like we’re both thinking the same thing, that maybe we’re out of our league here. But I shove the idea away. If any of us has a future outside of East Palo Alto, it’s Mari. She’s whip smart and dedicated.
“Okay, we’ll work it out.”
A gasp comes from the hall and Mari rushes in. “Gracias, Scotty.” She throws her arms around me. “Thank you so, so much.”
I laugh, hugging her back. “Nothing like eavesdropping, huh?”
She plants a kiss on my cheek. “I know, I’m sorry, I was just too nervous to ask you myself. I really want to go to this thing.”
“Ni?os,” my grandmother interrupts as the three little girls arrive back in the kitchen. They all eagerly parrot my grandmother’s favorite refrain. “?En Espa?ol, por favor!”
Honestly, I hadn’t even noticed that Mari and I had slipped into English. “Perdón, perdón,” I grumble. “But I have no idea how to say eavesdropping in Spanish.”
My grandmother’s one rule is that we speak Spanish at home even though her English is decent enough. How could it not be? You can’t live in a country for almost fifty years and not pick up the language. But I know her reasons run deep. She was here in the US illegally for a long time before she married my grandfather. I don’t pretend to understand what that does to a person. And I respect her fears of not being able to communicate with her own family.
So while we all discuss how to say eavesdropping in Spanish, I get the girls settled around the table and pour the milk onto their cereal. Just as I’m finishing up my own breakfast, my mother wanders into the kitchen in her ratty bathrobe, holding an unlit cigarette between her fingers. After partying heavily for most of her life and having four kids with three different men, my once beautiful mother looks every one of her forty-one years.
On the way to the sink with my bowl, I bus her cheek. “?Qué onda, Ma?”
She just mutters something under her breath and heads for the coffee pot. After the screen door crashes closed behind her so she can have her morning smoke in the back yard, conversation starts up again.
A round of kissed cheeks later and I’m out the door.
“Come in!”
Every Monday morning, I have a meeting with my boss. Dean is a good guy. Like Father Martín, I owe a lot to him for helping me get to where I am today. When the foreman on the job I was working a couple years ago, stopped showing up on the regular, I made sure the guys were working and kept the job on schedule.
Dean took notice. Of that and my ability to communicate in both languages. He made me a bargain that I couldn’t turn down: get your GED and I’ll give you a shot as foreman.
“Good, McCarthy. Come on in. Have a seat.”
It’s almost been a year now, and while there have been a few bumpy patches, on the whole, things have gone well with my new role. Really well. Dean gets a reliable crew and I have a job that both challenges me and pays well. Forty five grand a year may not be a lot to some people, but for a kid who grew up in East Palo Alto with a mother and a grandmother who’ve always worked for minimum wage, and an uncle with dubious sources of income, it’s a fortune. A steady fortune that’s been adding up in the bank because I’m as frugal as I can be and my grandmother’s house is mortgage free.
“How’re the kids?” Dean asks as I sit down in the chair in front of his desk.
“Good, thanks. How’re the grandkids?”
Without any hesitation, he grabs the newest framed picture from his desk and shows it to me. He’s so proud of his two-year-old twin grandsons. “Oh, you know, they keep my daughter on her toes like you wouldn’t believe.”
When the pleasantries are over, we start in on the week ahead; scheduling, project timetables vs progress, costs, and employee morale.
“Any more problems with Harrison?”
I shake my head. “Like you said, giving it to him straight has mostly changed his attitude.” Like me, Dean started at the bottom and worked his way up. He knows rough-in carpentry inside and out and he has a ton of experience with managing guys. I think he’s taken me under his wing because he sees that I’m just as willing as he was to work hard and earn the