“Oh, no, I didn’t get to visit, but I’d love to. It’s on my list of places to see at some point in my life.” Sonny’s friends had gone to Spain, all of them getting to go on their senior trip, the same one that he would’ve been on had he not fucked up at fifteen, but he’d been made to sit at home and take care of Marina. His parents always made it clear to him that they’d help him out, but they weren’t going to feel bad for him or let him push his parental duties onto them - he was the one that made the mistake of not using a condom, he was the one who wouldn’t agree to adoption, so he was the one who had to step up and be a good parent. And, as much as he hated not having a social life as a teenager, he was happy with where his and Marina’s lives were now. 

“Oh, wow, almost a year,” He repeated her statement, a grin spreading across his lips. “And have you enjoyed your time here so far?” He figured it must be difficult, getting used to a whole new culture and how people behaved in a different country, but he hoped that people had been kind to her thus far.

When she agreed to go out with him, that stupid goofy grin of his only widened. A part of him hadn’t been expecting her to say yes, but he was glad that she did. “Yeah?” His gaze dropped to Marina again when she started to say something else, but she shut her mouth when she caught the look he was giving her. Sonny looked back up at Lucía once he was certain that his daughter wasn’t going to say anything else about fucking stranger danger, hoping that his next request wouldn’t be too much too soon. “Well, how about this evening? If you’re free for the night, of course,” He knew he could drop Marina off at the babysitter’s house and deal with her whining about it later. “We could go to The 1909. I’ll pick you up. Say… six o’clock?”

Lucía was already getting ahead of herself, opening her mouth to offer to bring the complete stranger home with her next time she visited. It wasn’t even a ‘please meet my parents’ gesture as much as it was just pride for her home country, and the belief that everyone should visit beautiful places, Catalunya or otherwise, as much as they could. Luckily, as ditsy as she often made herself out to seem, she wasn’t a complete airhead, with flirting being one of the things she was best at, so she stopped herself short of the invitation and instead said, “You should really go. Barcelona is beautiful.” 

It didn’t feel like a year to Lucía. She still got lost trying to read English road signs, and still had to ask strangers in grocery stores for help translating ingredient lists on boxes of cereal. She’d always imagined that by a year in Primm, she’d be fully assimilated to American life, but instead, she’d started to realize she really admired her own heritage, and instead found herself now fighting the changes needed to fit in that she was once so eager to make. 

          “I miss home, but I love Primm,” she explained, “I want to stay in America forever. Maybe not Primm. Maybe Los Angeles or New York City, but still in America.” Primm hadn’t been exactly what she expected when she pictured America, with her perspective entirely influenced by TV and movies, but it was the only place she considered, knowing she’d need the support of her cousins nearby at least for a little while until she was ready to fully spread her wings. 

It was awfully conventional of her, and slightly un-modern, but Lucía was attracted to his assertiveness. She knew she was a strong and independent woman, but something about just having a man plan it out for her. She didn’t want to have to ask for dates, or make wishy-washy implications or ‘play the game’. She just wanted to be la princesa for the night, and she’d contribute... other things to the relationship afterwards. 

          “I am free, yes, six is good,” she smiled, mind already racing about how she was going to have to call Natalie as soon as he turned around to walk away, not only to tell her best friend about the absolute rom-com fairy tale interaction she just had, but more importantly, for advice on what to wear. 

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Daniel looked at the woman and then he couldn’t help a smile. It was always nice to hear nice words from others as they made him motivated to keep his business going. He wasn’t money hungry by any means so most of the time he was fine with just having casual compliments about how good his workers were faring and he didn’t always need to hear about how top notch the food was though that was also an important quality that the restaurant should have. But subtle flattery made him happy and had he not been running his work for a while now he would have felt flutter within him. 

