Page 146 of Raspados & Regret

You need me to beg again?

That one got me. I hate that please has become a weak spot. It should be illegal for that man to learn manners this late in life.

Elías

Fine.

Fabián

My place?

I stared at that message for a long time.

His place.

Not the market.

Not the trailer.

His apartment, his space, and potentially his bed.

The place where he sleeps alone, where his life exists without my mom coughing down the hall or Junior screaming commentary from a cooler. The place that would smell like him and detergent and motor oil and whatever quiet thing he does with himself when nobody is watching.

My stomach did something humiliating.

Elías

Send me the address.

He did.

Fabián

We can get burritos or something, so come hungry.

I almost threw my phone because I am Elías Cárdenas, and I know when a sentence has too many meanings in it.

Now I’m standing in my mother’s kitchen at seven forty-five on Monday night while she packs albóndigas into a container big enough to feed a construction crew.

“Mamá,” I say, watching her ladle more broth in. “I’m not moving in.”

She doesn’t look up. “I didn’t say you were.”

“You’re packing like I’m going to war.”

“You’re going to a man’s apartment after dark.”

“That is not war.”

Her eyebrow rises, so I shut up.

Anita, sitting at the kitchen table with Fatima in her lap, says, “It can be if he’s bad at it.”

I point at her. “You are not part of this conversation.”

“I am always part of conversations that make you uncomfortable.”

“Julio loves you by choice?”