Chapter 23: Tiger Stripes Confession
The fluorescent lights of the maternity store hummed with a sterile, judgmental frequency. Racks of forgiving elastic and cheerful floral prints stretched in every direction, a pastel labyrinth of impending motherhood. Ana stood frozen before a three-way mirror, clutching a bundle of navy fabric to her chest like a shield.
“It’s just a dress, Ani,” Nevaieh called from outside the dressing room curtain. Her voice was muffled, distracted. She was probably texting their lawyer back, the one Tía had demanded they “bully into urgency.”
“It’s a tent,” Ana muttered, but the word caught in her throat. She unclenched her hands and let the dress unfold. It was simple. A stretchy, dark blue wrap dress. It was also the seventh item she’d tried on, and the mirror was becoming a cruel, funhouse reflection of a stranger.
Her body was a map she no longer knew how to read. The sunset roses on her hips and back were stretched, distorted. The peacock on her thigh had acquired a new, rounded curve. Her belly, full and tight, was a continent separating her from her own feet. She felt enormous, alien. The vibrant woman covered in stories of resilience and ocean depths felt buried beneath a biological blueprint.
She wrestled the dress on. The fabric was soft, but the act of wrapping it felt like a surrender. She tied the sash loosely, but it did little to define the shape beneath. It just hung. She turned, looking at her profile.
The tears were sudden and hot, a pressure release she hadn’t authorized. They streaked down her cheeks, tracing the lines of her mother’s love letter tattooed along her collarbone. A choked sob escaped her. She clawed at the knot of the sash, suddenly desperate to get the thing off, to be free of the damnable, gentle fabric that seemed to scream only a mother.
“Ana?” Nevaieh’s voice was closer now, alert. The curtain rustled. “You okay in there?”
“Fine,” Ana rasped, but it was watery and weak. The sash wouldn’t yield. Her fingers, clumsy with emotion, fumbled.
The curtain whipped aside. Nevaieh stood there, phone forgotten in her hand, her face instantly shifting from casual concern to acute focus. She took in the scene: the tear-streaked face, the desperate hands pulling at the fabric, the heaving shoulders.
Wordlessly, Nevaieh stepped into the small room and pulled the curtain shut behind her, plunging them into the intimate, awful glow of the mirror lights. The space shrank instantly, charged with Ana’s ragged breathing.
“Hey,” Nevaieh said softly, her hands coming up. “Hey, stop. You’re gonna hurt yourself.” She gently brushed Ana’s hands away and worked on the knot. It came loose with a soft pull.
The dress sagged open. Ana stood there in her maternity bra and leggings, the full topography of her changed body exposed under the brutal light. She wrapped her arms around her belly, hiding, turning away from the mirror.
Nevaieh didn’t reach for her. Instead, she slowly sank to her knees on the thin, carpeted floor. She didn’t look up at Ana’s face. Her eyes were on the landscape before her.
She saw the silvery, lightning-bolt streaks branching across Ana’s lower abdomen. The new, deep curve of her hips. The way her skin stretched, luminous and taut.
Ana flinched, expecting a placating comment, a hollow “you’re beautiful.”
Nevaieh said nothing. She leaned forward, her curly hair brushing Ana’s thigh, and pressed her lips to one of the silver marks. The kiss was slow, deliberate. Then she moved to another, and another, tracing the patterns with a reverence that made Ana’s breath hitch.
“Nev…” Ana whispered, a protest dying in her throat.
Nevaieh looked up, her eyes dark and serious. “These,” she said, her voice low and steady in the quiet box of the dressing room, “are your tiger stripes.” Her hand rested gently on the side of Ana’s belly. “Proof you’re building our girl a galaxy in here.”
She leaned in again, her lips following a longer stretch mark that arced like a crescent moon. “This one,” she murmured against Ana’s skin, “is where she spun around last week. The big turn.” Another kiss, lower. “This one is from when she discovered hiccups.”
Ana’s tears weren’t stopping, but their texture changed. They were warmer now, less sharp. A tremor ran through her.
Nevaieh’s hands came up to cradle the full weight of Ana’s belly, her thumbs stroking the sides. “You’re not disappearing,” she said, her words a quiet vibration against Ana’s skin. “You’re expanding. You’re making room.” She placed one last, soft kiss on the very apex of Ana’s stomach. “You’re the most powerful thing I’ve ever seen.”
Ana finally looked down. She saw the top of Nevaieh’s head, her focused expression, the glint of her nose ring in the light. She saw her own body, not as a foreign object, but as a vessel held in worship. The hummingbird on Nevaieh’s forearm, fresh and vivid, seemed to pulse against her skin.
A shaky breath escaped Ana, the first full one she’d taken in minutes. She uncurled her arms from around herself and let her hands fall onto Nevaieh’s shoulders.
