Please Don't, page 13
I change it up some, fingers drumming on the steering wheel, rolling my shoulders. “What? What are you trying to say?”
She shakes her head and eats. The song turns to static, I hit scan on the radio. “Whatever. I’m a great dancer. And you should hear me sing.”
“I have, even over the mowers. I think we’re safer with the dancing.”
“Okay, show me what you’ve got then.”
“Um, no,” she deadpans.
I snap my fingers. “You know you want to dance. What sort of music do you like, anyway? I don’t even know.”
She looks at me, then back to the window, then back to me. I shrug. “Come on, I know you like Al Green, right? Mom’s got some other stuff in here, in the visor above your head.”
“Well, I like country music.”
I turn to her. “No. Please say you’re kidding. You are kidding, right?” Wow, I think she’s blushing. “Seriously?”
Molly squints at me. “Oh, I’m sorry, was I supposed to say mariachi music?”
“No, I…” I look out the windshield, then back to her. “That’s not what I meant.”
She looks down to her lap. The song ends and some other old song cranks up. She flips the visor down, looks to me with a smile, and laughs. “Nat. I’m messing with you.”
“Oh.”
Molly fiddles with her ponytail, pulls it tight then lets it go. She shakes her head. “You’re too easy sometimes.”
Up ahead the sunrise charges into the sky, pink and red and bleeding through the clouds. I drive straight for it, at least until the interstate where the traffic picks up with commuters.
I change the dial on the radio. “I can try to find a country station if you want.”
She starts giggling. It’s a beautiful giggle, like a child, the way she loses herself for a few breaths, gasps then grabs her sides and tries to reel it back in. I’m so glad I got to know it, know her, because most people have never heard Molly Martinez giggle and that’s just a shame. Soon I’m laughing too.
“You know what, you’re getting Reverend Green.” I hit the CD button and the drums roll in as I can’t get next to you plows into the speakers.
Things calm down in the car. Down the road I turn to her again. “So you’ve never spent a day away from your sisters? How could you be so cool the other day when they went to the museum?”
She looks over to me, eyes heavy with a smile. “Because you were a wreck.”
“Huh. I really had no idea you were so slick.”
She sits back, her eyes taking in the road, the horizon. “But no, I’ve never left them. I mean, the other day, I got to see them off, you know? But I’ve never left home, really. I walk them to and home from school. To the park. Everywhere.”
“Wow. What did you tell your mom?”
She exhales, sets her head back, and closes her eyes. “She thinks I’m wasting my time. She doesn’t trust lawyers, she says I’m going to get myself arrested. But I’m not, this is just as important for her as it is for me.”
I nod, like this is some casual conversation After all this time we’ve spent together, it’s still weird to think we’re doing this. Part of me enjoys it, how Molly’s comfortable talking about this with me. My old friends and I talked about going to Cancun, crossing borders, and partying. We never once worried about freedom or rights or police. College was assumed. Same for cars, clothes, success in general. But another part of me is still stunned. I mean, this is what is important to Molly. Basics.
I glance over to her again. “So, what do you want to study? In school?”
Without hesitation she turns to me. “I want to go into child development. Teaching.”
“Yeah?” I say, nodding. “I can see it.”
“I mean, this workshop. It’s something, you know. Otherwise, my whole life will just be, I don’t know, waiting. Does that make sense?”
“Yeah,” I say, because waiting I can relate to. “It makes a lot of sense. Like with my mom. I come home, make sure she’s okay, but I never feel like I’m moving forward. And now with this board hearing, I mean, yeah. Waiting.”
She nods, sets the banana peel in a grocery bag she brought for trash and takes a huge breath. “You know, today, hopefully there will be people who can help with applying to college.”
It’s almost a whisper, like college is a dream, a birthday wish not to be uttered out loud. I start to say something, to remind her she makes straight A’s and college shouldn’t be in question. But sometimes Molly just needs to talk without me talking over her. Besides, our roads are so different, even when we’re on the same path, like right now. Here I’m headed to a swanky hotel conference center, Molly is going to a workshop for undocumented students.
