The Feria (15 page)

At first she was stunned when he began pulling her away from him. When she was about to apologize, he urgently put his mouth on hers. Together, they were transformed back to two young lovers. Xavier held her face eagerly, pressing it into his. They kissed passionately, breathing each other in for several minutes, but it felt like an eternity. And even an eternity was not long enough.

After a few minutes, Xavier withdrew, sitting back on his hands.

“What’s wrong?” Her worst fear was realized. He did not want her anymore. The direction they were headed was wrong to him, unacceptable. Her mind darted frantically over the details, the kissing, the handholding, the touching. Where was it that she could have offended him, pushed him away?

He did not dance around his words. “I can’t control myself around you.” He turned away from her, as if repulsed.

Soledad blinked back tears, tears that now needed direction. Were they devastated tears mourning loss, or were they joyful tears of relief?

“Who do I think I am, charging in, luring you off to Mexico, and expecting to cheapen our reunion with fast-track sex on the dirt?” He reached for a handful from the ground and let it fall through his fingers. “It’s not at all how I’ve seen it over and over again in my dreams.”

He wanted her. And he dreamed of her the way she did of him.

“Our reunion was already cheapened. Emmanuel was there.” She reached out to rub his face, afraid to be rejected, but needing to try. “This is try number two.” She smiled when he placed a hand over hers. Searching those blue eyes, she brashly moved herself between his legs, and he sat, spooning her.

He pulled her hair back, then planted a wet kiss on her neck. Chills raced over her flesh at the feel of his breath.

“I’m so sorry, Cholita. I have dreamed of doing that for twenty years.”

“I wish you would do it for twenty more.”

“I’m afraid I can’t control myself.” He stared at the ground, laughing as if in disgust.

Soledad felt Xavier’s remorse, and denied herself the desire to touch him or comfort him.

“I’m so sorry about what happened with your husband, Soledad.”

She could hear that he truly meant it.

“I’m not. Not at all. I’m finally free.” The memories of her life with Emmanuel sucked her dry of any emotion, and she spoke softly, her back still to Xavier.

“Free?” As though he could see her shutting down. “Was it really that bad?”

“I was never his. Never. That’s what made it unbearable.”

He reached for Soledad’s hand.

“Did you make it to college?”

Soledad cringed at the hope in his voice, and she didn’t, couldn’t answer him.

“You still can. I’ll help you.”

“Xavier, we have a bigger problem.”

Xavier understood her subject change. “Yes, Alex and Abril.”

“What are the chances she would meet and fall in love with her brother?”

“Her brother?” Xavier looked suddenly alarmed.

“Yes, Xavier, you said you knew Abril is your daughter.”

Relief spread across Xavier’s handsome features. “My love, I’m sorry. I can see why you would be confused, but Alex is definitely not Abril’s brother. But what he is may not be any better.” He paused, his eyebrows furrowed.

“What do you mean?” Why didn’t he just spit it out? Didn’t he understand how worried she’d been?

“Darling, Alex is
my
brother.”

She sat shocked. His words tauntingly danced circles before her.

“But,
Señora
Mendoza, is she not your wife?”

“That sweet woman is a casualty of my father’s irresponsibility.”

“Your stepmother?”

He shook his head. “I don’t exactly call her that. She was never married to my father.”

Come to think of it,
Señora
Mendoza had seemed slightly older than Xavier.

Soledad sat silently, taking everything in. She suppressed the eagerness to evaluate her new hopeful situation, that she was soon to be divorced, and her precious Xavier was not married. But she still needed to make the connection between Abril and Alex. How it was all possible?

As if he sensed the calculations going on in her mind, he said, “A short time after you were taken from me, my father met Ramona. You know he was very reckless with women. But this one stuck. She made a home for my father, and she took care of me. I believe she truly loved him. She was much too young for my father, but that didn’t seem to matter to her. My father, of course, would never marry her but at the same time, he couldn’t let her go. They lived together like that for a little while, but then my father died suddenly. A drunken accident.”

Soledad squeezed Xavier’s hand. “I’m so sorry,
mi amor
, so terribly sorry.” She remembered the handsome man who’d answered the door for her the day she and Xavier had had to say goodbye. And actually, he looked a lot like the man she was staring at today.

Xavier continued. “So my father was gone, and I had this woman who had nowhere to go, who was mourning for my father, living in our home. I could not put her out, especially not after she began showing signs that she was pregnant.”

His story was starting to come together.

