Chapter 20: My first Dia De Muertos! (Part 1)

Remove the cinnamon sticks and cloves with a slotted spoon. Pour in the simmered onion mix. Stir well. Then finally add the chopped chocolate. Stir until perfectly melted. Perfecto!

"I think it's ready Mamá!" Coco said as she stood back from the simmering pot of homemade mole sauce that she had spent the last two hours on. She watched nervously as Imelda stirred the pot with a spoon before scooping a bit up for herself, blowing on it, and taking a small sip. Coco clasped her hands together as she watched for any facial clue to tell her if what she had made was either delicious or a complete failure. "Well?"

Imelda swallowed and smiled. "It could use a little more salt." She said as she reached for the salt shaker. Coco was quicker than her and snatched it away.

"N-no! I'll do it. It's my mole sauce, so I have to be the one to make any adjustments to it. R-Rosita is counting on me. It has to be perfect!" Coco added a dash of salt and stirred the pot vigorously. "Now that the sauce is done I need to grill the chicken. Do you think marinating it for only one day was long enough?"

"Coco, relax!" Imelda laughed. "The mole sauce is good, you marinated the chicken long enough, and everything will be delicious. I'm sure Rosita will love it."

"I hope so…" Coco said as she went to the small refrigerator to grab the plate of lime and chile chicken, looking at it critically. "Do you think it's too late to bake a cake as well?"

"Yes Coco, far too late." Imelda said. "I need the stove to cook for tonight too, you know. And remember I want you back before sundown. It's Dia de Muertos, and you know that it's a special one this year."

Coco sighed sadly as she forked the chicken onto a hot oiled skillet. "Si Mamá, I know." Then she perked up with a smile. "But that means Leti's coming home tonight! Isn't that a wonderful thing?"

Imelda smiled wistfully. The last few months had been tough for the Rivera family. But as Santa Cecilia slowly rose up from the devastating earthquake, so did the family from their heartache. Music wove it's way throughout the house again as inspiration had come back to Héctor, resulting in a new record being produced with Remember Me as the number one song all throughout Mexico. The shoe workshop was rebuilt and expanded upon, as well as the house itself. Several of their neighbors didn't want to rebuild after the destruction, so the Riveras paid a generous sum of money for their properties and now their home was basically the whole block. Matty was doing much better as well at school, having made new friends and was even smiling and laughing again. And Coco was starting to become a beautiful young woman, taking a great interest in learning to cook with a few successes and a lot of burnt dinners. Things were starting to look up finally.

Héctor walked into the kitchen a sniffed the air. "Ooh, are we having Pollo con Mole for lunch today?" He reached for a spoon of the sauce, but his hand was gently slapped away by his daughter.

"No! This isn't for you! It's for Rosita!" Coco said with an edge to her voice. "It's a very special meal just for her for Dia de Muertos."

"Rosita?" Héctor asked confused. "I thought she hated mole sauce though?"

Coco's face started to turn bright red and her eyes darted left and right. "N-n-no," she stuttered. "She loves mole sauce…"

"No, I distinctly remember," Héctor said as he thought about it some more. "We had mole sauce one time when she, Facundo and Julio came over for dinner and she scraped it off of her meat. And I thought it was strange because usually she eats everything in front of her, but apparently we served her the one thing she didn't like."

"Yes, that is strange," Imelda said with a knowing smile as she stared at Coco. "But you know who loved our mole sauce so much that they asked for double servings of it?-"

"Okay, you two need to leave, please!" Coco said frantically as she pushed her parents out of the kitchen. "You know the saying, too many cooks in the kitchen spoils the pot!" Once they were in the other room she slammed the door shut on their faces.

Imelda tried to stifle her laughter behind her hand as she walked over to the basket of cempazuchitl flowers waiting to be plucked, but sighed in exasperation when she saw her husband's clueless face. "Oh, come now, you must know who she's really cooking for? Think about it, idiota!"

Héctor placed his chin in his hand as he thought back to that dinner, the pieces slowly falling into place until with a gasp he turned disbelieving eyes towards Imelda. "No!"

