How Moon Fuentez Fell in Love with the Universe

by Raquel Vasquez Gilliland

  “I would’ve cheated on you too.”

  “¿Qué?”

  “What he did wasn’t right, but I would’ve cheated on you too. I would’ve done anything to get away from you, Mom. You are the worst person I’ve ever known.” I can’t believe how calm I feel, finally telling Mom what I think. Finally telling her the truth.

  “You want to know why I act the way I do with you?”

  “Yes, Mom, my scars and I would love to know.”

  “Why do you love throwing that in my face? When I already told you, I wouldn’t have had to do it if it weren’t for you.”

  “Bye, Mom.”

  “Moon, if you hang up now, you may as well never come back home. Never again.”

  I stare at my hotel room for a moment. The only sound is the hum of the mini fridge. It slithers around me.

  So I’ve been okay thinking about my life without my mom. But what Star did to me today? Those knives in my back? I’m beginning to think I’m better off without my sister, too. And that’s how I’m able to say it, with no hesitation, my voice steady.

  “Okay.”

  And then I hang up.

  40. How the Worst Birthday in the Known Universe Became the Absolute Best

  ONCE, WHEN I was eight or nine, Dad woke me up. It felt so late, but probably it was, like, nine thirty at night or something. “Moon, come on,” he whispered. “Let’s go.” We hopped in his truck, where it always smelled like coffee and dirt and the metallic tang of old tools. I loved it in there.

  We drove into a dirt road in a forest, bumping and jumping wildly with each rock the tires hit. Finally he stopped, reached in the back seat, and pulled out two hard hats—one for me and one for him. He took me into the forest, to a little clearing marked with yellow caution tape. I still remember that tape so vividly, how it moved in the wind under the moonlight.

  We climbed down into a hole and stood with walls of sediment all around us, lit by the moon and the lights on our hats.

  “This was where our ancestors met in the summers,” he said, “thirteen or fifteen thousand years ago.” With gloves, he picked up some dirt and showed me little pieces of chert, this really hard rock people used to shape into weapons. “These are the leftovers of their work. They’d come here to feast”—he pointed at a pile of bones poking out of the dirt—“and party, I imagine.”

  I laughed. “That sounds fun.”

  “Bet it was. The days were long and warm, the fields filled with wildflowers. I bet ancient people loved summer. I bet everything seemed full of hope.” Dad seemed so sad as he said it. So sad. I didn’t really understand why until much later.

  “So we’re looking at stuff that old, for real?” I asked.

  “Yes. That old. Imagine it, Moon. Every day we walk on ancient history.”

  “That’s a little creepy.”

  And that made him laugh and laugh. “Yes, I suppose it is.”

  “Can you bring me here tomorrow, too? When it’s during the day?”

  “Can’t do, kiddo. You’re not even supposed to be here now because of liability issues.” He gave me a big smile and helped me climb out. “But when you’re eighteen, you can come to all my excavations. Deal?”

  “Deal.” I remember saying that word so well, how the silver-edged moonlit forest swallowed my voice, how my dad’s arms felt good and strong as he carried me back to the truck.

  I am eighteen years old today.

  Nothing feels all that special about it anymore.

  Which is why I am hiding in my bunk on the bus while Star and Oak and whoever else go and eat platinum-dipped cheesecake champagne bath fizzies while laughing their asses off about what losers all their siblings are.

  My phone buzzes and my heart sinks a little when I see it’s Tía. Which is ridiculous because I love Tía. But Mom hasn’t called, not once since the big fight last night.

  “Hello?”

  “Happy birthday, Moon!”

  I plaster a big smile on my face. “Thank you, Tía.”

  “Got any big plans?”

  “Uh, not really. We’re still on the road.”

  “You should do something, though. Make a cake. Or even just buy a piece from the gas station. Couple of candles, make a wish…”

  “Good idea. Maybe I’ll make a hummingbird cake.”

  “There you go.”

  We chat a bit longer, but I think Tía can tell I’m not in a chatty mood, so she lets me go without prying too much.

