“You should forget about her.” He lit two cigarettes and handed me one. I didn’t smoke, just at parties, but I really wanted one.
“I know, I know.” I said and blew smoke out of my nose.
“Yeah güey, don’t you remember all she put you through? How she wouldn’t even let you go anywhere with me or Ángel without getting all jealous. She was always jealous or pissed off at you for something. No está bien. Don’t you remember?” He was talking about how any time I wanted to spend time away from her, she always gave me the questions, the looks that could last for days, and this is what he wanted me to remember right then, but that is not what came to my mind. I thought of the moment I first met Llorona in seventh grade, back when she was still known as Karina.
I had walked into the cafeteria with Ángel and Smiley who I’d recently started hanging around with and we saw Karina, Brenda, and Gladis talking quietly to each other, looking our way. I was new to the school, not having gone to elementary in Dennett, and didn’t know them. Brenda called out across the cafeteria and said, Hey you, private school kid, you with the colored eyes, venga! Come over here, my friend wants to tell you something! Some girls from another table turned around and looked at them and Brenda said, Hey feas, why don’t you take a picture? It lasts longer. All three of them busted out laughing, and I thought it was a bad idea to go over there and maybe look stupid. I looked at Ángel and Smiley then, and they cocked their heads to the side and shrugged their shoulders, telling me it was my call to make.
I walked over to the girls and Karina was laughing, covering her mouth, while Gladis was trying to clean herself up because milk was coming out of her nose. From the flash I’d seen of Karina’s teeth, they were crooked, but not like Smiley’s. The two incisors on either side of her front teeth were pushed in toward the center, making them look sharp, almost like a vampire’s. Brenda said, My friend Karina wants to know if you’d like to sit with us. I sat down and looked into her eyes, which were darker than I had ever seen, almost black. Other times, I would have said the right thing, because I had game even in seventh grade, but in that moment, nothing came to my mind. She tilted her head, leaned in close, grabbed my chin and pulled me closer to her, examining my eyes. She then reached out her hand to shake mine, but still didn’t say a word. We didn’t let go when we were supposed to release, and everyone got quiet. If there was a beginning to our going around, this was it. There was no Will you be my girlfriend, Circle Yes or No, notes, no proclamations of my love, no flowers left in her locker. It was this moment, just our hands reaching out for each other and not letting go until it was time to end it.
“Yeah, I remember,” I said now. Whenever someone told me how messed up she was, I thought about this moment in the cafeteria, the girl I knew, who was not like Llorona at all. She was the one who wrote poems about love and hope and read them to me in this shaky, little-girl’s voice. I was the only one besides Brenda and Gladis who had read her poems.
What most people like Smiley thought of when they saw Llorona was her standing up on the stadium bleachers at Dennett Junior High. She was up there all messed up on something, crying and yelling she didn’t deserve to live. I saw her leaning out on the wrong side of the hand railing with her arms out wide behind her, her feet hanging off the ledge.
This was a couple of months after we had met, after everyone knew we were together and everyone still called her Karina. The stadium at Dennett Junior High was way up there and everybody was standing around, looking up. Brenda and some other girls cried into each other’s hair and they couldn’t answer us when we asked them what was wrong with her. They kept telling me to do something, to help her and shook their hands like they were trying to get something sticky off of them. The teachers kept saying, Go to class, go to class, and pushed me back as I tried to get to her, while no one else moved or did anything.
Some idiotas in the crowd yelled up to her, Jump! Jump-up in the air. Wave ’em like you just don’t care. They said this because if she let go, she would come down for sure. Even though she didn’t need to, Brenda asked Ángel and me to jump those mensos and you should have seen them after, all cagados whenever they saw any of us.
Coach Sánchez got closer and closer to her, but she moved away from him, like he was going to hurt her. She cried harder and screamed, I’m going to jump, I’m going to jump!
Coach Bernál came at her from the other side and Karina didn’t see him because she was trying to get away from Coach Sánchez. And then she got quiet, closed her eyes and let go.
Karina started to fall backwards, her arms out wide, but Coach Bernál reached out and caught her by the wrist. He pulled her up and threw her on the safe side like she didn’t weigh anything at all. Later as I played it over in my head, I kept remembering how far away Coach Bernál had been from her when she jumped. I kept wondering how he had gotten to her so fast, how it was impossible.
The chotas finally came and all of us, we just stood out there watching them put Karina into the police car. I remember how her head was down and she couldn’t look at any of us. I wanted her to see my eyes, to know that we were all glad she hadn’t killed herself. Karina needed to know that counted for something. They took her away to Charter Palms where they put her on suicide watch. All her girls went to go see her, taking her flowers and stuffed animals. I went with them, but had nothing to give her, only my love.
I remember walking into Charter Palms, the woman inside the window asking me to sign in, telling me I had to wait a while because there were too many visitors. I sat down and Coach Bernál was there. I wanted to ask him how it was he had reached out to her, but I didn’t say anything. I just sat there while he tried to talk to me.
Cirilo, right? But they call you Güero, right?
Yeah, that’s it.
Coach Sánchez told me about you. He says you play real good B-ball. You ever thought of going out for the team? You’re built for it.
I went pssh. Basketball didn’t mean anything. Football was the only sport anybody cared about. The basketball teams played whole seasons with only two or three people watching, and these were just girlfriends or moms.
No vale, I said.
Anyway, son. He was one of those coaches who called his players son. He was trying to treat me like I was one of his football players so I would talk to him, so he could be the important male role model in my life for fifteen minutes. I came here to visit Karina. Were you at school today? Did you see what happened?
I thought, I did and I saw how you reached out for her, how you were the big man and all of us little boys couldn’t do anything. I said, Yeah I was there.
It was a miracle, let me tell you, that girl wasn’t supposed to die today. I don’t know how I caught her, but I did. It was incredible.
I said, Ya’mbre, you did a great job, we all love you. You have made such a difference in our lives. Teacher of the Year. At least you should get a nice coffee mug out of this.
Coach Bernál interrupted me and said, No son, that’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying that that girl, she’s special. You’re her friend and you need to take care of her. Tell her that life is good, that it’s worth living.
Brenda and Gladis came out and they were crying, holding each other all dramatic like they’d just lived through a bombing or hurricane. The door buzzed and the lady in the window said it was okay if I went in now. Coach Bernál nodded at me to walk in and I was glad I didn’t have to listen to him anymore.
He said, You can speak words of life or death to her, son, it’s up to you.
What was up with that? My words never killed or saved anyone and never would. They were just words and always would be.
I walked into the cafeteria where they let everyone visit and there were families at tables, talking all quiet. All I could hear were their voices and the juice machine humming. When she saw me, she walked up real fast and held out her hands.