The Same Sky(10)

Principal Markson looked surprised, but pursed her lips and nodded.

“Okay.” She took a breath. “Okay. We’re getting our budget cut next year. If, of course, they don’t close us down, but that’s another issue for another day.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. Did she want Jake and me to donate money to the school? If so, she was in for a letdown. Our failed insemination efforts had emptied our savings, and even though Conroe’s was doing well, we had little to spare.

“One of the positions we’ll be losing is the full-time school psychologist. Juliet Swann—do you know her?”

I shook my head.

“She might be a vegetarian, now that I think of it,” said Principal Markson. “Or a vegan? Not sure. There’s usually a big yogurt labeled with her name in the staff refrigerator.…”

“Well, that would explain it,” I said. There was an awkward pause. “I’m sorry,” I ventured. “But what does any of this have to do with me?”

Principal Markson clasped her hands. She paused, then said, “Look. There are some kids here in real trouble. They don’t have guidance at home, and now they’re not going to have as much guidance here. I’m reaching out to members of the community I think could be good role models. I’m hoping to create a Big Brother/Big Sister type of network, a way for adults to help at-risk kids at Chávez. Maybe eat lunch with them once a week, assist them with homework …”

“Oh, Principal Markson,” I said, “I don’t think so.”

“One girl I had in mind is Evian. Her mother is … let’s just say inconsistent. Her father’s out of the picture, and last year … well, she shot and killed her little brother. By mistake.”

My hand flew to my mouth. “Oh, no,” I said.

“It was ruled an accident,” said Principal Markson. “Her mother wasn’t home. Evian called 911 herself and waited with her brother. He bled to death. She was showing him the gun, she said. It belonged to Evian’s mother.”

I said nothing. My stomach churned and I wanted to get up and leave the room.

“Evian transferred from Travis, to get a new start. But she often skips school,” said Principal Markson. “There’s no one to keep an eye on her, check in. She’s depressed, most likely, and who knows what else. She doesn’t have anyone. No one. I know you’re busy, Alice, I do. But I just thought I’d ask. If you could just have lunch with Evian once a month? Just come to the cafeteria and sit with her for twenty minutes. I wouldn’t ask if I had … other resources.”

“Lunch is a busy time,” I said.

Principal Markson stood. “I understand. I hope you don’t mind my giving this a shot. I’ve got a list of kids like Evian, and I’m just trying to do what I can to help them.”

I nodded, standing. Principal Markson smiled as I departed, but I could see exhaustion etched into her features. “Have a good one,” she said, echoing Officer Grupo’s salutation.

“I’m really sorry,” I said.

“What can you do?” she replied. I walked away from her office feeling like a jerk. But what did I have to offer a depressed teenager? Nothing, I told myself. Still, as I left the school and walked toward Conroe’s, waving at Grupo in his cruiser, I felt a certain stirring. I tamped it down, pushing the girl from my mind. At Conroe’s, I climbed into my Ford Bronco (with newly upholstered leather seats—an anniversary gift from Jake) and drove toward Mildred Street. Jake would be waking up soon, and I felt like kissing him until my thoughts receded.





7




Carla


AS I HAD hoped, on my eleventh birthday Humberto asked me to be his girlfriend. By this time we had both stopped going to school and spent our days at the dump. Not many girls could handle the smell and the aggression, but I am not like other girls. As I’ve mentioned, my mother was in America, which gave me strength.

In the years my mother had been absent, her voice had grown raspy, hoarse. She sounded old. During one Wednesday call, my brother Carlos (now in kindergarten at Campbell Elementary School in Austin, Texas) mentioned “the baby.” I asked him, “What baby?” but my mother made him get off the phone. I asked her, “What baby?” and she said to please stop asking so many questions. Was she married? I asked her, and she said, “Dios mío, no.”



Each morning we walked to work in a group, our garbage bags over our shoulders: Humberto, me, some other boys. People lived at the dump, so we tried to arrive as close to dawn as possible to fill our bags before the piles were all picked over and you had to touch the needles or dig through shit to reach anything with value. Toward evening, trucks arrived, paying us handfuls of centavos for our hauls.

Some of the girls I knew had started sniffing glue. Some had become prostitutes. This is not a euphemism. No one was hiring you to do their laundry, not anymore. There were few jobs for men and no jobs for women. The robbers had become increasingly violent. I could go into more detail, but the point is that times were very hard. A woman had something to sell, and many did.

I did not.

I guess it was my grandmother’s Catholic doctrine, and the fact that my mother sent us enough money to survive. I believed that sex was something I would save for marriage. I lay in bed some nights, praying that I would remain a virgin. For some reason, I felt that this was out of my control.