Re: [AyB. Cris y Mari]
Least she'd knowna him as a more-or-less adult person, even caught in that never-ending chrysalis of her memory. He'd been with Elisa pretty much through high school and just after. Sure, the Pilar stuff was in the middle there, muddying it, but, before she got sick—and even after—, Cris had thought Elisa was gonna be the person he married, huh? Which meant, yeah, he was family in that way, but, she'd knowna him as somebody who was mostly a whole person. Her? She'd been a baby. Cris had thoughta her the way he did his sobrinos, and if she'd been in the States, he'da interacted with her the same way. So, whatever outdated knowledge nena here had, Cris' was more outdated. Last he heard, she'd never even lost her first tooth and she could tell him her age, if he could listen between the babblinga her hermana melliza y papi. So, if he was still the kid he'd been to her, imagine who she was to him. Not this.
She sucked on a berry, and Cris thoughta Sam again. She'da done it with all the messy, chaotic seductive deliberation she had, if it could be called deliberation on her point. Now wasn't the time to be thinking 'bout that and Cris was pretty good at compartmentalizing, but it popped into his head. Real brief, huh? Before he pushed it out and picked out a bagel for himself. He went with plain, and it kinda amused him that she might tuck that knowledge away, even though it didn't mean nothing. But, even that amusement was fleeting, there then gone, as the ghosta Elisa found her way into Cris' cranium and started to make herself at home.
Cris didn't bother cutting the bagel. It seemed like a hassle to interrupt Mari as she talked, and he could just tear it up and dip it into the cream cheese if he wanted to. But, he was listening and he didn't make it out to seem like he wasn't. He glanced up at her once. In the end, he didn't even eat his hunka bagel. He just held it between his fingers as she talked 'bout Magda, Emilia y Elisa, then Mami y Papi. After a second, Cris leaned forward more, so he was kinda bent over, both elbows on the counter as he looked up at Mari. "She liked you." He didn't know if that was important to start with or not. "She liked you both, 'course. You and Magda. But, that was kinda a joke 'tween her and Emilia. Magda, they said, was like Emilia. You, like Elisa." Cris brushed his fingers against his lips as he thought, then shook his head. She wanted to talk 'bout Elisa, as a person, who she'd been before she got sick. Or maybe as she was sick. But, Cris had a hard time rolling it all back, even now. "Did they tell you what happened? Tus padres?"