Since Sophia was so under the weather, I thought I had my best opportunity to visit Señora Davila. Adan called again and suggested we go for an early bite and a movie, but I thought that would put too much pressure on me to get back in time from the Davilas’ home. I told him what Tía Isabela and I had found going on at the hacienda when we had returned from the fund-raiser and how terrible the atmosphere was at the house.
“It feels as if a bomb is set to go off. I’m tiptoeing around,” I told him. “Because of the commotion, I didn’t get to bed until late and had trouble falling asleep.”
“I can imagine. She’s headed for big trouble,” he said, and then suggested we go to dinner. “You need to get out of there for a while, Delia.”
He promised it would be a quieter evening. I agreed to end the conversation and started out before Sophia came down. I had been hoping to find Santos at home and the opportunity to speak with him, but he was somewhere with his father.
Señora Davila was happy to see me and ecstatic that I was really going to Mexico and would see Ignacio.
“He has sent back this note, telling you where to meet him in your village. I would appreciate your giving him this,” she said, handing me a cross on a chain. In the center of the cross was a tiny diamond. “It was my grandmother’s, my mother’s, and mine. I want Ignacio to have it. I want him to have hope again,” she said.
I promised I would give it to him. She also gave me a letter she had written.
“Rather than send it the usual way, I’d like you to hand it to him personally. My husband is already nervous about sending your letters to him.”
“I understand.”
“I am not one for writing letters. My writing skills are poor, but there are things sometimes better said like this. Also, he can hold on to the letter, hold on to the words, and read them whenever he wants.”
“Sí, señora. I will hand it to him myself.”
“Gracias. Be careful yourself, Delia.”
She hugged me, and I left, wondering if I should say anything to her about Santos talking to Sophia. I thought it might add to her heavy worries, however, and decided not to speak of it. I couldn’t imagine Sophia coming here anymore, anyway, now that she was literally under house arrest.
She had still not emerged from her room when I returned. The door remained
shut, and I didn’t bother to check on her. Instead, I hurried to shower, do my hair, and dress for my dinner with Adan. Tía Isabela called from wherever she was to ask me what Adan and I were doing. She sounded worried that I would have somehow not agreed to go out with him.
“It’s an exciting time for both of us,” she told me. The way she had included me in her happiness surprised me but also disturbed me. It was almost as if Sophia had died and I had truly taken her place.
Despite my fear that I would be terrible company and ruin the evening for Adan as well, I soon found myself relaxing. He was very upbeat, perhaps to overcome my dark mood. He talked optimistically about the future, his business, his father’s election, parties we would attend, more trips with his boat, describing days and weeks of future activities as if we were already engaged or even married.
“Soon you’ll graduate from high school and be out of that house and away from all the tension and trouble,” he said.
We had gone to a fancy French restaurant, and I had permitted him to order for both of us. He surprised me with his command of French and his knowledge of the menu, the sauces, and even the preparation of the dishes. Once again, he reminded me of his travels in Europe, and I realized how wide the gap between us really was. Despite all that Tía Isabela had done to prepare me for this high social life and despite the progress I had made with my education, I was still a stranger in a strange land. Adan didn’t seem to care about it, however. In fact, he enjoyed being my teacher, telling me about things I had never seen.
“I want to do all these things over, go to all these places again with you,” he told me.
“How can you be so certain about us, about me, Adan?” I asked him before we had finished our dinner. I had waited as long as I could to ask. “After all, we have not known each other that long.”
He smiled, thought a moment, and said, “Because of the way you make me feel, the way I feel when I’m with you, and I don’t mean just having a beautiful young woman on my arm. Some men wear their women like another piece of jewelry, but for me, being with you…is different.”
“How is it different?” I pursued. I wanted to know what it was he felt so strongly.
He smiled again. “I like that,” he said. “I like that you’re making me dig deeply into myself to answer.”
“And what is the answer, Adan?”
He thought before speaking, just as before. “You make me aware of what it means to have family,” he said. “I haven’t felt this way since my mother died, even though my father tries the best he can.”
He couldn’t have said anything that would have endeared me to him more, but he couldn’t have said anything that would have given me more pause, either.
Family was what Ignacio had lost and what I had hoped to bring back to him.
Family was what I had lost and what I had hoped to regain myself when I was with Ignacio.
In the end, the rich and the poor want the same things after all, I thought. We are all desperate for the same real love, the same sense of belonging, the same comfort that came with loyalty and devotion. Money couldn’t buy it, and it was not something luck brought. You had to have an honest heart that you were willing to open to someone else, someone you would trust with your very soul.