---

 
After my mother died, my stepfather, Walter Bowes, moved to a new town and remarried in less than a year. Jolene, my new stepmom, at 23 was only eight years older than me. She had blonde hair, long legs and a very good figure. She’d been a dancer in a club until she got hurt in a motorcycle accident.

We got along pretty good, I guess. Jolie, as she preferred to be called, drank a bit, so did Walter and if they both were drinking, I found that it made sense for me to get out of the house. They didn’t always fight but they always ended up making love and not always in the bedroom. I slept on the roll-away bed in the living room and sometimes they used that.

So, one Thursday night, very late, I escaped into the night and met Danny Valenzuela.

I’d met him before, at school. Danny was a senior and I was a junior because way back when I was little and my Dad was alive, I started school in the fourth grade at the age of nine. I’d been home-schooled before that and got ahead of the public school classes.

I’m not really a brain though, not like my Dad who had a Ph.D. and an M.D. So by the time I got into high school, I wasn’t anything unusual as a student except that I was shorter than almost everyone.

Anyway, Danny and I had P.E. together in the spring. He’d been on the football team in the fall but he had a fight with the baseball coach and had to take regular P.E. the last quarter of his senior year.

He was nearly a foot taller than me, a big muscular guy that the colleges had already scouted for football but his grades were not so good. Rumor at school said that he ran with a gang when he was younger and maybe did drugs or even sold them. Some of that stuff was true and some was just lies.

That night when I left the house, it was so late even the fast food places would all have closed their lobbies and only have their drive-thrus open, if that. The nearest all-night cafe in our town was more than a mile from our house, out on the highway. I had a little money, enough to get some french fries or maybe some eggs and toast, so that’s the direction I headed.

About half-way there, a big dark-colored car pulled to the curb in front of me and the passenger-side window rolled down. I heard a voice call out, “You in trouble? You need a ride?”

I shook my head and said, “No. I’m just walking.”

The sound of the engine changed and then the driver-side door opened and Danny got out where I could see him in the light from the open car door. “It’s me, Bobby. Danny Victor.”

I moved a little closer. “I thought your last name was Valenzuela?” I said.

“It is. But I’m Danny Victor on the street. A cop called me that once.” He smiled, his teeth and eyes very white in his dark face. Someone told me once that Danny was half-Puerto Rican and half-Portuguese and hates for anyone to think he’s a Mexican, even though most of his friends are chicano.

“Oh,” I said. “What are you doing out so late? It’s after two in the morning.”

He laughed. “What are you doing out so late? I can take care of myself, chica. Uh, chico.” He paused. “Sorry. Naw, I was taking my girl home, but you got school tomorrow.”

“So do you,” I said and he laughed again.

“Hop in, if you ain’t going anywhere in particular, I know the way.” He tossed his head toward the other side of the car. So I climbed in.

This was back in the late seventies when a lot of big old fifties cars were still on the road. I think this one was some kind of Chevy. It had a big bench seat in front with leather and velvet upholstery. A huge bent iron bar with a knob on top came up in the middle from the floor; the shift lever, I guess, though it looked like something from a truck.

He saw me looking at it and said, “Four speed. Someone added that on for drag-racing before I got it.” He would have told me more about the car but he must have seen my expression because he just laughed and apologized again. “Sorry. You not too interested in cars?”

I shook my head.

He put the car in gear and pulled away from the curb. “Wanna get something to eat? Parker’s Pancakes is open.”

That wasn’t the nearest chain diner but a better local cafe at the other end of town. “I guess so,” I said. “I don’t have much money, though.”

“Eh, little thing like you, you probably don’t eat too much. My treat.” I could see his grin in the dark.

We got out to the highway and went through the middle of town with all the stores dark and the only place lit-up inside the police station. We didn’t see much traffic, either. Since the freeway went in, most people passing through don’t drive through downtown. We passed the road that led to the freeway on-ramp and headed on out to Parker’s which is sort of out of town.

We hadn’t said much or I don’t remember what we said when Danny suddenly asked. “How long you wanted to be a girl?”

I reached for the door handle but he used the electric to lock it on me and when I unlocked it, he said, “It’s okay. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

I still preferred jumping out of a moving car to answering that question so I just shook my head and kept unlocking the door and trying to get it open before he could re-lock it. He pulled into the lot at Parker’s and drove around to the dark back side with me crying and choking and moaning.

When he got the car stopped, he finally let me open the door and I started to climb out.

“Wait,” he said. “I’m not going to beat you up or nothing. That’s what you’re afraid of?”

I nodded, holding the door open, ready to run.

He reached up and turned off the dome light. “Don’t wanna attract bugs or winos,” he said. “Let’s just talk for a minute.”

Home was now clear at the other end of town, maybe six or eight miles away. I decided I didn’t have much choice. “Okay,” I said. “But I don’t want to talk about that.” I realized that he smelled of beer, like my parents, step-parents. I scooted a little further out the door, just barely on the seat.

“We’ll go in and eat in a minute, but I do want to talk about it. It’s the most interesting thing about you,” said Danny.

“Please,” I said.

“You think nobody knows?” he asked after a long pause.

I felt tears running down my face. “Please don’t tell anyone.”

“Bobby,” he said, his voice soft. “Most people would know if they thought about it. ‘Course most of them are dumb, they probably just think you’re a queer.”

My head jerked and I almost ran.

We sat there for a while longer, not saying anything, not even hardly moving. I didn’t know what to say or do.

“There’s tissues in the glove box,” he said after a bit.

I opened the box and found them, a little packet made for cars. I wiped my eyes and put the packet back, holding the wadded up tissue in my hand.

“Give me that,” he said. He took it and put it into a plastic bag that hung under the radio. “Feel better?”

“I guess so.”

“Okay, let’s go in and eat. Only place in this part of the world will make you a waffle after midnight,” he said. “You like waffles?”

