Playing for Keeps Read online

  Mrs. Cruz reached into her bag and pulled out a copy of the article. “Do you remember what they wrote?” she asked. Alicia nodded. Ignoring her daughter’s nod, Mrs. Cruz began reading from the article: “…These bright and resourceful teenagers are masters of the cultural mash-up. The quinceañeras they plan are an effortless mix of the modern and the traditional.”

  “¡Mamacita, por favor! You’ve read that article a gazillion times!” Alicia protested halfheartedly. She always pretended to be blasé about it, but kept a copy of the same article in her handbag—a red leather barrel that had been a hand-me-down.

  “Okay, okay. I’ll stop. But the point is, Ranya’s daughter, Valeria, is turning fifteen, and she would like to fly you and your business partners over to Austin to plan her party during your spring break.”

  Her mother had to be kidding, right? No. She couldn’t be. She wouldn’t mess with her daughter about something like this.

  Jumping up, Alicia did a little victory dance. “Woo-hoo!” Then she stopped. “Okay, wait,” she said. “I need details. Is there a catch?”

  Her mother shook her head. “All I know is, Ranya’s done very well for herself, and her husband’s family is in the oil business. She wrote me that Valeria is a little shy and introverted and that sometimes she has to ask her to speak up just to hear her at the dinner table.” She paused as she grabbed another chip. Alicia crossed her arms and waited. Noting her daughter’s anxious look, Marisol went on. “So, Ranya spent months interviewing dozens of local party-planners and knew they would all torture Valeria by insisting on a Texas-size party and a poufy white dress. She told me that Valeria is very proud of her Tex-Mex culture and wanted to honor it in a way that felt personal—and appropriate for her, not what a planner thought would be right. The family had decided they would have a small, intimate gathering.

  “But when Ranya showed Valeria the profile of Amigas Inc., she got excited,” Marisol continued. “She thought you guys would be able to deliver the kind of party she wanted and told her mom that, with your help, she’d be excited to have a big celebration. According to Ranya, that’s a huge step.”

  Alicia clapped her hands. “Spring break has been saved! You’re even more of a genius than I thought you were.” She grabbed her phone off the table. “Who should I call first? Gaz? Carmen? Jamie?”

  “Aren’t you forgetting something? What about your Rigoberta Menchú paper?” her mother asked, holding up the art book Alicia had been referencing.

  “I’ll focus on that all weekend long. I promise. But right now, I’ve got to let my partners know that we’re taking the quince act on the road.”

  With her mother’s laughing permission, Alicia went and sprawled on the chaise longue near the living room’s sliding-glass door. She punched seven digits into the phone. No answer. She hung up.

  “Ugh! I totally forgot,” she said to no one in particular. “Jamie’s having dinner with the Mortimers at the club.” She hoped that this dinner was going to be less dramatic than the first dinner Jamie had attended at the country club. In an attempt to make a statement, she had worn a ridiculous outfit and almost cost Amigas Inc. a huge job and almost cost herself a relationship with Dash.

  Alicia figured that Jamie was doing just fine as she didn’t use the ringing cell phone as an excuse to leave the table.

  She punched another number into the phone. Again, no answer. “And Carmen is taking that class in fashion illustration at the New World School for the Arts.”

  She hung up and dialed again. Finally, someone answered. “Gaz?” she said excitedly when her boyfriend picked up. “You’re never going to believe who our next customer is. I’m telling you, Amigas Inc. is blowing up!”

  “Is it another hard-to-please heiress like Binky? I’m sorry, I mean Bianca?” Gaz asked playfully. They had given her a hard time, but the whole group loved Binky Mortimer. She was OTT but a huge sweetheart.

  “As far as I know, she’s nothing like our worst cases. She’s rich, but she’s not an heiress, she doesn’t have a Jewish grandma intent on running the show her way, and the gig doesn’t involve a TV reality show,” Alicia replied. “So what are you doing now?”

  “Not much,” said Gaz. “Have anything interesting in mind?”

  “I have something delicious in mind,” replied Alicia. “Come over for dinner. I’ll fill you in on all the details of our new gig.”

