A Field Guide to Getting Lost Page 3

  CHAPTER SIX

  Luis

  The next morning, Luis banged around the kitchen, not even trying to keep it down, even though the soothing tones of his mom’s yoga video drifted from the other room. Yoga time was sacred time. He was supposed to honor that.

  Instead, he made as much noise as possible.

  He didn’t know exactly what he was mad about. His mom hadn’t done anything wrong. The stupid guinea pig hadn’t even done anything wrong.

  But everything was somehow wrong, anyway.

  “Love?” his mom finally said, appearing in the doorway with a less blissed-out look than she usually had post-yoga. “Can I help you find something?”

  Luis slammed another cupboard door and then sank into a kitchen chair. “Sorry, Mom. Nothing sounds good.”

  She sat down across from him. “Kinda in a funk, huh?”

  He scowled at the table.

  “What if I make some French toast? And then we call your abuelos?”

  Luis brightened. His mom had a way of working magic with gluten-free bread, egg substitute, and rice milk to make the best French toast ever. But talking to his dad’s parents in Guatemala would be even better than an excellent breakfast. Luis got to see his mom’s parents all the time—they only lived across the bridge in Issaquah. But a video call with his abuelos was a special treat.

  Once he’d had his fill of sticky goodness, they set up the laptop and made the call. It rang three times before his abuelo’s face filled the screen.

  “¡Luisito! ¡Mi nieto favorito!”

  Luis was his grandparents’ only grandson, but it was still nice to be their favorite.

  “Hola, don Miguel,” Luis’s mom said to her father-in-law. “¿Qué tal?”

  “Bien, bien, canche. Y ustedes, ¿todo bien?” Without waiting for an answer, Luis’s abuelo called over his shoulder for his wife. “¡Alma!”

  Soon she was there too, the lines of her face multiplying as she smiled at the sight of Luis on her grainy screen. “¡Ay, Luis, amorcito! ¿Cómo estás?”

  “I’m good, Abuela. How are you?” He could have said that much in Spanish. Her face always lit up when he spoke what he could. But he was shy, knowing how the words would tangle on his tongue.

  “Todo bien, gracias a Dios,” she said. She continued on, updating him on all of the tíos and tías and cousins he barely knew, speaking a mile a minute in the Spanish that Luis understood but couldn’t speak very well.

  “¿Cuándo nos vas a visitar?” his abuelo said when his wife finally stopped talking. “You spend summer in your homeland!” He always suggested Luis come spend the summer in Guatemala. Luis never knew what to say. His mom wasn’t even comfortable letting him go on field trips, much less travel to another country for an entire summer without her.

  If his dad were alive, it would be different. They’d go all together, like they did once, before Papi got sick. But Luis had been too young then to remember anything now.

  “Maybe when Luis is a little older,” Mom said. Like always.

  “Si pues,” Abuelo said.

  “Luisito, you write your book still?” Abuela’s English wasn’t perfect, but it was a lot better than Luis’s Spanish.

  He shifted in the kitchen chair, which suddenly felt unbearably hard. “Sort of?”

  “¿Qué ‘sort of’?”

  “I guess I’m stuck,” he admitted, avoiding his mother’s curious gaze. “It seems kinda pointless.”

  “Ay no,” Abuelo said. “Stories are never pointless. You just need some inspiración. You need to go somewhere or do something que te despierta. What about ese museo you took me to when I visited? The one with the walls like ocean waves?”

  Luis’s abuelos had visited Seattle for the first time a couple of years earlier. They’d done all the tourist stuff—Pike Place Market, the Space Needle, a ferry out to the islands. Luis had also taken them to some of his personal favorite places—the Central Library downtown with a children’s section the size of most branch libraries; the Fremont troll, a giant statue under a bridge; and the Museum of Pop Culture, better known as the MoPOP.

  The MoPOP was the least boring museum ever. Before you even got inside, you could tell it was going to be awesome. The outside of the building was like a sculpture by an artist, with wavy metallic walls, wild colors, and a strange, twisty shape plucked straight out of an alien world.