We got out. “Um, yes. But I’m not very hungry,” I said.

He laughed. “Girls always say that before they eat a bunch of stuff.”

“I’m not... I’m not....”

We walked into the light from one of the poles in the parking lot. “For tonight you are, you’re my girl tonight.”

“I’m not.... And you have a girl, you said!”

He waggled his dark eyebrows at me. “She ain’t here and you are, chica.”

He took my hand and I let him and we walked into the cafe together.

---

 
We sat in a booth under the big wide windows, I scooted in and Danny sat next to me. I felt very odd about this.

The waitress came over and glared at Danny. She looked to be about sixty, older than my grandmother who was the only blood relative I had left alive. Her name tag read, "Cora."

Danny grinned at her and blinked his brown eyes rapidly, pretending to try to look innocent. I noticed how long his lashes were.

"What are you doing out at this time of night with this child?" the old woman asked. "Daniel Victor!" she added.

"I found her," said Danny. "She followed me home, can I keep her?"

I blushed and very nearly ducked under the table to hide.

Cora glared at both of us, her own dark eyes snapping with annoyance. She snorted. "One of you ought to have good sense," she said. "How old are you, girl?" she asked me.

"Um," I said. She thought I was a girl? I had hair down to my shoulders but this was the seventies, more than half the boys my age had long hair. I wasn't wearing even one piece of girl's clothing, no make-up or jewelry.

The only reason she thought I was a girl was that Danny said so.

She turned on him. "Well, do you know how old she is?"

"She's sixteen," said Danny. "Her folks had a fight and she left the house in the middle of the night and I saw her and brought her here to feed her so I can take her back home in an hour or so. I know her from school."

Near enough the truth. "F-fifteen," I said, correcting the least important error.

" ¡Ay!  ¡Dios mio!" said the waitress. "Robbing the cradle, and she's got no more shape than a boy!"

I blushed again.

"Hey!" said Danny. "You going to hurt her feelings, tá­a. Bring us some waffles and eggs and a platter of bacon."

Cora snapped open her order book and demanded. "How do you want your eggs?"

"Eyes open," said Danny. "Chica? How you want your eggs?"

"Scrambled," I said, trying not to stammer.

"To drink?" asked the waitress.

"Milk, please," I said.

"Milk for both of us and leave the cow," said Danny. "Oh, and before you ask, her name is Barbie Wilson and she lives at...." And he totally made up an address!

I stared at him.

"That right, honey?" the woman asked me.

Danny nodded at me so I nodded too.

"Is he being a gentleman?" she asked.

"Oh, yes, ma'am," I said, looking at her and nodding again.

She huffed but turned and headed back to the kitchen. "He better, he knows I can tell his mother on him," she muttered.

"She thinks I'm a girl," I whispered to Danny.

He grinned. "Well, you are, aren't you?"

"I'm not...." I couldn't think of what to say.

"Look," said Danny. "You walk like a girl, you talk like a girl, you act like a girl. Why wouldn't she believe it?"

"I'm wearing...I'm not wearing...I mean," I didn't know what I meant.

Danny waved a hand. "Girls wear boy's clothes all the time. Shows you're cool." He grinned. "And you even wear boy's clothes the way a girl does."

"I do?" I said. "How?"

He shrugged. "I dunno. But when you came into the boys' gym one day, first of the semester, four or five guys did double takes. And you weren't dressed much different than you are now."

Cora came back with two tall glasses and a pitcher of milk. "Is your mother Tillie Wilson?" she asked me.

I shook my head. "No ma'am, my mother's name is Josie, uh, Josephine. She hates that," I added, amazed at how easy it came to expand on Danny's lie. My real mother's name had been Emily, and she hated the nickname Emmie.

The waitress snorted. "She doesn't know you're out?"

I shook my head. "I'll go back when they stop throwing things," I said. "They won't even know I've been gone."

" ¡Que cosa!" she said and left again.

Danny drank an entire glass of milk at once and poured another one. He had milk in the little dark hairs on his lip that would be a mustache if he didn't shave for a few days.

"Drink you milk," he said.

I drank some and put the glass back down. I felt scared but relaxed, like you feel when you go out on stage but you know you know all of your lines and everyone else's too. But I didn't know my lines, I didn't have lines.

"You're very pretty," said Danny.

Like that. I had no idea what to say. I touched my face, my hair, put my hand back in my lap and just smiled at him.

He laughed, drank some more milk and took my hand with his free one. "No one tells you, you're pretty?"

I shook my head.

"'S true," he said. "Swear to God. Get you fixed up, nice clothes, some makeup, do your hair, you could be a princess." He squeezed my fingers, gently.

I squeezed back, not thinking.

"Chica, you would like that? To be a princess?"

"I...." I settled on nodding.

"Okay," he said.

Cora brought our food; two plates with the wide old-fashioned waffles, not the tall kind they call Belgian in some places. Two other small plates had eggs, mine scrambled and Danny's sunny-side up with the whites still looking a bit runny, and a platter with eight pieces of crispy bacon. "You want syrup?" she asked.

"Yes, please," I said. The waffles already had butter in a big melty lump.

Cora pulled a bottle of syrup out of the pocket of her apron and put it on the table. "Enjoy," she said.

Danny dumped his eggs on top of the waffle and began cutting it apart with his knife and fork. "How many bacons you want?" he asked.

"Uh, two?" I said.

He nodded and picked up six of the pieces and crumbled them on top of the pile of egg-soaked waffle.

I poured syrup on one corner of my waffle and took a bite. Pretty good. A bite of egg and a bite of bacon and I smiled at Danny.

He smiled back then he took the parsley from the bacon platter and tore it to pieces on top of his waffle, egg and bacon monstrosity.

"You want syrup with that?" I asked, pushing the bottle toward him.

