Read Online After Peaches by Michelle Mulder - Free Book Online Page A

him die.
    José was shaking too much to speak. Marcos and Papá and a few of the other men heaved him into the back of the station wagon. I scrambled in, crouched behind one seat and held José’s hand. We won’t let him die, Analía , I promised. Not that promising would help anything, but it made me feel like there was hope.
    And that gave me an idea.
    â€œAnalía wrote to me,” I whispered to José. “I mean, she wrote to me about this farm. She was worried about you. She heard what you told her mother, and she wanted to make sure you were okay.”
    He opened his eyes and looked at me with brown eyes whose black dots were now impossibly small. I didn’t even know if he could see me out of eyes like that.
    â€œShe needs you to be okay,” I said, willing myself not to cry. His eyes were closing again.“ Por favor , José. Be okay.”

    â€œEes José Lopez,” Papá said in his terrible English. “Ees berry seek.”
    I knew Papá was trying his best, but the nurse at the front desk of the emergency ward looked totally confused. We must have looked weird: Mamá and Papá, still in their work clothes, lowering José into a chair, and me standing off to the side, clutching my notebook to my chest, as if it could make me feel strong.
    â€œEes seek working,” Papá said, still trying to explain to the confused nurse. José was shaking again and starting to sway, even though he was sitting down. Mamá bent over him, stroking his cheek and whispering. Papá placed one hand on his shoulder, and the other on my head. “ Cuéntale , Rosario,” Papá said, his face red, and his forehead tight with worry.“ Cuéntale, por favor .” Tell her . Please . But what was I supposed to say? All the way to the hospital, they’d been rapid-firing questions at José. Had he ever been sick like this before? What did he think caused it? What was he wearing when he was spraying the plants? What was he spraying with? Had he been wearing a mask?
    None of it made any sense to me, but somehow my parents got it in their heads that José was sick from spraying the cherry trees, even though he’d sprayed plants lots of times before. Back in Victoria, he helped spray the flower fields all the time, and he’d never got sick like this. As far as I could tell, my parents were desperate for an explanation and ready to believe anything.
    There didn’t seem to be any point telling the nurse about my parents’ crazy ideas. If I made it sound like José couldn’t handle his work, he might lose his job. Both Analía and José said the patrón could kick him out of Canada if he wanted, and then what would José’s family do? Starve like other people in Mexico who didn’t have jobs?
    It was as if my parents hadn’t even heard what the patrón shouted as we left the farm. After Papá told him we were taking José to the hospital, he wouldn’t even open the gate for us, and once Papá had forced it open and we took off, the patrón yelled that if we said anything to make him look bad, he’d make sure we never worked in this area again.
    â€œ Por favor , Rosario,” Papá repeated. “ Cuéntale .”
    My heart squeezed painfully tight. I wanted to help, but what could I say that wouldn’t make things worse? What if José’s sickness had nothing to do with the farm at all, and I said something that got back to the patrón ? Or what if I opened my mouth to speak and the nurse couldn’t understand me, and they gave José the wrong medication, and he died? What if he died all because of me and my not-yet-perfect English?
    â€œI don’t know,” I whispered in English finally, looking at my shoes.“I don’t know.”
    Immediately, the nurse’s eyes were on me. “Can you tell me what happened?” she asked, her voice gentle. She reminded me