Hank dropped Ana on the sidewalk like a bag of garbage.
He didn’t actually drop her, because he didn’t touch her. Hank no longer touched anything, if it could be avoided. He swore his stupid fingers had nearly broken just from lifting a glass of milk to his mouth at breakfast, but Hank thought he had played it pretty cool. Apart from the Milo thing.
He also played the short drive to Eustace High pretty cool. As bad as it was with Milo, Hank could still look at Ana, even if every time he did, he remembered the red-and-white night when Luz left while Ana bled from her head and Hank bled from his hands and Milo’s face remained pale and bloodless in the kitchen—
“Hank,” Ana murmured, “the light’s green.”
Hank drove, tapping his fingers on the wheel to make sure they still existed.
He tried to play dropping Ana off at the entrance pretty cool, too. He didn’t want her to know he still saw her as bloodstained. It wasn’t her fault.
Dad used to warn Hank about Ana. “You can’t fight a sister like you would a brother, Hank,” he’d scolded once, after he caught them roughhousing on the living room floor, cackling like demons. “Girls should be treated gently.”
Neither Hank nor Ana had put much stock in that, because Mom said Dad would know better if he’d ever had any sisters of his own. “Girls are just people, Hank, and you treat them like people.”
There remained nothing gentle between Hank and his sister.
“I’m gonna park and head right to Coach Huang’s office. Meet me by the gym after school.”
“See you.” Could she really, though, through eyes like that?
“Hey, wait. Check the glove box. I might have some sunglasses you can borrow.”
“Cool. Why don’t you hand them to me.”
Hank stared at Ana. Not her eyes, but as close as he could manage. “Look, I’m just trying to be nice.”
“Like you were nice to Milo?”
He hated her tone, mostly for its complete lack of venom. “Stop it.”
Ana popped open the glove box and retrieved a pair of wannabe Ray-Bans. She set them in her pocket and pushed open the door.
Hank almost offered to check in with her at lunch, to make sure her first day wasn’t as horrendous as it could be. He thought it, but didn’t say it.
He watched Ana in the rearview as he pulled away. She stood alone under the flagpole, hoodie zipped to the top despite the late-summer heat. After a moment, she tugged the glasses from her pocket.
Hank put eyes back on the road and yelped, dropping a huge foot on the brakes—
He’d been inches from smearing Carmella Spalding and her usual herd of girlfriends across his windshield. Carmella smacked his hood with the flat of her hand. A short girl flipped him the bird before hurrying to the safety of a sidewalk.
God, Hank would give anything to be that sure-handed. To smack something and leave an impact. Maybe he’d be better off driving with his elbows. Hank stared at his hands on the wheel, willing a smile back onto his face. It wouldn’t come.
An SUV honked, urging him forward.
He sat in the student parking lot for some time, catching his breath.
If Luz were still here, no way Hank would have almost run over some classmates. He wouldn’t have had to brake, even. Luz would have steered the car away for him, regardless of where Hank was looking.
Or maybe Luz would have driven the car right into the girls, just to see what would happen. To see if one of them might puncture a lung and perhaps die.
Hard to know, with Luz. Luz was always so curious.
And one of the things that piqued his curiosity most, the whole time Luz lived with the Vasquezes, was death. By the end, half the questions Luz asked, half the words he wrote with Hank’s hands, on whiteboards and notepads and once on Hank’s bedsheets with a Sharpie, were along these lines:
Does every creature die? When that happens, does the consciousness end? Will you die? Do you look forward to it? Is it difficult?
Now Hank whispered this into his empty cupped palms: “Luz, dying’s the easiest thing in the whole damn world.”
Coach Huang’s face was hard to read on the best of days and bordered on expressionless on the worst. His upraised eyebrows made him a stranger when Hank used an elbow to knock on the door to his paper-strewn office.
“Hank. You’re welcome to sit.”
“I’m here to apologize.” The seat was too small for Hank, but most seats were. “For what happened. At tryouts? I was being an idiot.”
“I’m still not clear on what was going on there, Hank. As far as I can tell, you had a tantrum and stomped out. Didn’t show your face all summer.”
“Yeah. I’m sorry. About the, um, tantrum, and missing practice. All of it.”
