Chapter 12

Carlita’s turn:

I caught Dave in his office. “We need to talk.”

I saw an almost scared look cross his face. “Here?”

“Home would be better.”

“Okay,” he said. “Brindy’s got Mila with her?”

“On campus,” I said. “I am proud. My sister is becoming a student. Next week she will take her GED test and she will be a high school graduate. She is sitting in with Brindy in class.”

I walked with him past Maddie. “We’ll be back in a bit,” he told Maddie.

We walked out of the office and turned toward our house.

“Don’t look so scared, my Dave,” I said.

“Well, we have a lot of adjusting going on with Camila. I dumped a big load on my family by doing that. You could...”

“Dave, Dave, Dave,” I said, “we are forever. First it was you and me. Then it was you and me and Brindy...”

“You didn’t say ‘now it’s you and me and Brindy’, so something is changing...”

“You should stop going to Texas,” I said. “You should stop making young Guatemalan girls turn eighteen overnight.”

“Does this have something to do with waking up with Mila in our bed?”

“It does. You remember how we grew to bring Brindy into our marriage?”

“Yes...”

“Dave, do we have room for another?”

“Mila asked for this?”

“She asked Brindy and she asked me.”

“She’s fourteen...”

I smiled. “I remember another who was fourteen and decided that Dave was meant for her...”

We walked into our house and closed the door. “My Carlita,” he said, “it was me and you, only. We lived together, decided, married...”

“Mila sees all of us – you, me, Brindy ... Brindy, in the night, thought Mila was me...”

“She’s pretty close in size,” Dave said.

“Brindy hugged Mila in the night, thinking she was me. She almost ... you know how sometimes at night we love each other.”

“She touched Mila?”

“No, but Mila said she wished it had happened. Dave, she sees us. Wants...”

“Brindy...”

“Us.”

“You and Brindy.”

“And Dave. This morning is the first time she saw a man for long. She knows about things. Thought that doing things with her mouth would be bad, until she saw YOU and knows that we do that to you.”

“She wants...”

“Us. She wants us to want her like we want each other.”

“I need, you, Carlita. Now I need Brindy, too, but you, first and foremost...”

“And I love my Dave. And I also love my Brindy. And I love my new sister, Dave.”

“Are you sure about this?”

“She is scared to approach you, Dave. She has never been with a man, has never been loved and cared for like you do for us.”

“Baby, she doesn’t have to...”

“She says she loves us. Brindy. Me. You. She wants ... what can we fairly say to tell her ‘no’?”

“What a mess...”

I kissed my husband. “You are the best, Dave. I will never have another. We gave gifts to each other, married. Brindy says you are the best. You are the man in her life. She says YOU are the joy of making love with a man.”

“Lita, my little one, I get scared. I have you. Brindy fell in with us. Mila...”

“You paid for Mila just as you paid for me. You rescued Mila. It is natural that she looks to you. But she has lived with us. She sees us as a home where love lives in abundance. Is it bad that she wants to be part of this?”

“She is part of this. We all agreed.”

I pushed him into his recliner and swung around to straddle his lap. I smiled. “I remember the first time I sat in this chair with you...”

“You are too hard to resist,” he said.

“And I told you that day not to resist me.”

“You got into the shower with me...”

“Dave, I loved you and I knew you loved me. it was right for us. Do you love Mila?”

“Like I loved my little Carlita when I found her.”

“Brindy will tell you. I will tell you. It is good if you love Mila like you love us.”

“Have you ... Brindy ... with Mila?”

“No. She says you are the man, the head of the house, and you must be first.”

I put my arms around his neck, kissed him again. The next one, he kissed me. I pushed myself down, found him hard.

“I have found something interesting, my Dave...”

“There is a forest pixie in my lap. These things naturally arise...”

“I love you, Dave, what we do to each other. I will be happy if Mila can find the happiness that you bring to me and Brindy...”

“Are you sure?”

Another kiss. I bit his bottom lip. “We had better get you back to the office before people suspect we’re having sex.”

“Too late. Everybody knows about quickies.”

“Then when they accuse us, we will be righteously indignant,” I laughed. “Or we could be naked when Brindy and Mila get home...”

