“Despacio,” Christophe said, laughing. “Slow down! Okay. This is Nacio.” He nodded at the taller of the two. “And Raimundo.”
“Hola, prima.” Nacio shook her hand, grinning widely.
The other hugged her. “Hey, Lupita!”
“This is Pilar,” Christophe said. “Su novia.”
The cousins looked at Pilar and gave slow, identical blinks, pondering the information. “Good job, prima,” Raimundo said to Loup. “So, you want to go fishing?”
“Uh… maybe later?”
“Idiotas,” Christophe said to his cousins with affection. “You and your fish. No, we are going to meet my mother. We will see you tonight, okay?”
“Okay!” They went back to the boat, laughing and scuffling and tussling.
“They’re very… lively,” Pilar observed.
“Yes.”
Christophe led them to the hotel, where his mother, Marcela, met them in the lobby. She was a tall, elegant woman with kind, intelligent eyes. She gazed at Loup for a long, long time, then embraced her, pressing her cheek against Loup’s.
“Welcome, mija,” she said in a gentle voice. “We are so very, very glad to have you here.”
No one had hugged her like that since her mother died, with such tenderness and none of the slight flinch of withdrawal that most people felt. Loup’s throat tightened. “Thank you, ma’am.”
“Ma’am!” Marcela laughed. “No, no. You can call me Tía Marcela.” She turned to Pilar. “And you too. Pilar, yes? Christophe spoke of you on the telephone.” She smiled. “Welcome.”
“Thank you.”
“Come.” She beckoned. “I have a very nice room for you, and you will stay as long as you wish. Christophe, be a nice boy and bring their suitcases.”
“Sí, Mami.”
The room was clean and bright and airy, looking out at the sparkling water of the little marina.
“Wow.” Pilar gazed around. “This is so nice. You’re so… nice!”
“I do this in memory of Martin,” Marcela murmured. “It was his great sorrow that he never knew his child. That she grew up in a place where she could not be free. And you, bonita, do not have such an easy path, either. It is wonderful and maddening loving one of them, but it is not easy.” She glanced at Christophe and smiled wryly. “Though it is easier than being a mother to one of them. So. Enjoy.”
Christophe eyed the bed. “Trust me, Mami, they will.”
“Bad boy!” she scolded him. “So, Christophe will fetch you in a couple of hours for the party. If you need anything, call the front desk. Ask for Ana Maria if she does not answer; she speaks good English.”
“Okay,” Loup agreed. “Gracias, Tía Marcela.”
“Martin’s daughter.” Her gaze lingered on Loup. “He would have been so proud. So very, very proud.”
They left.
Pilar looked apprehensive. “God, she’s so nice. It makes me feel kinda guilty. I don’t think she’d be so nice to me if she knew what I’d done. How bad I hurt you when I left you for Rory.”
Loup sat on the bed. “I do. I think she’d understand it better than anyone. Didn’t you hear her? She said it wasn’t easy loving one of us. And she did lose Tío Henri. I bet there were times she thought about giving up.”
“Maybe.” Pilar was quiet a moment. “I still wish I hadn’t done it.”
She glanced up. “I know. I know you do. But you’re here now, and that’s all that matters.” Her voice softened. “I know I can’t understand it the way normal people do, but believe me, I know what you did to get here was pretty damn terrifying. You gave up everything! I won’t ever forget it.”
“Thanks.” Pilar’s expression eased. “It’s not, you know.”
“Huh?”
“Hard.” She smiled ruefully. “Loving you. I mean, it’s kind of scary, yeah, but otherwise it’s pretty spectacularly easy.”
Loup smiled back at her. “I think the scary part was what she meant.”
“Yeah,” Pilar agreed. “But I can live with it. Thinking of losing you again…” She shuddered. “That’s scarier.”
Two hours later, Christophe came to collect them. He regarded the disheveled bedspread without comment. “You ready, bonitas?”
“Almost!” Loup called from the bathroom.
“Look up,” Pilar suggested, wielding a mascara brush.
“Ow.”
“Sorry.” She dabbed at the outer corner of Loup’s left eye with a tissue. “There. Perfect. You can do it yourself next time.”
“I could have done it myself this time,” Loup observed.
Pilar surveyed her handiwork. “Yeah, but I do a better job, and you’re meeting your whole family for the first time.” She tapped Loup lightly on the nose. “Just so you know, normal people would be nervous. Excited, but nervous.”
“Oh. Are you?”
