Chapter 35
CHAPTER 35
Elise comes by the register with an armful of new Cafe 22 t-shirts that I helped her design, stacking them by size into piles of navy blue, tan, and gray in the baskets underneath the counter. I already know I’m going to snag a navy-blue one for Cole.
He and I have kept up good boundaries with talking: not staying up too late, not taking away from the time he needs to study and the time I need to keep up my painting momentum. Sometimes our communication is a short and sweet good-night text, sometimes it’s hours on FaceTime.
Cole reserves the last hour of his day for journaling, a new habit he’s adopted in an effort to spend time with his own thoughts. After about a week, he told me he actually looks forward to it and he wishes he would have known to do it before. We’re growing individually and together while we’re apart, and it’s reassuring that we’re not letting go of our own identities or ignoring the things we need to work on .
Cole is also letting his hopeless-romantic flag fly proudly.
The afternoon I got home from the art intensive, a big bouquet of fluffy pink and purple dahlias was delivered with the note, “I hope I get to talk to you every day for the rest of our lives. Yours, Cole.” This week it was a dozen red roses with an excerpt from “The Building of the Ship” and a note:
It is the heart, and not the brain,
That to the highest doth attain,
And he who followeth Love's behest.
Far excelleth all the rest!
“From your favorite poet, HWL. Love you, Cole.”
“Tia,” says Elise, interrupting my thoughts. “I was looking at the schedule for next week and you’re off for four days in a row. Any fun plans?”
I tilt my head sideways. “I thought coming back from the art intensive, I’d be catching up on some shifts, but I guess not.”
“Nope, you’re free as a bird for those four days.”
What could I do with four free days? My natural instinct would be to stay home and paint, but why do that when I could?—
I have an idea.
I call Dad on my way home and make sure it sounds like a good plan. My passport is still valid from when I went to Mexico to see my grandparents a few years ago. The weather looks decent, no tropical storms on the horizon. The tickets are not terribly priced and I can use some points to book them. I’m all-in and my reservations are set before I even walk through the door to Aunt Mari’s house.
I text Cole about my exciting new plans.
Osito
That’s an amazing idea, that’s perfect! You’re going to have the best time.
I still have some hesitations about seeing Dad and telling him I’m a full-time artist now, given that I don’t have much to show for it. But this is climbing another rung on the ladder towards courage. I can’t chicken out on going to see them because I’d rather avoid the topic. I’m going and we’re going to talk about it and it’s going to be great.
As soon as I roll my carry-on into the baggage claim area of Aeropuerto Internacional de Cozumel, Dad and Julio raise their arms and yell, “ Goooooooooollllllll! ”
Everyone turns to look at them and they grin at their successful attempt to embarrass me. I roll my eyes, smiling the whole time. Dad’s wearing a sun-bleached Panama hat and a white guayabera that contrasts with his deeply tanned skin, browned by days under the sun on his fishing boat.
Julio is standing tall in a black t-shirt and gray shorts. He has new tattoos covering his left arm and I am shocked he told me nothing about them. Combined with his sharp black eyebrows against his lighter skin, he looks striking.
“Nina,” says Dad, folding me into a hug. He takes a gasping breath as he holds me. “Oh, I have missed you so much and I didn’t even know it.”
A faint scent of corn tortillas and Old Spice is woven through the fabric of his shirt, and it makes my heart happy. “Me too, Dad.”
I turn to Julio and wrap my arms around his lean frame. “ Hermana, ” he says as he gives me a hug. “ Ha pasado mucho tiempo .”
“Oh, like you know Spanish now?” I say, poking him in the side.
“Since he’s noticed the cute girl who works at the marina,” says Dad. I shoot a smug smile at Julio as we walk outside the airport and cross the street to the parking lot. I’ll ask him about it later.
“You have a good flight?” Dad asks.
“Yeah, it was great,” I say as I get into the back seat of Dad’s little white hatchback. Julio slides into the passenger seat and adjusts the seat, sending it flying back into my knees. I reach around the headrest to give him a throat-crushing hug.
“I’m so happy to see you,” I squeal.
“ Vamos a celebrar, ” says Dad, turning on the local radio station that’s currently playing a merengue classic.
It’s a twenty-minute drive to Marina Caleta, where Dad’s mini fleet of three boats are docked. We pass dozens of cinderblock and concrete buildings painted every color of the rainbow. Little red motor scooters carrying couples dart around, and every so often a bright mural outside a school or park catches my eye.
Giada encouraged me to try new mediums for painting, so I brought a travel watercolor set and a small sketchpad on this trip. I want to go back to landscapes and scenery for a bit and see how my skills have grown in that area from all my practice of portraits. If all goes well, I’ll head back to San Diego with a small postcard collection of watercolors.
