You Should Have Been Nicer to My Mom, page 22
Xiomara slowly emerged, glancing out behind Naomi. The door to Rafael’s room was decidedly closed, a reminder of how the family had separated themselves from her.
“Where else am I supposed to go?” Xiomara looked at her, incredulous. The weather outside was still raging, and Xiomara hadn’t arrived in her own car. She grabbed ahold of Naomi, forcing her to really look at her. “Hey, what are they planning? Like, what are they going to do to me?”
The home aide’s reaction was sobering. The corners of her eyes pinched together, trying to hide their concern and she looked away as she gently unwrapped Xiomara’s hand from her arm.
“Listen, I don’t know what they’re planning. They sent me out here so they could talk about it among themselves. I’m just doing my job.”
“That you’re not getting paid for,” Xiomara emphasized. “Papi Ramon’s dead. Without him, you don’t have a job anymore.” The words came out quick and vicious, popping Naomi’s worry. Her face fell and then slowly formed a sneer.
“Wow,” She breathed. “Wow. Really thought you were different.” Naomi turned away from her, and Xiomara instantly wanted to take it back.
“Wait, I’m sorry—” she tried. Naomi laughed at the attempt.
“What for?” She stepped up to Xiomara, body stiff with tension. “You’re right, I don’t have a job anymore. You know what I also don’t have? Prospects. I didn’t go to college, because I was taking care of your grandfather the whole time. Do you think I can afford to go now? With no parents, no safety net, just my last paycheck and a prayer? Do you have any idea what it’s like to be me?”
Xiomara’s mouth was dry. “They’ll kill me. You know that.”
“You Abreus are so dramatic.” Naomi scoffed, looking to the window. Xiomara wondered if she was going to see it, the demon that had appeared in that very same spot just earlier—but if Naomi saw it, she had a hell of a poker face. “They’re not going to kill you. You’re one of them,” she said.
“What if they’ve already done it before?” Xiomara thought about Josefina’s tape. “I listened to Mami’s cassette. He said he knew they were responsible for Josephina’s death. You’ve heard how they talked about my mom. They didn’t like her . . .
“And I’m pretty sure they did it,” Xiomara admitted. The certainty had hardened inside of her, tucked between her lungs, and if she didn’t get confirmation, she would choke on it for the rest of her life.
Time ticked on. For a while, Naomi said nothing, but her expression was hardened, and Xiomara couldn’t tell if it meant she would help her or not. She took a deep breath.
“Your mom was killed in a car accident. And no offense, but none of your relatives are smart enough to really plan and get away with murder,” she said, paraphrasing Yaritza’s earlier excuse.
“Maybe not.” Xiomara gripped the bedsheets. “But they have the money. They could have paid someone.”
“Xiomara . . .” She sighed. “I don’t know if—”
“If it were your mom?” Xiomara asked. If Julia’s death had been planned, if the break-in wasn’t just a tragedy, if someone in the family harbored so much hatred for her that they paid off someone to do the unthinkable, if, if, if . . . If it were your mom, wouldn’t you do anything to find out?
“If it were my mom, trust that I would be doing something much worse,” Naomi said, calmly and with a deadly focus. She had the look of someone with nothing to lose—which, in this case, seemed about right. At the same time, there was also Julia in Naomi’s face. Skin like mahogany wood, a heart-shaped face, the way her clear eyes looked like marbles. There were signs of Julia in every pore, a signature passed down from mother to daughter.
A dull sense of loss cut into Xiomara. She wondered if, just like her, Naomi had a hard time looking in the mirror. The home aide looked away from her but didn’t move. She rubbed the back of her neck, mumbling under her breath, “. . . must be losing it . . .” Finally, Naomi sighed. “All right. What do you want me to do?”
“Something that no one sees coming.”
* * *
Xiomara didn’t have to wait very long. The moment Naomi closed the door on her way out, the plan began to unfold. Sitting in the closet, Xiomara pressed her ear to the wall, listening to the home aide’s footsteps fade toward the stairs when Rafael called out to her.