“Yeah,” she admitted. “But at least we look nice.”
“You both look very lovely,” Christophe commented. “Shall we go?”
The party was held on a hotel garden terrace strung with lights and festive paper decorations. Most of the guests had already arrived, and they let out a heartfelt cheer when Christophe entered with Loup and Pilar on his arms. It was an odd assortment: Marcela and five other women of middle years, all beaming, and seven boys and young men ranging in age and size from a pair of identical twins who looked to be about eight to Christophe, the oldest. The boys descended on Loup in a swarm, chattering at her in a mixture of Spanish and English.
“Back, back!” Christophe swatted at them, laughing. “Easy!”
They ignored him or cuffed him back, roughhousing with the careless ease of long practice. Although they varied in height and hue, all of them had the same familiar wide, dark eyes and uncanny sense of physical presence.
Not a one of them made the slightest attempt to hide what they were. It evoked the sensation of nothingness where uneasiness should be, and made her feel strangely alone in the midst of the throng.
“Okay, okay.” Christophe began naming them, pointing at the twins. “Marcel and Daniel, and this one we call Paco. Raimundo and Nacio from the boat, and this is Alejandro. Oh, and the shy girl hiding behind the palm tree is his sweetheart, Amaya.”
“Venga, venga!” The twins dragged Loup away to meet their mother, who pressed Loup’s hands between hers and spoke warmly to her in Spanish. Paco, a couple years older, tugged at a fold of her dress and clamored to go next.
“It is a little overwhelming, I think.” Marcela joined them.
“A little, yeah.” Loup glanced over her shoulder and saw Pilar held captive to the crowded attention of Nacio and Raimundo, looking half-delighted and half-alarmed.
“Don’t worry.” Marcela followed her gaze. “They’re all good-hearted boys, and they know to be respectful. They are excited, though.” She smiled sadly. “And they no longer have fathers to help them behave.”
“Yeah, I know,” Loup said softly. “I’m sorry.”
“Of course.” She put a hand on her shoulder. “Come, meet the others.”
The women were gentler, easier. By the end of the evening, Loup had them sorted out. Dolores, the twins’ mother, sold embroidered clothing in the market. Paco’s mother, Cruz, was a hairdresser and the most talkative of the lot. Alejandro and Nacio’s mothers both worked for one of the big hotels in the next town, and Raimundo’s mother, Consuelo, worked for an agency specializing in rental properties.
All of them shared a shadow of loss and sorrow, as well as an exasperated sense of sisterhood born of the difficulties of raising boisterous, fearless boys. And all of them welcomed Loup with the utmost warmth.
It made her feel good, but it made her feel bad, too. It made her miss home.
Hotel staff began to circulate with platters of hors d’oeuvres. The boys surrounded them. Pilar escaped and made her way to Loup’s side.
“Holy shit!” she murmured. “They’re a little wild.”
“You okay?”
“Yeah.” Pilar smiled. “So far Nacio’s promised to teach me to swim, fish, and scuba dive, and I think one of the little ones, Paco, said he was gonna marry me when he grew up.” She ruffled Loup’s hair. “You having a nice time, baby?”
“Yeah.” She nodded. “It’s a lot to take in, but yeah.”
“I’m glad.”
They ate and mingled. Alejandro brought over his shy, pretty girlfriend and introduced her. She gazed at them with awe, as though they’d come from someplace exotic, and kept a tight grip on Alejandro’s hand. He was sixteen or seventeen, and less excitable than the rest of his cousins.
“Know why?” Pilar whispered in Loup’s ear. She shook her head. “ ’Cause he’s the only one getting laid a lot.”
She laughed. “Pilar!”
“What? I bet it’s true.”
Then there was more food, dinner served at a long table. Platter after platter of food, served by amused, indulgent hotel staff, vanishing at incredible rates into the mouths of seven not-quite-human boys and young men. The sun set in the west, making the lights illuminating the terrace twinkle brightly.
“Hey!” Christophe called down the table when most of the plates had been scraped clean. “We’re going to have music and dancing, but they want to hear your story, prima. About the big fight and escaping.”
“Okay, but you can’t go around telling other people,” she warned them. “Remember, it’s still supposed to be a secret.”
Christophe looked offended. “Yes, of course. Everyone understands.”
Loup told it with myriad interruptions for translation. The women listened with horrified fascination, and the boys with gleeful excitement and a multitude of questions, all wanting to know how she’d beaten a bigger, stronger opponent.