THE PART WHERE THE NARRATOR
GIVES YOU A SYNOPSIS.
Marlene is about to embark on a journey. She has just found out that her father has another family he’s kept hidden—in the same damn state. The same fucking state, but up north. Can you believe that shit? Dude kept another entire family in Northern California.
Marlene didn’t know what made her look up her genealogy on one of those find-your-ancestors websites. But you know how sometimes you do things almost without thinking, because it’s like your subconscious is guiding you, leading you to some higher truth? Well, she was high, and luckily so, because when she saw that her father, Doroteo Hidalgo, was recently divorced and had a son, she felt the weight of everything on her shoulders. Had she not been high, she would’ve lost her goddamn mind. Marlene calls her carnala del alma, her good friend Loli, and says, Read this shit. Loli does. Both of them fall silent. You don’t say jack shit, because there are no fucking rules for this. But like I said, Marlene is about to embark on a journey to find her brother. She’s going on this trip with Memo, her best friend. Loli would be going too, except she’s too busy getting ready to move into her dorm in a college far, far three states over in Texas. Marlene has tried not to think about what Loli’s departure means for their friendship. She is not so naive as to think that it will stay the same, but how far apart they will drift is hard to predict. Besides Memo, Loli Williams has been her closest friend since first grade. But unlike Loli, and to the disappointment of her parents, Marlene doesn’t have a Plan for the Future. Or a plan they approve of. In any case, Loli has her shit together and Marlene doesn’t, and maybe that’s a good thing, because if she did, she wouldn’t have time to look for a long-lost brother she didn’t know about.
First, she has to pick up Memo, who is about to get out of jail for what will turn out to be the first time. They don’t know that yet, though. They won’t know that for a long time, so maybe we shouldn’t even talk about that. Maybe we should worry only about the immediate future. The one that ends with hope.
Marlene thinks about Memo as she packs burritos, clothes, weed, supplies, and music.
THE PART IN WHICH THE NARRATOR TELLS YOU
ABOUT WHEN MARLENE THREW A BRICK AT
MEMO’S HEAD, SPLITTING HIS EYEBROW AND
LEAVING A PERMANENT SCAR.
When she was about four years old, Marlene threw a brick at Memo’s head. It wasn’t an entire brick. At least she doesn’t think it was a whole brick, just a large chunk of one. They were playing in Memo’s backyard, and their parents were inside making ceviche. It was a sweltering day in Corona, the next city over from Marlene’s. Probably August, when the heat feels like it will never leave and so your parents turn on the sprinklers for you to run through and cool off. That is to say, it was a perfect day to be a four-year-old in this particular backyard. And this was true until Marlene threw the brick. There is no consensus on the “what” of the argument that led Marlene to reach for what had been left behind after Memo’s father had built a planter for his wife’s herb and chile garden. Memo argues that Marlene just picked up the brick out of nowhere, because she knew he wouldn’t fight back. Marlene claims that Memo said something about throwing like a girl (in her memory they had been playing catch), so she did. In any case, the brick left Marlene’s hand with enough force to split his eyebrow. Memo was a bloody mess while Marlene stood there, frozen by what she had done. But only for a moment. In the next second, she ran to help her screaming best friend, using her hands and her shirt to try and stop the bleeding. The crying and screams had signaled to their parents to rush outside.
I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Marlene couldn’t find other words.
Memo’s mom ran inside to get a rag for the blood. She said they’d have to take him to urgent care.
Marlene’s mom yelled at Marlene. Why? Why? Why?
I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
The parents threw the kids in a car and drove; Memo’s mom in the back seat, still putting pressure on her son’s wound. Something she would always do. Marlene was in the back seat, too, her bloody little hand interlocked with Memo’s, making sure he was still there. That she hadn’t got rid of him.
Marlene doesn’t remember all of it, mostly just the part where she threw the brick and the part where she held his hand.
She thinks about this from time to time when she and Memo hang out. And even when they don’t, because that’s how guilt works. He likes to joke about it, pointing to his scar, ’Member this?
She does. The scar is still there. His right eyebrow sports a bald spot. A sort of bootleg, much-less-magical scar than the one that Harry Potter has. Or perhaps more Biblical. Á la Cain, but a different kind of chosen one. On occasion Marlene still holds his hand to make sure he’s still there. Though the last time she reached for her best friend’s hand was through a glass partition during visiting hours in the correctional facility where he was being held. He was still there, even if she couldn’t really touch him.
Memo will be a part of this adventure. This is also a love story. Don’t overthink it.
THE PART WHERE MARLENE ASSESSES
HER FATHER THE LIAR.
My father is a liar. Like his father before him and before him and before him. The machismo runs deep in this familia.
I use the word cautiously. Familia. It is a blood bond. A latching of ancestral memories, habits and traumas. I imagine this link like hooks connecting us to one another. Or maybe like fish caught by the same rod with thousands of lines and hooks, our mouths just ripping at different angles.
But like I said, my father is a liar. Like his father before him.
THE PART WHERE TÍO REYNALDO’S
MOM DIES AND THE KITCHEN IS FLOODED
IN TEARS AND TEQUILA.
Tío Reynaldo sits at the kitchen table. Tío Reynaldo is crying. Into his hands. It is a waterfall. Our feet disappear and the tears engulf our ankles. We slosh our way to him but it takes a while to reach him. We don’t reach him. We won’t ever reach him. My mom had burned a tortilla and the kitchen is still smoky. The comal is still on. The smoke seeps into the tears around our ankles. We can barely see through the smoke. Tío Reynaldo is obscured. He is a shaking mass. A silhouette. The kitchen is a mess. Tío Reynaldo is a mess. He left Penjamo, Guanajuato, where his family moved after they left Sinaloa, thirty-five years ago. In Penjamo they make a famous tequila. When he is sad, Tío Reynaldo drinks that tequila. Maybe it is not tears around our ankles. Maybe it’s tequila. Maybe it’s both. It could have been twenty years, since he left. It could have been ten. It could have been a hundred. It could have been yesterday. It doesn’t matter, because the point is that he left. And now both his parents are dead. They are dead. Both of them. He is an orphan. He hadn’t seen them since he left thirty-five years ago. When you don’t have papers, when you leave your country without papers, without permission, when you enter the United States without permission, when you make this place your home, you are immediately orphaned. You lose people. On the journey. En el otro lado. En este lado. You lose people. This country takes things from you. It wants to know how bad you want to stay here. There are ultimatums. Es chantaje. If you love me, this country says, you will stay. You will not leave me. If you love me, you will cry. You will work, here. If you love me, this country says, you will let me have my way with you. This country is often a bad lover. Or maybe just a very selfish lover.