Spirit Desire

My mom’s wedding seemed to be pushed to the back of everyone’s mind as Natalie was preparing for hers. In her words, she wanted to have the wedding as soon as possible because she didn’t want to look like a fat whale when her wedding day came up. So she and Chris had decided it would be on November 8th, exactly a month and a week away. This was the same girl who had planned every single detail for her quinceañera for a year and half in advance and here she was only giving her wedding a month’s time for planning

Since Natalie’s parents were still living up in Seattle and Natalie didn’t really have the best relationship with either of her parents, my mom took it upon herself to plan her wedding. She was extremely excited seeing as only my brothers had married and their wives did all the planning. She was still waiting on Mariana or I to get married so she could plan our weddings. She did though have a serious talk with Natalie and chastised her for getting pregnant before she was married

The extremely Catholic side of my mother came out as she chastised her becoming pregnant before marriage but then congratulated for finding a man who was going to get married to her and could provide with her. She also congratulated her for not living in sin.

“How did you marry Mr. Sandoval?” Natalie asked as my mom was cooking in the kitchen. After deciding on who to invite—which wasn’t too hard because coming from a large Mexican family like mine the majority of the guests would be family, the rest would be her friends and some of Chris’ family and friends.

“We didn’t have a wedding,” my mom answered as she rinsed some tomatoes.

“That’s why if I ever get married I won’t have a nice late 80’s dress,” I inputted.

“How did it happen?” Natalie asked.

“Mr. Sandoval met me and about four days later we moved in together.”

“Oh my God,” Natalie muttered, “did you even love Mr. Sandoval?” she asked curiously.

“Hay Dios,” my mom started, “Natalie, you’d be stupid to marry someone based only on love.”

“The story is so complicated Natalie,” I said as I hiked myself up onto one of the counters. My mom only glared and continued to cut up onions. “You won’t understand it so don’t even ask. I’ve asked her this same question for years.”

Natalie ignored me and continued interrogating my mother, “then why did you marry him?” she asked, “I don’t remember you two every being close. You had five kids with Mr. Sandoval and I never even saw you two kiss or hug.”

Natalie exaggerated, but I could only remember about three or four times that my parents have ever kissed each other, and that was when my father was trying to get on her good side after she found out he was cheating. The other two times were when Salvador and Nicholas graduated from college. That was it, a marriage of 24 years and five kids and no love was what they had to show for it.

“I didn’t really have a choice,” she answered, “things in Mexico were so much different at that time.”

“Did your parents make you?” Natalie asked.

“Dios no, my parents were angry when I married Alfonso. I was seventeen you know and I left them without telling them. I called them from San Diego after Alfonso and I married, they didn’t talk to me for about three years after that call.”

“How were they different?”

“Well, I used to live in a tiny little ranch and my family was very poor. I didn’t have the money to go to school like you two did here and when I met Adri’s dad I decided to marry him.”

“How did it even happen?”

“Okay, from the start. Alfonso’s grandparents still lived in el rancho and one summer he came with his parents to visit them. Everyone was saying he had come down to Mexico because he wanted a wife, he was already 29 at that time you know, very old for a man not to be married. He decided to pick me and I didn’t see much of a future in Mexico so I decided to get married.”

“I still don’t understand why you would marry someone if you don’t love them.”

“Things were different back then Natalie, if you could find a husband that could provide or get you out of the ranch and give you a good life then you went for it. Besides, Alfonso took me, I had only met him three days before and he was the most handsome man I had ever seen. He was lean and tall and he had such pretty eyes, just like Adriana’s, plus he was a lawyer here and I knew he could give me and any future kids a good life.”

“Just like that?” Natalie asked

“Si, 10 months later Salvador came, and then Nicholas, Adriana, Mariana, and Gaby. The love came later, but it wasn’t enough,” she shrugged and placed vegetables into a boiling pot of water. “Which is why you shouldn’t marry just for love.”

“Then what should you marry for, money?” Natalie asked with some hint of disgust in her voice.

Her tone wasn’t caught by my mom who answered her, “no, not just money but that’s a part of it. Estabilidad Natalie, you see when you’re older it’s not just does he love me and do I love him anymore. Suddenly, as you will see when your baby comes, you need stability. You need to be able to say they will eat three times today and they will have clothes and if they want to go to the zoo I can take them. Love doesn’t feed mouths Natalie, and it doesn’t get you a house, clothing and if it’s the only thing you have in life then it doesn’t even bring you happiness.”

“Are you in love with Matthew?” Natalie asked and I perked up waiting for her answer.

“I think so, yes.” She affirmed, “But this time it is different because I have my stability. I’m not looking for a future like you are in Chris. He’s a companion now, I don’t need to depend on him like I had to with Alfonso. All of you are grown and soon you will all leave—“

“I won’t leave you,” I sang and kissed her cheek loudly to which she swatted me with a kitchen towel.

