Chapter 2
Istroll inside my aunt and uncle’s three-bedroom apartment on La Vida Buena’s private floor without knocking. The smell of peppers and onions, plantains and meat, triggers my growling stomach.
“Hola.” I stop in the kitchen doorway.
My Tía Julia, a big-breasted, curvy woman with soft brown eyes, a round, pleasant face, and short, dyed-red hair, smiles at me and holds up a plate in offer. “Toma, nena.”
“Gracias, Titi.” I grab a knife and fork from the silverware drawer before heading into the dining room and sitting at the table next to Mateo and across from my annoyingly beautiful prima, Haydée.
Wavy black hair, long, sleek body, perfect adorable nose, full lips, and wide, tapered golden-brown eyes… At eighteen she’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen. Honestly, she looks more like Mateo’s sister than mine.
They both look like Tío Manuel, seated at the head of the table. People assume because my uncle and Papi were twins, growing up with him was a comfort. Nope. He might have Papi’s short and wavy black hair, Papi’s wide and generous smile, Papi’s playful black eyes and tall, lean build, but not Papi’s dreamy optimism and humor. My uncle is serious and moody.
“Hola,” I say, whispering grace before shoveling spicy frijoles into my mouth. I get holas from everyone but Mateo, who holds a fist out to me. I pound it with my own, and he continues eating.
“Mira, who goes to an island to work out?” Haydée asks, taking the offensive. “People go to resorts to eat, drink, and fuck.”
“Haydée,” my tía reprimands, taking her seat at the table.
My cousin rolls honey-brown eyes. “She’s trying to make this place lamer than it already is.”
I have no idea what Haydée sees when she looks at La Vida Beuna. Certainly not the good life the name mentions. “There’s already plenty of places in San Juan for people to do those other things. That’s why we’re having an issue attracting guests.”
“We’re having trouble,” Haydée says, “because this place is old, broken, and dated. Now that we have the money, we can update it.”
Though my prima and I are on two different wavelengths, I try to explain my vision. “Imagine a wellness center with a state-of-the-art gym, a full spa, and a nutrition bar that would attract not only tourist but locals.”
Haydée snorts. “Good luck getting some abuelas to come to your classes. No estás flaca anymore.”
For a moment, my mouth works soundlessly. Her saying I’m not skinny anymore knocks logic on its ass. I get that she’s eighteen and cynical, but everyone at this table knows the truth. A combination of not having the skills to deal with my parents’ deaths and thinking I needed to look a certain way to find love had led me down a very dark road.
I wasn’t skinny; I’d stopped eating. At fourteen. If I did eat, I’d vomit it out. I had so very little to eat that my aunt would bring huevos y frijoles into my bedroom in the morning. I’d eat to satisfy her, then go to the bathroom and throw it up. This had gone on for almost a year before Titi had insisted I talk to someone. That’s when I’d begun to unravel what I’d been doing to myself and why.
Mateo drops his fork with a clatter. “Ie… Deh,” he pronounces Haydée’s name slowly. “Apologize.”
Red rides up Haydée’s beautiful features. “Lo siento,” she says, and her apology feels genuine. “I didn’t mean anything by it. Verdad, your classes are attracting some pretty cool people.”
Even her lame defense of me is rooted in her vision of success—attracting “cool” people.
“Pero, not enough people,” Tío Manuel says, pointing at me with a fork full of mofongo.
Seeing an opportunity, I point back. “That, right there.”
He blinks at me, holding the fork an inch from his open mouth.
I jump into the silence. “The recipe is lighter and healthier. Tía and I worked it out together. You didn’t notice the change, but now you’re eating better.”
My uncle turns betrayed eyes on my aunt. “Que me has hecho?”
She pats the air with her sturdy brown hands. “Dramatico. I’ve done nothing to you. It is like Yolanda says—healthier fun.”
He grumbles, but Titi turns to face me. “Pero, Yolanda, you didn’t create this recipe alone. That’s why it worked so well. It’s why La Vida Buena works so well. Before your parents passed, we all worked together.”
I see exactly where she’s going, but before I can stop her, she continues with, “Why don’t you, Haydée, and Mateo work together?”
The room snaps silent. Haydée and I stare at each other. Her eyes are rimmed in black eyeliner. Her makeup is perfecto and practically everlasting. Just another way we don’t mix. Oil and water.
Calmly, I say, “It’s not practical to try to mesh my business plans with Haydée’s desire to bump elbows with rich people so she can sell them her fashions.”
“?Sinvergüenza!” Haydée shouts. And we’re off. Our complaints clash with the other’s, harsh words elbowing each other in the throat as we raise our voices.
“Cállate!” my uncle shouts. His booming command silences us. He puts down his fork, straightens his spine. “Julia’s idea is a brilliant one. Compromise is how Angel and I managed to keep the family business together. You will do the same. A resort that combines fitness with spring break fun.”
“It won’t work.”
“All of you will make it work,” Tío says, nodding thoughtfully, “Julia and I discussed it. Compromise is the heart of love. To teach everyone here this lesson, I’m giving Haydée my shares of the hotel.”
