Salvation (19 page)

And she looked up, laughing. “You are such a liar, Salva Resendez!”

But he wasn’t lying. And he wasn’t upset, though he had been during the previous week when he’d had to throw away his most recent acceptance letter—Harvard this time. Her face was alive, her eyes shining, the joy bursting from them. She deserved to go where she wanted. And she wanted the best.

He wouldn’t have needed her if she hadn’t.

Beth wasn’t exactly sure how they wound up in the storage room. She’d been careful not to enter a bedroom with Salva, either here at the party or anywhere else over the past four weeks, though it had helped that the trailer was such a mess she’d have died of embarrassment before letting him through her own front door. But somehow, with the excitement of the acceptance letter, her defenses had lulled.

And now here she was, in the dark, with only the flicker of the electric furnace to shed light on the fact that she was propped up against a stack of cardboard boxes, Salva’s mouth on hers, his chest against her own.
His arms, his skin, his touch.

God, it was like heaven.

His hand slid to her side, then up under her shirt.

Oh, this was not a good idea.

The sensation of that hand running up her flesh sent a thousand nerves pulsing. “No,” she finally mouthed against his lips.

And the hand stopped, withdrew. “Beth, I promise I won’t…” His voice was hoarse, pleading.

The problem was that
she
couldn’t promise. When they were together, alone, everything went so fast and felt so right. She was certain if he asked for more, it would still feel right, all the way around the bases and back again. She was not going to end up like her mother. “I can’t, Salva,” Beth whispered.

“
Jesús
.” He said it in Spanish, then sank back into the flickering dark, his hands running through his hair. “I don’t know what happens when I’m with you. I never plan. It’s just—we start, and I can’t quit.”

Except he could. He just had.

Her breath was still coming ragged. “It’s not only you,” she said, “but I don’t want…to ruin—”

“I know,” he interrupted. “We both want a future, Beth. Neither of us wants to risk that.” There was a pause. “Do we?”

Was he asking if she wanted to have sex?

“No,” she replied, her heart speeding up as if he’d actually said the words. For a heartbeat, silence stretched between them, and then she whispered, “Do you think, though, that maybe I should go to the clinic and ask for—”

“Yes.” Suddenly, he was clear across the room. “We should both get checked out and invest in protection.”

Her heart was racing around the block.

“Just in case we screw up,” he added.

Well, that was romantic.

Salva left the party early—around eleven
P.M.
—grateful for the escape. Beth had already split, right after he’d admitted that he was afraid of having sex with her. At least he’d admitted his fear to himself. Or rather how easy it would be to have sex with her. And risk wrecking his entire life. He wasn’t like Pepe. If Salva messed up, he wasn’t going to be able to walk away. Of course he hadn’t managed to explain that to Beth. Had probably just offended her.
Good one, Resendez. Real smooth.

For some reason his best friend, who was Salva’s alibi, had wanted to get away from the party as well.

The sports car was flying down the highway at about ninety.

Salva leaned back against the leather passenger seat. “What’s up, man?”

“Char.”

Of course.

“She said she had a headache.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s the fifth friggin’ headache she’s had this month.”

Char had always had migraines, Salva knew, but she wasn’t bad at faking them either. Maybe she’d actually listened to his advice to slow things down. His mind snagged on the irony. “Don’t worry,” he told his best friend. “I’m sure she’s still interested.”

Pepe swerved around a pickup that was probably clocking eighty. “Who’s worried? I just wasn’t aware we were going backward. She’s all freakin’ out because she bombed the state test again. As if that has anything to do with us. What’s she think?”

“She’s thinking she’s not going with you.”

Silence. Darkness swam around the headlights. There was almost nobody around here, especially at night.

Pepe took the next turnoff, one of those that didn’t lead anywhere—just some scenic viewpoint. A good place to make out if you hadn’t screwed your chances. The car shot to the edge of a cliff. And stopped. Then Pepe turned off the engine. “So…Stanford, huh?” he asked at last.

When had Beth entered this conversation?

“That’s a pretty tough school,” Pepe added.

Salva messed with the visor above the windshield. “She deserves it.”

“She’s pretty smart then.”

“Yeah.” He left the visor up.

“So where are
you
going?” The question hit him in the chest.

Salva turned and stared at his best friend. “What?”

Pepe was gazing out into the wide black emptiness that was the scenic view at night. “Look, Resendez, I ain’t stupid. I figure if Beth Courant’s getting into Stanford, then you’re getting into somewhere a hell of a lot better than Regional, huh?”

Salva’s hand tightened on the door. “Beth has a financial trust. I don’t.”

“Just be straight with me, man.” His best friend’s gaze turned direct. “Everybody else is talkin’ about next year. You’re not. Why?”

Salva rubbed the heel of his palm against the leather armrest. The car locks clicked off, then on. “I’m still waiting to hear back from State.”

“State University? Is that where you want to go?”

It was the best non–Ivy League school he had applied to. “Yeah, if I can get the money.”

Pepe’s head fell back against his seat. “You think it’s likely?”

“I don’t know.” Salva didn’t. He’d been offered full scholarships for all the smaller, regional schools he’d applied to, but State was a definite step up.

“Didn’t your brother want to go there? Before your mom—” Pepe stopped.

Salva closed his eyes. Pepe was the only one who knew to stop. He was the one who had been there the day of the funeral—the day Salva couldn’t make himself attend. They’d spent the whole day together, him and the guy everyone thought was
trouble. And Pepe had seen Salva cry like a baby and never told anybody.

“Miguel applied there.” Salva swallowed. “He didn’t get in. He was gonna go to Regional.”
Before the doctor’s bills for Mamá made him quit
.