"Yuck," he said. "Syrup? Not that stuff, it's just flavored corn syrup and water. If you had real maple, maybe." He shook his head, "But no, my mom and grandpop are both diabetic so I don't use sugar, most things."

"I thought your mom was Portuguese," I said, as if that made sense.

"Who told you that? No, I guess she might have some Portuguese, lots of Hawaiians do. She's Samoan, Hawaiian, Navaho and black. My dad's from Puerto Rico, so he's probably part black and part Indian, too, but mostly Spanish."

I blinked. Even counting Jolene's Louisiana French mother who wasn't really a relative, Danny's mix of heritage was much more varied than my Scots-Irish, English and German.

Danny had black, curly hair, dark skin that was close to cinnamon in color, and light brown eyes with green and gold flecks in them. He had a big head on some very wide shoulders. His features were regular with his nose not too big or too small, just right for his face. His lips were full, especially the lower one and they stood out from the color of his face, very red.

"You're staring at me," he said between bites. "Eat your waffle."

We ate and didn't say much until we had finished.

"That would have been better with cilantro," he said, "but this is a gringo place."

I smiled at him.

He looked at me, drank some milk and looked some more. "So you like guys, huh?"

I know I must have turned bright red.

"Must be hard–no joke–for you to go to boys' P.E. class," he said.

I had to have gotten even redder.

He laughed. "So, you like me? 'Ey?" He waggled his eyebrows and blinked his long dark lashes.

I looked away. I could probably have stood in for a stoplight then. Miserable with a forlorn sort of ache I didn't have a name for, I just nodded, still not looking at him.

When I had my face under control and did glance back, he winked at me while picking bacon out of his teeth with a corner of a business card he must have had in his pocket. "'Scuse me," he said but kept right on working on his dental hygiene. I turned away again.

"Chica," he said after a minute or so. "I'm done being disgusting." Under the edge of the table, he took my hand again. "You gorls," he deliberately said 'gorls' like a movie Mexican, "you don't like to watch a guy do that kind of stuff." He laughed.

I shook my head, trying not to blush again. Every time he referred to me as a girl, it made me want to run away but it made me happy, too.

He squeezed my hand again. "I guess I could stand to have two girlfriends, 'ey?"

---

 
When we finished eating, Danny paid the check, leaving a big tip for Cora. Then he walked me back out to the car with his arm around my shoulder.

"You ever had a boyfriend, chica?" he asked.

I shook my head. It was too dark outside to tell if I were blushing.

"Or a girlfriend?"

"No," I said.

He took my hand in his and squeezed it. "The important thing about having a boyfriend is you got to do just exactly what you boyfriend tells you to."

I couldn't tell if he had said that with a straight face or not. I must have made a noise because he said, "Don't laugh." So of course I did and he did.

In the greenish light of the parking lot lamps, I saw him shake his big head. "I'm going to have to talk to Sylvie about this. See if she'll let me have another girlfriend. I think maybe so, she sees how cute you are."

I didn't want him to tell her. I didn't want her to say no. I didn't want this little fantasy to end. I couldn't imagine it continuing and I didn't want to think about it ending. "D-don't tell her," I said.

He laughed again. "Oh, I got to tell her. If she find out I don't tell her, she cut off my balls, maybe you not too fond of yours but I like mine. Then she mail mis huevos to her uncle in the Marines and when he come back he will cut off my cabeza." He made a snick noise as he sawed at his throat with the side of his hand.

I knew he must be joking to make me feel better. But Sylvia Montez–we were both juniors, she had just turned seventeen, a slender, dark-haired girl in my English and American History classes, co-editor of the school paper. Very pretty and not stuck up; just until that moment, I had liked Sylvia. Suddenly, I almost hated her.

"No, don't tell her," I said. "This is just silly. I'm not a girl, I can't be your girlfriend. I...you...we're just pretending."

He didn't say anything for a bit but he squeezed my hand again. When we got to the car, he opened the door on the passenger side for me. I scooted in and he closed it, his expression serious as if he were thinking.

He came around the other side and climbed in, almost too big even for the old oversize car. He put the key in the ignition but didn't turn it on yet. In the darkness, we just sat there for maybe a minute.

I could only see his face as a darker profile against the night sky outside the driver side window. "I can't think of you as anything but a girl now," he said. "It's going to be too weird to see you in P.E. tomorrow." He started the engine and looked over his shoulder to back up. "You going to be naked and I'm going to get a hard-on." He laughed.

The dash lights had come on. Before we started forward, Danny turned on the headlights and we cruised slowly through the parking lot to the highway. I didn't know what to say. Actually, I usually skipped taking a shower after P.E., since it was last period I could get away with that. For the last two years or so, seeing naked boys made me feel–exposed?

But I would have to change clothes, wear gym shorts and a t-shirt, then change back. With Danny there, thinking of me as a girl...that would make it more difficult.

Danny steered the big car back toward town. "And those other guys, looking at you. It's going to make me angry. I might do something to them if they say anything to you."

"I–what?" I said.

"I don't know," he said. He flashed a grin at me. "I'm jealous."

"B-but..."

"You said, you can't be my girl 'cause you're a boy. But you're not really a boy. Tell me the last time you felt like you were really a boy?"

There must have been some time but I couldn't think of any.

He snorted. "I see you back in junior high school. I think, there's a pretty girl but no, you're a boy. But I watch you and you're not a boy."

"F-four years ago?" I said.

"Three or four, yeah, I guess. But you too young then. You play with the girls at lunch, it doesn't matter if you're a boy or a girl." He sighed. "But now.... The guys at school pick on you?"

"Some," I said. "Not too much, I guess." Some kids got harassed a lot more than I did. "It was kind of bad when I was a freshman."

He snorted again. "Anybody touch you, chica, you tell me. I don't want you being naked in front of all those guys. I'll think of something so you don't gotta go to P.E."

"L-like what?"

"I dunno yet. I'm smart, though." He grinned again. "I'll think of something."