The city gives way to dense forests of tropical trees as we get closer to the marina. The whole drive Julio and Dad and I chat about how the fishing is going, funny stories from Dad’s latest charters, and what kind of fish is popular to catch this time of year.
“Wait, so you’re helping Dad with charters now?” I ask Julio. “Like, long term?”
“I’m still not sure. I’m going to delay my application to business school for a while, we’ll see,” he says. “But in the meantime, it’s been awesome being down here. And yes, my Spanish has gotten better, solely because of living here and being immersed in the culture.”
Dad and I exchange a glance in the rear-view mirror that says we both know better. We park at the marina and Dad walks us down the pier. Julio keeps looking around, like he’s looking for someone specific, but he relaxes once we get to the boats.
Dad gives me a short tour of each of them, then we settle down for a drink on the middle one, La Sirena . Dad pops open the lid of a cooler and hands bottles of Modelo beer to Julio and me. “I can’t remember the last time we sat down together like this,” he says. “Having you two here…it’s the best.”
“It’s been way too long,” Julio replies.
“You’re always the one jetting off to new and exciting places,” I say.
He pauses with his beer midway to his mouth. “Because I never heard you guys say otherwise.”
I look at Dad to back me up, but he’s looking at Julio with his head tilted to one side. Julio looks at Dad, who finally looks at me.
“Did we just never…communicate?” says Dad. I shrug.
Julio leans forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “I always wanted to come home from college and have a quiet Christmas with you guys, but freshman year, my roommates talked me into a ski trip, and I was desperate for friends, so I went.”
“What about the next Christmas?” I ask.
“You took a winter session community college course for extra credit. So I planned another trip.”
“What about the one after that?” A strange sense of dismay rises in me. A sense of missing out on something that could have been. “Was that the one I went to Mexico to see Abuelo and Abuela?”
We look at Dad, who holds up his hands in surrender. “You both had made other plans for two years in a row, so I assumed you were done with coming home for Christmas. I took my first trip here to check things out.”
“What about summer and Thanksgiving and all those holidays?”
“Once you two had jobs and lives and you weren’t in college anymore, I thought you wouldn’t want to hang out with your old dad. I moved here and you never mentioned wanting to visit.”
I look around in disbelief. “All this time we could have seen each other way more?”
“Dang,” whispers Julio. He laughs to himself and sips his beer.
I can’t believe it. There’s no way this is a simple miscommunication issue. No way. And yet…the way Julio recounts it does add up. We’re each as much to blame as the next person. Schedules got full, jobs got hectic, we just drifted out of orbit with each other.
“Well, let’s never do that again,” I say.
“Yeah, for sure,” Julio chimes in.
Dad laughs. “You guys still want to hang out with me?”
“Obviously,” says Julio. “You were the first destination on my list when I got laid off at the bank.”
“You got laid off?!” I shriek. A twinge of regret follows my shriek. When I got laid off, Julio was nothing but kind and comforting. I set my beer in a cup holder and go give my brother a tight squeeze around his shoulders. “I’m sorry.”
He pats my arm. “Right back at you.”
“Would it make you feel better if I told you what I’m doing now?”
“Sure,” he says with a laugh.
“I’m an artist.” I go back to my seat without looking at either of them, giving them a moment to process. “I know you never were a big fan of me having an art career, but it’s what I want and I’m really enjoying it.”
“ Mija ,” says Dad when I finally look at him. “You’re an adult, your own woman now. I’ve grown, you’ve grown. I’m sorry for what I said when you were younger. I wasn’t trying to be mean, I only wanted to protect you from disappointment.”
“The arts are hard,” Julio chimes in. “It’s risky. So many people try and fail, barely scraping by and taking hit after hit when they can’t get their career off the ground.”
Dad shoots Julio a glance that tells him to stop talking. “Nina, I’m proud of you for trying,” he says. “I’m sure you’ll be amazing at it.”
“Thanks, Dad,” I say with a grateful smile. I can tell his words have genuine feeling behind them. “Oh, and I’m kind of seeing someone now actually. His name is Cole, he’s a corpsman in the Navy.”
“ Es un nombre gringo, ?no? ” Julio says.
“ Cállate ,” I hiss, trying to find a way to kick him. “This girl must be really cute if you’re learning Spanish for her. You hate Spanish.”
“ Es el lenguaje del amor. ”
“ You in love is new. And gross,” I say, like we’re back in high school.
“So, Cole. He’s a nice guy?” asks Dad.
“Really nice.”
“How serious are you?” asks Julio.
“Really serious,” I say, taking another sip of my beer.
“Like commitment-serious?” asks Dad. I nod and watch him and Julio exchange a glance. Dad looks skeptical; Julio’s going to be a hard sell.
