He shrugs. “It’s true.”
A smile escapes you before you can prevent it. “Then maybe you should sit somewhere less interesting.”
He studies your face as if the smile itself is evidence of something. “Would that help?”
“No,” you admit. “Now they’ll only think it louder.”
For the first time, he laughs. It transforms him more than it should, taking some of the guardedness out of his features and replacing it with a warmth that does not fit his coveralls quite right. You notice that too. Another thing tucked away silently for later.
The meal passes with small practical talk. Where you’re from. How long the repair work should take. Whether the city’s buses have gotten worse or simply more crowded. You tell him you grew up outside Puebla, the oldest of four, and began working in other people’s homes at seventeen after your mother got sick. You do not tell him about your marriage because it still feels too close to a bruise when strangers touch it.
He does not tell you much at all.
Only that he has been around houses like this before. That he is good with his hands. That he prefers fixing things to talking about himself. All of which might be true and yet feel, somehow, like polished omissions.
The next days settle into rhythm.
You wake before dawn in the little room assigned to you above the garage, dress in the half-dark, braid your hair, and start downstairs before the mansion’s expensive quiet has fully lifted. You clean surfaces that already gleam, fold towels no one has used, wipe fingerprints from grand pianos and mirrored consoles and door handles shaped like vines. You learn which staircase creaks, which cook steals apricots from the pantry, which groundskeeper sings boleros badly under his breath when he thinks no one hears.
And you learn the girls.
Valentina tests you constantly. She asks impossible questions while you straighten her bookshelf, hides things to see if you’ll notice, watches for signs of impatience the way other children watch for storms. She is sharp, proud, and angry in ways too big for a child her age. Sofía is different. She trails after silence. She startles easily. She asks for stories when you help her put away dolls, then apologizes for asking as if requesting anything at all has become uncomfortable for her.
Slowly, cautiously, you become part of their daily edges.
Not a mother. They do not hand that title away.
Not a friend either, because children in houses like this know friendship with staff is always vulnerable to adult decisions.
continued on next page
For complete cooking times, go to the next page or click the Open button (>), and don't forget to SHARE with your Facebook friends.
