ow the moto was back, chugging slowly down Blume Ramos. I flew out of Abuela Cuca’s gate, leaving the hens and lizards behind, and took a left onto Serafina and a right onto Castillo—our street. I saw a crowd forming in front of our house and more people rushing toward it from different directions. Those bodies sent out an energy I’ll never forget, a current that ran up the street, buzzed through my feet, and landed, vibrating, in my chest.

I fought the urge to cry, to run back to Abuela Cuca’s. I wanted to be brave. My mother had shown me how to make myself brave on this very same rise on Castillo, where she’d taught me to ride a bike. She had let me go too soon, and I’d picked up too much speed. I’d crashed where the road dipped, tangled up in the pedals and spokes, bloody and bawling. “Ya pasó, ya pasó,” Mami had said then, over and over. And she was right. It was over—and, somehow, that bit of distance eased the pain.

Then, with her eyes so close to mine I could see a thin blue ring around her black irises, she said, “Ponte guapa”—make yourself brave.

-from Chapter 1 of Property of the Revolution