I couldn't think of anything except maybe forging a note from a doctor but that would just get me in trouble sooner or later, so I kept quiet.

The streetlights on the west end of town are all butter-colored and everything under them looks either yellow or black. On the east end, where I lived, streetlights on the highway are blue-violet – most things look blue or purple except red things are sometimes yellow and green things are black.

We drifted through the quiet downtown area with the old-fashioned white streetlights and out to the residential area on the other side. I wondered if Dad and Jolie had finished their fight and made up yet. If they were back in their bedroom, I could go to bed on the couch.

Danny stopped the car a few houses down from my house. "You live here?" he asked.

"Eight-thirty-one," I said. "Two doors down on the left."

He drove on down and made a u-turn at the end of the block, coming back and parking right in front. The heavy thrum of the big engine made everything sound super quiet when it stopped.

Before I could get the door open, he had jumped out and dashed around to my side. He gave me a hand to help me out, I didn't need it but I took it anyway.

"Do you kiss on the first date, chica?" he asked.

"Danny," I said, all out of breath.

He pulled me close and bent to kiss me on the forehead. "That's all you get this time, querida," he said.

I almost fell down when he let go of me, my knees didn't work right. I stepped back to catch my balance and repeated his name, making it a question this time, "Danny?"

He put a hand on my shoulder to steady me. "You don't like me for a boyfriend?"

"I can't... I don't... I'm not...."

He grinned, his white teeth showing in his dark face. A moon had come up at the end of the street, fat and golden, making the leaves of the live oaks in front of my house shimmer like a tree from some fairyland where wishes came true. The one streetlight on my block was an old-fashioned one with a small yellow-white lamp almost the same color as the moon. Danny's face looked golden, too, in the light from either side.

He smiled at me. "Well, until you can and do and are, I want you to know, I'm not pretending. I want to be your boyfriend. Don't worry, I'll talk Sylvie into it." He held up a finger almost as big around as my wrist. "And next time, you get a real kiss, caramia."

He walked me to the door and I put a hand on the handle of the screen. I told him, "I'm here now, you go on home. I'll wait here to wave goodbye."

"You are so cute, chica," he said. "Did they lock the door?"

I nodded. I wondered why I couldn't fool him. The latch on the screen door had been hooked, otherwise it never quite closed right. They were probably sleeping and there would be a fight if I woke them up to unlock the door.

"Back door? Windows?" asked Danny.

"Sure," I said. "I can get in, don't worry."

He smiled at me, again. "You terrible liar, mi corazon." He scratched his head, thinking. "Okay, come back to the car, it will be good."

"What?" I asked, but I followed him.

He opened the door to the backseat. "Climb in," he said.

"I think I'd better stay here," I said.

"I know. You're not going anywhere. You can stay in the car, I'll walk home."

He went to the trunk and began taking things out. Soon, he had short, curtain-like pieces of cloth covering the front and side windows, a pillow and some blankets for the back. "Climb in," he repeated.

If I had not been so tired and sleepy, I probably would not have done it. I climbed in and stretched out almost full-length on the back seat. He floated another blanket down around me.

"The doors will be locked," he said. "You'll have to climb into the front seat to unlock them, the back doors don't unlock from inside except from the front seat control – if the key is on. Child locks. You want me to leave you a key?"

I shook my head. Sleep seemed to be filling the back seat of the big, old-style sedan, soft, sandy-eyed sleep. Trying to talk, or make sense of things, felt like too much effort, like carrying buckets filled with rocks that turned into live puppy dogs and you had to run to catch them before they all got away, hiding in the golden grass.

"Good night, chica," said Danny before closing the door. I shook my head to try to wake up and tell him good night but the big solid piece of old metal made a chunking sound and I heard him mutter something in Spanish before he walked away, whistling.

I think he called my father a stinking old goat and Jolie a dirty sow but my sleepy Spanish wasn't up to deciphering some of the more profane modifiers.

Sleep came and dreams in golden moonlight and when the sun came up it was foggy outside so I almost overslept.

---

 
I dreamed that Danny and I adopted oodles of puppies and we had to name every one of them.

"Max. Princess. Luke. Belle. Jay. Delaney. Porky. Sugar. Popsicle. Goldie. Pancho. Vicky. Fred. Molly. Digger. Tiffy. Tuffy. Trillian. Sam." I couldn't think of a name for one of the puppies and she made an awful racket scratching on the window.

I sat up and saw Jolie looking in the back window, the only one not covered with a curtain. The sun behind her head made her blonde hair look like a halo, an angel wrapped in a tattered bathrobe. She tapped on the window again.

I could barely hear her out there, she seemed to be asking a lot of questions. "Bobby is that you? What are you doing sleeping in this car? Whose car is it? I can't open any of the doors, are they locked?"

The doors were locked, she couldn't get in. I lay back down and wrapped the pillow around my head to block my ears. After awhile she went away and I fell back asleep. I knew I would be late for class but I didn't care.

When I woke up the second time, somebody was unlocking a door. I sat up, knowing it must be Danny.

He opened the passenger side front door and said, "Morning, chiquita." He grinned at me, his big face all freshly shaved and his hair neatly combed.

I felt grubby and out of sorts and I knew I would have some explanations to make. "Morning," I said. "My throat hurts." I hadn't noticed till I opened my mouth to say something.

"That's good," said Danny. "I mean, I'm sorry your throat hurts but it gives you two excuses, one for being late and one for not going to P.E. today. 'Ey?" He tossed a Wal-Mart bag at me. "I bought something for you."

"What is it?" I asked. I caught the bag and started to open it.

"Don't open it here, go inside, get changed for school, wear what's in the bag, don't let anybody else see it."

That was a lot of orders to absorb before breakfast. "I really slept in your car all night." I said. I yawned and tried to stretch but there wasn't enough room to do a good job of it. Danny hit the switch on the door locks so I could climb out the back door.

