Secret Saturdays Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Sean

  Sean’s Not a fighter

  Friends

  Sean’s Secret Trip

  The Morning After

  Sean Acts Weird

  Enough Is Enough

  And Again ...

  What’s Up With Sean?

  Sean Strikes Out

  Sean Is Day and Night

  Fight! Fight! Fight!

  Even Crazier

  Vanessa Goes Spying

  Two Criminals and a Short Convict

  Who Knew?

  Fake Friend or What?

  Now It Is

  How I Wish It Was

  Acknowledgements

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  A division of Penguin Young Readers Group. Published by The Penguin Group.

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  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.).

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  Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa.

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England.

  Copyright © 2010 by Torrey Maldonado.

  Chapter opener photo © iStockphoto.com/Frances Photography.

  All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form

  without permission in writing from the publisher, G. P. Putnam’s Sons,

  a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 345 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014.

  G. P. Putnam’s Sons, Reg. U.S. Pat. & Tm. Off. The scanning, uploading and distribution

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  Published simultaneously in Canada.

  Text set in Chaparral Pro Regular.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Maldonado, Torrey.

  Secret Saturdays / Torrey Maldonado.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Twelve-year-old boys living in a rough part of New York confront questions

  about what it means to be a friend, a father, and a man. 1. Inner cities—Fiction. 2. Single-parent

  families—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 4. Racially mixed people—Fiction. 5. African

  Americans—Fiction. 6. Schools—Fiction. 7. Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.M2927Se 2010

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009010361

  eISBN : 978-1-101-17176-9

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For my mother, Carmen.

  Without you, I wouldn’t be who I am

  Sean

  “SON! YOUR EARS ARE BIGGER THAN BASEBALL GLOVES.”

  Manny was a known troublemaker but I still couldn’t believe he was trying to clown Sean.

  Out here the rule was “Dis or get dissed on.” The best disser was king of the hill. That was Sean. You became the new king by knocking down the old king. I guess that’s why out of all the tables in our school cafeteria, Manny came to ours.

  Manny was a husky Dominican kid who looked white. Italian or something. He had green crossed eyes, a thick neck, and he always kept the same pissed face on. He had no sense and messed with anybody.

  “You speaking to me?” Sean said.

  “Yeah, you, elephant ears.” Manny laughed. He probably thought he was hard because he had two seventh graders with him. He looked like he was trying to dress hard too. The end of September is chilly, even in our lunchroom. But Manny kept his button-up shirt wide open. His white tank top showed.

  Sean eyed him up and down. “You rocking clothes from a ninety-nine-cents store and you trying to dis me?”

  The two seventh graders who had come over with Manny laughed, then gave Sean a pound.

  “What up, Panchi,” Sean said. “What up, Rob.” He made room for them to sit.

  Manny’s eyes bugged out. He probably thought they just sort of knew Sean, not that they were so cool. Manny was standing all alone now.

  If someone clowned Sean, he didn’t just dis back enough to shut the kid up. He took it to a whole other level. So I knew Sean wasn’t about to let Manny off the hook so easy.

  Sean winked at me, Kyle, and Vanessa, and we understood what his wink meant. We had known Sean since fourth grade, and his favorite boxer—a Heavyweight Champion of the World—winked that way before he threw his one-two knockout combo.

  “Everybody here knows your family lives in a homeless shelter,” Sean told Manny. He waved at his sandwich in front of him. “Here. I only took two bites from my hero. Take my leftovers to your family.” Sean pulled a dollar out of his pocket. “And this is so you don’t have to beg on the train later.”

  Kids at the table busted out laughing. Me, Kyle, and Vanessa did too.

  Manny opened his mouth to say something back to Sean, then closed it. His eyes were hurt looking and his face turned red.

  “Yoo-hoo,” Sean said, waving at Manny. “Hello? You too hurt to say something?” Sean tapped Panchi’s forearm. “Get your man Manny a Kleenex.”

  “He’s not my man anymore,” Panchi said, and sucked his teeth at Manny. “Punk.”

  Manny got mad, tightened his hands into fists, and took a step toward Sean but stopped when he saw Ms. Feeney, our Advisory teacher, coming over.

  “Everything okay over here?” she asked.

  Everyone nodded yes at the same time, except Manny.

  Manny looked at Ms. Feeney, at us, and then he bounced. After Ms. Feeney watched Manny leave, she nodded at Sean the way police who patrolled my neighborhood said hi to teenage guys who chilled on benches. There was something mean about it. Another teacher called Ms. Feeney away before she could say something to us.

  Dissing is like boxing. There’s a winner and a loser. Winners leave smiling. Losers end up sorry looking and deflated like a popped balloon.

  To dis someone, you need to find something wrong with them. Nothing was wrong with Sean, except his ears poked out a little.

  Almost nobody had nicer gear than him. He always had brand-new kicks, a hot cell phone, and iPods.

