Chapter Text
The summer of Vanessa's eighth year was the fourth hottest of her life.
Unaware of this interesting meteorological statistic, Vanessa just knew that had to wash her shirts in the sink twice as often as usual, to get rid of the sweat stains. An old piece of piping, begged from Mr. Rosario, held her sliding window open at night, to let in wisps of smoggy breeze and eight million mosquitoes. She put toothpaste on the bites.
The summer of Vanessa's eighth year, she decided to run away from home.
Later, she decided that the vice-principle of her school was to blame. Some suit from on high had decreed that instead of ending the academic year with the usual week of movies and macramé or whatever, the inner-city school needed to think about the dangers its children were going to face, running wild in NYC over the summer. There was a series of special assemblies: mostly along the lines of Just Say No (to drugs, alcohol, strangers, turnstile-jumping, you name it.)
Thing was, they'd had this stuff all year, and the boredom levels grew dangerously high, dangerously fast. When they showed the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles drugs PSA again, there was something close to a full-on riot. Most of the teachers seemed keen to get back to the usual end-of-year stuff – there was talk of a water fight – but the vice principle wasn't letting things go that easy. She pulled one last you-need-to-take-this-seriously move out of her bag: the Scary Story.
“I knew a girl once that smoked pot and her brain died.”
This had most of them perking up their ears. Everyone likes a Scary Story.
“There was a boy at a school I used to teach at – he went with a stranger to go buy candy and they found his body a week later.”
Many excited whispers. The VP looked gratified.
(She would be less gratified in the following days, when complaints from the parents started pouring in r.e. nightmares.)
There was an extended tale about a group of kids that bought a pack of cigarettes in an unspecified alleyway and smoked them for fun except the cigarettes were poisoned and they all died horribly – everyone was rapt.
And then there was a story about a girl. Who ran away from home.
Wait.
She ran away from home?
She was just nine.
Nine? I'm almost nine.
We never saw her again.
What.
She's probably dead somewhere, her poor family –
Yeah, okay, hold up... she ran away? Like, away-away? She left home? People can do that? Kids can do that? They can leave? Why did no-one tell me this?
Her poor, poor family –
Ha. Sure, her poor family. Did anyone ask her poor family why it was she wanted to run away?
Also, how do you know she died? She might be fine. She could be great.
The rest of the assembly was lost on Vanessa. The concept of “running away” was not totally unfamiliar to her – but it was something that belonged in ancient picture books about white boys with spotted handkerchief bundles tied to the ends of sticks. She had never considered it as an option before.
By the time she was waiting by the school gate to walk Nina home, Vanessa had made up her mind. She would run away. She would never see her mother again. Her mother would cry a lot, but she deserved it. Vanessa knew that mothers weren't supposed to spend all day stuck to their recliners with sweat, drinking glass after glass of foil-bagged wine over ice, topping up the glass when it got half-empty and keeping the same ice cubes so she could pretend she was still on her first. Mothers were supposed to do your laundry and help you with your homework and show you how to make the mosquito bites stop itching.
Thrilled at the idea of escape,Vanessa forgot that it should be a secret, and went right ahead and blabbed to Nina.
She regretted it immediately, as Nina's eyes filled with tears.
“You can't go. You have to come play with me.”
“You have lots of other friends to play with, Nina. And I can come back and visit.”
Nina considered this. “But you have to walk me to school!”
“It's the end of school, Nina. It's vacation,” Vanessa said. “And next year you can walk with Usnavi. You'd like that, wouldn't you?”
Nina's lip was still wobbling. “But where will you go?”
Vanessa smiled wide. “Somewhere cold. Alaska. Or, um... Oregon.” Oregon was cold, right?
“Oregon?” Nina wailed. “That's so far away!”
“Nina, shush!” They were back in the barrio by now, where people knew them. Someone might hear.
“Please don't go, Vanessa, please?”
Nina tugged on Vanessa's sleeve, whimpering embarrassingly. Batting her away, Vanessa saw Abuela Claudia sitting on her stoop – right in earshot. She smiled in greeting at the girls, but her eyes were a little too sharp. Vanessa swallowed as she waved back.
She turned to Nina.
“Okay, Nina, calm down. I'm not going away.”
“You're not?” Nina sniffed.
“No,” Vanessa said, as loudly as she could. “I was just joking, anyway.”
“Oh.” Nina wiped her eyes. “Okay.”
Vanessa wanted to start crying herself at the look on Nina's face.
“I don't even know where Oregon is,” she said, putting her arm around Nina's shoulders and steering her right past Abuela Claudia.
Half an hour later, Vanessa was sitting on her bedroom floor, her school atlas open in front of her, along with a bus timetable. She hadn't packed yet – there was still time. After her mistake of telling Nina the plan, Vanessa realised she was going to have to be a lot more careful, and decided to wait til it was dark.
Or first thing in the morning! Yes. Vanessa felt a flush of genius. Dawn was dark and quiet, but no-one would be suspicious if they saw her outside. They'd think she was on a milk run, or –
Her brilliant plans were interrupted by the buzz of voices. Someone was here, talking to her mom... Vanessa couldn't make out a whole lot, but the voice that wasn't her mom sounded kind of mad. And her mom... was crying? It sounded like she was crying. Vanessa stood, wondering if she should go and see what was happening, forgetting momentarily that she had decided not to care about her mom any more.
The door opened while she was still standing in the middle of the floor. Abuela Claudia smiled at her.
“Vanessa.”
“Abuela?” Vanessa was majorly confused. “What's wrong? Did something happen?”
