The day he decided to lend my mother his machine, she demurred twice, as good manners dictated, but I knew she had been subtly hinting at her need for it for several months. I helped her wrap it in a blanket. We carried it between us, as we transferred from bus to El to train. At home, she let me and one of my girlfriends record a play we’d written for school, but Boom-Boom wasn’t allowed near it. Once or twice, I remember my father using it, too, although, like me, he was just goofing around. For my mother, it was a serious work tool.

I put the tapes to one side. If I could find a place that would transfer them onto CDs for me, I could listen to her again. I owed Petra a little consideration for making me open the trunk. I might have gone the next forty years without remembering I had these tapes.

All I found in my father’s handwriting was a few love notes to my mother and a letter he’d written me when I graduated from college. I sat back on my heels to read it.

You know how proud I am of you, the first person in our family ever to go to college. I wish your mother was here. I wish that every day, but most of all on this day. You know she saved her nickels and quarters from all those piano lessons so you could have this chance, and you’ve made the most of it. We’re so proud.

Tori, everything you do makes me proud to be your dad. But you need to watch that hot temper of yours. I see so much of it on the streets, and even in our own family. People let their tempers get the best of them, and one bad second can change your life forever in a direction you don’t want to go. I wish I could say there’s nothing in my life I regret, but I’ve made some choices, too, that I have to live with. You’re starting out now with everything clean and shiny and waiting for you. I want it always to be that way for you.

Love, Dad

I had forgotten the letter. I read it through several times, missing him, missing the love that he and my mother surrounded me with. I thought with regret, too, of the many times I let my temper get the best of me, turning difficult situations into impossible ones. Even yesterday, talking to Arnie Coleman. Or this morning, with Petra. I could get so much better a response from people if I stopped shooting first. Maybe Mr. Contreras was right. Maybe I did need to be more like Petra. I thought it over. Maybe I did. But I couldn’t move myself into sanctity. I was still furious with her for raiding the trunk to begin with.