Life and Other Near-Death Experiences(34)

“You’re just saying that because you don’t want to make me feel bad.”

“No,” Milagros said, shaking her head. She took my hand again and stuck her pointer finger into the center of the line. “This is where you’re at in your life right now, more or less. See how there’s a break? Usually a circle or spot there means sickness, but a split like that means heartache. Your break is wide, so it’s bad, and it means a lot more than anything I would see on your love line,” she said, pointing at the swooped horizontal line across the top of my hand. “Although that does tell me that you, like me, have bad taste in men.”

I managed a small laugh, even though I was thinking about Shiloh and how icy he was as he drove me back last night.

“Now, don’t get all sad on me, mija. See these?” she said, poking at almost imperceptible lines just under my pinky. “I see ni?os. Children. A happy future.”

I didn’t like the direction this was taking. “I can’t have kids.”

She gave me what Paul liked to call the look. “There are ways. But enough of that. I’ll tell you more when you’re ready.” She walked inside her house and returned with two glasses of sangria, which we drank as she attempted to teach me basic greetings and how to ask for directions en espa?ol. I left an hour later with a promise to return in a few days for my next lesson.

Palm reading was nothing but a bunch of mumbo jumbo, the type of fortune-telling voodoo my Sunday school teachers had warned would send me straight into the arms of the devil. But what if Milagros was half-right? The heartbreak aspect was certainly accurate. What if I should have had a chance to live a long life, but that chance had been intercepted by some cruel karmic force—or a bad choice on my part? What if those long hours at the office had sent stress hormones pinballing around my body until they wreaked so much havoc that my cells began to spontaneously multiply? What if years of eschewing sweat-producing activities and ordering fries over salad had finally caught up to me? Because let’s be honest: guilt was playing on repeat in my head, and the lyrics sounded a lot like It’s all your fault, it’s all your fault, nah nah nah nah nah, this is all your fault.

I ate dinner at home and decided to call it an early night. My stomach hurt, badly, and I was increasingly dubious about my ability to withstand pain for long periods of time. If I could ride out the rest of my vacation with the help of Advil and my new friend Ambien, perhaps Paul would find me a pain specialist in New York to help me through the worst of it. Doctors were handing out OxyContin like candy these days, weren’t they?

As I crawled into bed and waited for sleep to set in, I wondered if I really had it in me to make it through the next three weeks without assistance. I was my mother’s daughter, but as with her high cheekbones and dark hair, I had not inherited her grit or gumption. I felt that I could not handle one more bad thing, which only deepened the guilt and shame, especially when I thought about all the people in the world suffering far worse things at that very second.

I pulled the covers tight around me and tried to breathe into the pain, like I’d heard women were often advised to do during labor. I wanted insight into my mother’s experience, and now I had it. There was no one but myself to blame.





NINETEEN


After eight days in Vieques, my carnation-pink sunburn finally peeled away to reveal skin best described as “palest tan,” so I decided it was safe to sunbathe once again. I pulled on my tankini, grabbed the makings of a light lunch, and walked out my back door and onto the beach.

It was a busy Saturday, and beachgoers stretched out for a mile in either direction, while a man with a cooler on wheels strolled back and forth calling, “Agua! Cerveza!” I located an open spot close to the water, spread my towel across the sand, and lay back, instantly sated. The day was dazzlingly bright but not too hot, and the heat felt delicious on my skin.

I must have been there a good thirty minutes before a cloud rolled in and blocked the light. I frowned, hoping a storm wouldn’t surface before I had a chance to flip over and toast my back.

“Hey,” said the cloud.

My eyes flew open.

Shiloh laughed. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Sure you didn’t,” I said. “What brings you to my beach?”

He sat down next to me in the sand. Even behind his omnipresent shades, I could tell that he was in a good mood. “Your beach? Well, let’s see . . . boredom?”

I smirked. “More like you broke into my house and couldn’t find me to terrify, so you decided to wander until you spotted your target.”

“Maybe,” he said. “Seriously, though. I’m sorry about the other night. I shouldn’t have pried.”

Ah-ha. This was a pity visit. “You don’t have to feel sorry for me.”

“That’s not what I said.” The flirty combativeness he’d just been using on me had been replaced with what I felt was a too-gentle tone of voice.

“True,” I said. “Even so, I hope you know that you don’t have to check up on me. I’m fine.”

“Who’s checking up? I’m in Vieques for the next few days, and I was going to the beach anyway.”

I regarded him. He looked sincere, but as I mentioned, I no longer regarded myself as an accurate judge of character. “So why did you? Pry, I mean?”