Matt de la Peña - The Living

“You do so much for this family,” his mom said. “You have since the day your dad left.”

Shy wiped more perspiration off his forehead. “Working on this ship was a mistake.”

“Shy, you listen to me. You remember Teresa’s bunnies?”

He didn’t say anything.

“You remember, don’t you?”

He did.

His sister had two bunnies when they were little. She got them for a birthday present. She loved those bunnies more than anything, used to take them to neighbors’ houses in a cage and let her friends pet them. But one day, while she and her friend Marisol were eating lunch in the alley behind their building, a neighborhood dog got into the cage and killed both bunnies, then sat there guarding their remains. Teresa came racing into the apartment, screaming her head off. Shy and his mom followed her back to the alley, and Shy saw.

His mom blew her nose, said: “Me and your sister were a wreck, Shy. We had to leave the room. And what’d you do?”

“Cleaned up,” he said in a quiet voice.

“You shooed the dog away and scooped those bunnies into a box. Took your dad’s old shovel and dug a hole in the empty lot next door. And you buried them. You were seven years old, Shy. Barely older than Miguel is now. I kept thinking, Where did my son learn to do this?”

Shy shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “They honestly think the medicine can work?”

“That’s what the doctor told us,” his mom said. “My point is, I don’t want you beating yourself up about being away. You’re working, Shy. You’re helping out your mom.”

“Email me updates, okay? Many as you can. I wanna know everything.”

“I promise,” his mom said. “Can we do this again tomorrow? I need to see my son’s face.”

Shy nodded. He kept picturing his little nephew lying in a hospital bed, the whites of his eyes having already turned red. It broke his fucking heart.

His mom wiped her face with tissues again, her eyes shifting off of Shy. “What happened to your room?”

Shy looked over his shoulder, saw Rodney cleaning up. “We’re rearranging,” he said, turning back to his mom. “Tomorrow between two-thirty and three, all right? And email me.”

“I will.”

“And I’m serious, Ma. Make sure you cash that bond.”

“Be safe, Shy. I love you.”

“Love you, too.”

Shy closed out of the call and turned off the computer. Then he just sat there for a few seconds, thinking about what he’d just heard. All his problems on the ship seemed laughable now that he knew his nephew had Romero Disease. He pushed down the urge to punch the wall in front of him.

“You all right?” Rodney asked.

Shy took a deep breath and turned around, saw that Rodney was now cleaning up his stuff, too. “I been better, man.”

“Sorry to hear about your nephew,” Rodney said. “What exactly is Romero Disease, anyway?”

“You never heard of it?” Shy asked. Back home it was all anyone ever talked about.

“I’ve heard the name. And I’m pretty sure people have died from it, right?”

Shy shook his head, remembering all the shit he saw his grandma go through. “It’s this awful disease going around back home,” he told Rodney. “People’s eyes turn red and their vision goes blurry. Then their skin gets so dry and brittle it starts flaking off. They die from fluid loss in like forty-eight hours.”

“Jesus, dude.” Rodney looked horrified.

Shy got up and grabbed his uniform shirt for the gym. He wouldn’t allow himself to even consider Miguel not pulling through. “He’ll be all right,” he told Rodney. “They got medicine now.”

Rodney stood there, hands on hips, nodding.

Shy looked at his clock. Two-forty-nine. “Anyways, I gotta get to the gym. Don’t worry about the rest of my stuff. I’ll pick it up later.”

“I don’t mind,” Rodney said.

“Soon as I’m off, I’ll go to Paolo’s office.” Shy pulled open the door, but just as he was leaving he heard Rodney call his name.

He turned back around.

Rodney cleared his throat. “You think whoever was in here will come back? Like while we’re sleeping?”

Maybe it was because Shy’s mind was so tweaked after hearing about Miguel, or maybe it was pure exhaustion, but Rodney’s words made him feel choked up. Like if he breathed the wrong way or something he might start crying. And Shy hadn’t cried since he was a little kid. He took after his mom that way.

“Nobody’s coming in here anymore,” he told Rodney. “I’ll make sure of it.” Then he turned and went out the door.

According to a few of the passengers crowding into the gym, the sun had completely disappeared behind thick gray clouds out by the pool, and sunbathers were migrating to other parts of the ship. This made the gym so busy during Shy’s four-hour shift, he hardly had time to stress about Miguel. He handed out towels, Windexed the floor-to-ceiling mirrors, wiped down machines when they weren’t in use, demonstrated how to adjust the sauna controls, spotted for a few guys in the free-weights section, and handed out complimentary bottles of Gatorade and water.

Shy had no idea it was the end of his shift until Frederick from Denmark came walking in to relieve him. “Everything is good?” he asked Shy, stashing his backpack behind the gym’s reception desk.

“Just crowded.” Shy motioned toward the floor where a couple dozen passengers were sweating on treadmills and stationary bikes and elliptical machines—all of them glued to the little personal TVs in front of their faces. “We’re running low on towels, but I already called down to Claudia. They should be on their way.”

“Very nice.”

Shy grabbed his stuff from the employee cubby, saluted Frederick and headed for the exit. As he pushed through the door, he ran right into Addison and Cassandra, the girls he’d met at his pool stand earlier.

They both looked at each other and started laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Shy asked, glancing down at their tight workout gear. Girls this irritating shouldn’t be allowed to have such smoking bodies. And guys with sick nephews shouldn’t be noticing shit like that.

“Oh, nothing,” Addison said.

“You work in the gym, too ?” Cassandra asked.

“I do everything on this ship,” Shy said, trying to keep a playful attitude. “Couple more voyages and I’ll probably be captain.”

They looked at each other again. “Ah, he made a little joke,” Cassandra said.

“How adorable,” Addison said, and then they both burst out laughing again.

Shy felt like a complete idiot. It was definitely time to get out of this convo and talk to Paolo. “Look, I gotta go handle a few things,” he told the girls, giving them a sarcastic thumbs-up. “It was great talking to you.”

He started past them, but Addison latched on to his elbow, saying: “Just so you know, Cassie decided dinner should just be you and her.”

Cassandra shot her an exaggerated look of shock and said: “You lying little bitch.”

“What?” Addison said. “I doubt my dad will be back by the weekend anyway. It’ll be perfect. I’ll post a bunch of pictures online—‘Cassie and her pool boy.’ Can you imagine everyone back home?”

They laughed at him some more, and Shy slipped her grip, still smiling, and told them: “Have an excellent workout.”

“Ah, don’t be all sensitive,” one of them called after him—he couldn’t tell which one. “We’re just joking around.”

Shy waved over his shoulder and started down a flight of stairs, hoping they both ate shit on the treadmills.

Paolo wasn’t in his office.

Vlad and Kyle, the two security guys Shy found in the break room, said Paolo was meeting with the captain about the weather. They had no idea when he was coming back. Shy left the security wing and stood in the crew hall for a few minutes, trying to work out his next move.