Because You're Different ✔

16. Chick flicks

Sam

June was writing her own book. I found out when she went to the bathroom and left Nathan's old laptop unlocked. She worked on it in our dad's office — I wondered what she liked about the room. It had lots of books that had never been read and never would be read because they were boring as hell. I hadn't had enough time to discover what her story was about, but the scene I'd skimmed looked just as boring.

After Valentina had been here a few days, I had a pretty good idea, though. She showed me a side of June I wished I had never known about.

They. Watched. Chick. Flicks.

Gooey, romantic, over the top, puke-inducing slime. Their favorite one, about a girl who was engaged but was still married to her childhood boyfriend and had to go back south to divorce him, was so cringey I voluntarily went to my room to do my English homework.

Why, June, why? Why were you so suddenly a girl?

Seeing Valentina cry over a movie kiss at least helped me a bit with the problems that came with having a hot girl staying in your house for a week.

"I think you're gay," I told Nathan. "No, I actually know for sure. You could've been doing her every night, but instead, you're studying all the time."

Nathan chuckled. "Stop thinking with your dick already. I assure you, girls like Valentina aren't into sex-obsessed little boys."

"Whatever." With the way he was behaving, I'd be getting it at least sooner than him. Nathan really wasn't any fun. I didn't know why I hadn't noticed it earlier, but he was kind of a weird dude. He could be out there drinking with college girls; yet, here he was, behind his laptop, once again.

He was right about one thing, though: Valentina was not into me. At all. Monday evening, I made the mistake of asking her what June and she were going to cook that night.

They had shared a kind of shocked look, and I knew I had something coming I wasn't going to like. "I can't cook, you racist little white boy!" she'd said, eyes on fire. "There's June, and Romina, and June's abuela and those are the ones that can cook. My mother, oh, you don't want her to touch a single thing in the kitchen, I'll tell you that. And me neither. June, her daughter will later inherit the talent, but me, I'm hopeless."

June and Nathan had almost burst out laughing, trying to look anywhere except at me. "I'm s-sorry," I'd said.

"Oh, yes, you better be sorry! Now, June will tell you what to do, and you'll listen to her, estamos?"

That was how I ended up cutting onions while Nathan was snickering at me from behind his laptop. Ass.

Most of the time, having Valentina over was fun. June was happier than I'd ever seen her, making more jokes again, and she even helped me send a text to Jennifer, who she probably really hated. If only she would've still wanted to work on our book, but no... I'd figured that now I've had my birthday present, she would be spending more time with me again and less with Nathan. I was wrong. Even with Valentina there, she sometimes kept him company late at night. I didn't get it. Was the lawyer stuff really more interesting than me?

There they were again. We'd been sitting outside all evening, the four of us, buried in thick sweaters, candlelight on the table, courtesy of Valentina. I didn't understand why you'd want to sit in the cold, but OK. We'd played a game first — big mistake, Valentina won and rubbed my nose in it — then just talked, comparing Palo Alto to New York.

"I feel so adult-like here," Valentina had commented. "Back home, there's always aunts and uncles and cousins watching your every step — family is just everywhere. It's nice to have some privacy for a change, to be one of the older people in the house."

All three of us had fallen silent. It wasn't actually normal, I guess, to live like this, and most of the time I forgot.

Not long after, Valentina announced she was going to bed, and the rest of us said the same.

So why, why were they still sitting at the table, the two of them, talking with serious faces about who knows what? I wanted to go get her, but someone grabbed me by the arm.

"No, no, no, no," Valentina said, not letting go. "Leave it alone. We're going to bed." The look on my face must have told her what was going on in my mind because she added, persistently: "Separately."

Shit. Girls were impossible.