“Are they? That’s great to hear. We set high priorities to manners around here. Although they lack in speed they’re some of the friendliest people you’ll ever meet.” He said with a small laugh. Nevada itself was a high strung place though and some people just demanded high quality food instead which sometimes stressed him a little. “Do you come here often?” He asked wondering if she maybe was a regular.

The speed was hardly a concern for Lucía. She was the type to wait around a restaurant, taking up a seat at the bar long after she’d gotten her check. She’d noticed, in America, that wasn’t always appreciated, but at least she always tipped well. That was another shock she’d adapted to in the last 10 months, with tipping extremely uncommon in Spain, she was quickly corrected by her cousins on the expectations here. Once she learned of the norm, and especially how little servers and bartenders made outside of their tips, she then always made sure to tip well over 25% even if the math was difficult for her. 

          “Well in my home, everyone eats slow and very long dinners, so that does not bother me,” she explained with a grin, “That is why I like them. I prefer nice over fast.” Pausing for a second to recall the meaning of the word ‘often’ she then nodded, “Yes, often.” There were only so many restaurants in Primm, and Lucía, with no drivers license or car, couldn’t always make the uber payment just for a dinner, so she became a quite frequent visitor of the local establishments.

Català - that explained why Sonny didn’t understand a bit of the language she spoke. The Catholic school he’d attended hadn’t made taking a second language class mandatory, so he hadn’t done it, and even if he had he was sure that said language probably wasn’t offered. The only experience he had in a second language was bits and pieces of Italian that he picked up from his parents and the people his father worked for; he could string together simple sentences, answer easy questions, and read the language to a certain extent, but he was nowhere close to being fluent. 

“Well, the way you speak it is absolutely beautiful.” He said with a smile, hand lifting to tuck some hair behind his ear. It had been forever since he’d flirted sober, so this was all strange to him and it was throwing him off a bit, but he was trying and he figured that had to count for something. “Oh, wow - Spain was on the list of options for my senior trip in high school,” He hadn’t made it that far, two years off from getting to senior year, but his parents had taken him on a little trip to Mexico when he got his GED anyway. “How long have you lived here?” 

Maybe it was too early for him to make a bigger move, but Sonny couldn’t help himself. It was totally corny to ask a girl who you met at the market on a date, it was such an overused thing in movies and books, but it felt right. “Well, thank you,” He said with a little laugh. “Would you like to go get drinks and dinner sometime? I’d love to take you out, if you’re down for that.” At that point, Marina looked up at her father with raised brows, grabbing the hem of his shirt and tugging on it a few times to get his attention. “Daddy!” She hissed out in a whisper. “No! Stranger danger!” Sonny shushed her quietly, shaking his head before telling her in a hushed tone, “This isn’t stranger danger, this is different. Shush.” 

          “Gràcies,” she thanked him again, perhaps indulging her use of the foreign language, even if the English phrase for ‘thank you’ was one she had learned early on in primary education, but clearly, it was working for her. “Did you visit? I hope it was Barcelona, not Madrid. So many Americans say they go to Spain, and then they go to Madrid. Big city but not beautiful like Barcelona. And no beaches!” Perhaps there was a bit of animosity between her and the capital city, mostly due to their staunch denial of the autonomy of Catalunya, but even Lucía herself had once wanted to live in Madrid, so clearly this disapproval was not entirely truthful. (Although she did make a very valid point about the beaches.)  

        “I moved in August,” she answered, “Almost one year!” It was still so new to her, assimilating to the language and customs taking longer than she expected, and making her shocked to think of exactly how long she’d been here now. 

Lucía was surprised by his forwardness, but she’d be lying if she said it wasn’t a good surprise. She figured, if anything, he’d just track her down on instagram and slide into her dm’s later, or just take their meeting as a fun flirt and move on. Whenever conversations shifted dramatically, it was easy to leave Lucía speechless, as it often took her a while to search her brain for the right vocabulary for answers to the questions she hadn’t been anticipating. 

