GRACE AND GRAVITY

by Caron Garcia Martinez 

A weak February sun casts its rays on the frozen farmland, slowly beginning to thaw the ice-crusted roof and windows of their small house on the edge of town in southeastern Ohio. She hits snooze and snuggles closer to Ana, her sister, burying her nose in Ana’s coconut-infused hair. If she can hold off the dread that morning brings, she can get through the day. 

Too soon, the alarm goes off again, and she stumbles out of bed and pulls on a thermal top, her Croydon High hoodie, her fleece-lined jeans. Shaking Ana’s shoulder, she whispers, “Wake up. It’s 5:30. We got fifteen minutes.” She grabs her softball gear. Coach will decide about their season opener in two weeks. She wants starting pitcher again this season and for her teammates to elect her team captain. 

She, Ana, and Carlos start the day helping their mom, Guadalupe, Lupe for short, get things going at The Coffee Spot. Lupe flips the front door sign to “Come On In!” and starts the Brewmaster while Ana scrambles eggs, chops onions, and dices green peppers for breakfast burritos. Already the two earliest frequent fliers are there at the counter, sniffing for the first scent of coffee like two old hunting dogs, noses to the wind. 

Carlos is mopping the floor near the restroom. Luisa passes a table with what looks like smeared egg and ketchup that has dried overnight and motions to him. “Dude, this is actually gross. Go grab a dishrag.” 

“You grab a dishrag. Mom told me to sweep.” 

“Yeah, but she obviously didn’t see this table. A customer comes in, they’ll think we’re a bunch of pigs. Get on this. Then back to the mop.” A pause. “You’re doing good. Remember how much you’re helping,” a shared gaze then, a softening in her eyes, which makes her younger brother’s eyes softer too.

Heading to the pantry to lug flour, Luisa glances over to the counter. Lupe gives her an already tired smile before filling the early birds’ coffee mugs while setting out cream and sugar, silverware, and salt shakers. The guy with a red fleece vest reaches for the little metal jug full of cream and puts his hand over her mother’s hand, leaving it there. For the merest second, Luisa stares, then looks away and looks back. His hand is where it should be, next to his coffee mug. Did that just happen?

Which old white guy is this? Luisa searches her memory. A lot of people in Croydon knew their family and helped them out after her dad was deported. Was this the plumber, who fixed the leaking pipes when the restroom fell apart? Or the HVAC guy, who redid the venting over the main fryer for practically no charge? Or was it the general contractor, who carved space out of the back office to make a walk-in pantry for Lupe? And why does it matter who it is—what was his stupid hand doing touching her mother?

“Here’s the flour.” She drops a five-pound bag on the counter and glares at Red Vest. “Ana. Carlos! Let’s go.” 

Lupe hands her the keys to the van and leans in for a kiss. Luisa turns her back and closes the door as sharply as she can. She’s left The Spot without hugging her mom, which feels deserved, but she’s out of sorts about it.

Ana and Carlos head inside to class just ahead of the bell. As a senior, she’s got first period free. She leans her head against the window and closes her eyes. If she could grab a nap for twenty minutes to clear her head, she’ll be able to get through the day.

What was that guy doing, putting his hand on her mother? Seven years ago, Trump had sent her father back to Mexico, the label “criminal migrant” branded not only onto him but the whole family. Only later did Luisa start to wonder if people in their community had turned Luis in.

“Hell,” she heard them say to each other, “Luis ain’t one of those dangerousmigrants, rapin’ and murderin’ like you hear about.” “He coaches our Little League teams, runs our diner.” “Helped me change a tire once after church when I had a flat out on Highway 74.”

None of their testimonials had helped to keep her father from deportation. The timer on her phone goes off, so she grabs her gear, and locks the van. On to AP World History. They’re learning about the Nazi Party leading up to World War Two. Words like “scapegoat” and “dehumanizing” made her best friend TJ text her, “Might as well be our own U.S. history, amirite?” She’d texted back: 

“srsly—first it was Germany—now this country—gaslight me the difference again?” 

Luisa gets through History, Calculus, and lunch, and more classes after and then it’s her favorite time of the day—out on the softball field where she gulps in the winter air even though it’s so cold it hurts. Only thing getting on her last nerve is a girl named Rosario, who never fails to try to be friends with her and TJ despite once telling Luisa, “At least my father came to this country the right way.” 

After warm-ups, sprints, fielding practice, and time at bat, Coach has Rosario, Luisa, and two new ninth-graders throw him a series of pitches. After a half hour, they’re all out of breath. Coach throws Luisa a new ball he takes out of his pocket and says, “Ace, you’re the one. You’ll be starting pitcher for the season opener and first in the rotation after that. Rosario, you’ll be ready in the wings for backup.” 

