6. Victoria
— ? —
Victoria
The van rattled over a pothole, and my aunt’s suitcase shifted, nearly crushing my foot.
“Sorry.” She didn’t sound sorry. She was too busy leaning across the aisle to continue her conversation. “Did you hear about Michelle? Moved back already. Can you believe it? Didn’t even last four months in Chicago.”
My stomach tightened.
I pressed myself closer to the window, trying to disappear between Daniela and the smudged glass.
The resort shuttle was packed with family - aunts, cousins, luggage everywhere, my mother already crying because we were all together.
Four months since I’d left Timothy. Four months of living in Daniela’s guest room, finding a rhythm: morning runs, helping at the gallery my friend owned, dinners with my sister where we didn’t talk about my marriage unless I brought it up first.
He’d stopped calling after the first month.
I told myself that was what I wanted.
“I heard the job wasn’t what they promised,” another aunt offered. “Or maybe she just missed us.”
“She missed something,” the first aunt said, and the aunts erupted in knowing laughter.
I stared out the window at the passing blur of palm trees and bougainvillea.
Michelle’s “Chicago job.” The one she’d texted the family group chat about two days after the anniversary party.
Got headhunted! Better money, better title!
I’d read it while sitting in Daniela’s guest room with mascara-stained cheeks, and I’d known it was a lie.
Couldn’t say why without explaining what I’d seen.
And now Michelle was back. And on the guest list for this weekend.
The van lurched to a stop.
“We’re here!” someone shouted from the front.
I looked up at the resort rising before us - white stucco, terracotta tiles, bougainvillea spilling over every balcony. The ocean glittered beyond the main building, impossibly blue.
My plan was simple: get through the celebrations - Aunt Rosa’s seventieth birthday today, cousin Alejandra’s wedding in three days - then tell my parents the truth before everyone flew back to the States.
Timothy couldn’t come, I’d told everyone.
Nobody asked follow-up questions.
Because Timothy never came to the family things. Not in five years.
***
My room was small and cool, the air conditioning humming softly against the afternoon heat.
I unpacked quickly, hanging the three dresses I’d brought, setting my toiletries in the bathroom. Then I sat on the edge of the bed and opened my jewelry case.
The ring was there.
Not my real ring - that was still on Timothy’s desk, as far as I knew. This was a cheap band I’d bought at a department store before the trip. Cubic zirconia. Close enough to fool most of the aunts from a distance.
I slid it onto my finger.
It was lighter than the original. Wrong in a way I could feel but couldn’t see.
It doesn’t matter, I told myself. This marriage is over anyway.
I just had to get through the weekend.
***
The birthday party was in full swing when I made it downstairs.
Music spilled across the courtyard. Drinks flowed freely.
My father was attempting to dance with three of his sisters at once, all of them laughing and swatting at him.
Aunt Rosa - my mother’s oldest sister, the one nothing in this family got past - sat in the center of it all like a queen on her throne, accepting embraces and gifts and declarations of love.
I grabbed a glass of champagne and found a quiet corner near the fountain. Just needed a moment to breathe. To prepare myself for three days of pretending.
The crowd near the entrance shifted.
I looked up.
Timothy walked in.
Two bouquets in his hands. One for my mother - peonies, her favorite, how does he know my mother’s favorite? - and one for Aunt Rosa, a massive spray of dahlias that made the old woman clap her hands with delight.
“You came!” Aunt Rosa was already rising from her chair, arms open. “Victoria, look, your husband came!”
The family erupted.
My father crossed the courtyard to clap Timothy on the back. My mother was crying - again - throwing her arms around him. The aunts descended like a flock of birds, all talking at once, touching his arm, his shoulder, pulling him toward the food.
I stood frozen, my champagne glass halfway to my lips, and watched my plan die where I stood.
He’s here.
He came.
And now I can’t tell anyone the truth without making a scene at Aunt Rosa’s birthday.
***
I found him near the service entrance twenty minutes later.
He was standing alone for once, the aunts temporarily distracted by a new round of karaoke. I grabbed his arm and pulled him through the nearest door - a staff bathroom, empty and sterile - and locked the door behind us.
“What are you doing here?”
My voice came out low and furious.
He turned to face me. He looked different from what I remembered. Thinner. Tired around the eyes. Nothing like the polished man who’d walked out of our bedroom a thousand times without looking back.
“I’m attending my wife’s family celebration.”
“You’re not welcome here.”
“Aunt Rosa would disagree.”
“You can’t just show up-”
“You watched me beg at your sister’s door.”
His voice dropped. The charm vanished. Something raw and bleeding crept into his eyes.
“You stood at that window and let me leave. You wanted me to suffer, so I came here to suffer where you can see.”
The words hit like a blow.
“It’s over, Timothy.” I forced my voice steady. “I was going to tell my parents after the celebrations, and you stole even that from me.”
His jaw tightened.
“Victoria-”
A knock on the door made us both jump. A small voice from outside: “Is it occupied?”
We looked at each other. A whole conversation without words.
His eyes asked: Do we fight? Do we make a scene?
Mine answered: Not here. Not now.
I unlocked the door and walked out holding his hand.
Like actors.
Like the married couple everyone believed we still were.
***
The party continued for hours.
I smiled. I danced. I accepted congratulations from relatives who didn’t know the ring on my finger was fake and the man at my side was a stranger.
Timothy played his part flawlessly. He danced with my aunts. He let my father teach him card games. He remembered everyone’s names - remembered birthdays and inside jokes and details I’d mentioned in passing years ago.
Where was this man for five years?
The question burned in my chest.
Where was this attention when I was begging for it?
Around ten o’clock, my mother found me near the bar.
“We fixed it,” she said, beaming, her face flushed with happiness.
“Fixed what?”
“The hotel was overbooked, but I talked to the front desk. They moved you two together.”
My blood went cold.
“One room?”
“One room, one bed.” She squeezed my hands. “Go. Be with your husband, mija.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but she was already gone, swept away by a cousin who wanted to toast something.
I stood alone in the middle of my family’s celebration and felt the trap close around me.
One room.
One bed.
Three days.
And a husband I hadn’t touched in months.