“It didn’t seem like you.” Coach Huang rubbed his chin. “I gather you had a lot going on. With your family.”
“I … yeah. It’s really not a big deal. I mean. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Didn’t ask you to.” Coach Huang’s face reverted to stony. “I’ve been your coach for three years now, Hank. You’re the first to make assists but reluctant to receive them. I know better than to expect you to ask for help.”
Hank shot him a smile he hoped was sheepish. “Sorry, Coach.”
The bell rang. Bleeping echoed through the gym beyond the open door. Hank itched to hear the familiar squeak of gym shoes on polished wood, if only to remind himself he missed it.
“Well, I appreciate the apology. You should extend it to your teammates, too.”
Hank winced. “Yeah. Okay.”
“Okay.” Coach Huang smiled. “I have to tell you, Hank, I’m relieved. I wasn’t sure you’d be joining us this season.”
“Well, I really love basketball, Coach.”
“I know. We missed you at camp. But right now you don’t want to be late for your first class. I’m not writing you a pass.”
“Yeah, save the passes for the court, right?” Hank’s laugh was too sharp.
“Exactly. Out. I’ve got a whole class of freshmen to tame.”
Hank fought the urge to check where his hands were. “But. So … about practice?”
“Oh. You didn’t pick up a schedule, did you? I have some here somewhere.” Coach Huang pulled a stack of blue flyers from under a stack of green ones. “Tack that to your fridge. And have your parents—sorry, your mom—sign your permission slip and bring it back for me ASAP.”
The flyer crumpled under Hank’s fingers. “This is the JV schedule.”
“Yes. I’ll see you at practice tomorrow after school. Varsity and JV are alternating days this year; there are too many of you guys to handle all at once.”
Hank cleared his throat. “Yeah, that’s fine. Cool. But last year I was varsity …?”
Coach Huang sighed. “And this year you are not.”
“I was a starter.” Was smiling still a good idea? “I played center.”
Coach Huang remained impassive. “Are you going to make me say more?”
“We made finals.”
“And this summer you showed up an hour late to tryouts, bullied one of your teammates, and didn’t bother coming to a single practice afterwards. So you’re on the JV team, Hank. And you knew that when you came in here.”
Hank couldn’t stop showing his teeth. “But … my family … this summer.”
“I saw the fumigation tent. And I heard rumors. But am I supposed to kick out someone who worked hard for months to make way for you? No. Did you know that one of your teammates lost his sister this year? Another watched his parents get deported. They both showed up. Bigger trouble than termites, but they still showed up.”
“It wasn’t termites,” Hank muttered.
Coach Huang opened his mouth and closed it again. “Well.”
“Coach. I have to be back on the team. Basketball is all I’m good for.”
“You say that, but I’ll need you to prove it during practice. Understand? Earn your place back. You burned a lot of bridges, Hank.”
How did anything happen anymore?
“Yeah. Okay.” Numb hands, numb lips, numb (somehow) teeth. “Totally.”
Coach Huang stood up and reached out a hand.
Don’t be limp fish, Hank willed his fingers. Please be real.
Coach Huang locked eyes on Hank’s grip. The shadow of a frown touched his features. “You’ll need a new one of those, I guess.”
The blue schedule was torn in two.
When had that happened? Had Hank made it happen, or had his hands …?
No. Luz was gone. Anything these hands did now was Hank’s doing.
The second bell rang. Hank was late.
“Sorry.” Hank grinned wide and wider still.
Just outside the door, Tim Miller, the tallest point guard in the region, the guy who had taught Hank to dribble back in elementary school, was leaning against the wall opposite Coach Huang’s office.
Hank’s smile crystallized. He froze in the doorway.
Tim Miller straightened up. Handsome gray eyes narrowed to pencil-lead points.
“Hey, Tim!” Hank said, too cheerfully.
Tim didn’t say anything. He waited for Hank to pass.
Hank held his breath until Tim was behind him. Four steps away, Hank exhaled—
A globule of Tim’s hot spit struck the nape of Hank’s neck.
“Faggot.”
Hank didn’t stop. As he left the gymnasium, his grin kept on expanding sideways, another canyon opening.