Hearts Entangled #1

He was hopelessly in love. She was too. Their relationship had progressed faster than he had thought it would.

He still remembered the first time he had met Rosa at market Wednesday morning. She was buying a few chayotes for her mom, and he was buying some squash for her older brother’s wife. Something had flashed between them, and ever since then he had looked for opportunities to court her. He had been surprised at first to realize that she was also looking for opportunities to court him.

But now Temo found himself in a predicament. They had to get married. Either that or break up. They had progressed in their courtship to the point that they couldn’t continue as simply friends. They both knew that they wanted to get married. They both also knew they were too young. In colonial Mexico, in the 1950s things were different than now. He briefly thought of eloping, but the ruckus and scandal it would bring to his brother and Rosa’s mom wasn’t worth it.

Besides he and Rosa had discussed it at length, that they wanted to work towards a better life. They both desperately wanted a family of their own and a place to belong. He was thankful for a place to live with his brother. It was a lot better than other arrangements he had lived with. Rosa had a mom that took care of her, but she longed for a man in her life to lead her. If they got married, they wanted to be a true family, not shards and pieces of one.

He tossed in his bed. He tried to look at it from all angles. The hours dragged on. Eventually the realization dawned on him that there was nothing to lose by talking to his authority about it. If they were too young then they could wait a few years until they were seventeen or eighteen. He was tired of hiding his courtship. It was time to open up about it. It seemed to be too big of a burden for a fourteen-year-old orphan to worry about.

But who was his authority? His heart throbbed at the memory of his mom. If only she would be around. Maybe he should ask his uncle over in Ayapango. He shuddered at the thought. If there ever was a human snake, it was his uncle.

Where was his dad, he wondered. What kind of man would never show himself to his son? Was he still alive? Oscar, Temo’s older brother, had hinted that their dad was a loser

and maybe even that there were more children than the two of them.

Again and again, his mind turned back to his older brother Oscar. He thought he should probably talk to him. That was simply scary. Not that Oscar didn’t like him. It seemed that Oscar genuinely cared about him. But they didn’t know each other. Temo had the feeling that maybe Oscar knew more about his past than he had ever shared. They didn’t talk about each other’s lives. Neither did they talk about their mom. Maybe the reason they never could get close was because they were only half-brothers.

He dragged himself back to the decision. In the darkness, he scrunched up his forehead. He forced himself to think clearly. The plan of action seemed clear enough. The first step was to tell Rosa that he planned to talk with his older brother about it. If she was fine with it, then he would pluck up his courage and go through with it. If not than he would try to confront the issue of putting a pause on their relationship. He grimaced at the thought. He sighed. “It is useless to try to sleep tonight” he thought to himself.

He rolled out of bed and silently left the house to walk the street.