Page 45 of Sucker Punch Drunk Love

“Yeah, baby, it is. And look at you, you speak such good Spanish.” Sondra, like the parental figures in my life, had failedher son, so with Mónica, she was teaching her Spanish. I approved given Mónica was a lot darker than me, and I didn’t want them questioning her cultura in the way people did mine. I wasn’t kidding when I said she’d reminded me of Hydee at the shelter, as her richer brown skin came at a slight contrast to me. But her full cheeks and lips she definitely got from me, her hair also a similar coily texture as when I used to wear my hair loose.

I was probably going to put her hair in cornrows before I left, or something maintainable until I saw her again. Sondra might have been an Afro-Boricua too, but her hair was looser, and it was clear every visit she hadn’t mastered the art of doing Mónica's hair. It wasn’t for lack of trying, but I wanted my baby walking around with the confidence locs had given me, so building that confidence started young. Having a daughter had been like a reset button to address my generational trauma. All the things I'd normalized with my own mother, I refused to pass down to my daughter.

“Can I tell you a secret, mami Sierra?” Mónica whispered, reaching to cup the space over my ear as I folded clothes.

“Of course.” As I leaned in.

“Estás bella.?*”

“Aw baby, you're so pretty too. With your pretty brown skin and your cute little nose. Don't ever let anyone make you feel like you're not the cutest little girl in the world,” I encouraged, pinching her cheeks.

“Would you like to go for ice cream?” I teased, as she clapped, as happy as a kid could be spending her morning at a laundromat. When I packed the bags of clothes in the rental car, I took a drive to Milk Jawn, one of the places I couldn’t afford before I left.

“Mami, can I have that one?” Mónica pointed to the flavor seemed to most interest her, but I had to remind her of her options.

“No baby, that has nuts in it. And you know you can’t have that. Don’t you like vanilla?” Knowing she was on the picky side. My daughter had a nut allergy that I didn’t play around with, and even though I had wanted to try an interesting flavor, knowing I would hug and kiss her before I go, I went for plain chocolate too, because it wasn’t worth the risk to me.

“Here, I’ll get you a scoop of both?—”

“God damn, ma. Can I talk to you for a second?” a loud, booming voice came from behind me, as I ignored it, holding my daughter’s hand close, as we walked to the register.

“So, what, you just gonna ignore me?” They doubled down.

“Don’t you see I’m with my daughter?” I acknowledged, trying to check out and get to the car before anything escalated.

“You was probably a trick, anyways.” The man finally left me alone, as I buckled my daughter’s seatbelt and asked if she was ok.

“Did you know that man?” she wondered out loud.

“No, baby. He was just a mean man who wanted my attention. If someone ever approaches you that you don’t know, you know you don’t have to give them your attention, right?”

“Mmmhmm,” she nodded. Not feeling as much in a snack mood anymore, I let Mónica have my scoop as well, but was well aware I’d have to burn some of that off at a park, so Sondra wasn’t inheriting that sugar rush later.

When I finally reached her abuela’s, she’d let me unpack all the clothes and put them up for her, as well as spend a few hours drawing, a little hobby she’d picked up. Last time I had seen her, she was getting really good at coloring inside the lines of things, that it surprised me when she attempted to draw me.

For three years old, it was really good. It took a lot of spatial skills to draw with that level of control with her shapes and color choices. It made me feel a little less insecure that she didn’t see me as her mother, because whenever Sondra would enter theliving room, she’d run and say “Look mamá Sondra, look what I drew!”

I don’t think she did it on purpose, it was just at the time being, she was with her, so I had to understand my absence made her shift between parental titles. Sondra insisted she knew Mónica knew she was her grandmother, but she was young and still fully grasping the concept of words and the differences between them.

“Okay, mami. Time for your nap,” Sondra insisted, as I was a little butthurt, but clearly it helped her sleep schedule and I wasn’t the one enforcing and creating structure. She was.

When Sondra returned, I joined her in the kitchen as she was putting up a bag of groceries.

“Thank you for letting me come and spend time with Mónica today.”

“She’s been doing good.”

“I can tell,” I beamed. “Thank you, Sondra.” I handed her an envelope with a few hundred dollars in it.

“Come on, Sierra. I’ve got Mónica handled, take that for yourself,” she initially refused.

“It’s not much, but I just started making better money. I should be able to give you more soon, I’m scheduled for a decent fight pretty soon. Maybe even to the point I’ll be able to take Mónica off your hands.”

“Get yourself together first, mija?*. There’s no rush. She’s still gonna know you’re her mother, when you’re actually ready.”

Offering to help her put things up, I got visibly nervous when I saw a jar of peanut butter. “You’re not feeding this to her, are you?”

“No, Sierra. You tell me a million times. This is for me. I worked a double the other day, peanut butter just helps me get through a long day when I get short breaks,” she dismissed.