Chapter 40
Forty
ISABEL
Mama is tight-lipped on our way to the restaurant.
I don’t have it in me to press her for answers.
All my words have fled me. There is only shame, deep shame, and an intense humiliation over all that I’ve done, all that I am.
They must’ve all seen that naked painting by now.
Taken photos of it, sent it to their group chats.
Outside of my shame and disgust and humiliation, I don’t know how to feel.
I don’t have the energy to process anything.
I just go through the motions, waste the day away laying in bed and wishing I could just fade into oblivion.
I’m grateful Amparo is away; I don’t know how I’d cope if I had to go to work.
I don’t even have the energy to reply to her check-ins.
I think of my notebooks. How right Natalia was about me.
I was foolish to write it all down, and even more foolish to think I could get away with it.
It doesn’t matter that I changed my ways halfway through; the fact that I’d ever done wrong speaks a lot about my character.
I was selfish, so, so selfish. I was cruel and vindictive and Kieran was hers, and I’d stolen him from right under her.
Still, I grieve my words. Those memories I will never get back, which I will slowly lose to time.
The restaurant is one of those dimly lit fine dining steakhouses that leave you with a bill over fifteen thousand pesos each time, minimum.
Already I’m suspicious; there’s no way Mama and I can afford to dine here.
Most of our feel-better dates are at chain restaurants, or a trip to the grocery to buy junk food.
The hostess leads us into a private room. Sitting at the head of the table is Alvaro Aranaz. He’s unmistakable; he looks exactly as he does in the family portraits hanging on the walls of their home. Dark hair, sharp nose, pale skin. Next to him is Natalia, whose smile drops when she sees me.
“What the hell is going on?” she snaps.
Alvaro places a hand on her gold bangle-adorned wrist. To Mama and me, he says, “Please, sit.”
Instinct tells me to run. Fight, flight, or freeze, and I’m so desperate to choose flight. But Mama nudges me forward, and my legs move on their own. I sit across Natalia, eyeing her warily. She scoffs and tosses her tablecloth on the table.
“Is this some kind of joke?” she asks her father.
“Natalia.” Alvaro’s tone is curt, chastising.
“Seriously, Dad. If you want a new charity project, there are so many other people who could use your—”
“Natalia!” Alvaro bellows. Natalia clamps her mouth shut and sinks in her seat. I’ve never seen her so cut down before. It almost makes me feel sorry for her.
Almost.
“I’ve invited the Martinezes today in hopes that we could reach an agreement.”
“We’re paying them off?” Natalia scoffs.
“We don’t want your money,” I’m quick to retort.
Alvaro holds out a hand toward me. “It’s not that. Please, let me speak.” He turns to Natalia again. “You’ve acted out of line, Natalia. I’ve been told exactly how you treated our guest—”
“But Dad—”
“What was our agreement? You can host your friends at home, and your brothers and I will stay out of your way, if and only if you include Isabel.”
“And I still don’t understand why. Why? What do you even know about her? Do you know who she is? She made my life miserable, Dad. She was, like, trying to write a whole book disparaging me.”
“No, I wasn’t,” I snap. “I mean—I was doing research. On the world you live in.” I can feel Mama staring at me.
“But then I realized how fucked up that was and—” I hate how my voice breaks, how I sound so close to crying.
I wish I could be as firm as Natalia, as strong.
I mean, she wasn’t wrong. I came with the intention to mine her life and her friends for inspiration.
Maybe I’m just as bad as she says I am. Maybe she sees something in me, something damaged and disgusting, that I don’t.
Alvaro drops his head. He sighs. “Natalia—”
“I’m your daughter! Why won’t you listen to me? I can’t believe you’re doing this!”
“Natalia, please—”
“It’s like you hate me—”
“Natalia—”
“She stole my friends—”
“Nat—”
“I’m your daughter!”
“You are not the only one!”
Silence descends on the table. It blankets us, making it hard to breathe. Natalia scoffs in disbelief. “What?”
“You are not the only one,” Alvaro repeats. He glances over to Mama, then to me. The gears click in my head. In Natalia’s.
Natalia starts to laugh, still in disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Her?”
Alvaro nods.
“Does Mom know?”
Alvaro nods again.
Natalia screws me with a look of disgust and hatred. I know what she’s thinking, because I’m thinking the same thing.
Sisters? How the fuck can we be sisters?
“Fuck this.” She pushes off from the table and leaves.
“Natalia! Nat—” Alvaro groans and drops his tablecloth on the table. He laces his fingers together and rests his head over his knuckles. I sit there, shivering with this revelation.
How is this even possible? Mama had sold me stories of my father, of someone she fell deeply in love with, but whose duty called him on to bigger things. I never liked that story; what could possibly be bigger than his own family? But now I know. Now I understand.
Who am I in the face of a billion-dollar company like the Aranaz Corporation? Who are we?
“I want to go home,” I say, vision blurring with my tears.
“Isabel.” Mama’s hand touches mine. Her tone is soft, pleading. “Please. Hear him out.”
“No. I want to go now.”
“The driver will take you,” Alvaro says, his shoulders slumped. Asshole. Asshole, asshole, asshole. You’ve been here this whole time. You knew about me the whole time. You fed me to the dogs. You didn’t care about me. I will never forgive you. You will never be my father. Never, ever.
I’m passing through the doorway when Alvaro’s voice stops me.
“Isabel,” he says. I clench my eyes shut. I should go. I should walk away, not give him any more time of day.
All the power has drained out of the formidable Alvaro Aranaz’s face. Instead, there sits a middle-aged man, looking exhausted, dare I say even heartbroken.
“What?” I snap.
He fixes me with his gaze. For the first time, I recognize myself in them.
The downturned eyes, irises the shade of a deep, dark brown.
I’ve always wondered why I hadn’t inherited Mama’s hazel eyes; now I know.
For the rest of my life, I will have to live with this: the knowledge that my eyes and everything it sees aren’t my own, but a gift from the man who abandoned us.
Alvaro draws in a deep breath. “I have made a great many mistakes in my life,” he says. “But you are not one of them.”
I wish I had something snarky to say back. Some one-liner to leave him with that he’ll turn over in his head forever and ever, haunted before he sleeps and right as he wakes up. Instead, my lip quivers. My vision blurs. I’m frozen in place until Mama’s warm hand clasps mine.
“Come on, anak. Let’s go.”
She leads me out of there, away from trouble, away from hurt, and takes me all the way home.