Warnings for this chapter: suicide, smut


Carmen stroked Jotaro's back as he held his head in his hands. "I really thought-" His stomach churned as he caught flashes of Joseph's vision: an unsteady red Emergency sign. A bespectacled young nurse, whose worried eyes belied her composed manner, helping him into a wheelchair. Jotaro bristled. Joseph's psychic powers didn't leak like that, even at the worst of times. He was rubbing Jotaro's face in it. Trying to make him feel bad.

"We'd become so close. I thought I could trust him." Jotaro whispered. There was that twisting in his gut again. He'd always sensed what Joseph was like. He'd ignored it. He'd wanted an elder so badly. He still did. Deep in his heart, he hoped a bandaged Joseph would arrive at his door and apologize.

"He's a jerk," Carmen declared, "Who doesn't v-visit his daughter?"

Jotaro opened his mouth, then closed it again. He'd always blamed Holly for his estrangement from her side of the family, but the truth was slowly becoming clear. Jotaro wrapped his arm around Carmen's waist, inhaling the scent of her hair. Somehow, she made it all bearable. "You're right." He pulled her closer. "Unfortunately, we're going to have to move."

Carmen pursed her lips. "We don't have to. Let's wait for him to give wri-written notice, then we can request a hearing, cause him a hassle-"

"I want our own place," Jotaro interrupted, his arm tightening around Carmen. "My father kicked me out of my family home. Now Joseph's about to evict me, too." His chest hitched. "I can change that for our daughter. I want her to always have a place to live."

Carmen nodded, her eyes soft. "Of course." After a long while, she smiled, "You really think we're having a girl?"

"I have a feeling."

She laughed at that, "You just don't want to be disappointed if it's not a boy."

Jotaro shrugged. "Regardless, I want to be out of here by the time the baby comes. It's important to me."


When Jotaro was in sixth grade, he'd considered dying. When it started to become clear that his life wasn't going to change. When he began to sense the obligation that burdened his father in their every interaction. It would take one thrust of a dagger to mend two families, to obliterate the malignant thread that bound them. Soon after his 11th birthday, Jotaro had summoned the courage to visit a hunting shop, but he'd raced out, legs trembling, the moment his eyes traced a shining blade. Train after train rushed into the station, but he couldn't find the nerve to jump.

That seed of guilt was still buried in his chest somewhere. His birth had ruined the lives of family he'd never even met. Jotaro had saved lives too, and back in the beginning, back when he and Suzie and Joseph were caring for Holly in the Kujo home, he'd thought it would be enough. But it all just curdled together, the guilt, the anger, the injustice, the deprivation, the want.

The Kujo family tree was etched in wooden panels that adorned their home. As a child, Jotaro sometimes looked up, his chest tingling, and marveled at how very long ago an ancestor had carved each name. Now he was joining, branching, writing in the ink of time. Was he letting the cancer grow?

He wouldn't spend his life cut off from the nectar. He refused a long, quiet death, sterile, forgotten and alone.


Jotaro wanted to meet with Carmen's father, but he soon realized that the winter was the Diaz Painting and Restoration's busy season. When Jotaro invited Castilo to lunch, he grunted, "Can it wait a few weeks?"

"Anything you need help with?" Jotaro offered.

Jotaro and Castilo met a few days later to string Christmas lights on the business's warehouse. Climbing a ladder onto the roof, they laid the lights' cords along the gables. It was fast work with two people, and when they were almost finished, Jotaro pointed to a diner below, "Want to grab a snack?"

"Blanca's cooking," Castilo replied in his usual taciturn manner as he clipped a bulb to a shingle, then tossed the bundled free end to Jotaro.

He caught it. Jotaro figured it was now or never. "Mr. D-" He stopped himself. It was odd for adults in Miami to address each other with honorifics. "Castilo, I would like to ask for your daughter's hand in marriage."

Castilo stared at him, bug-eyed.

"Like you-"

Castilo began to wobble, and Jotaro scuttled along the roof so he was below him, letting the coiled cord fall from his hand. It unwound, rolling over the eave and clacking onto the ground. Jotaro spread his arms, but Castilo regained his grip.