“Naomi, where are you going?”
Naomi’s voice hardly traveled. All Xiomara could make out was something about the dining room. She slowly closed the closet doors, encasing herself in darkness.
“What?” Yaritza shouted. Her footsteps were next, following after Naomi quickly until Xiomara could no longer hear either of them. She gripped Josefina’s tape, praying that this plan would work. Her heart skipped a beat at the sound of creaking floorboards. Someone crossed the hallway to just outside the room.
Don’t come in, she begged. Not yet. Not until Naomi did her part. Xiomara counted the seconds until she hit forty-five. That’s when she heard it—a high pitched bloodcurdling scream cutting through what sounded like a series of shots.
Rafael shouted for his daughter and ran. Most of the family followed suit, clambering down the steps so loudly that Xiomara almost didn’t hear the doorknob turning. Whoever it was opened the door gradually, putting one foot forward as if they only intended to peek inside. Xiomara tried to imagine it: what it must have looked like opening the door to an empty room that should have harbored the demon while chaos reigned downstairs. The person would be tempted to search the room from top to bottom, and find Xiomara hiding in the closet, but Yaritza’s cries of pain forced them to consider the impossible rather quickly.
“She’s not here!” Marisa yelled, running out of the room. “She’s not here!”
Now.
Xiomara pushed the closet doors open and moved with haste to Papi Ramon’s bedroom. It would be a while before any of them would muster the courage to check it, but that was fine, because she would hopefully be long gone by then.
On the other side of the window was the metal trellis, still intact and hopefully sturdy. Xiomara quickly undid the lock and pushed herself halfway out into the storm. The wind and rain flattened her hair against her scalp in seconds as she hooked her hands onto one of the rusted poles. Xiomara maneuvered closer, one foot dangling out the window and trying to catch hold, but the rain made it difficult for her not to slip.
“Xiomara?” someone shouted. Adrenaline spiking, Xiomara pulled herself out. She swung to the left, feet scrambling against the trellis while she steeled her arms. Finally, she wedged a foot into a metal corner and shifted her weight to test its strength. It held.
Xiomara scrambled down the trellis. The house had insulated sound so well that she hadn’t realized how deafening the weather was outside. She couldn’t tell where the family was or where they were going, but she could guess that they were frantically trying to locate her.
The ground squelched under Xiomara’s feet. The storm had turned much of the dirt into mud, with an inch of standing rainwater still slowly sinking into the earth. Xiomara already felt like she was swimming in it. Her shoes were already drenched, underwater and lapping up at her ankles as she maneuvered along the side of the house.
She ducked under nearby windows, careful to avoid being seen in case someone happened to look outdoors. In a few steps, she was finally behind the wall of the bathroom right next to the stairs. The small room had a tiny window, so small that not even her younger self could have cleared it. But that was fine, because all she needed was a hand.
Xiomara peered up, blinking away the rush of water as it pelted her. The night was black as pitch. The only thing that gave the dark any shape was the soft glow of light from the second-floor windows. It made the house feel like it was completely submerged in a void, flooded by the constant white noise of the sky. Behind her, the house shuddered, and for a moment it did not feel like an omen, but rather the pathetic whimper of a sick animal. Xiomara shared that shudder, a bitter cold cutting to the bone before she had time to register the feeling on her skin. She wondered how long it would take to develop hypothermia in this kind of weather. She couldn’t imagine lasting ten minutes.
The bathroom window squeaked open. Xiomara was tempted to scramble through it, but she forced herself to remain still—anyone could have been on the other side of that window. A hand shot out. The silver glint of a key caught her eye immediately. It dangled on a metal ring that hooked into the fob remote. Xiomara had never felt so much relief.
Naomi’s hand shook the dangling key, and Xiomara grabbed it.
“Thanks!” she hissed.
“Just hurry up and get out of here. I’ll try to keep them busy,” Naomi whispered. Then she was gone. Xiomara shook as she bent around the corner of the house. If she was right, no one would think to check on their car keys until they saw that the car was already gone. Hopefully, by then, she would already be miles away.
