After dinner, we walk home together as a family.
“Do you think she’ll be alright?” I ask my husband. I wonder how the news of my father affects my mom. I’m not sure if she feels the same satisfaction I do.
He nods thoughtfully. “Of course, she is strong. Just like you.” He squeezes my hand. I am grateful to have such a supportive spouse. I kiss him quietly on the cheek before the kids spot us and tease us.
After we get home, we fall asleep on the couch watching my daughter’s favorite princess movie. Nestled between my husband and my son, with my daughter on my lap, I know I am the luckiest woman in the world.
Here’s a preview of my next book, Deep Cover.
Deep Cover
Mila
I came to New York City to be alone.
Ironic, isn’t it? Trying to be alone in a city teeming with ten million people? But no matter, that’s what I did.
It is also ironic that I am on my knees scrubbing the floors of a beautiful Upper East Side townhouse instead of living in one. But that was another lifetime ago.
I straighten my back and shift my sore knees over the cold marble. My hands are raw. My legs are sore. Everything hurts. I have only been doing this for a few weeks. The other maid, Yolanda, works with the vigor of an Energizer Bunny and she doesn’t seem to be affected by the hard physical labor even after doing this for years.
“Mila, what’s wrong?” she asks me in her Eastern European singsong voice.
I give her a weak smile and point to my knees. “I’m so sore. I don’t know how you do it.”
She gives me a confused look, so I add, “It hurts.” Yolanda’s English is slowly improving, but she still has trouble with longer sentences.
That she understands. “Ah, no problem. Look.” She pulls up her thick black pants and I can see that she has paddings wrapped around her chubby knees. “I make for you. No hurt no more.”
I smile gratefully. Despite the lack of respect and poor working conditions, at least I make friends at work now.
A male voice clears its throat right near us, and we lower our heads and be quiet. We scrub the floor vigorously and quickly. Both Yolanda and I have sensed that this job isn’t quite like all the other ones our boss, Mr. Lopez, has sent us to. He is a greasy, disreputable man who likes to skim a little off the top of our paychecks and skim a little off the bottom of his female worker’s hemlines. He usually sends us out to clean up expensive Manhattan after-parties that need a little more discretion than usual. Rich men who don’t want their wives finding out about their mistresses’ lavish parties or vagabond teenagers with unlimited spending limits who don’t want their parents to see their credit card bill.
This time is different. We were quietly and respectfully ushered into the private elevator and were chaperoned from room to room by men dressed in suits. These men have guns and they stand guard throughout the house like a military outfit. Private security? These men have the hardened stances and flinty eyes of—
“Mobsters,” Yolanda says to me as soon as we are back out in the streets. We both take a deep breath. It was hard to work when those men were standing around, eyeing us suspiciously while toting guns. Even as I scrub the floors, the dark rusty stain between the marble tiles starts to look like blood to me. I shiver quietly at the memory.
“We don’t talk. Alright?” Yolanda nods to me. “We get money. We don’t talk. No mobsters for us.” She nods to me confidently.
I nod back at her thoughtfully.
Two hundred big ones. Not bad for a night’s work. Even though Mr. Lopez is a shitty boss, this job definitely pays better than any maid in Manhattan. Soon, I’ll have enough money saved up to get my own place. I stare up at the wooden rod above my head. I sleep in the hallway closet of an old lady’s rent-controlled apartment, just like a storybook orphan. But instead of expecting a fairy godmother to come and save me, I have to make my own way. Soon, I can afford my own apartment. I can afford to move my little sister, Chloe, out of that rat-infested dormitory and into a better one. I’ll get a better job while she finishes her music degree, and we’ll soon become respectable members of society. Easy as pie.
“Hey,” Chloe calls me on the phone.
“Hey,” I whisper back in the darkness. The old lady goes to bed early and I don’t want to lose my cheap housing option just yet. “How are classes?”
Despite her shitty childhood and unstable upbringing, Chloe has scored a coveted spot in the prestigious Julian Music Academy in Philadelphia. This week was her first week.
“Hard,” she answers with a nervous laugh. “But really good. Everyone is so talented, you know. I—”
“And you’re just as talented as the rest of them,” I interject. “You’ll do great.”
“Thanks, Mila,” she says in a low voice. “I know that school is expensive and you work really hard.”
“Don’t you worry about that. Just focus on your schoolwork and leave the rest to me.”
I hang up the phone and stare at the wooden rod in the dark and wait. I’ve managed to scrape together Chloe’s first-semester tuition at the last minute, but I am nowhere near the next one that’s due in a few weeks. There is a long line of people who want to get into that school, and I’ll be damned if Chloe loses her spot because
