The sun was starting to set and Miguel was humming to himself as he climbed up the little set of stairs before the front door of his home. The Rivera home of the Land of the Dead was different than the one in the Land of the Living; it was tall and pink and circled around a courtyard. The tall part of the building was three floors tall and was the homey-part of the property, while the rest of the one-level building was the workshop. There was a professional entrance for customers on the other side of the house, but Miguel was using the family entrance.
He opened the door and smiled at the living room before him. The walls were a soft white and the floors a pale wooden floor, mostly covered by one huge multi-colored Aztec-themed rug. On the left side of the room, Coco and Victoria sat on the couch; Coco was fixing an apron and Victoria was reading a book. On the right side of the room, the twins, Oscar and Felipe were sitting at a small table and chairs and playing a game of checkers. Farther into the room and down the hall, Miguel could barely make out Rosita in the kitchen, cooking dinner.
"Hola, Riveras!" Miguel greeted with a wave of his skeletal hand.
A chorus of "hola"s followed and Coco looked up and scooted over on the couch to make room for her great grandson. Miguel sat his guitar down gently by the couch's arm and sat and hugged his Mama Coco.
"How was your day, Mama Coco?"
"It was nice, very quiet today." Coco answered, keeping a polte eye on Miguel, but still working on the apron. "How was your day, mijo?"
"Pretty good." Miguel answered with a shrug.
"Ah, NO!" Felipe yelled with a smile on his skull as his twin stole his last three checker pieces with one clever move.
"Ah, HA!" Oscar cheered and jumped up from his seat and did a little dance. "I win this round, hermano!"
"I want a rematch!"
"After dinner." Rosita called as she walked into the living room. "La cena está lista."
Coco tucked her needle into the apron for safe keeping and stood up with Miguel. Rosita rushed to the youngest Rivera and gave him her usual bear-hug. The twins led the way into the kitchen and Victoria finally tore her eyes away from her book, closed it with a snap and sat it on the opposite couch-arm of the guitar.
Miguel walked into the large kitchen to find Imelda placing a huge plate of tamales on the packed table and she smiled at her family. After everyone washed up quickly at the little well just outside the kitchen door and Julio and Hector came inside, everyone was soon sitting around the table, chatting away about their day and enjoying Imelda and Rosita's cooking.
On one side of the table, Hector was speculating with Miguel on a new song he was writing.
"I've hit another writer's block, I'm afraid. I'm stuck after the first chorus."
"Do you know the notes, or just the lyrics?"
"I have the melody, just not the words."
"Maybe the song could be about how the guitar sings." Miguel's eyes grew wide and said, "Espera, nevermind! I have an idea!"
Hector laughed as the teenager muttered words under his breath and was itching to get some paper and a pen, but knew Imelda would not approve of him leaving the table. Rosita was listening and giggled at the men, happy to see their creativity flourish in such a way never allowed in life.
Meanwhile, Oscar and Felipe were picking on Victoria about her newest choice of reading.
"I just wanted to try something different." Victoria said calmly as she quietly ate some rice.
"Si, but this is radically different."
"Rather than facts and history, you chose a cheesy love story of…"
"It is NOT cheesy!" Victoria argued, finally snapping and making the twins laugh at her enthusiasm. "It is romantic, something you two have NO knowledge of!"
Julio wiped his white mustache clean with his cloth napkin and watched his wife listen to Imelda patently as the business woman ranted about a difficult customer.
"... seemed to think just a little polish could change the color, NO! It CANNOT! If he really wants his boots to be darker, I should have used entirely different leather, and I'll bet my femer he won't pay for a new pair of boots! Lo juro, when he told me he changed his mind I nearly…"
Coco glanced at Julio and froze at his staring and smile. It was his way of saying "I love you" a million times a second: that love-struck stare he gave her, like he was looking at a goddess. Coco's patience and love was what captured Julio so much, and watching her practice that trait with her mother, once again, Julio just couldn't help but stare.
Once Imelda was finished telling whoever would listen of what she was going to do to the rude customer, she took in a deep breath and said calmly,
"Anyways, Miguel, what did you do today?"
Miguel, who was sitting on Imelda's other side, swallowed some water and answered, "Well, I went to the fountain and played for a while, but it got too crowded around lunch, so then I just walked around."
"Found anything new?"
