“Sky!”
It’s her warning tone, the one that’s stating she’s about thirty seconds away from throwing her slippers at me. So I shut up and go to the door. When I open it, it’s all I can do to not let my jaw topple to the ground.
Adam is…wow. He’s wearing a phthalo green dress shirt with the sleeves unbuttoned and rolled up, revealing his veinedand hairy forearms. His dress pants are dark gray, nearly indigo, with black shiny boots. In his hand is a huge bag of something that smells incredible.
“You look beautiful,” I tell him. His neck instantly turns red.
“Look who’s talking,” he says in return. I step out and shut the door behind me.
“Oh,” he says. “I thought we would eat…you know. In there.” He frowns. “That’s what we had agreed, right?”
“Yes. I’m sorry, but—” I lower my voice to a whisper. “Nadia’s home. I lied and told her you were here for a house tour? And to take photos of me?”
Adam blinks and tilts his head. “Is that…a normal occurrence for you guys?”
I smack his arm lightly. “For the article, silly.”
“Ah.” He nods. “Right. Well, I mean. That actually could be helpful. I don’t typically do the photos of my domestic pieces, but sure.” He pauses. “So why are we still outside?”
I roll my eyes. “She’s freaking out and cleaning. Because of the photos of her home.”
“Ah.” He stands on tiptoe for a moment, then lowers back down. “Should we…help her?”
“Uhh—” Nadia would probably rather eat a plate of bird bones and shards of glass for dinner. But luckily, she saves me from responding by throwing the door open behind me so quickly, I nearly fall onto Adam. He holds my waist to keep me upright, and of course, it’s the first thing Nadia’s eyes spot.
She raises an eyebrow at me and turns to Adam with a big smile on her face. “Welcome to our humble abode.” She then shoos us inside.
Adam looks around, his eyes searching all the details of the kitchen, which is the first room after the dark porch filled withnothing more interesting than drying herbs and lines of shoes. I can see the way he shifts and takes in information, his brain bumping from one thing to the next: from the yellow ocher of the walls, to the green, shiny, and now-smelling-of-Fabuloso floors, to the stained glass of red butterflies and yellow poppies framing the windows. When Sage, Teal, and I were little, we used to trace the way they’d cross the floor and furniture in the sunlight, and in particular, we’d “feed” the light-bugs popcorn that Nadia’s old cat then used to eat. “What a great place,” Adam tells us. “It has so much character.”
Nadia beams. This is the exact right thing to say to her. She prides herself on a home that has a personality; one that cannot be easily replicated. I think this is in some part a response to the way Amá Sonya measures what makes an honorable home—by how much it resembles something found in a colonial-style house magazine, or maybe a bougie prison of some sort. “I bought it over thirty years ago. The cabinets are original, and so are the hardwood floors here in the living room and, oh, the staircase is original, too…”
“Uh, should we eat before the food gets cold?” Adam’s still holding the huge bag, so I grab it to place it on the table.
“Why don’t you set the table?” Nadia tells me. It’s not a question, it is an order. I learned this the hard way in early childhood, which even then maybe took longer than it should, but I’ll never understand why people ask questions when they mean to command. “I will show Adam the first two floors in the meantime.”
“Why only—” I begin to ask, but she takes Adam’s arm and begins to educate him on the Tiffany lamp collection in the next room. I was going to askWhy only the first two floors?Technically the third floor is the attic. And since the whole third floor and attic is now my room, I might assume that Nadia was trying torespect my privacy or something. But Latine elders seldom understand the concept. Again, I found this out the hard way years ago. Latine elders arealwaysin their kids’ business, whether we want it or not. Amá Sonya is the same. A few months ago when I joined Teal at brunch with Sonya, she hiss-whispered a lecture to me because she could see my panty lines under my skirt. The next time I saw her, she gifted me seamless underwear along with several silk slips that probably cost the equivalent of several of my paychecks.
So I know better than to argue with Nadia, even though part of me wants to rush up and make sure that she’s not telling him embarrassing stories about my childhood. I just let her boss Adam around as I grab the plates she literally just had me put away in the cabinets. I make three place settings, because even if Adam didn’t bring enough food, it would be rude to just eat in front of Nadia.
I fill everyone’s glass with ice water, and since they’re taking one zillion years at this point, I open the bag of food. Inside are five big, lidded containers. I can’t read the notes on the plastic lids, but it’s definitely Indian food. He must’ve gone over to the nearest town for it, since Cranberry doesn’t have an Indian restaurant, which is sad and bananas at the same time.
There are many types of curry and rice, with feta and garlic naan wrapped up in tinfoil, alongside onion bhajia, spinach bhajia, and thick-sliced fried potatoes. There’s enough food for me to put everything in serving dishes, and I’m just about finished with that when Nadia and Adam finally return. He’s holding up his iPhone with what I assume is a photography attachment on it. The man is ready for anything, even spur-of-the-moment lies. I’ll give him that.
“Oh, you set a place for me?” Nadia asks. “I don’t need—”
“You need to eat, no? Unless—” I look to Adam. “You don’t mind, do you?”
“Not at all. Please, join us, Nadia,” he says with his charming smile.
Nadia shakes her head. “You kids should enjoy yourselves.”
“There’s so much food. I didn’t know what Sky liked, so I basically got one of everything.” Adam smiles again. “And when’s the last time you had Indian, anyway?”
That convinces Nadia. She also knows it’s a travesty that we don’t have accessible Indian food in this town. And honestly, it smells too good to pass up. So we all sit and eat, trying a little bit of this and that, and we also chat about this and that. Adam, with what a good journalist he is and all, asks Nadia engaging questions about growing up in Cranberry in the forties and fifties. It’s pretty wild to think about the changes Nadia, Sonya, and the rest of that generation have seen in their lifetimes. “Almost no one in town had indoor plumbing back then,” Nadia confides. “There were outhouses in everyone’s backyard, with the moons on the top, as far as the eye could see.”
I want to ask her questions, too. Like, did she ever hear of a weird cult connected to the church, and oh right, does she happen to be a current member of that cult? Did they meet up underground to cavort with bears and lions? But I keep my mouth shut. Because if what Sage says is true, and I have no reason to doubt her—if Nadia always changed the subject when she asked about it, that means no one will get anywhere with her on the topic. That’s how Nadia is. Amá Sonya, too, for that matter. Pretty hypocritical behavior from ladies who insist they’ve got some right to know what we’ve all got going on in our lives.
Teal questioned Amá Sonya alotlast year to figure out if she knew if our mother was in town, and instead of answering like anormal human, all Sonya did was act like Teal slapped her across the face.