“Yes you will, it’s the rule of life. Children are only their parent’s temporarily. The point of having them is so that one day you can be sure that you’ve raised them well enough so they can leave the house and be good people. Salvador and Nicholas are already married. Adriana is starting her career and she has a boyfriend who loves her. Mariana’s off in college in Chicago and she’s practically married to Jonathan and Gaby’s going off to college next year.”

“Well this little peanut will never leave me cause I’ll smother them with love,” Natalie said and patted her tummy affectionately.

“You’ll want them to leave when they’re throwing up everything and never go to sleep,” my mom said, “Now go to the table, the food’s ready.”

“I’m already dreading that part of their life,” Natalie pursed her lips, “that and it moving around in my stomach. That’s not natural, have you seen those videos of women’s pregnant bellies where you can see the baby move. That’s not okay.”

My mom laughed before walking out of the kitchen to watch her telenovela. “If you need anything tell me,” she yelled from the living room and Natalie hummed a she served herself some food.

“This is too much,” she shook her head as she looked at her plate, “switch with me.” She took the empty plate from my hands and placed her plate full of food in mine.

“Eat your own plate Natalie,” I whined as I sat down.

“No,” she shook her head, “I have to be on a strict diet—well as strict as I can keep it while still being healthy for the little peanut. I don’t want to gain weight on top of the weight I will inevitably gain from the baby. I don’t want to be too fat, I probably won’t be able to wear the dress I always dreamed of and I don’t want to go down the list even more because I’m too big.

“Don’t think about that Natalie, you’ll look beautiful. You can get all of your bridesmaids’ really ugly dresses if you want so you can outshine everyone,” I smiled and dug my fork into the plate that had too much rice for my liking. “Except for me, I want my dress to be pretty, of course it can be simple or whatever but it can’t be ugly.”

“I have been thinking that I want the bridesmaid dresses to be a light maroon color, I want a sash underneath my bust of the same color. I think it will help pull attention away from my stomach, plus my ring has a ruby on it so it’ll look good.” Natalie looked at her ring.

“That sounds good, we’re going dress shopping for all us next Tuesday. I’m leaving work a bit early and I already made the appointment at the cute bridal shop in Coronado,” she smiled widely and clapped her hands, “do you know where you’re going to have the wedding anyway?”

“Lafayette,” she answered quickly, “I wanted to have my wedding there since we had the spring fling dance there when we were freshmen. Can you imagine it, white roses with maroon carnations everywhere? I already know exactly how I want it to look.”

“Do you know who’s going to be in the wedding party?” I asked.

“You as maid of honor obviously, Sarah, Daniela, and my cousin Luisa. Chris already has his guys too. Leone’s going to be his best man since he’s his oldest and best friend apparently, Matt and the twins are going to be the other groomsmen. Chris and I are going to go taste some cakes later this week, I’m so excited.”

“We also have to go and see and pick out all the decorations for the receptions, like the clothes, centerpieces and all that,” I smiled and she grimaced.

“This is the worst, there’s so little time to do everything and I need to be there for every single thing,” she frowned.

“It’ll only be stressful for a couple of weeks, after that I’ll take care of everything. Promise,” I held out my pinky to her and she laughed before she intertwined her pinky with mine, “besides, don’t think about the wedding preparations. Think about the honeymoon. Have you guys decided on a place yet?” I asked.

She nodded her head enthusiastically, “we’re between two places right now. I kind of want to go to Greece and Chris wants to go to Croatia. I just want the beaches Adri--”

“We have plenty of beaches here in San Diego,” I laughed.

She rolled her eyes, “yes we do, but they’re not Greek beaches are they? And they don’t have those massages with the little fish here,” she raised an eyebrow, “besides that would be a pretty boring honeymoon if we went to Coronado or something to camp. We don’t necessarily want to go to a big city either, I just want to chill out on a beach. Chris had wanted to go to Paris but I said no to it, everyone goes to Paris for their honeymoon, besides, you can’t even put a lock with your name on it on that bridge anymore. No point whatsoever.”

“Paris is too cliché,” I agreed and nodded my head.

She nodded her head and we lapsed into silence as we continued with our lunch.

“When are your parents coming down from Seattle?” I asked as I finished up the plate and placed my head on my hand.

Her eyes watered a bit and she shook her head, “they can’t make it to the wedding.”

“Why?” I asked before I could think of it.

“It’s too soon for them,” she answered and shook her head once more, “they already had plans to go to Cancun for their wedding anniversary, that’s a week before. They can’t change their reservations for the hotel and all that and it’s too much of a hassle.”