Imelda nodded. "Si!"

"Really?!"

"Si."

"But… why?"

Imelda shrugged and went back to plucking the petals off of the stems into a basket. "Love comes to us in mysterious ways, mi amor. And our dear Coco has had it bad for the boy for months now."

"But why him?" Héctor asked incredulously. "He's so quiet, and fidgety, and short! And I'm sorry, but no sixteen year-old boy should have a mustache that thick!"

Imelda smiled mischievously. "What can I say? Coco must have strange tastes in men. She gets it from me, I'm afraid."

Héctor nodded. "I guess you're right…Hey!"

A pale purple ribbon was carefully placed atop a section of thick black hair, and slowly but surely was woven along another section of plain hair. From the top to the bottom the hair was braided until it reached the very bottom and the end was tied up in a neat little bow. Then tiny white flowers were strung through the braid at each turn of the hair, the bangs brushed and picked to the right amount of fluffiness, and then spritzed with a sweet and fragrant perfume. When it was all done, she sat back and admired her work of art.

"Perfecto! This is so much easier than when I was alive!" Leti said as she took her hair off of the mannequin head and placed it atop her skull. She skipped over to her bedroom mirror and made sure that it was in the right position. After a few adjustments she picked up a small toothbrush, squirted some Bone-Glo on it, and brushed at the several colorful markings on her face. She was very proud of her soul markings, the lilac circles on her top brow that shrunk to little pinprick dots under her eye sockets, the streaks of gold on her cheeks, even that weird green sprig-thingy that was in between her eyebrows. She scrubbed them until they had a glossy sheen and smiled at her reflection.

"Muy guapa!" she said smugly, and turned around back towards her bed. "What do you think, Frangipani?"

On her pillow sat a pink elephant that was no bigger than a cat, with green polka dots on her back and a multicolored checkerboard on her belly. She had golden tusks, green toes, purple eyes and the underside of her giant ears were the pattern of a Monarch butterfly's. She looked at Leti and gave a small toot! of appraisal from her trunk.

"Great, now I gotta decide what I'm going to wear." Leti walked into her closet and rifled through her wardrobe. "Let's see… That dress is too stuffy… Too casual… The dress I was buried in? Nah, too depressing. Aha!" Leti walked out with a shirt and two skirts in hand. "My embroidered blouse! This is nice, I'll wear this!... Now what about shoes?"

Suddenly a knock came at the door, startling both Leti and her alebrije. "Mija? Are you almost ready?"

"Uno momento, Abuelita!" Leti said, before changing her mind. "Actually, can you come in here? I need your opinion on something."

The door opened and in walked a female skeleton, one who had died too young but had a sweet maturity in her eyes. Her hair was done up in an elegant bun, she wore a modest pink dress cinched tightly around her spinal column, and her soul markings were green and gold triangles above her eyes and gold leaves on her cheeks. "Leticia, you aren't even dressed yet!"

"That's what I want your opinion on!" Leti said as she held up two skirts. "Which one do you think, the red one or the green one?"

"Hmm…" The skeleton pondered thoughtfully. "The red one."

"That's what I thought too!" Let said as she hiked the skirt over her hip bones. "And I need to pick the proper shoes as well. Shoes are very important in our family, you know. Saddle shoes are too common and offer no support, which I'll need since I'll be walking around a lot. And boots are too clunky, I want to look my best tonight!"

"Mija…" Leti's grandmother said softly. "You know they won't be able to see you, right?"

Leti deflated a little. "I know, but it's my first Dia de Muertos from the other side. I just wanted to look my best for the occasion. Tio Nesto always says that your appearance matters more than what you say or do."

"You know some skeletons go to the Land of the Living with no shirt on at all. Just their ribs sticking out." Her grandmother laughed.

Leti grimaced in disgust. "En serio? Mamá wouldn't like that all. She'd say they'd have no class."

"Leticia! Mirasol! Hurry up!" An irritated voice called from downstairs. "It's half past six already! Vamanos!"

