“What’s the big deal?”

“Big deal? You and your father are the same. People born in the year of the mouse are tricky, selfishly meek. Maybe if we’d had another cat around on this trip it would have been more balanced.”

Michelle said, “I knew you wanted Elle to come instead.”

Her mother said, “Stop it now. But why did your sister decide to stay home with your father this summer anyhow? It’s odd to me a cat would choose a mouse over another cat.”

Michelle could have said that her older sister Elle had stayed back in San Francisco to be with her new boyfriend before she had to go off to college and not because she was choosing dad. But she decided not to. She didn’t want to have to take sides again. She didn’t want to rehash any bit of the awful painful heartbreaking divorce between her mom and dad. Besides, tonight was their last night in Spain. Michelle couldn’t stand for her mother to have another fit. It was easier with mother blaming her cursed destiny on karma: from the American War, to her divorce from father, to the sea of differences separating her from Michelle.

Later that evening, they attended an end-of-the-season dinner party hosted by the pensión owner for all of her employees and the dozen pensión guests. Michelle, her mother, and Aunt Kim sat at a long wooden table right beside the sea. Michelle could hear the roar of the ocean when the video arcade next door wasn’t blasting its music too loud.

The hostess circled with a jug of sangría. Michelle begged her mother, pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease. Her mother’s hand didn’t budge from the top of her glass. She said, “Alcohol leads to ostentation and ostentation is never attractive.”

The hostess held up her glass and everyone, including Aunt Kim, shouted, “Salud!” Michelle asked for a sip. She wanted an orange slice or just a piece of pear. Her aunt refused, deferring to her mother. She kept hoping her aunt would stand up for her. But Aunt Kim sat docile, having grown comfortable in her invisibility, the luckless younger sister of the most beautiful girl in town.

Her mother kept putting food on Michelle’s plate, selective in her choosing, prosciutto and paella, tuna and shrimp. She said, “You need to fatten up. Those sports have made you too skinny.”

“Please Mother, I’m not a baby anymore.”

Her mother said, “Only babies return kindness with ungratefulness.” And this was when the beautiful man from the beach arrived. Michelle couldn’t believe he was here and wondered if he was an employee or a guest. He sat down right next to her mother. She was still holding the shrimp platter so she turned to him and said in English, “Do you want some?”

He nodded and her mother served.