Despite my telling them I didn’t need their protection so much, I loved to hear from them and to see them. They were truly sunshine for me on any dark, rainy day in this house. It was comforting knowing they were always there.
As usual, the moment I hung up, Sophia burst into my room without knocking first. If she heard my phone ringing, she perked up like a sleeping snake. I wish I could lock my door, but then I thought that would only make her more suspicious and more intruding. Somehow, it was all right for her to lock her door when she wanted it locked, but it was not all right for me.
“Did you get an invitation to Danielle Johnson’s party?” she demanded immediately. “Well, did you?” she asked, her hands on her hips. “I was just on the phone with Alisha, and she told me about it. She wasn’t invited, and neither were Delores or Trudy,” she added, mentioning her three best friends, the girls who had been with us that fateful night when Bradley was killed. “I told them that if we weren’t invited, you certainly wouldn’t be.”
I didn’t answer immediately. I had always thought that lying to Sophia wasn’t as terrible as lying to anyone else. Lies were so much a part of who and what she was that it was as if they were her own language. She was comfortable with them, and she would rather be lied to and remain happy than to be told the truth and be angry or hurt. She took baths in deception. It was second nature to her.
But I was suddenly filled with a raging desire to hurt her in some way. Her arrogance and her meanness were just spilling over.
“As a matter of fact,” I said, “I was.” I picked up the invitation and showed it to her.
I could see that despite what she had said and probably told Alisha, she was anticipating this.
She stepped forward to rip it from my fingers and read it.
“A night in Paris? How ridiculous. Just because her mother came from France, she thinks she can parade about with her oui, oui and pardon moi’s.”
She ripped the invitation in half and tossed it into the little trash can by my desk.
“Well, you won’t go,” she said.
“Why won’t I go?”
“You’re my cousin. You live in my house. If you’re invited and I’m not, you just tell them no thanks.”
“Maybe you will be invited,” I suggested.
She looked at me suspiciously for a moment. “If I get an invitation now, I’ll know it was not really sincere.”
“Since when did you care about that?”
“About what?”
“Being sincere,” I said.
Her expression dissolved. “Very funny. I want to be with you tomorrow when you tell her where to go with her Paris party. I’ll tell you exactly how to say it,” she said, turned, and marched toward my bedroom door.
“I can’t. It’s too late,” I said.
She spun around. “What?”
“I already called her this evening and told her I would be there. You know I’ve been taking French.” I smiled. “When she answered her phone, I said, ‘Merci, Danielle. Je serai heureux de m’occuper de votre partie.’”
Her mouth opened and closed.
“I have a wonderful dress to wear,” I continued, rising from my chair. “You remember it, I’m sure. It’s perfect for an evening in Paris.”
I opened my closet and started to pull the dress off the rack, but when I turned around, she was already gone.
Even Abuela Anabela would be unable to hide a small smile, I thought.
But then she would chastise me and tell me to ask God for forgiveness.
Later, I thought, I would pray for forgiveness. I was enjoying the moment too much right now, and I knew that pleasure
was not going to last very long.
Sure enough, in the morning at breakfast, something we rarely shared with Tía Isabela on weekdays, Sophia complained to her mother about my being invited to the Johnson party and her not being invited. Tía Isabela was genuinely surprised to hear it. I could see a look of amazement and then a faint smile of amusement when she glanced at me.