Page 14 of All Superheroes Need PR
“And if he so much as sets foot on my porch, I’m gonna blow his damn head off.” My father bangs his fist on the table.
The doorbell rings.
Ding ding.
It happens like we’re in a movie. The laugh track rolls as we quiet and stare around at each other like we’re about to be invaded by enemy combatants. We all hunker down and, the children we still are, look to our parents. On my right, coffee frozen halfway to his mouth, David says, “You expecting somebody?”
“¿Durante el desayuno?” Elena’s eyebrows pull together, and she slaps her linen napkin down onto the table. She starts to stand, prepared to go to war, but my dad puts his hand on her arm and pushes back from the table. A heavyset guy who’s six two to my mamá’s five four, he certainlylooksmore intimidating that Elena does—but that’s only if you haven’t met Elena and disturbed her family brunch.
“I’ll get it,” he says, sparing whoever’s life is on the other side of that front door. Or, well ... that’s what I thought until ...
“Papá!” Luca, Mani, and I all shriek—because as my burly teddy bear of a father leaves the kitchen, he grabs his shotgun, which just so happens to be casually lying on the window seat, nestled between Elena’s brightly colored pillows.
“Sit down,” he grunts, and so we sit and remain seated, mouths open wide enough to catch flies. We’re all completely quiet, straining to hear the sound of my dad undoing the locks and the new door creaking on an old frame. Some light murmuring ... but it doesn’t sound hostile ... before my dad returns.
“Shit, Vanessa.” My dad hooks his thumb over his shoulder, his dorky purple T-shirt with wolves howling at a faraway moon presenting an odd contrast to the shotgun hanging limp in his right hand. “You didn’t tell us you knew the president of Cambodia.”
“Oh shit,” I whisper.
“Vanny!” Elena shouts, more surprised, I think, than anything. I never curse.
“You know thepresident of Cambodia?” Luca’s mouth hangs open.
I stand up from my seat in an awkward tangle of limbs, and David has to lean over and grab my arm to keep me from face-planting. I mumble a quick thanks, swat Luca on the back of the head as I roundthe table, and dust off my clothing. Who am I kidding? I’m wearing my goddamn pajamas. The ones from Tía Luisa with Mickey Mouse’s face printed on the bottoms and Minnie Mouse’s demented face handsewn on the front of the long-sleeve T-shirt. The ears stick out and flop around where my boobs are.
I could have changed. I have plenty of old clothes here from college, but when Elena came into my room this morning and took a flyswatter to my forehead until I got up and got downstairs in time for breakfast, I wasn’t exactly thinking of how I’d be presenting myself to potential clients—least of all the one who’d just fired me.
My stomach lurches up into my throat as I stagger over to the window seat, and my brothers immediately crowd in behind me, throwing pillows and elbows to make space at the glass.
“Shit, that really is the president!” Mani hisses.
“Mani!” Elena shouts. “¡Cinco dólares, por favor!”
“He’s not the president of Cambodia. He’s Thai, and he’s the president of the COE.” My heart joins my stomach up in my mouth, barely contained by my rattling teeth as I peel the curtains back and see the massive car sitting there in my parents’ driveway. “How did they get past the gate?” I glance over my shoulder to see my dad standing there, gun on his shoulder. He shrugs it.
“I opened it. Should I not have?”
“Shit,” I whisper.
“Vanny!” Elena cries out.
“I’ll pay her fees,” Charlie grunts, grabbing the back of my pajama shirt and dragging me away from the window. “Vanny, you wanna talk to him or you want us to run him off?”
“President or not, we can take him,” David helpfully shouts.
“Fuck yeah! I got another lacrosse stick!” Luca interjects.
Meanwhile, behind me I hear Elena say, “I’m going to be able to buy a yacht with this money before we finish breakfast ...”
“What are you waiting for, hermanita?” Mani pokes me in the ribs, making me buckle. “Go talk to him!”
“Did he seem p—angry?” I ask my dad as I push through the wall of my brothers and head to the entryway, wiping my sweaty palms on my pj’s.
Dad shakes his head and gives me a shrug with his shotgun-wielding shoulder. He follows me to the door. “Nope.”
I grunt. My dad is not a man of many words and has the emotional depth of a cucumber, which is why I’m so surprised when he gives me a kiss on the cheek and a pat on the head before he opens the door for me. “You got this, sweetheart. Whatever it is.”
I smile up at him, and suddenly my stupid outfit and my bacon-scented hair don’t feel so important. I take a breath, this one deeper than the last one was, less shaky, and remember: What’s the worst Mr. Singkham can do to me? Fire me again?
