MY NAME SAKE

My Name Sake-- by Cathy Colston
My death was truly my rebirth. You may have heard about me. Thirteen year old girl gone missing, later found dead. Oh I made the news. Everyone was SO worried about me. Then. It was somber eyes all misty with razor blade dew. I was the best student. The best daughter. Even a friend. A thirteen year old girl killed at the hands of a murderous fiend is big news. I mean Big news! You would think that my resurrection would have been just as big. After all isn’t that what happened to Our Lord and Savior. Mine didn’t even get a full sentence in the paper.
Patricia Benevedez - safe at home
They didn’t even spell my name right.
I was the most popular girl at school for three whole days. Better off dead I guess. I’m just a freak anyways. Yea, a freak. What thirteen year old girl you know still wears a training bra in high school.
Now that other Patricia, she was muy bonita and had a style of her own. When we weren’t in school she wore sweaters that ended below her shoulders with big hoops earrings that I just bet were real gold. Her mahogany hair was never one strand outta place. Even when she was riding her bike and the wind was kicking up a storm, it stood still. Her face was always flawlessly dressed. And I just know when she was born she popped out with a tube of pastel lip gloss and some maybelline. At Our Lady Of Sorrows she was always the first person you saw in a crowd. She didn’t just blend in with the alabaster wall paper like me. My brother Ralphie said that what guys like most about her is her low I.Q and the fact that she looks like she owns her own street corner. But the truth is, we were best friends. Even though she never really talked to me when she was around her cling-ons.
I always helped her with her homework in General Business class. And when she was having a hard time with her other classes, I didn’t mind one bit helping her with math, science, and history courses. That’s what friends are for.
It was Max Lucas Luna Luna that helped bond our friendship together. And yea, I embellished a little when I told her that he had the hots for her, but it was for a good cause. He didn’t exactly SAY he liked her, but he would have to be loco not to. It was during one of the Youth Exchanges that I saw her eyeing him. And oh my god! I hate to even think of that day again. I wish I could just forget it all together. How was I to know that glitter high heels would make me a pariah at school. Even if they were too big, the tissue inside at the tip of the toes should’ve helped them stay in place.
I had it all planned. If any of the guys at Holy Cross, that’s our sister school, asked me, my name would be Tricia. Not just Patricia. And I would talk sexy and breathlessly like Marylyn Monroe and they would all know that I was the same as every other girl at Our Lady of Sorrows. Except I wasn’t a make up induced animated Barbie doll.
All that would have been fine if I wasn’t such a clumsy dork. Fell flat on my face in front of everybody. A real geek right. That’s me. Patricia Benavidez.
Since that day, I didn’t really want to show my face at that school again. I did go back though. That’s when I told Patricia about Max Lucas Luna Luna. To tell you the truth, after that I don’t think I coulda made it at that school if it wasn’t for her. She was a real friend to me.
But that fight with Ralphie was a big change for me. Now I was the slave. Not only did I work until midnight on the weekends, but every weekday until eleven. I was shuffled back and forth from the first Taco Palace, where my mom was the slave, to No. 2 ,where Ralphie usually handled the work.
I don’t know what exactly started the fight between them. I do know that Ralphie expected to get more money out of all the work he did over in the new place. Although I don’t know how he believed he would. My papa was so cheap he wouldn’t even buy seats for the new place. They had a big blow up. Papa hit Ralphie and mi hermano had enough. Ralphie said that he could never come back because he would kill Papa if he ever laid a hand on him again.
I didn’t blame him one bit. Papa had tacos coming out of his ears. He didn’t care that I needed to have friends. He was a true slave driver. When Patricia started coming to see me at the Taco Palace, he screamed at her and ran her off. I bet he never had friends. That’s when I had enough. I left. And would’ve NEVER came back if not for Ralphie, who MADE me. He let me stay with him. But when they found the body of that dead girl, and in grief mama and papa said it was me, Ralphie drove me home. He couldn’t stand to think that mi madre was so overwhelmed with grief that she thought I was dead.
When I made it back to school, I realized who my real friends were. There were those who was happy that I hadn’t been found dead in a drainage ditch. And although I am not popular, I don’t mind being a geek as much.
As for Patricia, my tocaya, we don’t talk. Since I never could get Max Lucas Luna Luna to go out with her. I still see her sometimes though. She rides her bike by my house looking for her true love’s first kiss. I hope when I turn fifteen I don’t salivate over guys that could really care less about me.