Nevaieh finally looked up, meeting her gaze. “We can burn this dress if you want,” she said, a faint, crooked smile touching her lips. “Or we can buy it and I’ll draw a fucking superhero logo on it.”
A wet laugh burst from Ana. It sounded cracked and wonderful. “It’s actually… kinda comfortable,” she admitted, sniffling.
“Then it’s a uniform.” Nevaieh stood up in one fluid motion, her knees popping. She kept her hands on Ana’s hips. “And you look fierce in it.” She glanced at the mirror behind Ana, not looking at her reflection, but looking with her. “See? Commander of the Starfighter.”
Ana turned, reluctantly, back to the three-way mirror. The woman staring back was still round, still stretched. But she was also flushed, her eyes bright, her tattoos peeking from the open dress. Nevaieh stood behind her, a steady presence, her chin resting on Ana’s shoulder, her arms wrapped around her from behind, hands splayed over Ana’s belly.
“Okay,” Ana whispered, leaning back into the solid warmth behind her. “Okay. We can get the dress.”
They bought the dress, along with two pairs of pants that didn’t feel like punishment. The saleswoman, an older lady with kind eyes, had folded them neatly into a bag with a knowing smile.
Back in the car, the AC blasting against the afternoon heat, Ana felt drained but lighter, as if a poison had been wept out. She watched the strip malls blur past, her hand resting on the shopping bag.
“Hey,” Nevaieh said, one hand on the wheel, the other reaching across the console to find Ana’s knee. “Remember what Tía said about the lawyer? About being boring and fighting anyway?”
Ana nodded.
“This is the same fight,” Nevaieh said, her eyes on the road. “Just in a dressing room. It’s all just… building the fence. Brick by boring, emotional brick.”
Ana turned her hand over, lacing her fingers with Nevaieh’s. The pressure was solid, real. “You’re good at the bricks.”
“I’m learning,” Nevaieh said, squeezing her hand. “From a master.” She threw a quick grin Ana’s way. “Now, important question. Pancakes or arepas for dinner? I feel the need to cook something that doesn’t require trying on.”
“Surprise me,” Ana said, closing her eyes, letting the motion of the car lull her. The ghost of Nevaieh’s kisses still tingled on her skin, a new constellation drawn in real time, mapping a territory not of loss, but of profound, terrifying creation. For the first time all day, she couldn’t wait to get home.
For the first time all day, she couldn’t wait to get home.
Home, that afternoon, wasn’t their apartment. Nevaieh took a left instead of a right at the light, the tires humming over familiar cracked pavement. “Change of plan,” she said, flicking on the turn signal. “Tía called. Said she’s making pastelón and my presence is mandatory for plantain duty.”
Ana felt a wave of familiar comfort. “You mean your presence is mandatory for her to critique your slicing technique.”
“Exactly. Family tradition.” Nevaieh’s thumb brushed over Ana’s knuckles. “You up for it? Xavier just got back from his shift, Crys is already there. It’ll be loud.”
“Loud is good,” Ana said, leaning her head against the window. The sterile fluorescence of the store was fading, replaced by the golden wash of late sun through the oak trees lining Tía’s street. The house was a squat, pale blue ranch, its front yard a chaotic mix of red bougainvillea, a leaning Virgin statue, and Xavier’s tricked-out motorcycle on blocks.
The screen door announced them with a squeal and a slap. The smell hit immediately—fried sweet plantains, simmering ground beef, the sharp tang of cilantro and onion. A classic salsa tune competed with the sizzle from the kitchen.
“Finally!” Tía’s voice boomed from the kitchen. “I was about to send a search party. Nev, ven acá, these need frying.”
The living room was a museum of family. Faded photos of Ana’s mom, bright-eyed and forever young, shared a wall with graduation portraits and a solemn, framed military photo of Manuelis. His absence was a physical space in the room, a quiet chair no one sat in.
Crystaylia uncurled herself from the sagging corduroy sofa. Her hair was a purple cloud today, matching her nail polish. “Look at you!” she crowed, wrapping Ana in a ginger hug, her hands avoiding her belly with practiced care. “Glowing. Or sweating. The line is thin in this kitchen.”
Xavieris emerged from the hallway, shrugging off his paramedic jacket. His eyes were tired but his smile was easy. “Hermanita,” he said, pulling Ana in for a proper squeeze. He smelled like diesel and antiseptic. He nodded over her head at Nevaieh. “Guitar hero. Tía’s got you on slave labor.”
“It’s an honor system,” Nevaieh called back from the kitchen, where the sizzle intensified.
Ana sank into the couch, a pillow embroidered with flamenco dancers cushioning her back. The room accepted her. The ghosts and the living coexisted here, in the thick air of cooking and cricket song from the backyard.
