Free Girl in the Mirror by Mary Alice Monroe

and grown-ups talking in Spanish in the room next door, was like a soothing balm, restoring his sense of place.
    “Smells like heaven.”
    Marta said nothing, but her skin flushed with pleasure as she hovered over the huge stove covered with simmering pots. He and his father leaned against the wood counter in the delicious-smelling room, arms crossed, bottles held in fists as they began the awkward conversation that always followed months of separation.
    “So,” Luis began. It was more a clearing of the throat.
    “How are you?”
    “Fine…fine,” Michael responded slowly. He hoped he didn’t sound cautious, and took a long swallow of beer.
    “Real good.”
    “What you doing in Chicago?”
    He shrugged. “Same old, same old. Mayor Daley wants more trees planted, so when we finish a building, we plant him more trees.” Father and son exchanged glances over their bottles and shared a mutual laugh.
    “Glad to see you’re still planting something.”
    They tried hard to maneuver their conversation into friendly territory, and the occasional quips Marta offered as she stirred at the stove helped. Yet it was clear to Michael that his father was pining to talk plainly but didn’t want to push his son hard the moment he stepped in the door. Luis was a tall, big-fisted and broad-shouldered man with a voice to match. Seeing him stutter over inanities was like watching a bull stumble in a china shop. Michael decided to make it easier for him.
    “The nursery looks hard hit,” he opened, going straight to the point.
    Luis’s face revealed surprise, immediately followed by relief. He began to nod his burly head widely. “Yes, yes, exactly!” he boomed, stretching out his arm in agreement. “The drought last year, aieee! We lost so much, and what is left—” he shook his hands to the heavens “—it’s not fit to live. Son of a bitch drought. Grass burn like hell, and the people call and say, ‘No cut.’ When we no cut they no pay. Do they care? No! ‘No cut’ is all they say.” He shook his head. “So much dies.”
    “I heard it was bad. I’m sorry you were so hard hit.”
    Luis shrugged. “Will of God, no?”
    “Perhaps…” He took a long swallow of beer, avoiding a religious debate. In the Mondragon household, life’s twists and turns were all part of God’s infinite plan. To be endured. “How is Manuel doing?” Michael didn’t know his brother-in-law very well. He seemed a decent sort of fellow, but the man would have to be a saint to live with his hot-tempered sister, Rosa.
    His father shrugged noncommittally. “He does okay cutting the lawns. The men they like him, but…” Luis rubbed his jaw. “It’s not just drought. He no can draw the land pictures like the people want now. They want something special, you know? And if you can draw the pictures, you can sell stock, too. Draw for free sometimes, just to get the job.”
    “I know what you mean, Papa. It’s common now. Why didn’t you hire someone? A designer?”
    “Why I go hire someone when my son is best there is?”
    Michael’s sigh rumbled in his chest. “Perhaps because I’m an architect in Chicago? Papa, I build skyscrapers. High in the sky.” He ground his teeth and said softly, “I don’t dig in the earth anymore.”
    “ Madre de Dios. How can you like working away from the soil? What you want to play with concrete blocks for in Chicago when you can have all this fine California earth? This precious land. I ask you!”
    Michael heard the pleading hidden in the boisterous exclamation and it broke his heart. His father was a proud man, raised harshly as an orphan by his relatives in Mexico. At twenty-two he brought his family to America because a bachelor uncle had died and left a small piece of California land to his only living nephew. From the moment he’d seen the fertile valley, Luis Mondragon’s life had had purpose. He’d turned a deaf ear to the many lucrative offers for the land and held on tight to his