Don't Date Rosa Santos

by Nina Moreno

  “They mentioned it when I docked my boat here. This part of the dock isn’t the most…popular.”

  “You’re not superstitious?”

  “I’m mostly broke,” he admitted. “It’s humbling to have to pay off a year of college you didn’t finish.”

  “Why didn’t you?” I asked, then cringed. “Sorry, you don’t have to answer that.”

  “It’s fine. I’m surprised the viejitos haven’t done a full report on it yet.”

  His smooth Spanish accent distracted me for one very warm moment. It was curiously easy to talk sitting like this, both of us facing forward, glancing at each other only in small, careful bites. In the shadows, we were like two kids whispering after everyone else had fallen asleep at a slumber party.

  “College was more of a necessary hurdle to prove I knew what does and doesn’t work for me,” Alex admitted. “I hated school and was a terrible student. College didn’t change that.”

  “Did you hate it for any particular reason?” I loved being a student and sometimes feared it was all I was good at.

  “I had learning difficulties.” He said it mechanically, like he’d heard the words applied to him a million times. “School was mostly a pain of trying to learn things in a way my brain didn’t work, so I was in a lot of self-contained classes in high school. Probably one of the reasons you didn’t remember me.”

  “Maybe, but you also have a beard now.”

  He looked confused so I pointed at my chin and then his. “The beard makes you look older than nineteen.”

  Alex ran a curious hand over the lower half of his face. I found myself wondering how it might feel to run my hand across his beard and maybe press my face to his neck. I frowned, surprised at myself. Talking by moonlight softened a lot of edges.

  “Where did you go for school?”

  “Texas. It’s where my dad’s family is from. Where we lived until I was ten and my mom moved us back here to help run the Starfish after her mom died. I always meant to return.” He looked out at the water like he was searching for his hometown on the other side of the Gulf.

  “Not a fan of Port Coral?”

  “Not a fan of change.” At some point in our conversation he had gotten hold of a small piece of rope, and his hands were now busy tying knots as he talked. I watched, fascinated. It looked worn and soft.

  He looked up and his hand stopped. I immediately felt intrusive.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—” I started to apologize, but he shook his head.

  “It’s a coping thing,” he admitted with a frown. “Calms me down when I get nervous.”

  Was he nervous right now? Had I done that to him? The tiny thrill electrified me.

  His fingers tugged, and the knot in his hands untangled. “My dad gave me this rope to teach me different kinds of knots when I was younger. A way to keep me busy or distracted while he worked on the boats in the marina. After a while, it became a way to keep my hands busy and chill out.”

  “And you still have the same rope?”

  “And I still have the same rope,” he said with a hint of pride in his voice.

  I wondered over the touchstones and talismans we all carried, and the energy they held from enough handling and hoping. My hand slipped into my pocket and counted the pennies again. “Did it help with school?”

  “Lots of things helped, but it never got easier. The rope reminds me that despite failing physics I became a hell of a sailor.”

  I glanced at where he’d appeared from the dark earlier tonight. “Is that your boat?”

  “Yeah. If you ask my dad, it’s why I quit college. It’s not true, but I don’t regret it. I love my boat. Hell, I live on my boat.”

  I stared at the sailboat with renewed fascination and noticed the light on inside. He lived on that tiny little house that could take him anywhere.

  “The one good thing that came out of my year was interning for the biology department. Since I knew my way around boats I helped with their projects out in the Gulf.”

  “And now you’re back to help Jonas?”

  “I’m back to eat crow served by my dad and help Jonas. The marina is important to me. I’ve been doing some cool stuff, and I want to be able to do that here, too.”

  “So, you do like Port Coral?”

  He studied the stars for a moment before looking back at me. “Sometimes I like it very much. What about you? Where are you headed after you graduate? Havana, right?”

  I no longer had a sure answer. It was as disorienting as finding myself out here at night. “I just found out the program with University of Havana was canceled, and now I don’t really know. I’ve been accepted to a few places. I have until May to decide.” I squinted as if I was counting. “In other words, I have a few weeks to figure this out.”

