Blackbird Fly (2 page)

I remember the day she's talking about. I remember how my new coat felt heavy and the new house smelled weird. I remember asking about Santa, missing the water of the ocean, and hearing Lita tell me how lucky I was.

I stabbed the carrots one by one with my fork and set them aside on a napkin next to my plate. The oil from the salad dressing soaked through and onto the table, because my mother buys the cheapest brand of napkins. The cheapest brand of everything.

She eyed the napkin. “I thought carrots were your favorite.” She pointed at me with her spoon. “Carrots make good eyes, you know.”

I've been having the same carrot conversation with her for five years, but my mother and I are like a merry-go-round when it comes to conversations. We've run out of new things to talk about, so instead we talk about the same things over and over, like our first day in America and how carrots used to be my favorite thing to eat.

Back when I still believed in carrots, Lita told me
she'd read a story in a magazine about a model whose face turned orange because she ate carrots all day. That's when my mother told me to be careful and to not eat too many.

“You used to eat lots of carrots,” she said. “I waited on you to turn orange.”

Here's a secret though: Carrots were never really my favorite. I hated how their gristly skin snapped between my teeth and how they tasted not-really-sweet and not-really-bitter, but I would eat them until I was full, because when I was seven years old my mother told me they “made good eyes.” I'd eat them by the bag, expecting my eyes to turn blue, but they stayed slanted and dark with short, stubby eyelashes. Just like they are now.

I found out later that carrots were supposedly good for vision, not for color or shape, but who cares about that when you can get eyeglasses or contacts? Nothing fixes slanted eyes.

I watched the wet ring from the carrots expand on the napkin and listened to my mother hum Filipino
love songs. It's strange to hear her hum, because there's nothing musical about her. I don't think she realizes she does it. If she did, she would stop.

“When we were at the mall yesterday, I saw a guitar for only twenty dollars,” I said.

She stopped humming, her mouth a straight, tight line.

I speared a piece of sliced onion and let it dangle, then fall. “You said I could get one if I found one that was cheap enough.”

My mother sighed. “School just started. You need to focus on schoolwork.”

“I make honor roll every year.”

“You're too old for toys.”

“How am I going to be the next George Harrison or John Lennon if I don't have a guitar?”

“That's enough,
anak
.”

“You said I could get one. You said that at the beginning of summer. It's almost October now.” My chest felt hot.

She clicked off the stove and stirred the rice one final time. “Lunch is ready.”

“I don't care about lunch,” I said.

“
Ay,
Apple,” she said, shaking her head. “You need to eat lunch.”

We were back on the merry-go-round. Now she would tell me I needed to eat because she was a toothpick when she was a girl, and all the children teased her until she finally gained some weight. And then she'd say that even though you don't want to be too skinny, you don't want to be too fat either. You have to be somewhere in the middle, like her.

“You told me I could get a guitar,” I said quickly.

Her jaw twitched the way it does when she's irritated, but I didn't care.

“I don't want to talk about this again, Apple. We've had this talk so many times. Save it for later.”

This is what she always says, but later never comes. She just says this because she thinks I'll forget, but I won't forget. A famous songwriter needs a guitar. It's
a necessity. George Harrison had one. Paul Simon, Norah Jones—they all have guitars.

“That's what you always say,” I said.

“Ay, sus,”
she said. “Watch the mouth. You're getting too American.”

I pushed back my chair.

“I'm not hungry,” I said. “I'm going to ride my bike.”

“With friends or by yourself?”

I pretended not to hear her and headed toward the back door, where I snatched my weekend backpack from the corner. My weekend backpack looks just like a school backpack, but instead of lame textbooks it's packed with a change of clothes, my red notebook, and bottled water. I used to keep
Abbey Road
in there too, but then I almost left my backpack on the bus, and if there's one place in the world you don't want to leave your prized possession, it's the bus.

“It's a shame you have no buddy-up system,” my mother called from the kitchen. “It's not good for
children to be going around by themselves all the time. In the Philippines none of the children played by themselves.”

“This isn't the Philippines,” I said, on my way out the door.

I
climbed on my bike's faded banana seat and took off. My bike is pretty crappy, and the chain falls off sometimes. When it does, I have to lift up the back wheel and reset it. It's a big pain, but I have a special tool for it in my backpack. It doesn't help that Oak Park is full of cracked sidewalks. Sometimes I play songs in my head and swerve around the cracks in tune with the music, just to make it interesting.

Pretty soon sweat dribbled down my forehead and between my shoulder blades. There are lots of trees along the five blocks between my street and Alyssa Tate's, so the sun isn't that bad, but once I made a right onto Alyssa's street, the trees disappeared. The lack of trees makes it hard for me to hide my bike and change my shirt, but over the summer I found a perfect cluster of tall shrubs about four houses down from the Tates, so that's where I pulled over, parked my bike, and crouched to change out of my sweaty T-shirt and into the fresh one I always carry. I took a big swig of water, then came out from behind the shrubs with my old bike and bag still hidden.

There weren't any other bikes outside Alyssa's house, which meant the boys hadn't shown up yet. It was four weeks into the school year, and Alyssa always had a back-to-school party, but this year she invited only me, Gretchen Scott, and some of the boys from our grade. She said it was her mission to
have a boyfriend all year, and she had her sights on Jake Bevans.

Alyssa's mother took me through the air-conditioned house and toward the back deck to meet up with the girls.

“I hope you didn't walk all the way from your house. It's a million degrees outside!” Mrs. Tate said. Her blond hair was piled on top of her head in a clip, and her eyes were round and blue. Very American. “If you needed a ride, I would have been happy to pick you up.”

