“Celestia,” a deep voice called, low, calm, and unhurried. I halted, a frown slipping over me. It was my dad, and it was coming from the direction of his office.
“I’m late Apá, but I’ll be back on Friday for dinner,” I called back. I didn’t move though, not daring to leave before I was dismissed.
“Un momento, mija. Ven aqui,” he said. Patient, but firm. That’s how he usually was, but something in his tone or maybe his timing had my stomach twisting.
Using my good hand, I stripped my bags from around my body and turned my trajectory toward my father’s office, obeying his command. Itwasa command, even if he’d used the softest of voices. We always knew how to tell the difference.
It only took a moment for me to pass through the kitchen down the hall and appear at the wide doorway of my father’s office.
Large French doors carved the entryway to the dark wooded space. Books lined the back wall that served as the backdrop to his deep oak wooden desk. Dark leathers stretched over every seat in the room and a big jewel toned rug that looked like it was found in an estate sale hundreds of years ago carpeted the otherwise wooden floor.
Aside from the dread that was currently icing the back of my neck, I generally loved my father’s office. It was so warm and inviting and it always smelled faintly of cigar smoke and my dad. I used to come in here while he was away on business to sleep against the cool leather couch, pretending he was there. I also used to sit in here for hours with him when I was being punished for being one form of too much or another. My punishments were always a form of keeping me still because for me, especially when I was that young, not moving was almost like dying. The worst punishment imaginable.
Now, instead of seeing Apá behind his desk filtering through papers or shushing me because he was on an important call, I found him in the large leather chair across from the couch with a book in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. He was a lot less involved in the business nowadays, now that my older brother Oaxaca had taken things over. Ox had been a star hitter out the gate when it came to heading the family business, which had allowed Apá to retire much earlier than anyone initially expected.
Retirement looked good on him. It showed in the healthy glow of his cinnamon brown skin and the rested set of his dark brown eyes. Eyes that always used to look tired and unfulfilled. Eyes that now turned on me and grew wrinkles of concern when they fell upon my wrist.
Setting his book and coffee aside, he reached a hand out to me and said, “Will you tell me the truth, mija? What happened to my girl?”
Going straight up to him I placed my uninjured hand in his and leaned down to kiss his cheek.
“Apá, you wouldn’t like the answer,” I said. The only amount of truth I was willing to offer.
He grimaced. “Fighting again I see.”
I neither confirmed nor denied his claim even though I knew he wasn’t really asking. Instead, I turned my back to him and sauntered over to the large leather couch, plopping down as if the dramatic gesture could hide the dread in my gut.
“What is it, Apá? You don’t have to worry about this, you know I’m okay,” I said.
“Are you?”
“Yes. I am,” I said tightly. “I always am. You know that.”
“IthoughtI did,” he corrected. The look he gave me, all slitted eyes and uncertain expressions, pinched at my nerves. His next words stabbed at them. “I'm not so sure anymore.”
“What are you getting at?” I asked hastily, my spine straightening and my urgency spiking up. Hackles rising.
“You don't know?”
“If you have something to say to me, say it straight Papa,” I said through my teeth.
“Do not take that tone with me, Celestia, and don’t be so upset. We’re just talking,” he said, knowing me like the back of his hand. I only added the “P” to the front of what I usually called him when I got frustrated and this conversation was blowing my fuse quickly.
I bit the inside of my mouth, fighting the urge to say what I really wanted to say. Which went something like‘it sounds like you’re doing all the talking old man’. That wouldn’t bode well for me.
So instead I took the much different approach of fidgeting in my seat and sighing deeply with anxiety, “Please just say it plainly, Apá. You know I don’t like riddles.”
He sighed too.
“You’re twenty-four now, mija. You need to think about your future,” he said. “You’re the only one of my children I still worry about.”
“Oh?” I asked, swallowing what felt like sand.
“Yes. Alta is stepping up and making investments, Lis is stronger and stronger every day in her role at the company, Mateo has always been passionate about his businesses, and Oaxaca is—”
“Perfect, yes, we all fucking know Apá,” I grumbled.
“Hey,” he said, giving me a stern look. “Basta, mija. You know we don’t do that here, we—”
