Isabela glanced at herself in the mirror, Tomas was going to be arriving for cena any time now, and her Mama had insisted that she clean up before hand. She had showered and got all the mud off but now she had the matter of what to wear. She was so tired of her pink and lavender princess dresses, yet the only thing else that she owned, now thanks to Tia Carla, was a pair of old worn out overalls and a shirt, both of which were now covered in mud from her muddy puddle jumping spree. Her eyes landed at the crumpled mess that was the dress she had been wearing this morning, the one that was covered in pollen. Honestly she liked the way that black fades into navy blue with the splashes of yellow and red and green in it. It actually kind of looked pretty, in a non-perfect way.
She picked the dress up shaking it out a little to hopefully get rid of any wrinkles, there still were some, but it wasn't too bad, and slipped it on over her head. Technically this probably wasn't what Mama had meant when she had told her to get cleaned up for cena, but the dress was mostly stained now. Stained beautiful colors.
Now to do something with her hair, she had cut it, with help from Tia Carla, honestly, despite her obvious hatred of her Tio Bruno, she was quickly growing to like her Papa's youngest hermana, and it now fell to her shoulders. Earlier she had borrowed a couple of Luisa's hair ribbons and had pulled her hair back in pigtails. However, she didn't think that will be a good idea now, Luisa might not notice two hair ribbons missing from her drawer, that girl had over a hundred of them, but she would notice Isabela wearing them.
"Isa, you okay in there," Luisa's voice called out softly, "You've been in there for a while."
"Abuela always made me wear my hair down," Isabela said softly.
Luisa made an understanding noise as she opened the door to the bathroom, "Would you like me to help you?" she asked.
Isabela looked at her younger sister in the mirror, she had her hair down to the middle of her back, except for a small patch that was tied up in a soft pink ribbon that matched the flowing, lacy dress that she was wearing.
"Where did you get that dress?" Isabela asked.
"Mirabel made it for me for my birthday last year," Luisa said with a shrug, "I just never really had a chance to wear it, this isn't something that I can wear while doing my chores."
Isabela froze for a second, "Where is Mirabel anyway? I haven't seen her in a while."
"She convinced Mama and Papa that she should start her apprenticeship. Papa walked her over and set up her schedule," Luisa said, "Tomas agreed to pick her up on his way here for cena. Papa doesn't want any of us walking around town alone, especially Mirabel. Mama's afraid that Abuela will try to corner Mirabel and guilt her into saving the miracle."
…
Mirabel smiled as she straightened all of the bolts of fabric like she had been asked, "Anything else that you need me to do before we close up?" she asked eagerly, twirling around to face Senora Silva.
"No, I don't think that there is anything that we need to do right now," Senora Silva insisted, "Why don't you go flip the sign so that it says that it's close, then you can head on home to your Abuelo's place for cena."
"I would, but I promised Papa that I won't walk home alone," Mirabel pointed out, "He doesn't want me running into Abuela by myself."
"That's right, sorry dear, I guess I forgot about that," Senora Silva said softly, "Well, hopefully someone comes by soon to pick you up."
"Worst comes to worst I can ask Dolores," Mirabel pointed out, "Tia Pepa and Tio Felix made it clear that they and their family was supporting us in our decision to leave no matter what Abuela says about it."
Just then the door to the store opened, the sound of the bell ringing out causing both occupants to look at the door, "I'm sorry," Senora Silva said, "We're about to close."
"I'm actually here to walk Mirabel home," a deep voice explained. Mirabel looked up in shock to see Tomas standing there.
"Papa asked you to walk me home?" she asked.
"Trust me, I'm as shocked as you are," Tomas insisted, "When he stopped by the diner this afternoon, I thought that I was done for."
Mirabel chuckled, "Papa likes to pretend that he's tough, but he really is a sweet guy. He cares more about the fact that Luisa is happy than anything else."
"That's good to know."
…
Julieta was finishing up making cena when Sofia entered the kitchen, a little rag doll that had once upon a time belonged to one of Agustin's hermanas clutched in her little hands. Did Sofia have her own doll? She was going to have to investigate that once she figured out what to do with the money situation. She had some money saved up, but…
"I 'ungry," the little girl spoke up, her eyes trained on the jar that Abuelo had produced at the end of lunch, a jar that was full of cookies.
Julieta glanced around slightly before opening the lid and handing a cookie to her nieta, "Don't tell your Mami," she instructed.