  As soon as I hang up the phone, a growl emanates from behind me. “What the fuck is a hummingbird cake?”

  I close my eyes and take a long breath. “It’s just a cake, Santiago.”

  He doesn’t respond for a second, but then he says, “Wait. It’s got pineapple? Bananas? Pecans? All in the same cake?” He sounds appalled and disgusted in that unique form of judgment he’s so good at. “Well, you can’t make that in my kitchen. I forbid it.”

  “Fine.” I don’t feel like arguing.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. Shut up.”

  Of course he climbs up instead, pulling open the curtain so I have to see his beautiful face.

  “Why were you going to make the gross cake, anyway?”

  “I was never going to make a cake, okay? So you can stop freaking out now.”

  “Why’d you say it, then?”

  Sometimes I wish I had the foresight to film our interactions. Just so the next time someone calls Santiago silent and stoic, I can pull it up and say, See? He’s actually a raving banana peel if you get to know him.

  “I wanted to get off the phone. That’s why I said it.”

  “But why’d you say that specifically?”

  “Because it was pertinent to the conversation, you giant troll! Jeez! Go back to your hole in the ground. And do everyone a favor and don’t come back out.”

  “You want to know what I think?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “I think that you said it specifically to get my attention. I think—”

  “Oh my Lord.” I turn over, put my hands on his shoulders, and stare at him right in the face. He’s startled enough to stop speaking, thank you, Mary Magdalene. “It’s my birthday. It’s my birthday and I feel like shit, so to stop my aunt from asking too many questions, I told her I’m making our favorite cake.”

  He blinks. “It’s your birthday?”

  I groan and collapse back in the bed, turning my face toward the window. “Yes.”

  “Are you not doing something with your sister?”

  I groan and put my pillow on my head. “No. Go away, please.”

  And miraculously, he does. Or, at least he climbs down, and then I don’t hear him anymore. I keep the pillow over my head in case he decides to get back to torturing me. But he doesn’t. I lift the pillow a little to see if he’s near, but I think I’m all alone now. “Pathetic,” I mutter. Not even my nemesis wants to antagonize me on my birthday. And before this mood turns into a full-on pity party, I close my eyes and pretend I’m on a spaceship. A human-size vessel, shooting through the Milky Way at the speed of light. I am enclosed in warm metal, and there is nothing around me but iridescent starlight. Starlight is my only company for the rest of my days.

  I guess I doze off at some point in outer space, because the next thing I know, someone is shaking me.

  “Hey.”

  “Mm.”

  “Hey, Moon.”

  Crap. It’s Santiago. He’s changed his mind about ceasing fire for my birthday.

  “What do you want?” I croak like a frog.

  While I clear my throat and cough, he says, “Get ready. I’m taking you out.”

  That stops my coughing. “What did you say?”

  “Get dressed. I’m taking you out for your birthday, all right?” He jumps off the ladder, and I swear, the whole earth shakes. “Or you can lie in bed like a loser. All the same to me.”

  “Go away.” I feel like a broken record. But there’s no way I’m letting tha
t jerk take me out for my birthday. Where would we even go? To the dump, I’ll bet. He’d make me get all dolled up so he can drop me off at the local waste management like a piece of garbage.

  “Moon! Hurry your ass up!”

  “No.” But for some unknown reason, I lift my torso and roll toward the ladder. My feet make their way down. I don’t know, I guess I’m ready to be tortured today. It hardly seems like things could get any worse. Why not see how far Santiago takes it?

  But then a warm thought arrives: He likes you. And I guess I’m so used to shitting on myself all the time that I totally forgot. So… what if I want to see how far Santiago takes it in a different way? In the way that he likes me. In the way that he thinks I’m pretty, maybe. Or he likes that I make him laugh with my ridiculous name-calling. Or the way he looks at my body sometimes—he doesn’t see my rolls and cellulite and everywhere I jiggle. Or maybe he does and he likes that, too.

  Why was it so much easier to assume he hated me? Christ. I need to stop thinking and get dressed.

