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The day his mother found out, he was twenty three and feeling insignificant.
It was also the first time she hit him.
Even years later, Tenoch would not have a clear idea of who was at fault for his outing. He had vague suspicions, perhaps some theories, but it wasn’t the most significant aspect of the night. He couldn't even remember the events that led up to his mother looking up to him from where the phone lay hanging from its yellow cord. He couldn’t remember the sound of her question when she asked if he was gay.
In all his intelligence, he just shrugged. “Y que?”
The echo of the slap circled the room, followed by two pairs of widened eyes.
Behind them both, Leo had startled so badly the mop she was holding clangged against the floor, and to her side the gardener, coming in through the crystal door that slides with a screech when moved, stared at them both in disbelief.
Silvia Iturbide resembled the somber faces of Goya’s oil paintings. She would have fit the canvas if it wasn't for her pink scarf that had tumbled off her shoulder with her sudden move. Her mouth was open in a gasp. In front of her, the skin of his cheek started blooming.
Their world stopped spinning, but faraway in the street the city traffic kept screeching and the metro kept running. The sprinklers of the country club began their scheduled rain. The grass was green. It would still be green for weeks.
“I’ll get your money, Don Henry.”
Mamás voice shook as she directed her attention to the gardener. He regarded her with an uncomfortable nod, half hiding behind the maid, and scrambled back outside with an indescribable look in Tenoch’s direction.
Leo remained glued to her spot, but her eyes now traced Tenoch with unspoken grief.
“Ma-”
“Lárgate.” Her voice wasn’t harsh. Soft, manicured tone that didn’t match the words. “Before your father gets here.”
He coudn’t bring himself to believe that she’d tell her husband- she wasn’t stupid. Perfect wife of perfect class, they were extremely intelligent, specifically in hiding it. She’d know how her husband would react. But he still stumbled back, nearly loosing his balance as he made his way to the door.
- - - - - - - - -
Life manages to continue on, far away from a chauffeur or the beach or when his family last name pops up in the street corner’s newspapers. He doesn't notice at first, too busy trying to handle two jobs and a relationship that’s far from perfect. His brain feels like an M. C. Escher painting, his heart like the city in ‘85.
Tenoch can write for Televisa and work as an accountant’s assistant and learn how to hop on buses when his shifts run too closely for comfort, but his communication skills suffer and he has to face a disappointment that Julio fails to hide. It comes as forgetfulness: forgetting a date night, forgetting to buy shampoo, forgetting to call. Once, when rent very nearly doubled and his bank account nearly began counting backwards, he shut himself out from society for a solid two weeks. After everything was paid and his eyes felt like popping out from exhaustion, he finally played the phone’s receiver only to be bombarded with messages.
Julio screamed his heart out when he knocked on the door with some droopy flowers and a box of chocolates that cost him the week’s metro tickets. And then he kissed him, and kept lecturing on how they weren’t that young anymore.
“Pura pendejada- no don’t give me that fucking look Tenoch. I thought you’d gotten kidnapped you piece of-”
Ana never did that with him, and he’s beginning to think that never in his life had a partner, one night stand or three months commitment, had ever given two flying fucks about his wellbeing.
He sat on the couch, making himself small because fuck this, he kept fucking up over and over and how long until Julio figured he deserved better and remember he’s actually a pretty selfish-
“Look at me, cabrón. I love you too much for you to just disappear into the night, you hear?”
Now he leaves messages on the phone and organizes his bills in a tiny notebook. Step by step.
(Doña Zapata herself gave him an earful after a bowl of chicken soup and half a coke was placed in front of him. Her bitterness against his family's political affiliations seemed to have slowly transformed into annoyance at how badly he’d treated her son. She’d eventually love him as her own, but not yet.)
UNAM accepts him for a masters because as stupid and knuckleheaded as he is, Tenoch is still intelligent and still graduated in economics. Julio smiles when he shares the news and he wonders what his parents might think of him.
He graduates with more premature silver hair. They still invite him to give lectures and though he feels uncomfortable over his studies, he needs the money. And teaching doesn't make him bitter. Doña Zapata goes to his graduation and Julio asks him to move in. That night in the balcony, he smokes and smiles to himself because having his own house with his own money, or mostly Julio’s money but something actually created by himself is. It is.
