What's Mine and Yours(49)

Margarita closed her eyes, wished for the ocean to sweep up to shore and carry her away.

She felt Celeste kick at her side. “Get up. I’m hungry. I want In-N-Out.”

Margarita sat up and glared at her. “Why won’t you let me stay with you? What will it cost you? You already have everything. Your house, your parents, your diamond face—”

“Don’t start with that square-face bullshit, like you’re some victim.”

“I have nowhere to go.”

Celeste squatted beside her, put her hands in her hair. “You’ll figure it out. You’re resilient! And so pretty.”

Margarita shoved her away. “You selfish cunt.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying,” Celeste said. She hoisted Margarita up with both hands, dragged her in the direction of the road.



Once, Margarita found Robbie in the yard. It was fall, and there were leaves on the ground. They crinkled under her feet, soft and cold, as she walked toward him. He lay flat on his back in the dark. Margarita often woke before her sisters and watched TV by herself in the living room. She had heard a noise, followed it onto the back porch, and saw her father, his breath streaming above him in warm clouds. It might have been a year before Robbie left, before Lacey May said he’d gone without saying good-bye to take a last-minute fishing job on the coast.

He was in his work clothes, his name embroidered on the pocket in shiny thread. His eyes were closed, but she could see his eyeballs zooming underneath the lids. His lips twitched, as if he were trying to say something. She called him, and he said nothing. She gripped his shoulders, and his eyes fluttered open. They closed. He started to hum. Margarita screamed, and Lacey May found her. She scolded her for being dramatic, sent her inside.

Margarita watched from the window as Lacey May hooked her hands in his armpits, tried to haul him toward the house. He stood, and then he fell. Lacey May tipped him over onto his side and he vomited.

A while later, they entered the house, and Robbie collapsed onto the couch. Lacey May called Margarita into the kitchen, away from her father, and she obeyed. Her mother fixed her a cup of hot chocolate, a piece of toast. She told her that Robbie had been sleepwalking. Margarita had asked who kept them safe at night if their father was outside wandering around.

“That’s why he does it,” Lacey May had said. “To watch over us.”



Margarita woke to vomit. Celeste had placed a paper Whole Foods bag on her side of the bed. Margarita missed. She was thirsty; her head throbbed. Somehow, they had gotten back to Venice. Somehow, they had eaten burgers. Wrappers littered the bed. Celeste snored beside her. The lights were on, and it was one a.m. She fumbled for her phone.

She checked her texts, her voicemail, her email, the messages on each of her social media apps, but she hadn’t heard again from her mother or her sisters. They had given up. Of course. But the videos she and Celeste had posted had over ten thousand likes altogether. It lifted her. She clicked to Celeste’s profile and saw her followers had ballooned by at least one hundred. Margarita navigated back to her own account and counted her new followers: sixteen.

She looked over at Celeste, her slender body curled around the dog. She had vomited, too, yellow crust on her pretty chin, chunks of noodle and tomato on the bedspread around her. Her blond hair was pasted to her face, her bare breasts hanging out of her tank top. She was no better than Margarita, and yet Margarita had affixed herself to her. Why did she always forget she was enough on her own?

Margarita stood and aimed her phone at Celeste. She took in her face, the dog, the circle of vomit, her sickly pink nipple. She placed a cartoon golden crown atop Celeste’s head, used every hashtag she could think of for models in L.A., actresses in L.A., working in L.A., and California style. She tagged @Celestial_LA, set the location to Venice Beach, shared the video, and left.

The street was quiet, the houses dark behind hedges of palms, the sky black and clear. Margarita sat on the curb and told herself she’d only be gone for a little while. Her commercial money would clear and she’d come back, rent a better place, out of Cerritos. Find a better agent, a better friend. It was a delicious vision. She gathered it close and dialed her father.

It was loud wherever he was. Rancheras played in the background. A bar.

“Hi, Papi.”

“Hija?” He didn’t know which one she was.

“It’s me, Margarita. I’m in L.A.?”

“Qué hubo, pepita? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine, Pa. It’s Mama—”

Her father groaned. “Oh, don’t talk to me about that, hija. It’s the worst news of my life.”

“They’ve been calling you, too?”

He didn’t answer, as if he didn’t hear. There was roaring and clapping in the background, someone calling his name, Robbie, Robbie, in Spanish.

“Papi, I want to go home, but I don’t have any money.”

“It’s not going well for you over there, pepita?”

“It’s good, Pa. My career is really good. I just did a commercial for a tech company. Like Apple? One day, they could be as big as Apple. I’m just waiting for the check, but I know the family needs me now. I don’t want to be away anymore.”

Margarita knew he wouldn’t deny her. Robbie was good at covering up his guilt by giving her whatever she asked. Margarita knew she should have been relieved but she felt small and faraway, her body a shell left behind by an ocean wave receding.