       “Um, sí, yes!” she nodded, wanting to make sure the enthusiasm translated without coming off too eager. The younger girls reaction was amusing to Lucía, but she mostly ignored it, needing to focus more on her own silly reaction. Regaining her calm demeanor, replacing the panicked look of surprise with a sweet smile, she added, “That sounds lovely.” 

Andrea quickly placed the boxes over to the side just out of view or any danger of being knocked over by somebody, or even herself. She looked at the woman for a moment before she took her hand and shook it. “Pleasure to meet you, I’m Andrea Weber” She said with a gentle smile on her lips. “A live show in the shop? That really would be quite interesting, I don’t think we have had one of those in a long time. We can talk it over in my office if you prefer to talk less out in the open.” 

          “Yes, thank you Ms Andrea,” Lucía said, her professionalism much different than her normal composure, which was more of the bumbling, naive young girl. “My band has a unique, local, fanbase and a live show could be mutually beneficial.” Another phrase Lucía had memorized word-for-word, with help from her cousin to translate the message in her head out to perfect English grammar. 

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“You’re welcome,” she smiled, tucking a piece of light blonde hair behind her ear. Nodding, she said “I get that. Americans are simple to a fault.” Aubrey never understood why people from foreign countries always seemed so enamored by the United States. Maybe Aubrey was just naive but she didn’t see what was all that special about her home country, especially in a town like Primm. It was all small town America as you could possibly get. Just then, a brilliant idea popped into her brain: coffee. “What do you say we finish grocery shopping and then we grab some coffee? My treat.”

          “No, not fault, it is good. More, um, effective!” Lucía said, attempting to spin the joke into something positive. She really did idolize much of the ‘American Dream’ so it wasn’t hard to see the good in all its qualities. 

          “Yes, I love coffee!” She said, accepting the invitation enthusiastically. Loving coffee was not a trait she had to force, unlike some American things she had found herself really not liking despite every attempt to. Coffee was as much of a staple in her life in Spain, if not even more. 

“Healthy, well, I eat pretty healthy most times. I try to take care of my body. Unhealthy... sometimes I drink a lot of alcohol. And I have the juul. Oops.” 

“Sometimes, people are mean. Artists can be stuck up or mean. And sometimes people are rude when you ask to work with them. But, there are mean people in every job. So I still love my job.”

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Marina leaned her head into Sonny’s hand that was messing with her hair, always enjoying it when he played with her hair or brushed it for her. While she was definitely growing up and getting more independent, way too fast in her father’s opinion, she loved it when he babied her or did little things like play with her hair - or, when they got home every day, pick her up and carry her over the threshold into their apartment. Despite the fact that she loved what was already done for her by her father, she couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like with a mother. Most of the other kids at her school had moms, but Marina didn’t even know her mom’s name, or if she even had one. Sonny didn’t do any flirting in front of her very often but, when he did, she always kept a close eye on the women he talked to, listening to the way they spoke back to him, watching how they acted. She was nosy, curious, wondering if one of them was ever going to stay in their lives or just be a ‘friend’ who stayed the night sometimes or came over after she was supposed to be asleep. 

Sonny looked down at his daughter, noticing the way she seemingly lost interest in their conversation but knowing that she was still observing, before a looking back to the woman with a little smirk. “What language is that?” He asked, head tilting to the side a bit as he spoke. “You make it sound very beautiful.” Hell, just by looking at her, he would bet that she could make just about anything sound beautiful, coming from those pretty little lips of hers that his eyes kept drifting back to. Sonny’s flirting game was a little rusty when he was sober, but he figured it was best to just go with the flow and make it work - Lucía, as he came to find out her name was, was a beautiful woman and he could feel himself being drawn to her. 

The way she spoke her name could have made any man weak in the knees, of that he was certain.  “Lucía,” He repeated the name as he took her hand and shook it, a smile on his lips. “That’s a pretty name. Perfect for a beautiful woman like yourself. It’s very nice to meet you.”

