"The Flamenco Academy" Read Online Free PDF Page A

dad’s Mustang into our carport and honked
until Mom gasped, “Well, I mean, that is the rudest thing I’ve ever
heard. Go make her stop before the neighbors call the police.”
    I crunched across the rocks that were our
front yard, wishing I had a pair of the cool low-rise jeans Mom had
forbidden instead of the dorky ones with a waist she insisted on.
Didi yelled out her open window, “You going to school today?” Just
like it was optional. Just like I might be considering not going
that day.
    “Uh, yeah,” I answered. “Give me a second.”
I rushed into the house, certain that if I gave Didi more than ten
seconds to consider what she was doing, she’d be gone. I grabbed my
books and the box of animal crackers I took every day to eat on a
bench in the patio so I wouldn’t have to sit alone in the cafeteria
at lunch. I ran back to the car pretending I didn’t hear Mom
yelling that she didn’t approve and that I was to get back into the
house this instant.
    The Mustang, fingernail-polish red with
white leather upholstery, rumbled as we roared down Carlisle
Avenue. I wondered what it would be like to have parents cool
enough to buy a red Mustang with white leather interior. On the
back window, written in swirly script, was SKANKMOBILE. Didi smoked
Eve cigarettes, occasionally waving the smoke out the tiny slit she
opened in her window. Piercings had appeared in her lip and eyebrow
that I didn’t recall being there just the day before.
    “You have a theme song?” she asked.
    “Am I supposed to?”
    “Here’s mine. Check it out.” She shoved in a
CD and an oldie blared out: “Dirty Deeds.” I looked at the case to
find out that the band was AC/DC, some guys dressed up like British
schoolboys.
    “I know what you’re thinking,” she said.
“You’re thinking, No rap? No hip-hop? Where’s Snoop? Why’s she like
this old-school shit?”
    That wasn’t remotely what I was thinking,
but I loved having a conversation with Didi Steinberg that didn’t
require my participation.
    “Well, old school still rules! There’s a
reason it’s called rock. Cuz it rocks!” Didi sang along with the
CD, hitting the chorus hard, yelling about doing dirty deeds dirt
cheap. She turned to me as if I were sitting on a stool next to her
at a bar instead of careening down a road and explained, “That’s
how I got my nickname, Deeds.”
    We headed east, toward the mountains, toward
the rising sun, which was turning the Sandias the watermelon color
they were named for. Morning light flooded into the car. Didi had
the visor down so only the bottom half of her face was illuminated.
Her mouth was golden as she sang.
    With a screech, she opened the ashtray,
snuffed the cigarette, and plucked out a half-smoked joint. I knew
what it was only because back in Houdek Sheriff Zigal had visited
our class in seventh grade with a briefcase filled with drug
paraphernalia. He’d told us a joint could be called a blunt, a
spliff, a number, a nail, a stick, a stake, a spike, a rod. I think
Sheriff Zigal made up some of the names. Didi pinched the joint
between her lips as she fumbled through her purse until she dug out
a box of matches.
    “Take the Skank,” she said, nodding toward
the steering wheel as she removed both hands to strike a match. It
took me a split second to process the fact that there were no hands
on the wheel before I lunged over and grabbed it as we bumped onto
the median. Didi laughed when we sideswiped a newly planted catalpa
tree. She got the joint lit and sucked in a long hit before holding
it out to me.
    I waved it away and tried to keep the
Skankmobile in its own lane.
    Didi shrugged. “How does anyone do Pweb
straight?” she asked. Pweb. I liked her name for Pueblo Heights.
“Gotta keep consensual reality at bay.” She inhaled until there was
nothing left to burn, then popped the still-smoldering roach into
her mouth and took the steering wheel from my death grip. “You’re
not a bad wheelman.”
    I made