“It looks good on you,” she said. Virginia was barely listening to the conversation. She had slipped a phone out of her purse and was texting. “Virginia, put the phone away. This is the greatest day of your life. Be present for it!”
“I’m sorry,” Virginia said, under her breath. For being the star of the night, she seemed pretty over it all. I wondered if that’s how I would feel the night of my sweet sixteen.
“Okay, come on, Virginia, we have more people to greet,” Magnolia said. “Did you thank your cousin for coming?”
Virginia smiled a fake smile at Iglesias and said, “Thanks for coming, cousin dearest.”
“I never miss an opportunity to come,” Iglesias said with a crooked smile.
“If you think we’re too dumb to get your dirty jokes, you’re wrong,” Magnolia said.
After Magnolia pulled Virginia away, I turned to Iglesias. “Were you flirting with your cousin?”
“Ew, no,” he said. “That would be gross.”
“Not really,” I said. “She’s not your blood relative, right? She’s no more related to you than I am.”
“Yeah, except I’ve known her since she was in pigtails, so it’s a little different.”
I stewed silently and finally said, “What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “We could dance.”
“I mean, about your mom?”
“I think what you mean,” he said with a smile, “is your mom.”
“This is not funny,” I said. “This is terrible. We have to tell her.”
“Go ahead,” he said. “She’s right there.” Iglesias pointed to a large table where Encarnación and Fabio were engaged in discussion with three other couples, all of them drinking, telling stories, and laughing. “Maybe you should tell her in front of all her friends. That would go over well.”
“This is all wrong,” I said. “I was supposed to tell her I’m her daughter first, and then broach the bizarre nature of our relationship.”
“So we’re in a relationship?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, increasingly tense. “Maybe not. You’re the one who asked me if we were dating after you kissed me.” He tried to speak, but I didn’t let him. “I don’t kiss guys I’m not dating, Iglesias. But maybe that’s the kind of girl you want. Maybe you were hoping I was like your last girlfriend, with her misspelled tattoo.”
“Why are you so pissed off at me?” he asked.
I could have said I was pissed off because he’d completely messed up my plan. Tonight was supposed to be about me connecting with my birth mother, and now it had become about something completely different. Now I was thrust into his entire social universe as his new girlfriend, who he wasn’t even sure he was dating. I could’ve said all of that, but instead I just said, “I don’t know. I just am.”
I walked outside alone. I took a deep breath, hoping for some fresh air, and inhaled some cigarette smoke instead. I looked up and saw Virginia’s flat shoes poking out from behind a Dumpster. “Hey,” I said, approaching her.
“Oh, hey,” she said. “I needed to get out of there.”
“Yeah, I get it,” I said.
“Have you had yours yet?” she asked.
“My what?” I asked.
“Um, your quinceañera,” she said, as if stating the obvious.
It took me a moment to process the fact that she assumed I was Mexican. I could’ve corrected her, but I really wasn’t in the mood. And besides, I was Mexican. Kind of. So I just said, “Not yet.”
“Well, I hope your mother is more chill than mine.”
“Hardly,” I said.
She smiled and held out her pack of cigarettes for me. I shook my head, and then she used her last cigarette to light a new one. “Don’t smoke. It causes bad skin,” she said with a laugh. “That’s what my mom cares about. Forget cancer!”
“Why do moms use their daughters as excuses to throw parties for themselves?” I asked.
“Now, that is the million-dollar question,” she said. “My mom even invited Sharon Alvarez, who wrote the word slut on my locker last year.”
“That’s awful,” I said. Heidi may have made my life difficult, but she’d never done anything that bad. “Does your mom know she did that?”
“She knows I hate her. That should be enough.”
“Yeah,” I said, thinking of my mother inviting Heidi to my birthday. “My mom’s already invited my former best friend to my . . .” I was about to say sweet sixteen when for some reason, I said, “quinceañera.”
“What is that about? If it’s supposed to be our day, then it should be our day. Is she gonna make fourteen of your friends dress up as past versions of you?”
