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I was never good at acting, but I decide that seeing as I’m a fake wife, I need to carry on with this show until I can figure out how to get out of it.
We laugh, the congregation roars, and there are a few too many winks from men and a little crying from women who clearly think that Diego is a catch and are upset he is now a married man.
Did they secretly hope Belén would stand him up and they would be in for a chance?
I don’t know.
It seems irrelevant now. As we arrive outside the library and petals are being put on the stairs before we rush down it, he pulls me in closer and whispers, “You and your sister better have a good explanation for this.”
He knows.
1 Sign here!
2 Oh my God!
3 My cousin Cristina.
4 sins.
5 My cousin.
6 On our honeymoon
7 Come my love.
4
Diego
Iremember the first time I met Leticia. I was only eight, and she was four. Mi abuelo took me to their village in Cobeña. It’s a small town a few kilometers from central Madrid. It was primarily only a farming village, and the small houses around it were built for that purpose, for anyone who was hired to work on the land was given housing so they could work and live there.
As the years went by, houses have been built by big corporations, including Aranda de Hernandez Enterprise, which my family owns. This was one of the reasons that mi abuela and Leticia’s became friends. As the community grew, so did the need for a church and local facilities such as a health clinic and schools. Some of the land cannot be developed to houses, due to being protected by heritage, and there are crops and animals in the town.
Abuela used to laugh that there are more animals than people in Cobeña. Mi abuelo wasn’t happy the mayor wouldn’t allow him to build houses on the land and turn the village into a thriving community. That wasn’t what he was after; he just wanted more money and he saw an opportunity to do it there.
One of the first generations to move there were Leticia’s family. The bar, which has been passed from generation to generation, still resides there. It’s even a tourist attraction, as one of the oldest bars in the community of Madrid, and they have tons of tourists every year.
Leticia and Belén had gone with their abuelo to feed the sheep, a task Leticia loved, but Belén not so much.
When Leticia arrived home, she looked as if she had been rolling in the grass with the sheep. Her abuela scolded her for looking a mess.
“I’m glad I’m not going to have to marry her one day,” I said to mi abuela with such pride.
She shook her head, and Belén complained about having to go on such long walks and there wasn’t anything more boring than walking with sheep. She could be studying, learning, and her one goal in life seemed to be to leave the village. I admired her need to go out and explore, unlike her sister who talked about nothing better than being in Cobeña. I remember thinking that although the two of them look so alike as twins, they were very different on the inside. I was curious about it all, and I went crazy researching twins. Belén and Leticia had sparked my interest in the topic.
“No, Diego. Belén is to marry Jorge, and Lucas, Leticia.”
I laughed as mi abuela said it to me. I thought about how well Leticia and Lucas were suited, but then I had a wave of jealousy as I watched her take the hay out of her hair and she spoke about the different sheep. The feeling confused me, because in my head I didn’t like her, but then I didn’t like the idea of her marrying Lucas.
“I’ve given them names, so now the shepherd can’t kill them,” she said proudly.
Her abuelo shook his finger (it’s a Spanish thing. They tend to sway their finger from left-to-right to indicate no). “That’s not how it works. They are born so that we can eat.”
She refused to hear about the subject, shaking her head and running to her room crying. It tugged at my heart. I couldn’t comprehend her desire to keep them alive. Everything about Leticia made me curious, and it was as if she always made me want to know more about things I’d never been interested in before.
Now, I have the one person I thought I would never marry as my pretend bride. I’ve managed to keep my cool until now, but I’m ready to fucking explode. I want answers as I drag her to the back of the library in the room, where I had been getting ready for this wedding.
Mi primo Ricardo was outside the library and cornered Belén as she was running out. He told her to stay, and as soon as I found out she was still around, I told him to make sure Leticia, aka Belén, waited for me in the room.