  Inside, it only got better. The exhibits weren’t dusty old fossils or paintings by dead white guys. They were about things like Marvel superheroes; rock and roll history; video games; and fantasy and sci-fi books, movies, and TV shows.

  “We haven’t been to the MoPOP in a while!” his mom said. “Buena idea, don Miguel. Gracias.”

  They chatted for a few more minutes and made plans to talk again soon. Then his abuelos were gone, off in a faraway country, and all Luis had to remember them by were the Guatemalan handicrafts all around the house—mementos of the years his mom spent with her husband in his homeland before they settled in Seattle.

  “What do you think?” his mom said. “How about a trip to the MoPOP?”

  Luis nodded. Inspiration was striking already, even before he’d gone to the museum. What if the MoPOP could not only boost his spirits, but also make up for the date his mom had missed?

  “Yeah, and could we invite someone?”

  “Sure, honey.” She started to clear the dishes off the table. “Who’d you have in mind?”

  “Well, the man you’ve been seeing… he has a daughter, right?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Sutton

  The bot was finally turning right!

  Sutton had woken up way earlier than usual, with a sudden realization that maybe the problem wasn’t the software, but the hardware. She had spread out the maze on the kitchen table before she even started watering her plants. She was filled with hope and possibility. She could get the bot through the maze! Yesterday had been a frustrating blip, but it was all going to turn out all right!

  Of course, after she made an adjustment that got the bot to turn right, it only went halfway down the passage before it turned and doubled back again.

  “No!” Sutton wailed. “Keep going! No one told you to turn around!”

  “Hey, sweetheart.” Her dad appeared in the doorway, running a hand through rumpled hair. “You’re up early.”

  “Not prepared to engage,” Sutton muttered, squeezing the buttons on the side of the bot to recalibrate it.

  “To be fair, you’re engaging with the bot,” he pointed out, taking a seat at the kitchen table. “So you could maybe spare a few words for your dear old dad.”

  “It’s still not working,” Sutton grumbled.

  “Maybe it needs a break.”

  “It’s fully charged.”

  “Maybe you need a break.”

  Something in his voice distracted Sutton from the problems of her bot. She looked up.

  “We’ve been invited to the MoPOP.”

  “The what?”

  “You know, the Museum of Pop Culture? It’s by the Space Needle. That funky building with the colorful walls?”

  Sutton could picture the building, even though she usually averted her eyes when they passed it. It gave her a headache. “Who invited us?” Her dad was forever trying to set her up on playdates. Sutton was too old for playdates, but he never believed her when she said she had all the friends she wanted. Sure, her robotics team had quit meeting for the summer. Sabina and Sadiq were always off doing something sportsy. And Luna on the sixth floor had left to spend the summer with her grandparents.

  But not everybody wanted a million friends.

  “Actually…” He picked up the bot and started fidgeting with it. Sutton snatched it back. “You know this woman I’ve been dating for a while? Elizabeth?”

  Sutton froze. She didn’t actually know Elizabeth. They hadn’t met. Not that she wanted to meet Elizabeth.

  “Elizabeth’s son Luis is right around your age.”

  “The one w
ith the guinea pig.”

  “Right, yes. I mean, he doesn’t have a… never mind. They have a membership at the museum. And they’re going today. We thought it might be a nice chance for you and Luis to get to know each other!”

  It was nothing against Luis, but Sutton didn’t really want to get to know him. The idea of meeting his mom was bad enough. Once the kids got introduced, it was all downhill to the wedding!

  Sutton’s life wasn’t perfect as it was, but the variables were manageable. She knew what to expect. If her dad got married, what then? To start: Where would they all live? The apartment wasn’t big enough for four. And Sutton didn’t want to live on cutesy Queen Anne Hill, where Luis and his mom lived. She was a city girl!

  Sutton and her dad had their South Lake Union life perfectly mapped out—they had their farmers’ market and their pea patch and Mrs. B. and their library. Sutton had morning oatmeal and the periodic table of elements and Moti.

