“Please stop doing that.”
“I’m sorry, Mija, I just can’t.” She shook so hard that she dropped her spoon on the table.
I sighed. “No, I’m sorry. It seems like I have brought nothing but distress to you.”
She cocked her head and straightened. “Don’t you ever say that again. You never bring me anything but joy, entendido?”
I nodded and smiled, feeling so grateful for her. Maybe, I thought, I deserve her love after all. At that moment, I went down to the floor, as if someone had turned the chair abruptly, pushing me to the ground. But when I tried to get up, I couldn’t. I felt someone sitting on me, pinning me down, even though there was no one there. The smell of woods, citrus and fruit hit my nostrils: Jack’s cologne.
“Jack?” I said, tentatively.
Grandma Lita jumped out of her chair, looking around, and stretched a hand toward me, but my hands were glued to the floor.
“I can’t,” I said.
Poor Grandma Lita tried to pull me up in vain, begging me to get up. “Ay, Mija, Ay, Mija” she kept repeating like a broken record, her fists clenching and unclenching.
“It’s ok, Grandma. I’m fine, seriously.” I repeated it so many times that I soon started to believe it. Maybe Jack would let me go, once he thought I had suffered enough, or when he tired of the game. Just like he had done so many times before.
At least this time he wasn’t slapping me, and his spit wasn’t covering my face when he yelled because I tried to move.
“If I don’t fight him, he’ll tire and eventually go,” I explained to Grandma.
“Ay, Mija,” she repeated, her voice breaking and her eyes filling up with understanding. Tears streamed down her lovely face.
“Please don’t cry. It’s okay, really.”
She wiped her tears and clumped her hands into fists. “No, Mija. It's not! What he did to you, it’s not okay!” She looked around. “Jack?” she said to the air.
“Please, Jack, leave her alone.”
“Grandma, no—”
But she continued. “Please, Jack. Go away. You’re dead now, go to the light—”
“Grandma—”
The weight lifted off me and I sat, just as Grandma Lita hit the floor with a crash. Her sweet eyes looking dazed before she closed them.
I ran to her. “Grandma Lita?”
No response.
I turned around, wincing at the air, my lips pursed, my heart pounding. “What the fuck, Jack? You can do whatever you want to me, but do not fucking touch her, you hear me?”
A laughter, followed by a slap on the back of my head so hard that made me see stars.
“Fat ass,” he said.
The punch in the gut bent me over.
I gasped for air, struggling to straighten. When I recovered, I yelled, “I don’t care if you hit me. You’re dead. And I’m glad.”
The fist struck me right on the left cheek—his favorite spot—knocking me to the ground, next to Grandma. I wanted to reach out to touch her, but maybe it was better to let her stay unconscious.
