Reservations Required by Estela Bernal

Author:Estela Bernal
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arte Público Press
Published: 2021-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

At Tiny’s Hardware I told the woman at the counter I needed some paint.

“Tiny, customer needs some paint,” she yelled over her shoulder.

With a name like Tiny, I didn’t know what to expect, but the man who came out to help me was just regular size. Since he was much younger than the woman, I assumed he was her son. Anyway, I wasn’t there to figure out that puzzle.

“Paint’s back here,” Tiny said. “What’d you have in mind?”

“I want to paint my apartment,” I said.

Tiny led me to a wall with a bunch of color charts. I went back and forth between sea-foam and cool mint before finally settling on the mint.

After I sort of answered Tiny’s questions about the size of the area I’d be painting, he said, “One gallon might do it, then. You need a roller, brush, tape?”

“Yes, all of that.”

I hurried home with the supplies and dropped them off at the apartment before running down to the restaurant a whole fifteen minutes before it opened for dinner.

“You fall asleep?” Guerrero asked with a smile.

He had already chopped a mountain of onions and was starting on the tomatoes. A pot of beans was bubbling on a back burner and rice was sizzling in a huge pan next to it.

“I’m thinking of painting the apartment while the patio’s being built,” I said.

“You need help?”

“No, thanks. I think I can do it.”

“You’re a stubborn one,” he said.

I don’t know about stubbornness, but showing up at SCC was pretty gutsy, almost as bold as leaving El Paso on my own. What did I really know about this guy? Was he like most people who only showed their good side before you really got to know them? And did I really believe he’d bother with someone like me? Had he really flirted with me, or had my imagination gone a little haywire? Either way, I couldn’t stop thinking about him.

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