The door bursts open and the sound of vomiting echoes through the bathroom. It's barely seven in the morning, and regret for what happened last night begins to creep in as a bubbling stomach alerts to another opportunity to heave came forth.

"That's the last time I eat Indian fast food."

Lynn bursts through the door, "Dang it," she says before rushing to the hallway bathroom.

Francisco hears her, and could feel his own stomach churning from the sounds. He feels his heart pounding and he tries to ignore the sounds coming from Lynn. He was apprehensive about eating at the fast food Indian establishment last night, but Lynn convinced him, she said that she has eaten there before without any issues, and now there they are both hugging a toilet.

He tries to get up off the floor, and takes a deep breath to be sure that he isn't going to throw up anymore. His stomach continues bubbling, but he eventually gets to his feet and walks over to the other bathroom to check on Lynn, who is currently retching into the toilet.

"I told you that that restaurant was a bad idea," he says as she throws up again.

She looks up from the floor, "And I told you that it's been fine before. So stop bringing it up!"

He keeps quiet and complies with her request, "Can I ask you something? Do you happen to have any empty cardboard boxes that you don't need?"

She nods, "Yeah, a bunch, why?"

Francisco carefully breathes in, "My mom is moving to an apartment, and she needs them for the move."

Lynn is surprised, "Your mom's moving out? Why?"

"I don't–" he immediately rushes to the sink and throws up. He groans, and blows air out of his nose, "I hate throwing up."

Lynn rubs his back, and hands him some toilet paper, "I know. Do you want something for your stomach?"

Francisco shakes his head; he knows that she'll go after the pink bottle again, and he doesn't want to consume the medicine. He tries to clear his nose from his earlier heaving and rinse his nostrils and mouth of the acid.

He starts talking again, "She wants to live somewhere smaller. I mean, can you blame her? A four bedroom house? She doesn't want to take care of or live in such a large place anymore, plus the property taxes are getting too high for her. Besides, Chuy and I agreed that it's much easier for us to take care of it until we rent it out to one of our cousins."

"So it's still in your family?"

"Yeah, Chuy and mom wanted to sell it, but I convinced them that it was better to just keep it and rent it. So at least it's something."

"I guess…" Lynn says, as her eyes stare out in a daze.

Francisco takes a deep breath and when he's sure that his stomach is empty, he heads out to start the day, "So can you let me know if you can find something to help out?"

Lynn snaps her attention back on him, "Alright, I can look around and bring over some boxes to your mom's place. When do you need them?"


The two older brothers sneak out of their bedroom. Earlier that evening before dinner, their dad mentioned having to talk to their mom about something important, and the brothers decide to spy on their parents, who are quietly talking amongst themselves.

"Me dijo mi primo de un trabajo en una planta en Mi…" Juan attempts to say the state, but he can't quite remember the name that his cousin told him. "Me dijo que pagan bien, y que están buscando trabajadores."

"¿Y quieres hacerlo?"

"Pues, necesitamos más dinero, primero, voy a ir para ver si agarro el trabajo, y después el Gordo me va enseñar una casa y la ciudad. Va ser como una o dos semanas, y si agarro el trabajo nos mudamos allí."

The two brothers couldn't believe it; their parents are talking about them moving to another state. They know that money has been tight for some time, and with rent going up on the two-bedroom apartment, they know that it'll be a matter of time before they have to move again, but to another state; that's too much.

The ten- and thirteen-year old quietly sneak back to their room, with the new information in mind.

As soon as the door closes, in a hushed scream, Kiké declares, "I can't believe they want to leave here!"

"Can you blame them? Look around, Kiké. We sleep on a bunk bed and the three of us have to share this one small room," Chuy reminds his brother as he turns off the lights.

It isn't an ideal rooming situation, but the brothers have no choice but to endure it. Their earliest memories involved the brothers sharing a room with their parents, sleeping in the same bed or sleeping on a couch in a trailer. Luckily, their youngest brother never had to live through that part of their lives, but their current situation still isn't a dream.

Chuy tries to stay calm but moving to whatever state their dad was talking about is still a big deal. The two brothers have spent over a decade bouncing around apartments and different homes that the family could afford, but it was always in the same city; now they are possibly moving far away from everything they have ever known.