“What?” I asked.
Through the glass, Virginia cocked her head toward a row of fourteen girls dressed in matching shades of baby pink. “They each represent one year of my life before I became a woman. It’s all such a show. And my mom is spending all her money on this party. I was like, ‘Mom, give me the money. I’ll take myself on a vacation to Brazil. Jesus.’ I don’t get her priorities.”
“I totally understand,” I said.
“I thought you looked kind of square when you walked in, but you’re actually cool,” she said.
“I borrowed this dress from Iglesias’s mom,” I said. “It’s not how I usually dress.”
“Iglesias!” she squealed. “As in Enrique Iglesias. Genius. How have I not been calling him that?”
“No, please don’t. He hates it. I mean, he lets me call him that, because I’m kind of flirting when I do it, but you’re his cousin, so that would be weird.”
“First of all,” she said, “I am only his cousin by marriage, so I could totally flirt with him without it being weird. Second of all, we practically grew up together, and I have no interest in him. And third of all, the nickname is hilarious, and it’s so much less embarrassing than being called Rico.”
I suddenly felt really guilty about lying to her about having a quinceañera. She seemed really awesome, and I realized that in a way, she was my cousin too. And I didn’t want her to think I was a liar. “Listen,” I said. “I said something kind of stupid. I’m not actually . . .”
Before I could finish, she held her hand up. “Hold that thought. It’s time for my Cinderella moment.” Virginia ran back inside. Through the glass, I could see an older man, presumably her father, slip off her flats and replace them with a pair of high heels. The whole crowd clapped. And then the dancing resumed.
I watched from outside as Encarnación took Iglesias’s hand and danced with him while Virginia danced with her father and Magnolia took photos of the scene. I wondered how different my life would have been had I been raised in this community. After all, Virginia’s quinceañera was just another version of my sweet sixteen. Magnolia and Encarnación, with their constant bickering, were another version of Sheila and Auntie Lida. The father dancing with Virginia, he was basically Baba with fuller hair.
I walked back inside to say good-bye to Iglesias, and to Encarnación, but I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt their celebration. They looked like they were having so much fun. Iglesias was teaching his mom how to krump, and Encarnación was laughing at her son. Fabio was taking pictures of both of them with his phone. Even Virginia, who had complained about her quinceañera, was happily twirling in the arms of her father, a carefree smile on her face. The crowd of revelers was singing along to the song blaring through the speakers, articulating every Spanish word with delight. I had never heard the song before. I felt completely out of place, the only apple in a bowl of oranges, a blue M&M in a bag full of reds. I was just a visitor here, a tourist, and it was time for me to go home.
Chapter Thirteen
I COULD BARELY SLEEP THAT night. My heart raced, my hands trembled, and was having night sweats. I laid a towel down under me and stared up at my ceiling, wondering what I should do next. I couldn’t even figure out what was making me anxious. Was it the fact that I had fought with Iglesia
s, or was it the fact that I hadn’t told Encarnación who I was, or was it both? I played out different fantasies in my mind. In one, Iglesias and I moved to Mexico City together, where he became a hip artist, and I became his agent, selling the world on his brilliance. We never told Encarnación that I was her daughter, but because I was married to Iglesias, she became my mother-in-law, and so I started calling her Mama. Our wedding was on a Mexican beach—I don’t know which one since I’ve never been to a Mexican beach (hey, it was a lucid dream)—and the day of the wedding, Sheila and Encarnación fussed over me together. And then Baba gave me away. When we grew old together, I asked Iglesias if we had done the right thing by never telling our parents the truth, and he said, “Of course. Because all that matters is that we know the truth. And the truth is that I love you.”
