Confetti Girl (2 page)

Of course, Vanessa knows all about my crush on Luís, since it’s my favorite topic of conversation. And I know all about her
crush on a guy named Carlos.

I decide to get out of my house and walk across the street to Vanessa’s. When I see her mom through the front screen door,
I tiptoe to the backyard.

“Hey, Vanessa,” I call through her bedroom window.

She’s on the phone. She says, “Can I call you back later? Lina’s here—yes, I promise—ditto—you know I do. Do I have to say
it?” She cups her hand over the receiver and whispers, “I love you, too.” Then she hangs up.

“Who was that?” I ask as she holds open the screen so I can climb in.

“My dad. You came just in time to save me from apologizing to his girlfriend. I guess I hurt her feelings.”

“How?”

“I called her a Windsor and then I told her what it means.”

If that’s true, then Vanessa told her dad’s girlfriend that Windsor means more purses and shoes than brains. It’s a word Vanessa
and I made up. We use it when we’re talking about stuck-up girls who think they really live in Windsor Castle.

Vanessa has two beanbags, one blue and the other red. I plop onto the blue one as if I own it, and in a strange way, I do.
I didn’t buy it and Vanessa never officially gave it to me, but the blue beanbag’s mine—my little corner in her room. When
she goes to
my
room, she hangs out on the top bunk.

“Why were you at my window?” Vanessa asks. “Is something wrong with my front door?”

I don’t answer right away. How can I tell her I’m avoiding her mom? Especially when Ms. Cantu is such a wonderful woman? She’s
shown me so many grown-up things over the past year about washing clothes and cooking, things my mother was just starting
to teach me. She even buys me girl stuff from the grocery store, Clearasil and Kotex, because I’m too embarrassed to remind
my dad. I should be glad to see Ms. Cantu, but every time I
do
see her, she hugs me and calls me
pobrecita
and makes me feel like an orphan.

“I didn’t want to bother your mom,” I say to Vanessa. “She’s been so busy.”

“Tell me about it. Guess what I had for dinner last night.”

“Eggs?”

“And for lunch today.”

“More eggs?”

“That’s right,” Vanessa says. “How many times can you eat scrambled eggs without scrambling your brain?”

Around Easter, most people hard-boil eggs before painting them with dyes made by dissolving colored tablets in hot vinegar.
But in Texas, we make
cascarones,
confetti eggs. Instead of hard-boiling eggs, we carefully crack open a small hole on the top and let the insides spill out.
Then we wash and dye the eggshells. After they dry, we stuff them with confetti and glue a circle of tissue over the hole.
On Easter morning, we run around and crack the eggs on each other’s heads. Confetti gets everywhere. It’s a lot of fun.

Everybody loves
cascarones
around Easter time, but Ms. Cantu has made them a yearlong event. That’s why poor Vanessa lives with mountains of eggs. They’re
everywhere—eggshells stacked on the kitchen table, above the fridge, on the couch—some blue, orange, or pink, and some still
white—and next to the eggs are circles of tissue paper and piles of magazines and newspapers because Ms. Cantu believes in
making her own confetti with a hole puncher.

“If only eggs made us better at volleyball,” I say. Vanessa and I play for our school, but our team isn’t very good.

Vanessa laughs. “Maybe we’d win a few games.”

“If that were true, I’d come over and eat eggs all the time.”

“I’d feed them to the whole team.”

“I don’t know what’s crazier,” I say, “reading all day like my dad or making
cascarones
like your mom.”

“She calls it ‘therapy.’ I guess she’s upset because my dad has a girlfriend. I don’t know what the big deal is. It’s time
to move on. My parents have been divorced for three years.”

“Maybe your mom thought he’d come back.”

“But she doesn’t
want
him back. She’s a man-hater. When she isn’t making
cascarones,
she’s watching telenovelas or the Lifetime Channel. All the stories are about rotten men who cheat on their wives.”

“Well,
my
dad’s not rotten,” I say.

“Neither is mine, but try telling
her
that.” Vanessa grabs a heart-shaped pillow and hugs it. “How’s your dad doing?” she asks.

“I don’t know. He can’t talk without quoting some book or saying some
dicho
that doesn’t make sense.”