  His schoolwork was like his clothes. He was competitive. His assignments were super-neat, on time, all the time, and he got good grades.

  He had a nice father and mother. They loved him.

  And he was mad popular. Girls stayed stalking him. Sean was half Black and half Puerto Rican, like me, and girls thought he was cute because he looked like the rapper T.I. but in the sixth grade. He had T.I.’s same shape face, light brown skin, eyes, and haircut. In fifth grade, some girls even
called Sean “Little T.I.” for months. Back when they did that, me and Kyle teased Sean in girly voices and said, “Hey, Little T.I.” He’d snap back, “Justin, that’s why you a mini Nas and Kyle you a Souljah Boy with glasses.”

  Right now, Sean put his fist out to Kyle for a pound. “I got that one.”

  Kyle gave Sean his props. “You got it.”

  Sean reached over to Vanessa. “Gimme mine.”

  She said flirty, “You got it,” and gave him a pound.

  Sean stretched his arm over to me and held his fist up for a pound. Sean was The Man.

  “You got that one,” I said, punching my fist against his.

  Sean’s Not a fighter

  “WHO THIS BIGHEAD?”Sean nodded at the Latino guy standing next to Ms. Feeney.

  “Probably Ms. Feeney’s boyfriend,” I joked. I was used to Sean saying some things, but him calling people “bigheads” was new. I wondered where he got it from.

  Ms. Feeney was our only Black teacher. She had dreadlocks to her shoulders and almost a white girl’s accent. We had her Advisory class only once a week. Fridays, eighth period. Our last class of the day.

  “Everyone,” Ms. Feeney began, “this is Juan Jones. He is a former gang member. He’ll explain how his neighborhood and school pushed him to join a gang. I want you to listen.”

  “You can call me Jay,” the gang guy said. He folded his arms and stepped into the middle of the circle. He dressed like he was going to work or church. Crisp white collared shirt. Slacks. Nice shoes. His small Afro was shaped up neat. He was maybe Puerto Rican or Dominican. Only one thing about him said he once was in a gang. His tats. He had a tear-shaped tattoo under his left eye. His right hand had tattooed letters on the back between his thumb and index finger. Everyone was listening.

  “Family,” Jay said. “It starts with family. Where I’m from, a normal family ain’t normal. I grew up without a pops. That was normal because most kids in my projects didn’t have dads. Raise your hand if you grew up without a father.”

  I looked around to see who would raise their hand.

  Shaquan sat two seats from me. His dad was a drug dealer who had gotten shot and killed. Shaquan didn’t have a father. He didn’t raise his hand.

  Becky was maybe four seats from me. She came from a crazy family. Her pops smoked crack, lived in the streets, and had no teeth in his mouth. Plus, Becky’s sisters and brothers were in foster care. Becky didn’t raise her hand.

  Sean was right next to me. Even though his dad took care of him and his moms, his dad hadn’t lived with him for the past two years. Sean didn’t raise his hand.

  My father was ghost too.

  A few years back, he bounced on me and my mother after she found out he was cheating on her. He moved down south, and we haven’t heard from him since. I’m half glad he left. But sometimes when I see other kids with their dads, I feel like, “Why don’t I have that?” Plus, since he broke out, we had to go on welfare because of Ma’s bad leg. She hurt it the year before my pops left when we picnicked in Sunset Park. She fell while trying to Rollerblade and her leg broke in a few places.

  When he lived with us, my father was like a lot of men out here. They posed on every corner and pretended to be all hard and important. All fronts and good for nothing. Some of them even lived off allowances their grown sons and daughters gave them. They were just supersized boys.

  I don’t blame Shaquan, Becky, or Sean. I wasn’t raising my hand to talk about my father either. Why put it on blast that your dad wasn’t around? Kids will just make fun of that later.

  Jay made a face like he didn’t believe all our dads lived with us. “Anyway,” he said, “my pops had parts of him that me and my brothers and sisters didn’t know about.”

  I leaned over and whispered to Sean, “This guy is corny.”

  Sean nodded real slow like he was saying, “Yep!”

  “Sean, if you got something to say, say it out loud,” Manny said, starting trouble again like he did in the lunchroom. “Ms. Feeney, Sean’s whispering because he’s too scared to raise his hand and say he don’t have a father.” Manny turned back to Sean. “Raise your hand.”

  Some kids laughed at that.

  “Manny,” Ms. Feeney said, and shot him a mean look. She stepped into the circle next to the Latino guy. She looked embarrassed. She raised her hand and made her peace sign. That was her way to get us quiet without yelling. “Sorry,” she told Jay.

  “It’s cool,” Jay said.

  As soon as kids stopped laughing, Sean said, “Manny, at least I don’t have a lazy eye. One of your eyes looks left and the other stares right. I could stand right in front of your nose and you wouldn’t even see me.”

  “Sean.” Ms. Feeney frowned at him and shook her head “No.” She did her V sign again, but the class stayed noisy.

