“Dad, check your email,” I say into the phone. I’m walking back to my dorm but I couldn’t wait until I got there to tell him. Plus, I was hoping to catch him during his twenty-minute lunch break.

Sara went immediately from the meeting to her afternoon class, because, of course she did.

“No veo nada. What am I looking for?” he asks. I picture him in front of his computer at home, wearing his reading glasses, as he always does, although he is checking on his phone. “I only have Target coupons.”

I try not to laugh. “Refresh the page, Dad.”

“Oh, okay.”

I wait for the reaction.

“Oh!” he says. “Is this a plane ticket?”

“It’s a ticket voucher,” I say. “So we can work around your work schedule, but it’s enough to go to Mexico at any time of the year, even last minute. And because you don’t have to drive, you can go even if you just have a weekend. Dad, my professor just invested half a million dollars in our company.”

He is quiet for a moment, and I wonder if I’ve lost cell service. Or if he didn’t hear me.

He clears his throat, and I realize that he may have not been speaking because he did not want me to know he was choked up. “Mijo, I am so proud of you,” he says. “And not just because of all your success,” he says. “But because the first thing you thought to do was for family.”

“You and Mom have done so much for me,” I say. “And I wanted to do something, even just something small, to thank you guys,” I say. “And trust me, this is just the beginning. I plan on buying you and Mom a giant house one day.”

“Okay, but make sure you are still keeping your grades up, even while you have all this app stuff happening. No olvides tus prioridades.”

I smile at the ground. I guess old habits do die hard. I don’t know how much I’ll have to achieve before my parents don’t check in to make sure I’m taking my studies seriously. It annoyed me when I was in middle school, but now, it sounds like home.

“Of course, Dad.”

That night, Sara and I finally have our first real date. I wear a new button-down shirt, spritz on cologne I haven’t used since prom and knock on her door at exactly 6:30 p.m.

She’s wearing a floral sundress and shiny gold flats. We head into town and get burgers and milkshakes at a ’50s-style diner. And it’s like a first date and a fiftieth date all at once. We talk about me surprising my parents with the tickets and our classes and the company and what’s happening on our favorite TV shows, and it’s like nothing has changed and everything has changed.