Page 14 of Raspados & Regret

I drop the ice into the cooler and pretend the cold shock against my hands is enough to fix my entire personality.

It isn’t.

Today is day two of sharing booth space, and somehow, because life has a personal vendetta against me, our families are already acting like this arrangement is normal.

They’re not even mad anymore, and that’s the suspicious part.

Yesterday, we sold more raspados and aguas frescas than we expected, mostly because the market was packed and partly because people like watching two men argue while one of them wears shorts and the other one dresses like a mechanic in a thirst trap calendar.

I know this because I saw the comments all over social media this morning. Lord knows I shouldn’t have looked, but I did. Some lady posted a video of me and Fabián bickering over the cash box, and now strangers on the internet think they have rights.

“The crop top one and the glasses one need to kiss already.”

“Are they fighting or flirting?”

“This is the most bisexual raspado stand I’ve ever seen.”

“Need him to argue with me over condensed milk next.”

“The tall one is angry because he’s in love.”

I threw my phone onto my bed and screamed into my pillow before I got up and chose shorter shorts out of spite.

Not because of Fabián.

For airflow. That’s my story.

When five p.m. hits, the sun is rude as hell, and the parking lot has turned into a frying pan with vendor permits. The place is a madhouse with late vendors, and someone’s uncle has been trying to reverse a trailer into a spot for twenty minutes while seven men give him seven different sets of directions. Fabián is working under the canopy frame, arms raised to clip the corner into place.

When he lifts his arms, his crop top rises.

Not a little—a lot.

And I swear it has me muttering the Hail Mary under my breath more times than I want to admit. His stomach pulls tight. Sweat shines over the hard lines of muscle. The sexy little line of hair makes its evil little appearance again, vanishing under the waistband of his Dickies, which are hanging even lower today because apparently belts are optional during heat advisories.

I stand there holding a stack of cups. Staring—more like contemplating what he looks like completely naked.

Bad Lalo.

I smack my cheek, and my tongue ring clicks against my teeth.

Anita materializes beside me like a demon summoned by thirst.

“You’re pathetic,” she says.

I nearly drop the cups. “Shut. Up.”

“I didn’t even say what you’re pathetic about.” She hums, wiggling her eyebrows at me.

“You were going to,” I mumble, shoving the cups at her. “Take these.”

“Yeah—” She purses her lips. “That’s gonna be a no.”

“Then leave,” I groan.

“No.”

Fabián reaches for the other side of the canopy, and his shirt lifts higher. A silver bar through his nipple appears, and there’s no mistaking it this time.