"What?!" Leti cried out as she flung shoe after shoe out of her closet in a hurry. "I didn't know it was that late! Mamá always has dinner for Dia de Muertos at seven o'clock sharp! We're gonna miss it!" She hopped out of her closet, pulling on some woven leather huaraches over her skeletal feet. "These will have to do!"

"Okay, let's go!" Mirasol said and she ushered her granddaughter out the door and down the stairs. Waiting at the bottom was her husband Gaspar. He had also died quite young, his thick black hair oiled up and slicked back and dressed in a simple white shirt and tan slacks. His markings were purple and silver swirls, slanted downwards on his brow giving him a permanent grumpy expression. Marisol smiled sweetly. "Mi amor, you know you must never rush a woman when she's getting ready."

Gaspar pointed at his watch. "Well by the time we get there the food will all be cold. It's going to take forever to get to the gate, let alone cross the bridge and reach the house!"

Leti looked down guiltily, before a thought sprung in her mind and she grinned. "I got an idea, Abuelito!"

Gaspar knew his granddaughter's look and his eyes narrowed. "Oh no. No no no no-…"

But it was too late and Leti was already running outside the house and giving a sharp whistle. "FRANGIPANI!" By the time Leti had made it out into the wide street Frangipani had zipped down the stairs, flew past an agitated Gaspar and an amused Mirasol, and plopped down in front of her owner. Leti grinned down at the little elephant alebrije. "Okay Frangipani. Grande grande!"

Frangipani crouched down into herself, inhaling long and hard into her trunk, and she began to swell. Her soft plump figure grew into hard, scaly skin, the green polka dots shifting into vibrant tiger stripes. He tusks turned from little nubs into razor sharp instruments of death, and her ears grew larger and larger into a gigantic set of butterfly wings. Her cute little toots turned into powerful trumpets, and when she was finished she had grown into a fully sized elephant. She lowered her massive trunk down to Leti, and the little skeleton giggled as she lightly walked along it up to the massive knobby head.

"Now we can get there in no time! C'mon Abuelita!" Leti said happily.

"Muchas gracias, Frangipani." Mirasol said pleasantly as she too walked up the trunk to sit behind Leti. She looked down at her husband and frowned when he looked away with his arms folded over his chest. "Gaspar…"

"I am not getting on that thing ever again!" Gaspar growled as he pointed at the elephant with disdain. "Not since it thought it would be funny to fling me into the river. Mis amigos still laugh at me about it."

"Ay Dios mio," Mirasol exclaimed. "Stop being un viejo gruñón."

"I'm not an old man! I'm only twenty-five years ooOOOH!" Gaspar was suddenly lifted off his feet by Frangipani's massive trunk, swung over her head, and none too gently plopped onto her back behind his wife. His eyes rattled in his skull as his wife laughed at him, and he sighed in defeat. "Alright, fine. Let's go."

"Fly Frangipani, fly!" Leti cried and let out a loud grito as Frangipani flapped her large ear wings and took off into the air.

As they soared Leti relished in the feeling of cool crisp air against her bones and drunk in the beautiful view of the Land of the Dead. Before the most beautiful place she had ever seen was Mexico City. But when she first stepped out of the Department of Family Reunions with her grandparents and saw her surroundings she was amazed. High, winding structures of buildings on top of buildings, sky high trolleys connected on wires crisscrossed all over each other, sounds of music, laughter and cheer from every corner, and the colors! So many bright and vibrant colors, the most predominant being purples, pinks and golds. Mamá and Coco would love that whenever they finally got here. She herself would never get tired of this aerial view.

Frangipani dove down towards the ground and landed gracefully outside of the Marigold Bridge terminals. She knelt down to let Leti and Mirasol slide off of her, while Gaspar tumbled down into a pile of bones, moaning weakly. "Feel… sick… I hate flying."

Mirasol chuckled as she picked up her husband's skull. "Oh, so dramatic." She held the skull up and out in front of her as the rest of Gaspar's body magically rose up and reconnected itself back together, making their granddaughter giggle. "Alright, I'm going to stop by this stall first and rent some knapsacks and baskets. I have a feeling we're going to have a good haul this year!"

