Salvation by Anne Osterlund

“Better watch yourself, Real! You wouldn’t want to wind up stuck here with Charla while Resendez cleans up all the college girls next fall.”
    Salva grinned and tossed his tall friend a water bottle. “You mean,
both
you and I clean them up; right, Tos?”
    “Nah.” Tosa unscrewed the lid and gulped about half the contents of the bottle, then stared down into it. “I’m not going to college.”
    “What?” Pepe came off the fender.
    “Um…” Tosa screwed on the bottle lid, then unscrewed it again. “I’m thinkin’ maybe the army.”
    A hail of bolts fell from Pepe’s fingers. “What the H would you wanta do that for?”
    Salva didn’t care much for the idea either—the thought of his big, easygoing friend killing someone. But then—short of a trade school, which there was no way Tosa’s family was going to be able to afford—the military was a real option.
    The tall guy looked up at Salva as if for approval. “Well, it’d be easier, you know.”
    Meaning the whole citizenship process.
There was no way either of Tosa’s parents was going to pass the English test before he turned eighteen. Though, as Salva saw it, there were a heck of a lot better ways to become a citizen than to get yourself killed. But he didn’t have a right to talk. His father had passedthe test two years ago, and Salva didn’t have to deal with the whole visa mess.
Lucky.
He knew that. Just one more thing he owed
Papá
, because Salva never could have applied for the same scholarships if he’d had to fill in the wrong bubble on all those forms.
    He slid off the tires and clapped Tosa on the back. “The army’d be lucky to have you.”
    “What’s that supposed to mean?” Pepe demanded.
    Salva knew his best friend was still under the illusion the three of them were going to spend the next four years together. Which wasn’t going to happen. No way Tosa would have gotten into a better school than Community. And Salva had already received a yes from Regional at least, not that Regional was at the top of his list.
    He and Pepe needed to talk.
    But not here. And not now. What was needed now was action.
    “It means,” Salva said, “I bet they could use a half-decent mechanic.” He glanced around behind him. No sign of the shop owner. Or Tosa’s father. “Especially one we’ve primed so well for battle, don’t you think?” Salva picked up a grease rag, wadded it tight, and hurled it at Pepe.
    “Oh, man,” Pepe said, ducking the rag and crouching down behind the busted fender, “are you sure you wanta go there?”
    “Definitely,” Tosa answered instead, snagging the box of remaining rags and dodging behind the fresh stack of tires.
    Which meant Salva had to dive for cover behind the cabinet by the open office door.
    “Incoming!” Pepe shouted, and what followed was a barrage: aluminum cans, bottle tops, rags, the empty water bottle, a container of glue, lubricant. The rules were simple. No nuts, bolts, or wrenches. Nothing that would leave a hole in your head. And when you ran out of stuff to throw, you were out.
    Salva gave up first. The other guys, closer to each other, kept trading ammo.
    During a brief lull in the combat, he heard the customer bell ring and moved to close the door, but he paused as he caught sight of the hopeless look on Tosa’s father’s face. The owner, who should have been manning the desk, must have slacked off early. Salva stepped through the doorway and shut out the sounds of renewed warfare.
    Señor Tosa was the inverse of his son, nearly as tall but scary skinny and a total introvert. He was also a brilliant mechanic. But no way was he going to be able to follow the diatribe being flung at him from the guy who’d just entered the shop.
    The customer, a white guy maybe in his thirties, though it was hard to tell under the patchy facial hair, railed away about his Jeep losing horsepower. The damn thing had been running fine, he claimed, when he’d got it two months ago. He plucked at