“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means we’re giving you the rest of the year to have your life figured out, Celestia, or we’ll be taking matters into our own hands,” he clarified.
Like flashing red emergency lights, I felt anger rise in a sudden wave. I bristled, and I could feel tingling warmth prickle at the surface of my skin. “So you guys just think I’m some kind of bum, then?”
“Aren’t you? You live off money you haven’t worked for, and you do nothing but laze around all day,” Apá said, noticing the reaction he was getting out of me and pressing into it like a salty rock in a wound. He was good at that, and I suspected he’d used that tactic in his business dealings in the past. Something our grandfather taught him before he passed.
I felt my nostrils flare, but…I couldn’t really say anything in rebuttal. Even if my dad was purposely trying to rile me, he was also right. Like throat closing, nose stinging, frustrated tears in the backs of my eyes right. Like hit a nerve so head on, I was afraid it would burst right. Iwasa bum. A freeloading one at that. And I was his only child who had yet to figure it out.
Amá smacked my dad across the shoulder and detached herself from his side to slide up in front of me. She was bending low, because apparently I had dropped my eyes to the floor and didn’t hear her calling for me through the roaring in my ears. With her in my line of sight, I reminded myself to breathe, to relax my jaw, and to swallow. When she noticed me doing the tricks she taught me as a young girl who tended to get angry and let her temper got the best of her, she relaxed too. Reaching out both hands she tucked my hair behind my ears.
“He didn’t mean that like it sounds, mama,” she said, her voice soft and quiet.
I peeked up past her head at my father, but his expression didn’t give anything away. He just watched us calmly, his coffee mug grazing his mouth.
“No?” I croaked.
“No,” she insisted. “Celestia you have a world of opportunity available to you. Much more than many, many people in this life. Much more than I had when I was your age.”
I nodded, but I continued to look at my father, wondering now if he really thought I was a disappointment too. Amá noticed and used her hands to hold my cheeks and bring my gaze back to her. “You are by far my most passionate baby, yes? You just need to find where that passion belongs. Okay?”
“And if I don’t?” I asked, genuinely afraid that I never could or would.
“Then you’ll work at the company until you eventually do,” Apá spoke up, voice stern, word final. “You have six months until then.”
Chapter Four
CECI
“I’m here!” I yelled through the quiet dark of the gray wooden kitchen. It didn't belong to me, though I had become very familiar with it in the past couple of years, sort of like a second home.
I tossed my keys into the bowl that sat on the console table against the wall. They clanged loudly against the metal, the sound reverberating through the air like a gong. I winced at the noise, my eyes snapping to it as if it was assaulting my ears on purpose.
Really, it was just me who’d been on edge ever since leaving my parent’s house. Ever since the ultimatum they’d slapped on me.
Flipping on the light, I watched as it illuminated the space and brought the clean surfaces and tidy fixtures around me into view. Sniffing, I got a familiar whiff of the lemon scented surface cleaner diluted just right with the perfect amount of water and topped off with a spritz of lemon freshener after cleaning. I didn’t have to smell the zesty scent to know the place had been cleaned. I knew it would be, like clockwork, every damn day.
Making sure to pull out two coasters from the center dolly of the charcoal countertopped island, I lowered the two cups to the coasters instead of the pristinely cleaned counters. Why I did this instead of just setting thepaper cupson the counters when I knew they wouldn’t stain? Because I valued my sanity. And my best friend.
He was probably the only one who still found any value in me, though.
As if he had some sort of sixth sense and knew I was thinking about him, Connor chose that moment to materialize at the end of the far hallway that led away from the kitchen toward his nerd lair. His computer room. Built specifically for the use of enough computer power it rivaled a full-scale corporate office network. Con peeked his head around the corner of the wall, but he didn’t come out, instead just letting it hover there.
“Hi,” he said before immediately leaving again, returning to his beloved computers. It was a greeting we had worked on for a long time. Now that he was comfortable with me, rather than simply nodding in greeting, he was better at speaking freely. Still, in the mornings he sometimes slipped into old habits. I couldn’t exactly fault him for it, but I still would.
“Don’t trip over yourself with excitement, Con,” I called after him. It was more of a grumble, my bad mood from my unexpected morning already slipping out.
In a huff, I moved to his fridge. It was tucked away into the dark cabinets and camouflaged into the wood. I only knew it was there because I’d been here a million times. Before I could even pull out the yogurt, fruit and prepared smoothie that waited inside, I heard the thunderous steps of one Connor Ferguson coming my way.
I always knew when he was coming. Despite being quiet most of the time (when he wasn’t with me), his powerful legs and massive feet generally gave his entrance away. That and the fact that he chargedeverywhere, like he always had a specific purpose. Like he only ever went where he wanted to go; where he wasmeantto, and he didn’t have a minute to lose getting there.
I loved that about him. I especially loved it when those charging steps were coming for me, which they were now. It made me feel like I was in the right place with him. Like I was where I was meant to be too.
Closing the fridge, I moved over to grab one of the coffee cups and cradled the warm drink in my hands. Leaning a hip against the kitchen island, I watched and waited.
Speed walking toward me like a man on a mission, was Con. My Con. My very best friend. Tall, dark milk coffee brown skin, strong defined jaw that came down to a more defined chin, and eyes so light brown you could see swirls of gold and green mixed in under certain light. I assumed his head of hair would be curly like his brothers’ or sister’s, but he kept it shaved short to his head, which just let everyone see every single chiseled line of his face. His inherently lean frame had been built up by his religious exercise routine and his height spanned upwards to six-four. He wasbig.
And that’s probably why when he reached me he slid the coffee cup I held toward him out of my hands and crouched slightly at the waist so we were eye to eye. Carefully, he slid his bright hazel gaze from one side of my face to the other. Checking me for disease is what I called it when he looked at me like that. Really, I think he was gauging which Ceci he’d get that day, using some kind of internal ‘Ceci-meter’ to get it right. A smart man always had a plan I suppose.