I concede but look myself over. I’m a disaster in yoga pants, flip flops, and a long tee. The mirror pegs my hair at bird-nest bun. “Give me five minutes.”
* * *
Our little distraction posse makes the short walk to Orion’s. While Orion shrugged off the idea at first, by the time we reach the nearby street lined with rows of attached narrow brick homes, he’s in the doorway, arms crossed over a royal blue sweater. Charcoal socks poke over the threshold.
“Come on in, then.” Orion moves aside and his friends barge through. Jules tosses off the cape and helps herself to Orion’s home entertainment system. A dark EDM jam fills the living room.
I hang back while Orion locks up, feeling the bass line wedge under the wood plank flooring. “I’m really sorry.”
“Thanks.” His eyes flit around the room. “But that’s the way of it sometimes. Or much of the time,” he adds, almost like he’s used to disappointment. But then he cracks a smile. “Anyway, welcome.”
After two weeks inside the wide and tall spaces of the Crow, Orion’s house feels extra cozy. I wander through. A narrow staircase shoots right up from the front door, perfect for someone trying to sneak in, or out, unnoticed. The living room is all soft light and Persian rugs and worn oxblood leather furniture. Clean white walls back overstuffed bookshelves and framed collages. I draw close to one. Black and white photos show the Great Wall of China and an endless bamboo forest. Desert sunsets and abstract sections of bridges and monuments. It’s like the world on a wall.
“My dad’s travels,” Orion says behind me.
“You ever go with him?”
“Not this far.” He points to a photo of a gigantic flat mountain. “Table Mountain in South Africa.”
“Ri, we’ve got it all set,” Jules calls from the kitchen. “I can only hold off these barbarians for so long.”
“Better hurry if your friends are anything like my family,” I say.
In less than five minutes Jules and Remy managed to artfully arrange plates of reheated food on Orion’s counter. They move around the kitchen like they belong here. Sliced roast beef with a thick, plummy glaze and tiny herb potatoes and roasted vegetables smell almost as good as they look.
Remy hands Orion a plate. “You first and we’ll slop up what’s left.”
“Like farm animals.” Gordon hands me a plate and grabs one for himself. “Should we save some for Flora?” He cranes his neck. “Where is she anyway?”
“At Katy’s for pizza and whatever else they do,” Orion says, piling his plate with Remy’s dad’s delicacies. “She meant to scram while, you know… but she’s got curfew.”
I’m no part of hungry, but I still take a bit of everything before joining Orion at a round farm table. Jules pulls a spare chair from the wall. She turns it so the spindled back rests against the table, then straddles it like a horse. Does this girl ever sit in chairs normally?
Remy and Gordon are last, plunking down five ice-cold bottles. I read the label—Oldfields Cider—and remember Orion’s old enough to buy alcohol here. I’m new to hard cider. My first sip is a burst of hoppy, tart, apple happiness. Not too bitter or sweet or anything. The cider is perfectly balanced, just like any proper dessert.
Doesn’t take long for Jules to become heavily acquainted with hers. She traps a belch into silence, but her chest still balloons with it.
“A toast,” Orion says, holding up his bottle, “to friends who don’t listen when you say stay the bloody hell away, you meddling-arse muppets.”
Snickers all around. “To Jules forgetting her song notebook in the rush over here,” Remy says and the toasts alternate between sips, with Gordon saluting Remy’s dad’s delicious food, and Jules acknowledging Remy for putting up with her moody creative spurts.
All eyes fall on me, the new girl with the new cider and old hurts. I try to keep them off the table. They don’t belong with friends like these, who drop everything for one of their own. “To having a better option than Netflix,” I say.
Four bottles tip toward mine. I drink again, feeling warm with sour apple and fizz.
“But a whole summer away,” Jules says after mostly swallowing her roast beef, “without your Miami friends. You must miss them loads.”
“I…” I’m certain I fail at hiding the wave of bitterness that pulls through me.
“Especially that one girl? The blond who was always around when we visited,” Gordon offers.
“Stefanie,” I say.
