Rebecca Schwartz 05 - Other People's Skeletons

are you?”
    She didn’t answer, just kept her face buried somewhere around my midriff. A teenage girl hovered uncertainly in the background— the baby-sitter, I realized.
    When I’d come loose from Esperanza, been pulled into the house, I told the baby-sitter my name and learned hers was Tiffany.
    “She’s our friend, Tiffany. She’ll take over,” said Esperanza. “You can go home now.”
    But Tiffany and I knew it wasn’t quite that simple. “Tell you what,” I said. “I’ll stay a little while, and Tiffany can have a break and watch TV— then I’ve really got to get back home.”
    “No.” She fashioned her exquisite lips into a pout.
    “Why not?”
    “Stay all night.”
    “Honey, tomorrow’s a school day for me.” And anyway, your dad doesn’t need two dates in one evening. It was killing me not to ask where he was.
    “I just got back from Mom’s, and Dad went out!”
    “Well, sweetheart, I’m here.” I tried to keep my mind off Julio, talking brightly and fast. I asked civilized questions about our pals Libby and Keil, and what Esperanza was doing in school, until eventually I noticed my stomach was rumbling.
    Esperanza had eaten, so I asked if I could make myself something, but she came right back at me: “I’ll make you some eggs.”
    “You can make eggs? Who taught you?” I was instantly sorry I’d asked the question.
    But she only said, “I took a cooking class. Daddy’ll be back soon.” She looked wistful, as if she were afraid I’d leave if I didn’t think that.
    “Honey, that’s okay. I’m happy just being here with you.”
    She smiled and sat down to tell me all about sixth grade, which, so far as I could gather, was mostly about which recording artists were the best: “So then in the video there’s these two Valley girls and one of them says, ‘Would you look at her butt! It is so biiig….’ You know how they make every word separate, like each one is some sort of event? ”
    I was howling. She did a very funny Valley girl. But she stopped in the middle. “So, how’re you! I mean, is everything all right?”
    “Why, do I look sick?”
    “You never, like, just show up. Dad always tells me if you’re coming. Anyhow, he couldn’t have known or he’d be here. So something must be wrong.”
    “No, I just…” Was I going to lie? What was the point? “I just felt a little lonesome, that’s all.”
    Tiffany came in. “Bedtime.”
    “She’s right, honey. We’re being bad.”
    “Are you leaving?” She badly wanted me to stay; why, I wasn’t sure— to reassure herself, probably, that things were okay between Julio and me.
    “I have to get up early. But I’ll be down soon. Next weekend, maybe.” If I were invited.
    She held on to me a long time and looked terribly sad when I left. She missed her own mother, I knew; and when she was with Silvia, Julio’s ex-wife, she missed her dad; and me, I thought. She missed me, too.
    I was looking forward to the drive back, feeling the bitter sweetness of Esperanza’s good night, the outright sadness of not having seen Julio, but resigned, ready for an hour and a half of singing along with the radio. However, as I was waving good-bye, I heard a voice say, “What on earth is a Jeep doing in my driveway?”
    So I agreed to stay awhile, and Esperanza went to bed happy. Tiffany, it developed, lived across the street and didn’t have to be taken home. In seconds, Julio and I were alone. He’d been on a date, I was pretty sure— his sheepish look more or less confirmed it. But it couldn’t have been much of one because he was home early. And anyway, we had the damn agreement.
    The reason we had it was that we both recognized neither one of us could leave the place where we lived— I practiced law in the city, which was like lifeblood to me anyhow; and Julio was a marine biologist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. How much future did such a relationship have? So he had a right to date and I had a right to date because we were both adults and we recognized these things.
    Ftah.
    That was the way I felt, but I kept my mouth shut.
    He got me some wine and said the same stuff Esperanza had said: Was I all right? Why was I there?
    “I just wanted to see you. I guess I’m depressed.”
    “About Chris?”
    It would have been a perfect time to say: No! I’m depressed because this time next week I’ll have no breasts and this time next year I’ll be dead. Or similar calm words.
    Instead, I said, “I guess so.”