On These Magic Shores Read online

  If the police stopped and asked me where I was going, what would I say? So much lying to the receptionist and Mrs. Santos left me out of excuses and inventions. The library was just ahead. If I sneaked in there, I could go online to look up that article about the play and send a message to my grandma while I was at it. I couldn’t lead the police to our house. Kids my age were supposed to be at school.

  What did the law do to truants? Truants who faked a fire to rescue their baby sister? Truants whose mom had been missing for days?

  Biting my lip didn’t bring any clarity. It wasn’t until the police car drove away ahead of me that I realized I was hyperventilating.

  Long breaths, Minerva. Calm down.

  I looked over my shoulder, but no one followed me or even paid any attention to me. I ran to our house.

  * * *

  Mr. Chang waved. “Hi there! Having a good day?” He worked in his yard, picking up apples, as I passed him.

  Remembering Kota’s advice, I briefly nodded. I couldn’t even fake a smile. Now I was the silent sister. If he asked me what was happening, why all the emergency services were still zooming toward the school, I wouldn’t be able to say anything but the truth.

  My ears still throbbed. Would Avi’s ears be hurt after being exposed to the noise for so long?

  I held her close to me as I pulled her out of the stroller and walked down to our basement apartment. I’d get the stroller later. I always locked it, but now the door swung open when I barely touched it.

  “I’m home!” I called, just in case Mamá was here waiting for me, in case miracles and magic really existed and my phone call had been heard and answered.

  Of course the house was empty. No one was here. But someone had been inside. On the table was a gold coin.

  The gold coin the Tooth Fairy had brought Kota, the one she’d wanted to take to school before I stopped her because she would lose it and then she would cry like La Llorona from Mamá’s terrifying stories. The coin I’d given Avi so she could hold onto something familiar while I brought catastrophe on our heads.

  The coin lay innocently on the table. The same one. The coin.

  I was too tired to try to figure out the mystery. Too freaked out. I wanted to run out and ask for help. I wanted Mamá to get home already so this nightmare could become the past.

  Instead of crying, Where are my children? like La Llorona, inside I was silently crying, Where is my mother? I needed to get a hold of my emotions, so I took a deep breath.

  Avi slept while I went around the apartment searching every corner for someone who might be hiding, recording me as I freaked out. No one was there, which was good, but it didn’t explain the mystery.

  Avi woke up for lunch. Her body was a living clock. “Minnie? Cookies?”

  She had little crumbs on the corner of her mouth. I know it was gross, but I had to know what she’d been eating. I wiped the crumbs off her face and put a tiny particle in my mouth. It was sweet like a cookie.

  “Cookies, baby? Where did you get them?”

  Avi looked at me for a few seconds, as if I were a curious beast she’d never seen before. She shrugged. “Fairy so nice, Minnie!”

  “Fairies don’t —”

  I couldn’t finish the sentence because she put a tiny, pudgy finger on my lips. “Fairies nice, okay, Minnie? Everyfing okay.”

  Nothing was okay. Nothing, except that she seemed to be healthy and perfectly fine. Who was I to dash her hope and faith to pieces? I never had that kind of innocence, but why would I take it away from her?

  “I don’t have cookies,” I said, “but I have my cupcake.”

  Her eyes lit up. I’d been saving it for when Mamá came home, but she might never. Someone might as well enjoy it before it went bad, and if it was an enchanted cupcake, then so what? My sister was an angel and she deserved magical cupcakes.

  After she ate, she asked for me to put on Chespirito on the TV. I sat next to her through I don’t know how many episodes, watching El Chavo and La Chilindrina hitting each other, and Doña Florinda slapping Don Ramón. How happy they were in the vecindad. El Chavo, the one that lived in a barrel, had no siblings. He had no one.

  I was luckier than him. I had my girls. I would never let anyone take them away from me.

  A knock on the door woke me up. Avi shook me softly. “Minnie, door.”

  Startled, I jumped off the couch. What time was it? Was I late to pick up Kota? Was it the police coming to get me for making a scene?

