Chapter 6
W HEN I TOLD M ERI I WAS GOING TO SPEND A MONTH IN Puerto Rico, she went through all the stages of grief in a matter of seconds. There was denial, anger, bargaining. “I don’t believe it. You’re lying. This isn’t fair! I’m going to be saving people’s lives and nothing like this will ever happen to me. Take me with you. I could be your stylist. I’ll carry your suitcase.”
I’m hopeful she’s moved on to acceptance as she swings a straightening iron close to my ear.
“That’s so much better, thank you.” I admire the half of my head that’s sleek and controlled.
Meri looks at her handiwork and smiles at my reflection in the mirror. When I attempt to do this myself, I end up with visibly jagged edges where I’ve held the iron for too long. I look like an anime character.
I admire her reflection lovingly in the mirror. Her dark brown hair falls over her shoulders, and a few lighter-colored strands frame her face. My little sister always looks so put-together. I don’t know how she finds the time.
Just being with her calms me. Her room is the same size as mine but feels cozier and more lived in. The furniture is larger and fills up the space, so it wraps you up with its four-poster framed bed and thick warm throws. Mine has more of an IKEA showroom vibe to it. In my defense, I’ve been planning to move out for years but keep pushing the date. Secretly, I’d hoped to be in my own place by my thirtieth birthday, but that’s only six months away. At the rate I’m going, forty seems more feasible.
Meri divvies up a new patch of my hair to work with and eyes me suspiciously in the mirror. “So. Culebra Island, huh?”
“That’s right.” I do my best to seem unaffected.
“How are you feeling about it?”
“Great.” She’s got enough going on right now. The last thing I want to do is worry her. No need to tell her that for the last two weeks, I’ve simultaneously prepared for the trip and hoped a meteor would fall at just the right angle at the Miami International Airport, so there aren’t any injuries but it’s also impossible for anyone to get on a flight for a very long time.
Meri eyes me tentatively. “Really? So you’re not feeling sad or any kind of way you want to talk about.”
“Nope. I’m really happy about it. But it’s not like we’ll have much free time. We’ll be in the studio every day.”
She stops what she’s doing and looks into my eyes, holding the straightening iron up in the air. “And James is your cameraman,” she says, getting back to work on my hair. “Won’t that be awkward?”
“Why? Everything’s gone back to how it was before we dated.”
Meri purses her lips like she doesn’t believe me.
When Maureen explained we could afford only a one-person show, I immediately thought of James. He can run camera and sound, and he owns his equipment so we’d save money on rentals. I didn’t even give it much thought. James was the logical choice. So what if we haven’t had an actual conversation about anything other than work since we broke up two months ago?
“Seriously, I just want to make something beautiful,” I tell Meri. “This was my idea, you know? To shoot an in-depth making of an album.”
For the past few weeks, I’ve watched a lot of music documentaries and I’ve decided I want to make something original and inspired. No tired interviews of artists sitting by a soundboard or a wall of speakers, no boring shots of them recording in a booth that never feel spontaneous.
I want to capture the magic. Do I wish I were going to be doing it with another artist? Yes. But I’m not going to let that minor setback get in the way of doing a great job. “You can’t get another first and ten without a couple of fumbles,” I say more to myself than to Meri. She reaches over me to grab her phone off the dresser and taps away diligently, hiding the phone suspiciously away from me.
“What is that?” I try to get a glimpse of her phone.
“Nothing.”
I try to snatch the phone from her, but she pulls it back.
“Here, I’ll read it,” she says and clears her throat. “‘Meri, keep your eyes on the prize, not the bumps on the road,’” she declares in a monotone voice. “‘Runners don’t look back, because if they do, they’ll lose the race, or fall, or both.’”
My mouth drops and then I start to laugh. I’ve sent my sister a ton of inspirational quotes, but I didn’t know she’d been keeping a list.
“Is that supposed to be my voice?”
“‘The future is a risk, but “no risk, no glory.” And trust me, “glory” is always waiting just around the bend.’ That one’s weird, but I love it.”
I can’t help but smile, then moan. “Fine, I’ll stop sending them.”
“No, please. Never stop,” she says.