"Where do you think that dad's going for this job?" the older brother asks.

Kiké thinks about it as he climbs up to his bed, "Mississippi?"

"You think?"

"I hope not. Aren't the summers worse down there?"

"I don't know. What about Missouri?" Chuy wonders as he begins to get under the covers.

"Where's that?" Kiké asks as he wraps the blanket around him, "Maybe Minnesota?"

"Are those all of the states that dad could have been talking about?"

"How should I know? You're the older brother."

"But you learned the states more recently," Chuy tells his brother.

"Doesn't mean a thing," the younger brother proudly says.

Chuy scoffs, "And you wonder why I help you with your homework."

Kiké looks down at his brother, "Not good enough if I can't remember all of the states," he jokes.


Lynn digs through her closet trying to find any sort of boxes to help Francisco out, but all she keeps coming across are some of her old sporting goods, "Hockey stick, soccer cleats, swimming goggles, where the heck are those dang boxes?" she asks herself.

She keeps looking through her closet, but stops as she tries to recall why she owned so much equipment that she hardly uses anymore. Her eyes wander towards a set of hunting rifles and she quickly turns away from them, in hopes of searching for those computer boxes.

"Dang it, Bryton, when was the last time you sent me a computer?" she asks her old friend out loud.

For the last couple of years, Lynn has been a product tester for her friend's computer/software company. To her, it didn't make sense to send a computer from Washington all the way to Michigan just to get it tested, but he insisted on doing so. Unfortunately for her, this also means that she ends up with more computers than necessary, especially since she wasn't getting paid in anything, but a new desktop, or laptop, or tablet, but at least she always had something to give away as a gift or for parts.

"Finally!" she exclaims as she pulls out a large box, which had a bunch of broken down smaller boxes inside of them.

"They can probably use these for the move," she stops to think about the move.

Lynn shakes her head. She doesn't know why it's bothering her so much that his mom is moving away from his house. She figures that it may have to do with her own attachment to her home, and while she hasn't lived in her childhood home since leaving college, she can't imagine the house not being around.

"I guess it's part of growing up," she sighs.

She grabs the boxes and sets them down by the floor, but her mind keeps going back to the house on Franklin Avenue. Her whole childhood was spent in that house, some of her things are still in that house, and so many happy memories are tied to that house and that neighborhood.

"Why am I thinking like that? Mom and dad would never sell it…would they?"

The reasons that Francisco gave made sense, after all, there's no point in having such a large home, when there aren't enough occupants, and mom and dad could want to save some money and apartments are good for people getting to retirement age.

Lynn shudders as she thinks of her parents as retired.

She begins to think of reasons that her parents will never sell their home, "Overnight guests…memories…hard to sell…Lisa's home lab…" she begins to laugh. There's her reason to never worry – Lisa never moved out because she doesn't want to move her entire lab and finding a new neighborhood that would be okay with her experiments and occasional visits from various government organizations would be a nightmare for the younger woman. The thought begins to ease Lynn and keep her back on track.

"I guess, I can always count on Lisa never moving out," she jokes. Lynn looks at the time on her phone, "Crap! I'm late!" she yells before grabbing the boxes and heading out the door.


The boys look around the apartment one last time. In a few hours, the family is going to pack their belongings onto the truck and they are heading out to Michigan. From what their dad said, the family will be moving to a house with four bedrooms, they'll live close to a beach, and be around some family members who have already settled in the area. The two oldest could tell that their mom, who like them, isn't completely thrilled about the move, but they all understand that they have to move.

Francisco, who is dragging along his teddy bear, asks his brothers, "Are we going now?"

Chuy shakes his head. Their dad has been taking care of some last minute business and if he heard his mother right, they won't be leaving until later that evening. He didn't understand why they couldn't just wait to leave until the next morning, but there is no point in saying anything.

Francisco heads to his room to go play, and Chuy joins his mom and brother, who are watching tv until it is time to go.

Hours later, the sound of the front door opening surprises everyone, and Juan inside with some neighbors, "Bueno, ¡vamos a cargar todo en la camioneta!" he says.

"¿En serio? ¿A las cinco de la tarde?" Alicia asks, clearly bothered by how much time her husband took to handle the last minute errands, how long it'll take them to load the moving truck and how they are going to depart so late in the afternoon.