My mouth works soundlessly. A disbelieving ache erupts in my chest. In giving Haydée majority shares of the hotel, my aunt and uncle are essentially putting my cousin in charge of La Vida Buena. “No. You… you can’t. She’s eighteen.”
“Verdad. And you’re twenty-one. Your papi and I weren’t much older than all of you when our parents handed us ownership. This will work.”
“I’ll do it,” Haydée says. “But I get to sell my fashions at the resort store.”
I slam my mouth closed. I’m so stunned by this turn of events I can’t latch onto any argument.
“Oye, I’m in,” Mateo says.
I whirl on him, feeling betrayed. We’d agreed, because he’s finally decided to give up the drums and go to school, that I could make our decisions for the hotel. “Mateo?”
His eyes soften. “Come on, querida. Papi would want us to compromise. Don’t get so rooted in your ideas that you can’t make a simple change for the good of the familia.”
“Simple, my culo.” I close my eyes. “Now that you’ve gotten your scholarship, you won’t even be here.”
“I’ll be here when you need me,” he promises softly. “Georgia is not so far.”
A knot rises and fills my throat. It’s so large, so present, that even breathing around it requires effort. I’m being selfish. Everyone else wants this and they need me to agree—to make it okay to ignore my vision for La Vida Buena. Silent and frustrated, I nod to an agreement I don’t really want, but can’t fight.
Not when it’s all of them against me.
“Perfecto,” my aunt says.
Despite the relief I sense winging around the table, it seems as if a door closes on my future, the resort, and the way we could’ve influenced our corner of the world.
* * *
The problemwith being an optimist in Puerto Rico is that you open yourself up to being kicked in the teeth. Feeling wounded, I lean against the roof’s half wall and glare out over the ocean. The waves shush against the shore as multiple sailboats bob in the water.
La luna shimmers brightly in a pure night sky, reflecting moonlight across the ocean. Usually, a full moon calms me. Not only because Papi and I would come up here to watch her, but because, on the night of my parents’ funeral, I came to the roof and found a full moon. Knowing nothing of the lunar cycle, her presence comforted me. It was a sign, it seemed, that love endured.
Tonight, even la luna can’t help.
Mateo. How could you? I grind my teeth and close my eyes, smelling the salt and ocean and mechanical oil from the ancient HVAC unit buzzing behind me.
Rage, accompanied by a pessimism I don’t often engage in, chokes me. It rises up my throat, and before I’ve recognized I’ve given myself over to it and let it have its voice, I am full-out howling at the moon. Yep, like a werewolf.
I howl like the need to vocalize my pain has been living inside me for thirteen years, since the day of the accident. The day I’d waited an hour for my parents to pick me up from school. I howl for the hurt of that never-ending wait and the absolute heartbreak when I’d seen my tía park her car and run toward me.
I howl so loud and so long that it takes me a moment to realize someone is howling along with me. Someone just as loud, just as broken, just as fierce.
My howl cuts off with a start. I swing around, facing the person behind me.
Arms raised, a red-and-blue blanket fisted in his hands so it spreads out behind him like wings, Easton howls into the night. His sleeveless T-shirt rides high, unbelted low-hanging cargo shorts revealing packed abs and the tops of black boxers,. Tears stream down his handsome face.
My heart crashes into my throat. That’s what my pain and frustration feel like. He gets it.
He stops a moment after I do. Both of us are breathing heavily. His arms drop. His head drops. He whispers, “I fuck everything up.”
I’m not sure if he means the yoga on the beach, the crazy howling, or maybe his life.
“You sure do.” The sound of my sore, raspy voice startles us both. His head shoots up. I smile at him, a wild and crazy grin made from a wild and crazy energy. “Now the other werewolves will never show up.”
He winks. “Who says they haven’t?”
I laugh and something inside of me releases, breaks wide open. I have no idea where this frantic fever comes from, but, two steps forward, and I am kissing him.
I am devouring his full, greedy lips, waiting for a cease-and-desist.
I don’t get one. His tongue pushes into my mouth, hot and probing and desperate. I can taste the alcohol on him. It tastes good.
The kiss starts in our mouths and works its way down our bodies. Necks angling to get deeper. Chest pressing against chest. Hands and arms searching, achieving purchase, stroking. Pelvis to pelvis, a crash of his hardness to my soft wetness.
The howling is now internal. A want so raw and needy, my gyrating hips have a mind of their own. I will literally do it on this roof with him.
He pulls back with a jerk. His lips yank from mine. His hands release my ass and drop me back to my stunned feet. He takes a step back and then, as if to hold me at bay, rests his hands on my shoulders.
I’m shaking, uncertain and breathless with desire.
“I’m sorry,” he says, pushing off my shoulders, which has the result of sending me back a step. “I don’t do this.”
“Kiss women?”
He barks a laugh. “Kiss women who are crying in pain, while I’m too shitfaced to do the right thing.”
Rejection takes control of my tongue. “Seems like you’d do that a lot, considering how often I’ve seen you drunk.”
He brushes a shaky hand through his hair. “Yeah, well. I don’t.”
And with that, he turns on his heel and stomps away, leaving me thirsty and alone, sad and confused.
Basically, worse off than before he showed up. I cringe when I notice him try the door and realized it won’t open.
He’s right. He does fuck everything up.