"You so cute when you sleepy, querida," said Danny as I stood up and finally stretched.

"I don't feel cute," I complained. "I feel nasty and tired." I liked being called cute, though. It made me want to squirm but I liked it.

"Ho, ho," he said. "And we didn't do nothing last night, I just kissed you on the forehead." He grinned.

I know I must have blushed. For the first time, I noticed someone else standing beside the car. Almost as tall as Danny but skinny, he had red-blonde hair, a bony face, bright blue eyes and a sour expression like his stomach hadn't decided whether to hurt or not.

"This is Estéban, mi compadre," said Danny.

"Steve," said the skinny boy. "Je suis un Américain que je ne parle pas espagnol."

"What?" I said.

"He said he's an asshole so he's not going to talk Spanish."

"Mais oui," agreed Steve. "Les porcs peuvent péter mais un chien savent écorcer."

"He's a poet and don't know it," said Danny.

"What did he say?" I asked, fascinated by Steve's use of his hands and face; he hardly moved either but conveyed a sort of bored insolence. And he spoke French? I didn't know how good his French was but he sounded like he knew what he was saying.

"Something about pigs, I don't think either of us wants to know," said Danny. "Steve, knock off the frog impression."

"Votre má¨re était un rongeur et votre pá¨re sentis du vin de framboise," said Steve.

"I said knock it off," warned Danny.

"But of course," said Steve, this time in a bored-sounding British accent.

They sure lightened my mood, I started laughing even though it made my head and throat hurt worse.

"Go inside and change you clothes, chica," said Danny. He sort of made shooing motions at my butt. "Spaghetti and I will go get a bag of breakfast burgers at the drive-thru."

"Spaghetti?" I said. "Why doesn't he speak Italian?"

Steve looked superior. "Posso fare quello ma questo pagliacce puá² capirmi un piccolo."

"A piccolo?" I said.

"Go," said Danny. "His mother was frightened by a diplomatic pouch when she was pregnant. Get dressed. Wash you face. We'll bring you a sandwich and some juice."

I went toward my door, laughing again. Behind me, I heard Danny say, "I'll give you a pickle, a long green weenie, if you don't knock it off, Getty."

I glanced back and recognized the redhead, finally. Steve Paul Getty, a senior on the basketball and track teams and actor in the school plays, he had grown up all over the world because his dad was in the military or something.

Steve said something to Danny in a language that I can't even spell but they got in the car and drove away.

I tried the screen door, it wasn't latched and the front door wasn't locked. I didn't see my dad's pale green sedan in the driveway so he must have left for work already. Jolie might or might not be home, Tuesday, and Friday mornings she had physical therapy for her foot at the clinic and Dad usually took her but sometimes she skipped.

I crept into my own house, afraid of being yelled at but no one was home except the moth-eaten old cat named Cosmo that slept on the couch most days. Cosmo had come with Jolie and like his mistress and I, we got along. I don't think Cosmo liked anyone but as long as you didn't wake him up and his food bowl was refilled, he seemed content. The cushions for the couch were still lying on the floor and the cat had appropriated one of them as his bed; I left him alone.

I had a closet where I kept my stuff in the laundry cubby, just a half closet really with drawers under it. All but the top drawer also held my stuff. I went through the kitchen to get to the little laundry room and saw a note lying on the kitchen table.

A water glass held the note down but I could see it was addressed to me. I picked it up to read it.

Bobbey,

Walt worred about you but I told him you would be OK. Some frends of you'rs pickd you up and you sleepd it off in their car I said. I didn't tell him it was parkd in front of the house. Maybe you'r not happy here. If you want I can show you how to be emastipatd minor so you can movd out and get you'r own place.

Love, Jolie

I read it twice to decipher the spelling and be sure I understood what she was saying. Then I wadded the note up and put it in my pocket.

I walked through the house like a sleeping person who doesn't own a bed. I got clean clothes from the little cupboard that didn't belong to me and I went to the bathroom. I sat on the toilet and tried to stop crying.

The cat came in and looked at me. He walked up to my leg and I moved my foot because sometimes in his old mind legs are things to bite. But this time he rubbed himself against my ankle and purred. I put a hand down and he rubbed against that, too, purring. I laughed while I was crying because this was the friendliest this cat had ever been.

After I petted him, Cosmo went to his litterbox under the sink and made the room smell bad. He didn't have the energy to cover-up so he just took a swipe at the sand with his paw, looked at the mess and sort of shrugged before leaving.

I used the toe of my shoe to push some sand over Cosmo's business. Story of my life, I guess. I coughed some, spit into the toilet something green and disgusting, blew my nose and dried my eyes.

I ran water in the sink to get it hot and took off my shirt and shoes. I thought I would take a sink bath and change my clothes down to my skin. I knew I didn't have time to do more before Danny and Steve came back. It didn't really seem important anyway.

While the water ran, I remembered the Wal-Mart bag Danny had given me. Something he wanted me to wear. I went looking for it because I didn't remember what I had done with it. I found it on top of the dryer in the little hall we used as a laundry room.

I took it back to the bathroom and closed and latched the door before opening the bag since Danny said no one else should see. I pulled the package out to see what it might be.

Five pairs of girl's nylon panty briefs, size small in assorted colors, pink, white, yellow, powder and mint.

I closed the lid of the toilet and sat down before I fell down. Danny had bought me underwear? Girl's underwear? And he wanted me to wear it?

I heard the big engine of a heavy car stop in front of the house. It might be Danny and Steve, back with a bag of breakfast burgers from Barney's out on the highway. Stupid face of a smiling steer in neon but they made good burgers. Their idea of a breakfast burger was ham, sausage, cheese and egg with thousand island dressing and a slice of tomato. And they had a machine that made fresh squeezed orange juice, orange by orange, just enough for your cup.

