A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow - Laura Taylor Namey Page 0,4

me out of it.

That’s not true.

I have to go.

You totally rearranged your life behind my back?

You’d just lost your abuela. And after what happened with Andrés… Plus you know you would’ve fought it. And won, just like always.

Then I ran home and cried over a graduation selfie of us, taken the week before. My brunette mane and her fine blond layers flowed under mortarboard caps tinted the dark color of deceit.

Holding the soft jersey tee in the panadería office only hardened one fact inside of me: My grief had changed, morphing from a line between two throbbing end points—Abuela and Andrés—to a new shape. A triangle.

And this trifecta loomed so large, I couldn’t shake it. I couldn’t find myself underneath the black emptiness. My heart fragmented and my breathing came like the prelude to a storm. I had to move. I had to run.

Recipe for Being Abandoned by Your Best Friend

From the Kitchen of Lila Reyes

Ingredients: One packed gym bag kept in Papi’s office. One pair of Nike running shoes. One neon blue tank. One pair of Adidas compression leggings.

Preparation: Change into your gear and flee out the rear service door. Go to your sweet birth city, your Miami. It’s large enough to take you in. Reclaim places and streets that knew you, that knew your love and joy before the last three months took so very much. Reclaim it all.

*Leave out rehashing Stefanie with your family. It’s your loss and you’re going to handle it.

Cooking Temp: 475 degrees—precisely how hot Miami feels when you’re running during the afternoon.

That afternoon, two weeks ago, I went to the rear parking lot and locked everything but my key fob and phone into my turquoise Mini Cooper. Bending and stretching, I prepared to do the thing I did second-best of all. I ran farther than ever before, the kind of distance people earn medals and ribbons for. My only prize was the worn-out reward of stubborn defiance. For hours, I pushed past every hazard sign my body threw out, crossing neighborhood boundaries, until dinnertime came and went. One thought cut through the sweat and heat and pain until my limbs finally shut down: If I traveled far enough, I might be able to run right out of my own skin.

Today I wonder if Stef was right, if I actually could have changed her mind. After all, my powers of persuasion hadn’t worked on my family.

I sink onto the gray velvet bench and try to be as still as possible. I pretend if I don’t move, the place I come from won’t either. West Dade will lock into space and time until I’m home again.

3

After twenty-four hours in my room, I have no idea about the outside temperature, or the number of steps between the inn and Winchester city center. I do know every mysterious smudge on the ceiling, and that it’s six steps from my doorway to the bathroom. Fifteen steps to the loft kitchen and back.

The Wallaces don’t comment on my hibernation, and I find meal trays on the kitchen counter—bless them. One had a note:

Rest. I’m updating your family. Mami’s only called six times.

—Cate

Cate’s also said nothing about the suitcases still propped by my door. About my powered-down phone perched on top of my powered-down laptop.

And then there’s Pilar. I picture my sister’s pert smile and her calm, rational eyes and wonder how many times she’s texted. Or did she power down from me, too, knowing I couldn’t stay away for long? I glance at my phone, the voice of the most precious person in my life, only twenty seconds away. But no. Not yet. I’m not quite ready for an actual conversation with her. At least one not seasoned with the best swear words I know, in two languages.

A white UM t-shirt may have provoked my run, but my flight to England might as well have been booked by one Pilar Veronica Reyes. Since landing, I’ve thought about the midnight scene in my West Dade bedroom a dozen times—the one unfolding after I took off running alone for hours from La Paloma. The aftermath was a hurricane. As irked as I am with my sister, I’m more furious with myself for being so sloppy.

My body had paid dearly for my recklessness, too. I remember the way everything ached. How the fibers of my gray and white comforter scraped against screaming muscles and sunburned skin.

“Más,” Pilar had said that night, holding out the hundredth spoonful of caldo de pollo. I had