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But other than that--he was free At least until the school called his father, Mateo was free to do whatever he wanted
And what he wanted to do was find out exactly how badly Elizabeth Pike, his supposed best friend, had screwed hih to head back to the house after Dad had left to start getting ready to open La Catrina for lunch Harder to go into the storage space beneath the house where Mo possessions were boxed away in a corner, behind Mateo’s old bike and a few sombreros left over froo
Mateo stood staring at the boxes, a crooked tower of cardboard They were dusty Nobody had ever opened them, not since the day his father had crammed them down here As fondly as Dad res; that wasn’t his way Mateo had thought it wasn’t his, either But now he began opening the boxes, one by one
For thefor a diary, so like that Instead he found Mom’s clothes--neatly folded once, but now crureen dress--she would wear it to Christmas parties The pink sweater … Mateo had no one specific ed her while she wore it
Hesitantly he lifted the sweater to his face and inhaled But it didn’t ser, not even her perfume It just smelled musty, like the back roos: some junky pieces of exercise equip the them A box filled with her costus he’d h at the crayoned i out at the beach
Mom had kept every one
He hadn’t learned anything by going through the boxes, but for asurrounded by Mo rather than painful--a reminder that her life hadn’t been all bad Most of it had been great How long had it been since Mateo let hiood ti the final box, though, a card fell to the floor
Mateo stooped to pick it up It was in a lilac-colored envelope, and at first he assumed it must have been a Mother’s Day card he’d sent her But then he saw hison the envelope: just one word, a nahtly colored card with glitter around the letters read FOR A VERY SPECIAL GIRL! Mateo read the inscription in Molad we’ve beco has ever made me so proud as the day that you said I was like a hter to me! I hope we’ll always be this close--Lauren
The date was only teeks before her suicide Maybe she never got around to sending the card Maybe she forgot about it, because Elizabeth had wanted her to forget
She hadn’t just made Mom crazy She’d made Mom love her Some of the love that should have been Mateo’s had been stolen away by a girl as "like a daughter"
Mateo looked down at his pile of pictures that he had colored for Moo None of the Elizabeth was supposed to have said