“It can’t be worse than a mom who keeps making
cascarones.
Easter was five months ago!”

“At least she’s not saying her flesh is going to melt.”

“At least you don’t have to eat your dad’s version of therapy.”

“What are we going to do?” I ask. “Our parents are so miserable.”

“Don’t worry,” Vanessa says. “We’ll think of something.”

Querer es poder –
To desire is to be able to do

B
aker is our middle school, a brick building in a neighborhood with street names like Casa Grande, Casa Linda, Casa de Palmas,
and our street, Casa de Oro, which means “house of gold.” I felt nervous about starting middle school, but then I realized
I could sign up for sports. During recess in elementary school, I was always the first girl that got picked for teams. I got
picked before most of the guys because I was just as tough and fast. So Vanessa and I signed up for volleyball on the first
week of school. For now, we have to play on the B-team, but if we’re good enough, we’ll get to play on the A-team next year.

I have lucky socks for game days—white athletic socks with an appliqué of our mascot, a bronco. Unfortunately, it takes more
than lucky socks to win a game.

Coach Luna doesn’t know much about volleyball, since she’s really a math teacher. The only reason she works with us is because
all the
real
coaches help the football team. Sometimes I hate the football players. Who can blame me? They get everything—pep rallies,
cheerleaders, their scores on the morning announcements. I guess I can understand since the football team qualified for district
finals, while our volleyball team has lost more than half its games. That’s what happens when you have a coach who can’t tell
the difference between a spike and a block.

“Okay, girls,” Coach Luna says in the locker room. “I know Hamlin is first in district, but don’t let that intimidate you.
Losing a game doesn’t make you a loser for life. You still have high school and college and careers ahead of you. That’s the
game that
really
matters—the game of life. So, even if you lose
every
inning…”

“You mean match,” someone says.

“Yes, match. Even if you lose every match, you’ll still be winners in my book.”

She gives a thumbs-up and hurries us out of the locker room.

We’ve got time before the game, so we run laps around the gym, stretch, practice our serves, then do a setup-and-spike drill.
I see my dad walk in during our warm-up. He settles on the bleachers and opens a book. Luís is here too. He comes to every
game to work at the popcorn machine for student council. Every time I look at him, he’s scooping popcorn into paper sacks
or counting change. Maybe he doesn’t belong on the cover of a magazine like
J-14,
but I think he’s cute. Picture small, black-framed glasses on a curly-haired hero from my dad’s Greek mythology book. That’s
Luís.

A few football players walk in, Jason among them. They must have finished practice early because their hair is wet from the
showers.

Vanessa glances at the bleachers to look for her mom or her dad. She doesn’t have to tell me about her disappointment when
she doesn’t find them. I know because we’re best friends, and best friends can read each other’s minds.

Then the Hamlin girls arrive.

They look like racehorses, tall and sleek. Their arms are meaty, not skin and bones like mine, and they don’t breathe but
snort. They’re more muscular than boys in football pads.

“Genetic wonders, every one,” Vanessa says.

I can only nod in amazement. “Genetic wonders” are people who don’t need to work at being athletic or smart or musical. They’re
just born with the right DNA.

The floor suddenly quakes as the Hamlin coach walks in. There’s only one way to describe her—the human version of a monster
truck.

“I heard their coach was in the ’96 Olympics,” Vanessa says.

“No way,” I tell her. “And we got stuck with a math teacher?”

The Hamlin coach lines up her team and guides the girls through Tae Bo kickboxing moves. They’re punching and kicking the
air, making us wonder if there’s a combat version of volleyball we didn’t know about.

Coach Luna decides to copy the pro. She claps her hands and makes us line up.

“Okay, girls,” she says. “Time to get serious.”

We do jumping jacks, toe touches, and windmills. It’s embarrassing.

Finally the referee blows the whistle. Three minutes till game time. We huddle, and Coach Luna names the starters and says,
“Remember the
true
game.”

We put our hands in the center for a cheer. “One, two, three! Baker Broncos!”

Meanwhile, the Hamlin girls huddle too. Their monster-truck coach taps a clipboard and angrily points at them. Then they put
their
hands in the center.

