CHAPTER THREE

I am who I am, and I will continue to be.

—PAT NIXON

Sunlight peeks through the gap between Mom’s lavender curtains. It glints off the gold rim of my Lady Bird Johnson teacup. The first day of sixth grade. I had woken up on my own, without the alarm clock, like I always do on days when something important is going to happen. But I don’t get out of bed right away. Serving us breakfast in bed on the first day of school is another one of Mom’s traditions—although Maribel always says it wasn’t a tradition until I started school.

Maybe it’s babyish—my sister would say so—but after everything that’s happened, I’m looking forward to Mom’s first-day breakfast. To something being the same as it used to be. Last Saturday, when Dad made his weekly check-in call, I asked him if he would drive up to Nana’s house so he could be here, too. He said he would try. I didn’t believe it, though. Not really. I don’t think he did either, and anyway, I’m not surprised he isn’t here this morning.

My sister is still asleep in her bed against the opposite wall. Her arms are flung over her head, but even when she’s sleeping, she seems so sure of herself. Unstoppable.

I wonder if Mom will bring Maribel breakfast in bed, too. It’s not the first day of school for her, since Maribel isn’t in school anymore, a subject she and Mom have been fighting about most of the summer.

A floorboard squeaks under the hallway carpet. I pull Nana’s crocheted afghan up around my neck and turn toward the wall, pretending to be asleep so Mom can wake me.

Then I listen more closely. These footsteps aren’t like Mom’s, not quiet and creeping. There’s no clink of dishes on a breakfast tray. I open my eyes, sit up, and see Nana silhouetted in the bedroom doorway.

“Mija?” she whispers. “Are you awake?”

“I’m awake. But where’s Mom?” I lean forward, trying to look beyond Nana, into the hallway.

Her shoulders drop. “Your mami left early to help Tía Carla open the salon for one of those too-important-for-business-hours clients of hers. Ven, I have breakfast ready for you in the kitchen.”

Just then, Maribel jolts upright and runs a hand through her hair. “Wait, she didn’t take my car, did she? I need it. I have Alma appointments scheduled all over town today.”

Nana grimaces. Maribel groans.

“What about Grandpa’s car?” I suggest.

My grandfather died when I was still a baby. I used to think that if I closed my eyes and tried hard enough, I might remember his voice. His smell. The color of his eyes. Something left over in my memory. But it never works.

Nana keeps his big, gold Crown Victoria parked on one side of the driveway. She doesn’t drive it very often, but she washes it every Saturday morning, no matter what.

“Sí,” Nana agrees. “If you take Griselda to school, you can borrow your grandfather’s car for the day.”

“Fine,” Maribel says. She yawns and drops back onto her pillow.

Nana checks her watch. “Ándale, then—both of you better get moving if you want to be on time.”

I stretch, swing my legs off the bed, and pull a pair of faded gray jeans out of my suitcase. I grew over the summer, and the pants are sort of short now. But if I cuff them at my ankle, it almost looks as if that’s the way they’re supposed to fit.

Next, I unfold a sleeveless button-up shirt, the same violet-blue of wild forget-me-nots. I haven’t worn it all month, half hoping that when I finally put it on again, it might feel like something new. Like last year, when Mom left a sundress with tags still attached hanging off my bedroom door for the first day of fifth grade.

It was that spring, the school year almost over, when Maribel and I got home and found Mom and Dad waiting for us on the living room sofa. Something was wrong. It wasn’t just that Dad was home so early. There were times when projects at work made him late for dinner every night for weeks on end, but other times were slower: mornings when he was still in pajamas, dunking crumbly pink polvorones in his coffee when I left for school, and afternoons when he was already at home, weeding our garden when I got back. Last spring was one of the slower times. Maybe it had gone on for a little longer than usual, but I hadn’t thought much about it.

Instead, what made everything seem wrong that day was how still Mom and Dad were, as if they were posing for an old-fashioned camera, the kind where, if you moved, it ruined the whole picture. No one was saying anything. No one was even looking at me. Outside, in the cul-de-sac, an ice-cream truck played “Pop Goes the Weasel.” I remember hoping that, whatever Mom and Dad had to tell us, they would hurry up and finish before the truck drove away. I wanted an orange Creamsicle. No kidding, that was the biggest thing I had to worry about back then. I thought.

Finally, Maribel walked into the living room and sat in an armchair opposite our parents. I followed her, relieved someone had broken the eerie quiet spell and actually done something, had unfrozen us.

“Is it your bid, Dad? What happened? Did you get the contract?”

I had no idea what Maribel was talking about, or how she knew what was going on. Dad dropped his head. Mom looked at him, then looked at us.

“No,” she told Maribel. “He did not get the contract.” Then she took a deep breath and let it out slowly, as if she were blowing out candles on a birthday cake, only she knew none of her wishes would ever come true. She clapped her hands on her knees and looked at me and then my sister. “Griselda, Maribel, listen. We are losing the house. We need you to know this is not forever—and everything’s going to be all right.” It was her gentle but steady voice. The voice that said, “Pay attention,” but also, “Don’t panic.” It was her voice for scraped knees and waking up from nightmares. “It might not seem like it at first, but everything is going to be just fine. Everything is fine—but we’re going to move in with Nana for a little while—”

Maribel interrupted. “So that’s it? You’re just going to stop trying? Game over?”

Dad got up off the couch, ran his hands through his thick black hair, and walked over to the window. “Maribel, I owe money to three different banks. No nursery within a hundred miles will sell me anything on credit anymore. The truck needs new brakes, and I can’t pay for those either. So, unless you won the lottery and forgot to tell us, then, yes. That’s it. Game over.”

“For how long?” she demanded.

“At least through the end of your senior year,” Mom said. Her voice was as steady as a heartbeat. Pay attention. Don’t panic. “We want you to graduate with your class. After that, I’m not sure—we need to sort some things out. Dad needs to find some more work.… You know we’re very lucky we have family we can turn—”

“Dad has to find some more work? Why can’t you get a job? What, little Griselda can’t survive without Mami at home to fix her an after-school snack every day?”

Dad wheeled around. “Maribel, you will not talk to your mother—”

Mom raised a hand to hush them both. She closed her eyes and swallowed. When she finally spoke, her words were quiet and clipped.

“Of course I’ll try to get a job. Of course I have been trying. But Maribel, it’s not that simple.”

Maribel looked away and threw herself back into the armchair.

I was trying to keep up, but I didn’t understand and no one was explaining anything. We were moving in with Nana. Dad was looking for a job. Mom was looking for a job, too. Neither of them could find one. Maribel blamed me for… something.

“We’re losing the house?” I finally blurted. “Where is it going?”

“Oh, Geez.” Maribel got up and stalked out.

We started packing the next weekend.

One by one, I took my teacups, delicate as eggshells, off the shelf above my desk. Stamped on the bottom of each was a quote—something wise or clever a First Lady had said or written. I read every word as I rolled the cups in bubble wrap, but nothing the First Ladies had to tell me was very much help.

I emptied my closet and swept all the barrettes and hair elastics out of my bathroom drawer. I went to the garage where I had stored some summer-blooming flower bulbs—dahlias and ranunculus and begonias. I didn’t know where I would ever plant them. Or when. But, just in case, I wrapped them in dishtowels and packed them up, too.

Dad left his truck at the mechanic’s and drove Mom’s station wagon down to Los Angeles. It’s where he grew up, where his brothers, my tíos, still live, and where he thinks we have a better chance of starting over.

Now whenever Mom needs a car, she takes my sister’s. If I were Maribel, I guess I’d want to win that silvery-purple convertible, too.