Lucía grin grew as he asked about her native language. She could talk about Catalunya for ages, with many controversial and passionate opinions ingrained in her by her mother’s side since she was a baby. Despite the fact that throughout most of her life, she’d spoken Spanish quantitively more, in school and in public for the most part, it was strictly not allowed in her home, for the sake of maintaining Català heritage. 

          “I speak Català,” she explained sweetly, the flirty tone only strengthened by the accent, even if that part wasn’t necessarily intentional. (Her English pronunciation really was just garbage.) “I am from Catalunya, or Barcelona, as America thinks it.”  She loved the flattery, not just for her language but for her looks as well, he had managed to pick up on her two most prideful vices within moments of meeting her. 

Even with about a year now of practicing her English flirting, she quickly realized it was much harder to do sober, and not to mention, with someone she actually found attractive. “Thank you, but you are also beautiful.” Her attempt at a genuine compliment was rusty at best, but it was the effort that counted, right? She’d have to go home and look up some English phrases to use next time, or just watch more cheesy romantic movies and try to study how Jennifer Anniston, among others, could do it. 

My father, he is the brother of their mother. She was Alice’s mother, too–though there was no point in clarifying that right now, especially because she knew it would come out as snappy and she didn’t want to be rude to her cousin. They were related, though–it would seem that Lucia’s father was their uncle. Who knows? Maybe she’d get to meet him someday. “Yes, we are family,” she confirmed. And since they were family, she could only imagine what the blonde woman was going through, given Orion’s abrupt disappearance. “How are you doing with everything? Are you okay?” Really, it was a stupid question but she wasn’t sure what else to say at the moment. Besides, the least she could do was check in with someone who was suddenly her kin.

Lucía had been blessed with a combination of both headstrong and optimistic personality, which meant that any minor tragedy she had faced in her life thus far had been easily brushed off. A boyfriend broke up with her? More time to spend with her girlfriends. Got denied from her first choice university in Madrid? At least in Barcelona she knew the city well. And that sort of glass-half-full thinking had never been sarcastic or forced, she genuinely thought that way before she thought to become upset. But for once in her life, this was different. Even the ‘positive’ outcomes, like getting closer with Natalie, and now meeting a cousin she didn’t know she had, couldn’t justify the fear she was feeling surrounding Orion. 

Tears welling back in her eyes, she shook her head, quietly saying, “I am scared.”

Sonny couldn’t help but smile when the woman called Marina cute. She was right, but that was a thought programmed into his brain as a father. He believed that his daughter was beautiful, perfect in every way, no flaws except for the fact that she could be as hardheaded and stubborn as he was sometimes. A grin spread across Marina’s lips as she listened to the woman, nodding her head. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you! You’re cute too. What’s your name?” She was always nosy, and tended to engage in conversation with strangers no matter how many times Sonny tried to explain stranger danger to her. At the very least, she knew not to go anywhere with a stranger or get in their car. They had a secret word that was only known by Sonny, his daughter, and the babysitter, one that was used upon Marina being picked up from school or her extra curricular activities. If someone tried to pick her up and they didn’t know the word, she knew not to get in the car with them and to tell an adult.

He looked down at his daughter for a moment, surprised that she didn’t question the stranger further before lifting his gaze to look at the woman, a grin spreading across his lips. “She’s right, you are cute.” Now probably wasn’t the greatest time to try and flirt with a woman, especially at the Amish Market with his daughter in tow, but Sonny couldn’t help but compliment a pretty girl when he saw one. He’d mostly escaped his fuckboy days in high school, but that same stupid kid still lingered inside of him and reared his dumbass fucking head sometimes. “I’m Sonny, by the way,” He lifted a hand to smooth down Marina’s hair as best as he could, but the curls kept it from ever laying down completely flat. “I’ll second her question - what’s your name?” 

