Page 59 of The Grumpy Defenseman
The screen door opened behind us, and Mamá Rey appeared with a small plate of pan de polvo, because apparently the woman had a spiritual alarm that went off whenever emotional clarity required powdered sugar.
“You girls eat,” she said.
“Mamá, we’re talking,” Bella said.
“Talking needs food.”
She handed me the plate first, because of course she did.
I took one cookie. Let the sugar dust my fingers, the crumb soften on my tongue, and the sweetness settle somewhere I had not realized was still hungry.
Then I pulled out my phone and looked at the time.
He would still be at the facility. He always stayed late on days when his head was loud. And his head had been loud for weeks.
Bella watched me, her expression shifting from triumph to something warmer. She did not ask what I was planning. She did not need to. She had spent the last twenty minutes building the runway, and now she was watching the takeoff.
“Go,” she said.
“I haven’t finished the cookie.”
Bella took the plate from my lap. “I’ll handle the evidence.”
I stood. Looked at her: this woman who had dragged me to a bar whenI wanted to disappear, brought me home to a family that fed me, and seen me clearly from the first day we met without once looking away.
“Thank you,” I said.
And meant it with everything I had.
“Don’t thank me,” Bella said, holding the plate like a legal exhibit. “Just don’t come home tonight with a story that starts with I chickened out.”
I went back through the kitchen to say goodbye. Mamá Rey pressed the bag of pan de polvo into my hand again, as if I might have forgotten I had been loved on the way to the door.
“Drive safe, mija,” she said.
I nodded because my throat was too tight for anything else.
Outside, San Antonio was doing its thing: golden hour hitting the houses, the air warm and heavy with summer. People moved along the sidewalk in both directions, making their decisions, walking toward whatever came next.
I got in my car. Set the warm paper bag on the passenger seat. Started the engine.
I was not going to fix him.
I was not going to carry the truth he owed me.
But I was done pretending I did not want to hear it.
I did not go home.
Samantha
The training facility parking lot was almost empty.
A maintenance van. The security guard’s sedan. My car pulled crooked into a space because, apparently, decisiveness did not extend to parking.
The building sat in the late-day light, looking less like a sports facility and more like a place people went when they could not outrun themselves.
I turned off the engine and sat there for ten seconds.
