Lightning Rider Read Online Free PDF Page B

open. The toy top rests sideways inside.
    Its design is identical to the drawing on the first page of the book and the engraving on the back of the coin.
    “This design was on his pocket watch,” Papi says. “And the face of the clock on his nightstand table.”
    “Really?”
    “We never talked about him after he died. My mamá packed away his things, and that was the end of him. I thought.” He rubs the back of his neck. “I’d hoped she’d packed away memories of him in here.”
    “What is this stuff, Papi?”
    “The booklets don’t make sense—I scanned them and they’re lesson plans or something—and the big journal is worse. It’s just story after story of close calls and near misses with strangers.” He flips to the middle. “See? This one . . .” He runs his finger down the page. “This paragraph describes a flood, and the author saving a woman. This one is a tornado, and saving three children. This one a train wreck . . . seven people. Car accident . . . one person. It’s the same thing, over and over.”
    He looks up. “But every page references lightning. I don’t get it.”
    I might.
    I bend around him for the tequila bottle and lift it to my lips.
    Over the bottle, I wince at the burn and his disapproving scowl.

Chapter 3
     
    While Papi pinches the toy top and rolls it between his fingers, I drum out a riff on the countertop.
    “I think it might be aluminum,” I say. “I would think it was a superalloy if it wasn’t so ancient.” I take the top and bounce it once in my palm. “No, has to be aluminum.”
    He glances up. “Why?”
    “Alloys weren’t big until the military figured out all the applications in the space program. I have them on the brain because we’ve been playing with them for some of the fenders and bottom rails of the bikes. They’re nearly indestructible but wicked expensive.” I spin the top, sending it twirling across the counter. 
    I haven’t seen that look on his face in a long time. Maybe ever.
    “What did Rosa say when she gave it to you?” he asks.
    Oh, you know, that I might be some sort of freak who controls lightning.
    Like the stuff that killed your father.
    Instead, I say, “She didn’t, really. Just thought I’d want to have it. Said it was Lito’s.” 
    “My father’s?”
    “Your grandfather’s.”
    He grabs it and examines it again, then holds it next to the coin. “So you think the coin is my father’s and the top is my grandfather’s?”
    I shrug.
    Looking perplexed, he hands me the top, and I settle it back in the tin, snap the lid shut, and tuck it beneath the waistband of my sweats, pressed against my skin. The top clinks with every movement, and I palm the tin through the cloth. 
    I’m not exactly nostalgic, so I don’t know what’s made me attached to a trinket from a man I never met. I don’t do sentimental—Mami’s convinced her emotional gene skipped me.
    Papi examines the coin again before slipping it into his shirt pocket and wandering to the storm door. Beyond the glass, the storm grows. A fork of lightning flashes, and I shiver.
    “Of all things, why did my mamá save these, and what was my father doing with them in the first place?” he mumbles to the darkening day.
    In his voice I hear the scared little boy who’s just lost his father.
    I’m not sure he’s expecting an answer, so I make one last swipe at the grease on the counter and twist the book around so I can read the odd instructions. Papi pushes the door open and steps outside to ruffle Bimni’s ears and throw her slobbery ball across the yard. Thunder rumbles, and I try to ignore the flicker of answering lightning that glows beneath my fingertips.
    A discolored edge of paper pokes out from the bottom of the book, and I slice my fingernail between the pages to find it. Once freed, the paper slides onto the counter. The words . . . flicker.
    I lean closer, and the paper shimmers like it’s made of something unreal. Sounds about right.