Fantastical Mistake

Chapter 20 - Back Home

I took a deep breath before I rang the bell, holding my small suitcase in one hand while pulling my hair behind my right ear with the other. My nerves started acting up ever since a week ago, something I brushed away thinking it was because all the family was going to be together this weekend for the first times in ages. Still, my stomach was making restless turns at the thought of seeing everyone together again.

The door opened as I heard laughter from behind the walls, and I looked at the person who opened the door with wide eyes, the same chocolate brown staring back at me. She smiled brightly, small wrinkles showing at the corners of her eyes, opening her arms to me.

- Tina is here! – she exclaimed happily to whoever was in the next room.

- Mom!

Without reason, I stepped forward and enveloped the smaller woman in a tight embrace, somehow feeling tears pricking at my eyes. I had seen her just two or three weeks ago and talked daily on the phone with my mother, but I had this overwhelming sensation of esteem and relief when I saw her.

- Oh my, someone is very affectionate today it seems – I heard a deeper older voice chuckle.

Raising my head, I saw my father come into the hallway, my smile echoing on his lips. White hair and tired looking small dark brown eyes, I could only hold the tall man from the waist as my head could barely reach his shoulder. The sound of him laughing warmly as he hugged me back had me crying for real.

- Geez, are you trying to score extra points with the old folks or what? Scared all attention will be on me?

- Shut up, Tomás! – I reprimand, although I walk into the living room, cleaning my tears, and hug him firmly as well. He looked more tan than I remembered, maybe a bit thinner as well. I hadn't seem my older brother in months, so him it made sense to miss. But I was feeling like this about everyone.

- Be nice to your sister, Tomás. But really, Tina, are you alright hija? – my mom comes and looks worryingly at me, a warm soothing hand on my back.

- Yeah, sorry. I think I just missed everyone more than I thought – I tell her, trying to smile.

I see my dad go with my suitcase upstairs, probably to put it on my old room. My younger sister, Martina, who I hugged next, got the bigger room when I moved out, but with everyone coming back to the house this weekend, we would have to share the space.

- You're acting weird... Got into some kind of problem or something? – she suspiciously asked when I kissed her chubby cheek.

- No, no, everything's been okay... normal – I stated.

The bell of the house rang again and my mom clapped happily.

- That must be Isabella and John!

My older sister and her husband joined us. I held her just as tight, although being extra careful around the large baby hump, while I shook John's hands.

Isabella and I haven't always been very close to one another, but ever since she found out she was pregnant, I could see a new kindness in her. She was glowing as she sat next to me and Martina, starting an easy and comfortable conversation with us both while dad, Tomás and John went to the backyard and cooked the meat, my mom busying herself in the kitchen before joining us too.

It was strange. How much I enjoyed spending time with them, how much I missed them. We tried to have days like this at least once a year and I never felt so emotional about it. I laughed harder than usual, relished in every bite of my mother's wonderful food, committed every precious moment to memory, subconsciously.