“Right. Couldn’t she come here for at least part of the time?”
Couldn’t she have told me her life-changing plans? Been honest? “Not when she’s in a remote village in Ghana.”
Eyebrows raise, forks rest, and once again, no one forces details from my heart. If I talk, it’s my choice. Add in the alcohol and the coziness of the small kitchen nook—it opens me. I turn to Orion.
“Not to hijack your night, but still, my friend stood me up for the next two years.” I give them a ten-second intro to La Paloma, and how I practically grew up in the bakery kitchen.
“Stefanie was supposed to be right there with me, like we’ve been since we were kids. Her plan was nursing school and working with us part-time. We were thinking of getting our own apartment next year.”
But this plan has cooled and changed into a completely new recipe. I tell the group about her health aid volunteer work.
“That’s major,” Orion says. “She didn’t lead on about Africa at all?”
“I had no idea. Her whole family came into my bakery twice a week, and nothing. Not until I went over and saw the huge duffel bag and Stefanie’s passport on her desk. “She said I would have tried to stop her from going. But I would have supported her and given her my blessing.” I have to push these last parts out. They want to stick like honey to the back of my throat.
Jules asks, “How’d you leave things?”
“Broken.” The only word that works.
Time crawls. I can actually hear the click, click, click of the wall clock above my head. It’s official. I should hold no part in any distraction posse. I am Lila Reyes, displaced Miami baker and genuine mood killer. Didn’t we come here to cheer Orion up? I groan inside at myself and hop up. “Flan?”
Jules beams a clownish grin and the boys sit up straighter in their chairs, eyes bright. Flan, the only word I need.
9
My domed plate of flan sits on the top shelf of Orion’s fridge. I uncover and present the round, yellowy cream custard topped with caramel glaze. It smells like calories and sin.
Orion gets the first slice and stares at it dreamily, almost adoringly. I imagine it’s the gaze Charlotte is missing right now, wasted on Cuban baked goods. And now it’s on me, winter-blue eyes and soft mouth. “This is brilliant. You’ve known us only a few days and still went through all this trouble.”
“It’s what I do,” I tell him and watch his peekaboo smile grow into a grin.
I pass out the remaining pieces, forgetting Gordon already had two slices at the Crow and prudently remembering my one and a quarter. I can’t resist another sliver here, though.
The others eat, and actual moaning floats over the music. “You all need a private room with your flan?” With cold velvet vanilla and sweet caramel syrup soaking into each bite.
Remy says, “Excuse our ecstasy, but…”
“God, I mean it’s similar to our traditional custards.” Jules punctuates herself with her spoon. “But it’s like you infused the batter with a steamy bout of snogging.”
We all laugh. “No snogging or French kisses went into the making of your flan.” Sadly, none went into the making of my recent past, either.
But I do enjoy people loving my food. I focus on that until multiple helpings demolish most of the flan. I start stacking empty plates to busy my hands, but Jules stops me. “Enough of that, Lila. Cooks don’t clean in my family.”
The boys pitch in too, so I rise and poke through the adjacent living room. I’d left my purse on an ebo
ny piano bench. I pull out my phone; it’s early afternoon in Miami, but no one’s texted me. No crucial e-mails or missed calls either, like the usual state of my phone. I have officially disappeared to England.
“Lila?”
I whip around. Orion’s holding out another hard cider as a liquid gold offering.
“I’m good, thanks.”
Remy tosses a dish towel to Gordon. “Mum rang. One of the dishwashers at the pub went home sick, so I’m gonna fill in.” He points at the cider and tells Orion. “Drink another for me? And chin up, mate.” He works the locks and compliments my flan one last time.
Jules slings on a gray messenger bag then swoops the snow leopard cape over her shoulders. “Wait, love. I’m coming to help too. I look amazing in those striped aprons.”
Remy holds the door. “She just wants to sing classic rock hits with the cooks.”
