Forever My Lady Read online

  “I don’t think it’s fair for him to get in trouble.”

  “What are you doing out of class?”

  “I walked out.”

  “You what?”

  “I walked out. I told Mr. O’Donnell I didn’t think it was right and he sent me to your office.”

  From that day on, Dio and Jennifer were the best of friends. Besides his boys, she was the only friend he really had. He had to admit he was a little embarrassed walking down the hall with someone like her, but then he got over it. Nobody knew her like he did. Nobody liked being with her like he did. She didn’t have the easiest life either, with all the yelling and screaming in her house. But they’d both hide away in her tree house and talk the whole night and they’d eat Rolos ’cause she knew Dio loved chocolate. And she’d sing to him with the most beautiful voice and talk about their dreams. They’d sleep there at night whenever things were bad. They never messed around or anything; their bond went beyond sex. It was a friendship, a true friendship Dio had never experienced before.

  But then they were separated when his mother kicked him out of the house that year and he ended up lost in the foster-care system until he was eighteen. He thought he’d never see her again, until they were reunited just months ago after all these years. It was like they picked up where they left off.

  It wasn’t just some puppy love for the two of them. No, it was true love, real love that only comes around once in a lifetime, and Dio felt lucky just to hold her in his arms. He felt alive kissing her soft lips, or smelling the scent of her hair when she hugged him and buried her head in his chest. Everything about her he loved.

  She was the first one to notice his talent as an artist and encouraged him to go for his goal of owning his own car design shop.

  “Nobody will hire me,” he would say.

  “You won’t have to be hired, you’ll be hiring them!” she’d respond.

  He loved it when she said things like that.

  She was the only one who saw him as more than just some thug on the street, some vato, some gangsta. She encouraged him; she believed in him like nobody ever had.

  He was so much more than the way most people saw him and she knew it. He hated driving down the street and having people lock their car doors as he pulled up. He hated the way they pulled their children closer to them as he walked by as if he were going to snatch the kids right out of their arms. He hated being hassled by the cops every night he went out to chill with his girl for no other reason than being Chicano in a nice car. He hated being judged, period.

  Jennifer saw the real side of him, the side he never showed anyone, his vulnerable side. He could tell Jennifer anything and she’d listen. She’d share with him her deepest secrets that she wouldn’t dare tell her familia and she knew he’d never say a word. They were more than just lovers; they were best friends, and she was by far the only best friend Dio had left. And even that was in question. It seemed like anyone who ever got close to Dio ended up dead or abandoned him. It was like a curse, and now it was driving him loco not knowing if she was okay.

  “Halt!” the D.I. said. “I said halt!”

  Most of the trainees were about as confused as he was, didn’t have a clue what the D.I. was talking about, but they figured he must be telling them to stop. Thank God. Maybe now they could rest. He was beyond exhausted. He felt like his stomach, his lungs, and everything else would come spewing out of his mouth at any moment.

  The only one who looked more pitiful than him was this skinny mulatto kid the D.I. called Simon. He looked like he’d fall over if someone breathed on him hard. He had to be the nerdiest-looking kid Dio had ever seen. You could play connect-the-dots with the poor kid’s zits. Dio hated to admit it, but he wondered, with Simon’s Coke-bottle glasses and everything, how the kid could manage to look at himself in the mirror. It was that bad.

  “What are you huffing and puffing about, trainee?” the D.I. said, screaming at the top of his lungs in Dio’s face. Dio was keeled over trying to catch his breath.

  “Looks to me like you’re out of shape. Stand up.”

  “I can’t.”

  “I? Who’s ‘I’? Your name is Trainee Radigez.”

  “Hold up, a’ight? Jeez,” Dio said.

  The words came out of Dio’s mouth before he realized the big mistake he had just made. It was too late. The D.I. came at him like a semi.

  “Who the hell you think you’re talking to, boy? Who said you could talk to me, trainee? What’s the third general rule from your manual?”

  Dio was supposed to have memorized some fifty-page manual they gave them the night before with all these ridiculous rules and regulations. But the last thing that was on his mind was reading some stupid booklet.

