{"id":1980,"date":"2020-10-11T10:53:21","date_gmt":"2020-10-11T14:53:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/?p=1980"},"modified":"2020-12-10T18:48:12","modified_gmt":"2020-12-10T22:48:12","slug":"stay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/index.php\/2020\/10\/11\/stay\/","title":{"rendered":"STAY"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Opportunities like this come once in a lifetime, Flavia,\u201d said Marisol in an officious tone.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">She was holding one of Flavia\u2019s hands and looking into her eyes as if she were disclosing the mystery of the Apocalypse. They had been in the same position for ten minutes, ever since Marisol had said, \u201cWe need to talk.\u201d It was clear she had practiced her pitch: <i>Miami is the place for you, forget about the United States, Miami is the best place in the world to live, and for Cubans, blah blah blah, these government regulations that take us in won\u2019t last forever and you\u2019re very young, girl! They\u2019re not going to give you another visa to get in, this country is for young people, blah, blah blah, take advantage of this and stay. Stay here because in Cuba nothing\u2019s going to change. <\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Flavia nodded. In Havana, Marisol had lived in a two-story house since girlhood in a residential neighborhood nicknamed Casino Deportivo. In Miami, she lived in a one-room trailer she\u2019d bought in North West, one of two areas most frequently in the local news\u2014and not for good reasons. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">But Flavia didn\u2019t feel like discussing Marisol\u2019s version of happily ever after. At the end of the day, Marisol wasn\u2019t the only one who had become an exact replica of the \u201crevolutionary\u201d demagogues she had once criticized so much. For some, Cuba was the best place in the world; for its adversaries\u2014among them Marisol\u2014Miami was the best place in the world. There was no middle ground for either of them. In Miami, Marisol was the fifth person who had told her to <i>stay<\/i> with such conviction. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">The first had been Yoel, Marisol\u2019s younger brother, when he did her the favor of picking her up at the airport. The second had been her distant cousin Hilda, a mother of four dependent on the Department of Children and Families. The third had been Yulitza. Flavia thought she remembered that being her name\u2014Yulitza. To be honest, she didn\u2019t really know her. She was a social worker whom she had bumped into at Hilda\u2019s house the afternoon she went to visit her, but Yulitza had told her to <i>stay<\/i> as if she had known her all her life. The fourth had been Pepe, her old music professor. Marisol was the fifth, and Flavia suspected that this was due to the fact that she had only encountered five Cubans during her trip.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">At first Flavia had tried to explain to some her decision to not stay in the city, but after a few semi-agitated discussions and accusations about <i>how silly you are<\/i> from that Yulitza, she decided to stop with the explanations. Professor Pepe\u2019s heart attack was the last straw. He had become so upset when Flavia had been honest with him and told him that no, Miami didn\u2019t seem at all like the place of her dreams and that capitalism was the same shit everywhere, that he had a fit right then and there. The fright that passed through her upon seeing Pepe grabbing his chest with both hands and coughing until his face was blue convinced Flavia that talking about politics and the economy in Miami was as useless as hoping to live long enough to see the end of the cold war. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Everyone needs their enemies to make them feel like they\u2019ve made the right decisions in life. That\u2019s why, when faced with Marisol\u2019s arguments, Flavia limited herself to agreeing. Fifteen days after arriving and one heart attack later, she felt like a high-performance athlete in avoiding needless discussions. She didn\u2019t even have to pay attention to the words. She knew that all the details came down to one single insistence: \u201cStay in Miami.\u201d Or <i>estey jir<\/i> to say it in Spanglish, the city\u2019s official language. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">She put up with five more minutes of Marisol holding her hand and blah blah blahing: \u201cSuper expensive rents but blah blah blah; no medical insurance but blah blah blah; family plan, debts, but everything\u2019s super great, blah blah blah \u2026 blah.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cThank you, Marisol, thank you,\u201d Flavia said and finally wrestled her hand away from her friend, as if to grab her iPhone and check a nonexistent message that could have (<i>meybi<\/i>) arrived.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cHey, Mari,\u201d Flavia took advantage of the sudden silence, \u201cthank you for agreeing to have a coffee with me. I know you have a lot on your plate. But I wanted to ask you if you know any Mexicans, or someone who is traveling to Mexico before the weekend, who could do me a favor and take an envelope to my husband.\u201d Flavia was startled by the piercing cackle of Marisol\u2019s nervous laughter.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;A Mexican in Miami? Oh, Flavia, you don\u2019t know anything about life. If you want to see a Mexican, you\u2019ll have to look in a construction site or a field or something like that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">For a few moments, Flavia considered the possibility that Construction Site was another city in Florida she hadn\u2019t heard of. But she remembered Augusto, Marisol\u2019s husband, because someone had told her that ever since he arrived in Miami he\u2019d worked for a construction company that built high-end condominiums. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Oh, Mari, then doesn\u2019t Augusto know any Mexicans from his work?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Marisol got up from the table as if Flavia had insulted her mother. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Well, I have to go. When are you leaving? Is there time for another coffee? I\u2019m super busy, really super busy \u2026 Well, tell me, Flavia, hon, wake up. When are you leaving?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><span class=\"s1\">Flavia hadn\u2019t been sleeping. She\u2019d begun to feel lethargic watching the flurry of words breezing nonstop out of Marisol\u2019s mouth. And she was still asking herself what that city was called\u2014Construction Site\u2014that her friend had so vehemently<\/span> <span class=\"s1\">refused to talk about. