Ayelén didn’t turn into a salt statue, but salt rose in her throat, and although she’d never seen the sea in her life, some part of her DNA remembered that tears tasted like sea water, the same sea that had brought her family to this land. This land she was now leaving.
Beyond the little huddle, Padrino looked at her with tears in his eyes. Ayelén waved him over. He hesitated for a second, and then as if he were wading through cement, he made his way to her. So did her father.
Ayelén took Padrino’s hand and her father’s. “It was never a competition. Remember, a victory for one is a victory for all.”
Both men lowered their heads, chastised. The weight they’d put on her shoulders was too hard for a kid to carry. When they let go of her hands, Padrino said, “You earned it all. Now go and be happy. We’ll be cheering for you.”
Once, Ayelén had asked her mother how she’d learned how to be a mother, how she’d learned what the twins’ cries meant and how to soothe them. Her mother had laughed and confessed she’d been pretending since day one.
“Fake it till you make it,” she’d said and continued making perfect gnocchi balls for Sunday dinner.
Fake it till you make it—that’s what Ayelén tried to do.
She faked confidence until she reached customs somewhere in Texas.
When the immigration officer asked her where she was going, she tightened her fist around her talisman: Daiana’s note with little drawings from Nadia and Selena, hearts that united a stick figure labeled Ayelén to a giant heart labeled Your familia.
In a clear voice, she replied, “I’m starting college next week.”
Maybe the brown-skinned, young immigration officer saw all the dreams flashing in Ayelén’s eyes. Without more questions, he stamped her passport and smiled. “Come on in,” he said. “Welcome to the United States.”
She could manage only to mumble her gratitude. She was in a daze.
When her final flight arrived in Salt Lake City and there was no sign of her ride, she pretended a primal fear wasn’t clawing at her chest. She pushed it down, until she calmed herself enough to buy a calling card so that she could dial the phone number Daiana had given her so long ago, when they’d both been young girls sunbathing on a rooftop without a care in the world.
“Hola?” said a young girl’s voice, and her heart leaped. Ayelén hadn’t been away for more than fourteen hours, and she already missed the sound of her language on her people’s tongues.
“Florencia?” Ayelén asked. “It’s me, Ayelén, at the airport.”
A pair of little boys were playing by the telephone, and she had to look away from them, pretending she didn’t miss her little brothers with an intensity that made her weak.
“I’m almost there,” Florencia said. “I’ll meet you at baggage claim!”
Ten minutes later, Ayelén was laughing with Florencia, a girl she’d never met before, but who, after a tight hug, already felt like a friend.
With Florencia, there were two boys, Argentine transplants too. One was tall and dark haired and talked nonstop—Mauricio. The other, Gabriel, smiled shyly. In the car to Provo, where the school was located, Ayelén realized he wasn’t really shy. Although he’d been born in Buenos Aires, he didn’t speak that much Spanish.
The kids in the car pointed at every landmark, translating on the spot, filling her in on all the info she’d need to start out. She hardly knew more than their names and the fútbol teams they supported, but inside her, the voice of her ancestors told her this was a good start.
The Wasatch Mountains, still covered in their white winter coats, towered along the highway. She tried to memorize everything so that when she called her family, she could tell them every detail. In a way, they would be with her, seeing through her eyes.
She had her family supporting her from afar, an anchor and wings, all at the same time.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Yamile (sha-MEE-lay) Saied Méndez is a fútbol-obsessed Argentine American author who loves meteor showers, summer, astrology, and pizza. She lives in Utah with her Puerto Rican husband and their five kids, two adorable dogs, and one majestic cat. An inaugural Walter Dean Myers Grant and a New Visions Award Honor recipient, she’s also a graduate of Voices of Our Nations (VONA) and the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults program. She’s a founding member of Las Musas, a marketing collective of women and nonbinary Latinx children’s authors. Find her online at yamilesmendez.com.
WHEN I WAS WHITE
Justine Larbalestier
DEDICATION
For Mikki Kendall
SYDNEY, 1932
Never knew I was white til I met Joshua.
I was sixteen and knew nuthin.
“My money’s as good as anyone else’s, miss,” he said.
My mind was elsewhere, gazing out the shop front, past the onions on strings, the tinned pears, the rack of magazines, imagining meself dancing like Irene Castle, skirts flaring around me like wings, and Vernon’s hands on me waist, swirling me round and round, and everyone clapping.
“Miss, I’m leaving this money on the counter and taking the gum. Damn it. I need change. I’m pretty sure I’m giving you too much. Look—I don’t want trouble, I want to pay with your nonsensical money—what is a farthing?—and go, miss?”
He snapped his fingers.
I blinked. Daydream scattered.
“Sorry?” I stared at the handsome brown-skinned foreigner in front of me. Me cheeks went hot. His eyes were dreamy.
“Thank you, miss,” he said. His smile made his eyes dreamier. “I’ve always thought so too.”
“Thought what?”
“That my eyes are dreamy.”
I never said that out loud, did I?
I bloody did.
“What’s your name, miss?” he asked, leaning over the counter. His teeth was white and not a one missing.
“Dulcie.”
“Dulcie. Pretty name.”
It were when he said it.
“Tosh. It’s dead common.”
Like me. I’d always wanted a fancy name like Violet or Esmeralda.
“You’re not common, sugar. With those big green eyes.”
I laughed at his fib.
There weren’t enough water to wash that morning. The