“We’re going to fry ’em!” their coach says.

“Yeah!”

“Roast ’em!”

“Yeah!”

“Devour ’em!”

“Yeah!”

And together they chant, “Hamlin! Hamlin! Rhymes with champion! Yeah!”

If volleyball were a mind game, they’d have us beat. It doesn’t take much to make us feel like wimpy appetizers before a feast.

We take our places, mine by the net since I’m the tallest girl. We crouch slightly. We brush off our insecurities. We’re ready,
we tell ourselves. We forget everything Coach Luna told us about the schools and jobs of the
true
game. We don’t care if we’re in middle school. We want to win. Volleyball
does
matter.

Hamlin’s server dribbles a few times, looks for our weak spot, then executes a beautiful overhand that lands with a boom.
All we do is stand like statues because the serve’s too fast and powerful. I’m surprised there isn’t a crater where it hit
the court. We’re in big trouble. Only two of us can serve overhand, and half the time, those serves clip the net.

For Hamlin’s second serve, we move toward the ball, all of us, colliding in the middle like marbles.

“Next time, call it!” one of my teammates says.

The third serve drills toward us again.

“Mine!” Vanessa calls. She digs deep, hurls herself to the floor, and bumps the ball inches before it hits the ground. It
shoots straight up. Another girl sets it for me, and BAM! SPIKE! Right past the Hamlin girls! A perfect play. The ball’s ours.

Goldie’s our first server. She’s not very athletic, but her serves are brutal. In fact, we call her our “secret weapon.” She
shakes her bangs from her eyes, and executes a gentle underhand serve that floats straight up, nearly hitting the roof. We
can’t tell whether the ball will land on our side or theirs. The Hamlin girls can’t tell either. They squint at the bright
lamps overhead, and the ball falls inches from the net—their side! They scramble, but too late. The point’s ours. Like I said,
a secret weapon. I feel a guilty joy when their coach stomps.

Goldie’s serve is usually good for a few points, but like they say, we shouldn’t put all our eggs in one basket because the
Hamlin girls are quick studies. We fool them only once. The ball is theirs again.

For every point we make, they make three or four. It’s a quick game. We take a five-minute break and switch sides for game
two. I no longer have my back to Luís and my dad, but I don’t have time to search them out because it’s our serve and I’m
up.

I can serve overhand—when I’m lucky.

“You can do it,” Vanessa says, full of hope.

Yes, I can, I say to myself.
Querer es poder. Querer es poder.
These are words my dad has drilled into me. Basically, they mean if I think good thoughts, then good things will happen.
Maybe I can’t bore a crater like the Hamlin girls, but I
can
make a pothole. So I throw the ball, ready to drill it down, and drill it I do… right under the net.

I feel horrible when my teammates slump. Soon the Hamlin girls are five points ahead. We’re not appetizers after all—we’re
grease stains. That’s how bad we’re doing.

When I glance at my dad for encouragement, I can’t believe my eyes. He’s reading! During the worst game of my life! How could
he? If Mom were here—well—
she’d
watch the game and she’d make Dad watch the game too. I want to yell at him. I don’t care who hears. But then I notice Luís,
who
is
paying attention—to me.

Right in the middle of my volleyball game, I get paralyzed. I can’t turn away from Luís because he’s smiling as if proud.
I don’t think he understands volleyball at all. Maybe he thinks it’s like miniature golf where the lowest score wins. Or maybe…

Maybe he likes me. I smile back at him and wave. Then SLAP!—the volleyball hits my face with enough force to knock me down.

I hear the audience laugh when Jason says, “Check out Daddy Longlegs. The taller they are, the harder they fall.” He points
at me and cracks up. I’m sure Luís is cracking up, too. Now I know why he was smiling—not because he felt proud but because
I looked ridiculous. And now I know why the football players come to our games, not for moral support but for laughs.

I can’t take it. I run off the court to hide in the locker room.

A few minutes later, my teammates walk in.

“We lost,” they say. “Hamlin creamed us.”

My dad waits for Vanessa and me outside the gym. It’s autumn and the days are getting cooler and shorter. By the time we begin
our walk, the sky is a grayish purple and the first stars are out.