My brain locked up thinking about Barney's and trying not to think about how much I wanted to wear the pink panties in the plastic bag. How much I wanted to be Danny's girl.

---

 
I heard them knocking on the front door. "Bobby," Danny called. "We got you breakfast."

"Give me a few minutes, I'll be out," I called back.

I heard Danny laugh. "Gorls. They always take a long time to get dressed."

And Steve said, "Para entender a una mujer, duerma tarde y sueá±o de despertar en otro dá­a."

Danny laughed again. "You got that right. I feel like I woke on a whole 'nother day. Hey, we'll be eating in the car, chica!" He added to Steve, "I thought you weren't going to speak Spanish?"

Steve said, "Está¡s oyendo espaá±ol, no puede probar es lo que se hablando."

"Your verbs are too tense, pendejo," said Danny. "That's how I know it's you talking. Let's go and let her get dressed."

They left. I sat on the closed toilet seat for a minute or so longer before taking off all my clothes so I could get dressed.

Ten minutes later, I headed out the door. I locked the front door, I had a key, but I could not latch the screen door from the outside. I still wasn't sure why it had got latched the night before with me out. But no matter, I didn't worry about that.

I walked slowly toward the big, old sedan Danny drove. The clock in the kitchen had said 8:55 so I had already missed homeroom and almost half of first period. No hurry now, I wouldn't be any later, officially, as long as I got to the office before second period started.

Danny saw me coming and got out of the car to lean across the roof at me. "You get in front, chiquita. Tell that pendejo, Esteban, I said so." He grinned.

"I can hear you, you know," said Steve. He'd evidently given up the language game for the moment. He opened the passenger door and got out. "Hi," he said to me. "Danny says you're a girl. What should I call you?"

"B-bobby," I stuttered. "My name is Bobby." I stopped a few feet away.

"How do you spell it?" he asked. "With an 'i' or an 'ie'?"

"I told that Cora last night your name was Barbie," said Danny. He put his chin down on his hands on top of the car. From where I stood on the sidewalk he looked as if someone had decapitated him and handed him his head to hold, like a cartoon about the French Revolution.

Steve looked at Danny then at me. "Same question, 'i' or 'ie'?"

I opened my mouth but nothing came out. I glanced at Danny then away.

"She spells it with just an 'i' and draws a little heart above it cause it's cuter that way," he said, grinning at me. "I know you wearing them, 'ey?" he asked.

I knew what he meant. I nodded, still unsure of what I might say if I spoke.

"Get in," he said.

Steve held the door open for me and I slid onto the big wide front seat but when I reached for the door, Steve motioned me to scoot over farther. "I'm riding up front, too. It's where the food is."

I looked. Danny had laid out breakfast on the dash in boxes from Barney's. Breakfast burgers, hashbrown sticks, cinnamon egg sticks that are kind of like French toast, dippers of ketchup, hot sauce and maple syrup, cups of coffee and orange juice.

I settled into the space behind that big, ugly shift lever, feeling happier than I had in some time. "Which burger is mine?" I asked.

"Take you pick," offered Danny. He pointed. "Ham, sausage, egg and cheese or hamburger, bacon, egg and cheese or double sausage, egg and cheese."

"Oh, so we're all out of spam, spam, egg, cheese and spam? That's my favorite!" said Steve in a squeaky voice, scooting in beside me.

"Shut up. They've all got tomatoes and onions and lettuce, though you can take those off."

"And the hamburger ones have relish, 'cause I asked for that," added Steve. "And you can't take that off without making a mess."

"You guys ever hear of cholesterol?" I asked, smiling while I picked up one of the ham-and sandwiches.

"Cole Esterhall? He play third base for the Padres?" asked Danny, grinning. "You going to want more than one sandwich?"

"Uh, no," I said. "How many have you guys had?"

"Just one each so far," said Danny. He picked another one up and began unwrapping it. "They're kind of small."

I rolled my eyes.

"We have any left over, we'll give them to Gio at school. He's the bus barn guy, sleeps in the middle of the day and wakes up hungry about 1:30."

I knew who he meant though I had never known the man's name; an old janitor/mechanic who had an apartment on top of the bus garage.

Steve took another sandwich, too, and we ate. They made jokes over my head, insulting one another and acting clownish. Danny ate a third burger, leaving two for Gio. When we finished, I gathered the trash in one bag and the leftovers in another.

"Gio's gonna appreciate that," said Danny as he started up the big noisy engine.

"Thank you for breakfast," I said. "And, um, the package." I probably blushed.

"You welcome," said Danny, looking amused. "Now you for sure don't want to go to P.E. last period, 'ey?"

I shook my head.

Danny steered us out to the highway and toward the high school which was just south of downtown on the edge of the original residential area back when the city was a small cowtown. "You probably wondering why I brought Estéban this morning, 'ey?"

I looked at Steve who said, "Yo no sé también."

"Besides being a smartass who speaks seven languages, Steve is also a forger," said Danny.

"You want me to write him a note?" asked Steve.

"Her," said Danny.

"Her," said Steve. "Hey, that'll work for today and maybe for three days but she'll have to have a note from a doctor for longer than that and they always call to confirm those."

"I know," said Danny.

We got to the school, parked in the far lot since all the closer ones were full. We stopped at the lunch tables in the little green area between the rows of cars and the actual street. Steve took out some paper and pens. He asked for my father's name.

"Walter Bowes," I said. I spelled the last name; it's pronounced Boze, not Boughs or Bowus.

"He sign Walt or Walter?" Steve asked.

"Uh, Walter usually."

"What's he call you in a note like this?"

I blushed. "Robert," I said.

Steve went to work, producing a note at Danny's direction that read:

Please excuse Robert from being tardy this morning. He's been sick during the night and has to see the doctor this afternoon at 1 p.m. Please excuse him at lunch so he can go to his appointment, too.

