I wanted to throw my arms around her, but something held me back. Mari was so not gung ho about the bike project. The sudden change of heart didn’t make any sense—it felt like a trap.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” Mari asked. She was already hunting for leftovers to bring to the fireworks.
“Emilio.” I shrugged. “You were kind of . . . I don’t know. Defending him.”
Mari set a stack of Tupperware on the counter and sighed. “It was all Papi could talk about at lunch today. He remembers so much about it, Juju—you were totally right.”
Hey, Jude? Your old pal Devil-Jude here. The boss just called—wants to know why it’s so cold down here. We’re freezing!
“For some bizarre reason, he loves that Vargas boy,” Mari said. “He went on about him forever—I almost got jealous. Like, hello, you don’t need a son! Four awesome daughters over here!”
I laughed at Mari’s indignant huff, and I was relieved she’d softened up, but my chest ached with the effort of keeping quiet. I had all this stuff in me to say, things I wanted to tell her about Emilio. About how I couldn’t stop thinking about him. About his dimples and how the smell of his leather jacket made my stomach flip. How sweet he was at the garage today. But I couldn’t; her understanding had limitations. Expirations. Once the clock on our project struck twelve, Emilio would be gone, and that was how Mari wanted it.
But that wasn’t how I wanted it. Not now. Not anymore. Not ever.
Chapter 17
The Bowl was Canyon Rock Bowl, a natural amphitheater carved into the red sandstone that sloped toward the river valley. Across the swoop from the very top, it was a smooth terra-cotta bowl dotted with rock-slab benches and patches of yellow-green scrub grass.
“Watch your step, Papi,” Mari said as we navigated the terrain. “Juju, help him.”
I reached for Papi’s elbow, but he shook me off, the silver Alzheimer’s Association bracelet glinting in the setting sun. “I’m fine, queridita. You two keep grabbing at me like little monkeys, that’s the problem.”
“I could use some help,” Mom said. “I wore the wrong shoes for this adventure.” She finally slipped out of her wedges and went barefoot, picking her way along the rocks.
The freaks were definitely out tonight, and by freaks I mean everyone in town plus a good number of tourists, not to mention all the dogs, but we found a spot close to the exits. We had enough ensalada rusa, pressed red pepper sandwiches de miga, and medialunas to feed everyone here.
I tied Pancake’s leash to a screw drilled into the rock and headed down to the vending area for drinks, which we’d forgotten to pack.
“Jude!”
I almost didn’t recognize her voice, but the wild red curls clued me in fast. Zoe was hanging out at the lemonade stand, pink-filled cups spiked with lemon slices in each hand. She was tan and glowy, and a hot streak of jealousy raced through me when I pictured her and Christina splashing around the Animas, beach towels side by side on the riverbank.
“You have new freckles,” I said when I got close enough for a hug. “Like, a thousand more at least.”
Zoe giggled. “I didn’t know you were coming tonight. You should’ve texted!”
So should’ve you. . . .
“Mari’s in town. Family-bonding time.” I rolled my eyes like I’d rather be anywhere else.
“Your sister’s here?”
“She came to help with my dad.”
Zoe swirled her pink lemonade. “How’s . . . everything?”
Glad you asked, because it’s capital-A Awesome!
“Okay,” I said. “Considering.” I’d reached the front of the line, and Zoe waited off to the side while they handed over my lemonades and change.
“How’s the play stuff going?” I asked.
“Rockin’ it. I was basically born to be the Queen of Hearts.” Zoe’s mouth curled into a wicked, Queenly grin, but it faded fast. “Alice kind of sucks, though. She’s not from Blackfeather. Animas High, I think. Everyone misses you.”
I smiled. It was a nice sentiment, but for all that missing, I hadn’t heard a peep from anyone but Zoe and Christina since the BHS picnic, and even their peeps were getting shorter and less frequent, more like chirps than peeps.
“We’re doing a sneak preview on the eleventh. Like, a special screening for friends and family. I have extra tickets if you and Mari want to come. Oh, Christina’s here too. Come say hi.”