  Maybe Elizabeth wouldn’t approve of homeschooling, and Sutton would have to go to Luis’s school! She would have to stop eating whatever Luis was allergic to! There were too many variables to consider.

  “It’s not a big deal,” her dad said in a rush. “Just hanging out, no pressure. It would give your brain a chance to focus on something else, and I’ll bet you’ll come back knowing exactly what this little guy needs!”

  Her dad reached for the bot again, and Sutton cupped her hand over it.

  “I don’t know. My stomach doesn’t feel too great.”

  “Probably because you haven’t had breakfast yet.”

  Drat. “I’m supposed to walk Moti this morning.”

  “Already called Mr. Wong. He’s going to cover for you.”

  Double drat. “I was going to see if Sabina and Sadiq wanted to… shoot hoops.”

  He looked at her skeptically, seeing that for the bald-faced lie it was. “Pretty sure they’re in Yakima for a tournament this weekend.”

  Sutton sighed. Her dad was clearly not giving up. At least at a museum, they could focus on the exhibits and not have to talk to each other. “Fine.”

  “Great!” He jumped up. “Then get some breakfast, get dressed, and we’ll hit the road. We’re going to swing by Queen Anne and pick them up.”

  “That’s out of our way.” Sutton and her dad could walk to the MoPOP.

  “Queen Anne isn’t far. Elizabeth’s car is on the fritz. Let’s leave in twenty, okay?”

  * * *

  It was an alarmingly quick drive to the top of Queen Anne Hill, a beautiful neighborhood of charming old homes, some tiny and some enormous. Sutton had always thought Queen Anne homes looked like colorful confections in the window of a fancy pastry shop, all with their own yards and so different from Sutton’s shiny downtown apartment building across from a community garden.

  Now the neighborhood seemed kind of sickly sweet.

  But as they drove along Queen Anne Avenue, Sutton had to admit it was sort of nice, like a small town in the middle of a big city, with cute little shops and people stopping to chat as they walked their dogs.

  Sutton had that in South Lake Union, too. People sold things and walked dogs and talked to one another everywhere. Queen Anne Hill wasn’t special.

  Her dad pulled up in front of a house that was more artisan cupcake than giant wedding cake. The front yard had that weird no-plant landscaping that was mostly wood chips and whimsical garden sculptures, and the little house was a cheery bright blue, with a tidy front porch and solar panels on top.

  Her dad climbed out of the car. Sutton didn’t move.

  “Hon?” He poked his head back in. “I promise Luis doesn’t bite.”

  “Have you met him?”

  “I… have not.”

  “More than forty thousand people go to the emergency room every year due to bites from another human.”

  Sutton had learned this while working on a project about the breeds of dog most likely to bite versus the breeds of dogs most likely to do damage when they bite. Since then, she had been extra wary around humans she didn’t know. Even some of the ones she did know. Her dad shut the driver’s-side door with a sigh. Sutton thought—briefly—she was off the hook. But then he came around the car, opened her door, and crouched on the curb outside. “Hon, I know you’re nervous. I know this is weird. We’ve never done this before. But Elizabeth is special to me. Will you make an effort?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Luis

  Luis sat at the kitchen table, tracing his finger along the quetzal on his mug of hot chocolate. The green bird with an enormous tail was the symbol of Guatemala, the tiny Central American country south of Mexico where his grandparents lived. Where his father had come from.

  His dad had come to the United States without speaking much English, leaving behind his family and the world he had known for the first sixteen years of his life. He had flown into Los Angeles and gone to live with a great-aunt he’d never met, all so he could finish high school in the United States and stay for college. The plan had been that he’d return to run the family’s restaurant chain after he got his American education, but then he’d met Luis’s mom in college, and he stayed.

  Talk about an adventure! Even Penelope Bell going off to a boarding school for kids with special powers had nothing on Luis’s dad. Luis tried to imagine picking up and moving to a whole other country where he didn’t know anyone and didn’t speak the language. And the language wasn’t the only difference. The food, the customs, the way people interacted with one another… his mom had talked enough about her visits to Guatemala that he knew it was really different.

