We Came to Welcome You by Vincent Tirado

Author:Vincent Tirado
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2024-09-03T00:00:00+00:00

The Chismoso

Saturday morning Sol was back at the nursing home. The recreation room was empty as usual, and the television was off this time. The nurses stepped around occasionally to check in on them. If they were worried that Sol and her father would end up in another screaming match, they didn’t show it. In fact, Sol prepared for this by bringing a container of plátanos maduros. The fried plantains were her father’s favorite, and she knew he wouldn’t turn them down.

If only he knew not to talk with his mouth full.

“So, what’s new with your neighbors?” He smacked his lips and licked his fingers before reaching for another piece.

“Now who’s being chismoso?” Sol mumbled.

“Hey, if something happens to my only hija, I need to know who might be involved.”

Sol fought the urge to roll her eyes. “Papi, even if something did happen to me, what would you do about it?” He sure as hell wasn’t all that helpful when Mami stabbed her. Whatever the kids were doing in the woods, or however her neighbors treated her—that was her problem. Not his.

“Hey, I might be left to gather dust in this nursing home, but I still have a lot of strength and life in me.” Which he underlined with a coughing fit, sending bits of plantains flying over the table. He wiped his hands over them, but it only succeeded in creating small oil streaks across the table. Sol regretted not bringing napkins.

“Went down the wrong pipe.”

“Mhm.” Sol slowly went over to the water dispenser and brought back a full cup. Papi eagerly drank it down.

“So nothing going on at home?” He raised an eyebrow.

Sol thought about how she’d answer that—and how the conversation would go. She wouldn’t even know where to begin, so she’d probably start with the most recent thing and talk about the kids in the woods, and her neighbor lying to her about all of them going to school. But if she did, he’d ask why she doesn’t report them and then she’d have to talk about the situation with the Kennedys, and how she nearly got reported for making a 911 call about a false emergency.

Then she’d have to explain how she was now practically being strong-armed into joining the Homeowners Association even though she didn’t want to join.

Up until this point, Sol had seen, smelled, heard, and even felt odd things that didn’t make logical sense. And to make matters worse, she had no way of proving these sensations were real to anyone else. Any therapist she’d see would probably have her institutionalized, her wife would consider her insane, and her job would be gone before she had a chance to prove her innocence.

What could she actually tell Papi that didn’t revolve around her fucking things up?

I could talk about Nadine. Sol almost snorted.

If she told him about Nadine and what she’d said about her own child, he’d for sure think that the kid killed himself. Papi would even imply that poor parenting might have been a root cause.

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