Juan doesn't say a thing, and just starts moving some boxes.

The commotion of people walking in and out grabs Francisco's attention, and he moves out of the way as men begin to take the packed boxes.

"Pancho," Alicia calls to her son, "empaca los juguetes con los que estabas jugando, ya mero nos vamos a ir."

Francisco walks around the apartment looking for a grocery bag to put his action figures and toy cars. He heads back to his room and places his bear on the bunk bed before grabbing the toys on floor and heading to the family truck.

The neighbors begin to load some of the heavy furniture onto the truck, and soon the apartment is looking empty. This is it; the final moments before they have to get in the car and head to their new home.

Alicia turns to her sons, "¿Tienen sus bolsas para entretenerse?"

She doesn't want to hear her sons complain about being bored and made them each pack a bag to keep them occupied on the long drive.

The boys nod and grab them before heading out to the truck to meet their mom.

Juan pays the helpful neighbors and locks the door of the apartment. The boys look out at the apartment complex one last time as they get into the truck. Francisco tries to look over the dashboard from the backseat; the sun is beginning to set as they embark on their trip to their new home.

The boys look out the window to take in the sights, but all they could think about was what they are going to expect once they get to Michigan. Their dad didn't tell them too much, aside from what the house looked like, his new job, and how they were going to be close to his cousins and their families, but they don't know what to expect for their personal lives.

Hours later, Juan pulls into a motel, where the bright lights begin to wake the two older boys up. They hear their mom telling them that they are going to rent a room for the night and to grab their travel bags, so as to not leave them in sight.

Chuy grabs his four-year-old brother and carries him over his shoulder, "Kiké, grab mine and Pancho's bag."

The middle brother groans, "¿Donde estamos?" he asks his parents.

"En Las Vegas," Juan tells his son, as they walk to their room.

Kiké's eyes light up at the thought of being in Las Vegas, "¿Podemos ir a un casino o un show de magia?"

"No, tenemos que llegar a nuestra nueva casa y todavía nos queda tres días más de viaje," Juan told his son.

Alicia and the boys mentally groan at the thought of being in the car for three more days of travel. Normally, the family was used to, for the most part, having their space, but being cramped in an extended truck cab is hell, especially since they only stop because Juan wants to, not anyone else.

Juan grabs some clothes out of his bag, "Deja me baño primero, para que nos puédanos ir a dormir. Nos tenemos que despertar temprano para llegar a Colorado."

Francisco, who is still struggling to keep his eyes open, asks, "Are we home?"

"No, you idiot," Kiké complains, "didn't you hear dad? We only traveled for about four hours. There's still three more days of this."

The youngest brother groans and closes his eyes from exhaustion.

Juan exits the bathroom and after everyone has had a chance to get cleaned up, the family gets ready to go to bed. The boys lay under the covers of the large bed, as their parents set up a blanket and some pillows on the ground. Juan turns off the light and tells everyone to get plenty of sleep, as he plans to everyone getting up early in the morning, so that they can get on the road.

Francisco squirms under the sheets, and asks out loud, "¿Mami, donde esta mi osito?"

"No sé, Pancho, a la mejor está en una caja. No mas duérmete y lo buscamos cuando lleguemos a la nueva casa," Alicia reassures her youngest son.

Chuy ruffles his baby brother's hair, "Don't worry, you can handle a few nights without your bear."


Kiké's cab pulls in front of his childhood home, he hasn't been inside of the house in years, and now he gets a call from his mom asking him to come to help her move; he was tempted to not bother coming to help, but he was sick of his brothers constantly asking if he is going to help. He knows why they wanted him to help, Francisco is useless and both brothers are too stubborn and cheap to hire movers, well, at least he can grab some things, assuming that his mom didn't already throw them out.

He knocks on the front door and is greeted by his older brother, "Oh good, you're here."

"You wouldn't stop calling," Kiké nags as he walks inside. The house has changed a lot since he last walked in, but he isn't surprised; his mom was constantly trying to make changes to the house's décor when he was around, so he doesn't put it past her to move forwards with the plan, especially without anyone to object.