  Dio rolled his eyes and stood up. “I don’t know. You tell me.”

  “You gotta be out of your cotton-pickin’ mind. You dying on me, trainee? You better be dying on me if I see them eyes rolling around in your head again. The third general rule is, ‘Trainees do not speak unless they are given permission.’ You hear me, boy?”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “How do you answer an officer?”

  Dio shrugged. Drill Instructor Jackson mimicked him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Jackson flicked Dio’s long hair.

  “Nice,” he said with a smirk on his face. “Are you a sissy?”

  Dio was burning up. What was wrong with his hair? Sure it was long; he hadn’t cut it since he was like thirteen. Jennifer liked it that way. She always said that was her favorite part of him, that and his eyes. Besides, it reminded him of the Bible stories of Samson that his mother used to read him. Samson never cut his hair because it gave him strength; same for Dio. That strength had kept him alive all these years.

  “I asked you a question, trainee.”

  “Hell, no. I ain’t no sissy. What the fuck do you want me say?”

  “You’re really cruisin’ for a bruisin’, aren’t you, trainee? ‘Sir! Trainee Radigez doesn’t know, Senior Jackson, sir!’ That’s what you say!”

  “Sir, Trainee Rodríguez don’t know, Senior Jackson, sir,” Dio answered back half-heartedly.

  He just wasn’t in the mood for this. He could feel the stares of the other trainees. He hated when people stared at him.

  Senior Jackson cupped his ears, “What? Say that again. There something the matter with your voice? I can’t hear yooooooooou!”

  “Nooooo, there’s nothin’ wrong with my—”

  Jackson shoved his finger at Dio’s head.

  “Think, trainee, think.”

  If he touches me one more time . . .

  “Goddamn, you’re a slow learner. Are you a slow learner, Trainee Radigez?”

  “Sir, it’s Rodríguez, sir. Not Radigez.”

  Jackson stepped up to Dio like a train about to hit a car on the tracks. “You correcting me, boy? You don’t speak until spoken to, you don’t shit ’til you’re told to, and you don’t eat, sleep, or breathe unless I tell you to. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes . . . sir, yes, sir!”

  He cupped his ear again. “What? I can’t hear you, trainee. There are no secrets here, trainee. Speak up!”

  “Sir, yes, sir!”

  Dio hated repeating himself and he hated even more having to speak up when he didn’t feel like it. Everyone was staring at him as if he were an idiot, worse yet, as if he were some bad kid in the classroom who just got in trouble. It brought back too many bad memories.

  Jackson looked Dio up and down, heaving and huffing. He let out a little laugh. “You look like an ignoramus. Are you an ignoramus, Trainee Radigez?”

  What the hell was that supposed to mean? Dio wondered. It didn’t sound good.

  “Sir, no, sir.”

  Jackson turned to the other trainees. “Does he look like an ignoramus, trainees?”

  They looked at one another trying to figure out what the hell he was talking about.

  “Look at me, dammit! I asked you a questi
on!”

  They obeyed and answered back with a mish-mashed version of “Sir, yes, sir!” and “Sir, no, sir!”

  Jackson laughed in their faces. He gave them the once-over, pacing in front of the line one step at a time. They were all wearing dark shirts, the sign of a beginner in the camp.

  “You got three levels to get past in this camp and half you faggots won’t make it past the first one.”

  He flipped through the pages of a clipboard and shook his head.

  “You don’t know what it means. Do you? Do you?”

  “Sir, no, sir!” they answered.

  “So I got a bunch of dummies here. Oh, great. Hit dirt and give me fifty.”

  They looked at one another as if looking for some clarification.

  “Now!” and they dropped like flies, giving him pushups.

  Dio couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t he see they were exhausted as it was? Why was he making them do more?

  This was stupid.

  “There is no fun here. If you’re not working, you’re in school studying. And every night if you’re not in your bunks sleeping, you’re reading the dictionary. Each of you will be provided a copy of it and I expect you to know it backward and forward along with your general rules. The next time you don’t know a word I want you to look it up in the dictionary. And you better know what it means, next time I ask ya. I expect every single one of you to know the meaning of ignoramus by tomorrow. Do I make myself clear, trainees?”

