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Immediately I'm overwhelmed with the smell of both bleach and Marlboro lights, a stench I've spent months trying to forget. The living room is empty, its small and dark corners vacant except for a couch, a couple of end tables and an old television that's set to the local news station. I drop my keys on the table by the door and set my bag on the couch, walking through to the kitchen while my ears pick up the news report.
"Welcome back Los Angeles, today on News channel nine we have a special report on the ever-present drug epidemic."
I look over my shoulder to the chubby man on the screen, he is grey and balding, but his voice sounds like he could control a room within seconds.
"Local authorities have seized control of a building on the fifth block of Skid Row in downtown LA today and the findings are enough to attract even the attention of our beloved President."
I linger for a second longer to finish the report before I continue the search for my mother.
"Yes, today at around three in the afternoon, the LAPD arrested over twenty-five fugitives and obtained almost four million dollars in contraband that included several pounds of cocaine, heroin and over two hundred firearms."
The camera pans over to a blond woman in a red blazer, her cherry lipstick matching it almost too well.
"Yes, Joe, that's right. Our local authorities completed one of their biggest operations yet against the ever-growing battle with the Columbian drug cartel in over a decade. The authorities are saying that they may even lead to finding the head of the illegal operations, none other than the notorious El Oscuro."
She looks smug, proud even, as if she was a part of the crew involved in the bust. I roll my eyes and find the remote on the floor next to the couch, noting ashes on top of the buttons. I turn the volume down and set it on the cushion that's filled with both my mom's cigarette burns and my soda stains from when I was a kid. I still feel the sting of her palm on my shoulder from the incident and it was nearly ten years ago.
I hear the back door slam open and brace myself for the headache that is my mother.
"EMMIE!"
Her speech is slurred, but her movements to me are quick. I see a flash of red hair and then I'm being choked by both her clumsy hug and the stench of vodka. She pets my hair and starts humming enthusiastically.
For a moment I let myself fall into her. For a moment I let myself feel like a normal kid coming home from school to a mother that missed her. For a moment I let myself lie.
She pulls back and grips me by the tops of my shoulders. She's smiling but it doesn't reach her tired green eyes. I notice that more wrinkles have formed since I last saw her over six months ago. She's only thirty-six, but both the drugs and liquor have aged her another ten years.
I swallow the lump in my throat and put on a tight smile, trying to not let my annoyance show.
"Hi, Mom. It's good to see you. Have you eaten?"
I want to distract myself with cooking, my only joy in this house, but I already know her answer.
"No, baby I'm already on my afternoon cocktail, don't want to mess up a nice buzz while it lasts!"
She's on her fifth afternoon cocktail, not her first. I search her eyes to see if maybe she's dabbled in something else, but I only see a drunken haze. My eyes glance over her arms quickly, not noticing any new marks or sores.
I make my smile tighter as she releases my shoulders and grabs a beer can from the table closest to the kitchen. She tilts it toward me in offering and I shake my head slightly, already picking up my bag from the couch and making my way towards our small yellow kitchen.
I look around at the walls that are colored from both paint and smoke, smiling slightly to myself in remembrance of the first time I cooked pancakes on my own, to the time when I made my own twist on a traditional Tres Leches cake.
My mother is not the same as me in many ways, but one of the biggest is heritage. Though my Hispanic roots come from my biological father, her Irish genes have culturally taken over my upbringing.
My best friend Ricky was born in Polanco and moved to America when he was three. His family is the closest thing I have to both my ancestry and a family itself. I've spent many nights at his house, flipping through his mother's cookbook and memorizing recipes to take home.
My mom, of course, never ate anything unless I forced it down her throat after another late night at the bar or God knows where, so I never got a real opinion on how my home cooking tasted, but Ricky was always happy to oblige.
I realize that now, standing in our small kitchen, is probably the best time to tell her why I'm actually here. Why I've decided to disrupt my peace with the personal hell that is this woman and this house. I need a signature to continue my third year of school, the tutoring program I did in high school has lasted me until my junior year of college and this is the last time I'll ever need to ask her for anything, which I know will already be an issue.
"Mom, there's a reason why I've come home early. I need you to sign off on my last tutoring installment so I can continue this next semester."
She immediately chokes on her sip of beer, and I want to rip my hair out in response, but I maintain my composure.
"Let me just grab a pen really quick. I have it all right here, and when you're done I'll make some dessert."
Maybe if I bake, I can get through this one night of bullshit and be on my way back to my new life, back to my blossoming future that I've fought tooth and nail for.
I set both the paperwork and a pen on my table and looked up, not liking the sight before me. She looks paler, her balance faltering and her face full of arrogance and maybe a twinge of...guilt.