Miguel, still somewhat new to the Land of the Dead, used most of his free time, when not playing music, exploring and venturing off as boldly as he desired. Imelda had done the same when she first died and told Miguel he could explore, as long as he was home by sundown.
"Sort of. I saw a pretty cool duel."
Hector drank some coffee and asked, "A duel?"
Miguel nodded. "Si, there was this one part of the town where fencers and other fighters dueled on a wooden stage and people watched. It was kinda interesting, but there was this one guy who kept challenging people and no one could beat him. He had a big sword and wore parts of silver armor. I think he was a comandante in life."
Hector nodded, understanding, and Miguel went on with his story.
"Pretty quickly, no one wanted to fight him and he was kinda ruining it. I got the feeling it was supposed to be for fun, but he was taking it too seriously. I was just about to move on when one woman yelled, 'She could beat you! Come on, seniora, you can do it!' A few more people agreed and pushed a girl a little older than me on the stage."
Imelda stiffened at this and Victoria and the twins started to listen, too. Miguel was fourteen when he died, so the thought of someone fifteen or so fighting grown and experienced soldiers and warriors in an unfair competition was unnerving.
"What were they thinking, sending a girl of that age to fight in such a rough competition?" Victoria asked.
"I thought the same thing, Tia Victoria." Miguel answered. "But the girl looked like she wasn't scared and the man only sneered at her and said he'd never fight a girl."
Imelda's eyes flashed at this and the men at the table ooed softly, knowing better than to hold such stereotypes about women; a lifetime with any Rivera woman proved just that. Victoria huffed and Rosita listened even more intently, excited to hear the rest.
"Then suddenly, the girl pulled out some sort of weird weapon. It was kind of like a long knife or a short sword, but it was curved, almost like a crescent."
"Was it an elven sword?" Victoria asked.
Miguel shrugged, not knowing what his aunt had just said. "Could be. Anyways, she drew it so quickly the big guy did know what was happening. She sliced all around him, and at first I thought she was trying to scare him, but after they were still for a few seconds, his armor fell right off! His straps had been sliced! He was furious and they started to duel, but she kept blocking him and dodging and moving around him. It was actually really cool!"
"I wish I could have seen it!" Oscar said.
"Me, too!" Felipe added.
"And then, just when the big guy was about to strike, the girl sliced his skull off of his spine and then kicked the rest of his skeleton off the stage! He went flying everywhere and the crowd laughed and cheered like crazy; he never got back up on the stage."
"Wow!" Hector awed. "And you said she looked like she was your age?"
Miguel nodded and continued to eat. Rosita and Imelda were wonderful cooks and it was clear why Mama Elena's food was always so tasteful in the living world. Miguel felt a twinge of pain at remembering his grandmother, but it was replaced with happiness by good memories of her and her family.
"Why were they fighting like that to begin with?" Rosita asked, not out or rudeness, but out of curiosity.
Miguel shrugged. "I think it was just for fun. You know, sparring. Like when people sing or dance in a competition for fun."
"Seems like an odd form of entrainment." Victoria commented.
"Hm, not really." Hector said. "I can understand why people would want to display their skills like that. You spend so much time and energy perfecting what you love, it's one thing to do it for yourself, but to have someone see what you can do and like it…"
Miguel nodded, understanding his grandpa's logic from a musician's standpoint. Imelda also nodded and added,
"I felt the same way when first making shoes. Coco's face when she first tried on her boots! I'll never forget it!"
Coco would have blushed, if she had blood to rise to her cheeks, but instead her facial expression said all that needed to be said and she ate her meal to to try to hide it.
The meal went on steadily until a few minutes later, Hector gasped so loudly she made Victoria and Julio jump and the twins clang onto each other.
Imelda glared at her husband and asked, "What?!"
"I've got it!" Hector yelled happily and wolfed down the last of his food before running for his guitar and sitting on one of the chairs in the living room.
"I can sing to the moon,
I can sing for the stars,
But to see your smiling face
Is all I need to go on."
Hector played around with the words, not satisfied at all with the results, and Miguel, sensing that it was safe to do so, ran off into his room and grabbed his journal and a pencil and scribbled down his new ideas for a song. Rosita chuckled at the boys' excitement and at Imelda, who held her head and muttered,
"Guess dinner's done."