"I got the truck outside, and mom, Elena, and Francisco are getting all of the small things ready to put in boxes," Chuy informs him.

Kiké walks towards to his mom's room, "So let's get started, I wanna get the hell out of here as soon as possible."

Chuy follows him, "Well, I was hoping to get the bed and the frame ready first and get all of the large furniture–"

"Large furniture, got it," the middle brother says as he tries see how he and Chuy are going to move it.

Chuy rolls his eyes, "Are you still mad?"

"I'm not mad," he states, "I just want to get the job done and leave. Besides, I know that you only want me around because Pancho can't help you for shit."

It isn't the reason that the brothers called him, but the older brother isn't going to bother correcting him, especially when he isn't going to listen.

The brothers get the mattress off of the wooden frame. Kiké couldn't believe that his mom still had it, but after trying to lift it up, he can understand why she did; it was originally built to replace the metal frames that squeaked at night, unfortunately, they are heavy and take two people to move.

Francisco walks into the hallway and soon hears his older brother, "Get out of the way, mocoso!" Kiké yells at Francisco, as he and Chuy try to get their mom's bed frame onto the truck.

"You don't have to yell at Pancho, he doesn't have anywhere to go," Chuy said in his youngest brother's defense.

Kiké groans and set the bed frame down, and tries to catch his breath, "Yeah, well he's getting in the way again. I swear it's like the first time we moved in here, he can't help with the big stuff and he blocks us when we need to move."

Francisco glares at Kiké, "I was four. What did you want me to do, move the couch all by myself?"

"You could have been more helpful than just sitting in your room and playing with your toys."

Francisco shrugs his shoulders; he doesn't remember the move too well. Unlike his older brothers, who were eleven and thirteen when they moved to Royal Woods, he was only four years old. They had memories of their lives back in California which Francisco didn't share; all he could remember was the ride over.

"I'm going to go look for Elena, so that we can finish getting the smaller stuff ready to pack up," Francisco says.

Francisco walks up to his daughter and mother, who are talking as his mom shares memories with his daughter. While he doesn't mind his mom doing so, he wants to finish moving things out of the house early, so that they can get her set up in her new apartment.

Elena, who notices her dad, asks, "How come there aren't a lot of photos of you and your brothers growing up?"

"We didn't have a camera, so we relied on family members to take photos of us," he says as he picks up a roll of ruined film, "and if they couldn't come, then oh, well."

"That's sad, so there aren't any photos of you when you were a little boy?" Elena turns to Alicia, "¿No hay fotos de mi papá cuando era un niño pequeño?"

Alicia leads her to three professional portraits from when her sons were babies, "Aquí estan los retratos de tu papá y tus tíos cuando eran bebés. Ellos eran tan lindos."


Kiké stares out the window and sees nothing but trees. While he knew that the trip across the country wasn't going to be a grand adventure, he hoped that they could stop every once in a while and see the sights. So far, their trip has consisted of sitting in the truck and looking out the window.

It's their second full day in the car and the family is beginning to grow more agitated in the cramped conditions. Their days are mostly spent in silence, except for some sparse conversations and radio music that their dad plays when they approach a large city.

The middle brother sees a billboard for a restaurant and turns to his older brother, "What's a runza?"

Chuy shrugs his shoulders, "Where'd you see that?"

"On a billboard we just passed," he turns to his parents, "¿Podemos parar para comer? Tengo hambre."

Juan shakes his head, "No, ya nos paramos hace unas horas, y ahí tienen ustedes para comer."

The foods that their dad is referring to are multiple bags of chips, some soda and water bottles, and cookies; hardly a worthwhile meal. The family still has another day of travel before they reach their destination, and while the boys don't mind eating fast food for three meals a day; they miss their mom's home cooking.

Kiké pulls out a chip bag and quietly bites down on his snack while staring out the window again, "¿Donde vamos a parar?" he asks his dad.

"Creo que se llamaba Des Moynez," Juan says while mispronouncing the name of the Iowan city. "Hoy no mas va hacer como diez horas, y paramos para dormir," he tells the family.

"Then, ¿podemos hacer algo en un lugar para no estar sentados en el hotel, aburridos?" Kiké asks. He is hoping that they can finally do something instead of sitting around in a room, especially today.

