Names I Call My Sister

  Names I Call My Sister

  MARY CASTILLO • BERTA PLATAS

  SOFIA QUINTERO • LYNDA SANDOVAL

  Contents

  Till Death Do Us Part by Mary Castillo

  What Stays in Vegas by Berta Platas

  Whipped by Sofia Quintero

  Diss-Connected by Lynda Sandoval…

  A+ Author Insights, Extras, & More…

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  TILL DEATH DO US PART

  MARY CASTILLO

  Chapter 1

  Dori Orihuela thought once again that she never should’ve left Denver when she turned onto the dirt driveway leading to Grammy Cena’s house.

  Bordered on both sides by solid walls of nopal cactus, Dori thought once again that her sister, Sela, should’ve been put in charge of Grammy Cena. Sela had always been her favorite. But no one could count on them showing up at the wedding sober, much less showing up at all, and so the duty fell on her.

  Grammy Cena’s dogs, Pepe and Churro, charged and snarled at Dori’s RAV4. She stopped a few feet from the porch, cut the engine and rolled down her passenger window.

  “Grammy, it’s me! Don’t shoot!”

  At the sound of her voice, the dogs’ snarls turned to joyous cries for attention.

  Grammy opened the door and came out onto the porch. “Something bad is going to happen at this wedding,” Grammy’s witchy voice declared from the sagging little house with the giant pepper tree in the back. Dori bet the tree still had the rope swing that her brother and sister would argue over. As the oldest, she had been the one who refereed their turns.

  Grammy locked the door and then shaded her eyes with a bony hand. “Your Tío Fermin has been visiting again.”

  Tío Fermin had been dead since 1986, but he “visited” Grammy in the form of a skunk when he had messages from the other side. Grammy’s house backed onto a small canyon below La Vista Memorial Park, but Dori had long since given up her argument that the canyon teemed with skunks.

  With a sigh, Dori yanked her keys out of the ignition and realized nothing had changed in the five years she’d been gone. Pepe or Churro yelped when she opened the car door and it clonked one of them in the head.

  “Hey, Grammy,” she said, struggling past the two dogs who now circled around her legs. “You ready to go? We’re going to be late to the church.”

  Grammy yelled sharply at the dogs, whose tails dropped between their legs, their ears pressed pathetically against their heads.

  “Psh. I ain’t in no hurry to go to that wedding,” Grammy spat, scowling as Dori hurried to the porch to help her down. She twisted her arm out of Dori’s grip, determined to make her way down the stairs by herself. They seemed a lot more wobbly to Dori than the last time she’d been there.

  “How do I look?” Grammy asked, patting her hair.

  When they thought they were giving Grammy their final good-byes last year, she had asked Dori if her mascara was smeared. To see her now, Dori thought, you’d never think she’d been at Death’s door.

  Grammy’s wrinkled lips wore Max Factor red lipstick, just as they had since the 1950s, and her hair, which was dyed jet-black once a month, had been piled into her signature bouffant. When the sun touched her gold lamé pantsuit, Elvis probably looked down from heaven and shook his head at such bad taste.

  “Very, uh, shiny,” Dori replied, squinting her eyes. She could only imagine what dress her sister would show up in. “Now, you’re not carrying anything, are you?”

  Grammy remained suspiciously quiet.

  “Are you?” Dori insisted in the voice she used to question suspects. “Whatever you have, you need to leave in the house.”

  “I’m an old lady. What if someone tries to attack me in the parking lot? Or that hussy your brother’s marrying talks smart with me? What kind of world is this when an old woman can’t protect herself—”

  “I didn’t make the law, and we’re not going anywhere until you unpack.”

  Grammy stopped so suddenly that Dori’s heart lurched because she thought she’d tripped and was about to fall. “I’ll wait here all day if I have to,” Grammy pouted.

  “Then you’ll miss the open bar.”

  Grammy ran her tongue over the gap where her two front teeth had been, while her eyes bored into Dori’s to see if she’d back down. Dori put all her willpower into her cop face.