“She was, after all, carrying my brother. I promised to look after her. She traveled everywhere with me as I pursued my career in oil. She is a big part of my success.”

It began to feel awkward to Soledad.

“You two never began to feel anything for each other?” The thought sort of sickened her.

“Certainly not, I swear. To this day, she grieves for my father. Believe me, she has had plenty of suitors come her way over the years, and I have never stood in her way. And she did always care for me like a son, even being only a few years older than me. I guess in a way she took me in like an older sister.”

“You were not attracted to her at all? Not even after two decades of living with her and raising a child with her?”

“There was only one woman who owned my heart.” He stared into her eyes. “Ask Ramona. She’ll tell you. She knows exactly who you are.” He seemed proud.

“She knows?” Soledad asked, shocked. Xavier had confided to her about them?

“Well, she knows about you through my stories, but she didn’t realize who you were the day you met her.” His thumb ran circles around Soledad’s outer hand.

“So how and why did you go about raising your brother and passing him off as your son, and her as your wife?” She hated asking the hard questions, but she had to.

“You yourself did the things you had to do as a mother to protect your child. I believe Ramona did the same. She gave up a lot for Alex. And as for the father part, I have never passed myself off as something I am not. But any boy is eager to have a father, and so even though Alex knows I am his brother, he has called me his father since he learned how to speak. And I’m okay with that. So not wanting to embarrass this poor woman, we agreed that I would begin introducing her as my wife.”

“I find it so hard to believe that you both could live that way for so long and not act on it,” she shamelessly persisted.

“Soledad, we were two people who belonged to someone else, and had one little boy connecting us. He is my brother, my father’s son, and I would have died for him if the need was called for.”

She exhaled the breath that had lodged itself in her throat. She now believed him. “And now you’re an oil tycoon.” She laughed.

“A darn good one. But everything I did, every improvement I made to my life, was not just for them, but in preparation of the day I would be with you again, and your father.” His voice rose. “And I would be able to prove myself and prove that I could take care of you. That I wasn’t just a
feria
boy, cleaning up after animals and traveling like a circus show.”

“I was in love with that
feria
boy,” she was quick to defend.

“Was?” His voice did not try to hide his disappointment.

“And I will forever be.” She turned, leaning over and quickly kissed him on the mouth. “But beneath these revelations, we still have a grand problem.”

He continued her thought. “Our daughter is in love with her uncle.”

Soledad blocked out that last part so she could linger on his words
our daughter
. This would mark the first time she would hear him say this.

“I can’t believe that beautiful girl is mine.” He spoke so proudly, almost as if reading her mind. His gaze drifted behind her, as if trying to captivate the memory of Abril. “I’ve missed so much.”

“I’m so sorry. I hope you can forgive me.” Soledad clasped his hand. “But I believe that everything works for the good. Had you known you had a daughter, you would not have taken on your stepmother and brother, and you may not have pursued your dream in the oil industry.”

“I suppose you’re right. I’m sure you are, because before all of that, I considered sneaking into El Paso and whisking you away. I had no plan, no career mapped out quite yet. I just needed to take you.”

“I’m so proud of you. You have lived such an amazing and productive life.”

“It was for you.”

The intensity was gaining on them, but she had to get back across the border.

“I need to get home.” She felt like a child with a curfew and regretted her words the second they escaped.

“I didn’t see your auto. Let me drive you. We can finish talking on the way.”

His words scared her. They were making their way toward goodbye. Goodbyes with Xavier weren’t acceptable anymore. “Xavier?”

“I feel the same way, my Cholita.” Again, it was like he was reading her thoughts.

He leaned in and smelled her hair, inhaling deeply. From there he moved to her cheek, then down to her neck. She shuddered, then curled her arms around his neck, encouraging him to go on.

“Are you sure, Cholita?” he asked.

At her nod, he led her to a horizontal position, his mouth never moving from hers. Flashes of their first time, the last time they’d be together for two decades, revealed themselves under closed eyes. Just as he was on top of her, she willingly opened her legs. He freely moved his hands up and down her thighs and legs.

“If you only knew how many times I dreamed of this, Xavier.” She could barely get a breath out, much less a sentence.

“Me, too, Cholita, me, too.”

She shifted in his arms, feeling heat rush into her. When had she last felt this alive? Since the first, and last, time they’d made love? She moved against him, desperate to feel him inside her again.

“I love you. With my whole life.” Xavier lifted himself onto his knees and fumbled desperately to slide his zipper down. Soledad took his hands, using him to pull herself to a sitting position, her shirt and buttons disheveled.

