“But this book! Duke, I think the story is even bigger than I originally thought. I think Lore was somehow involved in the murder.”
There it was, no caveats or disclaimers. Why else wouldn’t she tell me why Andres was in town? Why would she lie about the note and not seeing him when, in my gut, I knew she had? Why had she alibied Fabian if she’d loved Andres? What about the gap in her own alibi, the gun she may have been carrying?
Duke stared at me. “This again? That is a fucking serious accusation, Cassie. You do realize that, don’t you?”
“Obviously,” I snapped. “And if I’m right, everything will be different. For us, I mean.”
Duke gave an aghast laugh. “Do you even hear yourself? You sound—”
My chest felt tight. I was breathing hard. “What, Duke? I sound what?”
I had the ugly feeling he was about to say crazy. That word you attach to a woman to dismiss her intelligence, her instincts, her ambition. If he said it, I wasn’t sure he could ever take it back.
“Ruthless,” he said, before walking inside.
Lore, 1985
Thanksgiving isn’t celebrated in Mexico, of course, so there’s no conflict in staying in Laredo, though Andres had asked her, kindly, with whom she’d be spending the day. It still startles Lore, the world she’s constructed for him, in which she exists untethered by parents, supposedly dead, or siblings she doesn’t talk to. She told him she’d likely go to Oscar’s house; his wife, Natalie, is pregnant again and could use some help in the kitchen or wrangling their two-year-old. Lore has never been to Oscar’s house and barely knows Natalie, but in this world, they’re good friends, and Andres looks forward to meeting them both.
The meal this year is modest. Lore and Fabian made the turkey and mashed potatoes. Everyone else brought one side dish: creamed corn, beans, baked sweet potatoes. Mami made two pecan pies for dessert. Some of the kids are complaining—where are the hojarascas and chocolate chip cookies and Lisa’s famous apple crumble? The parents all snap: “It’s Thanksgiving—time to be grateful for what we have, not whine about what we want!” Lore wants to tell the kids to think about the children in DF who lost everything in the temblor, sleeping side by side on the streets like a platter of enchiladas. But children can’t place the less fortunate in context with their own lives; they exist on different planes, unaffected by each other’s existence.
The adults try to keep things cheerful. The men make plans for an early-morning hunt, and Jorge and Lisa share funny stories about the kids at their schools, though inevitably the conversation circles back to the economy. Lore’s brother Pablo lost his restaurant job and is working in the warehouse of a transportation company for $3.35 an hour. His wife, Lisa, is still teaching, but she’s pregnant now with their third, a surprise; when she broke down and cried over Sunday lunch in her first trimester—“How are we going to do it?”—Marta scraped her chair back and left the table. Lore found her in the living room, pretending to look for something in her purse while angry tears fell from her eyes. “She didn’t think,” Lore said softly, a hand on her sister’s back. Marta flinched. “It’s fine. I’m fine.”
Marta still works as a physician’s assistant and it seems inevitable that Sergio’s savings and loan will fold, like so many others. Jorge’s job as a school principal is safe, but his wife, Christie, was let go from the law firm. She’s now a receptionist at a used car dealership with a reputation for cashing in on people’s desperation. Beto and his wife, Melissa, have responded to the times with entrepreneurial zeal, using their home as collateral to buy a foreclosure, which they leveraged for the next foreclosure. They’re buying up homes for pennies on the dollar, condos that were ninety thousand in 1981 now selling for forty. Recently they bought their first apartment complex, six units in El Azteca. One night, drunk at Lore’s house, Pablo bitterly pointed out that they were turning into pinche slumlords, and where did they even get the money, anyway? His implication was outrageous. Lore gave him a Schaefer Light for the road and told him to sleep it off. Later, she would find out from Melissa that Pablo had asked them for a loan. He hadn’t believed Beto when he’d said their assets weren’t liquid.
And Lore’s parents. Lore doesn’t think they’ve recovered from having to close the store or, worse, rely on their children to bail them out of a bad loan. Papi spends most days out on Sergio’s ranch, doing quién sabe qué—repairing fences, counting the deer, rehabbing or disassembling old cars that Sergio’s friends sometimes take out there. He needs to be doing something, Mami says. Mami, who spends her own days cleaning an immaculate house, ironing sheets that dried on the line. They don’t know how to be still, how not to work. They live off social security and her father’s VA disability checks, and though they’re in their sixties—they’re due some rest, they’ve earned it—they’re ashamed. Over lunch, Papi struggles to meet their eyes.
“It’ll turn,” Beto says confidently, and Melissa nods. “We’re seeing it already, with Mexico entering the GATT. Right, Lore?”
Lore nods, though she’s careful not to offer too much hope. “Nothing will change overnight,” she says, eyeing the hollowed-out turkey. She opts against seconds, in case any of the kids want some. “It’ll take months for Mexico to negotiate terms of entry, and we’re looking at probably ten years, at least, before its customs duties and regulations are comparable to other members’.”
“But still,” Lisa insists, “it’s good, right?”
“Of course,” Lore says.
They eat in silence, forks scraping against plates, drinks being refilled. Lore takes a sip of her chilled Carlo Rossi, sneaks a glance at Fabian. He’s been quiet, withdrawn, though they had a good time in the kitchen this morning, goading Gabriel into pulling out the bird’s neck and giblets while everyone, even vegetarian Mateo, laughed at his disgusted bravado. For a few minutes it had felt like old times, when the cuates were little and Gabriel would never dream of telling her to fuck off and Fabian had just opened the store and everything, every last thing, was promise and possibility.
Papi must have noticed Fabian’s mood, too. “?Y ustedes?” He’s looking at Fabian. “?Cómo les va en Austin?”
Fabian’s shoulders jerk, and he compensates by holding them back proudly. “Actually,” he says, “I’ve decided to come home.”
Lore gasps. “What?”
It’s been two years since Fabian’s first trip to Austin. Two years of weekly phone calls and monthly visits, sometimes seeing each other only for a night before Lore returns to DF or Fabian packs up for the four-hour drive, with Marta and Sergio watching the cuates when Lore and Fabian are both gone. She misses either Fabian or Andres—or both—all the time. Fabian doesn’t complain about her absences—how can he? He doesn’t notice them as extraordinary, doesn’t wonder about late-night phone calls. She misses him, wants him home, but she would be a fool not to know this will change things.
Fabian turns to Lore. “I’ve given it a lot of thought, y ya . . . llegó la hora.”
“Time?” Lore shakes her head. “Time for what?”
There is a respectful silence, an acknowledgment from her family that this is a new discussion, and yet because they’re all metiches, no one is going to step away and give them privacy.
“We need to close the store,” he says.
Lore’s eyes burn with tears. “Fabian, no. We’ve worked too hard—”
“?Y pa’ qué, Lore?” He shrugs, crossing his fork and knife over his empty plate, sad but resolved. He’s already grieved, she realizes. “I told myself I would stay up there as long as I could keep the business afloat. But what, I’m going to drive us into the ground just to keep the sign on the door?”
“But Fabian—”
“I know. We still have the loan, the land, the building. There’s more to discuss, but—” He sighs. “This is the right thing to do. It’s the only thing to do.”