Junot Díaz - The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

That should have been the end of it, right? Just a memory of some nerd I once knew who tried to kill himself: nothing more, nothing more. But the de Leóns, it turned out, weren’t a clan you could just shake of.

Not two weeks into senior year he showed up at my dorm room! To bring over his writings and to ask me about mine! I couldn’t believe it. Last I heard he was planning on subbing at his old high school, taking classes over at BCC, but there he was, standing at my door, sheepishly holding a blue folder. Hail and well met, Yunior, he said. Oscar, I said, in disbelief. He had lost even more weight and was trying his best to keep his hair trim and his face shaved. He looked, if you can believe it, good. Still talking Space Opera, though—had just finished with the first of his projected quartet of novels, totally obsessed with it now. May be the death of me, he sighed, and then he caught himself. Sorry. Of course nobody at Demarest wanted to room with him—what a surprise (we all know how tolerant the tolerant are)—so when he returned in the spring he’d have a double to himself, not that it did him any good, he joked.

Demarest won’t be the same without your mesomorphic grimness, he said matter-of-factly.

Ha, I said.

You should definitely visit me in Paterson when you have a reprieve. I have a plethora of new Japanimation for your viewing pleasure.

Definitely, bro, I said. Definitely.

I never did go by. I was busy, God’s Truth: delivering pool tables, bringing the grades up, getting ready to graduate. And besides, that fall a miracle happened: Suriyan showed up at my door. Looking more beautiful than I ever saw her. I want us to try again. Of course I said yes, and went out and put a cuerno in her that very night. Dios mío! Some niggers couldn’t have got ten ass on Judgment Day; me I couldn’t not get ass, even when I tried.

My negligence didn’t stop O from visiting me every now and then with some new chapter and some new story of a girl he’d spotted on the bus, on the street, or in a class.

Same ole Oscar, I said.

Yes, he said weakly. Same ole me.

Rutgers was always a crazy place, but that last fall it seemed to be especially bugging. In October a bunch of freshman girls I knew on Livingston got busted for dealing coke, four of the quietest gorditas around. Like they say: los que menos corren, vuelan. On Bush, the Lambdas started a fight with the Alphas over some idiocy and for weeks there was talk of a black-Latino war but nothing ever happened, everybody too busy throwing parties and fucking each other to scrap.

That winter I even managed to sit in my dorm room long enough to write a story that wasn’t too bad, about the woman who used to live in the patio behind my house in the DR, a woman everybody said was a prostitute but who used to watch me and my brother while my mom and my abuelo were at work. My professor couldn’t believe it. I’m impressed. Not a single shooting or stabbing in the whole story. Not that it helped any. I didn’t win any of the creative-writing prizes that year. I kinda had been hoping.

And then it was finals, and who of all people do I end up running into? Lola! I almost didn’t recognize her because her hair was ill long and because she was wearing these cheap blocky glasses, the kind an alternative whitegirl would wear. Enough silver on her wrists to ransom the royal family and so much leg coming out of her denim skirt it just didn’t seem fair. As soon as she saw me she tugged down the skirt, not like it did much good. This was on the E bus; I was on my way back from seeing a girl of zero note and she was heading out to some stupid-ass farewell party for one of her friends. I slopped down next to her and she said, What’s up? Her eyes so incredibly big and empty of any guile. Or expectation, for that matter.

How have you been? I asked.

Good. How about you?

Just getting ready for break.

Merry Christmas. And then, just like a de León, she went back to reading her book!

I poked at the book. Introduction to Japanese. What the hell are you studying now? Didn’t they throw you out of here already?

I’m teaching English in Japan next year, she said matter-of-factly. It’s going to be amazing .

Not I’m thinking about or I’ve applied but I am . Japan? I laughed, a little mean. What the hell is a Dominican going out to Japan for?

You’re right, she said, turning the page irritably. Why would anyone want to go anywhere when they have New Jersey?

We let that sit for a sec.

That was a little harsh, I said.

My apologies.

Like I said: it was December. My Indian girl, Lily, was waiting for me back on College Ave., and so was Suriyan. But I wasn’t thinking about either of them. I was thinking about the one time I’d seen Lola that year; she’d been reading a book in front of the Henderson Chapel with such concentration I thought she might hurt herself. I’d heard from Oscar that she was living in Edison with some of her girlfriends, working at some office or another, saving money for her next big adventure. That day I’d seen her I’d wanted to say hi but I didn’t have the balls, figured she would ig me.

I watched Commercial Ave. slide past and there, in the distance, were the lights of Route 18. That was one of those moments that would always be Rutgers for me. The girls in front giggling about some guy. Her hands on those pages, nails all painted up in cranberry. My own hands like monster crabs. In a couple of months I’d be back in London Terrace if I wasn’t careful and she’d be off to Tokyo or Kyoto or wherever she was going. Of all the chicks I’d run up on at Rutgers, of all the chicks I’d run up on ever, Lola was the one I’d never gotten a handle on. So why did it feel like she was the one who knew me best? I thought about Suriyan and how she would never talk to me again. I thought about my own fears of actually being good, because Lola wasn’t Suriyan; with her I’d have to be someone I’d never tried to be. We were reaching College Ave. Last chance, so I made like Oscar and said, Have dinner with me, Lola. I promise, I won’t try to take your panties off.

Yeah right, she said, almost ripping her page in the turning.

I covered her hand in mine and she gave me this frustrated heart-wrenching look like she was already on her way down with me and didn’t, for the life of her, understand why.

It’s OK, I said.

No, it’s fucking not OK. You’re too short . But she didn’t take her hand away.

We went to her place on Handy and before I could really put a hurt on her she stopped everything, dragged me up from her toto by my ears. Why is this the face I can’t seem to forget, even now, after all these years? Tired from working, swollen from lack of sleep, a crazy mixture of ferocity and vulnerability that was and shall ever be Lola.

She looked at me until I couldn’t stand it anymore and then she said: Just don’t lie to me, Yunior.

I won’t, I promised.

Don’t laugh. My intentions were pure.

Not much more to tell. Except this:

That spring I moved back in with him. Thought about it all winter. Even at the very end I almost changed my mind. Was waiting by his door in Demarest and despite the fact that I’d been waiting all morning, at the very end I still almost ran off, but then I heard their voices on the stairwell, bringing up his things.

I don’t know who was more surprised: Oscar, Lola, or me.

In Oscar’s version, I raised my hand and said, Mellon . Took him a second to recognize the word. Mellon, he said finally.

That fall after the Fall was dark (I read in his journal): dark. He was still thinking about doing it but he was afraid. Of his sister mainly, but also of himself. Of the possibility of a miracle, of an invincible summer. Reading and writing and watching TV with his mother. If you try anything stupid, his mother swore, I’ll haunt you my whole life. You better believe it.