  They stuttered, then coughed up, “Sir, yes, sir!”

  “What in the hell was that? You sound like a bunch of pansies. Are you a bunch of pansies, Trainee Grossaint?”

  He stepped in front of a white kid with ice-blue eyes and chiseled features, diligently doing pushups as if he were reading a book.

  “Sir, no, sir!”

  “You sure about that, Grossaint? ’Cause you all sound like a bunch of pansies. So, we got a bunch of pansies and dummies. Great combination.”

  Dio felt sick to his stomach. He felt as if he were going to cough up his lungs at any moment. He could barely handle the five pushups he had done already and he had forty-five more to go? His body quivered with each pushup.

  Jackson bent over and got into Dio’s face, “What kind of pushup is that? That’s not even a girl pushup.”

  The trainees chuckled, which burned Dio up.

  “I’m . . . sir, I’m . . . Trainee Rodríguez is trying, sir.”

  “Trying? What the hell does that mean? Trying? You either do it or you don’t. You are a pathetic excuse for a man if I ever did see one.”

  Jackson stuck his weathered boots under Dio’s chin.

  “When your chin hits these boots, then that’s a pushup. Start over . . . one . . . two . . .”

  He says one more word, one more word . . . , Dio thought.

  He would have done something about it right then and there, but now he was feeling sicker than before. It could have been the dung smell of Jackson’s boots, could have been the exhaustion, could have been anything, but when it happened, Dio had never felt more embarrassment in his life. His last meal and about everything else he had in him poured out of his mouth in chunks right on Jackson’s shoes.

  “What in the hell? Get up, trainee! Get . . . up!”

  Dio struggled up.

  “I can’t believe this!” Jackson went on. “You sick or something, trainee?”

  “Sir . . . no . . . sir.”

  “Then why the hell . . . ? You’re out of shape; that’s what your problem is. And you probably want a cigarette, too. Would you like that, trainee? Would you like a cigarette?”

  “Sir, yes, sir.”

  “This look like a quickie mart to you, Radigez? Grossaint, get over here.”

  Grossaint hustled over to Jackson’s side. “Sir, yes, sir!”

  “This look like puke to you, Grossaint?”

  “Sir, yes, sir.”

  “Why is there puke on my boots, Grossaint?”

  “Sir?”

  “Don’t make me repeat myself, Grossaint. That really ticks me off.”

  “Sir, ’cause Trainee Radigez—”

  “No! No! And no, Grossaint! There’s puke on my boots ’cause you haven’t cleaned it off yet. Get on down there and clean it up.”

  Grossaint dropped to his knees. “Sir, how do I—”

  “You got a shirt, don’t you?”

  Grossaint grimaced. He gave Dio a look of disgust and took the lower end of his T-shirt and began to clean it up while still wearing the shirt.

  What a smell.

  “Hurry up, we got a lot to do. And I want to see myself in the reflection by the time you’re done. Hurry up, Grossaint.”

  Grossaint worked hard at the shoes, scurrying after Jackson as he approached Dio. Everyone watched in shock. Dio couldn’t have been more embarrassed, but he kept up his façade.

  Jackson stood in front of Dio, nose to nose, and for the first time said something in almost a whisper. “How you feeling now, Radigez?”

  It was not what he said that bothered Dio the most, but the way he said it. All that could be heard was the trainees catching their breath and Grossaint scrubbing at the shoes. Jackson’s intense dark eyes peered right through Dio’s soul, but he lifted his chin in a defiant stance.

  “I said, how you feeling now, Radigez?”

  “Sir, fine. Feeling fine now, sir,” Dio answered back, never looking away.

  A smile curved on Jackson’s face as he stared Dio down. “There is no competition here, Radigez. No challenge to overcome. One way or another, you’re going to learn. I will win. I always do.”

  He resumed his normal top-of-his-lungs resounding voice.