She sighs, looking out at the cars on the road. “I might, I mean, there’s a chance I could even get financial aid, grants, scholarships, even though I have no social security number. I never knew this could happen. And now, well, at least there’s hope, right?”
I drive, unsure how to respond. Hope. Dreams. A pursuit of happiness. An honor student—despite the distractions, disruptions, the constant threat of upheaval—determined to better herself. So she risks everything to find that hope, that dream. She’s hoping to find hope. And even that causes her guilt.
Again, I can’t think of anything to say, and yet I see no reason to turn the stereo up. So we drive for miles without saying another word, within the growl of the Honda, the flutter of the plastic bag in the window, barreling down the same path towards our biggest fears.
23
In Northern Virginia, the traffic squeezes in around us. The lights take longer, the driving more stop and go—which doesn’t do my brakes any favors. We pass one string of shopping outlets and hit the next, thrown to a grind of four lane traffic, work trucks, commuters, vans, pickups, motorcycles, and some seriously brave bicyclists.
At the red lights, I watch Molly take it in, the girl who’s never been anywhere. I watch her tense and startle and shrink into herself. The day has gotten warm and I set the windows down, stuffing the trash bag window under the seat. The Honda seems like it’s aged a few more years during the trip. I keep an eye on the climbing temperature gauge. A little less than half a tank of gas, but I pull into Sheetz to top it off and so we can get snacks.
“I have snacks.” Molly holds up her book bag.
I hold up my empty coffee mug. “Yeah, but I need more caffeine.”
I park and she starts to get out but the door handle sticks, and so I hop out and rush over to her side, making a show of getting the door. “Madam.”
Molly looks down to the door handle. “Such a gentleman.”
The place is packed with people pumping gas, getting breakfast, getting on with their morning routines. I grab two biscuits and a coffee, offer one to Molly who shakes her head. I try not to notice her eyes shooting around, looking for trouble. But where I used to joke and try to get her to talk, now the whole situation just makes me mad.
Back in the car she relaxes. But not me, not for the first time it occurs to me how Molly dresses, the way she fixes her hair and never wears jewelry or even earrings. I take in her maroon t-shirt and khaki shorts, how she keeps herself as plain as possible, so she never draws attention. And my anger only builds, watching this amazing girl—someone our school should be parading around as a model for middle school kids—tuck herself in and hide from the world.
I pull out of Sheetz and we get about one hundred feet before a red light. I squeeze the steering wheel, but then shake it off. Because we’re going to try, we’re both driving up here to at least try and do something about our lives.
I turn to Molly. “Have you ever driven a car?” She squints at me. I shrug. “I’m just curious.”
“Actually, yes. I have driven a car once.”
“Yeah?”
She smiles. “I used to sit on my dad’s lap. He’d do the gas and brakes and I’d steer. Does that count?”
I squint my eyes in mock deliberation. “Hmm.”
“I drive better than you,” she says, nodding ahead. “You’ve almost rear ended ten cars now. And you pulled out of there like you were trying to kill somebody.”
I turn to her, ignoring that last part. “What? I am a cautious driver.”
“You hardly pay attention. You’re too busy fixing your hair, or, are we still calling it dancing?”
“I’m not fixing my hair,” I tell her, throwing it back. “This doesn’t need fixing.”
Molly busts out laughing. “Yeah, okay.”
We hit a light and I make a show of braking early, leaving three car lengths ahead. Molly rolls her eyes and calls me impossible. But I’m still hung up on things. I try to frame my question delicately, but it’s easier just to ask. “So, I mean, can you apply for a license?”
She cuts her eyes to me, then shakes her head. “Nope. At least not in Virginia.”
I tap on the wheel, taking this in. “Well, you could live up here. Take the metro.”