  “No good cotton-pickin’ nosy kids,” Grammy finally muttered, thrusting her small suitcase of a purse at Dori. “Go ahead and take it. But your Tío Fermin was around this morning, and I have a feeling that I need to protect all of us.”

  Dori confiscated Grampy’s old billy club, a switchblade, and a pearl-handled Saturday night special. There was so much felony time in her hands that she lost count.

  “Wait here and I’ll put them away in the house.”

  “But you said we’d be late!” Grammy shouted at her back. Still walking toward the house, Dori unloaded the gun before she got desperate and shot herself to get out of going to her brother’s wedding.

  Deep in the Immaculata Church, Sela watched her brother Robbie receive the traditional blessing from his padrino, Tío Vincent.

  “God has blessed you with a virgin bride,” Tío Vince said, his voice rough with emotion as he held a tiny box of gold coins. “These coins symbolize the family’s gratitude for her virtue.”

  Grammy snorted, “Virgin, my ass. Sammy has got as much reason to wear white in a church as I do.”

  “Her name is Dannie,” Sela hissed back. “And if God strikes you down for blasphemy, he’ll get me for standing next to you.”

  Grammy reached into her ear and turned down her hearing aid.

  Tío Vince then held out a gold braided lasso. “This lasso will also bind you and Dannie together in the eyes of God, just as it did your tía and me.”

  Sela watched her parents, their chests swelled with pride at their one and only son. Not only was Robbie now Dr. Robert Orihuela of Children’s Hospital, but he was also marrying a twenty-two-year-old virgin from an old San Diego family. She couldn’t count the number of times her mother chatted excitedly about how Dannie had been educated at Our Lady of Guadalupe and had debuted to society at the La Jolla Debutante Ball. In other words, she was bred to marry well.

  Mom dabbed the corner of her eyes and Dad patted Robbie’s shoulder as if he couldn’t stop himself. When Sela had walked up to her parents earlier, her flame print dress in mango and pink nearly made her mother cry tears of despair.

  Sela glanced over at Dori, who stood on the other side of Grammy. In a tailored white pantsuit with just a peek of her opalescent cami, Dori appeared crisp and capable. She had that bronzed warrior beauty. With her caramel corkscrew curls and hazel eyes, Sela looked like a fairy that had fallen out of her dew-covered bed.

  She wondered how she was going to tell Dori that Robbie had invited Pete, his friend and the love of Dori’s life. Maybe she could talk Grammy into doing it. They’d been playing hot potato with that bombshell for weeks.

  “Did I tell you about the dream I had last night?” Grammy said, her voice booming off the cool plaster walls of the dressing room.

  Sela grinned and “forgot” to remind Grammy that she had lowered the volume of her hearing aids.

  Grammy cleared her throat and cupped her hand to nearly shout in Sela’s ear. “I was dreaming that I was having sex with Brad Pitt and at first I was thinking it was nice, you know, but then I realized I don’t like that girly boy—”

  “Mamá!” Dad hissed, but Grammy couldn’t hear him.

  “I like
un tigre, a man like your grampy who can throw down and—”

  “Mamá!” Dad shouted.

  Grammy gave a start, her eyes wide and blinking as if she were senile. Sela repressed a grin that Grammy knew what she had been doing all along.

  “Oh, did you hear that?” Grammy asked.

  Sela basked in the horror on her parents’ faces. Tío Vince froze in wiping the tears off his cheeks. He was from Mom’s side of the family.

  “This is the only day Brenda and I will walk one of your grandchildren down the aisle,” Dad said in the tone that sent a warning zipping up Sela’s spine. “We won’t have it ruined.”

  Dori’s left eyebrow shot up, and Grammy dismissed him with a flap of her hand. Mom rushed over to make the peace.

  “Girls,” she begged Sela, not looking at Dori because she was afraid of her oldest daughter. “Meet us outside the church after the ceremony…for pictures, okay?”

  “Are you sure Pammy—”

  “Dannie,” everyone corrected in chorus.

