“I’m almost there,” Florencia said. “I’ll meet you at baggage claim!”
Ten minutes later, Ayelén was laughing with Florencia, a girl she’d never met before, but who, after a tight hug, already felt like a friend.
With Florencia, there were two boys, Argentine transplants too. One was tall and dark haired and talked nonstop—Mauricio. The other, Gabriel, smiled shyly. In the car to Provo, where the school was located, Ayelén realized he wasn’t really shy. Although he’d been born in Buenos Aires, he didn’t speak that much Spanish.
The kids in the car pointed at every landmark, translating on the spot, filling her in on all the info she’d need to start out. She hardly knew more than their names and the fútbol teams they supported, but inside her, the voice of her ancestors told her this was a good start.
The Wasatch Mountains, still covered in their white winter coats, towered along the highway. She tried to memorize everything so that when she called her family, she could tell them every detail. In a way, they would be with her, seeing through her eyes.
She had her family supporting her from afar, an anchor and wings, all at the same time.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Yamile (sha-MEE-lay) Saied Méndez is a fútbol-obsessed Argentine American author who loves meteor showers, summer, astrology, and pizza. She lives in Utah with her Puerto Rican husband and their five kids, two adorable dogs, and one majestic cat. An inaugural Walter Dean Myers Grant and a New Visions Award Honor recipient, she’s also a graduate of Voices of Our Nations (VONA) and the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program. She’s a founding member of Las Musas, a marketing collective of women and nonbinary Latinx children’s authors. Find her online at yamilesmendez.com.
WHEN I WAS WHITE
Justine Larbalestier
DEDICATION
For Mikki Kendall
SYDNEY, 1932
Never knew I was white til I met Joshua.
I was sixteen and knew nuthin.
“My money’s as good as anyone else’s, miss,” he said.
My mind was elsewhere, gazing out the shop front, past the onions on strings, the tinned pears, the rack of magazines, imagining meself dancing like Irene Castle, skirts flaring around me like wings, and Vernon’s hands on me waist, swirling me round and round, and everyone clapping.
“Miss, I’m leaving this money on the counter and taking the gum. Damn it. I need change. I’m pretty sure I’m giving you too much. Look—I don’t want trouble, I want to pay with your nonsensical money—what is a farthing?—and go, miss?”
He snapped his fingers.
I blinked. Daydream scattered.
“Sorry?” I stared at the handsome brown-skinned foreigner in front of me. Me cheeks went hot. His eyes were dreamy.
“Thank you, miss,” he said. His smile made his eyes dreamier. “I’ve always thought so too.”
“Thought what?”
“That my eyes are dreamy.”
I never said that out loud, did I?
I bloody did.
“What’s your name, miss?” he asked, leaning over the counter. His teeth was white and not a one missing.
“Dulcie.”
“Dulcie. Pretty name.”
It were when he said it.
“Tosh. It’s dead common.”
Like me. I’d always wanted a fancy name like Violet or Esmeralda.
“You’re not common, sugar. With those big green eyes.”
I laughed at his fib.
There weren’t enough water to wash that morning. The dress I was wearing used to be my aunt’s, and her boss’s before her, and the only reason I’d eaten was cause old Mister Wong hadn’t caught me swiping cheese and bread yet.
I was common as.
He wasn’t. He smelled like peppermint, his hat sat at an angle and weren’t shiny from age.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty,” I lied. “You?”
“Twenty-two,” he said. “Not many customers.”
He picked up the gum, turned it around, set it down. His fingernails were neat, with no dirt under them.
“They’re at work, if they’ve got it, and if they don’t, they’re out looking or still asleep.”
“What kind of work?”
“Making clothes or at the brewery. No one’ll be in here for hours.”
“Fortunate for us.”
Fortunate. He was dead posh.
“You talk funny,” I said. “Like the movies. Whatcha doing here?”
He leaned forward to whisper, “I’m lost.”
I giggled.
He saluted. “Joshua P. Desmond Irving the Third. At your service.”
“The Third? You an African king, then?”
“If I am, will you kiss me?”
Me face got hot and other bits of me too. “I’ll kiss ya either way,” I said, and I did.
He tasted like vanilla and laughter. He made me heart beat so fast I was woozy.
* * *
When we walked down the street together I was dead proud. Joshua was handsomer than any of the Hills fellas.
I didn’t mind Tiny Bruce yelling at us.
Johnno O’Rourke.
Tommy Newton too.
Calling us a bunch of names I’d never heard.
They said it weren’t natural, us being together. Me Irish, him dark.
But I reckon they was jealous.
Joshua tightened his hand on mine and muttered about this godforsaken city in this godforsaken country.
He didn’t like the Hills. He didn’t like Sydney. He didn’t like Australia.
I reckoned they was all right but I’d never been nowhere else.
* * *
Three weeks after he startled me out of me daydream, he pulled me into a new one: Joshua asked me to scarper with him.
“Too right, I will.”
I kissed Ma goodbye. I thought she was gunna be filthy but all she said was, “Send us some jingle soon as youse get some.”
I weren’t gunna miss her neither. She weren’t much of a mum and we was skint. Four of us in one room: Ma, her latest fella, the new baby, me, and only me with steady work.