“What is that noise?” Aquilla asked, turning to her dad.
“Oh, that’s Powder Valley. It’s an old dirt track. That’s how this road got its name. When they race there on Saturday nights, there’s a blanket of dust for miles. Your mother hates that race track.”
“Where is it?” she wanted to know, turning her attention back to the noise in the distance.
Manny pointed down the street. “It’s the next road to your right.”
“Have you ever been there? Why are they racing during the day?”
“That’s not a race. It’s probably just some thug running circles around the track. It’s a lot louder than that when they’re racing, and no, I’ve never been there. You like racing?”
Aquilla shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve never seen one.”
“Well, maybe some weekend before the snow starts flying, I’ll come and go with you,” he smiled.
Snow? She forgot about that, she had never seen snow in her life. Well, not that she could remember anyway. Snow meant cold. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that either. She liked the tropical atmosphere that she was raised in.
Manny loaded their things into the back of Monica’s SUV before heading out himself. He kissed Aquilla on the head and told her to call him anytime she wanted, and he would see her in a couple of weeks.
She thanked him and climbed into the back seat with Julius’s laptop. She could read for an hour while pretending to play a game or something.
“You’re very pretty,” Monica said through the rearview mirror as they drove down her new neighborhood. “Powder Valley.”
“Thanks,” Aquilla replied as she adjusted her body to a leaned position against the door.
“We could spend this time talking if you want,” Monica offered.
“Or not,” Aquilla replied, logging onto her computer.
The look between the two women sitting next to each other in the front seat didn’t go unnoticed.
I’m not going to go into the details about the accident, Quill. I can’t. It was horrific. I knew something bad was going to happen. We were going so fast. I knew my mother had removed her seatbelt and slid over to hold scared, crying Quill on her lap. She shouldn’t have done that. She should have kept them both secured.
I crawled out the window of the overturned car first. I was dazed, but wasn’t hurt. I looked up the bank and saw the police cars sliding to stops up the hill. I turned and saw my mother’s legs hanging from beneath the car. I didn’t see Quill until my father grabbed my arm and pulled me away. Her feet were beneath my mother’s body, one shoe on, one shoe thirty feet from the car.
He just left them there, Quill. He never even tried to remove the car. I knew, even at the age of ten, that she had no identification on her. My father refused to let any of us take anything with us that day. Humph, I guess I learned to do the same thing as I got older. I never carried identification if I was working a deal. To this day, my mother and little sister are known by Jane and daughter Doe.
That is so fucked up, Quill. They are in a cemetery somewhere in New York with a marker that reads Jane and Daughter Doe. Do you want to know what her name was? Sure you do. Her name was Sarina, and she was so pretty, Quill.
We didn’t walk very far before we were back to civilization. I remember him pulling me into an alley once when we saw a police car creeping along the street, searching for us, I was sure. I’m sure he had gone crazy at that moment. He wasn’t talking. He never said one word to me.
Once we made it back to that warehouse to retrieve our bags, he made me go to the bathroom and we both changed clothes. He told the guy that we had gotten the car from to burn my mother and Quill’s things. I started crying. He was just throwing them away. I’ll never forget that look in his eyes when he grabbed both my shoulders and shook me. He was no doubt crazy.
He yelled and told me that I wasn’t allowed to cry. He told me that it was business and sometimes things happen that we can’t control. My mother and sister being crushed by a car was just business.
The man from the warehouse drove us to the busy streets and dropped us off. I didn’t understand what we were doing. Were we really going to the parade? His wife and daughter were dead, and we were going to a fucking parade.
I really don’t know if we went there for that reason or not. Maybe we were there because he promised. You know how we Chavez’s are when it comes to keeping our word. When we stood beside you and your mother, I watched you climb out of your stroller and then watched your mother place back in. I didn’t care about the parade anymore. I wanted to leave. I wanted my mother and my little sister. I wanted to cry and I sure as fuck didn’t want to watch the stupid parade.
The next time you climbed out of the stroller, your mother’s back was turned. She was waving down the elbow to elbow sidewalk for someone to see her. You knelt right in front of us to pick up an unnoticed piece of candy.
My father picked you up, took my hand and walked us through the crowd. Nobody stopped him, nobody paid attention. I heard your mother’s frantic screaming by the time we were at the end of the block. I wonder now how all of those people let you slip through the crack like that. I guess nobody was paying attention to a girl being kidnapped. They were all busy with their own agendas.
You should have cried and screamed, Quill. You didn’t. You were always too, over zealous when it came to talking to strangers. You just wanted my balloon. My father gave it to you and you were as happy as could be.
Even at ten, I couldn’t believe what was happening. Forty minutes later, we were on a plane. Nobody asked questions. I remember my father giving you some kind of liquid in a plastic spoon. Something to make you sleep, I’m sure. You did sleep, and he covered your head with a blanket and handed over your passport. He walked you right through customs without one problem. You were Aquilla from that day forward.
I wanted to hate you, Quill. My father brought you into our home as an imposter. You were not my little Quill. I avoided you for the first two days we were home. I was sad. I wanted my mother, my sister, and my father had lost his mind. Even as a boy, I knew this wasn’t right. He treated you as if you weren’t a fraudulent of the real Quill. I tried to treat you like you didn’t exist.
That changed on the third night. For three whole days, you danced around and played without a care in the world. On the third night, you realized something was amiss. You were playing with the real Quill’s toys while I ignored you. You looked up to me with those water blue eyes and said. “Where my mommy go?” It broke my heart even as young as I was.
I realized then that you never asked for any of this. You were a victim as much as my mother and my sister. I held you in my arms that night while you cried yourself to sleep. I knew you were too young to understand, but I told you that I wanted my mommy too. I cried with you. I cried because I wanted you to go home to your mommy, and I wanted mine to come home to me.
After that night, you never let me ignore you. You followed me around like an instinctual orphaned lamb. I guess it was my instinctual habitat to adopt you, nurture you, and take care of you. I did. I became your protector. You became my responsibility. I wasn’t allowed to say the M word around you. My father wanted you to forget the “mommy” word. You did. It took a little while, but you finally forgot all about having a mommy that you were taken from.