“Thank you,” Raymond said, and hurried along, looking down at the sidewalk.
He almost plowed into a beefy, short man, who said, “Hey! Look where you’re goin’, kid!”
“Sorry,” Raymond mumbled, and hurried on.
“Hey, wait!” Luisa called from behind him. “I can’t walk that fast.”
He slowed for her, but it was hard to do. He wanted to get back to the apartment and not be alone with Luisa.
“So, seriously,” she said, as if she had never promised to stop talking about it. “You just don’t like anybody like that, and you never did?”
“Right,” he said, feeling the ice cream cooling the side of his ribs. He might have been holding it too tightly.
“Is that, like . . . a . . . thing? That people are like?”
“Yeah.”
“So, you’ll just never . . .” She trailed off, as though she might not continue. Raymond certainly hoped she wouldn’t. “. . . have a family?”
“I can have a family. Mrs. G says I can have any kind of family I want. I can have . . . I don’t know. A group of friends, or somebody who feels the same way I do.”
“But don’t you want kids?”
“I never really thought much about it. I mean, I never pictured myself having kids, no.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well. I didn’t mean to make you feel like it’s not okay to be whatever you are.” But she had. “We can talk about something else if you want to.”
“Yes, please,” Raymond said. Then he added, “But thank you for liking me. Anyway.”
They walked the rest of the way in silence.
They sat on the living room couch together, post-dessert, Raymond and Mrs. G. Waiting for cups of tea to arrive. All the kids except the toddler had been sent to their rooms to do homework, including Luisa. That felt like a relief to Raymond.
Mrs. G leaned over and whispered to him at close range.
“So what’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he said.
“Fine. All right. Tell me later.”
Sofia hurried into the room with milk and sugar, which she set on the coffee table in front of them.
“I’m just so embarrassed,” Sofia said.
“About what?” Mrs. G asked.
“Oh, all that trouble. I wanted you to see us as a happy family. Well, we are. I don’t mean we were trying to fool you into thinking we are. But then there was all that trouble.”
“Where was I during all the trouble?” Mrs. G asked.
She was getting weary. Raymond could hear it in her voice.
“The trouble. You know. With the ice cream. And Luis Junior being asked to leave the table.”
“That? Oh my goodness, that’s nothing. I never would have given it another thought. He’s a child. Children do things like that. Their brains aren’t fully developed. It’s just who they are.”
“See, Sofia?” Luis Senior said. He was just walking into the living room to sit down. The sound of those words let Raymond know, for the first time, that the man was even within earshot. “I told you it seemed worse to you than to them.”
He settled his bulk into a wing chair and sighed, both hands on his belly.
“Oh my goodness, yes,” Mrs. G said. “There’s no such thing as a family who doesn’t have those little bits of trouble. Who was it who said . . . I can’t remember now who the quote was from, but somebody said when you decide to be alone or have a family, you’re pretty much choosing between feeling lonely or feeling aggravated.”
Sofia laughed, and seemed to feel a little better.
“Well, anyway, it gave the young people a chance to talk. Luisa has been talking about Raymond ever since he was here last.”
“Ah,” Mrs. G said. “I see. That does explain a lot.”
Raymond, who felt revealed, was careful to say nothing more.
“I hope you all understand,” Mrs. G said about ten minutes later. “I’m just so tired. I get tired when I go out. And then I ate so much. I haven’t been eating all that much lately, but everything was so good, and I just stuffed myself, and now I feel as though I’ll just fall right to sleep.”
“Why, you hardly ate at all!” Sofia said.
Raymond wished she hadn’t said it. If she had known Mrs. G, she would know the older woman had put away a remarkable quantity of food—for her.
“But we understand,” Luis said. “Of course. You have to promise to come back again, though, and that’s nonnegotiable.”
He rose, walked to the couch. Helped Mrs. G to her feet.
“I promise,” she said. “Thank you so much for your hospitality. I would stay longer, but I’m just so tired.”
Raymond hooked his arm through hers, in case she became unsteady on her feet. Which happened when she was very tired. Luis tapped him on the shoulder, and when Raymond turned, he saw a twenty-dollar bill in the man’s hand, with possibly another bill underneath.
“I insist you take a cab,” he said.
“Thank you,” Raymond said, and took the money.
On his own, for himself, he would have refused. He could have ridden the subway. But Mrs. G was tired, so he took it.
They rode together in the back seat of a taxi, Raymond keeping one eye on the meter.
It had begun to spatter rain, and the streets slid by behind patterns of droplets on the cab windows. Raymond could hear the distinctive sound of the shoosh of tires on wet asphalt.
Couples walked down the street hand in hand under umbrellas, or ran because they had none. On one corner Raymond saw a couple standing on the curb, facing each other, caught up in a shouting match and ignoring the weather.
“Do you think I’ll ever have a family?” he asked her.
“Oh, so that’s what’s troubling you. Yes, of course you will, if you want one.”
“But what kind of family?”
“That’s the last question you should be asking, Raymond, because it’s the part that matters the least. Any kind you want. If you want more emotional intimacy, you’ll have a companion who understands the way you are. If you want to raise children, you will. Your own, or adopted or fostered ones. Or you’ll just be the world’s best uncle to your friends’ children. The thing about a family is the love. The ‘what kind?’ and ‘how will it work?’ is nothing. That’s just a thing you worry about before you learn that those details aren’t what matter at all.”