In another daydream, I stormed out of bed on that very night and banged on Encarnación’s door. She opened it in her nightgown and asked what was going on. I told her that I was her daughter, and she shook her head with tears in her eyes. She told me I had lied to her. She told me I was forbidden from dating her son. I told her he was her stepson, but she didn’t care. She slammed the door in my face. Iglesias and I tried to see each other again, but the weight of it eventually crushed us, and we went our separate ways. I ended up marrying Kurt, who forced me to give birth to all three of our children by C-section so that they could be born at a time of astrological compatibility with us. But eventually we got divorced. Then I married a Persian doctor who Sheila set me up with, but he cheated on me. Finally, in my old age, I saw Iglesias at a gas station, and realized he was the one I loved, and that we were now too old to do anything about it. So I just drove away without saying a word.
The fact that both of these fantasies saw me through to old age probably gives you some idea of the hours of sleep I was losing that night. And there were others as well, each with a running theme, which was that if I told Encarnación who I was, there was no way Iglesias and I would be allowed to continue our relationship. I had to make a choice—at least that’s what my subconscious was telling me.
At some point, I must have fallen asleep because I woke up at noon to the sound of yelling downstairs. I could make out Sheila and Baba yelling in Farsi, but there were two other voices, yelling in another language. Groggy, I opened the door and shuffled to the living room, where I found Sheila and Baba huddled on one side, and a middle-aged Chinese couple huddled on the other. My parents and Andrew’s parents glared at each other like they were planning nuclear attack. In between the two couples stood Amir and Andrew, one looking more exhausted than the other.
“Good morning,” I said, in English, hoping the neutral language would settle the mood.
“Daria,” Sheila said, forcing a smile. “You remember Andrew’s parents, Meili and Fang. You met them at the wedding.”
Meili and Fang each took my hand and smiled. I looked down at my bare feet and my worn pajamas, and then ran my hands through my frizzy hair. “I’m sorry, I just woke up.”
Meili looked at her watch. “It’s past noon,” she said. “You usually sleep past noon?”
I was taken aback by her hostile energy. “Um . . . sometimes . . . I mean . . . It’s Sunday.”
Meili shot a knowing look to Fang, which was not lost on Sheila, who said, “If you have something to say, just say it out loud.”
“She sleeps a lot,” Meili said. “That’s all.”
“Mom, please,” Andrew whispered. “Is that necessary?”
“Perhaps she was studying all night,” my mother countered, which of course wasn’t true, but I appreciated her desire to defend me. What I wished my parents had noticed was that something was different about me. I wasn’t a girl who usually stayed in bed until noon, and I wanted my parents to intuitively know that something was wrong.
Meili shrugged. “It is not for me to judge. You let your child sleep all day. You don’t pick us up at the airport. You send us to a hotel. It is not for me to judge.”
“For the last time,” Sheila said with a sigh, “I booked you a room at the Beverly Wilshire because I thought you would be more comfortable there. It’s a beautiful hotel.”
“Comfortable? The stranger you sent to pick us up left us there, and they said our room won’t even be ready until three p.m.!”
“We apologize,” Baba said.
“I was only trying to treat you as I would want to be treated,” Sheila explained. “If I came to Beijing, I would want to stay in a beautiful hotel . . .”
“You wouldn’t want to stay in our home?” Meili asked. “Why? It’s too dirty for you? You’re afraid there will be chickens walking on the floor? You’re afraid I’ll skin a dog, boil it, and serve it to you for dinner?” Fang put his hand gently on his wife’s arm, but she shoved it away. “We are family,” Meili said. “And family picks family up at the airport. And family stays with family when they visit. That’s not too much to ask.”
Amir and Andrew looked at each other like they were trying to devise a way to defuse this situation.
“We live in a small apartment,” Sheila explained as Meili and Fang gazed at our palatial living room, probably calculating its square footage in their heads. “The only room we could put you in is Lala’s old room, and it only has a single bed in it anyway. As does Daria’s room. There’s just no room for you, unless you want to sleep on the floor of the living room.” This was all true. We had lived in a bigger house before Amir went to college, but then Baba had downsized, much to Sheila’s chagrin.
“Well,” Meili said, “you could have purchased an air mattress. It’s bad enough our son doesn’t want us staying with him.”
“Oh, come on, Mom,” Andrew said. “You know we don’t have the space, but I told you that you can hang out at our place from the moment you wake up until the moment you go to sleep.”
