Merci Suárez Changes Gears Read online

  I climb up on the stool next to Lolo, who is perched at his usual spot in the corner, acting more or less like himself again, thank goodness.

  I biked over to El Caribe as soon as I got home from school. It’s peaceful in here today, nothing like Sunday mornings, when the line snakes all the way out the door and people shout out their orders to Tía for takeout coffee, pastelitos, and warm loaves of bread. Everybody knows this is the best bakery between Miami and Tampa, so it gets crazy.

  Tía Inés is busy refilling the cups of toothpicks that are decorated with mini Cuban flags. “She can’t stay long, viejo,” she tells Lolo. “Merci has to help Abuela with the boys today.”

  We both stare at her.

  “Oh, she needs help, does she?” Lolo says. He’s still bitter about the new arrangements. Abuela is going to be walking the twins to and from school, too. She bought new kicks at Foot Locker just for the job, white Chucks that I may have to borrow from time to time when she’s not looking.

  But he’s not the only one annoyed.

  I should mention here that 1) no one ever asks me if I want to babysit the twins, 2) Roli almost always gets out of it thanks to his tutoring job and working on his college applications, and 3) I get paid exactly zero for keeping them from swallowing pennies and running blindly into traffic. How am I supposed to buy a bike when nobody pays me for anything?

  “I wish you’d find somebody else, Tía,” I say. “There are kids at school who took that Red Cross class and actually want to babysit. I can get you names. Hire them. I won’t be able to watch them once soccer season starts, anyway.”

  She frowns at me. “Who in their right mind would hire a stranger to watch their kids when they have relatives around?”

  I sigh. It’s no use fighting. When it comes to helping, the motto around here is family or bust.

  “Can’t I at least have a snack before I go?” I say. “I’ve had a long day, in case you’re interested. And I’ll need my strength for the twins.”

  She sizes me up and slides over a small guava square, still warm, on a plate. “Ten minutes, then out you go.”

  “Put it on my tab, Inés,” Lolo tells her.

  “I already have, Lolo,” she says. “Along with the three smoothies.” She takes the glass from him. “Are you even watching your sugar the way the doctor said last time? Repeat after me: diabetic coma.”

  Lolo ignores her. Instead, he turns to me. “Bueno, ¿Y qué me dices? What’s the news from the sixth-grader?”

  “I was starting to wonder if you’d ever ask,” I tell him. “Bad news. Edna Santos — remember her?— she’s in lots of my classes, and I’ve been drafted into a club that I hate.”

  “Oh. Me, too. The Old Man Club.” He chuckles at his own joke.

  “I’m in the Sunshine Buddies,” I say, rolling my eyes, “which means I have to pal around with a new kid instead of getting ready for soccer tryouts. And he’s a boy, which Edna thinks is hilarious. She’s going to bug me about it every day, I just know it.”

  I take a savage bite of my pastry.

  Tía Inés stops what she’s doing and wiggles her eyebrows at me. “Well, so what? Is the boy cute at least?”

  I give her a steely look. This is almost as bad as dealing with Edna’s teasing. Tía just loves the idea of love and romance. “Cute if you like giants,” I say. “You can’t miss him. Michael Clark is almost as big as Papi.”

  “A six-footer?” Lolo says, whistling.

  “Ah. Tall, dark, and handsome,” Tía says. “I’ve always been partial to that type.”

  I glare to let her know I mean business. Then I scroll through my photos until I get to the shot I’m looking for. To kill time as we waited for our rides home, I was turning kids into animals. I snapped a picture of Michael and turned him into a moose in honor of Minnesota, but I chickened out before I could show him. What if he thought I was saying he looked like a moose?

  “He’s the biggest and the whitest boy I’ve ever seen.” I hold up the original shot of Michael as evidence. “There is either no sunshine in Minnesota, or this kid is a vampire.”

  Lolo squints at the picture. “You’re still wearing your azabache, aren’t you?”

  “Sometimes vampires are nice,” Tía says, wiggling her eyebrows again.

  I lay my phone on the counter. “The solution is to drop out,” I say.

  “Of school?” Lolo asks.

  “I meant the Sunshine Buddies, but now that I think about it, why not the whole thing? I already have a career plan, you know.”

