So maybe this journey to find her brother is not just about her father lying and confronting that lie. Maybe this journey is also about keeping all the family you can together, desperately gathering them like sticks to start a fire. Because, often, that’s what it feels like we are: the kindling that keeps everything warm in a country made of water.
* * *
1For those non-native Californians: whereas in most parts of the US folks say, “Interstate 10” or “I-10” when talking about an interstate, in California we usually say, “the 10” or “the 91” or “the 405” aka “the freeway from hell.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Isabel Quintero is an award-winning writer and the daughter of Mexican immigrants. She lives and writes in the Inland Empire of Southern California. Gabi, A Girl in Pieces (Cinco Puntos Press), her first YA novel, was the recipient of multiple awards, including the California Book Award Gold Medal and the Morris Award for Debut YA Novel. She is the author of the chapter books, Ugly Cat and Pablo (Scholastic, Inc.) and Ugly Cat and Pablo and the Missing Brother (Scholastic, Inc.). In 2016 Isabel was commissioned by The J. Paul Getty Museum to write a nonfiction YA graphic biography, Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide (Getty Publications), which went on to be awarded the Boston Globe Horn Book Award. Most recently, My Papi Has a Motorcycle (Kokila), her latest book, earned the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association Award.
HARD TO SAY
Sharon Morse
There’s so much I don’t remember about where I was born. Venezuela is just a few hazy scenes in my mind, so loosely tied together that they feel like dreams instead of memories. I don’t remember my school, except for the sweet, smiling face of one of my preschool teachers. I don’t remember our home, except for the balcony off the living room where I could feel the tropical breeze brush across my cheeks and whip my hair into a halo around my head. I don’t even remember the language—my first language. It, too, got lost to the haze of dreamlike memories.
My sister remembers it all. She was ten when we moved—old enough for her memories to stay intact. I had my sixth birthday just after we got to the States.
I try not to get jealous as I walk into the kitchen to the sweet smell of cinnamon pancakes and the sound of Clarísa speaking Spanish on the phone with our grandmother. My sister laughs and asks how she and our grandfather are doing. I know enough Spanish to figure at least that out.
“Morning,” my mom says as I pull out a stool next to my sister.
“Morning,” I answer.
Clarí stands from her stool and walks to the other side of the kitchen, like the two words that Mom and I uttered are disrupting her enthralling conversation.
Mom slides a plate of cinnamon pancakes in front of me, swimming in butter. It’s a tradition my mom has insisted on since my last day of kindergarten, when she accidentally knocked the cinnamon over and it went flying into the batter. We deemed it meant-to-be and carried on the tradition ever since. “You know,” I say. “I’m almost seventeen. You don’t need to make me special last-day-of-school pancakes anymore.”
“I’ll be making you last-day-of-school pancakes all the way through grad school, kid. Deal with it.”
I pop the top off the syrup bottle and pour it all over the pancakes. “So, you’re going to travel to wherever I’m attending college and make pancakes on a hot plate in my dorm room?”
Mom raises an eyebrow. “FedEx,” she says, dropping the pan into the sink. “Or you can always go to school close enough to come home for pancakes, like your sister.”
I laugh as I cut into my pancakes, letting the syrup run down through the layers. “Moms be crazy.”
“You laugh at me now,” she says, wiping down the countertop with a kitchen rag, “but you’re going to miss this when you’re all grown up and I’m too old to trust around an open flame anymore.”
“Nah.” I pop a bite into my mouth, savoring the butter and cinnamon and maple syrup on my tongue. “I’ll put you in an old folks home way before that.”
“Valentina. Have a little respect for your mother.” Mom swats at me with the kitchen towel. “At least make it a nice one—a retirement community for active seniors. With a pool for water aerobics.”
I laugh. “Deal.”
Mom does that mom thing where she watches me like I’m going to grow up and leave the house if she dares to look away.
“I still have senior year, Mom. There will be more pancakes ahead of us.”
“I know.” She purses her lips and nods.
“Oh, God, are those tears?”
“No!” She hisses and turns away to start washing the dishes.
I cram another bite in my mouth and chew around my smile while Clarísa paces the length of the kitchen with the phone pressed to her ear. Her mouth moves a mile a minute in perfect Spanish.
Even though Spanish was my first language, now I have trouble piecing together even the most basic conversations. I can understand bits and pieces when someone speaks slow enough. But I can barely find a response with two hands and a flashlight unless it’s sí, no, or gracias. It happened without even realizing it. One day it was just...gone. I can’t even tell you when.
Dad shuffles into the kitchen and puts an arm around me, giving me a good squeeze along with a loud kiss to the top of my head. “You ready for junior year to be over?”
I nod and swallow, my mouth full of pancakes. “So ready.”
“History final today?” He sits on the stool next to me.
“And I have to turn in my final art project,” I say, nodding to the canvas on the kitchen table, a landscape of Texas bluebonnets and an old hill country barn to showcase perspective. I brought it home last night to work on the last few details.
“You’ll nail that one, no problem. And I call dibs once it’s graded. I want to hang it in my office.”
“Deal,” I say, smiling into my pancakes.
“Dad, Ita wants to talk to you.” My sister holds the phone out to him. Ita and Ito became my grandparents’ names when Clarí was little and couldn’t say Abuelita or Abuelito. Everyone thought it was adorable, so of course it stuck.
Dad’s smile falters as he grabs the phone. “Hola, Mamá,” he says, but he walks toward his office before we can hear anything else.
“Is everything okay?” I push my plate toward my sister, and she takes my fork.
Clarí shoves a huge bite into her mouth. “So good,” she mumbles to herself. “I don’t know,” she finally says when she’s done chewing. “I tried to ask how things were going, but she wouldn’t tell me much other than the weather.”