I had a deep desire to crawl back into bed, to escape this hellish battle. And that’s when I verbalized the insane idea that popped into my head. “How about this?” I proposed. “One of you can stay in my room, the other can stay in Lala’s old room, and I’ll stay in the hotel.” I had a quick flash of Iglesias and me ordering room service in a crisp white bed at the Beverly Wilshire, pretending we were grown-ups on a glamorous vacation, or newlyweds on our honeymoon.
“I think you’re joking,” Sheila said.
“Of course she’s joking,” Baba said. “We’re not letting her stay in a hotel by herself.”
The truth was that I had been joking, but now I wanted to turn the joke into reality. “Why not?” I said. “It’s right down the street.”
“Abada,” Sheila said, which is Farsi for no effin’ way.
“If you say yes,” I said to my mother, “I won’t complain anymore about the awful sweet sixteen you want to throw me. I’ll wear whatever you want me to, and even let you pick the music.”
I could see my mother considering this offer very seriously, but finally, she shook her head.
“Come on,” I said, trying another tactic. “You let me sleep over at Joy’s and Caroline’s all the time,” I pleaded.
“Because there are adult chaperones present, aziz,” Baba said.
“Um . . . Concierge. Receptionist. They sound like adult chaperones to me.” From the half smile on Baba’s face, I could tell I was winning him over. “And at least they’ll be awake at night, unlike Joy’s parents, who sleep like logs. For all you know, we sneak out and rage all night when I stay at Joy’s.”
“Do you?” Sheila asked, worried. Then she turned to Amir and asked, “Does she?”
“Of course not!” I pleaded. “And I won’t if you let me stay in the hotel either. I’ll just order room service, and watch movies, and do my homework by the pool. And tomorrow I’ll go to school.”
“This is what you get for reading Eloise to her too many times,” Amir smirked.
“Don’t you trust me?” I asked, knowing that was the clincher.
“Of course we trust you,” Sheila said, softening. “
But . . .” Sheila was still unsure, and then Meili came in to save the day.
“You even consider letting a fifteen-year-old girl stay in a hotel alone?” she asked. “Ridiculous!”
“What’s ridiculous about it?” Sheila asked. “I trust my daughter, and I don’t believe that keeping her in some kind of prison is the right way to raise her.”
“Ha,” Meili said. “Maybe in the hotel, she’ll sleep until six in the afternoon!”
“It’s decided,” Sheila said. “Daria, you will move to the hotel.”
“Wait, seriously?” I asked.
“Wow, unbelievable,” Amir said, shaking his head. He pulled me in close. “Nice work, Daria. You clearly have the Esfandyar negotiation gene.”
I smiled. I had never expected this plan to work, and had Meili not butted in, it probably never would have. Sheila was so desperate to be unlike Meili that she was letting me go to make a point.
“Then it’s decided,” Meili said with a nod. “Your daughter will go to a hotel, where she will sleep all day if you’re lucky, and binge-drink if you’re unlucky. Can I move into my room now? I’m exhausted from the flight.”
Amir and Andrew helped Meili settle into my room, and Fang settle into Lala’s old room. At three o’clock, my parents drove me to the Beverly Wilshire and checked me in. They explained to the concierge that I was a fifteen-year-old girl staying alone and would need supervision. “Can we nanny-cam her room?” Sheila asked. Luckily, they did not offer surveillance services.
In the room, my mother lay down on the bed, her hair flowing onto the fresh white pillow. “I love hotels,” she said. “I wish I could stay here with you instead of going home to that woman and her husband.”
“She’ll soften up when they meet Rose,” I said. “Maybe.”
“Let’s choose to be kind to them,” Baba said. “They’re our family now, and they raised a wonderful child, so how bad can they be?”
Sheila laughed. “Your father has too much compassion,” she said. “That’s why half of his friends owe us money.”
“Two friends,” Baba said. “And they’ll pay it back.”
The Authentics Page 13