“Calm,” she whispered, speaking slowly, trying to bring him down from the frantic pace. “Calm.” She shifted to her knees and placed his hands on her breasts and began kissing him, moving from his face to his neck, slowly, soothingly. She pushed him down by his shoulders and climbed up onto him, straddling him, and very slowly, she led him inside of her, trying to make every moment of this event last. He wrapped his arms around her waist and groaned as she anchored herself, letting him deeper inside of her.

Making love on the riverbank might seem immature to some, but to Soledad it felt like the most right thing in the world. Their bodies became one again. It was as if the last two decades had never happened. Time had stood still.

After, he hugged her toward him, but there was no shame in their naked bodies. Not even the pieces of grass that stuck to her skin, nor the grimy dirt in the creases of her kneecaps could stunt this moment.

“I think that might hold me over for another twenty years.” He laughed, but stopped when Soledad’s body tightened. “Cholita, I was kidding, my love. Do you honestly think I will
ever
let you go again?”

“Really?” She was unsure whether or not to allow herself to find confidence and joy in his words. If this were true, she would die happy, knowing she had finally fulfilled her greatest desire. To be with Xavier for the rest of her life.

“Yes.” He was whispering now. “This is not how I ever imagined doing something like this with you again. You deserve so much better.” He sat up, his naked body luring her to one more engagement. He pulled her up and into him. He whispered softly into her ear, “I’m going to marry you. Will that be okay?”

She turned to face him, tears of joy streaming down her cheeks. She’d always wished she could open him up and be completely inside him, her desire for him, that unquenchable. And there, on the bank, hidden in tall grass, she got her wish. They consummated their pledge. They were on fire. Their moaning could have shaken the earth and, to Soledad, it did.

During the entire drive home, they held hands, as before, their fingers joyfully intertwined. She stared down at her muddy sandals on the car floor.

“How do I break the news to Abril?”

“It’s going to be a lot for her to take in,” he agreed.

“I feel like for as hard as I’ve tried to protect her, I only weaved a world of damage that will soon catch up to her. And she’s such a good girl.”

“You did no such thing. Life is full of the unexpected. It’s never what it seems. That’s what makes it all an adventure. That’s what makes it worth living.”

Soledad squeezed his hand. Fighting back tears, she still could not believe they were together in this moment. He was just as vivid as in her dreams, and she feared that at any second she would wake up, once again in her West Side home, once again tolerating another day married to Emmanuel. But these were new times. Her life had just started again.

“I can’t wait to buy you a ring, my love.”

“That’s not necessary.” She shrugged. “I didn’t have one this last time around.”

“You will have one this time.”

She didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “Thank you.”

“I’m here now, Cholita. And I am going to help you carry your worries. We are now in everything together. You never have to face anything alone, ever again. Do you understand me?”

Soledad nodded. He was her champion. She knew that with Xavier by her side, anything that seemed impossible would never be so.

“I have so much to talk to our daughter about. I don’t even know where to start,” she said.

“How about at the beginning?”

“Actually, she knows all of that.”

“She does?”

At her nod, he said, “Soledad, I want to tell the whole world that I love you and that I am marrying you. I don’t care what your ex-husband says. I don’t care what your mother says. I know Abril will fall apart, but together we will put her back together. Why do we have to hide or prepare anyone for anything? We’ve been given a second chance. What if we just put all fears aside, and went in with guns blazing?”

Soledad envisioned her and Xavier with guns, and basically, everyone falling over at the sound of their news. “I understand, Xavier, but Abril is still a child.”

“She is a young, strong woman, too. And she deserves to know.”

“She’s in love with her uncle.” Soledad felt a gush of nausea. She planted her hands on the seat to sturdy herself.

“Well then, this will make you feel better. The two of them haven’t even so much as pecked on the lips.” He flashed a smile that left her breathless and wanting him yet again, but she was more interested in his insider information.

“What?”

“I promise. He tells me everything. He thought he had done something wrong. Maybe perhaps, it was just nature keeping everything in balance. But for whatever reason, Abril is a very careful girl who guards her heart very well. Especially after seeing Emmanuel, uh, doing what he did. She seems to have put a wall up for right now.”

“But they’ve been spending so much time together.” Soledad was dumbfounded.

“Alex is a very good listener, and that’s what Abril needs right now, a friend to listen. She’s found just that.”

Relief swept through Soledad. If she hadn’t been sitting already, she knew her legs wouldn’t hold her up now. “Thank the Lord. I can’t believe how everything is working itself out.”