“I fear that I would be taken advantage of,” he said.

“No more than is good for us.”

I was back home working in the kitchen when Brindy and Mila walked in.

“Arroz con pollo,” I said.

“Chicken Jambalaya,” Brindy countered.

“No, it is truly arroz con pollo,” Mila asserted. “We outnumber you.”

“Dave will say jambalaya,” Brindy laughed.

“Dave will say whatever Lita tells him to say.”

Brindy smiled. She knows we’re equals with Dave. “I can make him say what I want, too.”

Mila said, “I wish that power.”

“What you must do, Mila, is when Dave gets home, if he sits in his chair, you must go sit with him.”

“What if...” she started.

“He will not. He did not when I did that the first time...”

“He loves you.”

“You have been here with him long enough. He loves you, too.”

“Brindy,” she said, “do you think?”

“I think Dave will love his Mila.”

I am just a little excited by the thought, partly because Mila is a sweet, pretty girl and she and Dave ... Dave will treat her tenderly as he did me, and as he did Brindy. Dave’s tenderness made Brindy whole again. Dave’s tenderness will make Mila part of our family.

“Lita,” Mila said, “may I use some of your scent...” she switched to English. “Your per-fume?”

Brindy laughed. “Oh, that’s not FAIR, Mila. If Dave’s eyes are closed, he will think you are Carlita...”

“I do not think it would matter if he knows it’s Mila. But yes, little sister. You can use it. Do not do very much.”

“I am going to do it,” Mila said. “I pray you do not hate me...”

“You love our Dave. We will love you for that.”

“How much will you love me?” Mila asked, shyly turning her head.

“Like I almost loved you last night, baby sister.”

We heard the front door open. Dave came into the kitchen, breathed deeply.

“Jambalaya,” Brindy giggled.

“Guatemalan style. Almost looks like arroz con pollo.”

“We will argue later, baby,” I said. “Go sit down for a while. Maybe one of us will come remove your shoes.”

He likes that. He disappeared from the kitchen. Brindy kissed Mila on the cheek. “Here’s your chance.”

Dave’s turn:

End of a long day. Lots of things going on the domestic front. Mila has become part of the family, part of the group here. She shows up at the office, talks with everybody, her expanding English skills in collision with our expanding Spanish. Everybody loves her.

I come home, get hit when I walk in the door. The girls are cooking, and from the smells, it’s Lita at the helm. Seeing the three of them in the kitchen, happily cooperating, that’s a good feeling. I was worried that the inclusion of Camila would upset our equilibrium. What I see tells me that we’re finding a new balance with Mila as part of the household.

I get run out of the kitchen, hit my recliner, kick it back to a great angle, and Mila shows up.

“I am to take your shoes, Dave.” She still has a shyness, sort of tentative, around me.

“Thank you, Mila. That makes me feel good.”

I don’t know who told her that remove shoes, then socks, then a foot-rub, is the next best thing to orgasm in my books. I close my eyes, open them, she’s standing beside me.

“It is good to make my Dave feel good,” she said. “I hope this does that.” And she flopped over the arm of the chair, landing her butt in my lap.

“Mila...”

“You do not want me here?”

“No, I guess I do, my Mila.”

“Am I now your Mila?”

“Yes...”

“Like Carlita is your Carlita and Brindy is your Brindy?”

“In many ways...”

“The other ways, my Dave...” and she brought her face close to mine.

There’s only one reason. I kissed her. This is not an experienced kisser. Of course, neither was Carlita. Retracing an old path, I am.

I pulled back. “Mila, is that what you wanted?”

“Yes, my Dave.”

“You told my wives this?”

“Your OTHER wives. Yes.”

“Other wives?”

“I am to be wife of Dave as well.”

“Mila, there is supposed to be love...”

“I love you, Dave. You?”

“I love you, Camila Luna...”

“Then it is settled,” she said. “Carlita says it is as it should be.”

“This is what you want? Mila, you do not have to be my wife so you can stay here. I am happy to have you as a friend, like my daughter.”

“I know this, my Dave. Carlita and Brindy explained that to me. I make a choice. Three choices, I make. You. Carlita. Brindy. I will be part of this marriage. Like you are. Like they are.”