Realizing that saying no was not an option, I decided my better alternative was to just get everything out of the car as fast as possible and be back before the women in my family scared Iris away.
Despite my best efforts to sprint to the car and gather everything in, it still wasn’t fast enough. After setting all the games, presents, and items for Sarge on the table, Iwalked back over to the kitchen to hear my sister talking to Iris.
“I’m really glad you’re not some super skinny chick with a thigh gap,” Rita said to Iris.
“What the hell is that?” I asked, having never heard of a thigh gap before but not liking the fact that Rita would be nitpicking at Iris’s body in any way.
Hearing my voice, Rita turned to look at me. “It was a compliment, bro, so calm down.”
“Then what does it mean?” I repeated.
This time she pointed her finger in my face. “Are you a girl? No. So you wouldn’t understand.”
“It means she has thick thighs and big hips, both of which areperfectfor birthing babies…and Ilovebabies,” my mom chimed in, emphasizing the last part.
“Mom,” I warned.
“Don’tmomme,” she shot back. “Go do your thing, I’ve got her.”
“I don’t have a thing,” I told her. “We already got everything out of the car.”
“Okay, then go hang out with your father and JT in the living room,” she countered.
She practically shooed me away, pushing me out of the kitchen.
“How old are you, dear?” I heard my mom ask Iris as I walked away very slowly.
My mother was trying to seem casual about it, but I knew damn well she was prying.
“I’m thirty,” she replied.
“Oh perfect,” Mom said. “Now that Hector is forty, he could use a friend who’s younger to keep him on his toes.”
“Mom,” I all but growled.
“I’m ignoring you since you are no longer in the room and not part of this conversation,” she yelled to me.
Thankfully, Iris seemed to just take it in jest by laughing.
“Do you like babies, Iris?” my mom asked next, and I just shook my head as I ran my hand up and down over my face, hoping to God Iris was still interested in me by the end of the day.
Dani waved at me from down the hallway and started to walk my way, signing,“She’ll be fine. They like her, so they won’t say anything too over the top.”
I highly doubted that.
“How long have you two been seeing each other?”she signed.
“We’re not,”I signed back.
“So we didn’t interrupt anything when we just showed up here this morning,”she signed and grinned from ear to ear at me, winking.
“Possibly,”I signed back, wondering how much to give away.
Dani was the sibling who would take your secrets to the grave if you asked her to, so I told her the full story about the break-in and why Iris was here.
“But you’d like there to be more?”Dani inquired, watching my face for any sign of emotion I didn’t say in my words.
That was the thing about Dani—because she couldn’t hear inflection in people’s voices, she was incredible at reading faces, and she was one of the few people who could read me, even after all the training the military and police academy had given me on how to neutralize emotions.