Rosario starts off running, and Coach catches her arm. “Easy. Take a breath. 

You did good. It’s just that Luisa did better. But you’re teammates.” 

Luisa starts to say something, and Rosario cuts her off. “Save it.” 

“Okay ladies, now, shake it off. We got one more thing to do today and that’s for the team to choose their captain. Breathe. I’ll give you a few minutes to collect your thoughts.”

Rosario stands up straight and sticks out her chest. “You’re right, Coach Toby. We’re teammates, not enemies.” Once Coach has jogged away, she says,“You know, you’ve always been a better pitcher than me because you had your dad coaching you all those years.” She widens her eyes as if she’s remembering something—“Pobrecita. No one to protect you now.” 

In the locker room, Coach calls for quiet. “I’ve asked Luisa and Rosario to give short speeches defining leadership and why they’d each be the best captain of this team. When we’re done, we’ll vote by a show of hands.”

Luisa goes first. She mainly looks at the floor, then at the ceiling tiles. “I think you all know me pretty well and know that I try to help everyone, no matter what position. I hope I’ve earned your trust. If we all try our hardest, we’ll have a winning season and a lot of fun. And if we don’t win, we’ll know we did the best we could. I guess that’s all.” 

“That’s it?” asks Coach. “You have a few more minutes, if you want to take it.” 

Luisa shakes her head, then catches sight of TJ near her locker, who mouths the words: “You killed it.” 

Next up is Rosario. She pulls a few Post-It notes she’s stuck to the inside of her locker door, and clears her throat. “Leadership means making tough decisions. It means knowing that even though you might be unpopular, you do what’s right for the team. Take for example Henry Ford. He knew he had to modernize the car industry and people might not like it or might lose their jobs…” The players shift their weight side to side, fidget, and a few whisper to one another. “But Ford started assembly lines… and that’s the kind of leader this team needs.” TJ is rolling her eyes so bad that Luisa wants to laugh. Rosario drones on, and even Coach looks bored.

But when she’s done and the vote is taken, Rosario wins. TJ slams her locker door. Filing out, friends and teammates don’t look at Luisa, who blindly stuffs her cleats and mitt into her bag and can’t get out of the locker room fast enough. 

The girls are quiet on the ride home. When Luisa pulls up to TJ’s house, TJ says, “Something is definitely sketch about all this and I’m gonna find out what’s up.”

On the drive home, Luisa does what she has always done when she’s upset. First, cry. Very ugly crying. For at least a good minute or two. Because her mother would always tell her, “Tears wash the windows of your soul. And you need to be able to see clearly.” Then, deep breaths. Last, count blessings, and take stock. You are the starting pitcher. That means you are the better player. Don’t forget that. And while friends will let you down, your family never will.

A few hours later, after Ana and Carlos have gone to bed, Luisa and her mom sit at the kitchen table trying to fight back their rising panic and rereading the letter that had arrived just that afternoon: “Guadalupe Guerrero: Notice of Deportation” in large black font across the top. Luisa attempts to translate every legal term into words that somehow don’t mean they are coming to take her mother away, but she can’t.

“This can’t be happening. First papa, now you?” 

Lupe is rocking back and forth in her chair, rosary beads in her fingers. “I prayed to God they would overlook me. I paid our taxes, ran The Spot honestly. Hoping they wouldn’t care about finding me.”

Luisa is more angry than sad. And anger seems more useful anyway. She slaps the table. “Rosario’s dad came here on a tourist visa and didn’t go back to Mexico. He just stayed illegally. But he somehow went to college to become an engineer on a scholarship. You and papa never did anything smart like that.” 

Lupe picks at a tissue, shredding it with her fingernail. “Me and your father only wanted to work. To have children born here and be good U.S. citizens. We never took welfare or tried to get money to go to college. We didn’t think it was right.”

“But her dad got his papers to stay. And then to work here legally. And now she’s safe. And we’re not! Why?”

Lupe makes her lips thin. “We have never taken ni un centavo from this government for welfare, scholarships, food—nothing.” “But that was dumb, Mama, don’t you see that?” 

Lupe replies softly, “We thought it was enough to live here as good people.” 

“Good people? Because by the way,” Luisa says, “what is up with that man holding hands with you at the counter this morning?” 

Lupe bites her lip. “You saw that? I’m sorry. I told him not to do that again in public.”

“Mom! In public or in private. What is up with that?” 

“Mijita, there’s something I have to tell you. I am thinking about—no es cierto, but I’m thinking about, well, marrying Mr. Bradley. We knew that if Trump got elected, a letter like this would come. And I would do anything not to be deported and leave you three kids here.” Lupe can’t hold back her tears. Her shoulders shake and she reaches for Luisa’s hand. “Can you try to understand that?” 