  “Don’t interrupt me,” Grammy spat. “I thought she’d want us in the kitchen with the rest of the Mexicans.”

  Dori’s hand clamped down on Grammy’s walker. “Let’s get some air, Grammy,” she ground between her teeth, with a glare at Sela to help her or be left with their parents.

  “Why?” The question shot out of Sela’s mouth when they were outside, the sun sliding over her bare shoulders. “Why are we being treated like second class citizens?”

  “Sela,” Dori hissed. “Not now.”

  For their precious mijo, her parents refinanced their house so he could go to Stanford. But they had refused to let Sela attend the USC Thornton School of Music on a full scholarship because, according to them—or really, Dad—there was no future in music. For Robert, they refinanced their house again to impress Dannie’s family, so they could pay for half of a huge society wedding and not look like a working-class family with two daughters who were known around National City as “those wild Orihuela girls.”

  “Sela! Sela, wait,” Mom called, running after them. “Honey, I need to ask you a favor.”

  A fragile bridge of trust had been built between them ever since Sela learned that her mother had had an affair with Mr. Neal who used to live next door. Sela wanted more than anything for at least one of her parents to trust her, and she’d worked hard to prove it by saying nothing, not even to Dori, about her mother’s secret.

  “What?” Sela asked, hoping the favor was to stand up when the priest asked if anyone was opposed to this union.

  “Well…” Her mother’s eyes fell as she dug around in her oyster-colored purse. “Dannie asked if…well, she thought that since we’re in…”

  Out of her purse, she pulled a pair of white gloves with tiny pearl buttons on the back.

  “Dannie asked if you’d wear these,” she said, her voice quivering as she avoided looking Sela in the eye. “Just during the ceremony. To cover up your uh, your—”

  Sela’s face stiffened as if she’d just been slapped by those very same gloves.

  “Tattoo,” Sela finished for her mom, holding up her left ring finger, which bore the words Piss Off, to any future engagement or wedding rings.

  Mom nodded, her shoulders rolling forward. “Sela, please, you know how much I hate to ask you this, but—”

  In all of its horrific clarity, Sela saw life with Dannie flash before her eyes…having to sit at the kids’ table on Thanksgiving, finding out she wasn’t invited to Christmas dinner, or being told not to get too close to the baby.

  She felt everything inside her go silent as a breeze sent a shiver through the papery petals of the bougainvillea.

  This was the day Mom had been dreaming of for her daughters. Given their track records, she would only get this one perfect wedding from her son.

  Sela decided she would do this for her mom, and only her mom.

  “It’s okay,” she said, taking the gloves. “Even though they don’t go with my dress, I’ll wear them for you.”

  Chapter 2

  If Sela had to hear one more reference to Dannie’s virginity or hymen, or look at one more gold-framed portrait of her sister-in-law, she was going to bend over and blow the sixty-five-year-old man seated next to her.

  She glanced over as he belched into his napkin. On second thought, she’d just throw herself in front of the next Rolls that went through the Hotel Del Coronado’s valet line.

  Grammy stabbed her with her elbow, reminding her to look like she was praying as the priest blessed the meal.

  Finally, the waiters swarmed the legendary Crown Ballroom while the quartet swept into a flaccid rendition of Vivaldi’s Spring from the Four Seasons. The crown-shaped chandeliers twinkled against the vaulted paneled ceiling as crystal glasses clinked and conversations rose up from the lengthy silence.

  She had to get through the dinner, the best man’s toast, the first dance, the cake, all of which would be recorded and then replayed via live feedback on the giant screen above the DJ.

  Sela turned to Grammy, seated between her and Dori. “You got anything strong in that purse?”

  Grammy winked and pulled her purse open. Inside was a bottle of Herradura Anejo.

  “Where did you get that?” Sela asked, marveling at Grammy’s resourcefulness.

  “The bar.”

  “The bartender gave you a sixty-dollar bottle of tequila?” Dori asked.

  “You make it sound like I stole it. Your father’s paying the bill.”