Gordon’s next to rush Orion’s threshold, lobbing a broad wave at both of us. “Shit literature exam ‘rang,’ ” he says. I start to follow, but he continues, “You’ll see Lila home, then, Ri? Someone’s got to stay a bit to make sure you don’t dissolve into a puddle of your own salt water.”
“Always the optimist,” Orion says, then adds, “Hold up, Gordy.” He stops his buddy on the porch.
Alone and apparently staying for a while, I study the upright piano against the staircase wall. Bösendorfer, the gold scripted logo reads. Faint scratches mar the smooth, matte ebony finish. Brass fittings have darkened, and the keys, while in perfect order, bear a slight yellow tint. This piano is well loved and used.
As intriguing as the instrument is, the series of framed photos lined on top snags my attention. The first photo shows a bride and groom under a floral arbor. The man could be Orion—same wiry but present build under a gray morning suit, same dark blond hair with the promise of curl on the ends. On his arm is a slight woman in a column of ivory lace. Blond hair sweeps back and a posy of roses blooms in her hands. Orion’s parents—have to be. Next to it is a studio portrait of the same woman balancing a small boy on her knee and a frilly dressed baby in her arms. Lastly, there’s a family photo against a stormy background of grass and craggy seashore. I pick up the large silver frame. The Maxwells huddle together in wool and tweed under a gray sky. Orion looks about ten or twelve and little Flora clings to her mother’s side, sunshine curls tumbling down her back.
“Ireland. Cliffs of Moher in County Clare.”
I face Orion, his family in my hands. His face tenses like it’s struggling under the weight of untold things. Curiosity wins over politeness, and I ask the boy I accused of asking too many questions, “She’s your mother?”
He takes the frame. Nods. “My mum.”
“Is she… gone?” Like Abuela?
I don’t expect the way his mouth works, angling wry and off center. “Yes and no.”
“She left?” Like Stefanie?
“In a way.” He replaces the photo slowly, almost reverently. “But not the way you think.”
What is wrong with me? Like I’ve been the billboard of soul baring, lately? “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked,” I say through a straggly breath. I hastily grab my purse from the bench. My eyes jump. Pictures. His dad’s travel wall. Kitchen. Front door. “I should go. I can see myself—”
Orion steps in front of me and gestures to the sofa. “Please sit.” May I? speaks from his face as he hesitantly reaches for my black purse, setting it on the bench. “Stay. It’s fine, Lila.”
I nod and sink into thick oxblood leather.
Orion grabs his cider from a sideboard. “Nothing to drink? You sure?”
“Maybe just water.”
He’s back with an etched crystal glass. He cuts the music then sits, one cushion between us. And says nothing.
The silence feels like forever. I raise my glass to the bottle in his hand. “So. Cheers?” I wrinkle my nose. “Or is that weird?”
He evades my reach but the quiet room snaps back into rhythm. “Actually, that could be deadly for both of us, according to the ancient Greeks. The dead used to drink from the River Lethe in the underworld to forget their past lives. So, the Greeks always toasted the dead with water to mark their voyage, via the river, to the underworld.” He gestures broadly. “As a result, toasting somebody with water is considered the same as wishing them and yourself bad luck, or even death.”
“Wow. Okay. No cheers, then. But all these superstitions you’re always rattling off. You don’t really believe in them.” I narrow my gaze. “Right?”
He flinches, looking royally offended. “Hey, what if I do? Is that so bad?”
“Um, really?”
“Yes, really,” he counters.
“There are tons of superstitions from hundreds of cultures.” My free hand flails. “Some of them probably contradict one another. If you believed them all, you literally couldn’t do anything! I mean wrong facing beds and not stepping on cracks and under ladders and treacherous black cats and that’s just a few!”
Orion looks over, a devil on his face. “Your voice rose about two decibels right then.”
Well. He led me right into that one. My cheeks are hot candy apples, no mirror needed. “So you were just trying to bring out my… I won’t say Cuban, because not all Cubans have volcano tempers.” I make a face at him: more overblown smirk than anything.