  “Of course! CEO of Sol Painting, Inc.,” Lolo says, patting my back.

  “Ave María”— Tía Inés closes her eyes —“this again.”

  I give her a dark look.

  Sol Painting is Papi’s company, but it’s only a matter of time before I’m running the show. It’s not like Roli is ever going to step up when Papi retires. He hates painting, for one thing, and his spackling is a disaster. He should definitely stick to easier things, like sewing people’s limbs back on or inventing new substances.

  “You’ll see,” I tell Tía. “One day, I’ll be rich. If I were you, I’d start being a lot nicer to me if you want me to pay for the twins’ college.”

  “But what if you change your mind?” Lolo asks. “You’re young. It happens, you know.”

  “Oh. I know,” Tía Inés says, interrupting. “She’ll become a waitress here at the bakery.” She waves her arms across the expanse of the counter. “Behold your empire. Wiping crumbs from a counter and listening to the same tired jokes from your nonpaying customers.”

  “People have always liked my jokes,” Lolo says.

  “Listen, Merci, just be nice to the new kid and ignore Emma.”

  “Edna,” I say.

  She rolls her eyes. “Who-evah. And you,” she tells Lolo, “stop encouraging a dropout. She’s finishing school and going to college like her mother. They all are, even the twins — if I don’t have to send them to reform school first.” She checks the clock and pulls the plate away from me. “Time’s up. Off you go.”

  I slide out of my seat, but Lolo swivels his stool toward me. He puts his big hands, warm and callused, over mine. All at once, I remember that day when he taught me how to tie my shoes, two rabbit ears twisting together, those chapped fingers guiding mine.

  “I have a job proposition for you that may get your mind off your troubles. It involves money.”

  “Then I’m listening.”

  “Your Papi booked a big job coming up soon, and it’s going to pay nicely. Why don’t you come along with us, too, and lend a hand?”

  “Where’s the job?” I ask.

  He pushes up his glasses and chuckles a little. “Where is it again, Inés?”

  “At the beach clubhouse.” Tía is standing by the coffee maker as she reminds him. Her voice is soft but he hears it just the same.

  “Exactly. At the beach clubhouse,” Lolo repeats. “We’re painting the bathrooms.”

  I scrunch my nose. “All day in the john?” Last time I helped paint trim at the marina on Singer Island, I smelled like bait for days. This could be worse.

  Lolo pats himself on the belly. “I can guarantee you twenty dollars, plus a delicious hot dog and soda if you say yes.” Lolo used to be in charge of payroll before Mami took over the books. Lucky for me, he still manages the petty cash.

  I put on my poker face. Lolo has taught me everything I know about the art of making deals. Rule number one: Never settle for the first offer.

  “I don’t know. I might have plans. How about making it thirty bucks instead?”

  His eyebrows shoot up. “That’s robbery, Mercedes Suárez!”

  “I’m saving for a new bike.” I pick some fluff off the seat of my jeans and hold it up. “For obvious reasons.”

  He purses his lips as if he’s bitten into a lemon. Everybody knows Lolo’s a tightwad.

  “Come on, Lolo,” I coax. “Your only granddaughter needs new wheels. Kids like Edna Santos are rollin
g around on two-wheeled Cadillacs this year, and what have I got?”

  He glances outside at my bike, which I parked right next to the one he’s been riding for years. They’re practically time machines.

  “You’re a ruthless negotiator,” he says at last. “I like it.” He sticks out his hand. “Thirty bucks.”

  “Then I’m in.” We shake on it, and I’m gone.

  “HIS EYEBROWS ARE WEIRD,” Edna whispers. “Pale but so bushy!”

  I pretend I don’t hear her — as I have tried to do all week when she brings up some other dumb thing about Michael Clark. So far, we are up to sixteen mentions, which have included comments on his sneakers (some mountain-climbing brand), the color of his eyes (like shark skin), how his voice squeaks (kind of adorable) and blah, blah, blah. I just don’t get it. Edna made a big deal of the fact that I have Michael as a buddy, but now she’s the one who can’t seem to take her eyeballs off him. Seriously, you’d think he was a hunk like, oh, say, Jake Rodrigo, the star of all the Iguanador movies. Now that’s dreamy. A long braid down his back. Dark skin. Muscles. And those green eyes with reptilian pupils, not to mention his aeris zoom that lets him hover and glide through the air. I keep a magazine poster of him in my locker. Edna saw it and rolled her eyes. “He’s fake, you know,” she said. “Maybe, but he’s still better than the real boys around here,” I said.

