Chapter 31: Chapter 31
Abel looked up at what Hector was pointing at on the paper. “Yeah, but don’t get any ideas. That place would be for me.”
Well, shit. For a moment there, Hector thought he’d figured out a way around his mother’s not-having-girls-overnight-at-her-house rule. The house his mother liked had a separate pool house way behind the main house, a house Abel would be making the most of.
“But don’t worry. The place has two master bedrooms on either end of the house, and the house is huge. Each master has its own separate entrance.”
“Cochinos!” Their mom said, frowning as she walked around the table to check the food on the stove. “Is that all you two are worried about?”
She turned around and waved a spatula at them, and it was on. She was going into one of her rants. Abel gave Hector a look. They should’ve known better than to talk about this in front of her.
“Even if are paying for it, Abel, if you want me living there with you two, you will not be parading a different girl in and out of there every day. I won’t have it. You need to be respectful to me and yourselves. Besides,” she turned to stir the food in the pan then turned back to them, “any girl who is okay with knowing she is not the only girl that’s been in your bedroom that week or even month for that matter is not the kind of girl you want to be bringing home.”
Hector wondered what his mom would have to say about Leticia and Miriam and smirked. Try the same night, Mom.
“De que te ries?” His mother glared at him.
Hector opened his mouth wide in protest. “I’m not laughing!”
That only made his mother’s glare even more severe since he laughed while saying it. Abel laughed now too. Hector was sure Abel could only imagine what he’d been thinking.
She turned on Abel now. “Don’t encourage him. You should be setting an example. You’re no spring chicken. When are you going to start looking for a nice little Mexican girl?”
Hector muffled a laugh into his fist as soon as his mom turned her back on them. Abel’s head was already hanging back defeated. It was the same song and dance with his mother. Abel wasn’t even twenty-two yet, but by that age, she and all her siblings had been married with kids for years. So to her, Abel should be looking to settle down—with a nice little Mexican girl, of course.
“And the younger the better,” she added.
“Oh, good. We’re getting the long version tonight.” Abel said, standing up with his plate in his hand.
“No seas grosero,” his mom snapped.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” Abel kissed his mom’s forehead as he passed her to get to the sink. “I’m not trying to be rude. Go on.”
“Did you get full?” she asked, immediately losing the angry tone and sounding concerned, as she if ever served them too little
“Stuffed actually. But it was good.”
His mother smiled, satisfied, then continued with her rant. “I’m just saying. The girls these days are so different from back in my day. The days of innocence and saving yourself for your husband are long dead.” She huffed. “So it’s best to get them younger when they’re still a little bit more innocent. You know, less experienced.”
“I’ll keep that in mind, Madre.” Abel kissed her forehead as he walked past her again. “I gotta go. Don’t wait up.”
“Where are you going?”
“I gotta go take care of some business,” Abel turned back with a wink, “respectfully, outside of your house.”
Hector’s mom placed her hand on her hip, pressing her lips together with a frown but didn’t say a word, watching him until he was out of sight. She turned back to Hector who was now sitting at the table, and he wiped the smirk right off his face, shaking his head in disapproval.
She rolled her eyes and went on about the age thing. Hector knew that argument was a bust. Younger wasn’t always better. Noah was proof of that. Roni was eight years older than he was, and those two were insanely happy. But he’d never bothered to argue the whole Mexican girl part. It’d never crossed his mind that he’d ever have to. Now he was curious. He had a feeling the answer would be based on some of the stuff his mom had said in the past. Still he decided to bite.
A little annoyed that Charlee was back front and center on his mind again, he waited for his mom to stop and take a breath before interrupting.
“So why only Mexican girls?”
His mom turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow as she piled the food onto his plate. “They don’t have to be Mexican. But it’s just better if you stick with your own culture. At least stick with Latinas.” She set the plate in front of him. “And hopefully to the ones whose parents were born in their country, not the second generation Latinas. They’re just as bad as non-Latinas—too Americanized—too modern for their own good.”
Hector rolled his eyes now, ready to chuck this theory in the fire pit along with the “the younger the better” theory. “And what does that mean? Too modern for their own good?”
He grabbed a tortilla and started rolling it up already, doubtful that his mom would have a valid argument for this one either.
After setting a glass of milk down for him, his mother sat across from him and picked up the home profile papers. “Well, you mean aside from the obvious? They don’t cook.”
She said that with so much conviction Hector laughed. Figures his mom would think that would be a deal breaker.
“And?” he looked up from dipping his tortilla in his chili verde.
His mom frowned. “Mijo, they’re just too liberal about everything. You wanna nice girl that still has some of the same good old-fashioned values you grew up with. You stray away from what you’re used to, and you’ll be treading into unknown waters. They are brought up believing and being told things Latinas are not told. Like that it’s okay to jump from one man’s bed to another’s just like that because men do it all the time. This equality stuff is constantly shoved into their modern-day heads. Some things are still sacred, and behaving that way is still frowned upon in our culture. Well, my era. And while I don’t have any daughters, just as I harp to you and Abel, I would like to think women like me from my era in my culture are also passing their beliefs and morals down to their girls.”
And there you had it. Another one of his mother’s theories completely deflated. Although he’d met enough of the sweet Latinas his mother spoke of, he’d also met plenty like Leticia and Miriam. His mother’s suggestion that only the Latin world still held morals was ridiculous.
Even he and Abel were perfect arguments against that. While his mother had managed to instill most of the morals and values she harped on about so often, neither Hector nor Abel had any qualms about engaging in a few acts his mother would certainly protest, so long as the girls were all for it.
Charlee was another contradiction to his mother’s belief. He frowned, realizing that once again he was thinking about her, even as infuriating as that afternoon had been for him. It didn’t make sense.
Uncontrollable desire was something even the most innocent would have a hard time masking. Hector had felt it in her kisses. It was exactly what he was feeling with every stroke of her tongue in his mouth. But the depth he’d felt in her kisses wasn’t because of the level of skill she possessed. It was just the opposite. If he had to guess, that might’ve been her first time doing something that arousing, and except for that heavenly moment his mouth veered downward to her neck, it’d only gone as far as kissing. Even then, her entire body had come alive, but not as he was used to. There was something so chaste about her body’s reaction to what he did to her, and he hadn’t even done much.
That’s why he’d been so stunned about her forgettable comment. What he felt when he kissed her was hands down new to him, and almost two weeks later it was still so fresh in his head. All he had to do was close his eyes and feel it all over again.
He stood up, once he’d polished off his food. His mother asked the same thing she asked both him and Abel every single time they finished eating. “Did you get full?” Hector nodded, placing the plate in the sink. “You got real quiet there all of a sudden.” Hector glanced back at his mom’s inquiring eyes. “Is there a reason why you were asking about girls that were not Mexican? Are you seeing one?”
His mom was a sly one. Too bad she was wrong. “Nope,” he said, rubbing her shoulders as he came up behind her. “I was just curious.” He kissed her on the head. “I’m gonna go to the gym for a while.”
“I thought you were there all morning?”
“Yeah, I was, but I still have some paperwork to do in the office.”
It was partly true. He did have some work to do but nothing that couldn’t wait until the next morning. He just didn’t feel up to sitting around watching T.V. because he knew he’d be plagued with thoughts of the inevitable. He only hoped Walter had already worked out and left. It’s why he’d come home first and taken his time eating. The last thing he needed tonight was to hear the guy go on and on about Charlee.