Efrain's Secret (24 page)

“I can’t do a program and go to college!” I yell. I know the math. Bronx arrest plus Bronx judge equals Bronx program. Then another realization crashes over me like a wave against rocks, launching me to my feet as I imagine my fingerprints scanning through a computer in Albany and triggering alerts on computers in every financial aid office throughout the country. No matter it probably doesn’t work like that; the result is the same. If I plead to a felony, I’ll no longer be eligible for federal student loans. Neither Harvard nor Hunter will offer me a financial aid package that doesn’t include student loans. “My financial aid applications!”

An officer yells, “Hey!”

No sooner had Miss Avery assured him that everything is fine than I sink back into the seat. She looks at me, shaking her head. “Efrain …” And with that utterance of my name, she asks all the questions I’d be too ashamed to answer. With that one word, she lets me know that she finally believes me when I insist that I’m not like all the others who have sat at this same table pleading innocence. The problem is, I myself no longer believe that anymore. “You have my word that I’m going to be very proactive on your case, and I will do everything in my power to build a solid preplea report that proves to the court that you’re a fine young man who made a mistake you won’t repeat. You’re not the big fish they want, Efrain, so I think I can get the DA to reduce the charges so you can plead to a misdemeanor with youthful offender treatment.”

See, Mrs. Colfax. I’m not a big fish in
any
bowl. “Which means?”

“It means I have a good shot at getting you community
service that you can complete before school begins and eventually get your conviction off your record.”

“Expunge,” I
say. “Verb. To obliterate, eradicate.”

Miss Avery sighs, then closes my file. “So you’ve already applied to college.” I just stare at the red marks around my wrists left by the handcuffs. I can’t look my lawyer in the eye, instinctually aware that for once my initiative and discipline about the college admission process are not an advantage. “Efrain, the criminal justice system can be slow and unpredictable. You may want to consider withdrawing your applications until your case is resolved.”

Incendiary
(n.)
a person who agitates

When I finish meeting with my public defender, they transfer me to another cell adjacent to the one I just left. I pass the time doing another emotional workout, following an hour of wallowing in self-pity with another hour of kicking myself for getting in this situation. What if the system is as unpredictable as Miss Avery says, and the judge decides to impose bail and send me to Rikers Island? It doesn’t matter that the gig is up, and I can tell my mother to go into the shoebox in my closet, where she’ll find enough cash to post bond. Until she pays it, I still have to spend some time in a real jail.

The terror of the mere thought must give off an odor. “Them kicks is hot.” The gruff voice belongs to a compact body hovering above me. My eyes make a reluctant trek to his face. I eke out
Thanks
, which is all the permission he needs to reach down and grab me by the ankle. I yell and flail, but others just gather to watch, some cheering
Get ’em. get ’em!
He gets off one Jordan, quickly tucks it under his armpit, and snatches for the other, all without letting go of my leg.

Officers burst into the cell. One drags him off of me after harnessing him with a nightstick while the other pulls me up to my bare feet. She points toward a sneaker on the cell floor where the thug dropped it. “Get your shoe.” I do as she orders while watching her look for the other one. She finds it in the hands of another detainee, who obviously confused the ruckus for a game of
finders keepers. The officer grabs the sneaker out of his hand and gives it to me. Once my kicks are on my feet, she takes me to the tiny cell where I had seen the kid several hours ago. “I’m going to put you in here for your own protection.”

Clang!
And there I sit for another half hour or so before someone finally calls my name. This officer cuffs me again and takes me through a door and up two flights of steps to the courtroom. When I enter, Miss Avery is already playing verbal badminton with the district attorney and the judge. As the court officer leads me to my lawyer, I scan the gallery looking for my mother. Instead, I spot Claudia in the crowd with her wailing baby. “Face forward,” the bailiff barks as he deposits me next to Miss Avery.

“How does the defendant plead?”

“Not guilty,” Miss Avery replies on my behalf. For a second, I wonder what she’s doing. Then I remember that this is how the process unfolds. If she is going to negotiate a deal where I can plead guilty to a misdemeanor, I can’t go on the court record copping to a felony. “Given that the defendant is a minor who has no previous brushes with the law, I ask that he be released into the custody of his father, who is present in the courtroom.”

Rubio? Here? Now? I jerk my head around to look for him.

The court officer yells, “Turn around and face the judge!”

Miss Avery puts her arm on my shoulder, which must be like pressing her palm against a block of ice. I stare straight ahead toward the bench. Without taking her eyes off what she is reading, the judge asks, “Is the state in accordance with that?”

The district attorney shrugs as if he were just asked whether he wanted his sandwich on whole wheat or rye. “Fine with me, Your Honor.”

“Will Mr. Rodriguez please approach the bench?”

I start to step around the table when Miss Avery pulls me back. “She means your father, Efrain.”

My heart boxes my ribs. “What does she want with him?”

“Knowing this judge, she’s just going to lecture him on how he’s responsible for you now, that he should do a better job minding you than he has been, blah, blah, blah. Maybe even make him go on record pledging to be the second coming of Michael Brady. All you need to worry about is keeping your nose clean and making your next court date, which is six weeks from today.”