“Your mother is going to the laundromat,” said Abuela.
“The laundromat?” Vanessa's mother hadn't been to the laundromat in over a month.
“Do you have anything to clean?” Abuela asked, walking right in like she owned the place. Vanessa shrugged and indicated a pile of things on the floor. She'd done her best, washing in the sink, but nothing had smelled quite clean after she was done, so she'd left everything out for when she remembered to try again.
Abuela tutted. “Well?”
“Well, what?” retorted Vanessa, as rudely as she dared. Abuela folded her arms.
Vanessa wasn't brave enough to keep pretending that she didn't know what she was supposed to do, so she picked up all the clothes and gave them to Abuela.
“The sheets off your bed, too,” Abuela instructed.
Vanessa complied immediately this time, though her cheeks burned as she handed the sheets over. She hadn't even thought to change them since she'd got them – months ago – and they were covered in weird wobbly sweat stains. Abuela didn't even blink as she took the sheets and handed them to Vanessa's mom, who had appeared holding a large laundry bag and eating an orange that Vanessa was pretty sure had not come from their kitchen.
“Make sure you finish that,” Abuela said, indicating the orange.
Vanessa was amazed to see her mother smile and nod, despite her eyes still being a little red. Then she smiled at Vanessa, and told her she she would be back soon. She looked like she wanted to say something else, but she just put the laundry bag over her shoulder and disappeared.
Vanessa turned back to Abuela, who was leaning down to inspect the atlas next to her foot.
“What's this?” she asked.
Crap.
“Homework,” Vanessa blurted.
Abuela smiled. “Perhaps you should tidy it away. It's vacation now, isn't it?”
“Oh... yeah.”
“Well then.” Abuela frowned. “What is that on your legs?”
Vanessa glanced down at the blue and white smears dotted from the hemline of her shorts to her ankles. “It's toothpaste.” She explained about the mosquitoes, and how she read in a book once the toothpaste was supposed to help, although it didn't really.
Abuela nodded as she listened. Then she said, “wait here. I'll be back in ten minutes.”
She touched Vanessa on the chin as she left, lifting her head a little.
Vanessa looked around at her room. It was kind of embarrassing what a mess it was.
But she was leaving. It didn't matter. The next place she lived would be a lot nicer.
She was leaving.
By the time she heard the front door again, Vanessa had wiped the dust off her shelves, straightened her comic books and shoes, and thrown away the empty soda cans that had been nesting in the space between her bed and her side table.
She was standing on a chair by the window, trying to reattach a couple of loose curtain hooks, when Abuela came bustling back into the room. She was followed by Usnavi, who was carrying a clunky box fan. He hesitated on the threshold of the room, eyes averted, skinny arms tight around the fan.
“Um,” said Vanessa, “you can come in.” Weirdo.
He sidled into the room, keeping his eyes on Abuela as though making eye contact with a girl's room might turn him to stone.
“Usnavi, set that up for us. There's an outlet there by the window.”
“Okay, Abuela.”
“And see if you can get that curtain straight.”
Abuela took Vanessa's hand and led her out of the room – Vanessa caught a glimpse of Usnavi's panicked face as he realised he was being abandoned – and led her to the bathroom.
“Is that fan yours?” asked Vanessa, as Abuela sat her down on the closed toilet seat and pulled a white tube of something out of her purse.
“I'm loaning it to you,” said Abuela. “You'll have to take good care of it. Don't leave it plugged in when you go out, and make sure to dust it every day.”
Vanessa nodded, impressed by the responsibility she was being given. The fan was in her room. She was going to take care of it.
“Now, this is for those bites,” said Abuela. “Much better than toothpaste. Give me your leg.”
Vanessa opened her mouth to say that she could put cream on her own darn legs, thank you very much, but Abuela had already knelt in front of her. She stuck out her leg without another word, fighting the sudden and inexplicable urge to cry.
“What's this stuff?” she asked, to distract herself. It felt amazing on the bites.
“Magic cream,” said Abuela, keeping her face totally straight, though her eyes twinkled.“It's my only tube, so I can't let you keep it, you see.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“Instead, I want you to come to me if you get bitten and I'll put it on myself. Okay?”
“Um...”
Abuela was looking very steadily at her. Vanessa realised that if she agreed, she would have to stay here – at least for the summer – and that was exactly what Abuela wanted. Her face grew hot, and it was on the tip of her tongue to tell the old lady to go mind her own business.
Instead, she started crying. Like she was Nina. Geez.
Abuela was pretty cool, though. She just patted Vanessa's knee and continued applying the cream, then told her to blow her nose.
When they emerged from the bathroom, Usnavi was sitting on the floor of the hall outside Vanessa's bedroom, looking cross.
“Usnavi, are you still here?” smiled Abuela. “That's a long time to wait.”
“I know. But you didn't say I could go.” He stood and scuffed his feet, still looking only at Abuela. “I wasn't gonna interrupt.”
Vanessa realised he'd heard her crying and almost ran back into the bathroom so she could die of embarrassment in private, but Abuela tapped Usnavi sharply on the head and informed him that waiting was good for the soul.
“Paciencia y fe,” she said to them both. Then she turned her ear to the door in response to a familiar shout. “Can I tempt either of you with a piragua?”
Usnavi finally made eye contact with Vanessa as they both grinned.
Later, lying on clean sheets, her mouth syrup-sticky, with the window closed and the fan on, Vanessa thought she might be able to stay here a little longer – at least for the summer. Usnavi had promised to teach her to skateboard.