I peered into the crowd to find my family, but everything was a blur. “I should get back—”
“Just for a minute,” she said. “I brought some of the guys from the Crow too—Mad Hatter and Tweedledum. We got a good spot.” A fresh grin lit her face, warm and hopeful and nothing like the Queen’s. “Come on. You’re totally sitting with us.”
I didn’t know the Crow guys—they must’ve been from Animas High like Alice—but Christina wasn’t wasting any time. She’d draped herself over the blond one like a sheet. A wet sheet. A super-clingy one.
The dark-haired guy—Mad Hatter—was loud and brutish, going on about some party happening later that night, but Zoe seemed into him, so I just sipped my lemonade and waited for the punch line that never came. Christina wasn’t saying much either—too busy flirting with Tweedledum.
At least the lemonade was fresh squeezed and super good and . . . tart! Theme of the night.
I turned toward Christina and tried to wedge myself into the conversation. “Have you been watching the rehearsals?”
“Yeah, Zoe is so good!” she said. “You have to see her do the Queen. It’s intense. Zoe, show her.”
Zoe cleared her throat and sat up straight. She made eye contact with each of us, seemed to be counting in her head. Her lips twitched. And then . . .
“Off with her head!”
Everyone within a twenty-foot radius turned to stare, and Zoe drank up the attention. Her eyes were wild and convincing, and the boys clapped, and Zoe bowed, and the whole scene morphed into a bunch of Crow inside jokes, most of which Christina was in on too.
Note to self: Exit, stage left.
“I have to get back to my family.” I rose from the blanket. “They’re probably wondering where I went.”
“Can’t you call them?” Zoe asked.
“I need to be there before fireworks start. For Papi, you know? Just in case?”
Zoe’s eyes flickered with disappointment, but that was it. She didn’t go off on another “normal teenage summer” monologue or tug me back to the blanket or offer to come with me to see my family, to hug my sister that was practically a big sister to her, too. There was a sigh, a shrug, and then Mad Hatter offered her a can of Pringles but not me and that was that.
“See you next week, right?” I said. “For the sneak preview?”
Zoe nodded half-heartedly, elbows-deep in Pringles, and Christina was hung up on some dramatic story about Tweedledum’s broken leg in tenth grade, so I left without saying anything else. I looked back only once, after I’d put a good amount of bodies between us, and Zoe was curled up against the Mad Hatter, laughing it up. I squinted at the image of my best friend until she dissolved, curly red hair blending into the rocks behind her.
I picked up fresh lemonades for my family, and on the way back to Camp Hernandez, I was so far into outer space missing Zoe that I didn’t see Emilio until I practically tripped over him. He and his friends had staked out a spot near the grills just outside the main area.
Emilio’s eyes shone with summer, like the whole season was made for him. He flipped a burger with a metal spatula, and when he saw me he smiled. “You brought me empanadas? I knew it.”
“You wish.”
“I want cheese on mine.” Some skankalicious skank draped her arms around Emilio’s neck, really working the pout. “Please?”
Rosette.
I waited for her to remove herself, but she just stood there watching Emilio at the grill, one hand lingering on his shoulder.
What a parasite!
“Hey, Rosette,” I said.
She looked over as if she’d just noticed me, even though she’d been eyeing me up the whole time.
“It’s Jude,” I reminded her. “Cookies?”
“I know who you are, Jude Cookies.” She flashed a freshly glossed smirk, twirled her long black hair. Right near the meat and everything. Seriously, was she always trying to contaminate cooking surfaces?
“Leave them alone, Ro,” another girl said. On an adjacent blanket, she and Samuel and Marcus were going to town on a bag of Combos, and Rosette plopped down next to them with a ginormous sigh.
“Hey, Jude,” Marcus sang. “Don’t be a—”
“Shut it.” Samuel elbowed him in the ribs before he could continue, and then he offered me the Combos in Spanish, which I gladly accepted.
My phone buzzed with a Where r u?? Thirsty over here! text from Mari, totally foiling my master plan to infuriate Rosette while chowing down on Combos all night.
“I gotta get back to my parents,” I said.
