Epilogue
Lulu
Six months later
Manu was the first to cut through the exchanged pleasantries and ask what Lulu had been dying to ask for more than twenty years.
“Why didn’t you take us with you? When you left. Why did you leave us with him?”
Their mother, Alma, froze mid-movement as she was handing a plate with a slice of Cuban mango cake to Hattie. A shadow moved across her face, which was so altered that Lulu wouldn’t have recognized her if he’d passed her in the street. Then she seemed to catch herself and smiled carefully.
“I’m not going to give you the ‘I thought you were better off without me’ spiel.
” She reached for the coffeepot, then poured a cup, which she handed to Hattie.
“The truth is that drugs make you selfish and blind to other people’s needs.
I thought only of myself when I left. I just wanted to get away from it all.
” Leaning back on the couch, Alma seemed to take in her youngest son.
“I know that is probably not the answer you were hoping for, but that’s the truth. ”
“Other people,” Lulu snorted as Xavi tightened his hold around his shoulder.
“We’re her fucking sons.” They were sitting on a smaller coach across from his mother, the cushions flat and sagging from years of wear and tear.
Manu was in a recliner to his right with Hattie sitting on the armrest next to him, their fingers intertwined, Hattie’s engagement ring catching the odd ray of afternoon sunshine peeking through the blinds.
“I’m not hoping for anything,” Manu said, his voice clear and neutral. “That’s not why I’m here.” Their mother nodded, then reached for her cup of coffee and sipped the hot drink slowly.
“How long have you been living here, Mrs. Cisnero?” Hattie asked, looking around the sparsely decorated living room, the white walls bare, deprived of any kind of personal touch or memorabilia.
“Two years. I came to New Mexico four years ago after rehab, then two years ago I moved from Rio Rancho to Galisteo.” Their mother’s gaze remained on her cup, her voice low and monotone as she spoke, almost like she’d rehearsed her speech or someone had helped her prepare for her sons’ visit.
“How long were you in rehab for?” Xavi asked, squeezing Lulu’s shoulder.
Lulu was happy that Xavi and Hattie were taking the lead, because Lulu feared he would be unable to conceal the resentment in his voice or that he would break down altogether.
And fuck if he was going to break down in front of a woman who’d left him and Manu without ever looking back.
Alma lifted her gaze, looking from Manu to Lulu and then back to Manu again.
“The last time I was in rehab, it was for six months, but I’ve been in and out of it over the past two decades.
” She didn’t speak the words, but they were left hanging in the space between them—the reality that she could end up in rehab again.
That this was the life of Alma Cisnero, fifty-eight years old.
This was the life of someone who’d spent most of her adulthood battling an addiction that never rested, never unhooked its claws from her, not even for one second.
Lulu had spoken to his therapist about this several times.
He’d started going in January. Xavi had urged him to go after he’d started seeing a grief counselor himself, realizing that he’d never really allowed himself to mourn the death of not just his father but what he, Xavi, had lost in the fire, too.
The therapist had explained to Lulu that living with an addiction was a lifelong battle and that, as a relative, you had to make up your mind if it was something that you wanted to be a part of or not.
There was no cure for addiction; there was only one day at a time, one step at a time.
There would be no guarantees that even if their mother was sober when they found her, she would still be sober a week later or six months down the road.
But Manu was determined. He wanted to know.
‘I need to know,’ he’d told Xavi one afternoon in April, flipping a piece of paper between his fingers, which turned out to be their mother’s address and phone number.
‘Me and Hattie are thinking of moving to the UK, but I can’t go without knowing, hermano.
If I should miss her or mourn her, our mother. ’
Miss her or mourn her. Lulu had long suspected that their mother was dead, like their father.
That she, too, had succumbed to years of addiction and perhaps of living a life on the streets.
He was surprised at how easy it had been for Manu and Hattie to track her down when all they had was a name and a date of birth.
In the end, it had been an article in the Albuquerque Journal that had led them to Alma Cisnero.
Her name had been mentioned in a feature about a new rehab approach in New Mexico for longtime addicts.
“Do you think it will last? This time?” Lulu suddenly blurted, his heart trying to drill a way out of his chest with the way it was beating so rapidly.
