Chapter 35
Thirty-Five
“ I told her not to make a fuss,” Tori said when they pulled up to her parents’ house on Sunday afternoon.
Cars lined every available inch of space on the residential street—and probably the connecting ones too. They had left a space open in the driveway, and Mia imagined Rita warning everyone not to park there. Her heart soared at the feeling of being welcomed home again.
“I like a fuss.” Mia leaned across Tori’s center console and kissed her on the cheek before jumping out of the passenger side.
Flowers in hand, Mia led the way around the house to the side gate. She was already dancing to the salsa music serenading the entire neighborhood when she pulled the tricky door open and let Tori inside first. For the sake of decency, she tried not to leer but Tori looked so good in her salmon shorts and thin white T-shirt.
Her mouth watered at the unmistakable aroma of a whole pig that had probably been roasting since dawn. The air was thick with the scent of the sour orange and garlic marinade Mia could practically taste. She hadn’t had lechón like that in so long, and she hoped it was nearly ready.
“They’re here!” someone called from under an even bigger tent than usual.
Cheers and clapping erupted, drowning out Marc Anthony’s crooning. And then Mia was swallowed by a wave of crushing hugs and warm kisses—the kind of reception that made her think maybe she should uproot her life more often.
A few hours later, Mia had already eaten, but couldn’t resist a bite of crunchy pork skin Tori’s dad had saved for her. Two sweating plastic cups of white sangria in hand, Mia found Tori sitting with her uncles.
One of them was telling some exaggerated story about having caught a marlin while fishing before his son corrected him that it was a barracuda and he’d screamed like a baby while getting the hook out of its mouth to throw it back in. Tori’s uncle retaliated by telling everyone how the kid had accidentally sexted his mother instead of his girlfriend.
Mia hadn’t laughed that hard in months. Maybe years. Maybe ever. Sitting on Tori’s lap, surrounded by so much love it was almost too much, Mia had never felt so deeply herself. And then Rita caught the corner of her eye.
As soon as Mia glanced in her direction, Tori’s mom gestured for her to come inside the house. Not many things had changed since Mia had last been in Tori’s childhood home, including being relegated to the backyard during big gatherings. The only time anyone went inside was to use the guest bathroom next to the sliding glass door.
But as she was summoned inside, it was clear Rita wasn’t worried about muddy shoes on her white tile floors—not like usual. Scanning her face from across the yard, Mia couldn’t read her expression. That alone was concerning because Rita was always so joyful. With a kiss to Tori’s temple, Mia told her she’d be right back and hoped it was true.
Mia slid the glass door shut behind her, and the party noise cut off so suddenly it was like leaving it all behind. Outside, it was all heat and laughter and clinking dominoes. Inside, the house was cold and quiet.
Rita called for her from the back of the house, and Mia made herself move toward her. Each step was heavier than the last. A thousand possibilities ran through Mia’s mind, and none of them were good.
Down a narrow hallway, toward Rita’s bedroom, Mia prepared to defend herself. Running through all the wrong words, she wanted to explain that she wasn’t some straight girl playing with Tori’s emotions. Explain that she’d never meant to hurt her when they were kids, that she would never have done it on purpose.
Sitting on the edge of an ornate bed dressed in a bright floral print, Rita was holding her hands in her lap. “ Ven , mija . Sit down with me.”
Nothing about Rita’s demeanor put Mia at ease. She was sure the woman was going to tell her—with a heavy heart—to get lost. Fighting the desire to puke, Mia sat and prepared to be told what a self-centered asshole she’d been. Prepared not to argue with the facts.
“I’m sure this is the wrong time,” Rita started when Mia sat next to her. “I don’t mean to ruin your welcome home party,” she added, like she wasn’t the one who’d planned it.
The thought made Mia relax her shoulders. Why would Rita plan a whole thing for her, just to tell her she didn’t approve? She swallowed hard enough to return the moisture to her mouth, sweaty palms pressed against her jeans.
“Tori told me about your losses,” she breathed like she hated speaking the words, eyes already glistening when she met Mia’s. “I am so sorry.” She reached over and took one of Mia’s hands in both of hers.
A familiar bang of cold, gnawing emptiness seized Mia’s gut. She resisted the primal need to survive by pushing it away and remained in her body. Remained at Rita’s side when she recognized the pain in her eyes.
“Tori would have had an older sister if the universe had been kinder to us,” she said in a voice so thin it shattered before she finished her sentence. “I was just into my second trimester… And, well…the loss was…”
“Brutal,” Mia guessed, hot tears running down her face, but she didn’t dare let go of Rita’s hands to deal with them.
Rita nodded. “Grief is already such a complicated thing,” she said after a while, shaking her head as if musing to herself. “Loss is the only thing we know with certainty is going to happen to us, and we spend no time learning how to cope with it. It’s like if we pretend it’s not there, it won’t come.” She took a breath. “And grieving the loss of a life still growing inside of you… Well, there are no tools for that. No language for it. Better to hide it away. Never speak of it.” She said it like she was ashamed of herself. “But it is just as important to grieve that loss as any other.”
“I wasn’t so far along,” Mia said, voice cracking.
