Page 64 of Sleeping with the Frenemy

Sofi was already shaking her head. “There’s no way, Ma. We’ve been through too much. Even if we did give it a try, there’s no way it would last long, then I’d be right where I’ve been every single time, trying to keep it all a secret so that I don’t lose the one family we really have left.”

“You mean the Vegas?”

“Of course! I see them like family and I know you do too. When Leo and I don’t work out, who do you think gets to keep them? Spoiler alert. It’s not us.”

“Maybe you two will make it work and maybe you won’t. Maybe it will ruin your relationship with the Vegas, maybe it won’t. There’s no way to ever know for sure, but at some point you need to stop hiding from anything that might hurt you, Sofia. You’re too strong to spend your life hiding and you deserve to be happy.” With that she turned and left, leaving Sofi standing there wondering if she should make the leap she wanted to make.

Because he could read her mind, at that moment her phone buzzed with a message from Leo.

Bombón, I have something I want to share with you. Meet me at our spot at 6:30.

She knew exactly where he wanted her to meet him. The place that had been their rendezvous spot since the night of their first kiss. She remembered it well because it was the night that had changed her life.

Sofi sat on her bed doing her best to stifle the sobs wracking her frame. She didn’t want Mami to hear her and wake up. She knew that Abuela Fina, who lay next to her, was down for the count thanks to the pills the doctor had given her. Sofi could jump on the bed screaming the lyrics to “America” fromWest Side Storyand Abuela Fina would sleep on. Sofi envied her that ability to bypass the pain by being unconscious.

Sofi felt like her body was slowly and excruciatingly trying to turn itself inside out. Everything hurt, but her heart hurt the most. She didn’t think it would ever not hurt again. The two most important men in her life, the only ones she trusted at any rate, were gone for good now. They’d died a week prior, but it hadn’t seemed real until she’d watched both her mom and grandma break down when they were handed the two urns containing Tío Manny and Abuelo Juan’s ashes. It was still hard for her to believe that the two cookie jar–looking containers sitting on her dresser were all that remained of them.

There was a scratch at her window and Sofi nearly jumped five feet in the air at the sound. She rushed to her closet to grab the bat Tío Manny had given her two weeks ago. It was the one he’d used to hit his five hundredth home run, so she didn’t want to have to ruin it, but the last thing they needed at the moment was for a burglar to break in.

The scratch came again, but this time it was accompanied by a voice whispering her name.

Cursing under her breath, Sofi tiptoed to her bedroom window and slowly peeled back a corner of the blinds to see, all while maintaining her grip on the bat. When she saw who was scratching at her window like a psycho from a horror movie, she was tempted to use the bat anyway. “What the hell are you doing, Leo Vega?” she whisper-yelled.

“Open the window,” he whisper-yelled back. “It’s windy as shit out here and I’m about to be blown away.”

“That’s what you get for climbing my fire escape like a stalker.”

“Just open the damn window already.”

“No, my abuela is in here asleep.”

He huffed. “Fine, then come out. We have somewhere to be anyway.”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Just come on. I have a surprise for you.”

Sofi thought of all the times Kamilah complained about the “surprises” her brothers would give her and decided she probably didn’t want to risk it. Leo already did whatever he could to make her life hell. Then again it wasn’t like she could be any more miserable and what else was she going to do? Stare at the urns and cry some more? At least, Leo was a distraction. “Okay, but give me a second to change.” She was still in the black dress her abuela had chosen for her to wear to the funeral. It had a puffy skirt and the sleeves were supertight. There was no way she could climb down the fire escape in that.

Sofi pulled on some jeans from her dirty pile and her school hoodie. Then she slipped her feet into her gym shoes and climbed out the window to meet him. Together they climbed down the ladder and ran around to the front of her building where a familiar car was parked. It was the Toyota all three of his older brothers had previously owned. Sofi hopped in the car and within moments they were on their way.

“Where are we going?” she asked when it became clear they were leaving the neighborhood. “Are we meeting Kamilah somewhere?”

“No Kamilah, just you and me and I told you it’s a surprise.”

Sofi wanted to argue with him, but couldn’t bring herself to. In all honesty if he planned to murder her, she’d probably not put up a fight.

The buildings started to get taller and the homes less frequent. They were heading downtown, but for the life of her she couldn’t figure out why. Then they pulled up to a street right by Millennium Park and Leo found a spot to park.

“Why are we going to Millennium Park? It’s closed right now.”

“It’s never really truly closed,” Leo said, opening his car door and getting out.

“That sounds like a good way to get us in trouble,” Sofi told him, exiting the car as well.

Leo reached into his back seat to pull out his guitar. “Nah. We’ll only get in trouble if we get caught.”

“Oh great. Now we’re definitely going to get caught.”

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