  I didn’t voice any of these questions, but I looked at Avi as if she could read my mind.

  “Kota and Mavvy, Minnie,” Avi said, pointing at the door.

  “Are you a psychic or something?” I asked, unable to keep the edge off my words. But Avi was tough. Unlike Kota, she didn’t get offended. She just pointed at the door again, like a miniature queen. I had no choice but to obey.

  Another knock, and I braced myself for the worst (a police officer with handcuffs) and opened the door.

  True to Avi’s words, Kota and Maverick — Mavvy? — stood there holding hands like best friends.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked. I know I sounded like a jerk, but I could really not take any more problems in my life, and him being at our house was a huge problem. What had Kota told him?

  “Don’t look so shocked, Minerva Soledad,” she said, brushing against me as she walked into the house. “I was tired of waiting, and when Maverick asked if I needed anything, I asked in return, and I received.”

  Ask and ye shall receive.

  Mamá loved this saying that she never practiced. She never asked for anything: permission, help, or forgiveness.

  Good for me that Kota paid more attention to words than actions.

  “Maverick, thanks, but now is not a good moment for you to come in. We have a crisis,” I said.

  I leveled my eyes on him. He was so serious, I thought the whole world fit into his dark brown eyes. He’d walked Kota home, but he couldn’t help us in any other way. He was just a kid, a year older than me in age but the seventh child, an only boy in a family of girls. I didn’t have a lot of experience with people like him, but as far as I knew, it sounded like his life was pretty magical. How could he ever help and not treat us with pity?

  No. Way.

  “I saw you sneaking out of the school with your little sister. Can I come in?” he said, putting a hand on the doorframe.

  If I slammed the door shut, I’d smash his fingers. And for the love of fairies, I wanted no more trouble. I didn’t want to hurt him or for him to hate me. But he couldn’t know.

  Mr. Chang’s head was barely visible from where I stood at the open door. Our neighbor and landlord was studying Maverick and me. What did he see? Did it look like I was letting friends in without permission? Would he complain to anyone?

  I couldn’t risk Mr. Chang coming over to check on us and discover the rent-paying person was MIA.

  I clenched my teeth to swallow an exclamation not proper for my sisters’ ears and mumbled, “Okay, come in. But just for a second. And only because the landlord is looking at us suspiciously. Don’t look!”

  The dork was turning his head to see for himself if Mr. Chang was there. I had told him not to look. Why didn’t he just do as I asked him?

  Before I could change my mind and send him flying, Maverick stepped into our house and Kota slammed the door.

  As if she had been waiting for him to cross into the threshold of our home before she could show her excitement, Avi ran to Maverick. “Mav,” Avi said, “fairies so nice!”

  Maverick laughed, bringing a little light to our shadowy apartment. Everything seemed clean — I really tried to keep things tidy — but I wondered what kind of home Maverick had. Did he notice the frayed curtains? The faded pillows on the sofa?

  The more I dawdled, the more he’d notice how poor we w
ere. I went straight to the heart of the problem. “You didn’t see me sneak out of the school. I walked out in plain view of everyone. I had permission.”

  Not that I would add whose, but that was none of his business.

  My main priority was to protect my sisters. I barely knew this guy. What if he went babbling our story to his parents or another kind of nosy grownup? We’d be doomed.

  Maverick narrowed his eyes, like a kid watching a magician at the mall trying to figure out the trick. Why?

  Kota. She had to go and babble to a stranger! When I got rid of him, I’d give her an earful she wouldn’t forget any time soon. “What did you tell him, Kota?” I asked, sounding like an ogre.

  She took a step back toward Maverick, her new protector. Her face turned bright red.

  Maverick placed a hand on Kota’s shoulder, like grownups sometimes do when they mean, I got this, kid. “She told me your mom’s on a business trip and the babysitter didn’t show up.” He put out his other hand up like he was taking the presidential oath. “I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone. My lips are sealed.”

  Kota looked at me with imploring eyes. Her lie was pretty convincing because she’d mixed in a little bit of the truth. Good job, Kota.