  “Good, then let’s drink the whole thing,” Sela said, mischief bursting in her stomach like sparklers.

  “You’re not supposed to drink,” Dori reminded Grammy.

  Sela’s face fell. She’d forgotten about Grammy’s cocktail of medicines. “Oh yeah, you shouldn’t.”

  “Your grampy would die a new death if he saw us leave a perfectly good bottle of tequila untouched,” Grammy said to her, then turned to Dori. “As for you, Tío Fermin is not happy about you becoming a cop.”

  “Tío Fermin was a snitch for the cops,” Dori replied crisply.

  “He did it for the money, to feed his family.”

  “While smuggling illegal aliens over the border and making several hundred bucks per person.”

  Sela wished she could appear completely unruffled, like Dori.

  Grammy pushed her shoulders back with the dignity that would rival the Queen. “He was helping his fellow man.” She then turned to Sela. “Why don’t you go up there and play something?”

  Deflating, Sela explained, “I had a song all worked out, but…well, Dannie said no. They already hired a professional.”

  She saw the outrage stiffen Grammy’s and Dori’s spines.

  “Would it have killed them to let her sing one song?” Dori asked Grammy.

  “Then why didn’t you say something to them?” Grammy countered.

  Sela and Dori spoke at the same time.

  “How was I supposed to know—”

  “Grammy, it’s okay—”

  “You’re supposed to take care of your sister,” Grammy argued with Dori.

  “You do realize she’s twenty-seven, don’t you?”

  “I don’t care if she’s sixty-seven, she’ll always be your little sister. I took care of my sister, God bless her soul, before she died.”

  Sela’s knee bounced anxiously as she waited for one of them to back down. Dori simply turned her attention to her as if she hadn’t clashed with Grammy.

  “So did you get the gig at Croce’s?” she asked coolly.

  “I don’t know yet,” Sela answered.

  “When are you going to find out?”

  “Any day, I guess.”

  “They’re going to pay you, right?”

  Sela tightened up. Did her sister think she was that helpless? “No, I’m doing it for free,” she said sarcastically.

  Dori sighed, tossing her napkin on the table. “I’ll be back.”

  Sela happened to glance over her shoulder, and did a
double take when she saw who sat at the bar.

  “Oh wait!” she said, flapping her napkin at Dori. “Look at the goodies at the bar.”

  Well, what do we have here? Dori wondered as she grabbed onto the chair for support.

  “What do you think?” Sela asked, dabbing her lower lip with gloss.

  Grammy planted both hands on the table and twisted around. “Ohh,” she cooed appraisingly. “Now that’s what I’m saying when I mean un tigre.” She shoved the bottle aside and fished out her gold tube of Max Factor red.

  “He’s mine,” Sela pouted. “I saw him first.”

  “What? I’m just touching up my lipstick!”

  Why did I come back home? Dori asked herself, snatching her purse with the trusty minideodorant she’d packed. Right now she felt like a prisoner who’d had a few years free, only to be thrown behind bars without doing anything wrong.

  With Grammy and Sela salivating over some guy, she was guaranteed a night of keeping them out of trouble. Still sore from being yelled at by Grammy and then snapped at by Sela, she pushed her chair under the table. Let them get each other out of trouble.

  “Have fun with him, okay?” Dori said.

  “Don’t you remember that game we used to play?” Sela asked.

  Unfortunately, yes, she did. Before she had been recruited into the Explorer program at National City PD, she and Sela had earned their reputation as “those Wild Orihuela Girls” by picking the cutest boy at a party and then competing to see who could get him out of his pants.

  Dori regretted not setting a better example to her little sister, and yet, Sela was her parents’ child, not hers.

  “I’m not going to be the wedding hoochie.”

  “Hoochie?” Sela asked. “If I was the wedding hoochie, I’d be out there dry humping every guy on the dance floor!”

  “Like that,” Grammy said, pointing to their cousin Lupe, who shouldn’t have worn that red knit dress without panties. “She should’ve had one of them Peruvian wax jobs or whatever they’re called.”