And there it was. Natalie’s biggest fear was her father not walking her down the aisle. When we were young she feared that it would have been because of something related to his bad heart, but it wasn’t. Her parents weren’t going to her wedding because it was ‘too soon’. Unlike my parents during their marriage, Rafael and Dolores love each other a lot. So much that they only really see one another

“I’m sorry Nat, if there’s anything I can do I’ll do it. That’s one of my duties as maid of honor isn’t it?” I smiled.

“It’s okay, they’re paying for the honeymoon since they can’t make it. I’ll forget all about it as I’m getting a massage and eating spanakopita,” she said with a dreamy look on her face.

“Who’s going to do it then?“

“I want Javier to do it if my dad can’t,” she started, “but I’m not too sure that Javier will be up for it. He’s probably been talking to Rafael and they’ve probably decided that this is all a bad idea. He’s probably not even going to come to my wedding, or if he does he’s not going to want to walk me. He’ll just get super drunk or come super late. I have no expectations.”

“Don’t worry about that Natalie, I’m going to convince him to come to the wedding and he’ll walk you down the aisle. I mean what good is being a girlfriend unless you can make your boyfriend do stuff?”

“Yeah, well,” she rolled her eyes, “I wish he would do it cause I’m his sister but whatever gets him to do it. If he doesn’t then I was thinking about asking Salvador,” I nodded my head and she continued. “I mean we’ve been friends for about twenty years you and I and your brothers have always been there so Salvador is a natural choice. He’s like a nicer, older, and smarter version of Javier,” she shrugged her shoulder and smiled.

“Come on, let’s go watch my mom’s novela with her, I think it has Sebastian Rulli in it and we both know he was our middle and high school crush,” I pulled her along with me and grabbed the list of guests from her bag and began making a seating arrangement.

Probably one of the most crucial parts of planning a wedding was figuring out who to sit where and who to sit them next to. I knew family had to probably be more towards the front but I also knew Natalie and her cousin Abigail had fought over a guy when they were each seventeen—it had ended with Natalie having a black eye. I also knew Abigail’s dad was Natalie’s favorite uncle so it was strange trying to figure out where to sit that family.

“Chris wants our first dance to be ‘True’ by Spandau Ballet, he claims music began and ended with Spandau Ballet,” she said, “I told him the only way we would dance to that song was if it was mixed in with Macarena. I hate that song so much,” she laughed.

“So what’s it going to be?” I asked.

“I don’t know, we’re probably going to end up doing the electric slide for our first dance at this point,” she shrugged her shoulders.

“Or ‘asereje’, we’ll teach him all the moves to it,” I laughed.

“He’s the worst dancer ever Adriana,” she snickered and my mom glared at us both for talking during her novela, “he can’t even do the Macarena properly and it’s so easy. He said he wants us to take some dancing classes so we can dance well at the wedding, but I don’t need them; you’ve seen me, I am the best”

“Just do it so that Chris won’t make a fool out of himself and you can have a nice wedding video,” I smiled and went back to the guest list and trying to arrange who would sit where and with who.

Natalie and my mom continued watching telenovelas until five in the evening, around the time Matthew came to visit. Or until he came back home since it seemed he was always spending time at our house—things were serious and it was a bit awkward.

He came in and began cooking something in the kitchen which reminded me that Javier and I had made plans to spend some time together tonight—he said he would be cooking and if I was lucky he would be making some pasta and grilled cheese sandwiches. Matthew cooking also reminded me of my dad and everything my dad wasn’t and hadn’t done while he was alive. I was happy for my mom and in turn happy for Natalie who had also found someone to make her happy.

But everything was making me doubt everything about my relationship with Javier and the way things were heading. I remembered watching an episode of Millionaire Matchmaker where Patti Stanger said that if a guy didn’t hint or move the relationship towards a serious area where one could think of marriage within the first two years of the relationship then it was going to go nowhere.

Here Javier and I were, six years later and still no closer to marriage. Not like I needed to be married by the end of the year, but I needed some sort of commitment and some vision of the future, and besides my career and family my romantic life had no end in sight. The worst part was that I couldn’t get my frustrations out to anyone. Natalie was his sister so that was a no, my mom was the worst at giving love advice, and my other two friends didn’t even live in the same city as me.

But there’s no point in crying over milk that hasn’t even been spilled yet.

“I think I’m going to leave and let your mom and Matthew have a nice dinner,” Natalie said as she stretched out on the couch, “have you noticed the older people get the earlier they eat dinner. Next year your mom and Matthew will be eating dinner at like 3:30, we won’t be eating dinner with them anymore cause they’ll go to the early bird senior special thing. Please kill me if I get that old.”

“Don’t be so dramatic Natalie, and it’s only 5:30. Now go on home because you and Chris need to sort some stuff out, you need to figure out he invitations and all that. We need to send them out soon,” I smiled as I stood up from the loveseat and pulled her up with me.