“You’re here with your parents? How sweet.” Rosette stifled a laugh, and the other girl smacked her arm.
“Hold up, I’ll walk with you.” Emilio turned to Samuel and held out the spatula. “Off your lazy ass and handle this, cabrón. I’ll be back.”
Emilio palmed my lemonade tray and put his other hand on the small of my back as we walked. We took the long way around the back of the Bowl, past a high sandstone wall that rose from the ground like a flame.
“I used to walk back here and wish I’d see a dinosaur,” I said. “They excavated some bones a while back.” I ran my hand along the rock face, grit scratching my fingertips. The feeling brought me right back to those dinosaur days. Three years ago? Five? Ten?
“This one time,” I continued, “Zoe and I got into a huge fight over Trevor Fluke. She crushed on him for five years straight, but in eighth grade, he and I got the leads in Romeo and Juliet, so we had to kiss.” I laughed at the memory—it felt like a story from someone else’s life.
“You had to kiss Trev?” Emilio gave a fake shudder. “Nasty.”
“It wasn’t a big deal at first. Just acting. But on the last night of the show, Trevor got, like, way into it. Weird, you know? But I couldn’t show it onstage, so I rolled with it.”
“Sick little bastard.” Emilio cracked his knuckles. “I know where he lives. His dad comes into Duchess sometimes.”
“Stop.”
“Hey. No one kisses my fake girlfriend but me.”
“Anyway.” I tried to ignore the heat that shot across my neck. “Zoe didn’t speak to me for two weeks. Like, ten years in girl time. I’d come out here and draw her name in hearts on the wall with rocks. Finally she forgave me and got a new crush.”
“Argentinean voodoo magic?”
“Something like that.” I stopped on the path and squinted at the rock face, wondering if the trick would still work.
Emilio slipped his free hand into mind. He traced his thumb over my skin and it sent shivers up and down my back, and we continued on the path, side by side as the sun sank before us, walking where the dinosaurs walked, millions of years before we were even a blip on the radar.
Maybe we still weren’t a blip.
We’d stopped walking again, and the red walls behind Emilio blurred as I focused on his eyes.
He nodded toward the pink silk flower clipped in my hair. “I like it.”
“Yeah? What’s the story with Rosette?”
His eyebrows rose. “Just some crazy Catholic school girl from the neighborhood. Known her forever.”
“A crazy girl with a crush,” I said. “Obviously.”
“Yo, that ain’t a crush. Girl’s been in love with me her whole damn life.”
“And?”
He shook his head and laughed. “Come on. I wanna say hi to el jefe, then I have to get back.”
“To Rosette?”
“You know how it is.” Emilio shrugged. “Samuel will forget her cheese and it’ll be this whole drama and I’ll have to comfort her. Loss of cheese is a real difficult thing. Try to be more compassionate, Jude.”
When we found my family, Papi insisted that Emilio join us, and Mom chimed in too, always jumping on a chance to feed someone, anyone, anywhere. When Emilio declined, Mom portioned out containers of potato salad and sandwich halves so he could take it to go.
Mari sighed. “He’s not going on a three-day trek.”
“Hush, Mari.” Mom gave Emilio the food, and for one millisecond I let myself pretend that he really was my boyfriend. That this was a normal night for us, hanging out together, eating, waiting for fireworks. That someday—maybe not tomorrow or next year or the one after that, but someday—he’d be welcome in our family, expected even, the legacy of bad boyfriends finally forgotten.
“Muchas gracias, Mrs. Hernandez.” Emilio smiled at all the goodies. And then he leaned toward me and my heart ran up into my throat. . . .
“See you soon, princesa,” he whispered. His lips brushed my cheek for a second too long, and his fingers grazed the flower in my hair, and then he was gone.
The fireworks exploded in bright green starbursts. I kept my eyes on Papi, and though he flinched each time the sky split, he clapped and pointed out his favorites to Mom, and I took a few pictures in the twilight without a flash, hoping they’d turn out okay.
Mari looked up occasionally, but she was glued to her iPad, probably reading submissions about monsters that fall in love with humans and the dangers of having a deadly, immortal boyfriend. I didn’t know how those girls managed—I could barely handle a few flirty innuendos from a nonmonster who wasn’t out to kill me.
