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Fanaa (n.) destroyed in love.
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I knock on the door to my parents’ hotel room, nerves bubbling inside me. I don’t want to see the disappointment on their faces when they find out I’m leaving. They never came right out and said it, but I knew they wanted me here for Manuel’s wedding. They’ve been friends with his parents for so long that everything is always just swept under the rug. It’s like his family and mine are one big family.
My dad answers the door and smiles down at me; he’s got his glasses on, though normally, he wears contacts. I know this means the two of them are still in the coffee phase of their morning.
“Hi, honey,” he says. “Come on in. Your mother and I are just getting moving. We slept in a bit, do you believe it?” He swings the door open wide.
I smile at him as I cross over the threshold and see that their room is exactly like ours, only flipped around—the bathroom and the bed are on the opposite side from the room we have. But everything else, even down to the ugly green carpet and wall art, is the same.
“Morning, you two,” I say, trying to tame the quiver in my voice. Mami notices, though, and calls me out on it before I can swallow back my nervousness.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, sitting up straight from where she was leaning against the headboard of the king-sized bed. “There’s something wrong.”
My dad, ever the oblivious to most things, looks from the coffeepot to me with one eyebrow raised, pausing from pouring more coffee into his mug.
I take a deep breath and sit on the end of the bed, where the blankets are now all jumbled up together.
“Ay, dios mio. Are you pregnant?” Mami asks, her eyes growing wide.
“Jesus, Mami. No!” I say, shaking my head. “I come in here to talk to you and the first thing you think is I’m pregnant?” I laugh despite the seriousness of what I’m about to tell them. It calms me, just a little, and gives me a moment to clear my head before saying what I say next.
“Then what is it, honey?” Dad questions, clearly catching on that something is going on.
I have to rip this off like a band aid before I pass out or give my mother a heart attack.
“You know how Manuel invited me to their party last night?” I ask, looking at my mother, unable to look at my dad when I tell them this.
“Yes,” my mami says, confusion playing out on her face.
“Well, I went. And Bordeaux went with me as my kind of, sort of date, thing,” I tell them, still looking only at my mami, pushing back tears that are stinging my eyes and threatening to spill out at any second.
I told my parents I was bringing Bordeaux after he inserted himself into the whole ordeal, and while they weren’t exactly thrilled for me to be hanging out with a mega rockstar, they weren’t against me bringing him, either.
“And while we were there, Manuel’s fiancée got trashed and had to be brought back to the hotel, and that’s when Manuel tried to force himself on me in a hallway,” I spit it all out quickly, no pauses or breaths, unable to hold it off any longer. I take a deep breath as my mother’s expression shifts from uncertainness to one I can’t place.
“I am so sorry,” I say to them, knowing how upset they’re both going to be.
Mami places her coffee on the side table and scoots toward me on the bed. “What on earth are you sorry for, nena?” She runs a hand over my hair and down my back, rubbing small circles—something she did when I was a little girl to comfort me. “You have nothing to be sorry about.” She looks from me to my dad, and that’s when I lose it for the first time. I bring my hands to my face and sob, uncontrollably shaking as she wraps her arms around me.
“Pack up,” I hear her say to my dad over my muffled cries. “We’re done with them.”
I snap my neck up and look at her through glassy eyes. “What?”
“You heard me. We might have tried to continue this friendship after what he did, trying to balance your heartache and our friendship with his parents, but this has gone on long enough and what he did to you at that party is unforgivable, do you hear me?” She takes my head in her hands, bringing me forward and kissing my forehead. “This is unforgivable.”
I hear my dad zip suitcases behind me as I lean into my mother, wrapping my arms around her.
Twenty-Four
Isla
Somniate (v.) to dream
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Not even thirty minutes after I leave my parents’ hotel room, we’re in the car on the way back to the city.
