Bronx today. AHH made the playoffs again. Danny’s not in the city anymore. He’s upstate at a tech school. After everything went down with me and the cops, he quit the gang. Gracias a Dios. I didn’t even need to talk to him about it. He moved up near Syracuse to live with an aunt who’s a principal of a middle school there. He wants to be a mechanic. Says he’ll make decent money and it’ll keep him out of trouble. I visited him one weekend before baseball started up. I had to thank him for getting that lawyer. I had to thank Pinchón too. Guess it makes sense that Pinchón would know an attorney, someone the cops would believe when he produced evidence that they had the wrong guy. Pinchón even offered to pay the bill, not that I let him. Those cops showed up at one of my Haeres games. I didn’t pitch so well that day. And Isa had come to watch with her mother. Mrs. Warren must have sensed I was buggin’. Bottom of the third, she went right up to those cops. Few minutes later, they left. I never asked what she said, but I did thank her. I never want to see those cops again. I’m still torn up inside. I haven’t been able to let it go, but I’m working on it. With the doc.
The train pulls into Sixty-Sixth Street/Lincoln Center. Mosaic stick figures leap across the tiled wall of the station. I don’t see any dancers with buns. But a guy with mouse-brown hair and glasses gets on. He’s carrying the case of some musical instrument, not sheets of music. I won’t run into Chrissy or Kevin either, though I’ve seen them plenty these past months. They already left for Prague for the summer. Chrissy emailed me that the music and dance school there is mad cool.
At Seventy-Second, a man plays the trumpet for change.
At Seventy-Ninth, a guy and a girl get on. Their clasped hands remind me of me and Isa. Only, the girl looks like me and the boy doesn’t have blond hair. His hair is red. The girl’s even wearing a Prince Royce shirt. They sit opposite me, one row down. I can’t not look at them because they can’t stop looking at each other. It blows the dust off the ache inside my chest. When the girl puts her leg in his lap and tucks her shoe around his calf, my eyes get all wet.
I squeeze my lids shut. I think of my favorite poem. The one I wrote for the San Francisco Literary Journal. The one I dedicated to Kiara. The one about needing to really know yourself and love yourself—your inside self—before you can share that love with others. I named the poem after Merrit’s new app that’s number fifteen on the top 100 list, right below his companion app that allows you to know if a video’s been doctored. Those apps are part of the reason Merrit got a transfer to MIT for next year. Isa’s family’s excited for him, but Isa and her mother are nervous. I told Isa it’s OK to be worried, but that she should talk about it with her brother. Merrit suggested setting up regular times when they can video Snapchat, when Isa can see him and know he’s fine.