  “A lot can happen in a few weeks.” Alex crossed his arms and the moonlight caught his tattoos. I realized with renewed alarm that he was a sailor with a boat right over there.

  I jumped to my feet. “It’s late. I should go.”

  Alex stood and I had to tip my face up to meet his gaze. He studied me for a moment with an open, curious look. “Well, you know where to find me now.”

  He returned to his boat and Luna followed. I waited until I was alone before moving on to the empty boat slip. My hair whipped across my face as I confronted the dark water and took measured breaths of the cooler, salty air.

  My father was both forever gone and still somewhere out there. Maybe that’s why Mom could never stay put. Did I want to be free from bad luck or from being in love? I reached into my pocket and tossed the ashes and pennies into the sea.

  “Late night?”

  Mom and I sat at our kitchen table, and she studied me from over her coffee. My gaze shot to the stove, but Mimi had already returned to her laundry room window.

  “I know the sound of your bedroom window opening,” she continued.

  “Only because you snuck out of it so many times.” On the sill, carved into the old wood, was Mom’s name. Beside it was a clumsy heart and my father’s name.

  “And now you’ve snuck in,” she said, amused. “Tell me, was it your first time? You were super loud.”

  “I fell inside, to be brutally honest.” I’d landed on my elbow.

  “Amateur mistake.”

  “And I see your hands are covered in paint.” White and blue splotches stained her fingers. “Something new, or are you actually going to finish the wall?”

  She hissed as if I’d burned her, but her eyes were lit with humor. “You’re grumpy when you’re guilty, and here I didn’t even ask what you did.”

  “Keep your voice down,” I insisted. I took a fortifying sip of coffee.

  “I’m sorry, but aren’t I the one you should be hiding this from?” She leaned back in the chair and cocked her head to the side.

  “You’re the one who made it so that window never locks.”

  “You’re welcome. Tell me where you were and I won’t tell Mimi.”

  “Tell Mimi what?” my abuela asked as she returned to the room carrying a box of mason jars. She set them on the counter and explained, “Jellies. Strawberry, I think. They will go good with pan tostado.”

  “Are you bartering your services now?” Mom asked. “What’s next? A cow?”

  “Tell Mimi what?” she asked again stubbornly. Her suspicious gaze jumped between Mom and me. I felt like a surreptitious accomplice to some unknown crime.

  “About your granddaughter’s activities,” Mom said lazily. I shot her a death glare.

  Mimi crossed her arms.

  I was going to throw up my coffee and morning pastelito. Mom had picked them up from the bodega this morning in some bid to soften me up before killing me.

  “She found a new officiant for Clara and Jonas.”

  I relaxed so quickly I nearly dropped my coffee mug.

  “He’s very earthy and hippie,” Mom went on about the news I’d told her earlier. “But bilingual. Cuban, right, Rosa?”

>   He wasn’t actually. I bit into guava and cheese.

  “Well, that’s something.” Mimi kissed the top of my head and returned to her window.

  Once she was gone, I glared at Mom. “Are you trying to kill me?”

  “Just keeping you on your toes.” Her grin was devilish. She took a big bite of her pastelito, smiling at me as she ate it. “My baby girl is a little sneaky. Is it wrong to be proud?”

  Being sneaky was exhausting. I was an anxious mess over staying out late on the docks, and my mother was smiling like I’d made honor roll. “It’s definitely twisted.”

  “It’s fun not to be the wild teenager in this house anymore.”

  I raised a disbelieving brow, and Mom’s smile faltered. “It’s just nice to see a little of me in you sometimes, too.”

  Later that afternoon, I headed to my high school. It was weird to not have to be here anymore. Everyone was here. Ana was probably fighting someone in the band room, and I bet Mike was sketching out design plans for his boat instead of the assigned work. For a couple more weeks, they belonged. But no one was saving me a seat except for Ms. Francis, the guidance counselor, whom I’d made an appointment with to discuss my suddenly no-longer-concrete plans in the face of my looming deadline.