They buy an apartment because surprisingly, Julio’s responsible and can actually pay for mortgages and save enough money to get them in a ten year debt for two bedrooms, half a kitchen and a tiny balcony. As a final touch, he gets dragged into a petshop after one too many beers.
“Why though-”
Julio shushes him. “We need a child now.”
“What-” he’s smiling and his feet don't feel as heavy. “We’d be terrible parents.”
Julio grins maniacally and he leans down on one of the cages. “ I will be a great father. You can be the asshole that comes in late and drinks and smokes if you want.”
He holds up a small kitten, one with scruffy gray fur that matches Julio’s tiny ponytail and mewls indignantly, revealing miniature teeth.
“See? She’s already complaining. She’s just like you.”
Tenoch wants to argue but the kitten yawns and why the fuck not. They’ll be parents now.
- - - - - - - - -
Tenoch doesn't go to Julio, rather an empty apartment and pretends he didn't bawl his eyes out in the metro station while a waiting businessman eyed him warily.
He pretends to ignore the phone receiver as it recites his unheard messages, he looks out the window and though his reflection has the body of an adult, he feels smaller than a child. He’s twenty four and his world still crashes when his mother talks. As the receiver finally goes silent he stands, tugs on his hair, and in the suffocating silence he slams his fist against the wall. Once, twice, and fuck it stings and he’s on the floor again.
The phone starts ringing, and he answers, and though Julio has something to say he shuts up immediately when Tenoch’s voice breaks.
Though it takes exactly half an hour of traffic for the door to open, time seems to warp and when keys click outside, Tenoch feels as though he’s been on the couch for only a few seconds. He’s not going to cry, he has no tears left but Julio’s arms are around him and he’s not that old yet so the damn breaks and so does he.
- - -
They’re smoking by the fire escape of the building, Julio’s legs dangling over the fall. Besides him, Tenoch huddles into himself, resting his nose against his knees. Though lankier, taller, and stretched out through the years of economics, he still manages to make himself small.
Julio reaches out his fingers to cover his hand, and underneath his fingertips yellowed purples are beginning to dot each knuckle. They give off a faint odor of manzanilla and he wonders if their savings should be spent on finding a proper therapist.
“I can’t go back home.”
“Tenoch-
“I prepared. But I wasn’t.” he huddles closer onto himself. “I don’t know.”
He doesn't, but Julio knows. He knows Tenoch’s been preparing for this moment since he decided to kiss back after their disastrous get together.
He knows that Tenoch has enough money saved to cut off parental support, that this wrung down apartment near ITAM doesn't have any debt to be paid, that Leo will probably pack a the last of the belongings for him- that as much as Julio’s hatred seethes at the mere thought of los Iturbide, Doña Silvia will either turn a blind eye or encourage Leo’s packing. He knows Tenoch has work offers, and he knows that as much as Miguel Iturbide would be willing to stop paying for the last few months of his son’s university as a final blow, he’ll let the payment continue as some stretched out hope of this all being a nightmare.
He observes the huddled form. His hair is longer now, and though it still falls over his eyes, the back forms a short mullet that might need trimming soon. His jawline is tightly defined and stubble covers it, and his shoulders are much broader. Any features of a teenager have been grown out, but he worries more about the carless happiness.
They love each other, no longer as awkwardly, very faithfully, but Julio still feared that some of Tenoch’s loyalty might push him back. Maybe he still regrets their decision to be together, maybe his mother’s love, fucking conditional love that turned its eyes away, maybe it’s more important-
“Please say something.”
And the fucking broken down, weary voice that he hasn’t heard since their last fight after the trip back to the city oh so many years ago. Accepting their love had been hurtful, but it's breaking his heart how much damage the family can do. Julio wishes to the heavens and whatever his Ma prays to every sunday that he could punch Miguel Iturbide or Silvia Iturbide or whomever decided that Tenoch should be kicked out, but in his powerlessness all he can do is take the other’s hand and kiss the multicolored knuckles and fingers and nails.
Tenoch is such a pretty crier because of the universe's many jokes, and he gets even prettier and tears salt his cheeks.
Julio hates the world and its people, and the cold bites them both as the cigarette butt disintegrates. He hates the world but thanks it too, because Tenoch chooses him over his family name and wealth. Maybe one day, years ahead, they’ll chase happiness.
But not tonight.
- - -
He’s twenty five and they’re living together, and he learns to cook.
