“Augusto and the kids will be here in a minute,” Carola calls out from the register, where she is checking out a client. “Augusto is doing an overnight shift, so we’re eating early.”
“I’ll go get the tostones started,” Abuela says, leaving her perch on the La-Z-Boy and heading toward the house.
Mami’s fastidious gaze falls on my face, and before I can pull away, her hands are on my skin, assessing. “You need a facial.” Her fingers crawl over my cheeks. “You have to moisturize if you want any chance of getting a husband, Luisa.”
“Maybe I should go help Abuela in the kitchen,” I say, but then Carola shoves a broom in my hands, expecting me to use it. “It’s mybirthday,” I cry out in mock indignation, which only makes her laugh.
“Vidalina was here this morning,” Mami prattles on as I sweep the floors. “Says her son, Juan Pablo, just broke up with his floozy of a girlfriend.” I ignore her, because who refers to women as floozies anymore, and the thought of getting set up with my very embarrassing teenage crush—who incidentally doesn’t know I exist—feels like entering the seventh circle of hell. “Maybe I should have them over for dinner.”
“Please don’t—” I bark.
Mercifully, we’re joined by my brother-in-law, Augusto, who decided from day one that his role in the family was “human buffer”—and we all love him for it. Augusto won over the family with his breezy Afro-Cuban manner, sharp wit, and shrewd intellect. His job as an Atlanta police detective earned him a special place in my heart as a fellow fact-finding geek.
“Happy birthday, hermanita,” he coos, balancing my baby niece, Sarita, in one arm.
He plants a kiss on my temple and in turn I shower my niece with little pecks. She giggles into her daddy’s chest.
“What about a makeover for your birthday weekend?” my sister squeals, eyes going wide with excitement. “Facial, blowout, nails.”
“Keratin treatment,” Mami offers. “Make that frizzy pelo malo smooth and shiny.”
“You shouldn’t say ‘pelo malo,’ Mami,” I snap, collecting hair clippings from the floor with a dustpan, then dropping them in the garbage. “It’s racist.”
“Bah.” Mami waves one hand in the air dismissively. “Everything is racist these days.”
I know I should let this go. I am too stressed and too tired for this conversation. Plus, my mother, like most people on the Island, still identifies as white every time she ticks a race checkbox on an official form. She’s brown, not permanently tanned as she likes to believe.
We finish closing the salon, then head back to the house, where Abuela busies herself beside the stove, smashing plantainson a tostonera and tossing them in hot oil. My nieces Rosita and Daniela storm past me, chasing after (i.e., terrorizing) Abuela’s cat, Chapulín. I love these girls more than life itself, but at three and five years old, they are truly little demons.
Augusto, still holding Sarita, pours me a glass of chardonnay, filling it almost to the brim. I mouth a silent thanks, and we exchange a knowing smile. We do this a lot, talk without words. Augusto is the brother I never had and never thought I needed, until he stepped into our lives.
“Augusto is Black,” Mami says abruptly, returning to our conversation in La Barna. Her eyebrows shoot up and her tone goes defensive toward me, and yet she lovingly offers a spoonful of paella to Augusto, which he eagerly accepts.
“I am?” Augusto responds with cartoonish surprise. “Oh. My. God,” he exclaims, chewing. “Another kitchen miracle.”
“See?” Mami turns to me. “How can I be racist when this man is one of the great loves of my life?” She pinches his cheek, then drops a piece of chorizo into his mouth.
“One does not beget the other, Mami. You only call it pelo malo because it’s Black hair,” I try to explain, exhaustion clawing back into my body. “Do you tell your blond, straight-haired clients that they have pelo malo? No. You don’t.”
“You think too much about these things, Luisa.” She grabs a serrated knife, then slices into a crusty baguette. “Give it a rest. That mind of yours is always thinking. Always working. Can’t you just unwind?”
Rosita and Daniela trap Chapulín in a corner and pull at his fluffy tail. He hisses at them, then releases a high-pitched yowl. “Leave that poor cat alone,” Mami shrieks.
Temporary or not, one thing is certain: Moving back home willfeellike forever. I make a mental note to run to the botanica and buy one of those San Judas Tadeo veladora candles for the lost and desperate. Maybe Abuela is onto something.
We gather around the table, eager to dive in. And after Abuela offers a blessing, we pass the dishes around.
“Luisa, amor, what did you want to talk about?” Mami asks, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Is everything okay, mija?”
“Later,” I say, stuffing my mouth with a forkful of paella.
“Why?” she insists, arms open in a collective embrace. “It’s just your familia here.”
The rice and seafood go down like gravel. I set down my fork and take a long swig of wine, aware that all eyes—including the freaking cat’s—are on me.
“I was thinking,” I say hesitantly, “that maybe I should move back here with you and Abuela. Save up for a down payment. To buy my own place, you know?” The table goes quiet, so I’m forced to fill in the silence. “I’d like to put down twenty percent. Have a comfortable mortgage.”
“You’re so full of shit,” Carola blurts out, sending her fork clattering against her plate.
