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Where Courage Ignites
6. Meet The Montez Family
I waited at the window by the door like I had the day before, only this time I had to push a tarp to the side due to some construction my parents were doing to it. They didn't have much explanation when I asked what was wrong with the window before, but I digress. I leaned against the bare, exposed wood of the frame. I gently tapped my fingertips repeatedly on the glass window in anticipation, awaiting that sky blue pick up truck.
"Gabriella!" I heard my mother call from the kitchen on the other side of the living room.
I quickly huffed a sigh in annoyance. "Yes?" I yelled back.
"Come here!" She barked back. I gave one last long look down the road before reluctantly abandoning my post. I raced past the stacks of collapsed boxes to the kitchen, my sock-covered feet sliding me atop the tile floor.
I spotted my mother kneeling on top of the brownish granite countertops, applying a fresh coat of white paint to the side of a cabinet. "Could you please remove the teacups from the cabinets for afternoon tea?"
"We can't have tea now, Troy's going to arrive soon!" I argued.
"Don't be so concerned about that, now do as I said," she demanded before redirecting her attention to the small can of white paint.
I huffed and grabbed the stepstool from its place next to the stove and set it up. I ascended it and reached into the small, shallow cabinets above the sink and removed our three teacups, two platters, and one teapot. I gently set the pieces down and replaced the stepstool to its home.
Randomly, my mother asked, "What does Troy like to eat?"
I scrunched my face in surprise at her odd question. "How would I know?"
"Well, can you take a guess? I need to know what to cook for dinner."
"I don't think he's planning on staying for dinner," I said, opening the pantry doors and scanning its contents for our black tea.
"Didn't you invite him?" She asked.
"No," I reached for the little gold tin. "I thought he was only coming over here because you don't trust him. Why would I think to invite him to stay later than he already has to?"
"I'm not making you study here because I don't trust him. I don't know the guy, I want to know that I can trust him."
"Okay," I said, although I didn't truly understand. I spooned the dried leaves into the infusion basket and set it in the pot. I held the pot by its fragile handle and approached the hot water tap over the stove. I was carefully filling the pot when there was a knock coming from the front door. A sudden buzz of excitement pulsated through my body and heart and I excused myself from the room, "I'll get it." I put the pot on the counter and dashed through the living room.
I spotted my father far in front of me already wrapping his large hand over the knob, Troy's figure visible through the blurred glass. "I'll get it!" I called. He held his hand up to me. I obeyed and stayed behind him, looking on as he opened the door.
"Hello, Troy." My father offered his strong hand out to him.
"Good afternoon Mr..." I heard him trail off.
"Montez," my father said.
"Mr. Montez," Troy stated, clearing his throat and shifting his weight.
"Come on inside, Troy," my father held the door for him.
"Thank you, sir. You have a lovely home." We slowly passed through the foyer and into the living room, stopping next to the stairs.
"Thank you," my father motioned towards me, "Gabriella can show you the study."
"Follow me," I said perkily and I mentally cursed myself for sounding so giddy. I guided Troy past the dining room and den, and veered us into the study.
"Wow, this is nice!" He said, his wonderful eyes tracing around the bookcases barricading us from the rest of the house. A large, antique map of the world sprawled across the entire wall on the opposite side and a massive wooden table sat in the center.
"Thanks," I laughed nervously, for no reason at all.
"Yeah," Troy chuckled, looking at me amused. "Can I set up here?" He asked, approaching the large, square table at the center of the room.
"Of course," I said, stacking my dad's papers and removing them to the narrow decorative table in the hallway outside the door.
"Gabriella!" My mother's shrill voice yelled for me.
I visibly cringed from her interruption, "Um, excuse me?"
"Sure," Troy said, occupied by untangling his long, white charging cord from the other little things in his backpack.
I marched across the house to the kitchen and found my mother pouring our cups of tea from the teapot, a rag conveniently held onto its body beneath its leaky spout. "Hey," I spoke. "Troy and I were actually going to get started on studying," I began explaining.
"Troy!" My mother yelled.
"What are you doing?" I asked, lowering my head in embarrassment, bracing myself for the moment when Troy would enter the room and be put through whatever my mom was planning.
He came to my side, greeting my mother, "Hello Mrs. Montez."
"Hello Troy." She gently tilted the teapot up to stop its pouring and placed it on the countertop. "Afternoon tea is a little family tradition of ours. Here," She offered my bluebird teacup to him.
"Oh, no thank you," Troy waved the tea away. "I don't really like tea."
"Try it," my mother ordered.