  If his dad could do something so amazing, Luis could at least figure out what was next in his story.

  He jumped at the sound of a knock at the door. It wasn’t a great start to being brave like his dad.

  “Oh shoot, I’m in the bathroom!” his mom called. “Can you get it?”

  Luis tapped the quetzal on his mug one last time for luck and went to the front door. He opened it to find a tall man in jeans and a Hufflepuff T-shirt.

  “Luis?” the man said. “I’m Martin.”

  The man held his hand out for a handshake. Sometimes when adults did that to a kid, it felt condescending. But with Martin, it felt natural, like he was truly glad to meet him.

  “You’re a Puff?” Luis said, nodding at Martin’s T-shirt. “So am I.”

  “Excellent. Sutton here’s a Ravenclaw.” The man looked to his right and found nothing but the potted rosemary on the front porch. He stepped aside to reveal his daughter behind him.

  “ ‘Wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure,’ ” Luis said, reciting the Ravenclaw motto. The girl looked back at him blankly.

  “I’m the real Harry Potter fan in the family,” the man explained.

  “Martin! Hello!” Luis’s mom had emerged from the bathroom, and the girl shrank back behind her dad again. But he stepped inside and she was exposed, out on the doorstep. “And you must be Sutton! It’s so nice to meet you!”

  * * *

  The car ride was awkward.

  In the front, Martin talked to Luis’s mom about her car trouble and the limits of Seattle’s public transportation system.

  “I like taking the bus,” Luis said. “But if it snows, we get stuck.”

  Sutton looked at Luis like he was speaking another language. But at least she looked at him.

  “Because of the hill,” he added. “It’s so steep, the buses can’t get down.”

  Sutton was quiet. But then a minute later, when Luis was sure she hadn’t even been listening, she said, “Soon you won’t need to leave the hill anyway. Drones can bring you whatever you need.”

  At first, Luis thought this was an invitation to conversation. Drones! He could talk about drones! He didn’t know anything about them, but that wouldn’t stop him from imagining the possibilities.

  But then Sutton reached into the seat-back pocket in front of her and pulled out a tablet. She angled it away from him and s
wiped in silence the rest of the way to the MoPOP.

  The first time Luis had visited Seattle’s MoPOP, it had been on a school field trip. The visit had been cut tragically short when Kyle McClaren pulled out a sandwich at lunch and sprayed peanut butter crumbs all over Luis while reenacting his favorite episode of Star Trek.

  That time, Luis wasn’t rushed to the emergency room, because his mom was there as a chaperone, so she knew to dose him with Benadryl. But the medicine made him so sleepy, he had to go home anyway. He’d never gotten to see the Infinite Worlds of Science Fiction exhibit.

  (Also, it had led to Kyle McClaren and his crew calling Luis “Pokey” ever since, because of the needle he carried around in case he ever needed emergency medicine for an allergic reaction. That led to “Pokey Little Puppy,” which was from some old picture book and didn’t even make sense as an insult, but they all thought it was hilarious.)

  Luis’s mom brought him back to the museum, just the two of them, and he loved it so much, they got a membership. The MoPOP was one of the few places where he felt like he could travel to other worlds, even if his mom was always standing by with an EpiPen.

  He had been excited to share it with Sutton and her dad. After the mostly silent car ride, he was less excited. But maybe she hadn’t been quite ready to meet them. He could understand that—he was excited, but also nervous. This was pretty weird, after all.

  When his mom first told Luis she was seeing someone, as in seeing-seeing him—not just a work colleague or a buddy from college, but a man she had been out with several times and wanted to keep seeing—Luis hadn’t known what to think.

  Part of him wanted to keep his mom all to himself. It had been working pretty well for them so far. But he had noticed a certain look in his mom’s eyes when they’d pass a happy couple holding hands on the street, and part of him wondered what it would be like to have a bigger family—two parents, maybe even a sibling or two?

  He didn’t hate the idea.

  “So this is the MoPOP!” Martin said in a cheery voice.