It’s a poor attempt at first, and he gets endlessly teased by Julio all throughout the week. Their entire apartment smells like burnt tortillas and they get two complaints from the neighbors.
He tries again, and it’s slightly charred and missing salt, but it's edible. When he tries a final time the chilaquiles taste good and Julio looks at him with this odd expression he can’t decipher. Later that night, when Julio’s reading and he’s staring at the ceiling, mind focused on the hand that pets his hair, he asks.
“What were you thinking earlier? When you tasted my cooking?”
Julio keeps reading. “Nothing.”
“What were you thinking?”
A grin. “Nothing.”
Tenoch begins to squirm and Julio closes his book. “Just that you’ve changed.” he keeps caressing his hair. “Not in a bad way. I never thought you’d cook.”
Neither did he but now that there’s no threat of a fire, he might consider continuing with his culinary curiosity. The only thing holding him back is the extreme hatred of washing and cleaning afterwards.
“How else have I changed?”
Julio says nothing, props his book back open and disconnects.
- - - - - - - - -
He’s twenty seven and his mother comes over.
He’s met with her before, a few times, after the rather disastrous coffee invitation (he really should stop relying on Vips for emotionally volatile reunions), and none of them had fallen to pieces in strained words. Tenoch considered keeping her invitation to himself, but the idea was snuffed out as quickly as it came when he saw Julio humming to himself while he playfully nudged the kitten out of his way and he set his file documents on the coffee table. Julio who asked him to move over, Julio who heard all of his thesis presentation for practice, Julio who kissed his shoulder and took him in and forgave his selfishness and-
When he tells him his idea, he can see a mix of emotion in Julio’s eyes, but the man just nods, presses a quick kiss against his jaw and continues his work.
“She better not expect any tea or shit.”
She did expect tea.
Mamá’s eyes went through every inch of the doorway, of their worn welcome mat, of the umbrella racks and the discarded boots, the small coffee stain on the edge of the couch, the lamps, the tiny kitchen counter, the vodka bottle by the window. Everythings as clean as he could get it to be, and though Tenoch doesn't feel embarrassed of his living situation, he still has the odd need to please her. Or to teach her. Or to scream at her.
This is his life, and he likes it.
He can’t really tell whether her wave of judgment is positive or negative, so instead he stands up and shows her around. Not everything, but what he considers important for her to know. To her credit, Mamá doesn't say anything, just follows him around and watches him. So he shows her.
Their slightly burned set of plastic kitchen utensils.
His collection of books, stacked on the floor. Julio’s Cafe Tacuba and Calle 13 records.
Luisa’s picture, pinned on the board atop his desk, messy with papers.
Charolastra’s litter box, though the kitten hides underneath the bed the entire time.
Mamá smiles at the last one, and he might have shared it too had she not frowned at their bed. Queen sized, two night stands characteristic of their owners, tousled sheets. Tenoch can’t decide if he left it unmade purposely. They exit the room quickly, but from their places on the couch it's impossible to avoid the open door that leads to an unmade bed.
She keeps silent as she reaches out for her tea (now gone cold, made with tea bags collected from motels of his book promotion tour, sweetened with normal sugar since vegan supplements cost twice as much. Not that they ever taste good. The napkin has patterns and the teacup doesn't match the plate underneath. He likes it better this way). After sipping, and he knows she’s fighting back a grimace, she looks up to him.
She doesn't fully smile, but the sentiment’s there.
“Ya estás tan grande, Tenoch.”
As if on cue, the front door opens and Julio comes in, juggling three bags of groceries and stumbling against the door as a symphony of barking dogs awake the whole hallway. The tips of his hair are still slightly blonde and they cover his eyes as he curses under his breath and pushes the door close, shouting out a greeting.
(Julio knows exactly what had been going on in their apartment, had timed his entrance, had counted the seconds, knowing full well Tenoch wouldn't last long enough to face his mother stoically. He doesn't have anything but resentment for Doña Iturbide).
“Julio.” Mamá says, and her tone is neutral.
He’s far from the image she wanted, Tenoch thinks. She wanted a pretty girl, maybe a plastic girl, una fresa with an interior design degree, designer bag, small feet, tight waist. A girl with pretty eyes and soft spoken words and the smell of Channel clinging to the back of her neck. Mamá wanted him to parade a white wedding dress by his arm, she wanted tiny children running around her legs.
