Page 25 of Keepsake

“This is the media room,” she told us, showing the next room with a more comfortable set of sofas and a big screen. “My office is over there.” She pointed to the opposite door. We all peeked at it, but it wasn’t very exciting. Just a nice table with her laptop, paperwork on top, and a vase of flowers. I stopped counting them at this point.

Logan pivoted to the right. We were all following close by. “The kitchen.” My tongue doubled its size when I took in the space. With an island right in the middle, copper pots hanging from the top and a cupboard in glass showing off expensive china covering all the walls opposite from the stove.

“You cook?” Dash asked.

“Sometimes,” she mumbled, but judging by the way she pinked from her cheeks up to her ears, I’d say she was lying.

“The dining room is over there.” She pointed to the right, where a big ten chair table stood. It was hard to miss.

I scratched my stubble as we progressed in the tour. I wasn’t in the business to agree with my own mother, but she was right in her own way.

Logan’s world wasn’t ours. Every single thing in her house looked and smelled undoubtedly expensive. My work boots scratched her wooden floor. I felt like an elephant in a china shop. I was blue collar and rough, she was fragile and small. The stuff in her house looked like it was ready to break if any Castillo even looked too hard at it.

This wasn’t a place for a toddler. I couldn’t stop Lachlan from touching things. Even right now, he was leaving sticky marks all over her furniture. Those damn crystal vases with the white and pink flowers were at the perfect height to fall over on his head.

I said nothing, and I wasn’t going to say a word. Logan wanted this. She was ready to fight for this. If reality and dreams were going to collide, that was her problem.

“And the bedrooms,” she said as we went up the stairs.

They all looked similar, big with king-size beds and beige decorations. The only different one was the one beside her bedroom that had a view of Lake Michigan. I stepped in.

“Tío, will you grab this one?” Dash asked.

I nodded, accepting. This was temporary, I reminded myself. My life was in my crappy apartment on top of my office. An office that was mostly for show and meeting new clients since most days I was at a construction site.

I looked around the room with the view anyway, my eyes on the lake. I breathed in and out.

“I’ll get them settled,” she said.

I turned from the window. The kids weren’t there anymore, and she was standing awkwardly at the door like she wouldn’t dare step closer to a room with me in it.

“You do that.” I nodded and my eyes turned to the view once again.

“BuyabedforLachlan.” I wrote down on my notepad. What do toddlers even need? I didn’t know.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I thought about how little I knew about everything. This had never happened. I always made a point of being prepared.

I scribbled down, “BE PREPARED” even though that one needed a dropdown list on its own. Breathing slowly out, I reached for my ponytail and pulled out the hairband throwing it onto my useless list.

My roots hurt as I raked both hands over the strands, relaxing it after a long day being pushed back. Shoulders slumped, I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to calm down.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Glancing up, there he was. My lips parted as my brain tried to understand his presence. Alvaro was a figment of my imagination. He was that man on the TV with muscular arms who was able to knock out a man double his size.

He was a character, a bedtime story Sofia liked to tell me about. And now? He was in my home watching me with those piercing warm brown eyes exactly like his sister’s.

“This is the first time I’ve seen your hair down.”

My hand flew to my hair once again as he said it. It must have looked wild after hours up. I tried to smooth it down, but I doubted it was going to make any difference.

“Today was a mess.” I decided to change the subject.

“It was a tantrum.”

“That neither of us knew how to react to.” I pushed, circling around the desk.

Alvaro shook his head, “It will work it—”

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