What American Is

So summer sucks if you're working. But I've already saved up 200 bucks from the babysitting and only spent some of it on like magazines, records, baseball cards, movies and a pair of black Dickies and a pair of red jellies. I saw the Blue Lagoon twice. Fame, three times. My Bodyguard with Christopher Makepeace who is just so, so totally and completely foxy. Xanadu. I loved Xanadu. Caught the bus to the Puente Hills Mall three times to see it, even though nobody would see it with me. Not my cousin Keith, not Brenna. They thought it looked stupid, but what do they know. They're lame anyway. Have to believe we are magic! Nothing can stand in our way man! That song rocks and Olivia Newton-John is awesome so they can just keep smoking whatever they're smoking.

Three more weeks until school starts. Freshman year. I like the way that sounds. Freshman. All serious and formal, like I'm on some castle-looking campus on TV, rushing to class in a yellow sweater. I want to be in prep school like Ricky Schroder in Silver Spoons or Tootie in The Facts of Life. But you never see schools like that in California, not around here. All we have are portables that look like trailers because there's too many people out here in West Covina, all of a sudden, coming from all over the place. That's what we did. My brother got cut in the arm by some Crip or Blood or whatever, and then Dad was like, That's it. We moving. Bout time I use that veteran's loan.

Dad's mowing the lawn. Ever since we moved to the suburbs from L.A., like five years ago that seem like a million, Dad has been a maniac about the lawn. It's like his life or something. It has to look good, because everybody else's in the neighborhood looks good. Plus, he always says, These white folks'll knock on your door over a lawn. You watch.

Come here, Avery, he says. You want to go to a game tomorrow? Double-header on Sunday? He says, You and Keith been working hard on them little jobs y'all got. Me too. They bout to kill me at Goodyear. Everybody needs a break, he says. He's got five tickets. One for him, and then tickets for Keith, me, and Brenna, even though him and Mom have never liked Brenna. She's got a mouth on her, that white girl, Mom's always saying. Got you talking like a white girl, Dad says. But she's just my only real friend ever since we moved here. And Mom won't go to the game, anyhow. She never goes. Baseball boring, she says. Ain't nothing happening out there and we sitting in the sun for nothing, she says. Plus she's not talking to Dad. There's some other woman calling the house and hanging up now. So there's one more ticket left. Carlos. I want to bring Carlos.

Daddy stops pushing the mower and leans on it. Who is Carlos?

I can tell by the way he's asking me that he thinks Carlos is somebody who wants to make out with me or something. I wish. Yeah Dad. Carlos has ulterior motives. I drive him mad with desire. I go, He's just a friend at school. He's nice.

He Mexican?

Yeah, I say. He's Mexican.

Dad stares down at the grass. There's this one patch that's a perfect triangle. It's the only piece left. He looks at me with one of his eyebrows raised. What kind of people are his family?

I bite my nails for a second. I don't even know what kind of question that is. I think. Kind of people. I know what Dad is asking me, but I guess I'm just wondering how should I know? I only met his sister once and she was mega awesome. So.

Dad says, He not one of them cholos, is...