Our sad gray house creaks and moans in the hot Los Angeles sun like a tired elephant waiting to die. I’ve made a nice brown puddle with a trickle from our leaky hose and Mama shares chisme with Rolando’s mom across our chain link fence.
As I plunge my battered G.I. Joe into the homemade swamp, I hear Mama’s tongue cluck, sharp and angry, while she hears how our chubby and happy priest has been sent away because he got caught with some pictures of a couple of altar boys.
I don’t know what the big deal is. It’s nice to have pictures of your friends. And that priest has so many friends. Friends like Claudio and Enrique from school. And me, too.
But he’s gone now, some place far away like Orange County, and Mama just shakes her head the more she hears while bubbles rise up from my drowning soldier.