You nod.
The honesty stings. You deserve the sting.
“And now?” you ask.
She glances toward Sofía, then back at you. “Now I feel seen,” she says. “That’s different from safe, but it matters.”
You take that answer seriously because that is what loving women like Carmen requires. Not possession. Not reward. Seriousness.
“I don’t want gratitude from you,” you say. “Or loyalty bought with schools and contracts and all the things I should have understood sooner.”
“Good,” she says.
The wind lifts a strand of her hair. The little girl hums to herself over the chalk drawing.
“What do you want?” she asks.
There are a thousand versions of the wrong answer.
I want you. I need you. You saved me. This house is yours. I can make your life easier. Rich men have been using those sentences as traps since before your grandfather sold his first barrel. You know that now. So you tell her the hardest truth instead.
“I want the chance to know whether what I feel can ever be fair enough to ask you for.”
That gets her.
Not because it’s poetic. Because it’s precise.
She looks down at the clothespins in her lap, turns one over between her fingers, and says, “Then take your time.”
So you do.
