Sincerely Sicily: Chapters 1–9

Since the beginning of the calendar year, construction has been diligently taking place on 15 acres of land at the
corner of Broadway and 7th Street.

“It was going to be a huge scheduling issue for us. It’s a twenty-minute drive away, and we
would’ve had to get up very early every morning. And then
Pa and I would’ve had to deal with traffic both ways.”

A few months ago, Pa told Enrique and me about Abuela’s arthritis and explained that the joints in her fingers are starting to swell more often, and she wouldn’t be able to use her
hands and fingers for long periods without being in pain.

It sounds like the judge has
banged her gavel in Caso Cerrado, the TV court show Abuela
watches on Telemundo.

“Here’s the sweater to go
with your uniform.” She pulls out an orange monstrosity
from the bottom of one of the bags.

I keep my head low
and follow the crowd, assuming they are walking toward the
courtyard, until some girl crosses right in front of me out of nowhere and hands me a bright orange sheet of paper.

To my left are
more real classrooms—the 300s for eighth graders—and the
library. And next to that is the administrative office.

She’s not the one stranded at
Chisholm. But I slide my phone into my bag and look out at
all the groups again, trying to keep in mind what Evelyn said.

Her
dark brown hair is now the entire length of her back, and she
has a few purple streaks mixed into it, probably clip-ins.

And even though Mrs. Taylor is still talking
and everyone is in class, I would rather stare outside at the
birds perched on the benches instead of at the slow-moving
clock, wishing for time to speed up.

“However, I do eat escargot. Does anyone know what that is?”
“No,” a few people say.
“It’s snails,” Mrs. Taylor says.

She says speaking Spanish is important because it connects us. The us she’s talking about is her
side of the family in Panamá, the one she left behind. Not us
in this house who speak English with Ma and Pa, occasionally sprinkling in some Spanish.

I’m not going to admit that I
was too nervous to talk to Reyna.

When Pa was
a kid, Abuelo took him to get his gold tooth; it was sort of a rite of passage thing.

“I thought you would have relaxed her hair by now,
Carmen,” Abuela says, glaring at Ma.

I move my eyes away from Abuela to Enrique and stay
quiet. My muscles are quivering.

And now, I sit here listless, not sure of what to do or
say.

The fresh air is a welcome relief from the stuffy portable
classroom.

“Here are some pics of when I have tried to braid
my hair myself,” I say, handing Reyna my phone. “They’re a
little funky. I’m getting better though.”

“Hi, I’m Sicily,” I say, unsure if I should have included my
last name like she did.
“Nice to make your acquaintance,” she says, shaking my
hand hard.

“During the summer, I... Oh, I mean we”—she points
her thumbs back toward the two girls behind her—“consulted Principal Rivas about the idea, and to my dismay, she
was against it. So I got my dad involved. He made a call and,
well, here we are!”

“During the summer, I... Oh, I mean we”—she points
her thumbs back toward the two girls behind her—“consulted Principal Rivas about the idea, and to my dismay, she
was against it. So I got my dad involved. He made a call and,
well, here we are!”

“Oh, also, the administration is selling these a-may-zing
T-shirts for fifteen dollars,” Erin Masterson says while spinning around and posing in the hideous orange shirt.

“To apply for a
writing position, you need to fill out this application. It asks
simple questions like your grade, your reason for wanting to
write for the magazine, and other general stuff like that. In
addition to filling it out, you have to turn in a submission
piece.”

I think twice about getting in
line, then remind myself that I need to try, regardless of Erin
Masterson, me not knowing what topic to write about, and
Ma saying writing should be a hobby.

We practically text as often as the Tether
Squad and I usually do.

I grab the draft I wrote in Pa’s office earlier and make a
few corrections, then rewrite everything on note cards.

They start their presentation by telling the story of their
great-great-great-grandparents’ move to New York City
from Italy and why their family eventually moved here to
California.

I adjust my khaki skirt,
grab my stuff, and walk to the front of the room.

“My family is from Panamá. It’s in Central America, and
it’s a Latin American country. Spanish is the official language of Panamá. The country is an isthmus. That means it’s
a narrow strip of land that connects two larger areas of land,
like this.”