I was standing at the kitchen window, lulled by the drone of a heavy downpour on our roof as I brewed coffee and mused on what Ugly might expect us to do. Though it was obviously a surreal situation to be in, I felt relatively sanguine about the whole thing. We hadn’t even discussed it when we got home from the fiasco of Mauricio’s barbecue-turned-blackmail-bonanza the night before. I’d overheard my parents speaking in hushed tones, Papá saying that he’d told Ugly flat-out that no daughter of his was going to be prostituted to clear Celia’s debts if that’s what he was thinking, that Ugly would have to kill him first. ‘He said killing me could be easily arranged but I’m off the hook because he’s a “mogul” of the relocation business, not the prostitution industry. That’s all he said. He wouldn’t tell me what we have to do.’ Anyway, with my instinctual fear of sex slavery mercifully off the table, I felt no need to panic. Or who knows, maybe it was just emotional shock and my brain had numbed itself to the reality of what it actually meant to be blackmailed by a criminal.
Just then, what had been Aunt Celia’s car came tearing through the rain to stop in our driveway, Ava at the wheel. She and Alejandra tumbled out in their school uniforms, running towards the annex and squealing at the rain. I took my coffee, grabbed an umbrella and ventured out, holding the mug close to breathe in the steam while my flip-flops squelched through the sodden grass, flecking my calves with mud.
In the annex, the twins’ muddied sneakers and socks were heaped at the door. Ava was already seated at Mamá’s table, having her nails filed. Pornographically wet in her uniform, Alejandra was draped across the couch like a lounging Cleopatra, wriggling her newly liberated feet and pointing her toes like a ballerina warming up. When they all turned to see me, I was met by a chorus of ‘Hola, Yola!’, which no one ever got fed up of singing at me any time I walked into a room.
My mother arched an eyebrow at me. ‘You’re not expecting any freebies this afternoon too, I hope? You know that everyone who walks into my spa is a paying customer – I don’t care if you’re my mamá resurrected from the dead. This is just an extra-special treat for the girls.’
Treat my ass. What she wanted was the inside scoop. But I did too, so helped speed things along. I joined Alejandra where she was stretched across the couch. ‘So,’ I said, smacking my lips at a bitter sip of black coffee, ‘what’s she like?’
I waited eagerly for the onslaught of bitching at how much they hated their unfaithful father and this unwelcome interloper in their home. But instead: ‘Oh my gosh, Yola, I know it’s such a mess but Vanessa is such a sweetheart.’
Mamá and I shared a confused glance.
‘She really is sweet,’ added Ava, nodding earnestly at my mother.
‘We freaked out yesterday when she turned up – I mean freaked …’ Alejandra was even laughing. ‘But Papá told us that it was this big mistake, the only time he’d ever slipped up, right after Mamá told him she was getting a divorce.’
‘He was heartbroken, you know,’ said Ava.
‘Was he heartbroken when Fidel was conceived too?’ I asked.
‘It really took a toll when Mamá got a lawyer and everything. She even kicked him out for a while. He said it totally crushed him,’ chirruped Alejandra, ignoring me. ‘And of course, whatever Papi did isn’t Vanessa’s fault. It was his mistake. Vanessa’s always wanted to meet us. She’s never had a real family, just her on her own with her mother in Isla de Gato.’
‘And she really is just so sweet,’ added Ava.
‘Verga, we get it, she’s sweet,’ I said. ‘But you seriously like her? How can you when …’
Mamá was glaring at me. Eyes like an owl on speed. I knew what that look meant: drop it. But if anyone had to stick up for Aunt Celia, it was me.
‘Sorry, chama, I don’t see how you can be okay with everything …’ I started, but Ava interrupted me.
‘I guess we realized that you really never know how long you’ll be around. You could die at any second of any day. That’s what Mamá’s last lesson was to us. All that matters is love and family. And Vanessa’s our half-sister. We want to know her and love her.’
‘That’s a beautiful attitude to have,’ beamed Mamá, who’d been nothing if not vocal about her dislike of Aunt Celia, so couldn’t give two shits about whether Mauricio ever cheated on her or not. She was just tickled at having new gossip fodder for her and Zulema to discuss over their pink zinfandels when they had ‘girly nights’. But as much as I wanted to call my mother out for her hypocrisy (think she’d want to ‘get to know family’ if family constituted a Shakira-shaped teen Papá had fathered in the early days of their marriage? Bitch, please) and as much as I wanted to cajole the twins into ripping Mauricio a new one, I realized it wouldn’t be worth my while. The twins were gonna stick by Mauricio’s asinine story of heartbreak-fuelled adultery no matter what, because nothing I said could ever shift the female impulse to forgive and justify the picaresque wanderings of the male member. Maybe we all have the natural compulsion to make excuses for men, or else the world would descend into anarchy as wives, girlfriends and daughters mass-murdered all the cheating husbands, boyfriends and baby-daddies out there.
So I boarded the denial canoe alongside the twins and picked up my oar. ‘You’re right, guys. Mistakes do happen in marriage. Your attitude is great.’ Because when your family members are cruising along a river of bullshit, sometimes it’s best not to tell them how to navigate. The only thing to do is help them paddle ahead into clearer waters and leave the bullshit behind.
UNAVOIDABLE CLICHÉS
Seven a.m. the following Sunday, our day of reckoning. We didn’t have to be at Mauricio’s house for our meeting with Ugly until midday, so I was indulging in my morning ritual: reading on a beach chair in the backyard wearing my favourite pyjamas, a threadbare Rolling Stones T-shirt stolen from an ex back in Caracas.
I was just tipping the mug over my tongue to get the last drops of coffee when a loud burst of knocking echoed through the house. I turned to look through the open porch doors. You could see straight through to the living room, past the dining table to the front door. Figuring it was Sancho or Mauricio come to strategize with Papá before our tête-à-tête with Ugly, I flipped back to the page I’d been reading.
Another round of knocks and my father shouting, ‘Hang on! I’m coming!’, then the creak of hinges desperate for WD40 as Papá opened up.
‘Buenos días, Hector! Nice to see you up and about at this bright and early hour of the day of our Lord.’
Ugly.
I looked over my shoulder so fast I nearly snapped a vertebra. My father, in bleach-splattered boxer shorts, was blocking the open doorway. I turned back to look down at my legs, bare right up to the white triangle of my underwear. Christ, why did we have to be a naked house? No one was ever fully clothed unless we had guests. I craned my neck around again to see if there was any possible way I could dart into the house and across the living room to the bedroom hallway without being noticed.