  I grab the second dress I packed, white and covered in a small sunflower print. Tía says it’s from the nineties. She’s the one who gave it to me, so I guess she would know. I like that it’s a wrap dress, that I can tie it at the smallest part of my squishy waist and let my hips and butt jut out like some ancient fertility goddess. Plus the white makes my skin look so dark and bronze. I love it.

  I let my hair down, kind of wild from my nap, but whatever. Just let me call it beach waves. And then I add pink pigment to my lips and cheeks. I decide to skip the eyeliner because Santiago starts banging on the bathroom door. “I’m hungry,” he grumbles.

  “When is that not the case?” I call back as I apply some perfume oil, a blend of lemon and coconut. I guess with a boy the size of Santiago, he’s gotta eat constantly to maintain all that body. Doesn’t make it any less annoying, though.

  “Moon, I’m going to leave—”

  I push open the door and put my hands on my hips. “You’re going to leave what?”

  He’s too busy staring at my waist and my hips. Told you they’re a force in this dress. But I snap my fingers. “Up here, perv.”

  He actually has the nerve to take his time dragging his gaze back up. I cross my arms and ask, “Are you done yet?”

  “You look good.”

  I furrow my brow, even though a hundred thousand butterflies have crept into my stomach between his ogling and the remark. I’d always thought I was too big and too loud and too much to be beautiful. But Santiago, even with that simple compliment, makes me feel like I’m the prettiest thing he’s ever seen. How does he do that?

  And, for some reason, this is how I thank him: “Where did you learn how to give a girl a compliment, huh? Clown school?”

  “Be quiet.” He says it without any malice and then he takes my hand. “Come on.”

  Santiago Philips is holding my hand. Santiago Philips is holding my hand across the bus, through the parking lot, until we reach what I assume is a taxi. He lets go of me to open the door and rests his hand on the small of my back as I climb in. By the time he’s inside, I feel hot and nervous. It’s because you need a boyfriend, I scold myself. You needed one, like, yesterday.

  And also he likes you. And yeah, that’s really the source of all my nerves, if I’m honest. Which I don’t want to be, because I can scarcely handle just the thought of someone like Santiago liking someone like me.

  Santiago gives our driver an address, and then we’re off. He doesn’t say much on the way, and neither do I. In fact, I turn into a right hypocrite, because all I can think is Santiago looks good. Really good. His slacks are tight on his thighs as he sits, and I can see the slabs of muscle in the moving sunlight. When he asks me to help him roll up his sleeves, I may or may not stop breathing for a few seconds. Thick forearms, all exposed and firm. It’s like he knows all my weaknesses.

  The driver pulls in front of a two-story, redbrick home. The front yard is filled with dogwood trees, all blooming pretty in white and pink. There’s a huge front porch lined with wooden rocking chairs and lit with big yellow candles. “Is this your house?” I ask incredulously.

  “Sure,” Santiago responds. “One of the twelve I own.” He holds out his arm and I grab it. Jeez. Is there any place on him that isn’t hard enough to smash bones against? If we’re ever at war, I know exactly who’s going to be my personal body guard.

  The door opens and a man in a suit smiles at us. “Mr. Philips? Ms. Fuentez?”

  “Yes,” Santiago responds. “I’ve reserved—”

  “The Magnolia table. Yes. Right this way.”

  The fellow leads us inside a warm, empty living room upstairs, featuring a stone fireplace surrounded with oversize brown furniture. Just beyond is a huge room that’s basically a restaurant. There are tables and people, the clinks of glass and silverware. We end up on an open balcony where a single table stands, covered in a peach cloth and white cloth napkins and wineglasses and an ornate carafe of ice water, wet with condensation.

  “Thank you,” Santiago says, and pulls out a chair. It takes me a few seconds to realize he means for me to sit in it.

  “Do you trust me?” Santiago asks as he takes his seat.

  “What? Why do you ask?”

  “Answer the question, Moon.”

  Do I trust Santiago? I mean, can you trust a guy who hates you? But also shocks you with random acts of sweetness?

  “Mostly,” I respond.

