Chapter 1: 5 am
Lupe woke up at five in the morning as usual, she got out of her bed without much hesitation and went to the bathroom directly, she could barely open her eyes, when she looked out of the window while sitting on the toilet, she could see the skyline of Chicago already lighted up, this was the favorite part of her apartment. The beautiful skyline was not far at all, but she had never been there even though she had lived here for over ten years.
She didn’t know why she started thinking about the time when she first came to America that morning. When Lupe first came here with her mom, she was not as happy as her younger siblings, she just turned thirteen, her English was not good enough for her to fully understand what the teachers said in the class, she spent most of time by herself at school even though there were many other students spoke Spanish, and she had to take care of two younger brothers and one younger sister after she got home from school since their mom had to take a second job in the evening till late night. She missed her school and her friends in Mexico, they didn’t even have time to say goodbye to each other before they left. She could never forget about that morning, when the whole village was still sleeping, her mom woke up all five of them from their dreams and told them to get up immediately, when they walked out of the house, they saw a truck parking in front of their house waiting for them. She remembered when she asked her mom if she could pack her stuff first, her mom shut her down right away and almost dragged her out of the house, her siblings were all sleepy and neither of them knew what was going on. She could almost still feel the warmth from her little brother’s body in the trunk of the truck. She didn’t know where they were going or why they were leaving, her mom didn’t say much the whole way, she knew she shouldn’t ask.
Lupe looked at herself in the mirror after the shower, she was kind of short, her medium length hair was just long enough to touch her shoulder, she did have beautiful hair and that was what she liked the most about her body, they were dark and black like a waterfall, she wished she could have more time to comb her hair. Lupe put on her glasses, it was a pair of glasses with very large frame, now she could see every inch of her light brown skin, she had a tattoo of colorful feather on her left chest, she got it after she broke up with her ex. Her mom didn’t like her to wear glasses, but she preferred it to contact lens, she thought the glasses made her look smarter, even though she wished her eyesight would be good enough to not need to wear them.
When Lupe got out from the bathroom, she was ready to start the day even though it was still dark outside. The wintertime in Chicago was what she was still not used to after so many years, not because of the snow, which she actually liked, she just didn’t like the long dark night. She missed the sunshine so much in the wintertime, she missed the time when she played outside of her house with her friends when she was a little girl, the sun was baking the ground almost through the whole year, but she and her friends would never complain about it and they always enjoyed the energy the sun brough to them, not to mention the sweet melon after that.
Lupe kept her routine almost every day, even at the weekend. She worked as an inventory clerk in a manufacturing company not far from home. She needed to be there at 6 every day from Monday through Friday, sometime even the weekend. She couldn’t afford to be late because she was paid by hour, even late for five minutes would make her lose payment of half an hour. She was still appreciated of this job compared to her last job as an assembler on the production line in the same company, at least she could sit in front of a computer most of the time, she remembered when she worked as a production line assembler, she could barely move when she got home cause her legs and back would hurt after a whole day standing there.
Her son was still sleeping when she tried to wake him up that morning, it was still dark outside, she checked her watch and realized he could sleep for five more minutes, so she just sat by his bed and looked at him until the five minutes was up.
“Manny, Manny, it’s time to wake up.” She patted him gently.
Manny opened his eyes and looked at him confusedly for a while, he had big dark black eyes and curly brown hair, Lupe gave him a big hug and kissed him on his cheeks. Sometimes she wondered if this boy was too good for her, during the years raising him up by herself most of the time, he barely gave her any hard time, he always listened to her and acted like a little adult. She thanked God every day for this boy, she felt having him in her life was the best thing ever happened to her.
“Put on some clothes so I can fix you something to eat, Ok?” She asked him gently.
“Ok.” The boy nodded, and then started putting on the clothes his mom put by his side.
His breakfast was easy every morning, a bowl of milk and cereal, Lupe was having the same thing with him. The five minutes of breakfast time with him was one of the happiest moments of the whole day. Occasionally she would surprise him with scrambled eggs if she woke up early that day.
By the time they got out of the house, she could see the sun was about to rise from far away, the sky was still dark but not pitch black as before, the roads were getting busier with more and more traffic. They lived in an apartment complex, some of her neighbors were leaving for work around the same time, Lupe said hi to them. She checked her watch when they got in the car, she had about ten mins before she had to be at the factory.
“Hey Manny, you need to get out fast when you get to grandma’s house, ok? Mama is running late for work.” She talked to Manny while she was just starting the car.
That was when she heard the explosion far away.
“What was that?” Manny sounded scared.
“Probably thunder, don’t worry.” Said Lupe. Though she was not sure what that was, it could be thunder, but it happened very rarely in the wintertime. She knew there must be something going on, but she didn’t think much about it until she arrived at work.