Lucía giggled as the young girl called her ‘cute’ too. Of course, Lucía knew she was cute, and she wasn’t beyond admitting it either, but to hear such a diminutive descriptor from a child was comical, yet still endearing. Even still, she was more surprised to hear the girls father repeat the compliment. Now she wasn’t sure who to focus her attention on, seeing as while, yes the little girl was very adorable, the man closer to her age was also, well, attention grabbing.

          “Moltes gràcies, thank you,” she said, slightly bashful, unusual for Lucía who typically held much more pride when speaking. “Encantat de conèixer, Sonny,” she added often over-utilizing her native lanugage when flirting. It was a bad habit, knowing the foreign tongue often made her more attractive just due to its uniqueness, and she fully utilized that tool. Typically, she went for much older gentlemen, (Lucía had a particular streak of picking up salt and pepper haired men at the bars in Primm,) but all that was just a game to her, and while it’d been a while since she’d actually attempted flirting with someone she wasn’t just using for attention or free drinks, she figured it couldn’t hurt to play along.

          “I am Lucía,” she said, holding out her hand for him to shake, “Lucía-Roci Pallas i Sabat.” The full, formal name a special touch, as she knew how musical it sounded rolling off her accented tongue. 

“It’s nice to meet you, Lucia,” Alice said softly, mustering a small smile, though the last thing she wanted to do right now as smile. She nodded when the blonde specified that she was from Catalonia. Truthfully, Alice had never heard of Catalonia but she wasn’t about to admit that and she felt a little better when her cousin said ‘Barcelona,’ a name she was familiar with. She wasn’t quite sure what to say next, though. She should she just dive into the story of their fucked up family? Of course, she loved her fucked up family but there was no denying that it was indeed fucked up. “So, um.. My dad does business internationally and when a business trip took him to Greece, he met Mama… To be honest with you, I’m not really sure how it all works science-wise but Orion and I were conceived around the same time, though we don’t have the same father. I was born three months earlier due to complications… From what both Cyrek and Orion have told me, I was with them up until I was about a year old. After that, my father came and brought me back to the United States…” No need to get into that fucked up part of the story right now. It didn’t pertain to Lucia, after all. “Anyways… I met the boys about three years ago, when I was living in New York City. Cy happened to be in town and when we met, we just…got along instantly. Like two peas in a pod. Shortly after that, I met Orion and he sort of put the puzzle pieces together.” Technically, Orion had tracked Alice down in New York but no need to make the story more complicated than it already was. “I decided to move out here to Primm so I could be closer to them. Family means everything to me. I know you don’t know me yet, Lucia, but… We’re family. And that means a lot to me.” Oddly enough, she found a lump rising in her throat but she swallowed it back down. Now was not the time to get emotional, even if the world around her was fucking crumbling. No matter how upset she was, this girl seemed far more fragile than she was right now. “Do you, uh.. Do you have any questions? I know I sort of gave you the abridged, shorter version, but… That’s basically the story.”

Even if Lucía had perfect English comprehension, her cousin (or was she even her cousin by blood?) and her explanation of her relation to Orion and Cyrek would be just as confusing. Lucía was sharp, you don’t get to be a polyglot without some ability to learn fast, but things like science and math were her weakness. The whole situation was far too confusing for her, and although her aunt’s immediate family had always been somewhat of a grey area for her, she had always just chosen to take it all at surface value. If someone was her told to be her cousin or some other relative, it was much easier for her to just accept it without trying to figure out the lineage behind it all. 

          “I am just Lucía,” she said, shaking her head, “El meu pare, my father, he is the brother of their mother. That is all.” She was learning to value the simplicity of her own genetic relationships. Her immediate family was just that, her parents and her sister. No halves or steps or fosters. 

Of course, Lucía was full of questions, but none that she could properly put into words, and they weren’t ones Alice would likely have the answer to anyway. So instead of attempting them, she just shook her head to denote she had none. 

          “We are family, though,” Lucía said, one thing she was able to ascertain from the story. And as convoluted as her family might be, they were everything to her.