hear then, and I feel hands on me. Not hands so much as pressure. The pain isnât the biggest deal. The problem is I canât breathe. I try and I canât. My chest wonât rise. Feels like a carâs parked on it. I try to tell them this. If they could please tell the car to move, Iâll be fine. It wonât be so heavy and I can breathe and everything will be okay if I can just get air. I try to shout this, any of it. But my mouth wonât work and my skin feels big, loose, and the sky feels too close, like it fell on me, on my face, like a sheet, and I have the strangest feeling, like itâs coming down to fix me, that itâs getting inside me with some dark kind of concrete, trying to patch my holes up and make it so I can breathe and I think how good thatâd be if that were true but I know Iâm just dying, the kid is right, I know I think Iâm just melting into it because my brainâs low on oxygen, and I know because thatâs logic, because brains donât work right without food, and I know Iâm not really becoming part of the sky, and I know because, I know because
LUPE VERA,
A.K.A. LUPE RODRIGUEZ ,
A.K.A PAYASA
APRIL 29, 1992
8:47 P . M .
1
Cleverâs studying a textbook while Apacheâs sketching Teen Angels magazine style at the kitchen table, and over on the stovetop Big Feâs slapping chorizo around in a pan with a wooden spoon. Heâs halfway through shouting his Vikings story at me in the living room, talking about how one night at Ham Park shots pop off and everybody hits the floor, and how bullets whiz, man, how they really do make that sound, when a knock hits the front door of my house all hard and fast, like bam-bam-bam, like whoever is on the other side doesnât give a fuck about his hand.
We were watching a bunch of mayates tear the city up after putting a brick through some white truckerâs face on Florence and Normandie, but the news got boring quick so we clicked over to the small dial to watch something else. Thereâs a western on TV now with the sound down, but whatever. Itâs safe to say my eyes arenât on the guns and hats anymore though. Iâm looking at Fate (Big Fe pretty much only goes by Big Fate, so you know) and Clever and Apache and theyâre all looking at me. Weâre thinking the same thing: this ainât sheriffs.
Sheriffs donât knock. They ram. They come in screaming behind shotgun barrels and flashlights. They donât care if youâre a girl like me. They fuck everybody up regardless.
No way this is sheriffs.
Fateâs got the juice card around here. Under his wifebeater heâs that natural type of big that pro wrestlers wish they could be. His right arm ripples with Aztec tattoos as he pulls his khakis up at the belt and moves the pan off the heat even while the sausage keeps pop-popping.
I nod at him and he keeps talking, to sound normal in case whoeverâs outside can hear us, and he nods back as he bends down and comes up with a pistol. Thereâs always one in the pan drawer under the oven.
Itâs a .38. Itâs real small, but it makes real holes.
âSo Iâm on my back,â Fate says as he moves to the door all slow, âlooking up at stars, and, like, little shreds of leaves falling down on me cuz the bullets cut straight through them. Theyâre just raining down on me.â
I slip to the floor. I eye the windows, but I canât see shadows for shit behind the curtains. Apacheâs right up on them though. I see the white comb he keeps in his back pocket peeking out. Heâs not much taller than me but heâs solid muscle, and he wears baggy clothes too so nobody can tell how strong he is. Heâs the kind of guy you need in a situation like this, in any situation, really. I mean, he scalped a fool once. Thatâs how he got his name. He took a knife and peeled the skin off, inch by inch, hair and all. He threw it in a
Lindsay Paige, Mary Smith