Page 50 of Careless Whisper

“Yes.” Mama nodded as she waited for my father to answer her call. “Ignacio, she’s going to tell us what happened.” Pause. “Yes.” Pause. Laugh. “Okay.” She hung up and smiled widely. “He’ll be here in ten minutes.”

A dry chuckle escaped me. “Anyone else you want for this?” I asked sarcastically.

She shrugged unapologetically. “Your grandma and grandpa want to know…and Jason…but I told them once we loosen you up, they can have you.”

“With a family like this…!” I feigned irritation. I knew I was damn fortunate to have so many people care about me.

Once Papa got settled, he and my mother looked at me like they were getting ready to watch a blockbuster movie.

“You guys wanna bring popcorn?” I joked.

Mama thought about it and then sighed. “I don’t think we have any microwave ones. I’ll add it to the shopping list.”

So, she asked Siri to add microwaveable popcorn to her shopping list.

“This story starts in Boston,” I began.

I was interrupteda lot.

“Thatpendejosaid what?” Papa demanded angrily several times.

“That son of a bitch needs his head examined,” Mama suggested often.

They were completely on my side. We supported one another rather blindly, but this was what family was there for:to be on your team. That didn’t mean they didn’t tell me when they thought I was wrong.

“You should’ve sued those motherfuckers in Boston,” Mama claimed. For a gentlewoman who was born and raised in an elite family, my mother could swear like a sailor.

“I agree. They had no reason to fire you,” Papa agreed. “Let me check on the statute of limitations for wrongful termination.”

“Papa, I’m not suing Stratford. I don’t want to go through that.”

My mother’s expression softened. “Oh, baby, you’re heartbroken, aren’t you?”

I sniffled as tears started to creep into my eyes. “Yes.”

“Thatpendejo,” Papa thundered.

Once they calmed down, they agreed that I had to figure out what to do next and how to proceed with what was happening in Seattle with MarenandElias. My father, a career diplomat, uncharacteristically from a professional perspective but very much in line with his personal one, demanded I sue Harper Memorial for workplace harassment.

“I want to see that woman lose her medical license,” Papa raged and then painted the air blue with curses in Spanish.

That night, after Papa went to bed and it was just Mama and me, she suggested that coming here and living with them and taking care of the clinic wouldn’t be running away. “It would be making a choice.”

I tilted my head thoughtfully. “I need time, Mama. I need to clear my head. I’m in no position right now to choose anything.”

The next day, Papa and I went to the market to pick up chiles and mangos. He didn’t mention the clinic or my life in Seattle orthat pendejo, which he’d taken to calling Elias. I imagined how angry he’d be if he knew that we’d started a physical relationship…or rather had a one-time-on-call-room stand in Seattle. As close as I was with my family, a few things you didn’t tell your parents.

“I’m telling you, Mateo marries that girl, he’ll be unhappy all his life.” He didn’t approve of one of my cousins marrying his girlfriend, who was a bit tooout thereaccording to our family.She was an Instagram influencer.

“She spends all her time in front of a mirror doing things to her face,” he continued, a poblano in his hand. “It’s going to be a disaster.”

I made a noncommittal sound.

“You don’t think so?”

I gave him a flat look. “Papa, I haven’t seen Mateo in years and don’t know his fiancée from that poblano you’re planning to buy. I’m going to go with no comment.”

As we walked home, he brought up Elias. “You’re a grown-up, Reggie, and I would never tell you what to do, but…I have worked with men like your Dr. Graham.”

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