of the apartment. Suddenly, a feeling ofrepulsion came over me. Then, I felt embarrassed. I felt shamed and violated, like I hadparticipated in a sleazy celebrity sex tape that had just gone viral. My stomach jerked,and I vomited outside in the front yard. I tried to gather myself. I was shaking as I lookedfor the holes in my shirt. I shimmied into my pants, lost my footing and fell down on theground. I jolted when I heard an explosion of shattered glass.

I looked with a mixture of awe and fear as I watched Nico plummet from the secondstory window. I was holding my breath as he smashed to the ground with fragments ofglass scattered around him. I looked up and saw Maria’s head peering out of the emptyframe. Shards of glass stuck to Nico’s clothes and skin, making him look like a humanpincushion. He stood up, and using the earth as his footplates he took off running.

Maria came strolling out of the building. She adjusted her black purse on her arm asshe made her way to the car.

“Let’s go,” she said through clenched teeth. We rode in silence.

“Maria, I am sorry,” I said.

She didn’t say anything; she just clenched the steering wheel and pressed downharder on the gas pedal.

“I left because I didn’t think that you wanted me,” I said with tears rolling down myface. She didn’t look at me; she just adjusted her strap and kept her eyes on the road.

“I left because I needed to know the truth about Ali, about my momma. I left becauseI needed to believe that there was someone out there who still loved me,” I said. The carwas completely dark, with occasional flashes of light that came from oncoming cars andstreet lamps. Maria slammed on the brakes. She closed her eyes and rested her headagainst the steering wheel.

“Maria?”

“Take the money and the ring that’s in my purse and get out of the car,” she said.

“What?”

She flung her black bag and me and screamed.

“Get out of the car! Now!” I flinched and quickly got out of the car.

Maria peeled off and did a whole 360. She turned out her headlights. I stood there,watching silently, wondering what Maria was doing. Then, I saw it. Maria turned on herhigh beams and two siphons of light glowed onto Nico’s face. He was hunched over andhiding behind a large tree. Maria pumped on the gas, and the car’s engine roared as itpropelled forward. Nico moved from behind the tree and the race began. I felt like I wason a roller coaster ride. My stomached dropped as I saw Maria rip around corners atwicked speeds. She followed him closely. While Nico tried desperately to lose her byzigzagging and running amuck on wobbly legs.

My heart was beating faster, not from passion like before, but from fear. WatchingMaria go after Nico was worse than probing for landmines. You never knew when youwere going to find one that was going to explode. The care kept jerking forward. Therewas a few times when Maria was inches away from hitting him. Maria’s car pounded ontrees, devouring bark and steel but not Nico’s flesh. I couldn’t stand to watch anymore. Iburied my head in my hands.

When I looked up, I saw that Maria’s front end was totally smashed, smoke rosefrom the trunk, and the tires were flat. I looked to my left and gasped with amazement asI watched Maria running as awkwardly as a cripple with two prosthetic legs. She waschasing Nico through the open field, running top speed like an African Rhino. She leapedforward, grabbed Nico by the waist and wrestled him to the ground. I ran to get a closerlook. For the second time since I’ve known her, there were tears in her eyes. Theystreamed down her face freely.

“You took everything from me!” she screamed while choking Nico. He lay on theground, almost motionless as he struggled to loosen her grip.

“My kids, my momma, my soul, you took everything.” Violent sobs rocked herbody, but she kept her grip on Nico’s throat.

“No more, No more,” she continued.

There were gunshots. Maybe it was my imagination, but I could see the bullets flyingthrough the air. The rounds pounded into her flesh, like raindrops into a stream. Iscreamed, as the strong, steel spine, Maria, that I had known as a mother for the last fouryears, fell to her death.

~ ~ ~

Chapter TwentyNelly

290 days before I turned eighteen, and it looked like I was going to spend each oneof those days at the hospital. It was movie night. Yay! The attendants at the hospitalwanted to find ways to reward our good behavior while keeping up the morale. There wasonly so much they could do. They tried to take us for walks, but a lot of the patientswould wander off. They also tried monthly outings and spiritual retreats, but there werealways one or two opportunists who figured out how to escape. They only thing that theycould do was get us to watch movies, the same movies, over and over again. Besides, itwas only a matter of time before a sane person went crazy in the psych ward. Like,Simon, a middle-aged gentleman who was still considered only a part-time nut.Unfortunately, he suffered from delusions of grandeur. For a couple of hours each day, hewould become Zeus, Theseus, or some other Greek hero.

His behavior turned frightening when he would walk around fervently chanting, andrehashing back-stories of his epic battles and heroic tales of war. Then there was Pamela,a transitional loony, who had entered the hospital on a gurney. Her crime, an accidentaloverdose. Or that is what they called it when she woke up the next day and realized thatshe wasn’t dead.

Then there was Peter, the catatonic who spent most of days strung out onprescription pills. He would sit for hours, with his brows arched, forehead furrowed,stricken with a severe case of intestinal flatulence. He had a difficult time withcontrolling his bowels, and

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