“Justice, what’s right, love especially, I believe, will
always
work out.”

“You’ll have a lot to explain, as well.” She was suddenly concerned for him.

“And I will. I’m not worried. And you shouldn’t be either, my love.”

Xavier returned her to the alligator pond. She exited his automobile a new, colorful woman. The world has now her canvas.

The pounding on the porch door was as loud as the night thunder echoing across the city, and for a while, Soledad mistook it for just that. She loved this weather, and was lying in her bed, taking it in, when the pounding on the door accelerated the pounding of her heart. Knocks like that never brought good news.

She covered herself in her lavender night robe and matching bedroom shoes and darted fearfully down the steps.

Her fears were validated when she peered out the kitchen window and saw a drenched Emmanuel pacing near the door.

Oh my God.
Her hands trembled as she fumbled with the lock.

“Emmanuel, what are you doing here at this hour?” she shouted out into the rain.

“I don’t care the hour, I need to talk to you.” He spoke sharply through clenched teeth.

Soledad pushed past him to get out of the house and onto the porch in an attempt to keep the noise, or anything else that was to unfold, outside.

She realized her mistake when cold drops of rain pelted her face, even under the protection of the porch.

Squinting, she tried with great effort to lift her face to peer at her husband in what now felt like a battle zone. The porch where she’d played dolls and hopscotch as a child, where she’d picked cherries, where she’d hosted friends, where her mother had told stories on warm summer nights, held no peace or happiness in this moment. Now, in this unfamiliar and demonized state, frantic eyes, and angry breaths, Emmanuel had invaded every piece of intimate memories Soledad ever had.

Her teeth chattered, like they always did when she was nervous. But Emmanuel took it as her being cold.

“Let’s step inside,” he ordered, briefly relenting from his rage. Reaching out with what felt like a doubtful hand, he rubbed her arm.

“I’m fine,” she pushed back. Her arms remained crossed over her breasts. “State your business, Emmanuel!”

He quickly pulled his hand back. “This is ridiculous,” Emmanuel shouted into Soledad’s face, challenging the loudness of the rain falling against the house and the thunder accompanying it. While he’d never been a gentle or pleasant soul, Emmanuel was never as angry or potentially violent as she was seeing him now. She was easily frightened.

“Enough is enough,” Emmanuel stated. Although the only light came from the porch, it was clear that his face was beet red. “You will get your belongings, and you will come home.”

“I will do no such thing.” She’d wanted her voice to sound bolder than it did, but she was stunned. What was he thinking, demanding she come home? After all that he’d done to her?

“And what gave you the right to give Abril permission to leave, without so much as asking me what I thought about it. What am I? Crap?”

YES!
she shouted in her head. “Honestly, Emmanuel, she doesn’t want to say goodbye. Right now she doesn’t even want to look at you!” Now that it came to her daughter, her voice sounded boisterous.

“
Y tú?”
Are you having trouble looking at me?” he sneered.

“Actually, Emmanuel, I could care less. It makes absolutely no difference to me.” She had found her true love. That was all the strength she was standing on as she faced him. He had tormented her for far too long.

“Nothing ever made a difference to you. But where you could care less, others have gladly filled in,” he stated, clearly confessing the many other instances of unfaithfulness.

Again, as he tried to hurt her with his words, she found her strength. “Nothing you can say or do will ever hurt me again, you
bastard
.” Soledad gasped. Never had she used vulgar language.

Pain erupted as across her left eye as Emmanuel struck her with a closed fist.

In her whole life, Soledad had only been hit like this once before, and once again, it involved Emmanuel.

Soledad squared her shoulders and lifted her chin, vaguely aware of something warm and sticky running down the side of her face. “Like I said, nothing you do ...”

Suddenly, she saw movement out of the corner of her right eye. Her mother appeared on the other side of the door. “Soledad?” The fear in her voice was evident.

“Leave, now.” Soledad gestured toward Emmanuel’s precious car.

“
For
now.” With one last glare, Emmanuel stalked from the porch and slammed through the gate. She watched as his Ford Thunderbird screeched away.

Only when she was sure the car was not going to return did she collapse to the ground. Flor, having already forced her way outside, collapsed with her, and the two women allowed the aftershock to swallow them.

“It’s okay, my daughter. You’re okay.” Her mother let out a muffled sob. Flor forced her daughter to her feet and hauled her into the house, then guided her to the sofa.

Soledad gazed up at her, and for the first time realized that her mother was looking more and more like
Abuelita
.