  “Enough for me to order your birthday dinner?”

  I shrug. “Sure. Why not.”

  “We will have the hazelnut-crusted grouper,” Santiago tells our server. “On the side, grits with white cheddar and the sautéed garlic peas.”

  “Very good.” As soon as the server leaves, I lean over and make a face. “Grits? Peas?”

  “You said you trusted me.” He lifts one shoulder.

  “These grits better be as good as yours, that’s all I’m saying.”

  “When did you last have grits before mine? How were they prepared?”

  I shrug. “Camping with my dad. I hated them, so he added jam so I wouldn’t starve.”

  “Jam?” Santiago looks like he might gag. “No wonder you hate them.”

  “Sometimes I’d put in a spoon of peanut butter.”

  “That’s even worse. My God.”

  “Hey, I was nine.”

  “You never talk about your dad.” He sips his water, but everything about the delivery of the question is careful.

  “There’s not much to say.”

  “What’s your favorite memory of him?”

  I smile. “He used to take us camping in Alaska. Everything about that was my favorite. Fireweed—my favorite flower—grows like crazy over there. My dad used to press them in his books, and for my birthday one year, he put the dried flowers in these beautiful frames.…” I trail off, looking down at my silverware. “It’s been a long time without him. Sometimes I forget he was ever around. Which makes me feel like such a shitty daughter.”

  “That’s normal,” he says. “Believe me.” And before I can ask how he knows, he says, “So why are you such a shitty cook?”

  I roll my eyes and smile.

  “What?”

  “Just, could you go thirty minutes without insulting me? Is that even possible?”

  He bites his lips, and when he releases, they’re almost fuchsia. “Fine. But only because it’s your birthday.”

  I snort. “Thirty minutes of civility on my birthday. Wouldn’t want to spoil me, huh?”

  “Exactly. So, why are you such… an inexperienced cook?”

  “Good one.” Now I’m sipping my water carefully. “Well, after my dad left, my mom wasn’t okay. She had issues. She couldn’t take care of us. She stopped cooking completely. And she forbade us from learning, for the most part. She didn’t want us to end up as maids or something, I guess.”

  “Why would cooking make you become a maid?”

  “I don’t know. Mom�
��s logic has never been that strong.” I shudder. “Lord. It was like a prison until Star and I learned how to drive. Probably that’s why I started hanging out in the woods so much.”

  Santiago looks at me for a long moment and clears his throat. “I’m sorry you went through that. I wish I’d—”

  But then we’re interrupted with dinner. And, Lord, it smells so good. So freaking good. I want to rub even the peas all over my body.

  I start with the fish, then the peas. “Oh my Lord, this is good,” I say. “Oh my God. This is so good.”

  “Try the grits, Moon.” Dang it. I’m caught.

  “Fine.” I take a small bite into my mouth and… and then I basically fall out of my chair. “Holy. Goats.”

  Santiago smiles. I grip the table so I don’t topple over. Good God. His smile is better than this meal, and all the meals he’s ever made put together.

  “Told you.” He shovels a huge spoon of grits in.

  “They’re even better than yours!”

  “Let’s not get carried away.”

  “Ha ha.” I pause with my fork in midair. “So how did you become such an… experienced cook?”

  He shrugs. “You know, it’s… kind of a similar story to yours. My mom got really depressed about some stuff… and she stopped cooking. And I was thirteen. Growing, like, an inch an hour or something.”

  “So you were even hungrier than you are now.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Jeez Louise. How were there no food shortages from that time period?”

  “Be quiet.” He’s smiling, his plate is empty, and he’s leaned back. I can literally see the ripple of abs through his shirt, and I look down at my plate with what may be a flush at my cheeks.

  “Anyway, I started cooking. But I didn’t want to only eat box mac and cheese and frozen pizza. I was concerned about health, too, so I learned how to make vegetables that tasted good. It went from there.”

  We chat a little more about food, and Santiago tells me, “What really got me into gourmet stuff…” He stops, like he’s said, or almost said, some big secret or something.

  “What? What got you into it?”