  Alicia put her hand over the mouthpiece, then called out, “Hey, Maribelle! Can Gaz come over to dinner?”

  “Fine with me,” Maribelle yelled back. “I could never say no to my biggest fan. But you have to ask your mother.”

  Alicia cried: “Mami, can—”

  “Fine with me,” her mother chimed in before Alicia could finish.

  Just then, Alicia’s father and brother walked in.

  Enrique Cruz was in his early fifties, with the lithe build of a guy who’d spent his entire childhood playing soccer and still spent weekends chasing the soccer ball up and down the field. Dressed in a casual business outfit consisting of a deep turquoise polo shirt and dark khakis, he looked more businessman than athlete tonight. Alex was dressed in his usual attire, a white polo shirt, tan khakis, and loafers with no socks. “Hey, Dad, you know the funny thing about when it’s just the women at home? The house is so quiet.”

  “I completely agree,” Alicia’s father said, laughing.

  “¡Cállate la boca!” Alicia, her mother, and Maribelle cried out in unison.

  Alicia quickly told Gaz to come on over, hung up, and ran upstairs and grabbed her laptop. She wanted to do some research on Texas ASAP.

  “Oh, good,” Marisol said, seeing the laptop tucked under her arm. “You should check your e-mail. Ranya said Valeria was going to try and shoot you a note. Maybe she got to it.”

  Alicia sat down at the kitchen table and logged on. Sure enough, there was an e-mail waiting for her from Valeria:

  Hi Alicia: Hopefully by now your mom has told you all about my crazy dream of getting Amigas Inc. over to Texas to help me plan my party! And hopefully, you are all on board. I would LOVE if you came. I know the deadline is tight…

  Alicia stopped reading and looked up at her mother. “Tight deadline?” she asked. “How tight?”

  Marisol shrugged. “I think you’ve done quinces in less time, but Ranya does want it to happen at the end of spring break, so you have two weeks.”

  The color momentarily drained from Alicia’s face. She took a deep breath. They could do this. Her mother was right. They’d had less time in the past and made it work. Turning back to her e-mail, she continued to read:

  So I wanted to give you a heads-up in advance about my taste. Black is my color of choice; I don’t do frills and am allergic to the color pink. My iPod is filled with tunes by local Austin indie artists like Roger Velasquez. I have a bangin’ collection of vintage graphic novels from the eighties. As for food, I think its gross to eat anything that was once a living thing. I’m into line dancing but only as an observer. I have no dance skills whatsoever. I love to skateboard and my happiest times are cruising down the half-pipe at the Austin County skate park. Our homestead, Castillo Ranch, is my favorite place in the world. Oh, and I usually like to get right to the point. Hope this is some help. See you soon. Valeria.

  Although Ranya had described her daughter as being painfully shy, Alicia thought she was impressive. From her writing it seemed as though she had the confidence to know exactly what she wanted and, more to the point, exactly what she didn’t. This was going to make for one very interesting party.

  Half an hour later, Gaz arrived at the Cruz home. He kissed Alicia on the forehead, then hugged Maribelle and Alicia’s mom. Alicia loved the easy interaction he had with her family. She knew girls whose parents disapproved of the guys they were dating. They could only see each other at school or when they managed to sneak a few moments at a movie or a house party. With Gaz, there were no such problems. She could see him whenever she wanted—no sneaking around necessary.


  Sometimes, in fact, Alicia was pretty sure her parents liked Gaz more than they liked her! Well, not more, but close.

  Her parents didn’t always approve of the things she liked. But she could tell that when her parents looked at Gaz, they saw what she saw—a smart, handsome guy, who was proud of his Latino heritage and had the potential to do anything he set his mind to.

  Still, Alicia was her daddy’s girl. So even if he liked Gaz, Enrique took great pleasure in grilling the younger man about his future whenever he came over to the house. Gaz, for his part, was respectful and formal, going along with the gentle ribbing. While Gaz called Alicia’s mom by her first name, he called her father Señor Cruz.

