I stared at the phone for another minute, smiling like an idiot. Marco, ever the gentleman, even when he was pretending not to be.
Damn him.
The past few days had been quiet—or at least as quiet as things ever got in my life.
I’d spent most of the time pretending I had my shit together. You know, like one of those girls who meditates at sunrise, drinks matcha lattes, and definitely does not think about tequila for breakfast.
I even went to see my mom.
I brought her a mango.
Not a gift, really. More like an offering. A peace treaty.
I knew she’d like it. She’d always liked fruit that made a mess—dripped down your wrists, left your fingers sticky, made you sit still long enough to finish it.
It was soft, just ripe enough, and the smell filled the whole room. Sweet and overwhelming, like those summer afternoons when we’d sit barefoot on the patio eating them. Back then, the world was simpler. It wasn’t perfect—never was—but something about those messy mangoes always made things feel okay. The tangy scent used to linger on our fingers for hours, hiding the subtle hint of bleach and laundry detergent that clung to Mama’s hands from scrubbing other people’s homes.
She was sitting up in the hospital bed when I came in, wrapped in two blankets even though it wasn’t cold. Her hair was thinner than the last time I’d seen her. Her skin looked paper-thin. Still beautiful, in that way only mothers are—something you don’t notice until you’re afraid to lose it.
“Hola, mami,” I said softly.
She smiled. Tired, but it still reached her eyes. “Vale,” she murmured gently. “Mira no más,you brought me sunshine.”
I held up the mango. “Close enough.”
She laughed—just once. Then she coughed. I hated how small it sounded.
I pulled the chair close and peeled another mango in slow strips with a dull plastic knife. She watched me quietly, like she always did. Like she knew how many versions of me there hadbeen over the years and was just glad one of them had showed up today.
“They say the radiation makes you tired,” she said, adjusting her blanket. “But I think the boredom is worse. All day, nothing. Just this room. The buzzing machine. People walking in like I’m not even here.”
“You’re not missing much out there,” I said, trying to make her feel better. “Well, besides the fact Lucia wants a duck now. Not a toy. A real one.”
“Dios mío.”She smiled again. “That girl is trouble.”
“She’s your granddaughter. What did you expect?”
She reached for the mango slice I offered and took a bite, eyes fluttering closed for a second.
I just watched her. Trying not to think about all the times I could’ve been here and wasn’t. All the phone calls I’d ignored. The visits I’d skipped. The excuses I’d made.
I used to tell myself it was because I didn’t want her to see me like that—lost, reckless, drinking my way through bad decisions and worse men.
But the truth?
I didn’t want to seeherlikethis.
Not fragile. Not stuck to a machine. Not dying in slow motion while I figured out how to be a person. It took everything I had to keep my smile on and my tears hidden.
“How are you feeling?” I asked, too quiet.
“Better,” she admitted. “They say the treatment is working.”
And just like that, I felt my throat tighten.
Because what the hell did “working” even mean? Did it mean she’d live? Did it mean she’d stop forgetting words mid-sentence, or that the color would come back to her cheeks, or that the beeping machines and IV lines would eventually go away? Or did it just mean she was stable enough not to scare usyet? Stable enough for me to walk out of this room and pretend I hadn’t wasted months avoiding it?
I didn’t ask. Instead I nodded like an idiot and handed her another slice of mango as if fruit made this easier.