Nevaieh walked back in, wiping her hands on a dish towel. She caught Xavier’s glance, then Crystaylia’s raised eyebrow. A silent conversation passed between them, one perfected over years of shared grief and blunt smoke.
Xavier reached into the drawer of the cluttered side table. He pulled out a small, polished wooden box and a pack of rolling papers. “Medicinal,” he said, his tone flatly professional. “For the nerves. My professional opinion.”
“Your professional opinion is that you had a long shift,” Crys teased, pulling a lighter from her jeans.
Nevaieh took the box, her fingers deft. She selected a bud, fragrant and sticky, and began crumbling it with a focused precision Ana knew was her form of meditation. The earthy, pine scent mixed with the cooking smells. It was the smell of this house, of after-funerals and before-parties, of talks that lasted until dawn.
Tía walked in, wiping her hands on her apron. She watched Nevaieh rolling, the thin paper cupped in her steady fingers. Her eyes flicked to Ana’s belly, then back to Nevaieh’s hands.
“The baby,” Tía stated.
“Is insulated,” Ana answered, her voice firm. She’d had this conversation before. “I’m not smoking. I’m breathing air. This is just… botana.” Appetizer.
Tía held her gaze for a long moment, then shrugged, a twitch of her mouth acknowledging the unspoken rules of this sacred, smoke-filled space. “Bueno. Just keep the window open. I don’t want the child born knowing all my business because the walls heard everything.”
Nevaieh finished, sealing the paper with a lick. She lit the tip, the paper flaring orange, and took a short, sharp inhale. She held it, then exhaled a slow, steady stream towards the open screen door. She passed it to Xavier.
He took it, nodded at Nevaieh, a gesture of thanks. “How’s the fence-building?” he asked, his voice already loosening.
Nevaieh settled on the floor, her back against Ana’s calves. “Brick by brick,” she said, taking the blunt back when Crys offered it. “Today’s brick was a navy blue wrap dress.”
Crys groaned in sympathy. “A necessary evil. Like mammograms.”
The blunt made its circuit. The conversation meandered with the smoke. Xavier talked about a car wreck on I-95, the strange calm he found in the chaos. Crys detailed her latest drama with a co-worker at the gallery. Nevaieh listened, adding a dry comment here and there, her head resting against Ana’s leg.
Ana didn’t smoke. She sat in the cloud of it, in the warmth of their voices. She watched Nevaieh’s throat move as she laughed at one of Xavier’s stories. She saw the way Crys’s eyes softened when she mentioned Manuelis’s love for this particular salsa album, now playing softly from the old stereo.
Tía brought out a plate of fried cheese and plantain chips. “So you don’t get too faded and forget to eat,” she said, placing it on Nevaieh’s lap before returning to the kitchen.
Nevaieh picked up a chip, offered it up to Ana. The gesture was simple, automatic. Ana took it, the salt sharp on her tongue.
Xavier exhaled, leaning his head back against the wall. His eyes were closed. “He’d be stoked, you know,” he said, not opening them. “About the baby. About all of it.”
The room stilled for a heartbeat. The record scratched in the silence between songs.
“He’d be trying to build a crib right now,” Crys said, her voice soft. “And he’d fuck it up completely. We’d have to hide the tools.”
“He’d be the one making Nev smoke him out in the backyard,” Ana added, her chest tight. “Asking a million questions about guitar chords to seem cool.”
Nevaieh took a final, deep pull from the blunt, her eyes glistening in the lamplight. She tamped it out in the ashtray, the ritual complete. The shared offering had been consumed. She leaned her full weight back against Ana, solid and warm.
“He’d already love her,” Nevaieh said to the room, to his photo on the wall, her voice rough with smoke and conviction. “Without even meeting her. Just because she’s coming.”
Tía’s voice came from the doorway, a dishcloth over her shoulder. “Ay, enough of the heavy. The food is ready. And nobody loved anything on an empty stomach, not even your brother.” She disappeared again.
They moved to the crowded table, a chaotic transfer of plates and glasses and bodies. Ana watched Nevaieh slide naturally into a chair beside Xavier, accepting the bowl of rice he passed her. She watched Crys steal a piece of fried pork from Tía’s plate, earning a playful slap.
Ana settled into her seat, her daughter turning slow somersaults beneath her ribs, a gentle, internal echo of the life buzzing around the table. The fence they were building, brick by brick, wasn’t just around their little family. It was connected to this older, weathered one, its gates perpetually open, letting in all the ghosts and all the living, the smoke and the salsa, the love and the relentless, cooking noise of surviving.
