Let the tea touch your lips, but not your self-confidence.
The porcelain cup is warm in your hand, almost comforting, at least if you don’t mind the way Alejandro looks at you over the rim of his untouched mug. The light in the dining room is muted, amber-colored, and old, the same light that used to make your mother’s cutlery look so soft and magical when you were little. Now it only lengthens the shadows. You see your brother’s smile, which you borrowed from him.
You tilt the cup just enough to make him believe it.
The bitter smell of the steam isn’t right. Not just valerian, not just chamomile. There is something heavier underneath, a sweetness that turns bitter in the throat, medicinal and slightly metallic. You let it moisten your lips a little, you don’t swallow anything, and you put the cup down, while blinking sleepily and practicing in front of the mirror.
Alejandro relaxes almost imperceptibly.
That slight relaxation in his shoulders sends shivers down your spine, just like the grin of a villain in a pulp novel. Real danger usually doesn’t reveal itself. He exhales when he thinks the trap has sprung shut. He stretches out his hand and squeezes your wrist, a gesture that would look like brotherly love to anyone else.
‘You need rest,’ he mumbles. ‘You’ve been so restless since Mom left.’
Nodding.
Indeed. You are restless. Since the funeral, the shape of the house around you has changed, though the walls have remained the same: cracked, cream-colored plaster, the same dark wooden beams on the ceiling, the same long hallway full of portraits of saints that, as your grandmother once remarked, were meant to keep evil out. You are learning that evil does not always come from the outside.
Sometimes he gets to know the floorboards together with you.
You slowly slide your chair back and feign fatigue.
