Return to Sender (27 page)

“¡Díselo!”
her father commands.

“My father”—Mari hesitates—”he says he doesn't have your money yet. To stop coming around to collect. He'll give it to you as soon as he has it.”

Tyler wants to say that that's not what he came for. But the look on Mari's face is begging him not to contradict her father. To please leave right away. That much he can give her for her birthday.

He turns and walks back home, not bothering to put his hood up. If they were not salty, Tyler would pretend his tears were just raindrops washing down his face.

Sunday night before Memorial Day, the skies suddenly clear. The stars sparkle as if they've been washed by the rain. Tyler is up at Grandma's with the three Marías, pasting little paper American flags onto pencil- sized rods. Tomorrow, they'll all go to the town cemetery and plant a flag beside each veteran's grave, including Gramps's. All the members of the local VA will be there, giving speeches. Mr. Rossetti will play taps, which he says he'll do as long as he has enough breath in his lungs. Tonight as they work, Grandma has the radio turned on to this station that is playing lots of music in honor of Memorial Day tomorrow.

“Grandma, are you really eloping to Mexico to get mar-ried to Grandpa?” Ofie starts in.

Grandma's cheeks again turn pink, but this time she hasn't been drinking champagne.

“Who told you such a thing?”

Ofie looks confused. Every kid in the world knows when they're about to get a grown- up in trouble. “Aunt Jeanne was just saying …”

“I knew it!” Grandma says crossly. “That Jeanne! She imagines things and then I'm held accountable. I'm going to give her a piece of my mind!” She marches toward the phone, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

Mari flashes Ofie a look. See what you've done, causing a family fight! “Remember, Grandma, Ofie has a big imagination and a big mouth,” Mari reminds the grandmother.

“I do not!”

“You do too!”

Ofie shoves Mari, who shoves her back. That's one thing Tyler has noticed. Mari is learning to stick up for herself.

“Okay, okay,” Grandma says, coming between them. She has forgotten her phone call. There's a more immediate fire to put out.

“Mari and I have to check on something outside, okay?” Tyler tells Grandma, who nods, looking relieved. “Thank you, dear,” she murmurs, giving Tyler credit for being a peacemaker. In fact Tyler is glad for this fight, since it gives him an excuse to do something with Mari without her usual tail of two younger sisters. Earlier, he set up the telescope on the small hill just above Gramps's garden. It's the only way Tyler will be able to deliver his rain- checked gift. He doesn't dare go near the trailer anymore, feeling so unwelcome.

Out they go, across the backyard, past the garden that Gramps would be planting tomorrow if he were still alive, uphill to the very place where last November they saw the Taurid meteor shower.

“Where are we going?” Mari asks finally. She must not have guessed the big hint Tyler dropped on her birthday about waiting for a clear night to deliver the second half of her birthday present. No doubt the scene with her father erased happier moments from that evening.

But as soon as she spots the telescope, she gives a little cry. “Can we find my star?”

Tyler has the coordinates all ready. They crouch down, taking turns looking through the telescope. Her star is a teensy smudge of light, but the way Mari oohs and aahs, you'd think it was as big and bright as Venus or Mars!

At one point, as Tyler is angling the telescope lower in the sky, he notices a clump of stars he has never seen before. Puzzled, he stands up to orient himself. Those lights are not in the sky but on the dark edge of the horizon and getting closer. As he watches, the glare coalesces. A battalion of cars, lights flashing, is racing toward the farm without a name.

“What are those?” Mari has stood up beside him. Her voice is edged with the worry that seems threaded through everything she says nowadays.

As they look down toward the farmhouse, the swarm of cars comes to a screeching halt. Dark figures leap out and surround the small trailer, where three Mexicans are just now watching a game of
lucha libre
and waiting for the three Marías to come home. Meanwhile, in Grandma's kitchen, peace has been restored. Ofie and Luby finish up the little flags that they intend to plant tomorrow at the graves of patriots who died for their freedom.

Sunday, June 4, 2006

Dear Diary,

It's been over two weeks since Mamá gave you to me for my twelfth birthday You looked so official, with a little strap and lock and teensy key! I couldn't seem to come up with anything important enough to write down.

But then, after two weeks of nothing happening, suddenly a lot has happened and writing in a diary was the last thing I could think of doing. Besides, it was only yesterday that we made a list for Grandma and Tyler of things to pick up for us at the trailer and bring over to our secret location, which I don't have to keep secret from you. So until today I didn't even have you along. It feels so good to have this safe place where
la migra
can't come and haul my words and thoughts and feelings away.

We are hiding, my sisters and I, so I don't have much privacy. And most of the time, I'm too worried to write. Worried about Mamá and Papá and Tío Armando, and what will happen to all of us. I bite my nails so much that at night my fingers throb.

Friday, June 9, 2006

Dear Diary,

We haven't been to school for almost two weeks now. Mrs. Paquette went over to Bridgeport and talked to Mrs. Stevens. Tyler says nobody except Mr. Bicknell and my sisters’ teachers know about us.

But by now everyone in class is asking where I am. Some of them have been asking Tyler if it's true what Clayton and Ronnie have been spreading, that I am in jail! I guess there are rumors all over town about what happened over at the Paquette farm.

So I'm going to write down exactly what happened. If I am finally taken away to jail, I will leave you, dear Diary, to tell the world the whole truth of what we have been through.

