Page 24 of For The Record

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@AntonioPerezFilms: Production for “Entangled,” starring Isabelle Holland, is well underway! Coming out in June

@TTang: @AntonioPerezFilms Can’t wait to see the movie!

@ENews: We caught up with @IsabelleHolland14 on her latest movie, Entangled, and her cute new puppy. Check out the interview below!

Chapter 12: Leo Perez

“Sit up straight and put your phone away, Leo,” my mother scolds me. “No cellphones at the dinner table.”

Even at the age of twenty-nine, she manages to make me feel like a teenager again. Over our mother’s shoulder, Raina sticks her tongue out at me. “Yes, Mama.”

Sighing, I tuck my phone into the pocket of my jeans, putting it on silent.

Ricardo is already seated at the head of the table, my mother at his right. Raina is next to her, and I’m across from her. A veritable feast is laid out across the table: arroz con pollo, ropas viejas, and even though there are only four of us, the table is overflowing with Cuban food. The smell of herbs and spices wafts towards me, the familiar aromas wrapping around me like a warm hug.

Ricardo says a prayer before we dig into our food. With my head bowed, I feel Raina kick my ankle under the table, and both our eyes meet across the platters of food. She sticks out her tongue at me, and I reciprocate; our typical routine. My shoulders relax slightly. This much, at least, is normal and expected, when work seems to be proving more difficult than predicted.

“TMZ saw you leaving a restaurant with someone,” Raina announces as soon as I start eating. “A girl.”

I rub a hand over my unshaven jaw, taking a sip of water. “I’m not answering that.”

“I wasn’t asking you a question, but now that you bring it up…” Her brown eyes light up with mischief. “Who was the girl, bro?”

Our mother’s ears perk up immediately. “What girl?”

I sigh. “There’s no girl.”

“Then what is your sister talking about?” Ricardo chimes in. His black mustache bobs up and down as he speaks, bringing a forkful of rice to his mouth.

“Okay, there is a girl, but it’s not a big deal,” I say. Raina should work for the FBI. I can picture her doing advanced interrogation already.

“Really?” My mother’s delight and desire for a grandchild shine in her bright eyes and beaming grin. Though, I have no idea why, since she’s barely fifty and still has one daughter living at home. “Who is she?”

Behind her eager question is anxiety. I can practically hear her saying:Not that gringa. She never did like Alina Rostova, the one time that they met. Possibly because Alina was scantily dressed, in my house, while we were alone together on a Saturday night, while my mother is a staunch Catholic, but that’s beside the point.

“She’s nobody.” The words taste bitter, the lie turning to ashes in my mouth, and I chase them down with a swig of water.

“PeopleMagazine would say otherwise,” Raina says, mischief still written across her face like a splash of freckles. She clears her throat and begins to read from her phone. “Leo Perez looked smitten as he exited a trendy restaurant with a mysterious brunette! Who is his rebound from Alina Rostova?”

“What happened to no phones at the dinner table?” I grumble. Our mother looks torn between taking the phone away from Raina and learning more about Skye. Since no one seems willing to enforce the rules around here, I guess it falls to me. “Her name is Skye. Skye Holland.”

“Shut. Up.” Raina slams the phone down with so much force I worry her screen is going to crack, the iridescent phone case face-up and glinting at me, almost blinding me in the dimly lit room, the only glow from an overhead light with the bulbs almost burned out. Ricardo is good with cars, but when I was at home, I used to replace every lightbulb and fix every leaky faucet.

Our mother clicks her tongue. “Raina, mija, don’t tell your brother to shut up.”

“I wasn’t telling him toshut up, shut up,” she says with a huff. “I wassaying, there’s no way that Skye Holland would go on a date with him.”

“How do you even know who Skye Holland is?”

“Um, Isabelle Holland’s younger sister. She was in my favourite show.”

“So why can’t your brother date her?” Ricardo asks, chewing a piece of chicken slowly and looking like he’s joining this gossip-laden conversation with all the eagerness of a turkey on Thanksgiving.

“Because for starters, you’re way too old for her,” Raina says, drinking something from a mug that looks whipped… and green. Matcha, maybe? I couldn’t name my sister’s favourite drink if held at gunpoint. “She’s only twenty-five.”

I’m twenty-nine, not thirty-nine, but I guess when you’re sixteen, everyone above the age of eighteen seems impossibly ancient.

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