  “I have to say, Rosa, I’m very touched you came to me about this instead of Malcolm. All my dual-enrollment kids go to Malcolm.” I liked Ms. Francis. Funny and honest, for an adult, she was a white woman somewhere in her thirties with curly red hair she always wore in a messy topknot. She walked Flotsam and Jetsam, her two Dobermans, through town most afternoons, and they were suspicious of everyone. I’d been meeting with Ms. Francis a lot over the years, and our relationship was now an easy, comfortable one. She knew about study abroad from the jump, and I knew she was ready to settle down, though she was having a tough time finding someone her dogs liked.

  Ms. Francis leaned back in her desk chair. The Spice Girls played on her radio. “So, your study-abroad program is on ice. Is it just for the upcoming semester?”

  “Maybe. According to the e-mail I got, they’re monitoring national policies, but with the current administration…” I stopped and shrugged. “There are other schools with programs at the University of Havana, but not only is there not enough time to apply, but they’re probably going to get canceled too. I can’t take that chance, especially when it means losing scholarships.”

  She clicked her pen and turned to a blank piece of paper in the notebook in front of her. “Well, whenever someone I know—I won’t name names—needs to make a big decision, they make a highly detailed pros and cons list and then draws all over it.”

  I smirked. “But Havana can’t be on my list. It’s no longer an option at this juncture.”

  “Is Charleston still on your list?” When I hesitated, Ms. Francis sat up. “Instead of focusing on the Where, give some thought to all the Whys.”

  I wanted specific, concrete advice, not an essay topic. “Honestly, I’d rather just think about Port Coral right now.”

  She tapped her pen and considered me. “So you’re helping take care of home before you leave?”

  Her implication hit me weird. “It’s not like I’m leaving forever. This will still be…I’ll still live here, too.”

  “College is a moment, Rosa. An important one, of course, but it’s not about the destination, it’s about—”

  “I swear, if you’re about to say journey,” I interrupted.

  “—exploration,” she finished with a sharp, teasing look. “You’re fixated on place because Havana was your answer for a very long time, for very important reasons, but it wasn’t ever about Charleston. It was about Charleston’s connection.” Her pen was still tapping. My pulse picked up as I watched. “This moment of indecision is ripe with the opportunity for a fresh perspective. Picking a school isn’t going to answer all your questions, because if it does, you need to ask better ones. Demand more of your possibilities.” Her phone buzzed with an alarm, and her pen came to an abrupt stop. “Dang, time for my next appointment.”

  I still didn’t know what to do. “I need to secure my spot by May first.”

  “Your spot at Charleston?”

  “I don’t know anymore.” I picked up my bag. She stepped past me to open her door.

  “Maybe I’ll pick one of the other schools that accepted me,” I said and slipped my backpack straps over my shoulders. “But that’s terrifying to consider this late in the game.”

  She huffed a laugh. “You’re so young. I promise you it is not late in the game, Rosa.”

  I hated when adults said that. High school was all fun and games until they threw huge deadlines and choices at us that would decide the direction—and debt—of the rest of our lives. “But what if I stayed in-state? I could save money and—”

  With a small, frustrated huff, she popped some gum in her mouth. “It’s two years, Rosa. I won’t even tell you where I got my undergrad—”

  “It’s right there on the diploma on your wall. You went to Nebraska.”

  “You are one of the most tenacious students I’ve ever had walk into my office. You’re determined, but sometimes that single-mindedness can narrow your focus too much. You don’t know what you want for a reason. Figure out the reason, and I bet you’ll figure out what you want. You have a couple of weeks to think on this, and I’m here if you need me, but go for now, because Chris Miller’s father is on his way.”

  Chris’s dad was a divorced veterinarian whom Ms. Francis had her eye on since the beginning of the school year. Apparently Flotsam and Jetsam didn’t mind him. I wished her luck and left.

  Outside, PE was in full swing. The noise soared and clattered before rushing past. Laughs rang out, and a whistle blew.

