just—”
“Let me finish, Gabriela.” Mom runs her hands through her hair, like she’s about to make an important announcement to important people and wants to look the part. This is a demeanor I’ve seen before, most often when Dad was deployed. It means my mother is about to ditch the passenger seat and take the steering wheel.
“As I was saying, your father has a lot on his mind, so I’m not sure he’s thinking clearly about this, about how important this journey must be to Lucas.” Mom takes a deep breath. “The last thing I want is to undermine your father. We make our decisions together as a team, despite how one-sided it may look on the outside.
But
I’ve also been married to the man for twenty years, and sometimes I suspect I know what he truly wants even more than he does.”
“And what does he want?” I demand. “For me to live with the guilt of having failed Lucas for the rest of my life?”
“Cut the melodrama, Gabi. What your father wants is simple—for his children to reach adulthood safely, without having to experience the kind of struggles he had to. What he sometimes forgets is that this world will never be safe, and two of his children are practically adults already.” Mom gets up from the sofa, picks up my pack, and helps reposition it on my back. “I’ll talk to your father. Now you’d better get going, otherwise you’ll miss your flight.”
Salty tears line the back of my throat as I give my mom an unexpected hug goodbye. “Thank you. For being on my team.”
“I’m always on your team, Gabriela. You just have to give me the chance to play.”
I break Mom’s embrace and turn towards the door.
“Gabi, wait.”
My shoulders sink. She’s about to change her mind. Mom disappears down the hallway towards Dad’s office.
“Take this,” she says when she returns, holding out a plastic bag.
Now I’m really confused. “What is it?”
“Something your father wanted to do for Lucas while he walked the
camino
. Something your Grandma Guadalupe did for him when he got sick.” Mom hands me one hundred extra euros and the clear plastic bag filled with tiny tealight candles. “Now it’s up to you.”
I accept this parting gift, aware that I’m walking this route for Dad as much as I am for Lucas. Maybe if I do this one thing right, he’ll trust me again.
Maybe I’ll start trusting myself.
Chapter 6
Seven hundred and eighty kilometers. Five hundred miles. The distance between Cleveland and New York. That’s how far we’re walking. Well, almost that far. Mom will talk to my teachers, but two weeks of class plus spring break is probably the most I can miss and still manage to graduate, so we’ll have to take a short bus ride in the middle of the route to speed things up. Still, walking for this long is
insanity
. And I willingly agreed to take part in it.
Not to mention that I most certainly overpacked. This is the first detail I discern as I study the other tourists—oops, I mean
pilgrims
—on the train ride from Paris to the Spanish border. Let’s start with the young woman across the aisle, the one who hasn’t looked up from her magazine in almost two hours. Her stylish sporting gear makes me wonder if she’s a model for Eddie Bauer or The North Face. She’s got to be either Dutch or Norwegian. Tall and very Heidi-looking with white-blond hair worn in two long braids. Like the rest of these passengers, her equipment tells me Europeans take hiking
very
seriously. Their fancy trekking poles, super lightweight packs, and layers of waterproof material make it look like they’re about to tackle Everest.
My
contribution to the world of
camino
fashion? A ratty pair of Adidas warm-up pants that should have been thrown out two seasons ago. Seth brought his camo-green rucksack, which holds a lot of junk, but stinks like canvas and makes us stick out like silly Americans who have no idea what the heck they’re doing.
Seth has uttered maybe three words the entire
“Let me finish, Gabriela.” Mom runs her hands through her hair, like she’s about to make an important announcement to important people and wants to look the part. This is a demeanor I’ve seen before, most often when Dad was deployed. It means my mother is about to ditch the passenger seat and take the steering wheel.
“As I was saying, your father has a lot on his mind, so I’m not sure he’s thinking clearly about this, about how important this journey must be to Lucas.” Mom takes a deep breath. “The last thing I want is to undermine your father. We make our decisions together as a team, despite how one-sided it may look on the outside.
But
I’ve also been married to the man for twenty years, and sometimes I suspect I know what he truly wants even more than he does.”
“And what does he want?” I demand. “For me to live with the guilt of having failed Lucas for the rest of my life?”
“Cut the melodrama, Gabi. What your father wants is simple—for his children to reach adulthood safely, without having to experience the kind of struggles he had to. What he sometimes forgets is that this world will never be safe, and two of his children are practically adults already.” Mom gets up from the sofa, picks up my pack, and helps reposition it on my back. “I’ll talk to your father. Now you’d better get going, otherwise you’ll miss your flight.”
Salty tears line the back of my throat as I give my mom an unexpected hug goodbye. “Thank you. For being on my team.”
“I’m always on your team, Gabriela. You just have to give me the chance to play.”
I break Mom’s embrace and turn towards the door.
“Gabi, wait.”
My shoulders sink. She’s about to change her mind. Mom disappears down the hallway towards Dad’s office.
“Take this,” she says when she returns, holding out a plastic bag.
Now I’m really confused. “What is it?”
“Something your father wanted to do for Lucas while he walked the
camino
. Something your Grandma Guadalupe did for him when he got sick.” Mom hands me one hundred extra euros and the clear plastic bag filled with tiny tealight candles. “Now it’s up to you.”
I accept this parting gift, aware that I’m walking this route for Dad as much as I am for Lucas. Maybe if I do this one thing right, he’ll trust me again.
Maybe I’ll start trusting myself.
Chapter 6
Seven hundred and eighty kilometers. Five hundred miles. The distance between Cleveland and New York. That’s how far we’re walking. Well, almost that far. Mom will talk to my teachers, but two weeks of class plus spring break is probably the most I can miss and still manage to graduate, so we’ll have to take a short bus ride in the middle of the route to speed things up. Still, walking for this long is
insanity
. And I willingly agreed to take part in it.
Not to mention that I most certainly overpacked. This is the first detail I discern as I study the other tourists—oops, I mean
pilgrims
—on the train ride from Paris to the Spanish border. Let’s start with the young woman across the aisle, the one who hasn’t looked up from her magazine in almost two hours. Her stylish sporting gear makes me wonder if she’s a model for Eddie Bauer or The North Face. She’s got to be either Dutch or Norwegian. Tall and very Heidi-looking with white-blond hair worn in two long braids. Like the rest of these passengers, her equipment tells me Europeans take hiking
very
seriously. Their fancy trekking poles, super lightweight packs, and layers of waterproof material make it look like they’re about to tackle Everest.
My
contribution to the world of
camino
fashion? A ratty pair of Adidas warm-up pants that should have been thrown out two seasons ago. Seth brought his camo-green rucksack, which holds a lot of junk, but stinks like canvas and makes us stick out like silly Americans who have no idea what the heck they’re doing.
Seth has uttered maybe three words the entire
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