We Were Here (7 page)

I rolled my eyes, said: “And why the hell do you call me that?”

“What?”

“Mexico.”

Rondell shrugged.

“And why do you say ‘what’ after every single frickin’ thing I say?”

Rondell sat there dumbfounded for a sec, and then he said: “Huh?”

“Forget it,” I said, reaching for my book. It’s basically impossible to have a conversation with a guy like Rondell. We might as well be speaking two different languages.

Rondell flipped open his Bible and pretended to read-though, as we all know by now, that was a straight lie.

I put down my book again and said: “First of all, man, I’m only
half
Mexican. My mom’s white. Second of all, I was born in Stockton, California.
America
. Not Mexico. And third, I don’t even speak Spanish. So your little nickname for me doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, does it, partner?”

“I’m sayin’,” Rondell said. “The whole world’s right in these pages.” He pointed at his open Bible, nodding, like he hadn’t heard a word I just said. “I carry it with me every single place I go, Mexico. That’s my word.”

I stared at him, amazed.

We both went quiet for a few minutes. I turned back to
my book, and Rondell pretended to read his Bible. After a while, though, he closed the cover and said: “Hey, Mexico.”

“Hey, Africa.”

“You could read this whenever you want.” He slid open his nightstand drawer and put the Bible back, slid it closed. “You don’t even gotta ask or nothin’. Just grab it. I don’t care none.”

I got this weird feeling about Rondell after he said that. I actually felt sorry for him. Because as much as he gets mad sometimes or puts his shoe on your neck like he did with me in Juvi, I wondered if his whole life people had been making fun of him behind his back. For how dumb he is. And maybe people took advantage of him too. Like with money or getting him to do stuff that’s illegal, stuff they wouldn’t do themselves, and he just didn’t know better. It actually made me feel pretty bad about life for a quick minute, and I stared at the rug by his feet.

When I finally looked up at him I said: “That’s cool, man. About your Bible or whatever.”

He smiled.

“But if you try to read this one, dawg, I’ll kill you, ’cause I’m almost done and I wanna see what happens.”

“Oh, you ain’t gotta worry about that none,” he shot back, shaking his head. “I only ever read my Bible. Not nothin’ else.”

I nodded at him. “Good.”

“Good, what?”

“It works out, then.”

“What does?”

Right then I decided Rondell wasn’t such a bad guy. Even if he was dumb as hell and couldn’t read a word and put all his simpleminded belief in a stupid thing like the Bible and called me an ignorant name like Mexico …

Still.

He wasn’t as bad as some other people I’ve known.

July 8

Me and Rondell were sitting outside today, on the far cinder block, eating cheese sandwiches, when Mong came walking out of the house and sat on the block right across from us. He didn’t say anything either, just posted there staring at me and smiling. Fingering the tooth around his neck. I stopped chewing mid-chew, looked back at the guy. Okay, dawg, I told myself. Here it is. The shit’s finally gonna go down.

I looked at Rondell, who was concentrating his whole mind on eating his sandwich, and then turned back to Mong. “Wha’chu need, man?” I told him.

He laughed a little, kept his eyes stuck on me.

I shrugged, said: “Lemme know—”

“Why do you read all those books?” he interrupted.

I looked at him all confused. “What?”

At the time I didn’t realize how I was saying to Mong exactly what Rondell always says to me. And how most of the time when you tell somebody “what” you’re not really asking a question, you’re just saying something while you try and think up something better you could say later.

Anyways, I’d just turned toward the house when Reggie and Demarcus came out and started walking into the backyard. But when they spotted Mong sitting with me and Rondell they stopped cold. They looked at each other. Then they turned around and went back inside.

“Those books,” Mong said, staring me right in the eyes. Still smiling. “Why do you read them?”

I didn’t know if his psycho ass was making fun of me
or what, so I just sat there a minute, thinking. I took another bite of sandwich, chewed it up and swallowed. I looked down at the second half and realized I didn’t feel that hungry anymore. I was just about to wad it up in my plate to throw away when Rondell tapped me on the arm, said: “Hey, Mexico.”

I looked up at him.

“You ain’t gonna eat that second part?”

“Nah.”

“Could I get it?”

I handed him the rest of the sandwich and the plate and he took a big-ass bite, sat there chewing and looking at Mong like he was just noticing him for the first time.

I turned back to Mong myself, told him my answer: “To see what happens.” Then I shrugged, trying to think if I should’ve even answered him in the first place.

Mong didn’t say anything back. He just stared at me, smiling, hardly even blinking.

“Why you wanna know?” I said.

But he didn’t answer me. He just stood up and walked back toward the house.

I watched him open the door, slip back inside, close the door behind him. I stayed looking at the door for a few minutes, trying to figure out what the hell just happened. Like, was dude clowning me for reading? Look at the bike thief nerding out with all his stupid books! Or was he just such a psycho he didn’t even know what he was saying anymore? Because who the hell would do that? Come up to somebody they don’t even know and ask why they read books? It doesn’t make no kind of sense, man.

I turned to Rondell shaking my head, said: “Yo, what’s up with
that
guy?”

But Rondell just looked at me with a blank face, wadding up the plate I’d just given him, and told me: “Who?”

July 9

I woke up in the middle of the night, and when I opened my eyes there was Mong. He was standing over my bed again with his arms crossed, only this time he wasn’t smiling.

“Jesus Christ,” I said, flipping over so I could face him. But after the first couple seconds I realized I wasn’t as spooked as the last time it happened. “What the hell you want
now?”
I told him.

When he uncrossed his arms and went to reach his right hand into his pocket I was sure he was going for a knife. Without thinking I bolted upright and swung for his face. Hard as I could. He ducked it, though, backed off holding his hands up.

“What the fuck!” I said.