  Including Michael Clark.

  Besides, who actually cares about the hair above somebody’s eyelids, except Edna? I’ll bet she noticed his brows only because she plucked hers over the summer. I still can’t look at her without feeling pain. Tía tried to convince me to thin mine out at the beginning of the summer. “Just over the bridge of your nose,” she said, coming at me with tweezers. When she yanked out the first hair, I was sure my brain came loose, too. No, thank you. I hid in my room all afternoon.

  “Look,” Edna says again.

  All the other girls in our group turn to Michael’s table and gape. Wouldn’t you know it, mojo strikes again.

  I shift in my seat, trying to follow what Ms. Tannenbaum is saying about our first learning packet in social studies. She’s a thin lady with unruly hair and hippie clothes, right down to her sandals. She’s everybody’s favorite teacher. We’re starting a big unit on ancient cultures that will last until December. The first and most boring part is about a place called Mesopotamia, so it’s taking some work on my part to look interested. Project number one: we’ll be making a relief map of the Tigris and Euphrates river basin.

  I’m actually a little worried. Not about the map itself. Ms. Tannenbaum is big on projects, which should be fun. But the trouble is that she’s even bigger on building group skills. “The world is interconnected. Collaboration is the key skill of the future,” she claims. Which means, you don’t usually work alone and in peace, the way I like. Instead, she wants you to learn by solving problems with others. So, here’s lesson number one, which has nothing to do with rivers. When she says, “Get into groups,” you better move fast or you’ll be a leftover and get placed in a group where the kids will look at you like you’re bringing the plague. Case in point: I was looking for a pen when she gave the word this morning. I stood there feeling like an orphan until Ms. Tannenbaum walked me over to Edna’s bunch and said I was joining them, even though the group was already full.

  “Have you even said hello to your buddy, Merci?” Edna whispers as Ms. Tannenbaum goes over the scoring rubric. “It’s Friday. You should have done it by now, you know. Miss McDaniels said that we have to check in every week, remember? You’re going to get in trouble.”

  “Shh.”

  “Just trying to help,” she says.

  “Girls, is there something you want to share?” Ms. Tannenbaum stares at us from the front of the room.

  “No, miss.” I give Edna a sharp look. How can I possibly pay attention with all her yapping?

  Of all my classes, this is the one I most wish I didn’t have with Edna. I’ve been looking forward to having Ms. Tannenbaum since Roli was in her class all those years ago. Her big claim to fame is the Great Tomb Project. Every year, her whole classroom and the surrounding hall are turned into a life-size walk-in tomb. All semester, you work on building it, and then your parents come to see. It gets in the newspaper and everything. But now I don’t know how much fun it will be with Miss Boss-of-the-Universe Edna around.

  “I encourage you to dig deep. Be daring in your thinking!” Ms. Tannenbaum says.

  About maps?

  “Be responsive to one another as you plan your projects,” she says. “Your group skills will be reflected in the grading.”

  A groan rises, but she doesn’t bat an eye.

  I check over her point system. Factual accuracy: 60 points. Originality: 20. Cooperation: 20.

  “If there are no more questions, you may begin.”

  The girls in my group go back to whispering and giggling about Michael as Ms. Tannenbaum starts to roam the room. I glance over at him guiltily. It’s true what Edna says. Not about his eyebrows, but about the fact that I haven’t exactly said hello yet, even though we were supposed to. But how can I? If I hang around Michael, Edna will probably start in about how awkward it is. Or worse, she might start asking me a million questions about him. Besides, Michael Clark obviously doesn’t need me to reach out. The boys in our class already seem to like him just fine. They talk to him as if he’s been here his whole life instead of five measly days. He’s that always-popular type. Or maybe they’re scared of him. A kid that big can probably do some damage.