Juan sighs, "Ay Kiké, ¿a quién conoces en esa ciudad y adonde iríamos de todos modos?"

The boy sighs, "Forget it," he tells his dad. For as long as the brothers could remember, their dad would never be the type to venture anywhere new unless work or family was involved. Over and over again, the family would tell their dad about going to nearby sights in California, and each time, they were shot down because they didn't know anyone in the area, or because he didn't know what they would do for fun.

Francisco rests his head on Kiké's arm, and the middle brother shoves him away. The youngest brother, who is snapped awake, attempts to scratch his older brother back. Kiké pulls away and punches Francisco in the arm. Chuy wraps his arm around Kiké's neck and holds him down while, unfortunately squishing the youngest brother.

The boys are yelling and screaming at one another until Alicia turns around towards her feuding sons and begins to slap each one until they stop fighting, "YA! CA-LLEN-SEN!"

Juan looks at his sons, who are clearly upset, "No tenías que golpearlos," he tells his wife in an effort to calm her and their sons down.

"¿Pues quieres que todavía estén peleando?" she asks him. She's stressed and exhausted, and having her sons fight in the car isn't going to solve anything, so she nipped it in the bud before the fighting got worse. Everyone can hear Francisco, who is still crying, "¡Pancho, ya para de llorar!" she tells her son.


Francisco pulls out his phone. Lynn said that she was searching for boxes, but she hasn't gotten back with him after over an hour. Most of the large furniture is already packed away in the moving truck, which his brothers are going to take to the new apartment, but the boxes are still necessary to help with the smaller items that were going in his truck.

Are you almost here with the boxes?

I'm on my way! She responds.

Francisco keeps an eye on his brothers, hoping that they would go with the large furniture before she got here. He didn't want to make this day even more stressful than it already is, but today was not the day for Kiké and Lynn to get together.

The familiar blue rusted car begins to pass by the house and pulls up in front of the house, "I'm here!" she happily declares to Francisco and Elena.

He walks as fast as he can to her, "Great, I'll just take the boxes and you can go on your merry way," he tells her in hopes of getting her to leave as soon as possible.

"What? Why? I don't mind helping and I'm sure your family would love an extra–" Lynn notices Kiké and immediately complains, "Oh God! You're still alive!"

He scowls, "And you're still shorter than a fucking garden gnome," he spits back. "As if my day can't get any worse," he complains.

Francisco and Chuy got between the two, who are taking heavy steps towards one another. For years, the two have fought whenever they saw one another, and unfortunately for everyone around them, time has not let either one forget.

Chuy speaks up in an effort to reduce the tension, "Hey Lynn, it's nice to see you after so long."

"It's nice to see you too, Chuy," she responds with kindness. Lynn turns to Kiké, and sticks her tongue out before going back to Dutch to get the boxes that she promised Francisco.

Chuy points his brother to get away from the area without saying a word, which Kiké does, but not before offering Lynn his middle finger.

"Go," Chuy pushes his brother away. He sighs, "I can't believe it. Nearly twenty years and they're still going at it."

Elena walks up to her uncle after seeing what transpired between the two, "What's going with them, tío Chuy?"

He can't remember why the two have started fighting, and he's sure that the two of them don't remember either; they just seem happy to insult the other just for fun when the opportunity arises.

"I don't know. I just know that your dad and I try to keep them apart whenever possible," Chuy explains. He notices that she isn't surprised by Lynn's appearance and he asks her, "You know Lynn?"

She turns towards said woman, "Yeah, she was my coach, before dad started dating her."

"What?!" he asks, surprised that the two have finally started dating. "Took them long enough."

Elena, surprised by her tio's response, "Wait, you didn't know?"

Chuy scoffs, "Has your dad ever been the type to talk openly about his life?"

The girl silently agrees. He isn't wrong, but she assumed that her dad would have casually mentioned the news to his brother, especially when he seems to have been waiting for the couple to date.

Francisco follows Lynn, and casually says, "Thanks a lot for bringing these boxes."

"No problem," she turns back to where Kiké was standing, "but why didn't you tell them that he was going to be here?"

"I wasn't entirely sure that he was going to make it, plus I was hoping that he would be gone before you got here," he whispers to her. "Besides, once the large furniture is packed into the truck, then he's going with Chuy to my mom's new place," he assures her.

