excerpt
Gus pulled back the cable and pushed off the edge of the roof. He
sailed out over the junk-strewn factory yard and beyond the overgrown
railway tracks. His toes brushed the tips of the highest
branches.
When the pendulum returned, Gus dropped onto the roof like a
pheasant crippled by buckshot.
– I think I’m going home now, Fred, I said. Unless you tell me
what’s going on.
That’s when Freddy said it. Words that resonate through the
years, the meat of the memory sandwich. I remember the building
swaying beneath us, Freddy leaning in close, saying, It’s who we are.
It’s what we do.
Gus led us out of the woods and across the highway, through
vacant lots, past a string of second-hand outfits selling used mattresses,
copper tubing, window frames. We marched into a convenience
store by the front door, exited via the rear, our shirts stuffed
with spoil. The booty was divvied up under the rear window of
Mario’s Bakery on Commercial Drive.
We were dangling our feet over the side of a dumpster, stuffing
our faces, when a bell sounded from inside. Gus jumped up and
knuckled the window. A man with the sinewed shoulders of a bull
emerged from behind the rear door. He extended an unintelligible
salutation and handed each of us samples of still-scalding bread.
Mario tossed a handful of crumbs into the air, and the sparrows
swooped low.
Where have you been all day? Mom asked when I returned home for
dinner.
– Nowhere.
– Chew your food! You know what happened to your uncle.
– I am. (Stomach cancer.)
– Where are you going in such a hurry?
– Out.
I rejoined the Monroes as they were striding up Rupert Street.
Their actions no longer puzzled me. Those boys were doing what we
all do when we must: seeking out the good to negate the bad. This
day-long trek was a pilgrimage. That’s what the Monroes did. It’s
who they were.
Libros Libertad 