  “Staring at your boyfriend again?” Edna asks.

  “Quit it.”

  “Boyfriend?” Rachel’s mouth drops open and her blue eyes get big. It’s like she’s going to pee her pants. “Are you going out with Michael Clark or something?” Rachel likes to be shocked by everything. You got a B? (Big eyes at you.) You live in Greenacres? (Hand over mouth.) But nothing thrills her more than love. Last year, when she saw two eighth-graders kissing behind the gym, I was sure she was going to spontaneously combust. She could barely catch her breath to tell us. I saw that same pair of lovebirds kissing behind a tree in the parking lot where Mami sometimes waits for us if we’re staying after school. To me, it looked like they were sucking each other’s faces off, like in a sci-fi movie. There were sound effects and everything. I wasn’t sure either of them would survive. Honestly, it was scary.

  “No, he is not my boyfriend,” I say.

  “Boyfriend?” Hannah sighs and makes a face. “My mom won’t even let me go to the mall without her.”

  Edna gets a devilish look in her eyes. She balls up a sheet of paper and tosses it at Michael’s table. She’s a lousy shot, of course, so it misses him completely and hits Lena instead.

  “Airmail?” Lena asks, opening it. “In invisible ink?”

  “Oops,” Edna says. “Michael!” she calls. “Merci needs to talk to you today.”

  “Stop,” I say, pinching her.

  “Ow!”

  He looks up from his work and then over at us. It turns my blood to ice. Thankfully, the boys in his group are in no mood for Edna today. A few of them make ugly faces at us, just like the twins do to me at home. Then they turn away.

  “How rude!” Edna calls out, giggling. “I hate you all.” It’s new this year, that giggle, and it definitely doesn’t say I hate you. It’s more like look at me, look at me, look at me. All I know is that it’s going to be tough to listen to it all year. Maybe I’ll invest in a pair of earplugs, like the ones Lolo uses when Abuela is watching novelas.

  “Focus, scholars!” Ms. Tannenbaum calls out.

  Edna taps the learning packet icon on her tablet and skims over the directions for the project. “OK, Merci, make a doc for notes. We’ll start with supplies. Who’s going to buy the clay?”

  “Clay?” I ask.

  “To make the relief map. Hello?”

  Edna thinks so quickly. If she weren’t annoying, it might actually be an asset.

  “I
’ll get it,” Rachel says.

  I open a new file for our group, but I don’t write anything under my heading for materials. A clay map is fine, but I have other ideas about how to make a map, too. Ms. Tannenbaum told us she wants us to use unusual supplies. Only yesterday, I helped Abuela straighten out her sewing room. It’s like a treasure chest, since she throws nothing out. “Everything has more than one use in this world,” she always says about even the smallest fastener or elastic band. How about all those things? We could use the green satin that was left over from a blouse. The coffee cans are filled with buttons of every color, too. The glassy ones that look like fish eyes could make a great river — and nobody else will have those.

  “I have another idea,” I say.

  But no one is listening to me.

  “Are you sure he’s in sixth grade?” Hannah whispers, still staring at Michael. “Has he been left back or something? He’s ginormous.”

  “Ask Merci,” Jamie says. “She’s his girlfriend, right, Edna?”

  I give her a stony look. “His Sunshine Buddy, and I have no idea. Why do we have to use clay?”

  “You have Michael Clark as your Sunshine Buddy?” Rachel’s voice is practically a scream. The boys look over at us and scowl again.

  Edna leans forward, smiling. “I know, weird. Anyway, he can’t have been held back. We don’t take dummies at Seaward. Duh.”

  Sure we do, I think.

  “I can print out good fonts for the legend and stuff,” Jamie says. Her dad owns a print and design shop.

  “Perfect,” Edna says. “Merci, are you taking notes or what? We need them in the classwork folder at the end of the hour. Don’t get us in trouble.”

  “Wait. Why am I the secretary?” I ask.

  Edna squints her eyes in Michael’s direction again. “His hair is long,” she says suddenly.

  Seventeen mentions and counting.

  The others look over at him, unsure what to say. I sneak another peek. Michael’s white-blond hair hangs over one eye as he works. It’s thin hair, straight and shiny.