Wind from helicopters was blowing my hair all around my head as I stepped out into the daybreak. The pink light was a motherfucker on my eyes after the darkness in the building. There they all were. Riot cops, sound cannons, National Guard. And there I was, some scrawny freak holding a sick little kid from Mexico.

“Please don’t shoot!” I yelled. I knew I was begging them for my life. There was nothing left to do. “We’re coming out.”

I stepped out farther. José and Sebastian and all the rest of them were right behind me. As I got closer to the troops, some of them slapped me on the back as if I was their friend returning from a long trip.

“You did the right thing,” one of them said. He looked relieved. For a minute I thought of Sebastian’s words, that it wasn’t always us or them, that it couldn’t be if anybody was going to get by.

I turned back to look at the building. Everyone was far away from it except for one person. It was Makayla. She was wearing a heavy winter coat that she didn’t need, and looked more solid than she had in weeks. She was waving her hands, urging us to get back, back.

The next thing I knew, I was flying through the air and there was as loud bang and my ears were ringing. There were pieces of brick and people flying over my head. Completely disoriented, I looked around for Ale, José, and Sebastian. Sebastian had cupped his body over Ale’s, protecting him. I reached out my hand, and it landed on a piece of brick. I grabbed it close to me and wouldn’t let it go.

3 Two years later, I’m still holding that brick. It’s in the middle of the room, on the only piece of furniture we have—a table that we dragged in off the street after making sure there were no bedbugs in it.

After the building went down, they took us across the river to New Jersey for medical treatment. We were all in the hospital for days. As soon as I could get out of bed, I went and found Ale and stayed by him until they dragged me back to my room. He got better. He’s a tough little kid, I’ll tell you that.

José and Sebastian took Ale and went to a shelter for a while, and I made my way to Lux’s house. As I stood outside her family’s door with my ripped-up, smelly clothes and my tons of eye make-up and my skirt and mustache, I almost turned and walked away without ever knocking. But I knocked. Her mother answered. She said her son didn’t live there anymore. I spit right in her fucking face, her son, but I was never so happy in my life. Live there. Lux was alive, somewhere.