No, Miss Avery, that’s not all I have to worry about.

Abhor
(
v
.) to hate, detest

As Rubio and I exit the court building and walk down the Grand Concourse toward his car, I sense him glaring at me. We get in his car and drive off in silence. At the first stoplight, Rubio finally barks at me.
“¿Y cuándo te metiste en toda esa baina de drogas?”

But I don’t have any words for the man. Rubio can lecture me, interrogate me, insult me, whatever. I’ll save my reasons for
metiéndome
to the parent who actually gives a damn.

“¡Efrain, te ’toy hablando!”
I just stare straight ahead at the bumper of the car in front of us. Then bam! Bastard punches me in the left cheek, sending my head banging against the window. When the pain radiates toward my jaw and temple, there’s no denying that this was more than a disciplinary backslap. The motherfucker punched me like a man hits another man. I finally turn to look at him. Rubio’s eyes blaze, and his chest heaves as if that punch took so much out of him.

It didn’t take enough out of me. I spring onto that son of a bitch like a leopard on a gazelle, slamming my fist into his temple and knocking his dome into the headrest.
That
, Mr. Harris, is PE to KE for you. Rubio swings his forearm between us and then slams it into my chest. He knocks some of my wind, and I fall back against my seat. Rubio comes for me, but I muster enough energy to block him with my left and throw a hook with my right. Rubio follows with a cross to my jaw, and it’s on. We just go at each other in the front seat of his car, like ultimate fighters in a
refrigerator. Drivers pound their horns and curse through their windows, but we won’t stop. I can’t stop. As I grab a fistful of Rubio’s hair, it flashes through my mind:
I’m going to kill him
. Never mind this is the man who gave me life. For giving me this life that hangs in the balance right now, best believe I have it in me to take away his.

I ignore the banging on my window and the muffled yelling in Spanish. Seconds later I feel the rush of cold air, then two hands as they grip my shoulders and yank me out of the car. When I realize what’s happening, I throw out my arm to brace myself for the fall against the hard asphalt. I wait for my bones to settle from the crash landing, then slowly draw myself onto my elbow. That’s when I see the blood on my knuckles. I don’t know whether it belongs to Rubio or me.

“You all right, man?” the man asks.
No, I’m not fucking all right
. “What the hell happened?”
I just gave my father a long-overdue beatdown
.

I stand there in the middle of the street amid all the commotion and stare at Rubio for a minute. Now he has one leg out of the car, the other one still kneeling on the front seat, and two dudes holding him back.
When I’m done with you
, he’s cursing at me in Spanish,
you’ll never disrespect me again
. I turn my back on him and start to limp away. Rubio demands that I come back and face him like a man. Fuckin’ clown. When he’s done with me? I’m done with him. I’ve
been
done with him.

Repudiate
(
v
.) to reject, refuse to accept

It takes me almost two hours to get from that stoplight on the Grand Concourse to my bus stop at Port Morris. Throughout the entire trip, folks stare at me as if I stepped out of a horror flick. All I want to do is get home, take a hot shower, and sleep forever.

Moms must’ve been looking out the window for me, because when I reach my floor, she’s standing in the open doorway. “Efrain!” She pulls me into the apartment and puts her hand to my bruised face. “Oh my God!” Moms throws her arms around me. “Look what they did to my baby!”

And who is standing behind her but that bastard. He ain’t such a pretty boy now with his swollen nose and fat lip. I pull out of my mother’s embrace and point to Rubio.
“He
did this to me.”

Moms spins around to face him.
“¿Le diste a mi hjio?”

“¡Claro que sí!”
Rubio booms.
“Y lo haría otra vez si se lo busca.”

“¿Si se lo busca?”
My mother shakes with fury. “I don’t care what Efrain does. Don’t you ever hit
my
son again.
Ever!”

Even though the evidence is all over his grille, I wait for Rubio to admit that I fought back blow-for-blow like a man. And just as if he can read my mind and intends to concede nothing, he says, “I am the man of this house—”

“This is
my
house, César!” yells my mother. “Your house is down the block.”

Rubio looms toward my mother. “I’m the head of this family!”

He has never raised a hand to my mother, and I’ll be damned if he starts tonight. I step around Moms to shield her. “No, you’re not.
She
is.” I get in his face. “You don’t have a family. All you have are obligations you never meet.”

“Efrain!” My mother grabs at my arm and yanks me away from Rubio. “Go to your room while I talk to your father.”

“Fine.” I shoulder Rubio as I shove past him and head to the bathroom. As I turn the corner, I catch Mandy peeking out of her bedroom door. She’s crying, and I expect her to run out and throw her arms around me like when Rubio brought me home after hours in the emergency room with food poisoning. Instead, Mandy fumes, then slams her door shut. She turns the lock for good measure. Moms must have told her the truth about where I was. I can’t lie. Her reaction hurts, but all I can do is try to explain on our walk to school tomorrow.