He stepped off that bus in the dead of winter—January. The soggy gray city had made dreaming dismal.
The factories were angry monsters, but a means to an end. He took a job at the American Lard Company and roomed with co-workers. The group of men slept in shifts and rows on the floor of a studio apartment. His wages paid for the necessary with any leftovers tucked away. June arrived, and the humid heat was a stark contrast to the desert of his boyhood. He thought there could be no greater evil than the smell of boiling pig fat. Inhaling the fumes from the hot vats of lard slowed him down. But by the end of his fifth year, he started looking at properties and found a place just across the street from the park.
My abuelita Carmelita sold everything she owned to come and help him. Together, they raised enough for a decent down payment. They financed the rest with an uncle’s help. As soon as they collected the keys, they moved in. They named the bakery Burciaga’s. My dad hand-carved a wooden sign on rosewood, oiled it and hung it outside the door. They bought equipment, leaning on the building’s credit line as collateral. They invested every last penny they had and then some.
They sold everything they baked by mid-morning the first day. They even took orders for the next week. Things seemed to be looking up.
A few months later, my dad found my grandmother lying on the kitchen floor, dead of a brain aneurism. His world crumbled. Despite the loss, my dad pushed on.
“Are we going to be okay?” I looked at my dad.
My dad couldn’t give a simple answer to my question because he was hopeful. He was willing to gamble, but it wasn’t just up to him or my mom or me. Our entire neighborhood was on the line. The Nowaks, the Sanchezes, the Fernandezes, the Sustaitas, the Wongs and everyone else had as much of a stake in this.
I hurried up the stairs. I walked into my room and threw myself down on my bed. One thing was clear. This wasn’t MesoAmerica. MasaAmerica maybe. Or even MasiAmerica.
We weren’t Egyptians or Aztecs. As a matter of fact, we weren’t exactly one thing. My dad was as Mexican as a mariachi hat, but my mom had grown up right down the street. Josefina was half Polish. The Sanchez sisters had a daddy no one ever talked about. And so on.
Despite these strikes against the new plan, I still wanted to be hopeful like my dad. I would chase hope, wrestle it down and hold on to it like him.
I tried to tuck my worries about tomorrows to the back of my head. I pushed them under a doormat. I locked them in a closet with el cucuy and my other childhood monsters. I put them in my mouth and let them sit there like bites of stale bread until they softened enough for me to swallow.
Chapter 4
I scrubbed at the mixing bowls. One of the problems with being stuck inside the bakery all day was that I was sure all the more interesting distractions were somewhere else. I thought myself into a circle—or maybe a knot—like a dog chasing its tail.
I arrived at an impasse. Like I said, even if things didn’t work out, at the very least my friends and I would get to spend our last summer together.
It was something like my last meal or —since I was the Cinderella of crumbs—having a fairy godmother grant me one last wish.
I hurried to the park.
I tugged on the belt loops of my dad’s old jeans as I jogged. They hung low around my waist and the torn dingy hems dragged on the ground.
“Lovely outfit, Masi,” Josefina said. She pointed at my T-shirt. The white jersey was spotted with grease like someone had flung spoonfuls of butter at me.
“Likewise. You make a fine chorizo,” I threw back. Josefina had, with all the skill of a sausage maker, squeezed herself into a pair of gym shorts she’d probably outgrown back in eighth grade.
Josefina’s thick eyebrows locked into a menace. I mimicked her face. Her scowl deepened. “Not funny,” she said, right before her face melted into laughter.
I shrugged. “These are my work clothes. I got no one to impress.”
Marcos stepped forward from behind a nearby tree. He reached upward and pulled his hair back behind his ears. “What am I, fried cheese?” he asked.
I put my hands on my hips. “How long have you been here?” I demanded.
Marcos walked to my side in one stride. Josefina turned her shoulder and ignored him as was mandatory of younger sisters. Marcos grinned so that his high cheeks dimpled. “Long enough to hear everything, chorizos.” He jabbed his index finger into my arm like I was his little sister too.
I lost my train of thought. If I had to be completely honest—like if someone was pelting me with dried masa balls—I sometimes suffered unsisterly feelings towards him. Maybe it was that he’d grown out his hair. Or maybe I was just a sucker for dimples. I fought the feelings off, of course.
“Ow. Keep your hands to yourself.” I rubbed at my arm. I thought back at what Josefina and I had talked about. Relief washed over me. We hadn’t said anything particularly embarrassing. “We didn’t even say anything. You’re so weird,” I said.
“Whatever,” Marcos said. He strolled back to the tree and pulled his music player out of the front pocket of his Old McDonald overalls. He pulled his headphones on, let his hair fall into his face again, leaned back against the trunk, and closed his eyes.
I made a real effort to ignore him, just like Josefina had, and turned away. Casey and Stacey Sanchez trudged towards us from their mother’s flower shop across the street from the north side of the park, wearing cotton candy-colored sundresses—of all things. The boys from restaurant row also arrived in pairs. Frank and Freddy Fernandez wore rancho wear, Pedro Wong sported a tracksuit and little Iker Sustaita sported too-large fatigues—I suspected hand-me-downs from his grandfather. Colonel Franco trailed in at the end.
He moved like a slow shadow at sunset.
He paused next to Josefina and me. I nodded—a tight chin chop. He nodded back. He rubbed at his knee—I suspected an old war injury—just above the hem of his cargo shorts. “Do you want to sit, Colonel?” I asked. “We can move over by the park bench.”
“No thank you, Masi. I don’t know about you kids, but I’m done sitting around.”
He cleared his throat. We all gathered around him. His lips moved and the jet-black broom above his mouth brushed the air in front of his face. “Good morning, everyone. I’m here because I want to be here. I hope you want to be here too.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Yes, Grampa, sir,” Iker said.
“Think of this as summer camp,” Colonel Franco said. “What we’re doing is important. Everyone has something to contribute. Our first task is to collect bricks and bring them to the park.”
I nodded.
“Let’s take it from the American Lard Company, tear the place down brick by brick and use it for the pyramid,” Marcos said.
“That would be stealing,” Colonel Franco said.
The company’s four massive buildings sat forgotten at our neighborhood’s borders. I doubted anyone would even notice. “But, isn’t building on Pig Park stealing too?” I asked. If Colonel Franco was going to be a stickler for the law, I figured we didn’t own the park either.
“The park was established by the American Lard Company for its employees. They turned it over to the neighborhood when they left. The Chamber of Commerce administers a land trust.”
My mouth dropped open. Colonel Franco may as well have been talking military code. Everyone stared at him, not just me.