Her mother stroked her wet hair, careful not to touch her injured eye. “I will never let that man hurt you again.” The determination in her voice was foreign to Soledad, but she commended it nevertheless.

“M
amá,
please don’t worry yourself with this. He’s harmless.”

“Harmless? Are you serious, Soledad? You need to look at your face. This is a man who is not used to losing. He has always gotten anything he ever wanted, no matter what the cost.” She stepped out and returned briefly with a towel.

“
Mamá,
my
papá
is gone. There is nothing Emmanuel can do to hurt us anymore. That’s why he’s so angry. He knows there is absolutely no reason for me to go back to him. Frankly, I don’t even know why he wants me.”

“To win,
mija
.” Her mother patted her legs, arms, and face with the towel, avoiding her eye.

“Not a good enough reason.”

“This has absolutely no importance to me, but I don’t know how you feel about it. He will pull the very little he still has invested in your father’s trees. I’m just preparing you for that. I know how hard you have been working to protect your father’s legacy.”

Soledad sat in silence. The adrenaline was gone, and her eye had begun to throb, but she was too preoccupied in her thoughts. Xavier had already calmed the fear of losing Emmanuel’s financial backing. Where Emmanuel had failed, Xavier was going to come in and redeem. Could this be the moment she needed to speak to her mother about the secrets she had been struggling to withhold? Did she dare?

“My darling, let me get you something cold for that eye.”

After holding the frozen beef on her eye for at least ten minutes, her mother pecked her on the cheek and started to get up from the sofa.

Soledad tugged on her arm. “
Mamá
, I need to tell you something.” She paused. “But I don’t know how you will accept it.”

Warily, her mother sat back down, looking suddenly old. Yes, she’d been through a lot at her father’s hands, but so had her mother, so used to bad news that she sat quietly, defeated, fatigue written all over the countless lines etched on her face.

Soledad took her mother’s hands, settled into the sofa with her, and began recounting a long love story.

It was dawn, and the women had fallen asleep holding each other on the sofa. Soledad’s eye throbbed with such a thunder of pain that she actually moaned. She looked over at her sleeping mother, who for the first time in many years, slept with pleasantness over her face. The rays of sun peeking in through the gaps in the shutters put stripes on her
mama’s
face.

Shifting slowly so as not to wake her, Soledad slid out of her mother’s embrace, and went to the hall mirror. She reeled at the sight. A purple-black mark hugged her eye, the white no longer white but bloodied. She had a high pain tolerance, but now she understood why she’d been tormented all night. She had in her hand the now warm bag of meat that had brought her temporary relief.

Her mother soon woke and begged her to invite Xavier over.

“I don’t want him to see me this way,” Soledad said, embarrassed that this had happened to her.

“I understand.”

In the kitchen, her mother cooked with such a renewed spirit that Soledad felt ashamed for never having shared more with her.

“I’m going to the market today,” her mother said. “Would you join me?”

“I don’t know that I should.” She fidgeted in her chair, the milk in her mug untouched. She was not only nervous about going out in public, but at the thought that at any second, Abril would come down those stairs and have to see her mother like this.

“You can’t let Emmanuel win. Are you going to stay indoors for the next several weeks until your mark goes away?”

“I know. It’s just that it’s so fresh today. It’s terrible to look at. I don’t want to make others feel uncomfortable.”

Flor went upstairs, promising to be quiet, and came down with makeup and sunglasses. “You won’t be disappointed in my work.” They laughed, and her mother sat down in front of her at the table and began cosmetically repairing her injured eye, her mother’s gentle hands working quickly.

Soledad was reminded of a time when she was small and she’d sit at this same table, with the same hand-mirror, and her mother would fix her hair.

After ten minutes of her mother’s handiwork, while still noticeable, her eye was far less dramatic. After taking two aspirin, she reluctantly agreed to accompany her mother.

The fresh color of vegetables and fruits on display at the farmer’s market was simply lovely. The smell was a bouquet of their very best, brought out in a parade for all to see. Soledad was admiring some pears when among the singsong chatter of the crowd around her, she heard a timid voice right beside her.

“
Hola
,
Señora.
”

She turned to see Ramona staring at her. Her smile was pleasant.

“Hello,
Señora
. It’s so nice to see you again.” Soledad was genuinely pleased. She reached out to embrace the woman who only weeks ago was a stranger, but now something so much more. Family. She was pleased when Ramona, too, reached out for her.

“Many congratulations to you,” she whispered into Soledad’s ear. They still held each other.