“Why did you let me think that planning a wedding in a month was okay? I’m miserable right now Adri,” she whined as she picked up her purse.

“I didn’t trick you into thinking that this was a good idea, it was that peanut in you that made you speed up your life plan by like three years,” I poked my tongue out.

“Uncalled for,” Natalie smirked, “I’ll return the favor when someone asks you to marry them.”

“I’ll be even worse, I’ll get married in two weeks,” I smirked but still felt bad at the fact that Natalie said when someone asks you to marry them rather than saying when Javier asks you to marry him. “I won’t have a wedding Natalie,” I opened the door for her and she stepped out the door, “I’m going to go to Vegas and get married. You can come as long as you pay for your own hotel room and transportation.”

“Well I hope you’re happy getting married without an audience,” she laughed, “having an audience is half the fun of getting married. Now make sure we have at least three shops for the bridal stuff.”

I saluted her and she smiled before driving off. I quickly ran up to my room and changed out of the yoga pants and tank top I was wearing to go meet up with Javier. After piling up my hair atop my head in a bun and making a mental note to have my hair cut sometime soon I started making my way to Javier’s place.

The drive down to Javier’s house was always a pleasant one, my family had lived in the same area years before and it was nice to see my old neighborhood once in a while. Plus, it was always nice to drive by the coast and feel the sea breeze when you were stuck in traffic.

“Javi,” I sang as I walked into his house—Javier and Natalie both had the horrible habit of never locking their doors. I smiled as I kicked off my sneakers in the hallway and walked into the living room. I frowned as I didn’t see him sitting there or in the kitchen.

“Javier, where are you?” I yelled out again as I began walking up the stairs, I would kill him if he was still sleeping.

But he wasn’t there, not in his room or any other of the rooms. I checked my phone’s messages to make sure we had been talking about seeing each other today and rolled my eyes when we had agreed to meet up Friday night and yet he wasn’t here.

I called him but he didn’t answer and I angrily left him a message calling him an asshole before hanging up. I also sent Natalie a message calling her brother and asshole to which she responded by letting me know that she already knew that and inviting me over to her house where Chris and his friend were gathered. I declined and instead told her I was going to wait for Javier since I didn’t feel like seeing anyone at the moment and as bad as it sounded I wanted to fight with Javier and yell at him for ditching me when we had made plans.

I laid on his couch drifting in and out of sleep until he came at around eleven at night. He had been surprised when he heard the television on and I sleepily sat up from my place on his couch and two pillows fell to the floor.

“What are you doing here Adri?” he asked as he kicked off his shoes and shrugged off a thin jean jacket, lazily slinging over the back of the couch. He ran his hand down his face and yawned as he sat down on the couch’s armrest.

I shrugged my shoulders and sighed, “we were supposed to eat dinner together and stay in tonight. You forgot I’m guessing and didn’t have the time to answer your phone or whatever.”

“Shit,” he muttered quietly and tilted his head back as he closed his eyes, “I’m sorry Adriana.”

I shook my head, “no it’s fine. Whatever. I’ve just been so busy and we had planned to be together tonight. I wanted to see you since you’re never around anymore because you have this stupid thing against Natalie getting married and you’re also taking it out on me. I just wanted to let you know that.”

“I’ve been busy too Adriana,” he ignored my comment about Natalie, “and we just finished a big project and all the guys went out to get some beers and dinner to celebrate and I joined them. I forgot we had plans today or else I would have never gone.”

“It’s fine,” I crossed my hands over my chest and bit my bottom lip, “you just never want to be with me anymore and when we do plan something it turns into you bitching about Natalie or you just cancelling or forgetting. It’s better for you to have fun than to listen to me bitch and moan,” I shrugged my shoulders and stood up from the couch.

“I love it when you bitch and moan,” he muttered and stood in front of me. He placed a kiss on my forehead before gripping my hips and pulling me to him into a hug—which was hard since I refused to uncross my arms. “I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.”

I nodded my head and placed my hands on his chest and gently pushed him away from me, “I know, because next time I won’t be waiting for you to come home after you ditch me.” I smiled before grabbing my keys from the small coffee table and walking to the hall.

He followed after me confusedly asked where I was going.

“Home Javi,” I said as I tied the laces on my right sneaker, “I don’t really want to be around you and your alcohol breath right now.”

“Stay Adriana,” he said, “come on, you camped out on my living room for hours and after five minutes of me getting here you’re going to leave.”

“Well, I was planning on staying the whole night but you ruined that after you got here four hours late. So we’re all good Javi. I’ll talk to you later.” I waved him off as I opened the door and walked to my car. He didn’t bother to see me drive off, instead by the time I opened my car door he closed his front door and I called him an asshole under my breath once more before driving home.