On our way to my house after school, we barely speak, still too shaken from what happened in the hallway. I chew on my nails as Keisha completely unravels the bottom hem of her shirt, nervously pulling on threads. Juan Carlos picks off every scab on his knuckles.
The waves pounding on the beach usually calm me. I make up melodies in my head that go along with their rhythm. But I can’t hear them now. The only sound in my ears is the Luck Eater’s snarl.
“Diapers.”
I shake my head, snapping myself from my thoughts. “What’d you say, Juanito?”
“Diapers. I have to pack diapers in Señor Listopatodo if things like that are going to happen,” Juan Carlos says, shuddering.
The seabirds flying above squawk as they watch us hurry down the sidewalk to my house. We huddle together and look around every corner for a shadowy man in black. When we reach the front door, our sighs of relief fill the living room. Passing through the kitchen, I grab a handful of ajonjolí candies to share with Keisha and Juan Carlos. We find my abuelitos in the backyard, arguing over a mango that has fallen from a tree.
“Hi, Abuelitos!” I call, hoping my voice covers the uneasy feeling that still swirls in my stomach. I open an ajonjolí candy, popping it into my mouth, but the sticky sesame taste doesn’t make me forget the sourness of school.
“Ay, mi vida,” Abuelito says, smiling and inviting me in for a big hug. I let the softness of his guayabera shirt surround me, and I breathe in the scent of his oaky cologne.
I look across the yard to the metal firepit where we burn effigies on New Year’s Eve, and I spot a small piece of partially burned green fabric sticking out of the ashes, a remnant of Papi’s effigy.
“¿Y la escuela? ¿Cómo les fue?” Abuelita asks as Abuelito releases me. I sit down with Keisha and Juan Carlos on the steps of the patio and pass an ajonjolí to each of them.
Keisha inspects the candy closely before popping it into her mouth. “School was . . . interesting,” she says.
“Por supuesto que es interesante. Hay tanto que aprender,” Abuelita shoots back, her hands on her hips.
I shake my head. “That’s not what Keisha means. Of course, there’s a lot to learn. But that’s not what made today interesting. There’s just some weird stuff going on that we’re trying to figure out.”
I’m not sure how to explain it in a way that won’t make my abuelitos think I’m one domino short of a full set.
Keisha speaks up before I can. “So, um, Mr. and Mrs. Feijoo, do you think we could ask you some questions about Cuba? It’s for a school project.”
Juan Carlos raises his eyebrow at Keisha, and she shrugs her shoulders, a determined look set on her face. I tug at the edge of my hoodie. My abuelitos never talk to me about what happened in Cuba, but maybe they’ll tell Keisha and Juan Carlos.
“You all present Cuba?” Abuelita asks. She looks at each of us, and her eyes stop on me. I squirm.
“Sure,” I say, scuffing my feet on the wood slats of the patio deck. I don’t like lying to my abuelitos, but I don’t see any other way. Pipo said that calling on the dead was a family trait, but I’ve never seen my abuelitos do such a thing. I can’t tell them I’m trying to make the ghosts of more relatives appear to help me because I’ve been cursed by the Luck Eater.
That’s not Peak Cubanity.
That’s Peak Insanity.
Abuelito shouts loudly, making us all jump. “¡Así es! Sabía que eran los más inteligentes de todos.”
Juan Carlos laughs, and Keisha turns to me so I can explain.
“My abuelito says we’re the smartest out of everybody for picking Cuba,” I say.
Keisha smiles softly and gives Abuelito a shy wink. “I’m okay with that.”
“What you need to know?” Abuelita asks, sitting at the patio table with Abuelito.
I take a deep breath and drum my fingers on my knee. Pulling my diary out of my backpack, I try to decide how to get Abuelita to talk about family members who might help us with the Luck Eater.
“So, we could present all these facts about Cuba, but we thought that would be pretty boring. I thought if I talked about family, that would make Cuba a little more real to everybody.”
I look at my abuelitos warily. I don’t want to upset them by making them talk about something they want to avoid.
Abuelita smooths her hands on her skirt. “Bueno, you want to know about family?”
She pauses and looks out into the yard, watching the green jays peck at another fallen mango. The birds pick at the orange flesh, and my eyes widen when short, fat worms pour from the fruit.
Maggots.
I look at Abuelita, but it’s obvious that she doesn’t see the same thing as I do. I squeeze my eyes shut, shake my head, and try to focus on getting the information I need.
I clear my throat, wracking my brain. That’s when I remember.
“When you gave me my diary for New Year’s, you were looking at your Bible, and I saw the family tree in it. There was one name that stuck out—Fautina. Is that where Liset got her middle name from?”
Abuelita twists her hands in her lap, still staring off into the yard as thick clouds float overhead. For a moment, I’m afraid she’s going to change her mind and not say anything. That she’ll come up with a sudden chore she has to do in the kitchen and leave us stranded in the backyard.
“Ay, she is my abuelita like I am yours,” she finally says. “She make the best arroz con pollo.”
“Abuelita, you make the best arroz con pollo,” I say, my voice shaking. She’s oblivious to the maggots squirming out of the mangos and into the grass. Past the mango trees, on the wooden fence that borders our yard, I notice red marks seeping out of the slats. Squinting, I recognize what they are.
Bloody handprints inching toward the firepit.
Juan Carlos looks at me and raises an eyebrow, but I shake my head. We have to keep going. I know we’re onto something. Something that the Luck Eater is trying to stop us from getting.
“Who you think I learn from? She teach me tostones, croquetas, picadillo, frijoles, flan . . . all the best food,” Abuelita responds. A grin spreads over her face. It’s the first time I’ve seen her smile when she talks about someone she left behind in Cuba.
Abuelito pats his belly and chuckles. “Gracias, Santa Fautina.”
“So she was a pretty good cook?” Keisha asked. “She probably would’ve gotten along with my grammie.”
Abuelita nods at Keisha, as if energized by our interest in Fautina’s food. “Claro. But she not only cook. She tell stories. She tell me all about our family. All they do, who they are. The best stories. So real. Like picture on television.”
Juan Carlos looks at me and nods. Keisha scrawls everything Abuelita says in her notebook.
It sounds like Fautina might have been able to do what I can do.
The wind picks up in the yard, ripping Keisha’s paper out of her notebook. It shoots across the yard toward the firepit.
“Get it!” Juan Carlos yells.
We all jump up, chasing after the paper as it sails through the grass.
Keisha reaches the paper first as it lands in the firepit. I come up behind her and reach between the ashes and blackened twigs for the page, but just as my fingers touch it, the paper bursts into flames.
“Mari, look out!” Juan Carlos says.
I pull my hand back and clutch my fingers. The paper is consumed in flames until it’s nothing but gray ash.
“How . . . how is that possible?” Keisha stammers.
“Because we’re close. I can feel it. The Luck Eater is trying to stop us,” I whisper to Keisha and Juan Carlos.
Looking across the yard to the back fence, I’m proved right. Because the bloody handprints are gone. Instead, uneven red writing over the knobby wood taunts me.
NICE TRY.