Lynn sighs. While she isn't happy that he is going to be around, if all it takes is loading furniture onto a truck to get rid of him, then she is more than happy to help speed the process along.

She closes the trunk of her car, "So how much stuff is left in the house?"

Before Francisco is able to answer, "Mira esto," the couple hear, "Pancho, ¿porque no nos dices que tu y Lynn volvieron a estar en contacto?" Alicia asks, as she gives Lynn a little smile.

"Nadien pregunto, ¿cómo quieres que te dige?" he responds.

It isn't the best reason, especially since at some point she and his brother have asked if anything new has occurred in his life, but he didn't want to make a big deal about his new relationship.

"Hiciste lo mismo con todas de tus otras novias, pensé que sería diferente con Lynn," she remarks, as she takes some of the boxes from her son's arms.

His mom is right, as a teen, Francisco didn't make a habit out of telling anyone about his love life; at first because his brothers and possibly his mom would tease him, and later, he did it out of habit.

Francisco shrugs his shoulders.

Alicia walks back into the house, and Lynn asks, "What was that about?"

"I didn't tell her or Chuy about us and now they're just teasing."

"You didn't tell them?! How the heck have you not told them yet? It's been nearly two years," she tells him, surprised by the new information.

"They didn't ask," he says, as he walks away from her to help pack up the smaller items.

"That's not a good enough reason!"


The family steps out of the car and look at the house in front of them. It isn't anything extravagant, but unlike their old home, the family will have lots of space with each son having a room of his own, a yard that they can play on, and a piece of land that they can one day call their own. There are still some cosmetic fixes that can be done to make the home better, but the family can make due until the problems can be remedied.

Kiké whistles as he looks around the neighborhood, "Where's the beach that dad promised us?"

Chuy shrugs his shoulders, "I don't know, I guess, we missed it, or maybe it's a little further away."

"Or it doesn't exist…" Kiké snickers.

Their dad has made them some lavish promises before in the past, and while they should know better, it doesn't stop the boys from occasionally believing him when he made such promises.

Juan opens the front door and calls out to his sons, "Bueno, vayan y escogen un cuarto."

The excited boys quickly run into the empty house, and look for a room to call their own. The two older brothers, happy that they will have a space to themselves, immediately call the larger rooms as the youngest struggles to keep up the pace.

"No fair!" Francisco complains, "You're gonna pick and give me the littlest room."

"You're the smallest," Kiké reasons, "it's fair. Besides, if you really want it so bad, then beat us to it," he laughs.

Francisco runs as fast as he can, but his older brothers quickly leave him the dust while looking inside of the bedrooms before deciding on which one they want for themselves.

As he predicted, Francisco did end up with the smallest room, but his mom assures him that the room is all for him, and that he doesn't have to share with his brothers, "Y te ayudo a decorar, pero tenemos que bajar todas las cajas de la camioneta," she tells him.

The boy pouts. He isn't worried about what the room is going to look like, he just didn't want to have the smallest room because he was the youngest.

Alicia calls on the other boys to start helping bring in as much as they can off of the truck; the sun is about to set, and she doesn't feel comfortable leaving the family's belongings on a truck in an unknown neighborhood. Juan assured her the small town is safe and has little crime, but she isn't going to take that chance just because her husband said that there isn't much risk.

She walks inside and turns on the lights. She's relived that the house at least has power for them to be comfortable, especially after she had to nag her husband to call the utility companies before they arrived in the city.

"Where's the tv?" Francisco asks, hoping to find some cartoons.

Alicia looks down, "¿Qué?"

"La tele," the boy repeats himself in Spanish.

She leads him outside, and points at the truck, where Juan and the older boys are beginning to unload, "Ve y ayuda, y a la mejor la encontramos," she points to her son.

Francisco runs up to the truck, and tries to lift up a box, but it's too heavy. He keeps trying with other boxes, each one just as heavy as the others, until his dad and brothers tell him to get out of the way so that he doesn't get hurt. Rather than annoy them anymore, Francisco heads to the family truck and grabs his toy bag so that he can peacefully play in his room.