As Mirasol walked off, Gaspar checked his watch again. "Well, I hate to say it, but I think we've made good time. Good thing too, I can taste my little girl's menudo already!" He rubbed his hands in anticipation of the feast, grinning until a large pink trunk plopped down heavily on his shoulder. "Ugh! Alright, alright, thank you for the ride, alebrije. You happy now? Now go on home, we can just take a trolley back later." As Frangipani flew off with a powerful gust of wind, Gaspar called out, "And shrink back down before you get there! I don't want to have to clean up your giant caquitas!" He turned his attention back to Leti and smiled down at her. "Are you excited to go home, mija?"

While Gaspar had been dealing with her alebrije, Leti had been looking at the gate terminals separating the city and the Marigold Bridge, watching as skeletons were scanned and approved to cross the bridge per their ofrenda picture. But one skeleton's scan ended in a loud buzzing sound and the dejected soul was left to simply limp back towards the Land of the Dead. "Abuelito, why did that skeleton not get to cross the bridge?"

Gaspar looked to where Leti was pointing and winced at the skeleton's yellowed, dusty bones and limp posture. "Ah, his foto wasn't put up I'm afraid, and if your foto isn't put up then you can't cross over. By the looks of him no one has for a while. He's being forgotten."

Leti watched the poor skeleton with wide eyes. Suddenly her excitement for the holiday turned to fear, and she looked up at her grandfather. "W-what if Mamá and Papá… didn't put up my foto?"

Gaspar's brow furrowed and he knelt down to look Leti in the eye. "What makes you think they wouldn't put your foto up? Your parents love you, mija. Heck, anyone with half a brain cell would love you as soon as they met you! You don't have to worry about that."

Leti looked down at the ground. "It's just that… When I got sick, everyone was so sad. Everyone cried, even Tio Nesto. What if they're mad at me because I made them so sad? That they wish they could just… forget me?

Gaspar sighed but smiled warmly as he traced a finger over her skull markings. "Leticia, you couldn't help getting sick. Never blame yourself for that. Look at your Abuelita and me! We both got sick and died when Imelda was only five years old and our sons only a few months old." His eyes turned sad and he paused as he let the old wounds of his past make themselves known. "For the longest time I hated myself for my own weakness, and I was sure that Imelda would try to forget us if only to ease her own suffering."

"But instead, she told everyone our stories, even though we spent such a short time together as a family. We meant that much to her! She told all of our stories to her friends, her husband, and even you kids as well."

Leti grinned. "Like the time you kicked a fútbol into a beehive and got stung so much that you looked like a prickly pear cactus?"

Gaspar glowered. "The point is… Imelda knew we never meant to leave her, just like she and the rest of the family know that you didn't mean to leave them. They aren't angry at you, mija. Trust me."

Mirasol walked back over carrying three baskets and bags, noticing the pair's solemn faces. "Is everything alright?"

Gaspar stood up straight and placed his hand on Leti's shoulder. "Si, just some 'First Time Crossing the Bridge' jitters. We've all been there! But everything's okay now, right Leticia?"

Leti nodded and smiled up at her grandfather. "Si, I'm ready now, let's go!"

The three of them walked up to the terminal, and when it was Leti's turn she was given a first timer's welcome by the crossing agent and a round of applause by the whole staff, making her giggle. She smiled widely for the camera, even though inside she was still a little anxious, before the reassuring ding sounded. "Your foto is on your parents' ofrenda! Have a wonderful visit, Chiquita."

Leti sighed in relief. "Gracias, senor!" she exclaimed and walked a little ways past the gate to await her grandparents. She gazed in awe at the huge, glowing orange bridge before her, watching the footsteps of the skeletons walking on it light up and inhaling the sweet aromas that were beckoning her to come forward and join them. A few seconds later Mirasol and Gaspar came up next to her and took her by the hands. Her excitement had returned. "I'm going home!"