It was connected to this older, weathered one, its gates perpetually open, letting in all the ghosts and all the living, the smoke and the salsa, the love and the relentless, cooking noise of surviving. The pastelón was half gone, plates pushed aside, when Crystaylia leaned back and patted her own flat stomach. “So,” she said, her purple nails tapping the tablecloth. “Are we doing a real baby shower, or one of those sad ones with cucumber sandwiches and no music?”
Xavier snorted into his beer. “We’re not having a sad anything. Manuelis would haunt us.”
“It’s in three weeks,” Tía declared, as if she’d just remembered the weather. She began stacking dishes with a clatter. “At the community center. I already booked it.”
Ana blinked. “Three weeks? Who booked it?”
“I did. Your Tía Lourdes is doing the cake. Your cousin Benny will DJ.” Tía leveled a look at Ana, her voice dropping to a tone that allowed no argument. “You think I was going to let your generation handle it? You’d have it in a parking lot.”
Nevaieh, who had been quietly tracing the wood grain of the table, looked up. “What can we do?”
“You can show up,” Tía said, heading for the kitchen. “And not wear black. It’s a celebration, not a funeral.”
Ana felt a swell of hot, conflicting pressure behind her ribs—gratitude warring with a fierce desire for control. This was her life, her child. But the train had left the station, fueled by love and plantain oil. She looked at Nevaieh, searching for a reflection of her own panic.
Nevaieh just gave a small, surrendering shrug, the corner of her mouth twitching. “Brick by brick,” she mouthed silently.
Later, after the dishes were done and Xavier had left for a night shift, Ana found herself on the back porch swing. The chain creaked a familiar, rusted rhythm. Crickets sawed in the darkness, and the air was thick with jasmine and distant traffic.
Nevaieh pushed the screen door open and stepped out, two glasses of water in hand. She handed one to Ana and sat beside her, the swing dipping under their combined weight. Their thighs pressed together.
“You okay?” Nevaieh asked, not looking at her, watching a moth batter itself against the bare bulb over the door.
“She booked a hall,” Ana said, the words tasting strange.
“I know.”
“She picked a DJ.”
“Benny’s actually good.”
Ana sipped her water. The ice cubes clinked. Inside, they could hear Tía and Crys arguing good-naturedly about how to store the leftover amarillos. “I just… I wanted to pick the plates,” Ana whispered, and it sounded so stupid and so vital that a choked laugh escaped her.
Nevaieh’s arm came around her shoulders, pulling her close. The night was warm, but Ana leaned into the heat. “We’ll pick the plates,” Nevaieh said into her hair. “We’ll get the most ridiculous, ugly plates we can find. And we’ll tell everyone they were Tía’s idea.”
Ana laughed again, wetly, and turned her face into Nevaieh’s neck, breathing in the scent of smoke and clean cotton. She guided Nevaieh’s hand from her shoulder down, placing it on the tight curve of her belly under the soft fabric of the dress. “Just feel,” she murmured.
Nevaieh’s hand stilled, then relaxed, her warm palm spreading over the place where their daughter slept and tumbled. They sat in silence for a long moment, the only sound the creak of the swing and the crickets.
Then, a distinct, rolling pressure pushed against Nevaieh’s hand—a firm, deliberate shift from the inside.
Nevaieh’s breath caught. “Whoa.”
Another kick, stronger this time, a swift punch beneath Ana’s ribs.
“She knows it’s you,” Ana said quietly, watching Nevaieh’s face in the dim yellow light. Her eyes were wide, fixed on nothing, all her focus on the palm of her hand. “Every time. I swear she’s quieter for everyone else.”
A series of movements followed, not kicks but a slow, liquid roll, a limb dragging from one side to the other under Nevaieh’s touch. Nevaieh moved her hand slightly, following the journey. Her expression was one of pure, rapt discovery, as if she were listening to a secret frequency only she could hear.
“Hey you,” Nevaieh whispered, her voice rough. She leaned down, her lips close to Ana’s belly. “Easy in there. We’re trying to relax.”
The baby kicked again, right where Nevaieh’s cheek nearly touched.
Nevaieh laughed, a soft, amazed huff of air. She looked up at Ana, her eyes shining. “She’s arguing already.”
“Your daughter,” Ana said, the words swelling in her chest.
Nevaieh rested her forehead gently against the spot. She didn’t speak for a long time, just listened with her skin. The baby settled, as if satisfied with the contact. When Nevaieh finally sat up, her smile was something new, something solid and quiet and unshakable.
“She knows the score,” Nevaieh said, her thumb making slow circles. She kept her hand right where it was, a constant, claiming weight. “Three weeks, huh?”
“Three weeks,” Ana echoed, leaning back. She looked up at the few stars visible through the city glow, the same stars inked on her skin. The fence they were building felt taller suddenly, sturdier, with a real gate. And on the other side of it, kicking impatiently, was the reason for every brick.