9
I’m so glad you came,” Krysta says, pulling me into her enormous foyer. “This party is going to be such a snooze fest.”
“Krysta,” Mrs. Perez says in a warning voice, patting down her flawless hair. “This fund-raiser is very important to your father. I expect you to be on your best behavior.” She glances at me. “Do you want to borrow something to wear, dear?”
I look down at my skirt and blouse, the fanciest things I own, and realize they look like gym clothes compared to Krysta’s sparkly dress.
“I think I still have some stuff from a couple of years ago,” Krysta says. “It should fit you.”
As she leads me up to her room, caterers bustle around getting everything ready. The way Krysta explained it to me, the party is so that her dad can convince people to give him money for his reelection campaign.
When I’m decked out in Krysta’s hand-me-down, she takes out a pair of shiny earrings. “Here. Try these.”
“Can’t,” I say, showing her one of my ears. “No piercings until I’m an adult, remember?”
“Well, at least let me put some glitter on your eyelids!”
I’m pretty sure my parents wouldn’t approve of that, either, but I don’t object.
“You look so good,” Krysta says when she’s done making me over. I’m surprised there’s not a hint of jealousy in her voice. She really means it.
I glance at the mirror and have to smile at my reflection. I may never compare to Krysta, but for once, I actually feel pretty.
“Here. You should take this,” Krysta says, trying to give me the glitter.
“Thanks, but my mom and dad will never let me use it.”
Krysta groans. “Your parents are so weirdly strict!”
Sometimes I wish I remembered more about the way things were back home. Then I’d know which of my parents’ rules are because of where we came from and which are because they simply like to say no.
Maybe things will be different once we have our ration cards.
“Can I tell you a secret?” I whisper.
Krysta’s eyes widen, and her lips curve upward. “What is it?”
Even though Mama told me not to tell anyone, for fear of jinxing things, I can’t stand to bottle our news up inside for another second. So I go ahead and spill everything. “And the citizenship ceremony is on my name day!” I say when I’m done, practically jumping up and down. “I couldn’t have asked for a better present!”
Krysta’s frowning, so I hurry to explain. “It’s the day honoring the saint I was named after. In my family, it’s an even bigger deal than a birthday.”
I expect Krysta to jump around with me, but she’s as still as a statue.
“When is the ceremony?” she finally asks.
“Monday,” I say. “Can you believe it? In two days, I’ll finally be like everyone else.”
For some reason she doesn’t seem excited. Instead her nose scrunches up as if she’s smelled something rotten. “You’ll still be different, you know,” she says flatly. “I mean, look at Four-Eyes. He takes his rations, but he’ll never be one of us.”
The words hit me like a punch to the stomach, and I can’t stop myself from blurting out, “There’s nothing wrong with Daniel.”
Krysta’s eyebrows go up.
Careful, Mira.
“Are you friends with him now or something?” she asks.
“Of course not,” I snap.
“Krysta!” Mrs. Perez calls, knocking on the door. “Are you done in there?”
“Coming!” Krysta calls back. She dabs one last coat of clear gloss onto her lips before opening the door.
“I checked your activity chart. You haven’t practiced your piano today,” Mrs. Perez says. I can hear the sounds of the party ramping up below.
Krysta snorts. “Mom, what do you want me to do, play scales in the middle of the party? No one wants to hear that!”
“You should have thought about that earlier,” her mom says. “You know the rules. A half hour of practice every day, no exceptions.”
“But, Mom. I can’t—”
“No exceptions.”
Krysta’s face is tight, but she doesn’t argue. Instead she grabs my arm and pulls me down the staircase. It’s strange to see Krysta under someone else’s control, when at school she’s the one who makes the rules.
As we weave through the crowd of men in pressed suits and women in shiny gowns, I realize that Krysta is dragging me toward the piano.
“Does your mom really expect you to practice in front of everyone?” I ask.
“She does this every time we have people over to show off what a perfect, talented daughter she has,” Krysta says, her voice laced with bitterness. “Last time we had a party, she made me show off my fencing moves. I thought if you were here, maybe she’d leave me alone.”
I glance down at the floor, wondering if that’s why Krysta invited me to be here tonight.
But when I look up again, I realize that instead of bringing me to the piano, Krysta is pulling me over to her father.
“Dad, save me,” she says. “Mom wants me to practice piano in front of everyone. Will you talk to her?”
Mayor Perez sighs. “You know your mother. Perhaps it would be better to go along with it.” But as he dabs at his temples with a handkerchief and glances around at the growing crowd, I can tell he’s cringing at the thought of anything messing up his big party.
