Chapter 29
29
SUMMER BEFORE COLLEGE
CHE AND JULI DECIDE TO host an end-of-summer party before we head off to college. “Feel free to invite your friends,” they say. “But absolutamente ninguna bebida alcohólica . Okay?”
We nod vigorously. Then we drive to 7-Eleven and buy three handles of tequila.
In the hours leading up to the party, Manuel and I circle each other like nervous fireflies. We stack Solo cups and spread garbage bags throughout the basement, always sticking close to each other but careful never to touch.
Che and Juli keep a margarita machine in their basement closet. They pull it out whenever important-looking people arrive to stay in their guest room. On hot summer days, they make virgin daiquiris for Manuel and me to sip while we lie on plastic sun chairs out back. We dig out the machine now, while his parents are out buying hors d’oeuvres. We pour in a pound of ice, an entire bottle of premade margarita mix, and two handles of tequila.
Just as the final drop of alcohol falls into the swirling mixture, Valentina walks into the basement carrying a stack of paper plates. Manuel and I freeze. I’m holding the empty bottle. It dangles idiotically over the hole into the machine. We stare at each other, all three of us.
Then Valentina winks and keeps walking.
Tonight is special. Tomorrow, Manny leaves to live in a place I don’t belong. I can go see him, but I’ll always be a visitor, semi-real, existing in finite chunks of one weekend at a time. Never permanent. Just a friend from home.
For twenty minutes, the party is wonderful. For twenty minutes, Manuel and I guzzle frozen margaritas and dance to ABBA in the backyard. For twenty minutes, I get steadily drunker as we whirl about each other, sometimes grazing palms, sometimes brushing bare feet. Then…
Then come the children.