  Now, over plates of ceviche, Alicia’s father played twenty questions with Gaz.

  “What’s your toughest class this year?”

  “Definitely statistics,” Gaz replied as he tucked in heartily to his meal.

  “What about algebra two?” Alicia’s father asked. “Don’t you need that to get into a good college?”

  Alicia put a hand on her father’s. “Gaz took algebra two last year, Papi. He was the only freshman in the class. His math skills are off the hook. You know that.”

  Enrique raised an eyebrow. “Off the hook, huh? What are you pulling in statistics?”

  Gaz helped himself to a pile of plátanos. “A minus. It’s a really hard class.”

  “Do you think you can pull it up to an A by the final?” Mr. Cruz asked, taking the plate from Gaz and shoveling the remaining sweet plantains onto his own dish.

  “That’s the goal, sir.” Gaz smiled.

  “Good,” Alicia’s father said. “You keep me posted on how that’s going.”

  When dinner—and the questions—were done, Gaz and Alicia cleared the table and then went into the kitchen together and cleaned up. The extra help meant that Maribelle could nip out to the Florida room to watch her favorite telenovela.

  As they loaded the last dishes into the washer, Alicia turned to Gaz with a playful smile. “Do you have time for a swim?”

  He grinned back. “Always. I even brought my suit.”

  She went to her room to change while Gaz changed in the half bathroom off the kitchen. As they walked out to the pool together, Alicia instinctively reached for his hand, surprised anew at just how right it felt. She wondered if it would ever stop giving her butterflies—holding his hand, seeing how handsome he was, like now, in his papaya-colored board shorts that showed off his natural tan perfectly.

  She stood near the edge of the pool, preparing herself for the jump into the cool water, when Gaz surprised her. Grabbing her by the waist, he jumped into the water taking her with him. She screamed and laughed as they both plunged under.

  “Hey!” she said, pretending to be miffed as she surfaced and spluttered. “What’s the big idea?”

  Gaz didn’t answer. He just kissed her, the kind of kiss that made her quiver, as if she were made of jello.

  “That’s the big idea,” he said, when he finally disconnected his lips from hers.

  “I like it,” she smiled. “I also like the idea of us in Austin, all expenses paid, for spring break. Aren’t you excited?”

  “I am excited,” Gaz sighed, sounding anything but. “And I love that Amigas Inc. has taken off. It’s just a bummer that the trip is at the same time as the yearly South by Southwest Music and Media Conference in Austin, but by now, the tickets are completely sold out. It’s sucky timing. I mean, if I had known, I could’ve gone. I’ve always dreamed about going to South by Southwest. It has all kinds of cutting-edge media presentations, music showcases, and film screenings. It’s the place to be if you want to get exposure and buzz going for your work. Watching you rock the quince business in Miami makes me want to take my music to the next level. But I don’t know. I’m just not as good at putting myself out there as you are.”

  Alicia hated to hear Gaz criticize himself. She kissed him lightly. “You’re an amazing songwriter. You pour your entire soul into every song.”

  “But if I’m going to be a successful musician, I’m going to have to learn how to sell my music. I want to turn on the radio and hear my songs. I want to play stadiums, like Coldplay, or even minor-league baseball stadiums, like Wilco. I want to go all the way, and I don’t even know where to start,” Gaz insisted, ignoring his girlfriend’s support. “There’s so much I could learn at a place like South by Southwest.”

  “So, we’ll get you a ticket,” Alicia said.

  “How?” Gaz asked.

  Alicia beamed at her boyfriend. “I’ll make a way out of no way. It’s my thing.”

  Gaz pulled her close, hugging her tight. “It’s enough that you are trying. That you just believe in me.”

  Alicia hugged him back. “I do believe in you, Gaz.”

  “I know you do,” he said. “And that makes a world of difference. With you by my side, I can do anything.”

  THAT NIGHT, AFTER Gaz left, Alicia was too excited to sleep. She had managed to get ahold of Carmen and Jamie earlier and filled them in. But they were still waiting to get the okay from their folks. Figuring that chatting was better than tossing and turning, she logged on to her computer and joined a group chat with her girls.

