Gina Oleander is not in the parking lot when I exit the school. Part of me is certain she was here earlier than we agreed upon, and part of me wants not to care that I technically flaked on a person who would do that. Her brown paper bag in my hands is a crumpled reminder of our deal, and it doesn’t sit well with me. I don’t like owing things. She didn’t rub me in any way that would warrant retaliation, regardless that she hurled all over my backpack.

She didn’t say it couldn’t be 3:20 tomorrow.

Instead of stalking the parking lot in the afternoon sun waiting for someone who more than likely doesn’t want to see me, I head for my van and chant to myself the constantly growing list of things I have to buy. Food takes the number one spot. Gas second. A new backpack third. Thankfully, I’ve got ten bucks to get started.

My life is a plethora of checklists and every miscellaneous duty on those lists pertains to me and me only. I don’t care about your prom tickets, and I don’t care about your yearbooks. I’ll turn in my assignments to make the passing grade, and I’ll sit at every pep-rally that moderately entertains me. Should someone ask me to join an honor society in order to increase my chances at scholarships, I’ll pass and let a more deserving person fork up the 95-dollar entrance fee, someone who wears a huge backpack filled with supplies like Gina Oleander, or someone unnecessarily accommodating like Joel Vallejo. I’ve yet to form an opinion on Argus Miller, but Buzzcut Ortega and Tigo Gart can choke on a fat one.

“C’mon Granny, let’s bounce.” I slap the hood of my van, chuck Gina's bag into my passenger seat, and ignoring that someone’s drawn dicks into the dust on one of the windows, I bring my ride to life.

The drive back home is as forgettable as the billions of syllabi stuffed into my tight back pocket. On automatic, my brain doesn’t register anything but the Houston traffic and the unforeseen sun frying my fingers on the steering wheel. It’s uncomfortable, but I deal knowing Houston weather is a new stripper trying to make an impression on the clientele, hot and inconsistent. Higher cognition returns to me only after arriving back at Las Palmas de Luz and jumping out of my vehicle. 

And as soon as I do, the afternoon bathes me in faded orange. I look up at the sky over the gray lot overrun by bent-up cars, trucks, and the occasional drug money-race car. Mondays are a mix of pretty and ugly like that, aren’t they?

For me, Monday is an errand day. My room is the grocery store. The beginning of every work week I pop in and gather clothes, deodorant, pads, barely-used journals, and clean sheets. Then I head out before Trinidad can stop me. Her bank closes late, and I seize full advantages from that fact.

Maybe if I empty half of Gina’s brown paper bag, I can have something to hold all my stuff in. Trini will notice if I take one of her duffel bags.

When the thought enters my head, I reach past the driver’s seat and into the passenger side, shaking Gina’s bag until most of the pregnancy tests fall over the seat.

Slam goes the door to my Volkswagen. “Sorry, Granny.”

I cross the small alleys that lead into my apartment courtyard. A feeling bangs the walls up and down my stomach until I’m forced to stop, think, and breathe for a second. I’ve forgotten something, and I hate the feeling that comes as a result. Though I know gnashing my teeth together won’t make me remember, I do it to placate the nasty feeling that one of my priorities has been buried under my other thoughts and responsibilities. Shit, shit, shit, what I am forgetting?

“Chismosas.”

I’m nearly onto the apartment porch when my elderly upstairs neighbor speaks. My feet scuff to a stop, and I pause, listening to the ruffle of her newspapers above me.

“Son cotorras, ablar y ablar. No tienen nada mas que hacer.”

They’re parrots, talk and talk. They have nothing else to do.

And just like that, I remember.

Mierda.