Bona Fide Baby

Chapter 27 - The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea

The sun sank below the horizon, and left a colorful trail of fire streaked with pink and purple hues in its wake. The colors shimmered through the clouds like light breaking through a prism. The neighbors collected their stuff and headed on inside behind drawn curtains.

The scent of late night Spanish coffee comforted Xiomara. From her seat in the backyard she looked up at the apartment window and saw the shadows of Carolina and Leon moving behind the sheer curtain as they did the dishes. A few seconds later Esmeralda joined them with a drying cloth.

That's when Xiomara knew what she had to do. At fifteen the twins were more than capable of taking care of themselves, and with Josh and Gianna around, her mother would have all the help she needed. Her siblings hadn't needed her physically for a long time now. Well, except for Esmeralda. She still needed someone around to help supervise her and make sure that she was doing her physical therapy and taking all her medications.

The backdoor opened and Carolina stepped outside. "What are you moping about, mi amor. Please don't tell me it's because you're still on the fence about moving in with Omar."

"Not so much." Xiomara hid the piece of paper she'd been scribbling on in the inside pocket of her phone case. "But I wanted to talk to you about a few things first."

Carolina sat down on the other plastic chair. She reached for a pack of cigarettes in the pocket of her maid outfit and was about to light one up when Xiomara intercepted her.

"Mom, how many times must I tell you that you can't smoke around me and the baby? Put it away."

"Okay, okay." Carolina shoved the box and lighter back in her pocket. "What did you want to talk about?"

"When I leave I'm going to need you to step up your role as a mother. The last time Gianna had an older boyfriend you just let her carry on because he was giving her money."

"What's your point?" Carolina asked in a ragged voice. "I wish I was smart enough when I was her age to go for an older guy. Those suckers truly know how to take care of a woman."

"Mom, listen to me. She's a minor and that guy should be thrown in jail. I told him so myself. Why do you think all the gifts stopped?"

"You like to meddle in stuff that don't concern you, Xiomara."

"Don't concern me? How dare you say something like that to me. After all I've done to help this family? I don't know what happened to you, Mom, but this is not okay. Yes, it may be true that you've never met a man who loved you enough to stay, but this is not okay."

"And you think you can speak to me like this because you think you found your guy? Who just so happens to be well off and lives in some fancy condo on the hill. You think that makes you better than me? Your father was a hardworking man. He started a one man business and he built us a house from scratch. That man loved me and would have given anything to make me happy. So don't you ever think that I don't know what love is."

"So why did you leave him then? If you loved him that much, why did you leave?"

"I told you why. Your father was paralyzed from the neck down after a car accident, and at that time it was really difficult for a woman to find a job that would bring in enough income to feed a family of three. Although your father had started his own business, we had no savings. A few months after the accident we were literally starving. One day I came home and saw that he had booked us tickets to St. Maarten. Except the tickets were only for me and you." Carolina wipe a stray tear from her eyes. "I cried and begged him not to do this to me, but he told me that we weren't married and I was in no way bound to him, and that if I stayed, the three of us would die of hunger eventually."