I’m determined not to sit here and stew. I can’t spend this whole trip feeling sorry for Molly Martinez. She doesn’t want that. It’s why she answers me the way she does, short and quick, her voice light and dismissive, ready to move on.
Eventually, we go back to the silence. We drive without talking. A few forever-long stoplights and I’m fiddling with the radio when Molly turns to me. “My dad had a truck. It was registered in a friend’s name. A Ford, he loved it so much, used to wash it every Saturday,” she says with a laugh, “even though it had all these dents and rust spots.”
“So what happened to it?”
She looks at me like I’m crazy. As though whatever happened, her dad’s truck was the least of her concerns. “I don’t know.”
I get back to the radio, for something to do. Maybe to dance and try to make her laugh. But when I go to put the reverend on Molly smacks my hand away. “Okay, Al Green is great and all but we need something else to listen to.”
“Be my guest. I was just about to start singing, though.”
“I think you should go,” she says, handing me Mom’s Mazzy Star CD. I raise my brow, shrug, then set the CD in the player. The drifting strums of Fade into You set me back into my seat.
I wouldn’t be making this trip, considering a possible face-to-face with my dad, if it weren’t for her. And I no longer sit around feeling sorry for myself and about what happened since Molly and her family moved in. I’m inspired, for the first time in a long time.
But I can’t show her, so I look around like a smartass. “Go where? I’m driving.”
She doesn’t laugh. “You know what I mean. Go see them. Go get some answers.”
Molly works my phone. She instructs me on the exits to take, which lanes to be in. Besides the directions, things have gotten quiet in the car, the closer we get the more we fidget. I can’t tell if she’s anxious or excited or both like me. From what she told me earlier, she’s attending two or three workshops. The first is titled, Know Your Rights, hosted by an ACLU lawyer. Know your rights, I repeat it in my head. Even after my own fall from grace, it’s humbling. Never once did I consider my rights. It was like oxygen. Just there.
It takes us nearly forty minutes to navigate traffic past the leafy trees and over a few bridges to a much more industrial setting. We find the building. We’re running late as we pull down Canton Street. Molly is fumbling with her bag, zipping, tightening, her hands a whirl of activity as we pull up. It’s on the back end of Milton Row, a low slung, dirty beige building. It’s a crappy place to go searching for hope. It looks about as inspiring as a day at the DMV.
I peek to my right, Molly is quaking with energy.
“Do you want me to come in?” I say, watching the people milling around the door. I catch bits of Spanish, some staggered English, pieces of other languages. Everyone is brown or black and they all share the same weary gaze of desperation in their eyes.
Molly shakes off her nerves and brushes a strand of hair from her face. “What? We just talked about this. Go to your thing.”
A quick shrug. “I told you, I’m not going.”
She manages a grin. “Sure you are.”
I look away from her, to the people lining up to find hope. Molly dips her head to meet my eyes. “Look, we both have goals today. And we are both going to meet our goals before we go home.”
I nod. “Wow. You really do sound like a teacher.” Molly scolds me with her eyes. I squirm. “So I just barge into this…whatever the hell it is and stroll up to my dad. Kristen. What then?”
She lowers her head. “Improvise.”
“Improvise. That’s your advice?”
“Yeah, I don’t know. Tell your dad you came to see him. Give him a hug.”
“What? No. I’m not hugging my dad.”
She shrugs. “You want to see him. If you didn’t, we wouldn’t be here. This was kind of your thing before it was mine, remember?”
“Yeah but…”
She’s got all her stuff in her lap as she turns to me. “I’ve got to go. Now you go.”
Out the windshield the white sky still holds a pinkish tint. “I’ll be back at three. Right at three, okay?”
“Mmm hmm.” Her eyes float over to the people, the traffic, the vendors setting up for the day. I’ve never seen her so nervous.
“You okay?”
She takes a quick breath, nodding, finally meeting my eyes. “This place is crawling with lawyers. If I’m not safe here, well, there’s really no hope at all, is there?”