When she finishes my hair, she combs through it with her fingers. “I can’t believe it. You’re going back to our roots.” Meri sounds satisfied. “How did Dad’s song go? He used to sing it all the time.” She starts humming the tune and immediately I feel a familiar ache in my chest. I want to tell her to stop humming it. Instead, I stand and pretend to look for something in her closet.
It’s complicated. I feel like someone’s playing tug-of-war with my heart. There’s the pull of finally getting to see the place our dad was from and loved so much. Wrote a whole song about. But then there’s a yanking in the other direction, because I’m not sure I’m ready to see it without him. His biggest dream, other than hearing one of his songs play on the radio, was for us to go there together. But we were always too busy or too broke for a vacation.
“Do you want to borrow something?” Meri asks excitedly.
I check out the multitude of colors and patterns in her closet. “No thanks, I’m all packed.” Whenever Meri finds me something while out thrifting that fits and I feel good in, she’s noticeably bouncier and her eyes light up. She spins around the room, eyeing me from different angles, hoping I haven’t changed my mind. It’s the sweetest thing. You’d think she’d just cured me of some ailment. Though I do believe, for her, feeling your best does have healing powers.
“How are you so chill? You’re about to spend a month with René. I wouldn’t be able to sit still. I wouldn’t be able to sleep.”
I can understand what she means. At work, René’s groupies have revealed themselves to me over the past few weeks. The head of HR and even hard-core music buffs have come by my desk to chat about him and what I know about the new album.
“Why do you actually like him?” I sit back down on the bed, facing Meri.
“What do you mean? He’s a bonbon. A chocolatey sweet bonbon.”
“But you don’t know anything about him. No one does.”
“I know a few things,” she says slyly, like she has a secret. “Check it out.” She digs her laptop out from under a stack of textbooks on her nightstand, finds what she’s looking for, and turns the computer screen toward me. It’s a picture of René kissing Natalia, two-time Latin Grammy–winning pop star from Colombia. They collaborated on a duet two summers ago and ended up dating for a while after that. It’s a selfie, so one of them must have been holding the phone while they were kissing.
“Where did you get this?” I ask. While I came across a few paparazzi shots, I didn’t find anything this intimate online.
“I’m just a really thorough fan,” she announces self-righteously. “Fine. This was on Natalia’s social media. I’m always on the lookout for pictures like this, and save a screenshot before they get deleted. Which happens every time celebrities break up and start seeing someone else.” She pulls up another photo of Natalia and René getting ready for a night out. “But I don’t share them with anyone,” she says, defending herself.
“So you’re a stalker who also respects their privacy?”
Meri doesn’t hesitate. “Exactly. And if you want to send me some more for my collection, that would be so appreciated.” I shake my head, so she continues, “You’re going to have so much access, Dani. I’ve never asked you for anything like this before.”
“Because that would be unprofessional.” Inside, I feel something soften. Early on, just after we lost our dad, I felt Meri trying to keep up with me, and grow up ahead of her time. So, stalking aside, I kind of love when Meri does silly, immature things like this. Like when she asked for sparkly pink roller skates last Christmas.
Meri clicks on the next image. René and Natalia, embracing by a pool in their bathing suits. I read they were inseparable for a while, until he cheated on her. Big surprise. I linger on the image longer than I would like. He seems so happy.
I close the computer and a wave of exhaustion hits me. I shut my eyes and try not to think about the overwhelmingly difficult task ahead.
When I open them, Meri’s bent over and looking through a stack of papers by her bed. After a moment, she sighs.
“What’s going on?” I ask gently.
Her eyes tear up. “I bombed it. I failed the practice test.”
“Oh no. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s just like I’m blocked or something. I don’t know what to do.”
“What about the tutor?”
She blinks and takes a deep breath. “It’s so expensive.”
I wrestle to get the words out. “No, it’s not. Let’s do it.” The tutor I found boasted a high success rate of helping students pass the nursing entrance exam. Meri comes closer each year, but has never secured the minimum scores for acceptance. The next test is three months away and I can’t, for the life of me, imagine how she will feel if she fails it again.
“Thank you. Maybe just for a month.” Meri sighs.
“Whatever you need, seriously.”
Using Meri’s laptop, I enter my credit card information on the tutor’s website, and it’s a relief when it goes through. Instantly, I feel the purpose and satisfaction that come whenever I can help my family. Now I just have to keep it together the next four weeks. Make sure I’ll still have a job when the bill comes in.