Troy glanced at me for a second before taking the teacup. "Thank you," he said. He looked down at the brown liquid questioningly, tilting the cup side to side in observance. He blew on it for a moment and cautiously raised the steaming drink to his lips, glancing over the edge of the cup at me as he did so. My original observation of his eyes was correct; their blue and yellow colors perfectly complimented that of the bird on my teacup. He suddenly brought the teacup down into his hands and smiled, "It's pretty good."
"I'm glad." My mom smiled genuinely. "That's what happens when you try real tea, not that bagged Lipton nonsense." She winked.
"Thank you for encouraging me to try it."
"Thank Gabriella, that's her share." She raised her cup to me in toasting before grabbing the other and setting off for somewhere else.
Troy looked at me and smiled, "Can I finish it?"
"Of course, I can always make a second infusion."
"Second what?" Troy blinked.
"Second infusion," I giggled. "With this particular type I can stretch it to three before it loses its flavor."
"Wow, you guys really do know your tea."
I blushed and shrugged, fiddling with my fingers behind my back. "We should get started on the biology homework," I suddenly remembered. "It's going to take me a lot longer now that I have to show my work."
"That's true," Troy responded. I turned to lead him back to the study and he cautiously followed, his eyes focusing on the full teacup he carried.
When we found the study again, I quickly discovered my backpack tipped over and a trail of papers leading around to the other side of the table. "Isabella…" I said warningly. I heard a short gasp from the other side of the table and the chair across from me began shaking. I leaped over to the other side of the table and found the bare binding and covers of a notebook with torn out pages scattered about. "Isabella!" I growled, dropping down to crouch on the floor and look underneath the table. Barricaded in by chairs, she sat at the center with a handful of more loose, torn papers. "Those were my notes!"
"My notes," she responded.
"Isabella," I said, "You know those were sissy's notes, not your notes. You don't take things out of my backpack, okay? You don't do that."
"Sissy notes," she understood, pushing them back towards me on the floor.
Troy crouched down to see what was happening from the other side of the table. Isabella gasped in surprise at the stranger's sudden appearance.
"Troy, Meet my little sister Isabella. I hope you didn't leave your backpack open."
"No, we're good. Actually-" he looked away in thought, then abruptly jumped to his feet and came over to the side I was on as I stood up. He reached into his backpack on the table and exposed a black and white composition notebook. "Isabella," he bent down to reach beneath the table. He straightened back up and I heard the distinct sound of paper tearing from beneath it.
"Is it okay that she does that?"
"Yeah, the class is super easy anyways."
"What do you say to Troy, Isabella?"
A little voice spoke from beneath the table, "Thank you Twoy." Rip.
Troy bent down and scooped up a handful of my notes. "I hope this wasn't too important," he offered them out to me.
I giggled, "No. It's just social studies stuff. She didn't do anything I wasn't already thinking of doing myself."
Rip.
After nearly an hour and a half of biology problems, my parents called us in for dinner. Initially Troy tried to excuse himself from staying, but they insisted. He and I set the table while my parents brought over the plates and trays of food.
"Gabriella, would you like to say grace?"
"Sure," I cleared my throat, "In the name of the-"
"En español, mija." My father instructed me to say grace in Spanish.
"Pero," I argued, "Troy no puede compre-"
"Dios puede comprendernos bien. Empieza." He told me to start, saying that God could understand us.
"En el nombre del padre y del hijo y del espíritu santo…Dios, gracias por esta comida, como las papas, los frijoles verdes, y…" I paused, completely blanking on the word for spaghetti, so I guessed. "El spaghetti?"
My father let out a heavy sigh, "El espagueti, mija."
I shortened my thanks, "Gracias por el espagueti. ¡Amén!"
My parents murmured back, "¡Amén!"
My father began scooping his serving of green beans. I noticed his moustache twitching irritably, as though it was itching him to speak. "Don't they teach you Spanish in that school, Gabriella?" He blurted out.
"Nothing new," I said.
"What about you, Troy?" My father zeroed in on Troy positioned next to me, "Are you learning Spanish?"
"No, sir. I'm studying German."
"Why do you want to study German?" My father asked disapprovingly.
"I heard it was the new language of business. They have a wonderful economy in Germany and I'd like to go into business someday."
My mother joined, "Spanish wouldn't hurt in any profession."
"Certainly," Troy agreed. "There's no disadvantage to knowing more languages."
My mother transitioned, "Are you involved in any extracurricular activities, Troy?"
"Yes, ma'am. I play basketball on the varsity team."
My father said, "Varsity, eh? We heard that basketball is the big sport at East High."
My mother asked, "Where do you want to go to college?" I feared that this dinner was dissolving into nothing short of an interrogation.
Troy responded, "Berkeley."
"You're sure that's where you want to go?"
"Yes, I'm already set to move in this August."
My mother paused, "You're graduating early?"
