Page 38 of You've Got a Place Here, Too

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I made Tía some fried eggs and plátanos maduros

that she devoured like it was to be her last meal.

While she’d been caring for Mami, who’d been caring for her?

I framed the Hotesse picture I had in my dorm room

and placed it on our family altar. He’d been a kind of guardian.

And I was not ready to let him out of my life just yet.

I texted Melody, who had been reaching out. I responded to

professors, all of whom said they understood.

I washed clothes that had piled up in the hamper.

And brought Mami her favorite bata, bobby pins,

and a hairnet for her doobie; lotion to rub on her

anesthesia-swollen feet.

The day we got Mami back home,

I FaceTimed Melody.

“She looks so thin. But she keeps smiling

and saying she’s grateful to be alive. She has

like a hundred pills she needs to take

and a checkup every week for the next month.”

Melody’s big brown eyes were full of concern

and my heart grew big, tripped over everything I felt for her.

This woman who was wanting a woman she’d never met to be okay.

“I emailed the dean,” I said. And I had to clear my throat.

“I’ll be taking a leave of absence.”

And I didn’t talk time, because I didn’t have units, not

hours, or days, or months to know when or if

my mother would be better, if my tía would be strong

enough to care for her sister. But I didn’t have to say.

Melody nodded, the tears in her eyes made them brighter

than usual. “I’m here,” she said. “When you need to vent,

when you need a pep talk, when you need to listen

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