"The second thing she said to me was that her sister will take care of you." She opens the photo album up to the first page, which displays a photo of two baby girls lying next to each other in a crib. At the bottom of the page, written in choppy cursive, are two names: Esmeralda and Ruby.
"I didn't know my mother even had a sister," I admit, feeling even guiltier for not asking more about her. I’ve never met any of my mother's family before and haven't a clue how an aunt I’ve never known existed can care for me. I’m no longer a child, old enough to be married off, old enough to leave my father’s home for my husband’s bed. My mother is dead, my brother’s been shot, my father’s been arrested, and only now do I find out about an aunt I’ve never known. I want to be excited over this piece of history, to ask so many questions. But I don’t. Gloria smiles brightly. How she has so much energy, I'll never know. I’m so tired, my eyelids are dropping. I reach for my Coca-Cola from the coffee table and take a large drink. The caffeine is supposed to wake me up, but it’s done nothing but make me sleepy.
"Oh, she did. They were twins, just like you and Michael." She continues on through the album. As the girls age in the photos, their personalities become more apparent. One of the girls is always smiling politely, while the other usually has a cheesy grin on her face and stands in some grand pose. The girl with the polite smile, who seems to accept being in her sister's shadow, has slightly darker caramel brown hair than her sister, but other than that, they have the same brown eyes; same small, swooping nose; and same full lips. I touch my face, realizing how very much I look like my mother.
"Which one is my mother?" I ask, unsure. The way Gloria talks about my mother, it seems she was so very different in her youth than her adulthood—lively, joyful, rebellious. The Esmeralda Mancuso I knew was none of those things. Loving, gentle, kind—sure. But she most certainly was not rebellious. She lived by my father's word.
Gloria points to the photo before us—showing the girls in their late teens—and lands her finger on the girl with the lighter hair and her tongue sticking out. "This is Ruby," she says. Then she points at my mother. "This is Esmeralda." Esmeralda, in the photo, had been the shy one in the corner.
"Whatever happened to Ruby?" I ask, hoping for a direct answer.
"Last I spoke with her she was out in California." Gloria stands up and pulls me with her, marching us up the stairs and into my room. "Heaven knows how close she is to New York now."
"What do you mean?" I ask. Gloria is acting weird, even for her. She purses her lips and straightens her back in thought. I allow her to lead me to my bed and tuck me in as though I’m a small, incompetent child. Everything she’s done since we left the hospital feels intentional. The entire situation leaves me reeling, my brain jumping from asking one question to another, ending with few answers and more questions than I can keep straight.
"Just that I'm not sure where she is right now," she confirms. "It's a big country." She smiles and smoothes my hair away from my face.
"You trust me, Alex?" she asks. I blanch at the question, my nerves on high alert.
"Why do you keep asking me that?" I demand more forcefully than I intend, surprising Gloria with the volume of it. My body is so worn out and feels heavy with sleep already. I just want to drift off.
"Because, I need you to know that everything I've done is for you," she says and goes into another speech about how I need to trust her. I try to pay attention, really I do, but I can't keep my eyes open anymore as I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Chapter 5
Alex
Trust your instinct to the end, though you can render no reason.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I SLEEP WELL for the better part of the night. My mind is groggy, confused. I try to keep myself alert and aware, but can’t get my brain to function. Something’s wrong with me. My limbs are heavy and slow to respond. I can still breathe and function despite the haze, but something definitely feels wrong about all of this.
Light shines in through my window, much to my dismay. It isn’t quite morning yet, but it’s now moved into that place between darkness and light. It’s too early to be so awake, too early to be dealing with—well, anything. I hear my bedroom door crack open and try to move my head, but it’s too much effort. I give up and wait. Gloria comes into view with a nervous smile on her face. She’s carrying a short stack of clothes.
“We need to get you up and ready,” she says. For what, I want to ask. The words stall on my tongue. She sets the clothes down on the night table beside me and peels back my covers.
Gloria helps me with everything from brushing my hair and putting it in a long braid down to tying the shoe laces to my Chucks. She’s dressed me in fitted jeans and a baseball tee—one of my favorite outfits. It’s plain and comfortable and it doesn’t tell the world who I am, unlike most of the clothing my father prefers I wear. “We have an image, Alex” he says. It’s his image, not mine.