  A war ranged inside me. I sat down on the couch, and Kota and Maverick joined me.

  Maverick believed her. He had to be the most ­gullible boy in the world. Oh well, why not? Nothing fresh came to my mind. Maybe my reservoir of lies had gone dry with the imaginary fire.

  “So you know?” I said. “You see? Our mom? She’ll be back tonight.”

  “Tonight?” Avi’s face lit up like Fourth of July fireworks.

  Okay, so I didn’t see that coming. It was too late to backtrack though. I either betrayed Mamá and made her look like the worst mother in the world, or I broke Avi’s heart. Why did I always have to do the hardest things?

  Kota bit her lip, and my insides twisted for her. She was trying so hard not to show Maverick the truth. So hard.

  I kept my eyes on Maverick because I couldn’t face Avi. I just couldn’t. “She’ll be back tonight.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Kota said you took Avi to school. What happened? There was a fire in the teacher’s lounge. They said a coffee maker started smoking and by the time the firemen showed up, the fire had spread to a curtain nearby.”

  Good thing I was already sitting, or I would have fainted right then. “Really?” My mind reeled. “Was anyone hurt?”

  Maverick raked his hands through his hair. “No. The fire alarm saved everyone.”

  “The fire alarm? It saved everyone?” I knew I sounded so silly, repeating everything, but Maverick went on with the tale.

  “The weird thing is that the alarm went off in the bathroom. It was a miracle, because the one in the break room wasn’t working. The firemen said the batteries hadn’t been changed in a while. Everyone’s okay.”

  A real fire. And my sister had been in the school. If I hadn’t slipped away. If I hadn’t reached her in time. . . .

  You saved everyone’s lives, though, another voice said in my head.

  It might have been right, but if something had happened to my sister, I would never forgive myself.

  “What happened then?” I asked.

  Kota and Avi’s eyes went from me to Maverick as if they were watching a tennis match.

  “All the parents were freaked out. There’s no school for the rest of the week because they’re checking each smoke detector and fire alarm in the building. It’s all over the news.”

  “No school for the rest of the week?” Kota repeated, jumping off the chair and running to my arms, in her first spontaneous hug in like forever. “I’m so happy. Problem solved for now,” she whispered in my ear.

  “Fairy smart,” Avi said in her clear bell-like voice.

  Kota and I laughed and laughed, but it was just that we were so nervous about the whole situation. Maverick must have thought we were the weirdest girls he’d ever met.

  “Okay, so we have to wait until your mom gets home?” Maverick asked, shattering the bubble of relief we had now that school wasn’t a problem, at least until Monday.

  Because by the way he’d propped his feet on the table, it looked like he wanted to stay waiting with us until Mamá came back, and that wasn’t happening.

  “Our mom comes back tonight. You can’t be here when she arrives. She doesn’t like friends over when she’s not here.”

  Avi made a rolling-eyes kind of face that almost made me chuckle and ruin the authority in my voice I’d managed so far. Mamá never let friends come over. Period. But I wasn’t about to let Maverick know.

  “Let’s go to my house,” Maverick said. “My mom’s making a big dinner for my sister and her friends from church. It’ll be fun.”

  “Okay,” I said. I don’t know what got into me. Maybe the fact that he’d mentioned dinner. One less thing to worry about. He’d also said his sister had invited friends. We wouldn’t be the only ones there for the food.

  “Really, Minnie? We go, Minnie?” Avi asked, clasping her hands like in prayer.

  Just to make her happy, I said to Maverick, “But don’t tell your parents our mom comes home tonight, or that I took my sister to school. It’s not a secret, but my mom would be so embarrassed if anyone knew the babysitter didn’t show up.”

  Mamá would be so embarrassed if she knew we were eating at people’s house. That was the honest truth.

  “I won’t say anything,” Maverick said. “But my mom won’t judge. She goes out of town sometimes, too, and my sister babysits all the time.”

  I had a feeling his situation wasn’t the same as ours. At all.