  “One of you fuck up, you all fuck up. Understand?” Jackson said. He looked right at Dio as he said it.

  “Sir, yes, sir!” the trainees answered back.

  “You done yet, Grossaint?”

  “Sir, yes, sir!”

  “Get up then and get into place. Take your shirt off, Grossaint. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Sir, yes, sir!” Grossaint answered.

  “Seems to me Trainee Radigez is tired, so you’re all going to have to do the running for him. Five more miles.”

  They couldn’t believe it. Dio could feel their cold stares on the back of his neck.

  “Now!” Jackson commanded.

  “Sir, yes, sir!”

  “You just sit there and relax, Radigez. Sit there and enjoy yourself. Don’t worry,” he said with a crafty smile, “they’ll take care of everything.”

  Bzzz! Dio couldn’t believe his eyes. Almost five years’ growth fell on the floor as a junior officer shaved off his hair. Clump after clump it fell and Dio did whatever he could to remain strong. He wasn’t about to give them the pleasure of seeing how the haircut was tearing him apart.

  If Jennifer could see him now, she’d be shocked out of her mind. His mother hated his long hair; in fact, it seemed like she hated just about everything about him. His hair was his strength. He felt, with every clump that fell on the floor, that he was getting weaker and weaker. He held on to what little strength he had left.

  It was times like that, in camp, that he wished Jennifer were around. Dio had loved lying next to Jennifer late at night after he’d snuck into her bedroom. And they’d whisper and laugh all night long, knowing if her parents ever found out, they’d have him arrested. They never did like him. They never understood the special thing he and Jennifer had together.

  They were probably jealous, Dio often thought.

  Her parents’ love had long ago fizzled out. They were like cold tamales that used to be piping hot.

  He glanced at the twenty pairs of eyes staring at him. It seemed like all the trainees had already paired off into cliques. It was as if he were in junior high again and nobody wanted to be his friend.

  Dio felt completely naked as the last clump of hair fell to the floor. It felt weird as the breeze flowed through his almost bald head with every step he took. He tried
to keep his head up, walking past the glaring eyes of his fellow trainees as though he didn’t know that they were staring at him.

  He could see Grossaint’s eyes following every move he made as he found an empty spot on the floor and sat down, alone. He’d only been here for a few days and already he’d made enemies.

  Dio’s eyes met Grossaint’s ice-blue ones. He couldn’t figure Grossaint out. He had one of those faces that said a lot, but you didn’t understand the language. It was like looking through a big dictionary and not knowing where to start. Grossaint just looked at him as his friends whispered things in his ears: Dio imagined that couldn’t be a good thing.

  Dio was beat by the time they got into their tent. It was a large tent with bunks sitting on the hard desert ground. Nothing’s colder than the February winter in Las Vegas. It’s the type of cold that just clings to your bones and rattles them. Dio had slept on floors more comfortable than those bunks, but at this point he felt like he could sleep on just about anything.

  It was only 8:00 PM and they were already ordered to go to bed like they were six-year-olds or something. Dio tossed and turned on his bed, switching the so-called pillow over and over trying to get a more comfortable side. His mind was troubled. He was living in hell and there was no way out. Hell on the outside and riddled with guilt from the hell inside his head.

  His mind was filled with questions and worries about Jennifer. He wondered if she had died on that hospital bed or, if she was alive, if she was in pain. If she was still alive, she probably wondered what had happened to him and probably wanted to know why he hadn’t contacted her at all. Maybe she was just as worried about him. He wanted to be near her so badly. She was the only thing that kept him sane in that crazy gangsta life he led. If he could just get to a phone, just for five minutes. He just needed to hear her voice again. Just needed to know that his baby was all right.

  Every time he tried to go to sleep that night, everything that had happened would play in his mind over and over again.

  Dio remembered standing outside Miguel’s Mexican Restaurant that night on East Charleston, on the pay phone with the rain coming down in sheets. He had planned to go home real quickly before he spent that Valentine’s evening with Jennifer. It was supposed to be such a special night, but it turned out to be a horror instead.