If there was any indication that the family were considering taking a look outside, Xiomara didn’t see any. None of the windows moved, and no one dared to pop their head out in the storm, not when lightning was flashing. A couple hundred feet away, Xiomara heard the snapping of a tree and the subsequent thud on the ground. No one would come looking for her outdoors.
She pushed herself forward, carefully settling one foot in the muck before dragging the other in front. In just another few strides, she would be at the front of the house and the back of someone’s car. She guessed it was Rafael’s since he’d arrived first.
But his was not the car she intended to steal.
When everything gets chaotic, go get Manuel’s car keys. Unlink them from his house keys first, though.
From the security video, she knew exactly the order the family members had arrived in. Rafael had arrived first, parking his car farther into the driveway. Then Naomi arrived, by Uber. After were Marisa and Aury in a coral Bentley that Xiomara guessed belonged to Aury. She always did enjoy luxurious vehicles that she could customize.
And last were Manuel and his kids, in a large black SUV. Yaritza later arrived via a rideshare just like Xiomara and Naomi.
Another perk of the Dead Mom Club, she thought wryly, just as her foot slipped. Both hands and a knee hit the pavement first, and once the firecracker pain had dulled to a low sizzle, she collected herself and crawled next to the large car. Her hands trembled as she slipped the key into the car lock—using the fob would risk the headlights springing to life and calling for attention.
The key did its job flawlessly. Xiomara opened the door and scrambled inside. She flopped forward onto the dry passenger seat, pulling herself into the driver’s seat and shivering in the dark for a few seconds. The inside of the car was not any warmer than the outside, but at the very least, it was dry, and she would not have water sapping every degree of body heat from her.
Now it was time for the harder part—turning on the car. The headlights would flash no matter what, but she hoped her family would assume it was just another lightning strike and avoid the windows. Down the road, the glow of another car’s headlights grew larger as it approached. If Xiomara was lucky, it would be Mark, coming back from his office with the previous will sitting dry in his briefcase.
But she was rarely lucky, and this car didn’t even have the same make or model as the one she had seen him drive earlier. She decided to wait for it to pass instead, and rubbed her hands together for warmth. It surprised her to feel how numb they’d become in the span of time it took her to enact this plan. Once she was safely down the road, she planned to crank the heat to high.
The car did not pass. It slowed, stopping on the side of the road and killing the lights before Xiomara could see who it was. The door popped open, a cheap umbrella pointed against the direction of the wind as the person struggled to keep it straight while dashing to the front door.
Xiomara couldn’t help but freeze, struck dumb by the lanky legs that moved quickly for the safety of the archway. She couldn’t imagine what stranger would risk life and limb in this weather to get to the family. Maybe it was whoever had left that threatening letter about confessing sins. Once the umbrella came down, Xiomara’s eyes widened at the familiar frame.
What the hell was Marcus doing here?
Her head started buzzing with adrenaline. She had two choices—she could stick to her plan and drive off, leaving Marcus to deal with whatever ensuing craziness her family would think up. Or she could grab Marcus and risk getting caught.
If I leave, they’ll assume Marcus is the demon and kill him.
“Xiomara?” Marcus called, his voice muffled by the distance and rain. His fist pounded against the door as he peered into the sidelight. “Xiomara! I’m here!”
Shit, shit, shit. Distressed, Xiomara fumbled with the keys, dropping them somewhere between her feet on the car floor. She dove for them, feeling around the rug with her heart caught in her throat, jerking up only when Marcus said something that filled her with confusion.
“I brought the tape player you wanted!” He pinched the umbrella under his armpit and held up something small and square. He went over to the window in the study. The curtains billowed, as if someone were pushing them aside. “Xiomara, are you in there?”
Someone stood on the other side of the window. Xiomara could see them no clearer than she could see Marcus, from several feet away. They had a smaller frame wrapped in an identical cardigan to hers and rapped a hand against the glass. Marcus leaned in. Xiomara couldn’t tell what he was seeing, but she had the sickening feeling that whatever it was, it wore her face.
