“Spanglish Deceptions”

By Bryan Betancur

Spanglish Deceptions

I read the email again. After countless rejections, rewrites, restless nights reproaching myself for believing I could write compelling fiction, I finally received an acceptance. The editors at a prestigious journal wanted to publish the story “Spanglish Deceptions.” It was a moment to feel proud, validated. But the story wasn’t mine.

I read the email again. I wouldn’t submit to a journal of this caliber during my most audacious delusions of grandeur. The letterhead alone sufficed to prove something was amiss. And the message wasn’t even addressed to me, but to a writer named Poster X. This Poster X, stupid nom de plume aside, merited the editors’ admiration, not me.

I read the email again. My eyes, accustomed to scrutinizing nothing but demoralizing rebuffs, pined to revisit the praise lavished on “Spanglish Deceptions.” Haunting yet hopeful …vanguard of Latinx literature…why we’re committed to publishing authors from marginalized groups. The email-encomium was a dream come true for an aspiring Latino writer like me. But I wasn’t the author. “You’re a good writer, too, no te estreses,” I whispered in a feeble attempt at affirmation that echoed the insincere encouragement editors sometimes included in their rejections. Yet I continued stewing in jealous rumination, imagining Poster X’s satisfaction at receiving the acceptance.  

I read the email again. Did I have enough tact to compose a reply that wasn’t unduly passive aggressive? Dear editors, I admire your journal and hope to place my work there some day. In the meantime, you sent me an acceptance intended for another writer. While this oversight is understandable and completely forgiven, it has reiterated, without my needing reminding, that I’m a shit writer. Saludos cordiales, pendejos. Not Poster X.  

I read the email again. The acceptance had come from a no-reply email address, which meant I had to respond through the submission management website I used to send stories and communicate with journals. The site housed all my rejected submissions dating back three years. I would be forced to confront the archived evidence of my failed writing before alerting editors at an eminent journal the story they fawned over wasn’t, couldn’t possibly be, mine. I cursed under my breath and logged into my account.   

I blinked hard and leaned toward the screen as if searching for the 3D image in a Magic Eye puzzle. Jagged icicles spread like tendrils through my veins. Someone hacked into the account. My name still appeared at the top of the page, and several of the active submissions were in the usual In-Progress purgatory, waiting to be read and banished from the pearly gates of publication. Everything looked normal, save the two most recent submissions, both sent to illustrious journals, both titled “Spanglish Deceptions.”

Despite the impulse to slam the laptop shut and forget everything I just saw, I clicked the Accepted tab. Y claro: one acceptance, a story titled “Spanglish Deceptions.” I scrolled through the submission form. Every auto-completed field contained the usual information except the submitter name, which was changed to Poster X. The somatic manifestations of my anxiety disorder poured forth in sweaty, breathy succession. What could be more humiliating than confessing to respected editors that I submitted a story I didn’t write?

After performing EFT tapping for ten minutes to suffuse an oncoming panic attack, I reassessed the situation. Who was Poster X? Had he or she submitted work through other hacked accounts? What was the endgame? Unable to cope with the nauseating whirlwind of unanswered questions, I sought refuge in avoidant behavior. Rather than draft a message to the editors, I read “Spanglish Deceptions.”

I desperately hoped to find something to criticize—an underdeveloped character, exaggerated emotion, a superfluous modifier. Pero nada, the story was sublime. It boasted a subtly complex plot, and the protagonist’s inner monologue drew the reader in with the warm familiarity of a steaming bowl of sancocho. More importantly, the work gave voice to my people, spoke to and for the Latino community in a way my fiction seldom (if ever) accomplished. Poster X captured the Latino identity in its multifaceted complexity, yearning, and nostalgia without resorting to banal stereotype. You’d want to read “Spanglish Deceptions” again and again to savor every leitmotiv and poignant social commentary.

I walked to the living room and lay faceup on the area rug. What’s the worst that would happen if I took credit for Poster X’s story? I didn’t have a writing career to derail, so I could easily ignore the ruthless criticism I’d face if I were outed as a fraud. But what if Poster X wasn’t Latino? What if a white writer intended to use me as a brown mask? The story merited wide circulation for its adroit apposition of artistry and advocacy, but not at the risk of propagating cultural appropriation; not while talented Latino artists struggled to navigate a publishing market still mired in structural racism.

I turned my head toward the window. Heavy, ashen clouds moved languidly behind the wilting orchid on the sill. I tensed my body, took a deep breath, slowly released.

***

I know perpetual fear of exposure will make it impossible to fully enjoy whatever recognition “Spanglish Deceptions” might bring. The truth will inevitably come to light. It always does. Until then, I’m Poster X.  

Bryan Betancur is a Spanish professor in the Bronx and a freelance journalist who writes on issues related to Latino political identity and representation. In addition to academic and journalistic essays, he has published creative nonfiction in iōLit and The Nasiona and fiction in Hispanic Culture Review (forthcoming).