Thank you,
Walter Bowes

Although the wording did not really sound like my dad, Steve somehow gave the document an air of genuineness by nothing more than wrinkling the paper just enough. Then he folded it in four and handed it to me.

"Leave your afternoon books," Danny said. "You won't be taking them. When lunch comes, meet us here and I'll take you to the doctor."

"Huh?" I said.

He grinned. "I really got you an appointment with a doctor. Don't worry, he's a good guy and he'll give you an excuse for the rest of the year, you don't gotta go to P.E. and show those pendejos your cute panties."

Steve's eyebrows went up but he didn't say anything.

I looked at Danny and he waggled his eyebrows at me. My face turned pinker.

I looked back at Steve and he waggled his eyebrows, too, first one then the other then both. It was so ridiculous.

"Cabron!" someone said from outside the car on Danny's side.

Some rapid Spanish followed, too fast for me to understand or note, though there were words of English here and there as Danny talked to another of his friends.

"Pinche norteá±o Spanglish," commented Steve.

I could see the other boy talking to Danny and thought I recognized him. Albert, the teachers called him, but his friends seem to know him as Chango. He stood about five-six with short arms and legs for his height, a very hairy body, short black hair on his head and a mustache. I remembered him as always smiling. We had several classes together because he was also a junior and smarter than he looked.

"Chango's going to be your escort," said Danny to me. "He'll be around when I'm not."

"What?"

Albert, or Chango, stuck his head in the left side window and said, "Hi! You need to go to the office first? We better get going, second period starts in less than ten minutes."

Danny let me out on his side, I grabbed my books and Chango and I headed off to the office. Danny patted me on the butt as I left.

"Meet us back here at the car at lunch," he said. "Sylvia will be here, she wants to meet with you."

Chango grinned at this but I nodded.

"Steve and I got shop second period, we gonna give Gio his burgers, too," Danny said, retrieving the Barney's bag. Steve got out on the other side of the car and they headed toward the shops and athletic buildings at one end of campus while Chango and I aimed at the Administration Center at the other end.

After we crossed the street and went in the gate, I asked Chango, "Why do I need an escort?"

Chango slapped his forehead with a wide, short-fingered hand. "I forgot, I'm 'sposed to tell you, carry your books like a girl."

"What?"

He motioned. "Hold them in front of you, not down at the side."

I stared at him.

He motioned again. "Danny said to do that, don't carry them like a boy."

I changed how I held my books, both arms around them against my chest. It did feel more comfortable that way.

Chango nodded. "That's why you need an escort," he said.

---

 
No one in the office questioned the note at all and Chango escorted me toward our second period class, History. He bopped along as if listening to some rhythm I couldn't hear and once he motioned to me that I carry my books against my chest.

I felt embarrassed doing that, and excited to sort of have permission to do so. I usually had to stop myself from doing it two or three times a day and now, someone was telling me to go ahead. I wasn't sure exactly how I felt about that.

We were a few minutes late for class but Mr. Durant had a standing rule about being tardy: take your seat and wait for him to call on your for an explanation. He simply nodded to show that he had seen us and went on with his lecture about post-World War II rebuilding in Europe.

I'd read this part of the book but Mr. Durant always added stuff in his lectures that might be on a test, you had to pay attention to get a good grade. So I listened, but I kept getting distracted thinking about Danny and his friends and what might happen in the future.

When the class ended Mr. Durant called Chango and I up to him. "Bowes, Urbaá±ez." I walked up and handed him the slip from the office, Chango stood beside me and just grinned.

Mr. Durant looked at him and said, "Well?"

"I don't gotta note, I just kept Bobby company," said Chango, not changing his grin. "I'm an escort, like those destroyers you talked about last month."

Mr. Durant frowned at him then at me. I realized I was standing there holding my books funny. I tried to change from cradling then in my left arm against my chest to holding them down at my side like a boy but I almost dropped them.

"Do you need an escort?" Mr. Durant asked me.

I probably blushed. "Chango's just a friend," I said. I couldn't think of anything else to say.

Mr. Durant is tall and bony with thin, dishwater blond hair, Woody Allen glasses, and the biggest, brownest eyes I'd ever seen on someone as pale as he was. He had long dark eyelashes, too. Maybe the glasses magnified them. He just stood there, one hip on the corner of his desk, looking at us for a moment.

I wondered what he thought he saw.

"Do you need an escort, Bowes?" he asked me.

"Sometimes," I said. I didn't look but I knew Chango's grin had gotten wider.

We got out of there without much more than a curious look from Mr. Durant. He didn't seem to know what to make of the situation.

"Third period," I said. Chango nodded. "I've got English, but we don't have that one together."

"I had to retake English II," he said. "But I got Study Hall for third, so I can walk you to your class." He grinned at me. "You go ahead, I'll follow. Danny says you wiggle your butt nice."

"What?" I know I squeaked.

He made motions, so I walked away, trying not to think about whether I really did wiggle my butt. I knew I had spent hours at various times worrying about that, trying not to do it. And now–now I felt confused. I was supposed to wiggle?

At the door to Mr. Kerry's class, Chango came up beside me to say, "When class is out, you wait for me, I'll be here and we'll go to the office so you can checkout for your doctor's appointment."

"All right," I said. "Are you sure this is all necessary?"

He grinned at me, his wide trollish face showing a lot of teeth. "Nothing is going to happen to you, Los Norteá±os have got your back."

"Huh?" I said.

He left without explaining that. Norteá±os was how some Mexicans referred to people from the US and Canada and norteá±o was a music style, similar to American country music or zydeco; Norteá±o also meant the fractured Spanish a lot of Mexican-Americans spoke, called Spanglish in English. I wondered if Danny's friends called themselves Los Norteá±os, like a gang name.

Mr. Kerry called me in to the class before I could spend much time on that thought and we read poetry aloud from handouts he passed around. Nineteenth century stuff, though some of it had phrasings that made it sound much older. When my turn came, I read Coleridge's "Xanadu." It sounded good but it didn't seem to mean anything and I said so during discussion.