“Can you let me in?” he asked, a free hand pulling at the window.
El bacà protects its owner’s properties.
The figure ballooned. The cardigan melted into flesh, becoming veiny and muscular. Xiomara jolted out of her stupor and threw the car door open.
“Marcus, get away from there!”
Marcus turned, fortunate enough to miss how the thing in Papi Ramon’s study smiled—but not fortunate enough to miss what happened next. The window exploded. Xiomara hadn’t taken two steps before she was thrown back, her head slamming against pavement and darkening her vision while rain battered down.
Pools of pain radiated down her back. Her hands found the ground, but vertigo kept a strong grip. She crawled along blindly until her vision returned, pushing herself up against a tire and peering over the top of Aury’s car to find where Marcus had gone. Unlike Xiomara, Marcus didn’t appear to have been blown away in the attack. His crumpled body lay not too far from the window, surrounded by a growing puddle of blood, diluted only by the rainwater that carried the crimson fluid in streaks toward Xiomara.
She didn’t have to check if he was still alive. The spine at the base of his neck was visible enough.
12:17 a.m.
Xiomara fell to her knees, and just in time, it seemed. The front door slowly peeled open as Naomi’s head poked out, followed by Yaritza’s nosy expression. The pile of gore once known as Marcus immediately shocked them back. Naomi fell into the open door frame, sliding down on her ass with both hands pressing into her mouth. Yaritza went running, screaming something that might have been actual words had Xiomara not been too stunned to process them.
She felt herself leave her body. Xiomara watched herself sit in the cold and unforgiving weather, while Aury and Manuel were next to peer out of the door. Aury shouted in surprise, and Manuel did the same. The two delved into some kind of argument while Xiomara wondered what had taken them so long to open the door? They had all run down to the first floor in seconds when they’d thought she had escaped, but when Marcus stood at the front door for several minutes, knocking and yelling for Xiomara, it was like none of them had heard him, or even bothered to check.
Marisa was at the door next, for just a few seconds before Aury waved her back. The family disappeared into the house, leaving Naomi in a horrified state, still transfixed by the corpse. Xiomara watched her, focusing on the way the home aide’s shoulders rose up and fell quickly. The panic attack was enough reminder for Xiomara to breathe. She came back to her body, exhausted and wracked with agony, then steadied herself by leaning against the Bentley. Xiomara hooked her elbow over the hood as she came to her feet. She immediately noticed a large crack in the windshield, splintering from the top right corner to the bottom middle—and resting right at the base was the cassette player.
Tentatively, Xiomara reached for it, only to be whipped around and pulled to the ground.
“What are you doing?” Naomi gripped her arm tight. Her voice came out strained, like she was trying to keep herself from crying but only succeeding in not choking on her tears. “I thought you said were leaving!”
Xiomara opened her mouth. “Marcus . . . he . . .” She swallowed the words before she could scream it.
Naomi stilled. She didn’t blink or turn, yet she looked at the body from the corner of her eye in a way that said she was very aware of where it was. “That was your . . . ?”
Xiomara swallowed again. All the water in the world could’ve drowned her then, and it still wouldn’t have been enough for her dry throat.
“Okay, but . . . you still have to go,” Naomi whispered. “Go, get out of here. You still have the car keys, right?”
Xiomara turned to the SUV. “I dropped them somewhere in there.”
Somehow, despite having blatantly left the car door open, Xiomara found it shut. Without another word, Naomi went over to the SUV and pulled at the handles. The doors wouldn’t budge, already locked from intruders. Was this the demon’s doing?
“Naomi!” someone called.
“I’m coming!” she yelled, then pressed the tape player into Xiomara’s chest. The numbing cold made it so she could only feel a light pressure when the corners were probably digging into her skin. “Listen, at this point, you’re better off just making a run for it. Better yet . . .” Naomi searched the dark for moment. She pointed out toward the road. “Is that his car? Grab his keys and go. I don’t care which direction you go in, just go.”