“Anyone want more sandwiches?” Mom was digging into the cooler as if we hadn’t been eating all night. “There are two red peppers and a bunch of asparagus. Mari, querida?”
“No thanks.” Mari smiled at me in solidarity. “Stop trying to fatten us up.”
“Ay, I don’t want the food to go bad. Bear? You want?” She held one out to Papi. “No?”
“Papi, you’re not hungry, right?” I asked. Another round of fireworks cracked open the sky, and he flinched.
I raised my voice. “You’re not hungry, right?”
“What, queridita?”
Pop . . . pop . . . boom!
“Never mind,” I said.
“¿Que?” He cupped his hand over his ear.
“Food,” Mom said. “Do you want more food?”
Pop-pop-pop!
“Put it back. We’re fine.” Mari waved away the sandwiches.
“Your father is hungry.”
“He isn’t. Papi, tell her,” Mari said.
“I don’t . . . know.” He glanced up at the sky. “What is . . . what time . . .” He trailed off.
“Should I put these away?” Mom held up the sandwiches, her last ditch attempt to stuff our faces. “Or do you—”
BOOM!
All of us jumped at that one, especially Pancake, and Papi covered his ears, his mouth pulling into a grimace.
“We need to go,” I whispered to Mom. She glanced at Papi and nodded. She remembered the BHS picnic scene as clearly as I did and needed no further explanation.
We packed up quickly, and I kept my hand on Papi’s arm as we crept along the rocks in the dark. Each time the sky lit up, his bones jumped beneath my hand. When we finally reached the bottom, I saw Emilio in the lemonade line with Rosette the Succubus, and I waved. Like, really big. Could’ve-landed-an-airplane big. It totally worked, because he said something to her and then jogged over to us.
Mom smiled at Emilio, then turned to me. “You go with your friends, Juju. Don’t worry about us.”
“Mom, it’s fine. I’m tired anyway.”
“She’s tired,” Mari said.
Mom fished the keys from her purse and handed them over. “You can take my car home, yes?”
“I don’t—”
“It’s the Fourth of July. Stay out, enjoy yourself. Here, take the sandwiches for your
friends, okay?”
I took the food and nodded, clearly unprepared to battle the force of Mom. And, okay, maybe slightly intrigued by the sudden change of plans. Not that anyone in my family needed to know about that. “Guess I’ll see you guys at home later,” I said.
Mari shot me a warning glance. “Not too late, Juju.”
Chapter 18
Everything looked different in the morning. The dusty barn, scattered with boxes and bike parts and tools, held none of the forest’s magic. Emilio and Papi worked diligently on the exhaust system while I dug through a box of old mugs from Celi’s paint-your-own-pottery phase, just another glamorous day at Casa de Hernandez.
Papi went inside for more coffee, and Emilio called me over to show me something. When he held up a chrome pipe and starting talking about dual exhaust something or other, my heart sagged.
Who cares about dual exhaust when I couldn’t stop thinking about you last night?
His turn: You were thinking about me last night?
Me: I hardly slept.
Him: I thought about you too. Matter of fact, I’m still thinking about you. Here’s another killer smile with a side of dimples. All yours . . .
“Don’t you think?” Emilio was saying.
“Yes! Wait, what am I thinking?”
Emilio set down the pipe. “I could totally take advantage of this situation. You know that, right?”
My breath caught in my throat as I laughed. Last night at the Bowl, Emilio had looked at me with that same fire in his eyes, and something inside me swirled, and I saw the whole terrible ending right there. It didn’t matter what I wanted, what I thought was possible, what I thought my sisters had misjudged. If I let it continue, if I let it cross the line we almost crossed last night . . . whether he’d meant it or not, come next month, Emilio Vargas would flash his dimples one more time, ride that black motorcycle out of town, and break my heart.
Now he reached for my hair, and I flinched.
“Sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean . . . sorry. Papi will be back any second. And my sisters are finally okay with the whole motorcycle thing, you know? If Mari saw . . .”