Jo
I love you
Aida
Imagine me saying something about good choices
When Jo returned to the table, Felix was already standing, his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. Their glasses had been cleared away.
“I didn’t realize it was almost eleven,” he said. “Shall we head out?”
Her first instinct was to apologize for keeping him, for talking too much, but she bit back the words. He wanted to know about MnM. He’d even thanked her for sharing. She had nothing to apologize for… right?
They shouldered their way through the sea of bodies, and Jo’s ears rang with the sudden quiet outside. She pulled her jacket tighter around her to keep the cold air from creeping up her crop top. She crossed her arms under her boobs to hold the jacket closed and craned her neck toward the night sky. The number of stars visible here still took her breath away. Jo doubted she would ever get tired of seeing so many constellations at once.
She lowered her gaze to find Felix watching her curiously. “I like the sky here,” she said. Before she could think better of it, she added, “And I like being friends with you.”
He blinked in surprise, but then looked pleased. “Me too, Jo. It’s been… a while since I’ve gone out with a friend. I had fun tonight. You want a walk to your car?”
Jo almost declined. The parking lot was right behind the bar, and Ashville was generally safe. But, come to think of it, Felix was probably going the same direction anyway.
“Sure. Thanks.”
They walked side by side to the lot, accompanied by drunken shouts and laughter from people taking a smoke break or stumbling down the street. Jo pointed out her car, a bright blue hatchback. Felix stood a few paces away while she opened her door. She paused before getting inside, looking at him one last time, surrounded by stars that went all the way to the horizon. She tucked her hair behind her ear and said good night.
“Night, Jo. See you next Friday.”
Friday. Six days away. It might as well be an eternity.
7
“Good morning, Mr. Navarro!”
“Hello, Leo.” Felix approached the front desk and tapped the large “visitor check-in” button on the tablet.
“Visiting or checking out today?”
“Signing in to visit for now,” he replied as he tapped through the screens with practiced ease. “Depends on what Tito is up for.”
“Great!” Leo chirped. “Just give a shout if you two decide to go on an adventure today!”
Felix’s lips quirked up. Apparently, he couldn’t even hear the word “adventure” anymore without thinking of Jo. He supposed it was because he’d spent over an hour the night before listening to stories about her friends and the shenanigans their campaign party had gotten up to.
“I sure will,” he said and hit the “print” button. Leo handed him a visitor’s badge sticker with the date and time, Felix’s name, and “Guest of Manuel Navarro.” No matter how many Sundays in a row Felix came to visit Tito at White Hills, it was always jarring to see his grandfather’s legal name on the visitor’s badge. Even Leo, who used formal address with everyone else, called the old man “Tito.”
Leo waved him on, and Felix affixed the sticker to his T-shirt as he walked the familiar path to the communal lounge in the assisted living area. Tito was sitting in his usual spot in the large, high-ceilinged room: the leftmost seat of a brown suede couch with lush cushions. He held a sudoku book up near his face with his right hand, a pencil in his left. On his lap was the library book Felix had brought him the previous Sunday.
He swore to himself, suddenly realizing he’d forgotten this week’s book.
“Hey, Tito.” He bent down and gave his grandpa a gentle double tap on the side of his knee. “¿Cómo andas?”
“’Ey, hijo,” Tito replied with a toothy, yellowed grin. Tito had given up smoking over two decades ago, when Felix was in middle school, but his teeth never fully recovered. He stuck his pencil in the sudoku book as a bookmark and set it on the end table beside him. “Thought you forgot about me today.”
“Never, Tito. I’m sorry I’m late.” Felix kicked back in a matching armchair beside the couch, slouching almost to the point of reclining. He folded his hands and dropped them onto his stomach.
“Busy Saturday night, eh? Out late with your girl?” Tito’s grin grew even wider under his heavy mustache.
Felix’s own facial hair was thick, but he had nothing on Tito. That ’stache was dense as a push broom and black as ink. Unlike Felix’s stubble, which started coming in gray a couple of years ago, Tito’s mustache was as dark as it had been when the man was twenty; Felix had seen his grandparents’ wedding photos to prove it. And despite turning ninety a few months back, Tito still had a full head of wavy salt-and-pepper hair. His skin tone was several shades darker than Felix’s, a combination of genetics and decades of working outdoors as a cattle rancher. But they had the same oval face, the same long nose and chin, the same dark brown irises. Felix was even starting to see the same laughter lines around his eyes that Tito had.
“I keep telling you I don’t have a girl,” Felix said with a soft laugh. “I got a drink with a friend last night and time got away from us, that’s all.” As if to emphasize his point, a yawn crawled its way out of his mouth. He covered it with the back of his hand.
“This is why you forgot my book then, eh?”
Felix winced. “I’m sorry. I had a busy day at work yesterday and didn’t have time to check your holds. I’ll drop it off at lunch tomorrow so you have something to read this week. And I can return that one for you.”
He felt bad for the white lie, but the way Tito harped on him about finding someone and settling down, he wasn’t about to tell him the truth—that the idea of going to Stan’s with Jo had distracted him so badly he’d completely forgotten to pick up Tito’s reserved book at the end of the day. Tito handed over his current book, a thriller called By Dark of Night. Felix flipped the cover open to skim the description on the inside flap.
“You wouldn’t like it,” Tito said. “Too exciting.”
“Only the most boring books for me, huh?”
“That’s my boy.”
Felix closed the book and wedged it between his thigh and the arm of the chair. “What are we doing today, Tito? Brunch? Walk in the park? Or you want to stay here and get your ass handed to you in backgammon?”
“You cheated last time.”
