That's Not What Happened by Kody Keplinger

Author:Kody Keplinger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.
Published: 2018-10-10T16:00:00+00:00

Dear Whoever,

I’m not the best with words. People have always called me shy, but that’s not really it. I just never really know what to say. I spend so long searching for the right word that by the time I have what I want to say worked out in my head, the conversation has moved on. Pictures have always made more sense to me.

Maybe that’s why I’ve written seven drafts of this letter. That, or maybe it’s because Lee asked me to write the truth. I’ve been giving people the truth they want to hear, showing them the pictures they want to see, for so long that I don’t know which way is up anymore.

All I know is I try so hard. And everyone thinks I’m doing so well, but I’m scared and I’m angry and I’m tired all the time, and I can’t tell anyone that because they don’t want to hear it and because I don’t know how to say it.

And also because of Rosi.

I didn’t really like my cousin. I’m not supposed to say that, but if I’m telling the truth, there it is. We didn’t get along at all. I’m sure she was nice to other people, but not to me. She was my younger cousin. She set the bar, though. And I could never reach it.

Rosi was the better Martinez. She never missed a single Mass. Her Spanish was perfect. At school she was popular and had good grades. And I was the quiet, geeky lesbian who spent all her time reading manga and drawing instead of studying. I barely managed a C in my high school Spanish class. Rosi was better than me at almost everything, and she loved to remind me of that.

Every time we were at Abuela’s house, Rosi would wait until I walked into the room to start asking our grandmother questions about growing up in Mexico or about Abuelo, who had passed away before we were born. Within seconds, they’d both fall into rapid Spanish that I couldn’t follow, full of laughter and smiles. If our parents were around, they’d join in, too. And I’d be stuck sitting there, left out. Abuela was always the first to notice me, but whenever she’d try to pull me into the chatter, even switching back to English, I just didn’t have words. Not in any language. So I’d shrug and Abuela’s face would fall, and over her shoulder Rosi would give me this look of pity, like she hadn’t done it on purpose.

She mostly ignored me at school. We were a year apart, so it wasn’t that hard. She had a big group of friends, who all seemed to really like her. I mostly just had my sketchbook. We only had one class together, and we sat on opposite sides of the room. Outside of school we may have been cousins in a close-knit family, but within those four walls, we might as well have lived in different universes.

But as much as I resented Rosi—hated her, sometimes—the moment I realized she was dead was the worst of my life.

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