It’s a big question, one I can’t answer. We say goodbye, and again she tries the door, and again it sticks. It must be broken now, and so I leap into action, which means nearly getting creamed by a moving truck.
Molly eyes me like a crazy person as I open her door. She steps out with her bag, brushes her hair out of the way. “Well, thanks.”
“Call me if anything comes up. I’m just like, you know…” I turn, as traffic whizzes by. “I’ll be somewhere nearby, I think.”
She laughs, an honest, nervous laugh. “Okay, three. All right?”
I nod. She starts for the building and I watch her walk down the sidewalk, getting smaller and smaller until she turns, opens the door, and enters the building.
24
The truth is I didn’t have to punch Mr. Meyers.
In those first seconds after I ripped him off Molly, he turned to me, furious, wild, and for a second his face settled into the usual pretentious way he regarded me in class. And somewhere—if I’m still being truthful—maybe it wasn’t only protecting Molly that led to him lying on the floor, hands at his face, his nose leaking blood on the tile.
Afterwards, I stood there, hulking over him, somewhat aware of that silent promise I’d made. Molly had already run off by then. And as it began to settle in, what I’d done, I scooped up my research papers—spattered with Mr. Meyers’ blood—and set them on his desk before scurrying out to the hallway.
I left my chemistry teacher in the other room, crumpled, writhing around, moaning, kicking his feet into the shelves. An hour later I sat in Principal Vicks’ office, staring at my research paper on her desk, sealed in a plastic zip lock bag, like some ghastly piece of evidence in a murder case.
Meyers wasn’t in the office or at the school. Mrs. Vicks sat rigid behind her desk, clutching her phone in case I lunged for her, explaining to me how poor Meyers was at Woodberry Memorial Hospital. He would have to take medical leave, because I’d assaulted him. Assault. I was too busy rolling my eyes to say much.
She said he likely wasn’t going to press legal charges, which he certainly could, she wanted me to understand. She seemed to be studying me. I should consider myself lucky for that, she said. I couldn’t go around using my size to bully people—teachers or anyone else. I could have injured him much worse.
I sat in the chair, blanking out as she recited the school’s zero tolerance policy. She already had my transcript at the ready and quickly pointed out how my grades had plummeted in the past year. Did I have anything to say for myself?
By the time I thought about explaining what had really happened, I thought back to Molly, the sheer horror on her face in those seconds afterwards. The slight shake of the head, the whisper in her voice as she pleaded, begging, just before she ran off. So that left me in the office with Mrs. Vicks. And as she stared me down, waiting for what I had to say, I wasn’t sure why, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
So I had nothing. Nothing when she shook her head in disappointment. Nothing when she suspended me for the rest of the year. Nothing when the school board sent mandatory expulsion papers to my house. Nothing but my own arrogance. Because back then, I assumed it would all blow over. I’d watched my dad get out of speeding tickets, find loopholes when he did his taxes. I’m from Fenwick, and kids from Fenwick Estates didn’t get expelled. They didn’t get charged for weed or underage drinking. Things just kind of worked themselves out.
But things haven’t worked out.
And if that wasn’t enough, I learned the rest a few weeks later, near the end of the school year, when I ended up at Molly’s door—my very first trip to the lovely Lafayette Estates. But my words left me when Molly’s face went pale and the terror came over her all over again. I held my arms up, assuring her I wanted no trouble. This was before I knew anything about her, and I thought she’d be itching to tell her side of the story. I needed her to do that.
So I got her the job, or a shot, as Virg called it. I explained it to her as I took in the chipped concrete stoop, the muddy yard, and the torn screens, the shredded vinyl siding. The confederate flag across the street. And then I left. Molly never said much of anything. But she showed up for work the next day.
Virgil made her cut the hills and shovel mulch out of the truck and do all the grunt work. But she kept coming back and never complained and he said she could stay. A few times I approached her about Meyers, but it was clear she wasn’t going to talk about it. And the more Molly showed up and refused to talk, the more it sunk in: I was completely alone in this.
