“Are you guys dating?” Luisa asks. “Do you like him?”
I choke back the regret creeping up my throat, and the questions stop when they register the look on my face, the longing and sadness I know I can’t hide. The frayed edges of the sweatshirt I stole from Jett are particularly interesting, and I tug at a loose strand.
The fabric is baggy, but it still smells like him, and I refuse to wash it, even after I spilled soy sauce on the front and spent twenty minutes crying.
I hate how on edge I am, how unraveled I’ve become since the luggage claim.
“That felt like the wrong question to ask,” Luisa whispers to Maria.
Luisa whispers back, “What do we do? She looks like she might cry.”
“I’m not going to cry,” I snap. There’s been enough crying today. There will be no more until they leave. “I am fine.”
The declaration tears another rip in my heart. Jett would hate to hear those words, despise the lie falling off my tongue.
Mom laughs—deep and hearty. “Mentirosa. Your bed isn’t made. Youalwaysmake your bed.”
Everyone’s head turns to my cracked bedroom door and the crumpled sheets. I hate that she’s right. I sigh, slumping in my seat. They might as well know I fucked up the best thing that’s ever happened to me.
As concise as I can—because I can barely stomach sharing the story without upsetting myself—I tell them about Jett. About the trip and how, somewhere along the way, he stole the worn, tattered pieces of my heart and returned it to me fully mended. I stumble over the deal we made, how he fired me, wincing when my sisters tease me and my mother rubs the skin between her eyebrows.
“A sex deal,” she mumbles in bafflement. “Dios.”
“That’s not what it was,” I yell.
That’s exactly what it was, and when she puts it like that, I am horrified. What on earth was I thinking?
We were equal participants in this brand of stupid. I think I love him even more for going along with something as idiotic as firing me so we could sleep together.
She shakes her head. “It’s fine. I’m a cool mom. I can be hip.”
“Cool people don’t say hip,” Luisa tells her.
Maria laughs when my mom scrunches her nose—the telltale sign she’s annoyed. We’ve all inherited that trait from her. Her stubbornness and fantastic eyebrows, too.
I continue my story before I lose steam, and I have to suppress the tears as I explain how he laid out his truth and I let him walk away.
Luisa takes my hand, squeezing, and Maria drops her head on my shoulder.
A steely determination transforms my mother’s face, her brown eyes glittering with a scheme. “He lives in the city?” she asks.
“About twenty minutes from here,” I say with trepidation.
She rounds the counter and ushers me out of my chair and into my bedroom. She grimaces at the mess but pushes me past it and into the bathroom, turning on the shower.
“Get in,” she demands. “We’ll clean while you shower.”
I gawk at her. “Why?”
“You smell like soy sauce.” She drops a towel on the counter while she barks at the twins to make the bed. “You don’t want to smell when we go to Jett’s house.”
I fly into the shower to prevent continuing that conversation, scrubbing my body clean and adding a nice-smelling body oil. Just in case.
They help me get ready.
Maria curls my hair and fusses over my bangs. Luisa scours my closet for an outfit, selecting the long polka-dot maxi dress Jett bought for me in Sydney. My mom supervises, in charge of the playlist—the same songs she would play as she cleaned when we were kids—and picking out a cherry-colored lip gloss.
Nerves flutter in my stomach as we pile into her car, the twins shoved into the back.