"No, ma'am. I'm a senior. This is my last semester."
My father chimed in, too, "You're eighteen?"
"Yes," Troy responded.
An awkward silence played out and I wished I could disappear. At the end of the dinner, he won back some points after he helped clearing the plates without being asked. Regardless, we were through all that and had only a few problems left. Later in the study, Troy asked me, "So wait, why did you divide it by ten?"
"Because there are ten centimeters per decimeter, and we need the answer to be in decimeters. So by dividing it by ten, we get the answer into decimeters. Does that make sense?"
"Yeah, it does," he brought his eraser down onto his paper. The little fibers of eraser flaked onto the page. "I just forgot we had to convert it is all."
"That's alright. It's an easy thing to forget, but you know Mr. Brannigan will count that wrong. So be careful."
"You're right, thanks." Troy smiled.
I returned his smile, before shyly bowing my head, "Excuse me," I set off to the bathroom.
When I returned, he was facing the fireplace with his backpack on. I noticed then that he was looking at a painting hung between a gap in the bookcases. "Cool house," he commented.
I stood next to him and found what he was looking at. I recognized it immediately by its red siding and massive, ocean-like body of water behind it. A nostalgic smile snuck its way onto my face. "It was, thank you."
"You lived there?" Troy asked incredulously.
"Yes." I gestured to the lake. "You see all that water?"
"Yeah."
"We had a dock in the backyard that led out onto that lake. You couldn't see the other side from there. It looked like it was the end of the world."
"That's awesome!"
"I know, right! I spent so much time out there." I reminisced.
"Fishing?"
"Reading. It was the perfect spot," I boasted. "Absolute heaven on Earth."
"Sounds like it meant a lot to you."
"It does."
"Do you ever wish you never moved?" He asked.
My eyes traced his profile, his sculpted nose and sharp jawline until he looked directly at me and I locked eyes with him. "Not anymore."
He opened his mouth to say something when a voice calling our names abruptly shut him up before he could even start.
"Coming!" I yelled back, leading him back to the kitchen where I spotted a tray of my mom's famous brownies.
"How many people live at your house, Troy? I need to know how many to pack up for you."
"Thank you so much, Mrs. Montez. It's me, my dad, and my mom."
"Of course, Troy." My mother said, stacking some brownies on a plate and covering it with saran wrap. "You're welcome back here anytime."
"Thank you. I should probably head out before my mom calls."
"I'll walk you out," My dad's deep voice said from behind us.
"Um, thanks for the help, Gabriella," Troy followed my dad out and I was left to my mother's devices.
We stared at each other unmoved in an uncomfortable silence. "What?" I finally spoke.
"He's a nice kid," she admitted.
"I know," I crossed towards the empty sink and grabbed the bowl that had held the batter.
"It's pretty easy to like him, isn't it?" She said, and I could feel her eyes burning into the back of my head.
"He's a nice guy, I'd agree," I said, scraping my finger along the inside of the bowl and licking off the batter.
"I think you both would make a cute couple."
My eyes opened larger than our teacup saucers and the bowl nearly dropped from my limp hands. "What?" I pivoted towards her.
She approached me with a small smirk on her lips, took the bowl from me, and gently set it back in the sink. "I think you two would make a cute couple."
"What makes you so sure of that?"
"Dinner with him, he was respectful and kind. Convincing your father will take more work, I'm afraid."
"Well, it's not like he likes me back," I crossed my arms.
"After the way I noticed him catching glances at you tonight? I couldn't be more certain about anything else."
"Are you serious?" I gaped.
"Like, totally serious," my mom imitated her idea of how a teenager would sound.
"Don't," I said.
My dad announced his presence, saying, "Nice kid. Too old for you."
"They're only two years apart, David." My mother argued for me and I felt the need to pinch myself, it was so surreal.
"He'll be going to college soon. Then he'd be a college freshman dating a high schooler, and long distance, too."
"David…"
"No, Maria!"
I butted in, "This isn't something worth arguing over! We're just sharing a textbook for crying out loud. I'm sure this can all be saved for another day, if that day ever comes. It shouldn't be an argument already. Goodnight." I went upstairs to my bedroom and got ready for bed, but couldn't help but consider Troy and I becoming a couple. It was highly unlikely, yet the possibility was far more in my favor than the hundreds of other girls at East High who crush on him, but have never even talked to him before. It was a fantasy for sure, but for now I decided it'd be impossible. I'm hoping realizing that fact will keep my feelings from going any deeper.
A/N: Thank you very much for reading! Do you think Mr. and Mrs. Montez will ever come around to letting Troy and Gabriella date? Do you think Troy actually likes Gabriella like Mrs. Montez thinks?
