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TO THOSE WHO WAIT<br />
CARLA DOESN’T SAY anything about it again until just after lunch two days later.<br />
“Now. You listen to me,” she says. “No touching. You stay on your side of the room and<br />
he stays on his. I already told him the same thing.”<br />
I understand the words she’s saying, but I don’t understand what she’s saying.<br />
“What do you mean? You mean he’s here? He’s already here?”<br />
“You stay on your side and he stays on his. No touching. You understand?”<br />
I don’t, but I nod yes anyway.<br />
“He’s waiting for you in the sunroom.”<br />
“Decontaminated?”<br />
The look on her face says what do you take me for?<br />
I stand up, sit down, and stand up again.<br />
“Oh, Lordy,” she says. “Go fix yourself up fast. I’m only giving you twenty minutes.”<br />
My stomach doesn’t just flip, it does high-wire somersaults without a net. “What made<br />
you change your mind?”<br />
She comes over, takes my chin in her hand, and stares into my eyes for such a long time<br />
that I start to fidget. I can see her sorting through all she wants to say.<br />
In the end all she says is: “You deserve a little something.”<br />
This is how Rosa gets everything she wants. She simply asks for it from her mother<br />
with the too-big heart.<br />
I head to the mirror to “fix myself.” I’ve almost forgotten what I look like. I don’t spend a<br />
lot of time looking. There’s no need when there’s no one to see you. I like to think that<br />
I’m an exact fifty-fifty mixture of my mom and dad. My warm brown skin is what you get<br />
by mixing her pale olive skin with his richer dark brown. My hair is big and long and<br />
wavy, not as curly as his, but not as straight as hers. Even my eyes are a perfect blend—<br />
neither Asian nor African but somewhere in between.<br />
I look away and then look back quickly, trying to catch myself unawares to get a more<br />
accurate picture, trying to see what Olly will see. I try out a laugh and then smile, with<br />
teeth and without. I even try out a frown, though I’m hoping I won’t have cause to use it.<br />
Carla watches my antics in the mirror, amused and bemused at the same time.<br />
“I almost remember when I was your age,” she says.<br />
I don’t turn around, talking instead to the Carla in the mirror. “Are you sure about this?<br />
You don’t think it’s too risky anymore?”