Rita squeezed her and held her in her gaze. “It might be hard for some to understand how much you can love someone so very small.” Her tears fell and her voice trembled but she didn’t look away. “How you can channel all the same unconditional love and hopes and dreams into them just like you would a baby you can hold.”
Mia blinked against the sting of tears that came too fast. A kind of comfort she couldn’t have expected settled into her chest even as her heart broke for herself. For Rita.
She let herself feel the full weight of what she’d lost. Not in pieces, not in private, not through clenched teeth—but all at once, in front of someone who already understood. Her grip tightened around Rita. When she opened her mouth to speak, all she produced was a sob.
Pulling Mia into her arms, Rita held her the way Mia wished her own mother could. Rocking from side to side, gently rubbing her back, Rita let her cry until she finally reached the bottom of what had seemed like an endless pit of grief.
When Mia finally spoke, her voice was hoarse and barely above a whisper. “People move on and forget. They’re allowed to, I guess. The world keeps spinning. They go back to work. They stop asking.” She pulled back just enough to look at Rita, her eyes red and raw and mirroring Mia’s pain. “But I can’t forget. I can’t escape my own body. I can’t stop feeling this emptiness. This, like, hyper-awareness of what’s missing. Like a phantom limb, or, I don’t know.” Her jaw and chest and throat ached from crying, and she was suddenly so tired she wondered how strange it would be if she laid down.
Rita didn’t flinch. She didn’t offer a correction or a platitude. She just reached up and brushed a strand of hair from Mia’s forehead, her touch so gentle it undid her all over again.
“Talk about it every day if you need to,” she said, sharp but warm in that way only moms seemed to manage. “Call me crying at two in the morning if that’s what your heart needs. Sit at my table and say their name over and over until it doesn’t burn as much. I’ll be here, mija . Always. No matter what. I will always love you like my very own.”
Mia’s breath caught in her throat. It was the kind of promise she hadn’t known she’d been waiting for.
She didn’t speak again right away. There was nothing to say. She just leaned in and let her head rest on Rita’s shoulder, letting herself be held. And for the first time since the losses—since the bleeding, the hospital, the silence—she let her body go soft. Let herself be comforted.
For the first time in so long, healing felt possible. Like she might really mend the gaping emptiness rather than just pave over it.
But even as warmth settled into the long abandoned spaces in her heart, something cold and familiar curled at the edges of her thoughts. Mia sat up, picking at a loose thread on the hem of her sleeve while she tried to formulate her confession.
“I don’t know if I can try again,” she admitted, hating the truth she’d been avoiding. “Not just physically. Emotionally. Spiritually. I don’t know if I’ll ever be brave enough to risk that kind of pain again.”
Rita nodded, like she’d known that was coming.
“And if it’s not me,” Mia went on, “if it’s Tori… I don’t know if I could handle that either. Watching her go through it. The fear, the waiting. What if it happens again?” She swallowed. “What if I can’t give her what she wants? What if I keep her from being a mother?”
The fears had been sitting in her chest for weeks—months—but saying it out loud made it real. Made it impossible to run from. She looked at Rita and waited for her disapproval.
Instead, empathy lined the corners of her eyes. “Mia,” she said with infinite patience. “Tori has never once talked to me about wanting children.”
Mia shook her head, but didn’t get the chance to argue.
“Not once. Not when she was little, not as a teenager, not as an adult. She’s never said she didn’t want them either, but it’s just never been a thing she focused on. You know what she has talked to me about?”
Mia dropped her attention to her lap. Rita waited until she looked at her to continue.
“You. Over and over. Even when you weren’t talking. Even when she thought she’d never see you again.” Rita reached for her again, interlacing their fingers while she spoke. She was so sure. So steady.
“If that time ever comes, if you two decide you want to grow your family, there are so many ways to do it. Not all of them require biology. And none of them require rushing. You hear me?”
Mia nodded, but her chest still ached.
“You don’t have to carry anything alone, mija. You don’t have to have all the answers today. Or tomorrow.”
Tears welled again, but this time they didn’t sting. They just sat there, blurring her vision.
“I just don’t want to be the reason she doesn’t get something she wants.” Mia spoke the last of her fears.
“And what if what she wants most is you?” Rita asked rhetorically, her lips quirking into a smile like she’d already seen the future and knew it was going to be okay.
Mia didn’t respond. She just let her head rest on Rita’s shoulder again. Allowed herself to feel hopeful.
Rita gave her one more squeeze, then leaned back and dabbed at the corner of her eyes with the edge of her thumb like it was no big deal. Like they hadn’t just shared something sacred.
“Now,” she said, voice lighter, “go tell Tori we’re out of ice.”
Laughing the kind of delirious laugh that only came with exhaustion, Mia gave her a knowing look. “Ice, huh?” She was still smiling. “Now?”
“Of course! When else?” she teased, walking the short distance to the on-suite where they both tried to hide grief’s fingerprints on their flushed faces and swollen eyes.
Before she walked out to find Tori, Mia gave Rita the hug she would have given her own mother. With a heart floating with gratitude, Mia whispered thank you , even if the words could never be enough to match what Rita had given her.