  Alicia:

  What’s the dealio? Any word?

  Carmen:

  My mom says she has 2 talk 2 your mom.

  Alicia:

  Tell her 2 call now. She’s still up. Remind them—mom is chaperoning! We’ll behave!

  Jamie:

  I’m going to Austin!!! Dad said okay.

  Alicia:

  Cool. Da Amigas are heading to the Lone Star State!

  Carmen:

  Good news + bad news.

  Alicia:

  Bad news first.

  Carmen:

  Domingo can’t come. He’s got 2 work.

  Alicia:

  But you’re coming. That’s awesome.

  Carmen:

  Gonna miss him though.

  Alicia:

  It’s just two weeks.

  Carmen:

  Says the only girl whose guy is coming.

  Jamie:

  True that. Dash has got a golf tournament.

  Alicia:

  Trying to get Gaz 2 music festival in Austin. He’ll be busy @ nite. Girls will hang.

  Carmen:

  Absence makes the heart grow fonder, right?

  Jamie:

  It’s working for me and Dash. No time 2 argue. He travels so much on the golf circuit when he comes home, we just chill and have fun.

  Carmen:

  Gonna miss Domingo soooooo much.

  Jamie:

  Text him every day.

  Alicia:

  Write him real letters. More romantic.

  Jamie:

  Buy him a cowboy hat.

  Carmen:

  :^)

  Alicia:

  We’ll buy all our guys cowboy hats.

  Jamie:

  Preppy Dash in a ten gallon hat. Hi-larious.

  Alicia:

  I’m fading. Got 2 go.

  Carmen:

  Ciao for now.

  Jamie:

  Later, ladies.

  As soon as classes let out the Friday of spring break, the members of Amigas Inc. rushed to their various homes to pack for their trip. Their flight was early the next morning, and they were going to be together for two weeks, but before the fun could start, there was just so much to do!

  Alicia paced her room. Her mother had treated her to a brand-new suitcase—a leopard-print hardcase with a hot pink interior. It was huge, so Alicia knew it would hold everything she needed. The problem was that she had no idea what to bring. The pile of neglected clothes sat in a big mound on the floor. The suitcase itself was empty, except for her toothbrush.

  This was an emergency. She decided to call Carmen for some expert advice.

  “Carmen, I don’t know what to pack!” Alicia cried, cradling the phone between her ear and shoulder.
“You’re the fashion genius; I’m drowning here, and I desperately need your help.”

  In Carmen’s room, a silver vinyl duffel bag sat fully packed and ready to go by the door. Besides being a kick-butt fashion designer, Carmen had been blessed with the genetic ability to pack both lightly and fashionably—without even trying. Her suitcase was like the ones you saw in fashion-magazine articles, where seven items morphed magically into twenty-one different outfits.

  “Well, it’ll be cooler in Austin than it is in Miami, especially at night,” said Carmen calmly. “So, plan to layer.”

  Alicia, who was dressed in a black miniskirt, cream-colored sleeveless sweater, and black pearl necklace, shook her head. “Come on, chica, you know I don’t do layers. I do miniskirts and cute tops.”

  Carmen laughed.

  “Hold on, I’m getting another call,” Carmen said. She switched lines. It was Jamie.

  Jamie was standing in her own bedroom staring miserably into her vintage steamer trunk, which was empty except for a set of watercolor paints, her sketchbook, and a toothbrush.

  “Carmen, you gotta help me out!” Jamie cried. “I don’t know what to pack.”

  “Not you, too,” Carmen said. “I love you ladies, but you have got to get it together!”

  “Come pack for me,” Jamie begged her. “I’ll give you this cool vintage dress I just scored on eBay.”

  Carmen’s eyes lit up. Jamie was the queen of vintage finds; from the thrift stores of Miami Beach to the coolest Japanese vendors on eBay, the world was just a treasure chest of goodies waiting for Jamie to find them.

  “New or used?” Carmen asked, interested.

  “Mint condition,” Jamie replied. “But I guess you’ll have to come over and check it out for yourself.”