“No assumptions.” Another sip. “Was actually just going for smart-arse on my part. As usual.” When my smirk curls into a mock snarl he adds, “And no, Lila. About the superstitions, it’s more that I like to collect them. A sort of hobby. I also enjoy the history behind them.” His shoulder bone pops up. “I have for years since…” He darts to a cherrywood bookshelf, returning with a photo. He keeps the framed subject turned toward his chest.
“I wasn’t being evasive about my mum or trying to make you feel bad. It’s a long story. But I’ll tell you the basics.”
I set my glass on a coaster, nodding.
“Seven years ago, she was diagnosed with a type of early-onset dementia called FTLD—frontotemporal lobar degeneration. I was barely twelve and Flora, eight. And Mum was only forty-two.”
His revelation drops inside of me, spinning in silent chaos, bumping away the teasing jabs from just moments ago. My words change. “I’m so sorry,” comes easily. “Is she here? Upstairs?”
“Not anymore. Dad wanted her home as long as possible. We had caregivers, in and out, for years. And my last six months of school I was on home study so I could help.” He stares ahead now. “But about nine months ago, she became too far gone. We moved her into a group home where they take amazing care of her. I visit about every other day.”
He places the photo into my hands. “This was one of the last shots Dad took of her before her diagnosis.”
I swallow past the lump in my throat. His mother is beautiful in a cream sweater, fairy blond hair dusting over her shoulders. Orion has her eyes and I’m lost at the sight of this woman, his mum, standing under a cherry blossom tree in bloom. “Oh, Orion, she’s…”
“She’s everything.” His voice cracks. “The cherry blossom trees in London were her favorites. Flora’s named for them. But she doesn’t know me or Dad or Flora anymore. She doesn’t know her own name anymore.”
My mouth opens to offer some kind of consolation, drawing from the place where my own loss grows, when the front door squeaks open.
Flora steps in, dragging a chilly gust behind her. Seeing me, her face goes blank with what could be confusion; I’m clearly not Charlotte from Twyfold.
Orion jumps up. “Hey, Pink, you want some amazing flan custard that Lila made?” he asks like we’ve been discussing movies or music or anything but their mother. I note Flora’s nickname, too. Pink for cherry blossoms? Maybe. But Flora’s black and gray getup is the opposite of pink or floral.
Flora’s already a third of the way up the stairs, just ahead of a no, thanks. Orion approaches, whispering over the railing. And then she’s gone.
He turns,
cocks his head, then grabs the mass of dark gray wool hanging off the banister. It’s the cardigan I wore the other night in the churchyard. “Here. You’re shivering.”
The patches of forearm visible under my three-quarter-length plum top are goose bump–heavy. I realize I’m not so much cold as overwhelmed. But I trade the photo frame for the soft wool and drape it around my shoulders. “Thanks.”
Orion replaces the picture, this time on the piano. “This was Mum’s. She was an incredible pianist.” He rattles his head. “That’s actually how she suspected something was off at first. Songs she’d memorized for years and played all the time, well, she began losing the notes.”
“Only forty-two, though. It’s hard to think of that happening to someone so young.”
Orion sits, closer this time. “It’s more common than it should be, medically speaking. But you never think it’s going to be you or your family. Especially when you’re twelve.”
“You must’ve had to grow up pretty fast.”
A single nod. “That’s why I latched onto superstitions. As a mental escape, not a code of conduct. Dad and the doctors tried to help and inform me—always forthright about what was happening—but there was so much extra inside. Confusion and bitterness. The collecting gave me something to do. Superstitions explain or give meaning to some things we can’t understand.” Orion grabs the cider, runs his finger around the lip. “Cultures trapped that confusion into relatable objects or notions. It brought people a sense of closure and maybe some control.”
Some things we can’t understand. How Stefanie can share a past with me but not trust me with her future. How Andrés can say he still loves me but can’t be with me. How Abuela went years too soon. “My family tried to help me, too.” And counsel and treat and coddle. “But I wouldn’t have it, so they sent me here.”
Orion leans forward, hands clasped. “Three months, though. All because of your friend?”
“I wish that were it.” I bite my cheek.
A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow Page 7
