Because You're Different ✔

67. Richness

June

I looked down at my hand, holding a knife that old that I remembered using it before. A knife had outlasted my dad. A knife. And not only a knife, also the kitchen it belonged to. The whole neighborhood. All of it was still there. All of it, except for my dad.

"Déjamelo hacer, cariño."

The voice hadn't even finished the sentence or gone was the knife. Gone was the tomato I'd been slicing to pieces. The juice and seeds covering my fingers were the sole signs of me ever having had it. My eyes wandered to my left index finger. It'd been days since I took off the ring, and yet, every time I was confronted with the band of pale skin, the only evidence something had ever sat there, I was struck by lightning, scared I'd lost or forgotten it.

I hadn't. It was never supposed to be yours, June. This was your life. Abuela taking over halfway through whatever I was doing, me being destined to stand there and watch.

Strange. How could I've forgotten this was how things went?

Two of my younger nieces, barely toddlers when I'd set out for California, were now running after each other, laughing and screeching outrageously as the smaller one hid behind abuela's apron. Abuela scolded them, not even needing to put down her work, like it was easy to tell off a child while keeping an eye on the pans and simultaneously slicing tomatoes with the speed of a machine. It was easy. For her.

Here, in Soundview, she was the woman of the house. The one who cooked. The one who decided. The one who people listened to.

Here, I was nothing, because everything I could do, someone else could do better and faster.

Here, I was the one people had to take care of.

Here, I'd never gotten older — I was still a kid, too clumsy and young to have any influence over anything.

California was independence. And I'd gotten used to it.

A hard smack against my legs made me stumble backward, colliding with the counter. One of my nieces giggled, getting up from the floor to sprint away, abuela yelling after her. I squeezed my eyes shut — did that woman have to shout every second of the day? Before she could start to fuss all over me, like everyone seemed to be doing since I'd returned, I followed my niece to the living room.

Why were there so many people in such a tight space?

They'd created one long table out of multiple smaller ones, the ones plastic and round, the others wooden and square, lined with an array of different chairs and stools. David had kept a normal one free for me, one that was at a good height so that I could actually reach my plate. He drew it back for me when I approached, giving me that smile that everyone sent my way again and again. The pity smile. It made me sick to the stomach. Did they have to treat me like I was broken?

Nathan would've never let me suffer through a pity smile.

Ignoring that thought, I reached out to take a piece of bread — immediately, uncle Pedro pushed the basket in my direction, winking at me. Without hearing myself, and without meaning it, I thanked him, while the only thing I was really grateful for was him going back to his conversation with uncle Antonio, who was in one of his manic states and was talking the loudest of everyone in the room. They were discussing Franco, a subject I was very familiar with, having written a paper on it for European History only a few months ago. Yet, I doubted if they'd listen to me if I would try to join them. Maybe out of courtesy. Let's pretend to be interested in what the girl who lost her father had to say.

Dad would've listened. He always did.

"You good?" David asked. He was seated in a plastic kid's chair, yet still managed to tower over me. There was something about him that reminded me of dad. Maybe it was the fact he was big, and at the same time appeared to be entirely harmless. Strangely enough, it was soothing.