“Shall we have Carlos call Sabina to join us for dinner?” she asked, hesitantly.
“Um . . . actually, I’m completely exhausted. I think tonight I’d just like to rest.” I didn’t wait for her to respond. I turned away and stumbled toward the hallway. Just before I left the room, I looked up to see Carlos wearing a sympathetic smile. I returned it kindly and then entered the guest room and plopped down on the bed. My mother came in a few moments later. “You don’t need to find me friends, Mama,” I said but I think my frustration actually came from how confused I was about her new life and the new man in it.
She crossed her arms over her chest. “I just want you to enjoy yourself while you’re here. Sabina can show you around. She’s a lot of fun and a smart girl.” Her expression was genuine, and I realized I should be grateful to her for trying to help me. I just needed to figure out how or if I would fit in there.
“Can you give me a few days, Mama? This is all a lot for me to take in.”
Finally, something in her broke away. She came over to me and wrapped me up in her arms. “I know you will figure out what to do, belleza, just like I did.”
“You think so?”
She nodded. “I know so,” she said, and then she kissed my forehead and left the room.
Almost a week later, I finally agreed to meet Sabina, Carlos’s daughter. I figured meeting without our parents present was best even though I had warmed up to Carlos over the couple of days I was there. My mother seemed like a new person and Carlos was always gentlemanly and polite toward me.
Sabina and I met at a café on a Friday afternoon. She was not what I expected at all. She was covered in tattoos, smoked cigarettes nonstop, and said fuck for every other word. Frankly, it surprised me that my mother considered her a good influence. I, for one, loved Sabina’s uniqueness and envied how self-assured she was. She spoke almost perfect English and told me how most people our age in Spain went out to clubs and got drunk and danced and had casual sex. I felt like an inexperienced extraterrestrial.
“So I want to take you to El Sol. We’ll dance the night away, but we have to find you something to wear first. You dress like a twelve-year-old.”
I looked down at my oversized cable-knit sweater and jeans and laughed. She was right. Sabina took me to her apartment and gave me an armful of dresses to take back to my mom’s and try on.
“I’ll come get you at eleven,” she said as I walked toward the door.
“Huh? Like, eleven p.m.? I’m usually in bed by then.”
“The clubs don’t even go off until after twelve.”
I was shocked.
At my mom’s place, I tried on all the dresses, most of which barely hit me mid-thigh. I chose one of the more decent black dresses. It was made of a tight, stretchy material that showed off a lot of leg but it had a turtleneck top and long sleeves. It was the most conservative dress in the lot.
While I was curling my hair, my mother came into the bedroom and sat down on the bed without uttering a word.
“I’m surprised you’re okay with me hanging out with Sabina. She’s got a crazy streak.”
My mother spoke something in Spanish under her breath.
“What’s that, Mama?”
She stood and came up behind me. We were staring at each other through the mirror. “Look at you,” she said in Spanish. “Look at yourself. A grown woman, but life has made you a child again. You don’t need my permission anymore, or my approval.”
I took what she was saying in the spirit it was intended instead of feeling offended. “I know. Sometimes I forget so much time has passed.”
While I finished getting ready, I told my mother all about Nate and the uncertainty I felt. She told me to wait and see what he would do. I really didn’t have another choice anyway. I could have gone back to his house and waited for him, but there were things I needed to know about him and myself, things that only distance could tell me. Would we just forget about each other and go on with our lives if we were a world apart? Would he go back to being a workaholic and would I go back to walking through life numb and alone? Sadly, there was something strangely comforting about the idea of that. The unknown is a scary place, and I had spent a lot of my courage trying to stay warm in the cab of his truck that night at the hospital.
Sabina arrived promptly at eleven. In the short time since I had seen her that morning, she had bleached her hair to a platinum blond. Her eyebrows were still dark and her lips were a true blood red. She looked stunning in a shimmery metallic dress and four-inch stiletto heels.
“You look amazing!” I said, eyes wide.
“You’re not so bad yourself, sissy.”
“I can’t believe you bleached your hair. You’re so brave.”