  “Do you live very far?” I asked as my sisters put their jackets on without being told.

  “Nope. We can go on my scooter.”

  “Scooter?” I asked. “How in the world would the four of us fit on a scooter?”

  I was visualizing the skateboard with a handle, him being the skater boy and all, but right then, Kota clasped her hands and looked up to the ceiling in ecstasy. “Wait until you see his mini-motorcycle! It’s the best!”

  * * *

  Maverick’s mini-motorcycle was a real motorcycle. He called it a scooter, but it was a battery-operated not-so-fast motorcycle that was a beauty all the same. I’d only ever seen them in television ads on Saturday mornings.

  “Are you allowed to drive this without a license?” I asked, eyeing the scooter as if it were a spaceship.

  Avi, already sitting very still on the scooter as Maverick put a helmet on her, gave me the thumbs up.

  “It’s a toy. Sorry, I only have one helmet,” Maverick said.

  Just a toy? My toys never looked anything like this.

  “It’s okay if Avi wears it,” Kota chimed in, as if she had any say at all in what was okay and what wasn’t. “I already wore it when he gave me a ride home.”

  “You rode this home?” My mom would ground me forever if she found out. She would be so ­furious she wouldn’t talk to me until I was already the ­president of the US and gave her a special award for the most patient mom in the world.

  “We can’t all ride this,” I said, trying to get between Maverick and Avi. “None of us can. It’s too dangerous.”

  My sisters pouted and protested, but how could I let them? How could I?

  Maverick scratched his head as he thought and thought. He looked like Winnie the Pooh. Adorable, but so clueless. “You’re right.”

  “Minerva, why do you have to ruin all the fun?” Kota exclaimed, stomping her foot as if she were squashing me — a cockroach — under her pink tennis shoes.

  “No, she’s right,” Maverick said, “Maybe you and Avi can sit on the scooter, and Minnie and I will walk beside you.”

  It was a perfectly reasonable solution. Then why did my heart feel like I�
�d missed out on a ride to the moon? The little ones perched on the motorcycle like queens.

  The afternoon’s breeze had a bite with the ­promise of fall already on the way. It blew my hair all over the place, like it wanted to get rid of my pitiful thoughts. How could I be jealous of my girls having a little fun?

  Just then, a police car drove by, making my heart do all the somersaults and pirouettes I never allowed the girls to try. The cop was a bald guy with a reddish mustache. He looked like he was bored. Of course he would stop us.

  Maverick waved at him, and the guy drove by, making a sign from his eyes to me that I interpreted like, “I’m watching you.”

  I shivered.

  “Are you cold?” Maverick asked. “We’re almost there.”

  I shook my head. He hadn’t seen the guy’s warning. It was so creepy I wanted to pretend it hadn’t happened, so I listened quietly to my sisters’ game of princesses flying in a magical ship guided by their noble servant Sir Maverick.

  They never named me. I guess there was no room for me in their make-believe story, but I was grateful for something to keep me distracted from the cop and his warning.

  “Their imaginations are so amazing!” Maverick said. “Kota was telling me all about the magic cupcakes and the golden coin she got for her lost tooth.”

  He gave me a look of let’s play along that kind of annoyed me. Why did he believe the lies about our mom, but when we told the truth about the fairies, he didn’t?

  “Fairy’s so nice, Mav,” Avi said in a such a funny voice that Maverick and I exploded in laughter.

  The trees’ golden leaves fell on us like rain and then crunched under our feet.

  “The fairy is nice, Avi,” Kota said, like she was the expert. “Let them laugh, but if you don’t believe, the Peques don’t leave you presents. That’s why Minerva doesn’t get gold coins for her teeth.”

  Maverick looked at me again, his lips clamped down like he was suppressing laughter, but I didn’t feel like laughing at all. Maybe my sister was right. But I believed now. How wouldn’t I after seeing the golden coin on the table? I knew for a fact I had left it behind at the school. And what about those cupcakes? No, I believed. Why didn’t I get any special favors from the Peques, then? Why wasn’t Mamá back?