While in his room, the young boy can hear his exasperated family argue about how there isn't a clear path to move things through the house, the mess that his brothers are making, and how the living room is getting filled with boxes.

The eleven-year-old, who passes by his little brother's room, asks his parents, "¿Por qué no puede ayudar, Pancho?"

The four-year-old turns around, "Because I'm too little to help."

"Too little, my ass," he complains.

"¡Mami, Kiké dijo mala palabra!" Francisco tattles.

The older brother stomps into his little brother's room, and Francisco quickly throws a toy car at his head, before running away from his older brother. The younger brother screams as Kiké takes a hold of his brother and begins twisting his arm.

Alicia walks in and grabs Kiké by the arm and drags him out of the room. Francisco can hear his mom punishing his brother and he happily returns to playing with his toys.

With all the boxes off of the truck, the family rests. Alicia and the boys begin to hear Juan begin to snore.

Francisco shakes his dad, and he snaps awake, "¿Quieres dormir en tu cama?"

He yawns loudly again, which startles the boy, "Ahorita…cuando termino de armarla…pero después falta armar las camas de los niños, y después pueden dormir en sus propios cuartos. Pero lo hacemos mañana," Juan loudly yawns as he assures the boys.

The boys didn't want to wait until tomorrow to sleep in their own beds, and the middle brother quickly let his dad know, "¿Por qué no puedes empezar ahorita?"

"Mijo, estoy cansado y tengo hambre," he tells him. He calls out to his wife, "Alicia, ¿me puedes hacer una torta?"

Alicia scoffs, "¿Con que comida?"

Juan neglected to remember that there is no food in the house, and after moving everything inside, he's too exhausted to go out and get a burger.

He pulls out his wallet, and hands her some money and tells her that there is a burger place a few blocks away. Alicia, sure that she's going to get lost one way or another, recruits her sons to accompany her to the fast food restaurant.

The boys groan. They didn't want to leave and they wanted real food, but neither parent is going to budge; when their dad gets hungry, he can get annoying quickly, and mom hates grocery shopping at night.

"¡Vamos!" she tells her sons, who are dragging their feet towards the truck.

After finishing their food and washing up for the night, the family sets down some blankets to sleep on the floor. None of them are tired, but with the boys' rooms filled with unopened boxes, Juan suggests that everyone sleep in the master bedroom until the beds are up for the boys; unfortunately they all have to sleep at the same time.

As soon as the lights turn off, everyone begins to hear Juan snore; despite having so many days to get accustomed to the loud noise, the boys sigh as they suffer for one more night of torture.

"He's like a bear," Kiké jokes to his brothers.

After hearing that, Francisco suddenly remembers his teddy bear and asks his mom, "Mami, ¿donde está mis osito?"

Alicia says, "No sé, Pancho. ¿Lo pusiste en una caja?"

Francisco doesn't remember doing so, "No…"

"Pues, a la mejor se quedo en California," she says.


With the furniture loaded onto the moving truck, Alicia turns to her sons and lets them know to grab anything that is being left behind for themselves.

Elena, curious about her dad's boyhood room, goes in search of it before the room gets emptied. She places her hand on the doorknob, and is immediately turned away from the door.

"Nope," Francisco says, as he leads her towards his bedroom, "that's your uncle's room."

Lynn, who is following behind him, asks, "What's so bad that you had to stop her from going in?"

"Kiké's room," he responds.

He mentally recalls that his brother has some items that he doesn't want his daughter to see, "C'mon, it's this way," he leads the two.

Lynn looks inside. The last time that she stepped foot in his room there were posters, sports equipment, and handmade furniture that kept other miscellaneous items organized; now the room, looks more bare as it is mostly furnished with the same handmade furniture has begun to wear away.

"Hey, look! Now you have a bed for that spare room of yours," Lynn suggests. Then a thought appeared, "Hey, now that I think about, why did you bother getting a large house with a spare room?"

Kiké, who is passing by with a box, responds, "Because mom and dad always kicked him out of his room whenever we had guests, so he was stuck sleeping on the couch."

"That's because I kept my room the cleanest," Francisco says. "Chuy was messy and who knows what people would find if they searched anywhere in your room."

The older brother chuckles, "You still haven't figured out the trick," he laughs, leaving his brother alone.