  “Shut up!” Manny shouted at the kids laughing at him. He stood up like he could make us listen to him, but we laughed harder.

  Jay, the gang guy, smiled at Ms. Feeney. “It’s okay. Kids will be kids, right?”

  She gave the class such a dirty look that one by one we got quiet. When the class got completely silent, she apologized to Jay again and said, “Please continue.” Then she told us, “Sit straight and act mature.”

  We fixed ourselves in our seats and Jay started speaking again, but Sean cut him off. “Manny,” Sean said. “At least, I used to live with my father. Before he moved to Puerto Rico. Do you even know who your real father is?”

  The whole class exploded. This time, Ms. Feeney tried to get control by staring hard at us, but everyone just laughed louder.

  Manny jumped up like he wanted to fight Sean. Ms. Feeney got in front of Manny fast and put her hand on his chest. “Go in the hallway,” she said. She told Sean he had detention, and to the rest of the class she said, “What happened here tells me this class isn’t ready for today’s guest speaker, so I’m canceling today’s Advisory. Take out your independent reading books from your literacy class. Everyone will read quietly for the rest of the period.”

  About half the class sucked their teeth, rolled their eyes, and moaned.

  “All because of stupid Manny,” a girl’s voice said.

  “God!” some boy breathed out real heavy.

  “I didn’t want to hear this man anyway,” another kid went.

  Everyone was heated, but we all slowly pulled our books from our backpacks. As I sat up, Ms. Feeney told Jay loud enough for the class to hear, “I apologize. It’s unfortunate this class loses its opportunity to hear you speak.”

  He smiled. “I’ll still speak with them if you want.”

  Ms. Feeney said, “No, no. This class doesn’t deserve you.” She eyed everyone. I opened my book fast and pretended to read.

  When Advisory ended, me and Sean grabbed our book bags to bounce, but Ms. Feeney rolled up on us with the quickness and told us to stay in our seats.

  “Is this the second time today I saw you make a kid want to fight you?” she asked Sean.

  Sean shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “Am I in trouble too?” I asked her, wondering why she’d make me stay.

  “Justin, you’re okay,” she said. “You don’t have to wait for Sean if you don’t want to.”

  “I’ll stay,” I said. I did want to see what would happen to Sean. He was my best friend.

  Ms. Feeney asked him, “So someone insults you and you turn it into a competition. Put him down harder and tell everybody listening the ugliest truth about him?”

  “He talked about my father,” Sean said out the side of his mouth. “So I talked about his. We even.”

  “Did that bother you? When he talked about your dad?”

  “No. Why would it bother me? I have a father. Right, Justin?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “He just lives in Puerto Rico.”

  “Exactly,” Sean said.

  That was true.

  When me, Sean, Kyle, and Vanessa became cool in fourth grade, Sean told us his pops moved to
PR to take care of their family’s house there and run their parents’ farm. Sean’s mother and father stayed together and him and his dad kept tight because Sean’s dresser drawer always had stuff his pops sent him from PR. Puerto Rican toys, key chains, and stuff. How? His moms was a cashier at IKEA. That money came from his pops.

  “I know you have a father,” Ms. Feeney said. “And I also know you really liked hurting Manny just because. Lately, you seem to enjoy being nasty to kids. But why, Sean? It’ll only make kids want to fight you, and you’re not a fighter.”

  “Mmm,” Sean hummed like he was saying, “Whatever you say.” He rolled his eyes and stared at the ceiling.

  But Ms. Feeney was 100 percent right. Sean didn’t fight. Not with his fists.

  “Puerto Ricans are butt,” this Black kid told me in fourth grade.

  It was three o’clock on the Monday after the Puerto Rican Day Parade. I was outside my school going home when this kid everybody called Hammerhead started teasing me about the Puerto Rican beads I got at the parade. His real name was Gregg. I should’ve dissed him back about his head because it really popped out in front and back like a hammer. But I didn’t think of it. Maybe because I was a little scared. He was bigger than me.

  I tried ignoring him but he got louder. Soon, maybe seven kids were walking with him. His friends and other kids, watching.

  “Ayo, ‘Livin’ la Vida Loca,’” Hammerhead shouted at me. “I heard you half Black and half Puerto Rican. What’re you? Puerto Rican today? Tomorrow you Black?”

  Before I knew it, he was right in front of me. I tried walking around him, but he kept moving to block my way. I didn’t know why, but he wanted to fight. Nobody ever jumped in my face like that. My stomach felt funny. My legs started shaking.

  Then this voice from the crowd yelled, “Yo, Gregg, why don’t you leave Justin alone and go hammer some nails with your forehead.”

  It was this boy from my building. Sean. We weren’t friends. We just passed by and said hi. Probably twice we were on the same volleyball team in gym class. I saw him and his parents around, and then one day his pops was ghost. That was all I knew about Sean until he stepped in between me and Hammerhead.