Page 38 of Rules of Association

The table laughed again, and he went on, “What did you do? Label too many bottles wrong, Ceci?”

I kept my mouth shut.

“No, I think she dropped Al’s camera one too many times,” Melissa said with a quiet smile on her face. I settled deeper into my chair, suddenly feeling less and less hungry. “Al, texted me halfway through and asked if it was possible for a camera lens to break on sand.”

Okay, ouch. Glad to know I was that bad ateverything.

I didn’t know my eyes had slid to my other sister until I was met by her frantic, guilty look. Quickly she turned her red-cheeked face to Lis. “No I didn’t! I didn’t mean it like that!”

“Yes, you did,” Lis snorted. “Don’t try to back out now.”

Just great. I sat back, my arms finding my chest and twisting in a knot, my eyes traveling upward.

“Well,yousaid she’s never mailed a letter in her life because she licked all the invoice envelopes instead of using the sealing tool!” Alta snitched.

“It’s true! She has paper cuts all over her tongue!” The last word broke under the sound of Melissa’s laughter. Looking at me she shook her head. “I’m sorry Ceci, but that’s just too good.”

I shrugged and waved a hand through the air flippantly. “No, by all means, laugh it up.”

And they did. Again, and again, and again.

Apparently, it was allsuperfunny; me messing things up. And apparently it didn’t matter that I was sitting right the fuck here—they had to recount it all right now. In front of me, where I was supposed to,apparently, be okay with being teased and ridiculed.

And maybe if it was about something else, I would have been. I mean, I don’t bat an eye when they constantly retell the story of when I first learned how to ride a bike and kept breaking with one wheel instead of both. I somehow ended up coming home with a skinned forehead from eating pavement multiple times and had to wear a baseball cap to cover up the scab for the rest of the summer. I don’t even care when they make fun of current me, saying I don’t have a domestic bone in my body every time Amá tries to teach us girls some of her mom’s old recipes and mine come out burned black.

I usually didn’t care what they said about me. Teasing didn’t sting me as much as Lis who was super sensitive or Al who just wanted to please everyone. But it was stinging right now.

Maybe if it was at any other time or about anything else, it wouldn’t be getting to me so much. But for some inexplicable reason, this hurt. And instead of crying or screaming or making threats, all I could do was sit there seething. Swallowing the massive ball weighing on my throat until it was a heavy weight in my stomach instead.

Down the table, a deep voice rumbled out a laugh. It was less chafing than the others, but amused, nonetheless.

“Sounds like you had a busy week. You should have come to me, instead,” Ox—who hadn’t said much of anything due to Clementine sitting beside him, alternating between shooting daggers every time he so much as cracked a smile and giving me sympathetic looks—spoke up.

I could tell Fergy wanted to say something, to take up for me in some way, but I just continued to shake my head at her. I didn’t wantanyonetaking up for me. I could do that myself, and I would’ve if… If they all weren’t so right.

As for Ox and his not so subtle pouting about not getting a turn, I didn’t even want to entertain him with the concept of me working with him. I already stretched my limits by cooperating with Melissa, but there was one line in this family I would not cross and that was the one into Oaxaca Fernandez’s control. We wouldn’t mix.

He was way too right and me wrong. Him perfect and me the worst kind of imperfect. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my older brother. I loved all my siblings, but just like I couldn’t stand letting Apá down, I couldn’t stand disappointing my too good brother either. So I would steer clear of him, if only to avoid that outcome.

Apá seemed to agree, because finally he spoke, his deep voice being heard even through the commotion of laughter and jokes. “Let her figure things out on her own, Oaxaca.”

I felt my insides boil as my eyes moved along the table, skipping over the menacing presence burning holes into my face, and landing on my dad. He was sitting there relaxed in his spot at the table. Looking so goddamn indifferent about the fact thatIwas struggling with whathewanted me to do.

That indifference churned the already rocking turbulence in my gut. And I didn’t know what to do with it. I didn’t know what to do here at all. This feeling was new.

Growing up, Apá had always been the one to have my back. While my hyperactivity and rambunctious behavior had always been something that was scolded or restrained, Apá always said to just‘let me be’. To‘let me figure myself out on my own’. And while those words had been my salvation when I was younger, they felt like a weapon now. Like he of all people was finally turning on me. Like he had had enough of “letting me figure it out on my own” because while he was saying the words, him pushing the fast-forward button on my life was notletting me figure it out, it was the opposite. And I couldn’t help but think that maybe the one person who had never really acted like I was so much to handle, was actually starting to get enough of me.

Well, maybe not the only person.My eyes flicked across from me again and were met with a swirling hazel that burned into me with angry heat. I looked away immediately.

Damn this feeling. This is exactly why I didn’t want to struggle in public. Even if it didn’t look like it to them, I had been handling it. I had been figuring it out. I loved the shelter and while I didn’t think my family would ever find it acceptable to work there, I had explored the possibility of finding something related. What exactly, I had no idea. But that was the thing, I would have gotten there. Now here I was, a fucking joke all of a sudden because I was scrambling and more confused than ever. Rushing to catch up because I was so far behind.

I was a live wire. My head pounding and my throat burning, courtesy of my father and those other watchful eyes.

Too many thoughts were swirling in my mind. Defeat at an entire week of failure. Irritation at the idiots laughing around me. Hopelessness at the possibility that I could ever get this right, especially after getting it so fucking wrong right off the bat.

My skin was growing hot and I knew I had to be wearing my irritation. I wished nothing more than to be like I always was. To appear cool with this. But there was just something about it that was grating on the most sensitive of my nerves. I didn’t think there was much more weight I could take before my threads snapped.

“I think we’re embarrassing her,” someone said. I couldn’t tell who anymore, my vision having gone red, but I could hear everyone laughing again.

---