My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories(90)

“Well, she’s puking all the time. Kinda throws things off.”

“I should be able to help. What would she like?”

“I don’t know. She used to be my friend, but then she stopped. She stopped being anything.” Just like my mom. They stopped being the people I needed them to be. “Don’t worry about it. She won’t let you do anything. No one can help her.”

Ben’s brown eyes are so soft, but somehow pierce right through me. “Someone needs to.”

Santa ho-ho-hos the arrival of a customer. Scowling, I head for the door. Ben crumples up his list and throws it in the trash.

*

Later that night I storm into the house, pulling on my house jacket with an annoyed huff.

“Maria? That you?”

“Yeah,” I shout, answering my mom.

“How was work, mija?”

The rest of my shift was terrible. Ben was being all, I don’t know, normal—he made people exactly what they ordered. I tried to complain to him about Paul McCartney simply having a wonderful Christmastime, and he just shrugged. Two people stiffed me on tips. And, to top it all off, Candy’s creepy boyfriend showed up early, while she was puking in the bathroom. She still hasn’t told him the news, so I had to lie and say it was food poisoning. His stare was even colder than this wretched duplex.

My mom’s standing over the stove, stirring a pot of macaroni. It gives me a pang of loneliness for Ben. Which makes me angrier, because why should I miss a person who I only left five minutes ago?

“Maria, we need to talk.” She points at a stack of envelopes on the table.

“Were you in my room?” The envelopes are college applications, mailed to me or forced on me by my school counselor. I tried to throw them away—so many times—because they’re pointless. But it felt too depressing to get rid of them, and too depressing to stare at what I can’t have, so I shoved them under my bed. Right next to the duffel bag I keep my tips in. “Did you take my stuff?”

“I was vacuuming. Why aren’t any of them opened? Where have you applied?”

“Did you take my money?”

“I would never take your money. I want to—”

“You take my money every day! I work my butt off at that stupid restaurant and you don’t even let me get my own checks.”

She sets her spoon down, looking worried. “I didn’t take any money from your room. I want to know which colleges you’ve applied to.”

I bark out a bitter laugh. “None. Why would I apply to college?”

Her eyes go wide. “None? You’re going to start missing deadlines!” She grabs at the envelopes, frantically searching through them. “What about this one? It’s in Barstow. It looks nice. Or Cal State San Bernardino. It’s not too far away.”

“I want to go far away! And since when am I going to college? We can’t afford that.”

She shoves the applications at me. “You can’t afford not to. You don’t want to be like me. We work so hard, and so long. We don’t want that for you. You deserve more.” Her eyes are intense, pleading. “Por favor, mija, necesitas aplicar. Para tu futuro.”

It’s the most Spanish she’s spoken to me in years. She always said we shouldn’t leave Rick out by using a language he doesn’t know. But hearing it now makes me feel like a kid again. So, like an obedient little girl, I grab the first application and start filling it out while she watches, holding her breath.

*

“Can you help me with a project?” I ask Ben, two days before Christmas. He’s slammed, doing as much prep work as he can, but he immediately stops.

“What do you need?”

“I want to make something. For my mom. Something special. But I don’t know how.”

“What were you thinking?”

“She used to tell me about rice pudding. Her grandma made it for them every Christmas. And she tried to make it a few years ago, but then she got sad and dumped it all down the sink, said it wasn’t right. She’s never tried again. She works really hard. She deserves some of your magic.”

Ben’s smile is the powdered sugar on top of a cookie. “I think we can do that.”

We work all morning. He shows me how to get the milk simmering at just the right rate. I scorch the first batch, and we have to throw it out. But Ben insists it’ll be more magical if I make it myself. So I try again. This time I keep the temperature steady. I skim the surface like he shows me, so that the milk doesn’t get a skin. We add the rice, and I tend to it with feverish intensity. He takes over the stirring while I mix together eggs, sugar, vanilla, more milk.

“It needs…” I tap my finger against the counter, glancing at him for clues. “Nutmeg?” He smiles wider. I sprinkle some in and pour the mixture into the rice on the stove. His body is next to mine, and we both lean in, breathing the sweet steam as it rises up. I turn my face and breathe him in, too. “Keep stirring?” I whisper.

He nods. And doesn’t move. So we stand, occupying the same space, watching as ordinary ingredients combine into something I hope will be magic.

*

“Mama?” I push the door shut with my foot, carefully holding the still-hot dish. Normally rice pudding is served cold, but when I sprinkled the cinnamon on top, it felt … right. Perfect. “Are you home?”