"Do you think poetry should mean something, Bobby?" Mr. Kerry asked in his soft voice. He'd come to the US from Ireland back in the sixties and his voice had a lilt to it, though not much of a real accent. He had a long face and green eyes and wasn't much older than his students.

"Wouldn't it be better if it were beautiful and it meant something, too?" I replied.

"Hmm," said Mr. Kerry. "Anybody want to refute that idea?"

I don't know why but I blushed. Someone brought up Star Trek and Mr. Kerry looked pained. "Ah, yes, television, the vulture eating our livers," he said. This produced a lot of laughter. "Oh, sure, now, you all understood the reference?"

I made the mistake of nodding and then had to explain to the cast about Prometheus who was sentenced to have his liver eaten, "But it was an eagle, not a vulture. A vulture wouldn't eat him if he were still alive," I finished just as the bell rang.

Mr. Kerry kept grinning at me as we filed out of class. At one point, I looked back and he nodded and winked at me. I looked away quickly, not sure just what that was about.

One of the boys in class, a big guy called Gordon, last name or first name, I wasn't sure, bumped into me. I said, "Excuse me," but he didn't move out of the way.

He looked down at me and made a sucking noise. "Bet you'd like to such Kerry's dick," he said.

I didn't say anything but tried to move away which is not easy when a lot of kids are trying to go through a doorway at the same time.

"Fuckin' fruit-sucking fag," said Gordon. "Oh-but-it-was-an-eagle," he whined in a falsetto. "And then you giggle so he knows how cute you are."

I didn't think I had giggled.

Another boy, just as tall but fatter, came up on the other side of me. "Is this pervert bothering you?" he asked, talking to Gordon, not me.

"Hey, Lotto, yeah. The fruity smell is just sickening." They both snickered, as if that had actually been funny.

"Gordo and Lotto? Why don't you guys go have lunch, it's your favorite class, isn't it?" I don't know why I said that.

They reacted by bumping up against me, one side then the other and knocking me down. I scrambled to get out of the way before they could kick or stomp me and realized that Mr. Kerry had appeared.

"You boys are going to be late for lunch," he said to them.

Gordon sneered at him, but Lotto (I remembered his name, it was Frank Lott) said, "We ain't late."

"Not yet," said Mr. Kerry. "But if you aren't out that door in the next ten seconds, you will be staying here for half an hour then reporting to the office for further detention."

"Huh?" said Lott.

Gordon grabbed his arm and pulled the idiot through the door.

Mr. Kerry sighed.

I sat up and started gathering my books back together.

"Does that happen much?" Mr. Kerry asked.

"N-no, sir," I said.

Chango arrived just then, standing in the doorway. He looked at Mr. Kerry for a moment then asked me, "Someone knock you down?"

"Uh?" I said.

Mr. Kerry smiled. "Hello, Albert. A minor run-in with a couple of swinish types."

"Who?" Chango asked him.

Mr. Kerry shook his head. "No, you know I won't tell you."

Chango nodded and looked at me.

"I'm not going to say, either." He offered his hand to me but I stood up without it, holding my books in front of me. "Thank you, Mr. Kerry," I told the teacher.

"You're welcome, Bobby. If they bother you again, tell me. Once is an accident, twice is a pattern; don't let there be a third time."

"Tell me," said Chango when we were out the door.

I shook my head. "You'd go after them."

"Oh, I know who it was," he said. "Gordon Ryan and Frank Lott. But you got to know you can tell me things like that."

"I..." I said. "What are you going to do about them?"

He shrugged. "Up to you. You tell me, I take care of it so they know not to bother you. You don't tell me, and I know anyway," he grinned showing a lot of teeth, "I tell Danny and it goes a lot worse for them."

"What would he do?" I asked, worried that Danny would get in trouble.

"Maybe put them in the hospital," he said. "Just as a warning." He thought about it for a second. "Probably just Lotto, Gordon is smart enough to understand a lesson."

"Crap," I said.

He grinned at me.

"Okay, what would you do?" I asked.

"Deliver you to Danny, you're going to be gone all afternoon. You won't need me. So I can stay here make things–scary for them."

"You're not going to hurt them or get in trouble yourself?" I asked.

He shook his head. "They may need to go home and do laundry," he said. "No blood, just shit in their pants."

We stopped at the office and got my exit pass before we headed toward the parking lot but Danny met us halfway to the gate, waving from near the end of the administration building.

"Chiquita!" he said, grinning at me. A dark-haired girl stood beside him, Sylvia, his "other" girlfriend. She looked at me as if I were a rabid skunk she might have to shoot.

"Do I tell him?" asked Chango.

"No," I said. "Do whatever you think you need to." I walked toward Danny.

Chango nodded. "Hey, VEEK-tor," he called, exaggerating the Spanish pronunciation of Danny's other name. "All safe and sound, but I've got something to do." He headed toward the construction site behind the principal's office where some workmen had been putting in a teachers' outdoor smoking patio.

"How is it, Bobbee?" Danny asked me, exaggerating my name, too.

"Okay, I guess. Hi, Sylvia," I said.

"Hello," she said, being pleasant enough. Maybe I had imagined her being mad about things.

We watched while Chango picked something up and put it under his left arm then walked toward the fence. Danny glanced at me and grinned. "Someone give you a hard time?"

I shook my head.

Chango turned at the fence then ran at the Administration building, aiming for a blank spot between the windows. Using his speed and one hand, he ran right up the wall and lifted himself onto the roof.

"What?" I said. "What's he doing?"

"Somebody must have made trouble for you," said Danny. He grinned at me. "Chango's a fucken apeman, ain't he?"

"What did he pick up and take with him?" asked Sylvia.

"Paving bricks," I said, hoping Chango didn't get into trouble or actually hurt someone.