“I don’t know.” Alma twisted her hands in her lap. “I hope so, but I’m not na?ve. The odds are against me. I’ve been sober for four years now, and I’ve found a job, but I know there are no guarantees in life. I have to live with the reality that I can always relapse.”
Lulu’s lips tingled. He hated how calm she was, how well-spoken, and…
and honest somehow. He’d expected to find a mess of a woman, a junkie with puncture marks on her arms and a trashed house, littered with garbage and decaying food.
It would’ve been easier to call her out and yell at her if that had been the case.
Instead, his mother sat there quietly, as if she were expecting a firing squad to raise their rifles at her any moment.
“I will always be an addict, Lulu.” Her voice was breathy now, tender almost. “And I will never expect you or Manu to forgive me. What I did was unforgivable, and still I’ve had to do exactly that.
Forgive myself. Because there can be no healing without redemption.
I cannot heal if I do not let go of the hate I have for myself. ”
“I don’t hate you,” Manu sniffled, wiping at his eyes, before burying his face against Hattie’s shoulder.
“He doesn’t,” Hattie said softly. “He misses you. A lot, and the not knowing has been like a ghost following Manu around wherever he goes.”
“I’m sorry,” Alma said, and the word was like a red flag to Lulu, anger building inside him. “You have no idea how sorry I am, Manulito.” Then she turned, her eyes, which were so similar in color to Lulu’s own, locking on to his. “I am truly sorry, Lulu.”
It’s not good enough! Lulu wanted to scream.
It will never be fucking good enough! But Xavi’s stoic, calming presence next to him held him back.
Xavi gave Lulu strength with his own quiet strength.
Lulu’s anger slowly dissipated as he dropped his gaze, and there was only a gaping hole left inside his heart where his mother had once occupied the space.
But that was a long time ago. That wound would heal, too.
Xavi would help him heal. Soon there would only be a dullness left, reminding Lulu that he had once had a mother and that he had loved her unconditionally, but that he’d lost her.
“You okay, baby?” Xavi leaned in, his breath warm and soothing against Lulu’s chin.
“You wanna go? Just say the word, and we’ll go.
” Lulu turned, his eyes meeting Xavi’s, huge and dark, and spilling over with love.
At the end of the day, when all this was over, he’d be going home with Xavi.
They’d be flying back home to Buffalo, to their apartment.
Then Xavi would read to him from his favorite books, while they planned their trip to Madrid.
Later, Lulu would drift off to the tap-tap-tap of Xavi’s fingers against the keyboard as he worked on his novel.
A novel that he was now going to finish because Lulu had told him to.
Because he wanted to read it, just like he wanted to read the next one and the one after that, too.
Because he loved Xavi’s words—in fact, he needed them like they were soul food or the air that Lulu breathed.
Xavi’s words, his voice, added color to the world, warmth, hope.
Yeah, soon Lulu would be back home again with Xavi, and everything would right itself in Lulu’s world.
“I’m okay, oso.” He wasn’t. He so wasn’t, but Lulu was trying his damn hardest to keep it together. Not for himself but for Manu.
“Okay.”
The room went quiet again, birdsong from the outside wafting through the slightly ajar window, a car alarm going off somewhere in the distance, then shrill laughter from some kids next door.
Manu resurfaced from Hattie’s shoulder, smiling teary-eyed at her while they seemed to share a silent conversation.
Eventually, Manu nodded slowly, then brushed his fingers along the flowery dress covering Hattie’s stomach.
“We’re having a baby,” Manu said softly, his eyes not leaving Hattie’s. “It’s a girl.”
A gasp tore from Lulu’s lips, then before he knew it, he flew from his seat and rushed to Manu’s side.
“What? What did you say?”
Manu turned, laughing at him, his eyes all watery.
“Hattie’s pregnant. You’re gonna be an uncle, hermano.
” An uncle. He was going to be a fucking uncle.
Probably long-distance, because it was almost certain that Manu and Hattie were moving back to her hometown in the UK.
But still, he was going to be a fucking uncle.
“You’re not fucking with me, Manu, are you?”
“Nope. I would never fuck with you about things like that.”
“We wouldn’t,” Hattie giggled, roses blooming across her cheeks.
“And it’s a girl?” Lulu whispered, looking at Hattie’s still flat stomach with awe.