  “Rosa!” Benny walked over, hands in his pockets. He fell in step beside me. “What are you doing here? Getting up to some more brujería?”

  “Meeting with Ms. Francis.”

  “You in trouble? You’re stirring up a lot of chisme lately.”

  “Not everyone goes to their guidance counselor because they’re in trouble. And what chisme?” He shot me his bright, charismatic grin, and I rolled my eyes. “Forget it.” I noted he wasn’t in gym clothes. “No mile for you?”

  “This knee gets me out of everything now.” The words were teasing. The tone was not.

  “Like soccer?”

  “We’re not talking about soccer.”

  I sighed. He was so stubborn. “You are such a Taurus.”

  “Not talking about that either—we’re talking about you and your old-man-and-the-sea boyfriend.”

  “What? Your family is the worst. He’s not my boyfriend,” I shot back even though my lungs did a weird, concerning squeeze. “Also, he’s not an old man.”

  “That’s not what I hear.”

  “Because you don’t listen.”

  “Perhaps, but is it true that he has a boat?”

  “Why?” I asked, suspicious, before the obvious reason for him asking hit me. “Oh my god, first of all, I know my own curse, and secondly, it doesn’t matter because he’s not my boyfriend.”

  “This isn’t about that.” Benny lowered his voice, and his eyes darted around the open field. “I think I know where the Golden Turtle is.”

  I was starving, and if I hurried, I could make lunch before Mr. Peña switched to dinner and I missed out on the croquetas. “The wha—Are you seriously still on this? Benny, you have got to stop. We are not going to find lost treasure in Port Coral.”

  “I found the map today.”

  “Whose map?”

  “The map. Every year there was a map, a way to start the quest. But no one ever found the last one, thus never found the turtle, and the mapmakers never confessed.”

  “And you found this long-lost map?”

  “I’ve been doing independent study during second period, which apparently means cleaning out old storage rooms. Anyway, today, I got to some yearbooks from the early 2000s. I looked up our parents, and there
in a collage was this graffiti map of our town. And what do I see on it? A freaking golden turtle.”

  “And no one noticed this whole time?”

  “It was a yearbook. No one looks at theirs after graduation. And it was a mess of a map. Busy as hell. The aesthetic back then was ridiculous.”

  “Wait. What does this have to do with Alex having a boat?” I asked.

  “Because it’s on a barrier island.”

  I stopped walking. I couldn’t go on a barrier island. Then again, a week ago I thought I couldn’t go to the marina.

  “We can become legends in this town.” Benny flashed me a grin. “We just need you to ask your old-man boyfriend to take us.”

  I hustled across town, kicking up pink-and-white petals in my rush, before dashing into el Mercado. Alex didn’t have a phone, which meant I had to go to the marina and try to flag him down from outside his boat or something. I needed food first.

  There were still a few croquetas behind the glass counter. Farther down the counter were the new desserts, and there were pastelitos again. Jackpot. The air was cinnamonsweet, so the baked goods must have just arrived. I looked for Mr. Peña, but someone else was behind the counter dropping off boxes of cookies. Afternoon light sifted in from the window behind him, making the blue waves across his arm shimmer, and revealing the flour dusting his gray shirt.

  “You’re the baker?”

  Alex froze. He set down the last box and turned. “Rosa?”

  I opened my hands to encompass all the baked goods between us. “You baked this?” He nodded. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He looked confused. “You didn’t ask.”

  “If I baked all of this, I would tell everyone. Any and every conversation I had would start with, ‘Have you heard the good word of dulce de leche?’ Oh my god.” I covered my heated face. “You make the dulce de leche.” I groaned into my hands.

  “Is that a good thing?”

  “Yes,” I said without lowering my hands.

  Mr. Peña came in from the kitchen. He gave me a look and gruffly told me, “I have three left.” He scooped the last croquetas into a small paper bag for me. Alex and I were still standing there as Mr. Peña began setting out the rice for dinner. I looked at Alex and asked, “Do you have a minute?”