“How about a trade?” Krysta says. “If you help me get out of this, I won’t tell Mom you’ve been cheating on your diet.” She sounds like she’s joking, but I can hear the threat in her voice.
I expect Mayor Perez to simply laugh and tell her she’s on her own. After all, the mayor has a reputation for never backing down from a fight. But Krysta’s dad actually cracks a smile and says, “I’ll see what I can do. But never bring up the diet thing again, okay? Your mom would kill me.” Then he gives her a playful pat on the shoulder and rushes away.
“Wow,” I say. “I didn’t think that would work.”
Krysta shrugs. “My dad’s the easy one. It’s my mom you have to worry about.” She glances around. “Are you hungry?” She grabs some snacks off a waiter’s tray and then waves me toward a nearby couch. We perch on the white leather, munching on appetizers and rating everyone’s hairstyles.
“Sorry,” Krysta says after a little while.
“For what?” I ask.
“About the citizenship stuff.” She looks down at her napkin. “I guess I just got freaked out. Once you’re like everyone else, you can be friends with whoever you want.”
I blink at her. “You really think I’m only friends with you because of that?”
“Come on, Mira. I know I’m not the easiest person all the time, but…” She shrugs. “Forget it.”
I can’t help thinking back to the first time we met, when she showed up at my door, so excited to have someone new in her neighborhood. Even though we were strangers, she confessed that the other kids were scared of her because of who her dad was and that she never had anyone to hang out with. I’ve always been a little scared of her too, but I guess I’ve also always understood her. If it weren’t for Krysta, no one would want to hang out with me, either.
“You’re wrong,” I tell her. “You’re my best friend.”
She squeezes my hand, and I squeeze back. “I really am happy that you’ll finally get to use Amber,” she says. “You’re going to love it.”
“Attention, everyone!” her dad calls out. “I’d like to say a few words!”
The crowd quiets down, and everyone turns to look up at Mayor Perez standing in front of the giant white fireplace. Krysta’s mom is posed beside him, smiling as usual, even though she must be annoyed at her husband for taking their daughter’s side about the whole piano thing.
“We’ve done a lot of good in my years in office,” Mayor Perez says. “But our work isn’t over yet. There are a lot of problems to tackle in our town. In our country. We have a certain way of life here, and when I’m reelected, I will do whatever it takes to make sure our town continues to thrive.”
As I listen, I can’t help remembering what Krysta told me about her grandparents. The way Mayor Perez is talking, you’d think his family had been in the country for generations, just like his wife’s. Maybe if you think of yourself in a certain way long enough, you start to forget that you were ever anything else.
After the fund-raiser, I’m waiting outside Krysta’s house for Tata to come walk me home, when I hear Mayor Perez’s voice filtering out from the backyard.
“What do you expect me to do?” he’s saying.
“You do what you have to do,” a gravelly female voice responds. “We have to take action now before it’s too late.”
I know I shouldn’t spy, but I can’t help creeping toward the fence that lines the backyard and peering through the cracks. Inside the yard, I spot Mayor Perez standing by the shed with two older men and a woman. It seems like an odd place for a business meeting.
“There’s only so much I can do within the law,” Mayor Perez says, unlocking the shed door.
“We funded your last campaign, remember?” the man with a shiny bald head asks. “Without our support, who knows if you’ll be reelected?”
“My well has been dry for months.” The woman shakes her head, but her gray hair doesn’t move. “This can’t go on, Sebastian. You need to fix this.”
“Here,” Mayor Perez says. He hands each of the people a paper bag. “My well is getting low too, but this should hold you for now.”
The bald man glances inside, and his lined face wrinkles even more. “This is barely enough to last me a week!”
“You need to make it last,” the mayor says as he closes the shed. Before the door shuts completely, I catch a glimpse of a well inside. “If we’re asking everyone else in this town to ration, we should learn to do the same.”
The woman laughs. “Considering how much money we’re giving you, I don’t think we need to learn anything.” She marches back into the house with the bag, followed by the two men. Mayor Perez lets out a deep sigh before he hurries back inside.
I stand there staring at the shed for a long time. There’s only one reason why there’d be a well hidden in there. We learned about Amber wells in school, how they were outlawed years ago when the rationing started. It’s illegal to have one, let alone use it. But clearly Mayor Perez doesn’t care.
Krysta’s words come back to me. Everyone bends the rules, Mira.