One look at Grandma’s oldest friend’s car, and Mom bursts into sorrowful tears. The gesture is so abrupt, I clamp my mouth with a hand, my eyesight blurring with tears of my own. Because Mom never cries like this. She always contains her feelings, but this time she lets herself sob. I’m too scared to go downstairs. I can’t take any more sad news. I can’t take any more goodbyes.

“Who’ll look after Isabel?” I hear Dona Clara say on the sidewalk. “No one will hire that careless girl. She’s always daydreaming about telenovela actors and letting the cooking oil burn. It’s my fault for not being harder on her. I didn’t teach her well.”

“Isabel is hardworking because of you,” Mom says. “And I’d hire her in a heartbeat if I could.”

Dona Clara pats her gently on the cheek. “You have your mother’s heart.” Her eyes suddenly shine with fear. “Alice, you’ve put up a good fight. We all have. But there’s nothing else to do. Look at me now. I’m moving in with my little brother in São Paulo. He says he’ll take care of me, but he can hardly look after himself.” She squeezes her cane, leaning heavily against it. “My cousin Yara is stubborn. She’s staying. But I give it one month, and she’ll be joining us, too.”

“Olinda won’t be the same without you,” Mom says.

Dona Clara’s eyes are bright with tears when she looks at the houses, like she’s trying to memorize our neighborhood. I duck behind my curtains to avoid detection. When I peer out the window again, she’s back in her car.

“Accept their offer before it’s too late,” she urges Mom. She nods toward Sugar. “Before they take the chance, because if and when that happens, you and Lari will be left with nothing. Julieta didn’t spend her days in that kitchen so her girls would be ruined in the end.” She reaches out the window and squeezes Mom’s hand, and they don’t let go of each other until the last second. “Watch over Isabel for me? That foolish girl has no one in the world.”

“I’ll look after her like she’s my own daughter,” Mom promises.

Dona Clara drives off, her car’s engine rattling and sputtering down the street.

I watch the taillights until they’re gone.

37

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15

There are no classes after the midterms, and I lie to Mom saying my teachers are running review sessions. Instead, I meet with Pedro at the cafeteria’s kitchen to work on our cake. Sometimes Victor and Cintia join us to be our taste testers, after we explained to them we’re up against Deals Deals.

Other times, like today, it’s just Pedro and me...