"Mama, you did not just give mi hija a cookie right before cena, did you?"
Julieta grimaced slightly as she turned around to see her two oldest hijas standing behind them. Luisa was giving Julieta a look she knew all too well, she had been caught red handed, "Luisa, it is my solemn duty as Sofia's Abuela to spoil her rotten."
"I wish Abuela would think like that," Isabela muttered.
"I do too," Julieta insisted, "The two of you look nice," she said, changing the topic.
Her daughters smiled as they thanked her for the compliment and offered to help set the table.
As Isabela walked past her Julieta snagged her closer and whispered in her ear, "You know, just because Alma had you acting a certain way, doesn't mean you have to act the complete opposite. Just do what makes you feel comfortable and happy."
Isabela gave her a brief hug, "I will Mama, I'm just trying to figure out what that is at the moment."
"Tomas!" Isabela and Julieta broke out of their hug at Luisa's shout and hurried outside just in time to see Luisa passionately greeting Tomas as Mirabel pretended to cover her eyes.
"Now that's what a couple that's about to get engaged should act like," Julieta said happily, "I'm sorry I let things go so far between you and Mariano, Mija, I should have realized that you didn't have any feelings for him."
"I should have spoke up sooner," Isabela admitted, "I didn't know that you and Papa wouldn't encourage it like Abuela did."
"There's a lot of things that I'll do different from your Abuela," Julieta confessed, "and one of those things will be listening to my children and helping them," she promised, giving Isabela a quick squeeze, "Come on, let's eat before your Papa starts grilling Tomas."
…
Dinner at Abuelo's house with Tomas was the complete opposite of dinner at Casita with the Guzmans. Luisa and Tomas sat next to each other like Mariano and Isabela, but that was the end of the similarities. Luisa and Tomas couldn't stop stealing glances with each other.
As Isabela helped pass food around, Mirabel carefully picked out the mushrooms from her serving and carefully slid them onto Isabela's plate next to her. Isabela turned back to her plate, and frowned at the pile of mushrooms on her plate. She glanced up at Mirabel, with an unimpressed look on her face, "Seriously."
"If you want to make up for being a lousy sister, you can eat my mushrooms for me," Mirabel offered with a bright smile.
"Mama!" Isabela called out.
Julieta groaned, "Mirabel, stop trying to feed your mushrooms to your sister. You don't have to eat them, but you need to leave them on your plate."
Mirabel sighed dramatically, "I guess I can do that," she said finally.
Things settled down again for a little while, until finally Tomas cleared his throat, "Senor Madrigal?" he spoke up slowly, Luisa reaching out to squeeze his leg in support knowing perfectly well what he was about to do.
"Si," Agustin said, quirking an eyebrow at him.
"I know that we haven't really had a chance to really get to know each other yet, and I apologize for keeping my relationship with your daughter a secret for so long… and well..." Tomas trailed off, rubbing the back of his neck, "I will like to correct the mistake that we made and ask for her hand in marriage."
Luisa's face turned bright red, as Agustin looked Tomas up and down, "I understand that you're divorce, would you care to explain that to me?"
Tomas took a deep breath, sighing slightly, "It's a long story, and it's rather personal. I worked for her father. One day while balancing the book I noticed something strange about the accounts. When I brought it up to him, he dismissed it, instead introducing me to his daughter. I was young and naive, I couldn't have been much older than Mirabel at the time. When he suggested that I marry her and become his partner instead of an apprentice, I agreed."
Tomas paused, and Mirabel didn't miss Luisa grabbing his leg and giving it a supportive squeeze, "I was blind, I thought I had it good, I had been an orphan for as long as I could remember, I lived on the streets before he took me in, now I was married to a beautiful woman, had a nice house and was a partner in a jewelry shop, and we were expecting Sofia. That's when the police started poking their noses into the business. It was a mess. Long story short, they were involved in a smuggling ring and pretty much threw me out to the wolves. They laughed and mocked me as the police took me away.
"I thought I was done for, I was handed the divorce papers the same day I was declared guilty. I was to be executed at dawn," Tomas shuddered at the memory, "That night, a man showed up at my cell, he told me that I would find my daughter at a baby farm north of there and once I had her, I needed to follow the butterfly, and it would lead me to safety. That's how I ended up here."
"Good job Abuelo," Mirabel suddenly shouted cheerfully, "Playing matchmaker huh, send me a good one."
