Finding Miracles by Julia Álvarez Read Free Book Online

burst out laughing. Señora Robles had told us that it was a superstition in her part of Mexico: when two people said something together, they were joined for life.
    Kate held out her hand, and I slapped her five.
    “Uno-dos-tres-cuatro-cinco,”
Nate counted, not wanting to be left out.
    The minute the doorbell rang, I called out, “I’ll get it!” and rushed into the mudroom. I had decided that if I waited, rehearsing what I was going to say, I’d get my usual stage fright, and the night would go by without my saying a word to Pablo.
    “¡Bienvenidos!”
I welcomed the surprised couple at the door. The Bolívars were dressed like every other Vermonter in winter, in bulky parkas and clunky boots. In fact, except for their soft brown faces and the fact that they were slightly shorter than most of Mom and Dad’s friends, they looked like everyone else I knew. I mean, not poor and cowering in
sarapes
and
sombreros
. I don’t know what I was expecting. Movie refugees, I suppose.
    Both Bolívars stepped in, full of
gracias, muchas gracias
. But Pablo was hanging back. Would he stand in the cold on the other side of the door all night until I apologized?
    “Hey, Pablo.” The well-rehearsed lines tumbled out of my mouth. “Funny, your dad and my dad knowing each other. Small town, all right. Everyone knows everyone else.” From stage fright, I had passed on to manic motor-mouth. Did he even understand what I was saying? Actually, Em had told me that Meredith had told her that Pablo knew a lot more English than he let on. He had been studying it since he was a boy. But living in a dictatorship, he had learned to keep his mouth shut.
    Pablo stepped inside. He was taller than his parents, but he slouched as if trying to make himself smaller and hide behind them. “Thank you for the invitation,” he said, as if it had been my doing.
    Mrs. Bolívar kept staring at my eyes.
“¡Qué ojos tan lindos! ¡Qué linda!”
My eyes were beautiful. I was beautiful. No one had ever said that to me just like that.
Thank you again,
Banana Republic top,
I thought.
    “Come on in. Everyone’s waiting to meet you.” I gestured with my hand in case this was more English than the older Bolívars could handle. I felt kind of shy speaking in Spanish in front of native speakers. And Mrs. Bolívar’s compliments were making me feel even shyer.
    Dad had appeared at the mudroom door.
“Mi casa, su
casa...” He went through the whole my-house-is-your-house routine. Honestly, Dad. Then he gave both Bolívars big, embarrassing American hugs.
    Next was Pablo. Dad kind of threw an arm toward him just as Pablo was reaching out for a handshake. There was an awkward moment when neither one knew what to do. Finally, they did this half-and-half maneuver—hugging with one arm and shaking hands with the other, both of them laughing.
    Dinner turned out to be like Mr. Barstow’s World History class. Mom and Dad and the Bolívars got started talking about politics. But first, it was like Señora Robles’s Spanish dinner lessons, lots of talking about the food. Mom had made rice and beans, the way she had learned to cook them back in the Peace Corps.
    “They are as good as Abuelita’s,” Mr. Bolívar claimed.
    “Mejor,”
Mrs. Bolívar protested. Even better.
    Latin people, I was learning, really overdid it in the compliment department.
    Talking about the food led to talking about
el paisito
. “The little country,” as Mrs. Bolívar called her homeland. Every time she said it, her eyes filled with tears.
    Actually, they had some good news to report. Their oldest son’s name had appeared on the list of prisoners the Human Rights Commission had recently interviewed. Their middle son had come out of hiding and called to say there was a cautious but hopeful mood in the country. The United States had decided to support free elections. Former president Carter was going down in late May to be an observer.
“Tenemos esperanza,”
Mr. Bolívar confessed.