Sunday, June 11, 2006

Dear Diary,

Mr. Rossetti went to church with Grandma, so for the first time we are alone in the house. My sisters are downstairs watching television, as Grandma finally brought our TV over. Mr.

Rossetti doesn't own one. He calls it the idiot box and says there wasn't anything wrong with radio that needed fixing. He has a lot of opinions about things, I am finding out.

No news yet about Mamá and Papá, but Mrs. Paquette says that she and Señora Ramírez have contacted Mr. Calhoun, the lawyer who helped out with Tío Felipe.

When I heard Tío Felipe's name, I suddenly thought of our family in Mexico! They would worry so much when they didn't hear from us. I asked Mr. Rossetti if we could call Mexico, but he doesn't have long distance on his telephone. He says he doesn't know anyone he wants to talk to outside Vermont!

So I asked Mrs. Paquette, who asked Ben, who asked Alyssa to call and explain. My whole
familia
was so worried. But Alyssa told Tío Felipe that a lot of people are working on getting my parents out of jail and reuniting us all again.

Just hearing about that reunion, I start crying and can't stop. That just gets Ofie and Luby going, and then it's terrible as Mr. Rossetti doesn't know what to do except give us his handkerchief to blow our noses. That's another thing about him. He doesn't believe in Kleenex. There wasn't anything wrong with handkerchiefs that needed fixing, he says.

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Dear Diary,

Today, I am going to write down what happened when Mamá and Papá were taken away I meant to do it on Sunday, but my sisters called me down for a special program about swallows on TV. They know swallows are my favorite animal because of the song
“La Golondrina.”

I didn't realize there was so much to know about them! How they fly for days and days, eating and even making babies as they fly, so desperate are they to get where they are going. How they bring good luck to farmers when they nest in their barns. (Tyler says his grandfather would never let anyone disturb a swallow's nest, even when the milk inspector said there was too much of their poop around.) Best of all is how, like my own family, swallows have two homes, one in North America and one in South America.

Here is what happened the night
la migra
took my parents away:

Tyler and I were outside looking at my star, which is the most spectacular birthday present I have ever received. I still cannot believe there is
a star in the universe with my name on it! I don't know how Tyler could have afforded to buy it, as he loaned all his money to Papá to help ransom Mamá back. He also gave up his birthday trip to go to North Carolina to rescue Mamá and invited me along. That is all the birthday gifts I will ever want from him for a whole lifetime.

Just as Tyler was about to take his turn at the telescope, we saw cars racing toward the farm. Next thing we knew, all these agents had surrounded the trailer and were shining huge searchlights so nobody could escape in the dark. They banged on the door, but when Papá opened it, just as quickly, he slammed it shut. Two agents had to push against it hard, finally knocking it down. Next, they were hauling Papá out, but he was struggling and swinging at the agents. Meanwhile, Mamá was jumping out of the window of our bedroom, but there were agents all around ready to catch her. Two of them grabbed her by the arms and herded her inside one of the cars. She was screaming the whole time. Only Tío Armando came out peacefully, head bowed, his hands handcuffed behind him.

Meanwhile, Tyler's parents came running out of their house. His mother was shouting something, but the agents were not listening. She ran back inside and came out waving a piece of
paper, which one of the agents grabbed and put in his pocket.

All the time we were watching, I was sobbing hysterically. When Mamá began to scream, I tore off down the hill toward the trailer to be with her. After all she had been through, I just knew she'd have a nervous attack right then and there. But Tyler caught up with me and wrestled me to the ground.

“Don't, Mari!” he whispered, pinning me down by my wrists. “You can't go, you can't. They'll take you, too.” When I finally stopped struggling, he pulled me up and took my hand, and we ran as fast as we could down to his grandmother's house.

When we burst inside, Grandma and Luby and Ofie looked up surprised. I guess they hadn't heard all that commotion with the radio playing. I couldn't talk because I was crying so hard. Tyler explained to his grandmother what we had seen. “They were all dressed in jackets with guns and stuff, not like real policemen in uniforms. The jackets had ice written on them.”

“That's Immigration and Customs Enforcement, oh my!” Grandma's hand was at her chest, her breath coming fast. Even she was in a fluster. “They didn't take your parents, did they?”
The color drained out of Tyler's face. “I don't know.” Suddenly he looked as scared as I was.

Luby and Ofie had begun to cry, which made my own tears dry up. Months ago, when Tío Felipe had been jailed and Papá was all worried that he was next, he made me promise that I would take care of my sisters like their little mother. I had to stay strong for them.

Grandma ran to the phone and dialed Tyler's parents, but nobody answered. Either they were still outside, talking to the agents, or maybe they, too, had been taken away for committing the crime of hiring Mexicans without papers.

The grandmother looked so pale, I was afraid she was about to faint. “We're going to stay calm. Really calm. And very calmly we are going to get in my car.” It was like she was talking to herself, but we were more than happy to follow her instructions.

Next thing we knew, we were driving in the opposite direction from the trailer, taking the back way into town. It wasn't like Grandma told us to hide or anything, but my sisters and I crouched down in the back. I felt just a taste of what it must have been like for Mamá, riding under a false floor in a van all the way across America.

We pulled into Mr. Rossetti's driveway, and Grandma ushered us to the back door, knocked
once, then walked right in. Mr. Rossetti was already in bed upstairs. “Joseph!” she called up. “You got company.”