“Calm down,” he told me, and then I saw he didn’t have a knife in his right hand, he had a folded-up piece of paper, which he tossed in my lap.

I picked it up, watching him the whole time. Slowly unfolded it. Looked down at the words. It was a letter from the president of all the San Jose group homes, addressed to Lester. It said the state was going to increase funding for the entire program, which would affect the sentence lengths of both current and future residents.

I looked up at Mong, my heart still beating all fast. He was just standing there with his arms crossed again, watching me read.

I went back to the letter. It said what Jaden was talking
about before, how current resident sentences would all go full term from now on, and in some cases they could even be extended for consistent misbehavior.

I looked at Mong, back at the paper.

It said with the extra resources they planned to increase the rehabilitation side of the program, including more one-on-one therapy sessions and educational and career counseling.

Pretty much the last thing I wanted was more damn therapy. I handed the letter back to Mong, said: “So?”

He folded it up and stuck it back in his pocket. “I’m leaving,” he said. “One week from today.”

“What’s that got to do with me?”

He shrugged, peeked over at sleeping Rondell. “Maybe it’s better with two people,” he said, turning back to me.

I stared at him, confused as hell. I knew dude wasn’t asking me to go with him. Last I heard we pretty much hated each other.

He crossed his arms again. “I’m asking you because I trust you.”

My eyes straight bugged. “You
trust
me,” I said.

He nodded. “I have a place we can get to in Mexico. On the beach. I have a ride for us. If you want, once we get down there we can go our separate ways.”

I pictured him stabbing me in the back on a beach in Mexico, me falling to my knees, blood pooling all in the sand. “Nah, I’m good,” I said, leaning back on my elbows, letting my head go against the wooden headboard. “I can’t be doing all that.”

“You can do anything you want,” Mong said.

I shook my head, thinking about everything. The letter addressed to Lester. The extra therapy sessions and people’s sentences. Mong standing above my damn bed again, only
this time asking me to go on the run with him. “Nah, man,” I said.

He smiled and kept staring at me.

There were a few seconds of quiet between us. I looked over at Rondell, who was still sound asleep. I looked at his Bible sitting there on his nightstand. Then I turned back to Mong and said: “I know how you could get money, though.”

His smile got bigger. “We can get work in Mexico too,” he said. “At this resort they have. And it’s a different country, where nobody will know us.”

“You
could get work there,” I said. “Not me.”

Mong kept right on smiling, though. He pointed at me and said: “I’ll give you three days to tell me if you’re going.” And then he turned and left the room.

“I just told you,” I called after him. “I can’t.” But he was already out of my room.

I sat there shaking my head, trying to think. And then I heard the springs in Rondell’s bed crunching as he rolled his big ass over. “You gotta take me with you, Mexico,” he said.

I turned to look at the shape of him through the dark. “I thought you were asleep.”

“Nah, Mexico. I been awake this whole time, that’s my word.” He went on his back and put his hands under his head, his big feet tenting his blankets way past where his bed left off. “I been in places like this since I can remember. I just don’t wanna do it no more.”

“I don’t even think I’m going,” I said.

“But if you do.”

But if I do.

He didn’t say anything else. He rolled over onto his stomach and immediately started snoring. I stayed awake awhile,
though, letting Rondell’s last line float around in my head some.

But if I do.

But if I do.

I put my hands under the back of my own head, like Rondell always does, and stared up at the ceiling. I pictured my mom’s face when she drove me to Juvi. The way she kept looking in the rearview mirror, or at her side mirror, even though there weren’t any cars around us. I pictured her eyes when she finally looked at me outside Juvi, just before the guards took me away. Sometimes the look in a person’s eyes can tell you what they mean just as good as words. I never admitted this before, but I think I know what she meant when she looked at me. Even back then I did. It was relief. It was like me going was a big weight lifted off her shoulders. Like she’d been holding her breath underwater and she finally got to come up for air.

Maybe it’d be better if I went to damn Mexico, I thought, laying there across the room from snorin’-ass Rondell. Even if Mong stabbed me on the beach and I had to watch my blood go into the sand. Life for everybody else would probably be easier.

I remembered that first night back at the pad after the judge said my sentence. How I came in from me and Diego’s room and saw my moms sitting on the couch in the living room, perfectly still. The TV was on, but she wasn’t watching it—she was staring out the window. And when the light from the news show flickered over her face I could see tears going down her cheeks. They were streaming out from her eyes and rolling off her chin onto her shirt. And she wasn’t wiping them off or nothin’. Just letting them do whatever, like she didn’t even know it was happening.

Seeing her like that, man, it was like somebody shot me in
the damn stomach with a gun. My whole body went numb like I was dead. But I wasn’t dead. I tiptoed back into me and Diego’s room, climbed under my bed and curled up on my side on the floor. And that’s where I fell asleep that night. Under the bed. The next morning I got up and took my shower and ate breakfast and went to the levee with my fishing pole and then when I came home I went right back under my bed and slept there again. I slept under my bed every night until it was time for Moms to take me to Juvi. I remember thinking how lucky I was Diego was away for that week. Or else he would’ve kicked me out from under the bed and told me I was acting like a little bitch. But at the time I seriously didn’t feel like trying to be anything else.

Here’s the thing: even if it would be for the best, me going with Mong to Mexico, even if it made it easier for my moms and everybody else in my family, I seriously don’t think I can do it. I’d never be able to come back. Ever. And besides, shouldn’t I have to stay here and suffer doing the time they gave me? Even if it goes the whole year and I gotta do two times as many counseling sessions? Shouldn’t I have to pay for what I did? Wouldn’t it be messed up if I just left the Lighthouse and Jaden and the sentence they gave me and went to another country to start over, like Mong said?

Still, though, I keep thinking.

But if I do.