“Well, it ain’t a bad school,” Pepe said.

“No.” Salva opened his eyes. “It ain’t.”

His best friend grinned.

“It’s just”—Salva’s hand formed a fist as he tried to explain—“if I can get into State, it’s gonna mean a lot, you know, to my father—”

“Shit.” Pepe rolled down the front windows. “This isn’t about your father. It’s about you, always having to win. You’re such an f-ing competitor.”

The comment made no sense. “You’re the one with the sports scholarship,” Salva argued.

“No, man.” Pepe pulled the keys from the ignition. “I’m just the only one of us willing to
settle
for the sports scholarship. You were all-state. You could have played at Regional, but that’s not enough for you. You’re gonna go conquer the friggin’ world.” He held up his hand, car keys dangling in his palm. “And that’s okay, ’cause when you do, you’re gonna remember tonight, and who let you drive, huh?”

Oh yeahhh.

Bang!
Salva looked up, annoyed, from the arc of interview notes he’d spread out on the kitchen table. It sucked to have homework on a Saturday evening; but the party had been last night, and he now had less than forty-eight hours to prepare for the mock trial on Monday. Lucia, who was home yet again, had
claimed
she was taking the girls for a walk to help her order dinner at the
taquería
downtown. But the front door had just slammed.

Señor Resendez arrived in the kitchen, breathing hard, and grinning from one end of his face to the other. He lifted an envelope in his hand. “From the State University!”

Salva eyed the package. It was thick, but he’d been fooled by that before, with the trashed acceptance from Princeton.

Papá
thrust the envelope into his hands. “Open!”

Trying not to let the package shake, Salva ripped the seal.

His father was hovering, leaning over his shoulder, hands pressed together in prayer position.

“What does it say?”
Papá
was now holding his clenched hands over his head.

“It…” Salva struggled for breath.
Don’t tell him until you’re sure.
His father’s trembling had turned into an earthquake. Salva scanned the rest of the letter. “It says I’ve been accepted and that…” It was
real
. He was going to State. A flood of relief washed through him. “They’re going to pay my whole way.”

The hands exploded.
“¿Todo?”

“All the tuition, not my books or housing, but—”

“You can stay with Miguel!” his father shouted. “You can work for your books!”

Then the arms were around Salva in a huge, crushing hug.
“Mijo, mijo,”
his father repeated over and over again.
My son. My son.
The words brought tears onto Salva’s face. But there was no shame. His father wouldn’t see them anyway, because the dampness soaking Salva’s shirt wasn’t his. Those tears were his father’s, and Salva knew, for the first time, the unbelievable feeling of making someone else’s dream come true.

When the girls came home, Lucia consigned the tacos to the fridge and cooked instead. They had enchiladas with mole sauce, roasted peppers, and fried ice cream. Talia and Casandra took turns hugging Salva, possibly because they were happy for him, but more likely in thanks for the food.

Dinner was followed by the longest string of phone calls Salva had ever participated in in his life. Grandparents, both sets; his aunts and uncles; and three million cousins, spread out everywhere from Guanajuato to San Antonio to North Carolina. Of course his father did most of the talking. Salva just had to get on the phone to listen to the congratulations. He didn’t even know a fraction of the people who gave him
felicidades,
but he could hear how happy his father was every time he had the chance to tell someone his son was going to a four-year state university.

After passing the phone back to
Papá
for the umpteenth time, Salva sneaked into the kitchen, poured himself a mug of cinnamon hot chocolate, and dropped with fake exhaustion into a chair.

Lucia laughed, shaking the remnants of dishwater from her fingers, then reached for a towel. “Are you going to let
Papá
do all the calling?” she teased. “You know he could go on all night.”

Salva shrugged, his excitement about telling his best friend tempered by the knowledge that deep down Pepe would be disappointed. “I’ll see Pepe and Tosa tomorrow at church.”

“And what about your girlfriend?”

There was no way Salva was letting his father listen in on
that
conversation. Plus, Beth had said she and Nalani were spending the rest of the weekend somewhere out of town. “I’ll see Beth on Monday.”

“Ah!” Lucia swatted him with the towel. “Then you are dating the girl who is okay pretty.”

“Diga.”
Their father stepped through the doorway, making his son jump. But
Papá
just handed over the phone for the hundredth time.

Salva pressed it to his ear.

“
Hola
, little brother. So I’m told you’re coming to live with me.”

Miguel.
Salva almost dropped the phone.
Papá
had called Miguel? After all this time? His father had said something before, but Salva hadn’t taken it seriously.

“Un momento.”
Salva eased past his father, shook his head at Lucia’s questioning look, and left the kitchen. Then shut himself in his room—the same room he had shared for the first six years of his life with the person on the other end of the phone.

“Congratulations,” said Miguel.

“Um…
hola,
” Salva managed.

“You know my place is only a half hour’s city bus ride from your new school. Are you coming to stay with me, or what?”

“Well…” Salva didn’t want to take anything more from his brother. Ever. Miguel had derailed his entire life to help support his younger siblings. And had ultimately lost
la familia
in the process. Or maybe not. Maybe Salva could make up for that now. “If I get a job, I might be able to pay you rent.”

“You won’t have time for a job. Not if you’re going into engineering at State.”

Salva hadn’t thought much about the program. He’d written his college essay about becoming an engineer because it was the most high-profile degree offered at the school. And because the lady who’d run the scholarship workshop at Liberty had said you should always pick a career, to make the essay more convincing. But the program
was
supposed to be intense. “Well, maybe some of the local scholarships will help cover the cost of a place to stay,” he said, running his hand over a crack in the wall. Miguel had started to putty it up once, but ants still came through it in the summer.