HELEN

Sofia declined a phone call from her mother, but when she called a second time, she excused herself and turned her back.

I couldn't help but overhear. "Bueno? Estamos en el ensayo."

I didn't understand her mom's answer, but Sofia let out a heavy sigh.

From what I heard and understood, they were arguing about Thanksgiving and a guy named Frank.

When she was done, she looked at me, a forced smile on her face.

"Sorry about that. She wanted to know what I wanted to eat later."

I couldn't decide whether to address the lie or not. "Why are you lying?"

She squinted. "Did you understand what I said?"

"Your tone was entirely different from what a meal discussion should sound like. Also, I grew up in Spain – of course, I understand Spanish."

She looked at me curiously, "You – you grew up in Spain?"

I realized that we were already off-topic, but I didn't want to pressure her, so I laughed at her disbelieving face. "Yes, I grew up in Spain. My mom is – was Spanish."

Sofia stared at me. "How – why didn't you tell me?"

I shrugged my shoulders.

Her face suddenly changed. "That's why you went to Madrid over the Summer?"

"Yes. Well, we didn't actually go to Madrid. We went to Ávila where my mother's family lives. But no one knows it or cares enough, so I just say I went to Madrid."

"That's crazy!"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I don't talk about it a lot."

Sofia smiled at me sadly. "What happened to your mom?"

"She – eh – she died," I swallowed, and blinked away the tears, "nine months years ago. Cancer."

"That must be hard."

I nodded. "Let's not talk about it, please."

She smiled, then she quietly said: "Spain. Crazy."

Spain. I missed Spain. When I sat on the airplane this summer, I thought I would feel closer to my mom there. That I wouldn't feel her absence every second of the day. It never happened to feel like Mom, but it felt like home, at least.

"You said you spent the last two years in Mexico, right? That's crazy!"

She laughed. "It was. Our house was literally on the other side of the street of cartel-members."

"What? How did you end up there?"

"Long story. You just heard me talking about Frank, right?"

I nodded. She told me about her mother's husband, the abuse, the moving to Mexico. When her uncle's partner got kidnapped, her mom decided she should come back to the States. Sofia had been attending Prepa – high school – there for a year, had good grades, a steady group of friends, a relationship.

"Leaving all that behind must've been difficult."

She shrugged her shoulders. "Kinda."

"Do you like it here?"

Now she smiled at me. "It's getting better."

When she drove me home later, Sofia told me that her grandparents – her stepfather's parents – had asked her to come to Nebraska for Thanksgiving. She didn't know how to tell her mother but apparently, they already did. Even though her mother had never been a big fan of Thanksgiving, she was sad to hear Sofia thinking about going.

I understood why she was struggling – it was the first Thanksgiving with her new family, the first Thanksgiving with her mom for three years.

Still, she wanted to go, I could see that. She talked about whole summers in Kearny, on the farm her grandparents worked. Her stepdad had not been a good father, but they had been good grandparents.

I encouraged her to go.