"Like you, Carmen is quiet, shy and deferential-" Jotaro cut himself off. He'd practiced the speech for Melissa, who found the whole concept outdated. She'd informed him that Americans considered all those qualities bad, but his original words had slipped out in surprise. "Kind, gentle and agreeable," he corrected himself. "You raised her well. I would be honored-"

"What in God's name?" Castilo interrupted. He flailed one hand, careful that the other was anchored. "You're living in sin. My daughter's pregnant. You've got the nerve to ask my permission now?"

Melissa had warned Jotaro about this possible reaction, but it hadn't seemed right to propose without asking. And it would have felt incomplete. Jotaro had spent so much time trying to win the Diaz's approval. Attending church. Hanging out at Oscar's store. Studying with Camilo. He wanted to be told he'd done a good job.

Castilo gritted his teeth, retrieving the fallen cord with a strong yank. "It's high time you married Carmen. This isn't permission, it's a demand."


Jotaro had hoped that Joseph might give him a ring of Suzie's to propose with. A ring belonging to his grandmother who had been happily married for 40 years was exactly the sort of thing Carmen would have liked. Instead, he went to a jewelry store, armed with a wad of cash from his settlement with his father.

The ball-capped clerk barely looked up when Jotaro explained what he was looking for, instead shoving a binder in his direction. "Pick out what you want, and we'll make it."

"Do you have anything I can take home today?" Jotaro asked, encountering a strange look. "My girlfriend's expecting," he added.

The clerk's mouth twisted. "That sucks."

Jotaro walked straight out of that store. The next shop he found had an elderly woman behind the counter. She crooned, "How lovely," as he made his selection.


Jotaro woke up early the next morning, as he usually did, but Carmen was still in bed. The pregnancy had been exhausting her, so he tiptoed towards the door. He was surprised to hear the blankets rustle.

"Are you up already?" she called out.

Jotaro looked back at her. She was ogling his bare chest. He chuckled. The hormones were making her more amorous, but she'd never say the words out loud. "I am."

Carmen bit her lip, which twisted, like she was struggling. Her cheeks turned pink, "Can you come back?"

His eyes twinkling, Jotaro obliged. He gave her a long kiss. She sucked in a breath, running her fingers down his back, rocking her hips against him. He pulled away, with a slight smile, to admire her. Carmen's breasts were already swelling, spilling over her chest. Her waist was still tight, maybe a bit larger, but her hips were expanding, along with her thighs. Jotaro felt a ripple of excitement. He'd done this to her. He fondled her bulging breasts.

Carmen shuffled closer, reaching out to touch him. Jotaro caught her hands, pinning them above her head. Her body twisted towards him, her hips thrusting, but he was just out of reach. Fuck that got him hard.

"Say it," he whispered.

Carmen made a half-hearted attempt to escape his grip, yanking her arms. She bit her lip, looking away from him. "Please-" she got out.

"Please what?" Jotaro said more loudly.

Carmen was beet red, sweating, her eyes squeezed shut. "Please fuck me," she whimpered.

Jotaro released her, and she pressed her chest against his. He let his hand drift downwards, between her legs, between her lips. She moaned. He wiped his fingers on her thigh. "Look how wet you are."

Her chin dipped. "Please Jotaro," she murmured into his ear.

His eyebrows raised, he retracted his hand and spread her legs with a playful nudge. She swore under her breath as he pressed into her, thrusting her hips and pulling him closer.


"Let's go for breakfast," Jotaro suggested after they'd rested for a while.

"I can cook you something," Carmen said, "I'm not that tired."

"It would be nice to get some air."

"It's really alright."

God, she was just like Castilo. "I really feel like-" Jotaro tried to remember what was on the menu of the diner they sometimes went to, "Eggs Benedict."

"Sure, if you really want to."


Jotaro took Carmen back to the spot where he'd first approached her on the sidewalk. When he was a boy, he'd seen American proposals in movies and thought they were stupid, but now he understood. As soon as he started speaking, he felt like he was begging. "The past two years have been the best of my life …" For once, he didn't have to fight his urge to kneel, his urge to bow. "You've accepted me. You've loved me as I am …"

Carmen blinked back tears the entire time. As Jotaro held out the ring, his arm shook. He waited, waited for her to take it. She slipped it on her finger, and his cheeks became warm. Getting to his feet, he kissed her.

Jotaro had expected to go unnoticed, like most things on the streets of Miami, but a small clump of bystanders that had formed started clapping. Each congratulated the couple before moving on. An old man with a camera took a photo, promising to mail it to them once it was developed. A surfer clapped Jotaro on the back.