“It's okay. My mom dropped me off.”

She glanced toward the front door and frowned. “Oh, was your mother outside? I would've liked to say hello.”

“She was in a hurry.”

Gretchen and Alyssa were on the back patio. Alyssa was sitting in the chair the way she did when she knew boys might be watching—with her legs crossed and her head tilted to the side. When we first became friends in fifth grade, she never cared
how she looked when she sat. Back then we talked about how we were going to be a rock duo, with me on guitar and her on vocals. But later she changed her mind and said she wanted to be a Broadway star instead or a pop star like Britney Spears.

Now she mostly talked about boys.

“Hey, Apple,” said Gretchen. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail, and her lips were covered in pink gloss.

“Hey,” I said. I sat on the empty patio bench, pulled my legs to my chest, and rested my chin on my knees.

Alyssa grabbed a lock of her hair and twisted it around her finger. “The boys are on their way. I think Jake is bringing a bunch of people.”

Five minutes later the back door opened and the boys wandered in, but it wasn't a bunch of people. It was just three: Jake Bevans, Lance Bosch, and Braden Tucker, each wearing a cap for a team in New York or Boston or Chicago, places that might as well be a
million miles away. Braden was in my homeroom, but we hardly ever talked.

Jake sat in the seat next to Alyssa, and Lance sat next to Gretchen. Even though there was a big, empty space next to me on the bench, Braden sat on the arm of Jake's chair.

“Is there anyone else coming to this thing?” Braden asked.

“Maybe,” said Alyssa.

Jake leaned away from Braden. “Go sit down somewhere. Get your butt out of my face.”

Everyone laughed except for me and Braden.

Jake nudged him and nearly knocked him over. “Go.”

“Suck it,” said Braden.

“Dude, there's room on the bench, and I don't want your butt in my face,” said Jake. He nudged him again; this time Braden slipped off the arm of the chair and stumbled a few steps. Everyone laughed. Braden thumped Jake on the back of the head, sat
down, and said something to Jake that none of us could hear.

My heart thumped. I glanced at Alyssa and Gretchen, but they were busy looking at the boys with bright, light eyes.

“This sucks,” said Braden. “I thought it was a party.”

“It would be, if you would get out of my face,” Jake said.

Alyssa giggled.

“Just let him sit there, Bevans, so he'll shut up,” said Lance. He and Gretchen looked like they could be brother and sister. They both had the same light brown hair and light brown eyes. “What's the big deal?”

Jake motioned toward the vast space of wilderness next to me. “The big deal is, he's sitting next to me like a pansy, and there's all that space next to whatshername.” He narrowed his eyes at me. “What's your name again? What is it, like, Banana or Orange or something?”

Jake Bevans does this act where he pretends he doesn't know who I am, even though we sat next to each other in third grade, spent half of fourth grade in a study group, and talked for an hour during a bus ride on a fifth-grade field trip. Back then he didn't have too many acts. He was just a skinny kid who kept to himself. Now he's one of the tallest guys in the class. He must've taken some kind of growth hormone when no one was paying attention.

“My name's Apple,” I said. “Remember when we got stuck sitting together on that bus in fifth grade?”

Jake snorted. “Why would I remember something like that?”

“It was the trip where you threw up all over yourself.” The words burst out of my mouth by themselves. I wasn't even trying to be mean, but I knew he remembered that bus ride.

The others laughed. Jake's face fell, flat and red.

“Aw, poor baby,” Lance said, leaning back in his chair. “Did your mommy have to come pick you up?”

The girls and Braden laughed.

Jake glared at me.

“It wasn't a big deal,” I said, even though it was a really big deal, because the driver had to pull over and we had to call Jake's mother and everything. We were a half hour late getting to the zoo because of it. “Everyone gets carsick sometimes. I know I do.”

“I'm sure you get sick a lot because of all the dogs you eat,” said Jake.

Every part of my body froze. The air left my lungs. I heard the comment again, even though he hadn't repeated it.
I'm sure you get sick a lot because of all the dogs you eat.

“What are you talking about?” asked Alyssa.

“Chinese people eat dogs for dinner,” said Jake. He glanced around. “You guys didn't know that? It doesn't even matter what breed. It's illegal to even keep them as pets in China.”

Alyssa's eyes turned wide and round. She looked at me. “Is that true?”

“Apple isn't even Chinese,” said Gretchen.

“It doesn't matter.” Jake crossed his arms. “It's all Asian people, not just Chinese. They all eat dogs.”

“Why?” Alyssa asked.

Jake shrugged. “I don't know. Ask Banana here.”

Braden and Lance chuckled.

My whole body felt hot, like I'd suddenly developed a life-threatening fever.

Alyssa raised her eyebrows at me. “Apple, is this true? Do Chinese people eat dogs for dinner?”

“I'm not Chinese,” I said.

Alyssa rolled her eyes as if to say,
We know, we know, but close enough.

“She may not be Chinese, but I guarantee you don't wanna go to her house and ask her mom for hot dogs,” Jake said. He put his fingers on the corners of his eyes and pulled them to make slits. “Would you-ah like-ah Chinese-tea with-ah you-ah hot-dahg?”

Braden covered his mouth with his fist in a fake
attempt to hide his laughter. Lance clapped his hands and leaned forward, saying, “That's so wrong, man,” between his own laughing howls.

Jake looked directly at me and said, “There's more than one reason you wound up on the Dog Log.”

Everything stopped. The laughter. My heart. Time. It was like Jake had thrown a grenade at all of us—a grenade that hit only me.