“Oh my God Mom—how could you do this to Papa?” 

Seconds tick by, and Lupe tries to form words, but each time, she stops, and then she inhales very deeply, “Mijita… it was your papa’s idea.” 

A deep cold fury is spreading from Luisa’s heart to every part of her body. 

“Papa loves you. He would never say that. You’re lying.” 

“I’m not lying. Call him yourself.”

Luisa grabs her keys and phone and heads out to the van. She punches in her father’s number and starts to cry as soon as she hears his voice. “You know about the letter we got today?” 

“Yes, mijita, your mom texted me. It’s terrible, but not a surprise.”

“Well, her solution is to marry a man she doesn’t even love… which by the way might not even be enough to make her legal anyway. They could still throw her out.” 

“Luisa,” her father’s voice is weary, and pained, and the words come so slowly. “They might try, but it will take time and is a low priority because Mr. Bradley is a citizen. They’ll work on deporting other people—‘the easy targets’—like I was.” There’s a pause. “Luisa, you’re eighteen already. And at twenty-one, you can help us. That’s the important thing. Your mom and me, we’re thinking of the three of you, not of us.” 

“Papa, you told us family was everything.” Luisa knows she sounds like she’s eleven again, and she chokes on the words. “I hate you right now. Do you know that? I hate all of this, and I hate you both.” 

There is silence, and a distant siren, and only the sound of her father breathing. “One day you might have kids of your own. Maybe then you’ll understand.” He sighs. “Sometimes things happen that we can’t control. Then, all we can do is make the best choice we can. And sometimes ‘the best’ is not even very good. But it’s all we can do.”

Luisa is browning ground beef to make chili when TJ breezes through the door into the kitchen at the diner. “You’ve been avoiding me at school all week and ghosting when I text. Only time I’ve seen you is at practice and then—you’re just in a zone.” 

“Pretty much,” Luisa says, adding her mom’s mix of spices to the pot. 

“Okay, well, first. I have no words about your mom. I saw her when I came in, and she told me. I had no idea, since you’ve said nothing.” 

Luisa is intent on stirring the chili as if she’s fighting with it. 

TJ continues, “I mean, your dad. Now your mom. It’s so wrong. And I don’t know what to say. I feel so bad.” 

“Say less,” Luisa tosses in canned pinto beans and bites her lip.

“Okay. But I want you to know I will seriously do anything for you that I can do.” It’s quiet for a moment as both of them realize how empty the words sound. 

“Also, I found out why you didn’t get captain.” “I don’t care why. It doesn’t even matter.”

“Rosario told people she heard Coach telling you to find reasons to cut players and that ‘fairness was not the point.’ Oh my god. Can you believe our friends first of all believing Coach would say something like that, let alone you would ever do it?” 

Luisa slices the onions so rapidly they don’t have time to make her cry. “I believe it. Seems like people get away with lying and it doesn’t even matter.” “Yeah, and then Tina told me she was going to vote for you anyway until Coach made it a raise-your-hand thing and not a secret ballot, and then she was like, game over, because Rosario would never forget it, and she is one petty person you do not want to piss off.” 

“Takes a lot to stand up to a bully,” Luisa says quietly. “Most people don’t have it in them.”

“She lied to them, and she scared them. Made them think they’d lose out if you won.”

“So they know me, but they believed her.” Luisa’s eyes finally meet TJ’s for the first time since she’s entered the kitchen, and her words are edged with the same steel as the knife she holds in her hand. “When you make people afraid, it’s like they lose all their common sense.”

“I’m going to tell all of them they were played. And how bad they hurt you.”

“I can’t care. I just need to play my game, and pitch to the glove, and try to focus on how to keep my family together, you know?”

TJ gives Luisa a sideways hug and Luisa lets her. They lean their heads to the side, resting lightly on each other the way they have for ten years. TJ wipes away a tear, but Luisa’s face is set like a rock. “You have so much more on your shoulders than the rest of us do,” TJ says. “We’re all about—team captain! And prom, and graduation! But you’re like, am I losing my whole life?” 

“Pretty much,” Luisa says. She bangs the cast-iron lid on the big pot and turns the flame down so it’s steady and low. She fixes her gaze beyond the wall, her face arranged in what her father used to call her mirada asesina, her killer stare. “But the game isn’t over. And I’ve got a few more pitches to throw.”

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Caron Garcia Martinez is a writer, coach, and educator whose passion is working to create a more just world. A native Californian, she lives in Northern Virginia and teaches at American University in Washington, DC.