Elena turns to her, "I think he meant that they were doing it on purpose."

Francisco sighs, "Yeah, I got that."

After Francisco moved into his new house, he took most of his things, but he still left behind some items in his closet. He opened the door and sees that some of his old clothes have gone missing, "I guess mom has been giving away my old clothes again."

"She does that?" Elena asks.

Francisco nods, "She likes to donate or give them away to family that she visits in Mexico." He spots an old box, and smiles, "Look at this," he says, grabbing onto the old box. "I think that this is full of your baby things, Elena."

The girl looks inside the box and finds a plastic-wrapped white dress, a photo album, and a rosary.

"It's from your baptism," he recalls. "I remember your abuela went all over town trying to find the most beautiful dress she could for the ceremony. I knew that she wouldn't have gotten rid of this."

Francisco hands Elena the box, and she asks, "Can I keep it?"

"Sure," he tells her, "I'm sure your abuela won't mind, just go put it in my truck, so we don't forget it."

As she walks away, Elena looks through the photos of her family. She doesn't have a lot of mementos from when her parents were together, so she is happy to see photos of how happy they were on the day of the baptism.

Francisco slowly steps down and looks underneath his bed, "I'm surprised that my mom didn't throw any of this stuff out," he says as he pulls out an old shoebox.

"Why do you say that?"

"She and my dad always used to throw out everything that either got in their way or wasn't useful anymore; it made it really hard to keep anything unless we had a good reason for it."

He opens the box and immediately gets hit with nostalgia. He takes out a bobble head that he won from Gus' Games and Grub, the ball from his last high school baseball game, his baseball cards, toy cars, a pack of old bubblegum, and underneath everything, he spots an envelope.

He immediately closes the lid to keep Lynn from seeing the envelope. He hasn't thought about that secret admirer letter since he was a teenager, and now he's hit with the memory of how never figured out who gave him the letter all those years ago.

Lynn notices how quickly he closed the box, and playfully asks, "What are you hiding?"

"Nothing, just some silly stuff from when I was a kid," he pulls out the old pack of gum and the toy cars and shows them to her, "See."

She takes the gum and cars from him, "Then I can see what else you have in your little memory box?" she asks, as she slowly steps towards him.

He steps back with each step that she takes forward, until he bumps into the wall, "Are you really that desperate to see my Paws the Tiger bobble head?" he asks as he takes out the mascot.

Lynn makes an attempt at his secret treasure box, "I'm more desperate to see what you're trying to hide in your little shoebox. I mean, I get it. You've had the box for years under your bed, probably forgot about some of things that you hid away from your parents. When did you start your little secret box? Ten? Maybe younger, because of the toy cars, but if you have an old bobble head from," she looks at the figure which came out when they were about fifteen or sixteen, "2018, then you've probably been putting some other stuff in there," she implies.

Rather than continue to hear her accusations, he pulls out the envelope, "It's a secret admirer letter I got when I was a kid."

Lynn stops and she stares at the familiar sight which she hasn't seen since she was thirteen.

"I guess I should have gotten rid of it years ago, but I was sort of hoping that I would get another one to find out who it was from. Oh well," he says, as he walks away and tosses the envelope in the trash.

"Dad! Everyone is about to leave," the two hear Elena say.

"I'm coming," he tells her back.

As Francisco walks away with the box, Lynn walks towards the trash can and looks at the aged letter that he threw into the trash. She picks it up and smiles; she couldn't believe that he still had it after all these years.

"Well, he definitely opened it up and read it…I guess I should've sent that second letter."

She isn't sure if she even has the second letter that she wrote, but to know that he unknowingly held onto her letter makes her feel warm inside.

Francisco calls her, "Lynn, are you coming?"

She quickly stuffs the letter into her pocket and heads towards him, "Yeah, I'm coming."


Another chapter down!

Thank you to my loyal readers for your support

So we got a slightly better glance at Francisco's family life, a few stepping stones to little arcs down the line, and a few callbacks to some of the earliest chapters, so I say that this chapter went well. Hopefully, I can keep the momentum going for the upcoming chapters.

(By the way, don't neglect to tell me if I forget to finish sentences, I tend to jump around when writing chapters and can forget to finish a sentence)