“ Mija ,” Dad says, stretching back in his seat. “Are you sure it’s not just because he’s the first nice guy you’ve been with?”
“He’s…” I trail off, thinking of how different it is to describe him to say, Jules, versus to Dad and Julio. They don’t care how strong he is, how pretty his eyes are, how sweet he is when he’s tired. They care about things like is he going to break my heart, how is he going to protect me and provide for me. “He’s very caring, very kind, he’s thoughtful and encouraging. He’s dedicated to his job. He loves his family. Aunt Mari loves him too. He’s…amazing.”
“I am worried for you,” Julio mumbles, finally looking up. “Navy guys are not all good. What if he turns mean and cheats on you? What if he drags you around the country and he doesn’t take care of you?”
Dad leans forward. “I worry you may not understand what it means to marry someone, Nina.”
“Dad!” I exclaim. “I’m not a child, I know what marriage is.”
“Does he, this Cole?”
“Yes, he had a very good picture of marriage. His dad was a wonderful husband to his mom. He died a few years ago.” A lump wells up in my throat and I look out across the marina, blinking back my emotions. “Where was all this concern when I was dating an absolute loser?”
I pick at the gold label on the stubby brown beer bottle. Where was all this questioning when Bryce was making me feel small and less significant than him? How come no one asked me the hard questions before it was too late?
“I think when you’re gone,” Dad says, slowly, cautiously, “I have an image of you as a grown-up woman, confident and self-assured. But when you’re sitting right in front of me, I see my little Nina, the one who grew up begging her brother to play futbol and would ask me to read princess stories before bed.”
“I feel the same,” Julio says. “I think about you working in D.C. and being some powerful woman who wears heels to work every day. It wasn’t until you called us from Aunt Mari’s that I realized you’re not that. Not in a bad way, just…you’re still you, still young and vulnerable.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t protect you better,” says Dad. “No matter where you are, you’re still my girl.”
Julio nods. “We need each other. I mean, look at how Dad’s been here for me, Aunt Mari’s been there for you. Familia , you know?”
It’s Julio saying “familia” that makes my heart crack wide open.
“That’s it,” I say, with a laugh as I tilt my head back to keep my tears in my eyes. “We’re having a family reunion, every summer and every Christmas. I don’t care where we are in the world, we’re going to make it happen. And you’re going to meet Cole and I know you’re going to love him. Now stop making me cry.”
Dad and Julio both come over and squeeze me tight as the boat gently sways under us.
Painting in Cozumel is a revelation. I thought I might feel irked by not having my regular studio set-up and controlled atmosphere, but it’s actually freeing and energizing to be painting wherever Dad takes us. My sketches are quick, my color studies of the ocean are vibrant turquoise and aquamarine, and I love having the island as its own subject.
We all go snorkeling one morning and I spend the afternoon painting as many fish as I can from memory. If I had more time, I’d settle in and do actual oil paintings and pull together a theme. As it is, I fill my sketchbook easily by the end of my visit.
It illustrates what Cole said on the beach when we were talking about the future, about me painting anywhere. If Cole and I were together, and we would have to move to wherever the Navy sends us, there would always be something new and interesting for my creative brain. I can take my supplies all over the world, I can find inspiration anywhere, and being an artist is actually one of the most liberating professions I could choose for myself right now. I don’t have to give up any part of myself to follow him, I simply have to find my anchor points, find my routine, and get to painting.
I can go anywhere with him.
By the time I hug Dad and Julio at the airport, I’m sad to say goodbye to them, but so ready to be one day closer to Cole being home.
“Okay, so Christmas, yes?” I say, looking each of them in the eye.
“Christmas here?” asks Dad.
“Christmas at Aunt Mari’s?” I counter.
“Talk to her first before you invite us all there,” says Julio.
“Okay, Christmas at Aunt Mari’s, pending an invitation.”
Dad chuckles. “Even in your late twenties, you’re still my ni?os .” He suddenly calls out to a passerby who must be a friend of his, asking him to take our photo. He puts one arm around each of us and beams. When he texts it to us, all I see is pride emanating from his whole demeanor. He may be Julio’s dad, and my uncle, but he’s our rock.
“Love you, Nina,” he says, giving me a hug and multiple besos to my cheeks.
“Love you, Dad. Thank you for everything. Thank you for still being here for us, even though we’re adults.”
“We’ll never be too old to need a hug from you,” Julio chimes in as I turn to hug him.
“I hope it works out with the girl you have a crush on,” I whisper to him.
“Aww, thanks, Nina. I hope it works out for you and el gringo .” I poke him hard in the ribs, then give him one more hug.
“? Hasta Navidad! ” I say as I walk away, waving to both of them.
“? Hasta Navidad! ” They shout back.