Page 27

CHAPTER 27

ROSE

I t seems like my roommates are asleep by the time I get home at one in the morning. I remove my sandals and tiptoe my way to the back, passing Hope’s room to reach mine. I’m super careful closing my bedroom door because everyone here is a light sleeper.

But unlike the quiet in the house and the residence, I’m freaking buzzing.

I lock myself up in my bathroom with my phone. Checking it for the first time since getting on my car to drive home, I find a text from Logan that simply says, I’ll leave your stuff at your cubicle tomorrow . Nothing else. Zero acknowledgment about anything else.

“This freaking guy,” I grumble, tapping away from my text message app and to the contact list.

I find Mom’s and press call. She’s the only one who can talk my mind into making sense so I can get any sleep. Otherwise I’m going to ruminate about Logan Kim the entire night and hate myself at work tomorrow.

“What’s wrong?” Mom asks upon taking the call, her voice slurring.

We have an evergreen agreement that we can call each other at any time and barring something truly incapacitating—like a surgery—we pick up right away, if only to check whether the topic is an emergency and agree on a callback. It’s both the privilege and downside of being a family that only consists of a Mom and daughter duo.

“Not an emergency,” I start with to bring her heart rate down. “But my head’s an absolute mess and I can’t function.”

“Espérate.” I can hear her bed creak as she sits up. “Okay, I’m all ears now but you’ll owe me brunch after this.”

“Deal.” The Rose in my bathroom mirror and I take a deep breath. “I just really, really wanted to tell you how thankful I am that you’re my mother.”

“That is an acceptable reason to call me at one in the morning, but I fail to see why it’s making your head into a mess.”

I set my phone on loud speaker, modulating the volume so that Hope can’t hear it next door, and as I talk I set out to open brand new makeup removing products. I have to use my stock, after staging my opened products in Logan’s bathroom in case his parents snooped around. I don’t regret making the effort, even if I do regret other aspects of the night.

Mainly how I didn’t hug him goodnight. And that man sure needs a freaking hug.

“I met a friend’s parents tonight,” I say and before I can add anything further, my mom chimes in.

“A guy friend?”

“I—yes. And before you ask, not my boyfriend. Just a friend.” If at all. I’m not sure that he’d consider me one.

“Uh huh.” I won’t acknowledge the skepticism in her voice.

“That’s not the point. What I’m trying to say is that his parents are just hateful people, which really puts into perspective how lucky I am that you raised me.”

“Should I be worried?” I hear her bed sheets rustle. “I know you’re an adult, mijita, but I don’t want you hanging out with bad people.”

“That’s the thing,” I whisper-exclaim, throwing my hands in the air and almost sending the cotton pad soaked in micellar water flying. “He is absolutely amazing. Kind of cranky if you don’t bother to look deep, but actually a genuinely good person whose parents happen to be garbage, and who obviously messed him up.”

Amusement laces her voice. “Seems like you care about this guy.”

“ Mom .”

“If you don’t, why are you calling me at one in the morning to talk about him?”

Shots fired. Target hit. I double over from the pain in my chest, holding myself up by my hand on the vanity. “Maybe I do care about him but…”

“But?”

Squeezing my eyes shut, I take a deep breath and finally admit that this is what I really wanted to do all along: spill all the beans. Audrey knows the work part of the situation, but not everything else. Not the personal stuff.

I tell Mom everything… from the very first time Logan saved my life by making a wild catch that went viral, to the opportunity that opened up for me professionally, and how I roped him into helping me for nothing in return, other than the service I provided tonight of getting fans off him.

I do gloss over some details, for example me feeling up his thigh or how electricity shot down to my toes when our noses brushed. I definitely provide no commentary on how outrageously good looking he is, or the fact that he smells even better—good enough to drink.

Instead, I emphasize how the deal includes no kissing and restricted PDA that can only happen on my terms, and how he has respected all of that. And me.

Gosh, the way he defended me to his parents made my knees weak. If it hadn’t been because he grabbed my hand right after that, I might’ve melted on the spot.

“What’s the guy’s full name?” Mom asks.

“Logan Kim,” I respond in a daze after recounting the past couple of month’s worth of shenanigans.

There’s some tapping, which I’m sure is from Mom keying in his name into a browser. While I wait for the inevitable reaction, I work on removing my jewelry.

And there it is. “Oh my freaking goodness. This guy is a Greek god.”

“Even better in person.” I sigh.

“Husband him up. Right now.”

“Mom!” I whisper-hiss. “That’s not what’s going on here.”

“Why not? And don’t give me any of that work assignment crap—you’re both pretty deep in it if he’s introducing you to his family.”

“He didn’t want to, trust?—”

“But Rosalina, that guy wants you. And what’s more, you want him.” I freeze, watching as my face in the mirror reddens more and more. After the pause has stretched enough, Mom adds, “You’ve just never talked about a guy this way, chiquita. I think you have feelings for him and that’s why your head’s a mess.”

“That’s not true.” I have difficulty swallowing down the lump in my throat. “I don’t even like hot guys.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” My chest rises and falls in tune with my rapid breathing, my voice growing more high pitched as I continue. “I like normal guys who don’t give me an inferiority complex and don’t keep me on my toes, guys who’d never cheat on me, and who are not professional baseball players.”

“Is this Logan fellow a cheater?”

“No!”

“Then why does that speech sound so specific?”

“Because I… I…” A groan is all I can articulate for a second. “I already dated a baseball player and it sucked.”

“You did what ?” Mom sounds just the same as if she was trying to clarify whether I put the dark clothes in the laundry along with the white, and not as if I just admitted to having kept a hefty secret from her.

But this is what I wanted, to unload everything I had stuck in my chest, so I tell her that story too. I gloss over the part about how I gave myself to a guy who didn’t deserve me because this is a Latina mother after all, but the gist is clear. I was duped by a guy who kept me a secret while he fooled around.

“Rosalina!” She also whisper-shouts this. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“I was too embarrassed, and then this thing with Logan happened and—ugh.” I melt against the wall, sliding down until I’m sitting on the floor. “I deserve la chancla.”

“No, that guy does! And the wooden one like the kind my mom used on me, none of this rubber crap they sell now and call flippy floppies.”

I bite my lips and don’t correct her. Flippy floppies is definitely the superior name.

“But what I don’t understand is this,” Mom says, “you yourself admit that this new guy, Logan, is a pretty good one. He sounds dreamy to me. So why are you comparing him to that Ben Williams asshole who now has a target on his face?” I have no doubt that should Mom ever spot Ben in the wild, she will land her footwear right in the middle of his mug.

“B-Because this is fake.” I bring my knees up to hug them. “It’s kinda like Ben not making our relationship public. This one is public but it’s fake. Once again, the real thing escapes me.”

“Then make it freaking real,” she whispers with urgency. “Grab that man by the?—”

“Mom,” I gasp.

“—Face and plant a big, noisy kiss on that mouth of his.”

“I can’t do that, are you kidding me? That would be sexual harassment—it’d get me fired.”

“Good point, get his consent first.”

I give a dry chuckle. “Therein lies the problem. He barely tolerates me, forget being interested enough to let me kiss him.”

“I know you’re an adult,” she repeats way more sardonically than earlier, “but your mother is right on this. You wait and see.”