“My numbers?” Ms. Lina frowned.
“Yes, I want to know all about the little numbers that add or subtract to your ability to continue running your business and keep your home. Within the next two days gather all your paperwork. Business plan, taxes, and bank statements forthe last seven years, accounting ledgers, retirement and stock portfolios. I want to see every profit and every expense, then we’ll determine how many customers and over what period of time you need to break even, and how many you’ll need for a healthy profit that will allow you to live your best life, because breaking even is not the business model we want to aspire to.”
Ms. Lina smiled. “Your flame burns very bright when you talk about business, but that’s not what we’re here to talk about, is it?”
“I kind of prefer it,” Lauren muttered, finishing her second cup.
“Because of what came before?”
Lauren waved her hand as if it would erase everything that came before this moment. She got distracted by the motion of her hand. She had such graceful hands. How had she never noticed it?
“My goodness, the tea has already found you. I think it’s time we get you back to your room.”
“I like it here with you Ms. Lina. You have a calm nature. Very caring. A mother is supposed to be caring—” She found herself drifting to the side.
Ms. Lina rushed over to prop her up, but she wasn’t strong enough to manage Lauren’s body. So instead, she sat on the couch, and steered Lauren’s head into her lap.
“You’re who I fantasized my mother would be when I was a child.”
Ms. Lina laughed. “I would’ve been a horrible mother.”
Lauren shook her head, attempted to rise, and Ms. Lina pushed her head back down, a little ungently, probably miscalculating the amount of force needed given Lauren’s size.
Readjusting her head, Lauren closed her eyes and felt like she was in a spinning vortex of darkness. Though her eyelids feltheavy, she popped them back open and patted Ms. Lina’s thigh encouragingly.
“You’re not judgmental, you’re not unnecessarily mean and bitter, and most important…mostimportant, you didn’t break my heart and use the pieces to try and mend the heartlessness of another.”
Lauren wanted to hold onto her outrage, wanted to be energized by it, but the tea swept up every emotion not aligned with peace and drug them out to the unreachable parts of her awareness. She closed her eyes and sighed. She was free and in a place where reality couldn’t touch her.
A few hours later, Lauren rolled over and groaned. Something slimy coated the back of her hand and the side of her face. She opened her eyes and quickly shut them; the morning light was blinding. She took a few moments and let her eyes adjust as she wiped the saliva from the side of her face, wiping her hand in disgust on her pajama bottoms.
The smell of food had her scrambling to get off the bed and to the toilet, only for her to land on her ass and realize she wasn’t in her bed at all but on the side of Ms. Lina’s too-small-for-her size loveseat. She sat on the floor tangled in a cream-colored blanket trying to piece together the events of the night, but after the second cup of tea, everything was a blur.
“You’re awake!” Ms. Lina called out joyfully as she entered the room. Lauren pressed the meaty part of her palms into her temples.
“You’re very popular for a newcomer,” she said, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. “I’ve had to turn away three visitors, all wanting a chance to speak with the infamous Ms. Lauren Green.”
“Did you drug me?” Lauren asked incredulously, as she unsteadily rose to her knees.
“Drugs? In my home? Never, mija. The tea, it is purely herbal. It fills in the spaces, provides only what the body needs and yours apparently needed healing sleep. How do you feel?”
Lauren did an internal check and despite the initial disorientation of waking, she felt…clearer. Rested.
Despite that, Lauren side-eyed Ms. Lina as she lifted herself up onto the couch. Correction, notMs.Lina, just Lina now. Anybody who had the gumption to throw her a drugged-out tea party was no longer extended the honorific.
“I see you, old woman,” Lauren said warily. “You’re definitely related to that bastard.”
Lina laughed. More like a cackled.Yeah, Lauren thought,definitely giving bruja, definitely giving witchnow that the nurturing veneer had fallen. The older woman was too diabolical to ever be seen as motherly again.
“And just FYI,” Lauren said, picking up the blanket from the floor and folding it. “Good mothering women don’t drug their unsuspecting children.”
“Of course they do. And if they don’t, they should. Now, suck it up and say thank you, Tia Lina, you are the best host in the world and do exactly what is needed to take care of your guests.”
Lauren snorted.
“Then you will leave me a glowing review on Yelp as you are so committed to helping me grow my business.”
“Cutthroat, opportunistic, and a fabulous cook. I begrudgingly admire you despite your moral ambiguity. I’ll even have to accept your unfortunate connection to the sheriff.”