She’s getting a man with worn converse and a small ponytail and beautiful eyes and a smile that outshines any pearl colored dress in Mazaryk’s window displays.
“Señora Iturbitde.” Julio’s tone is colder, but he offers a smile, and marches straight into the kitchen.
(Sometimes, Tenoch wishes he could just forgive her, but when he vaguely even pictures Doña Zapata turning a blind eye on her husband, of even considering cutting off Julio, Julio who loves his sister and mother, Julio who provides for them even if there’s no need, Julio who visits her every Friday with a bag of cocadas- Tenoch can live with his resentment. Mamá chose that for herself).
Mamá stands up and it hasn't even been more than half an hour, but she’s collecting her coat and carefully placing the mismatched spoon on the plate. He accompanies her to the door, helps her put on her coat, and maybe she just might give him a hug for old times sake.
She gives him a tight smile and brushes a strand of hair off his cheek, with brightly manicured nails.
Teoch watches as she walks away, the clacking of her heels and swishing of her silk scarf leaving off an aroma in the hall. He stands there, long after the elevator doors click shut.
A pair of arms hug his waist and he leans against the doorframe, placing a hand atop Julios’.
“Do you think she’ll be back?”
He still sounds like a child, puta madre, and Julio doesn't say anything, just tightens his embrace.
- - - - - - - - -
His father visits him in the university a few days after he’s left home, his cheek still burning in humiliation, and when they lock eyes in the library Tenoch feels himself praying that their conversation will happen elsewhere. Miguel Iturbide hadn’t been a volatile man, but his expression holds a myriad of emotions and Tenoch isn’t stable.
The man motions him forwards and they walk in silence to one of the tables outside. It's suffocating, the way they sit, face to face, his father’s eyes boring holes into his scalp and his own gaze pierced over the cobblestone floor.
“Since when?”
Nothing else.
It’s not a question born from curiosity, rather a market research of all the possibilities. Since Tenoch was five and he accidentally looked out of the car’s window and saw Barrio Rosa’s drag show. Which is a lie. Since he was left alone by his parents to discover the possibilities of sexual pleasures as a bratty, rich teenager. Since Boca del Cielo, since he first got high or that one time at la Diana where Saba had to drag him out half unconscious. Why does it even matter?
Tenoch shrugs and can't meet his gaze with his fathers’.
He expects some sort of anger, but all he gets is a proposition.
“You don’t come out. You don’t say anything- I’ll keep paying for your university, you graduate. I’ll send you to Europe afterwards, and maybe in a few months you’ll meet a girl- or we can get one to come right now.” Iturbide scratches his chin and his voice is lacking any form of human emotion. “I can talk to Ana’s parents, tell them you miss her-”
“No todo se compra con dinero”
Not everything’s bought with money, father mine, and he might just start screaming because his brain’s about to implode. Not everythings bought with money, nor with fees or favors or connections among the elite. For a moment Tenoch remembers that his father isn’t even upset or worried for his child, rather for all of those tools to stuff himself with money. It makes sense now, more than before, the constant political hatred, the helplessness over fighting against corruption so rooted into men’s form of living that there is no cure but to live poor and die poor. Tenoch has no right to complain about anything in his life, but he understands.
The man before him is a stranger.
It still hurts how quickly Iturbide realized that his son will not agree, how effortlessly he stands up and walks away. With his well pressed suit and casual walking he blends into a sea of teachers and students and governments alike, and they never meet face to face again, only through newspapers and the occasional report on television.
- - - - - - - - -
He’s twenty eight and his third screenplay gets mixed reviews in Morelia’s film festival debut, but the producers in the company open a bottle of mezcal in celebration.
Boinas gets released with parole and they pick her up with a bag of spicy mango treats and a lot of tears from Doña Zapata.
Charolastra gets sterilized and the secretary at the vet flirts with him so blatantly that Julio nearly devours him in a kiss in front of everyone who’s waiting, receiving several indignant gasps from two elderly ladies that wait for their own cat.
A new bar next to the supermarket opens and now they get beers along with basic necessities like sauce tetra packs or condoms or chicken stock, and order tacos for dinner during lazy saturday evenings.
They dine in one of Polanco’s fancy restaurants when Julio gets a new job offer, and walk holding hands through the street, making fun of the window displays with watches that cost kidneys.
Life goes on, and it's sort of beautiful.
