Read Online Down to the Bone by Mayra Lazara Dole - Free Book Online Page B

Soli is that things never get to her unless they’re huge (like the death of her father). She’s not sensitive like me. Look at all the horror that kid put her through, but as long as she had me, she didn’t care. And she’s not neurotic about it, either. Nothing fazes her. Everything that happened to me today will be stuck in my heart—like a sharp knife that gets twisted in there—for ever . Soli says she’s never even cried about all the horrific names Olga called her. Things just slide off her chest easily. And that’s a large chest, let me tell you!
    I wish I could be like Soli. I don’t know why I’m so thin-skinned. It’s a curse, no doubt.
    Viva comes indoors and spreads kisses. “¡Eh, familia !”
    “Rynn,” I jut my nose over to Viva, “this is Viviana Celina de la Risa Catalina del Carmen Cabrera Prieto de Santillanos.” Viva giggles and her chubby belly ripples. I can tell she loves that I’ve memorized her entire birth name. A little thing like that is a bold statement that matters to her, it says loud and clear that I care. To Viva, a gift like this is far better than anything material I could possibly give her.
    She plops on the couch and fixes the little mercurochrome-colored bun on top of her head with bobby pins. When she finds out I haven’t yet called my mother, she reprimands me, “Shylita, call your mami now. Tell her you is staying with me.”
    Viva and my mom don’t get along too well. Let me rephrase that. Mami doesn’t respect Viva too much. She thinks Viva doesn’t know how to rear children. She disapproves of Soli doing whatever she wishes and says, “Allowing a girl to roam the world on her own and go in and out of the house as she pleases, isn’t a sane way to raise a child. That woman is missing some screws. How can she not place rules for Soli to follow? I can understand if Soli were a boy.”
    Isn’t life ironic. I don’t see Viva kicking her daughter to the curb anytime soon. They have a beautiful relationship based on love and more love.
    “Yeah, Shyly, get it over and done with.”
    I hate having to do this but I must. I’d rather be in denial and focus on the times I’d look up at my mom, naïve, questioning and she regarded me with tenderness. If I’d go to her consumed with grief about a parakeet or hamster that had died, she’d hold me and reassure me, “Everything’s going to be okay. Go ahead. Cry. Crying is good.” The following day, she’d come home with a baby pet.
    How can a mother change so drastically on you?
    Soli throws me her cell. I drag my feet as I pace up and down the living room. I feel my heart in the pit of my stomach as I press my mom’s digits. I know I have to call her or Viva won’t let me stay.
    “ ¿Hola ?” she answers in a stern voice.
    “Hi, Mami.” I shake inside; it feels like a marble is stuck in my throat.
    She growls, “Hi, Mami? Hi, Mami?” She repeats it, as if I didn’t hear her the first time. “How will a ‘Hi, Mami,’ ever take away what you’ve done to our family name? You’ve disgraced us.” I gulp knives and razor blades and bombs that explode in my stomach.
    “Mami, please relax.” I sit next to Viva on the couch and lay my head on her lap. She gently smoothes the hair away from my face.
    “Re lax when your own daughter gets thrown out of school for obscene texts and lies about having slept with that degenerate in my house? Is the degenerada Soli? Is it?”
    “No, Mami. It’s not Soli. I swear on Papi’s grave.” She knows I only swear over my father’s dead body to say the truth. I close my eyes. “Mami, I’m in really bad shape. Don’t make things worse.” I feel like I’ll die of a heart attack if she keeps this up. We’ve never really fought. Of course, we’ve had your typical arguments, but she’s been the type of fun mom all my friends wished they had.
    “If Jaime finds out, I’ll kill you!”
    I go on with a trembling voice. “Viva will let me stay at her place if you