The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (53)

Families were not supposed to be dysfunctional the way the Montoyas were. Thankfully, their little unit was perfect. Tatinelly, Rhiri, and himself. Though he preferred that they spend holidays just the three of them, they alternated years visiting his parents and hers in Texas. He didn’t think he could handle another full-blown family reunion. But Tatinelly had been stressed all week, what with the news making her feel like she was being followed. He’d told her not to watch it before bed, but she insisted. They lived in the most secure neighborhood in Anywhere, USA. There was no possible way she was being followed.

Still, there was a snowstorm blowing in on the Pacific Northwest, and he had a few vacation days he wanted to spend with his best girls. Four Rivers wouldn’t have been his first choice. In fact, he’d intended on driving right past Four Rivers to the Gulf Coast for better weather, but then they got those terrible calls.

At the sight of the tree, Mike felt a deep shudder in his bones. How could a person have become a tree? Even though he’d seen it with his own two eyes, part of him didn’t want to believe it had happened. He’d said he was asleep, but he lied. He had to lie. How could he go on record saying that he’d seen what he saw? It wasn’t natural. The Montoyas could keep their crazy. At least now that Orquídea had passed, rest in peace, the whole family could move on from their myths and superstitions.

But then he looked at Rhiannon in the rearview mirror, nearly bouncing out of her seat as their pink Beetle crested the engine-killing hill. She should know her family, no matter how odd and off-putting Mike found them. Rhiannon was perfect. He’d even come to love the small pink rose growing out of the center of her forehead. She got her sweetheart shaped face and high cheekbones from her mother. Truth be told, the only part that she got from her father was her hair’s wheat-brown shade, when he’d had hair. After the fire, he’d woken up with it ashen. Then, a few days later, every single strand had fallen off, like a tree gone barren after a good howling wind.

Rhiannon pointed out the window and said, “It’s her! It’s Mamá!”

Tatinelly smiled, though every part of her hurt. They didn’t understand what caused her pain. When she went to the doctor, they told her she was well. She was imagining things. But when she moved, she felt like she was made out of rusted and forgotten metal parts. As if health issues weren’t bad enough, Tatinelly claimed to have her very own stalker. No one seemed to believe that either. But now that they were in Four Rivers, with the wildflower-scented air, she felt settled. She wished they’d come during a happier time. She wished she’d been able to call her daddy earlier in the day. Maybe she would have made him late for work and he wouldn’t have gotten clipped by that truck. Tears ran down her cheeks again, but the cool breeze kissed them away.

She reached out a hand to Rhiannon. “Yes, baby girl. That’s Mamá Orquídea.”

Rhiannon’s voice was like a bell chime trilling in the wind. Dragonflies flitted into the car, nudging at her rose, walking across her shoulders, nesting in the curls of her hair like she was a fairy changeling coming home.

The Sullivans parked outside of the house where Reymundo and Marimar were waiting on the porch. The tree beside it cast a long shadow. When they parked, the dragonflies left them for the tall grass in the hills.

“It’s good to see you,” Tatinelly said, hugging her cousins tightly. She regained some of her strength, as if Reymundo were giving her some of his and Marimar was holding her up.

There was no time to regret how little they’d seen of each other over the years. How unfortunate the circumstances were. Rhiannon leaped from the car. Her dress was a sharp green, the color of new leaves, the color of the tight rosebud at Marimar’s clavicle that had never blossomed.

Marimar couldn’t help but laugh as the girl hugged her legs. She spoke at about a thousand words per minute. Her favorite color was leaf-green, and she was in the second grade. Her best subjects were science and reading. Her favorite stories were the fairy tales her mother liked to make up, stories about magic hills and river monsters and a place that neither of them had ever been to. She was afraid of the dark, but only when she was alone. She wished that she was tall enough to touch the flowers on the big tree. She could hear the tree crying. Could any of them hear the tree? Was there someone inside of it?

“You can hear the tree?” Rey asked, but his clipped tone wasn’t disbelief. It bordered on jealousy. “We never heard anything and we cleaned up this mess.”

Mike ruffled his daughter’s head. “She thinks all the trees talk to her. Such an imagination.”

Rey feigned a smile. “Such.”

But Rhiannon had already lost interest in her cousins. She pointed at the blue rooster and asked, “Mommy, what is that rooster doing?”

“Gabo is laying an egg, honey.”

“Actually his name is Jameson now,” Marimar said.

Rhiannon cocked her head up at Orquídea’s tree, waited as if listening, and giggled. “Mamá Orquídea doesn’t like that you changed his name.”

Marimar blanched. “What?”

“Why did you rename Gabo?” Rey asked.

Marimar shrugged defensively. “He drank a whole bottle of Jameson and croaked. I buried him, even, but there he was the next day, roosting in Orquídea’s roots.”

“Does he have nine lives? Like a cat?” Rhiannon asked.