- - - - - - - - -
He wonders what Luisa might say of them now, hand in hand, laughing, hugging, fucking, getting drunk and working. She might smile, faraway, with those knowing eyes of hers. She might congratulate them, encourage them. But the dead stay silent when talked to.
- - - - - - - - -
By the time Christmas comes around this year, he’s learned enough to help Doña Zapata with the romeritos. He sits in a plastic stool by the kitchen counter, cleaning out the herbs with gloved fingers and occasionally stirring the pot of mole. Just minutes ago, Doña Zapata had rambled throughout the afternoon, a mix of words that were either complaints or graces to god. He hummed in reply every few minutes, and though he didn't quite understand everything she said, her presence felt comforting.
She’s off to church now, smiling at him and patting Julio’s cheek as the door opens.
“She loves you more than me now.” Julio says as he sticks a finger into the pot and licks it.
Tenoch slaps his head and while Julio laughs he looks down at the stove. Everything boils or steams or grills quietly and the apartment fills with both feast aromas and whatever cologne his partner chose for the night.
“You’re not going to church?”
“Are you?”
He used to, with his mother when she wore her shawl and his father pretended all his monetary abuse was god’s will and his grandmother slapped him more brusquely than he just did to Julio when he grew bored of the priest’s speech. In a way, it bothers him that he never got to connect spiritually with anything, and remains curious over how people get on their knees in the Villa simply out of gratitude. Mysteries he’ll never get to explore, but life has continued for the best and even if there’s no turkey on the table or matching silverware, he has a partner and a job and a stove that heats up the room like how Julio warms his hands.
Tenoch wasn’t born with a poetic license, but life seems to be giving him enough materials to write a decent verse or two.
Julio tugs on his hand and they both make their way to the firescape. He lights a cigarette and scoots closer as Julio leans his head against his chest. Inhaling the smoke, he watches as a light from the apartment in front of their street turns off. Three Christmas trees shine against windows in the perpendicular apartment block, two with heavy red bows, one with only the tiny white lights. For once, the tree he thinks of isn't from his childhood, but of the tiny plastic one they have at home, the one with red ornaments that Charolastra likes to paw at.
“What's on your mind?”
Tenoch glances down at Julio, whose lips part in a small smile and hold the cigarette.
“Nothing-”
“Ay si cabrón, tell me-
“I want to marry you.”
Julio’s lips parts open in a gasp and the cigarette falls against his hand. Tenoch yelps and startles back, sending the stick back through the metal stairs and his cheeks burn. He looks away, ashamed, and the moment of peace is ruined, and perhaps the whole dinner and Julio-
Julio is laughing.
Tenoch ducks his head and blinks, confused.
“Que?”
“Tenoch-”
“Que? Chingada madre- no te rias.” he’s cursing to hide his discomfort but before he can say anything else Julio’s kissing him and the world twirls around them.
His hand finds its way to Julio’s hair but the kiss cuts short and they’re embracing. It's soft, it's safe, and he lets himself bury his nose against the lapel of the christmas sweater.
Julio cradles his head and keeps laughing. “That was curtly romantic and sort of desperate.”
“Shut up.”
“No, no, I liked it. I liked it a lot.” He huffs against his ear. “I just thought you’d get a ring-”
“I can’t afford a ring.”
“And some flowers and maybe a serenata and- you know it's illegal for us to get married here, right?”
He knows and it stings, and nothing about the comment was planned. But if marriage isn't what his parents had and it’s a promise to have Julio by his side for the rest of his life, it sounds like heaven.
“I can hear you thinking.”
“Fuck you.”
“Tenoch,” though he can't see him, Julio’s smile sounds through his voice. “talk to me. You really want to get married?”
He does. “We can’t, technically.”
“We can be engaged.” Julio provides.
“We don’t know if it’ll be legal, and-”
“It will be, eventually.”
“And I don’t have a ring.”
Julio pulls back and takes his face between two warm hands, squeezing his cheeks. “You think I give a shit about a ring?”
Tenoch gazes into sun colored eyes and finds nothing but sincerity.
He's twenty nine. He can’t marry the love of his life and he can’t visit his family for christmas. But the air coming from inside smells of chocolate, and when the door swings open, far away in the hall, Boinas is mumbling a Tatiana song to herself.
Julio is grinning stupidly and Tenoch is mirroring his expression.
He doesn't feel terribly insignificant tonight.