To My Little Cousin

Your name is three languages: Adriana for your Mom’s, Ac for your dad’s, Nicole is where they met: your mom in apartment #2 with us, your dad, upstairs with his cousins in #7, far away from Yucatán, far away from the languages you hide like a path to a cenote. When classmates laughed at your last name, yuck, awk, and the teacher said nothing, you didn’t want to write Ac on any paper. I love iPhones, the internet, the quickness to learn Ac is a turtle god, so vast it rules the sky. Its shell, with bright sharp corners, protects us. Now, near Navidad, you ask stories about fireworks, Abuelita, chickens roosting in the cashew tree, so your mom searches for flights. We find one to San Salvador, but Priceline won’t let us buy for a child only. You can’t have layovers. No relatives can sit with you. You’re a citizen. And we don’t know how to tell you, we’re different. The way you insist on Spanish, ask your dad to teach you Maya, says there’s a need to taste that dirt we’ve eaten. Here, we must dig deep to tell you Nicole means victorious people. Victorious. We pay extra for a direct flight. Once there, remember the names your parents have chosen. Remember the turtle shell we hold up with our brown and brilliant hands.