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cFlavia, sweetie, wake up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Oh, yeah, yeah, Marisol, I\u2019m leaving in a week. But, well, I wanted to find someone who would take this envelope to Mexico for me before that because if I send it by mail, we\u2019ll basically arrive together.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Once again it seemed that a bell had rung, snapping Marisol out of her trance. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Well, Flavi, say hi to your mom for me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Distracted, Flavia nodded once again. The mention of her dead mother made her realize that either it\u2019d been too many years since she\u2019d spoken to Marisol or her friend had not paid attention to anything she\u2019d told her over the first Cuban coffee they\u2019d shared in the land of reunion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Marisol got up from her chair and started to pick up her things scattered all over the table. As she put her pack of menthol cigarettes into her gold-colored purse, there was a burst of gestures and a stream of syllables. She told Flavia what lovely children one of her colleagues at work had, whom Flavia didn\u2019t know but would surely love to meet, then grabbed her keychain with the three-inch American flag on it and remembered that the Colombian woman who had given her that beautiful keychain had eight dogs\u2014eight dogs!\u2014in the courtyard of her house. A purple sparkly matchbox brought on mention of her boss\u2014a fifty-two-year-old, pregnant and with her hormones firing off, who was very upset lately, poor woman\u2014and the whole world thought that her husband was cheating on her with someone else, a colleague from the same office whom Flavia also didn\u2019t know, of course, but would surely love to meet. This woman, the boss\u2019s husband\u2019s lover, was the one who had given her the lace fan. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yes, yes, what a beautiful fan, and sure, I would love to meet your friend,\u201d responded Flavia automatically as she began to feel hot just looking at Marisol put on her pink, rhinestone-encrusted coat. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cA coat, Marisol?\u201d she had asked when she saw her friend getting in line for coffee under the full August sun, reserving her criticism for the fuchsia hue and the rhinestones on the back of the jacket. But seeing Marisol putting on the same jacket she\u2019d just taken off, Flavia finally understood that the woman used those colors to fill a void in her life. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Well, I better get back to work,\u201d said the Cuban from Miami, again with excessive seriousness, as if all the details about all those people in another galaxy had brought her naturally to the same conclusion: &#8220;But think about it, <i>estey jir <\/i>and you can count on me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">They exchanged noisy cheek kisses. Flavia watched Marisol\u2019s pink rhinestone-encrusted coat as it melted into the distance. She sighed. It was ironic that that <i>count on me<\/i> had been said by the same woman who\u2019d read Flavia\u2019s WhatsApp message and didn\u2019t get back to her for three days before agreeing to a coffee. In the distance, Marisol became a pink coat with two legs, then a pink coat without legs, then a shiny dot, then an unknown street. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Flavia gestured quickly to the waiter to pay the bill. From the bar he yelled, \u201cYour friend already paid.\u201d In an automatic reflex to ward off his yelling, she shrugged her shoulders. Upon seeing the gesture, the waiter understood that she had not heard him and repeated, \u201cYour friend already paid, ya pag\u00f3, she paid!\u201d He gestured with his right hand, making a cutting motion under his chin, meaning <i>she paid, girl<\/i>. Between kindly shouts that might have been death threats, Flavia left the caf\u00e9 faster than the speed of light. She tried to hide under the table umbrellas in the patio among people drinking their coffees, stumbling and tripping until she saw the walkway beside the building and luckily\u2014this was what she loved about Miami\u2014the water\u2019s edge.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1987\" style=\"width: 541px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1987\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-1987\" src=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Eduard-Reboll1-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"531\" height=\"299\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Eduard-Reboll1-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Eduard-Reboll1-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Eduard-Reboll1-360x203.jpg 360w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Eduard-Reboll1.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 531px) 100vw, 531px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-1987\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>Photo by Eduard Reboll.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">She crossed the street. She retraced her steps along the sidewalk toward the sand and felt the heat of millions of rock crystals around her feet. She took off her new sandals carefully, thinking that, at this very spot in the universe, she could spend the whole afternoon with her bare feet kneading grains of sand. And, in reality, she did have the whole afternoon to be there. The rare books she\u2019d come to look for at Museo P\u00e9rez had been scanned two days earlier; the same afternoon she\u2019d signed an agreement that was going to make her business grow substantially. And she still had a week to explore every little bit of Miami Beach. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">She\u2019d promised Esteban she\u2019d enjoy the trip\u2014\u201cAbove all, the ocean that you miss so much, my love\u201d\u2014and they kissed each other for the last time at the entrance to customs. Peace returned to her when she thought about Esteban. He was so calm, so serene, what would he say about that whirlwind of people and memories his wife had encountered? Thinking about Esteban distanced her more and more from Marisol\u2019s sermon, Pepe\u2019s heart attack, the waiter\u2019s shouting in the caf\u00e9\u2014from that strange caricature of Havana she imagined she saw at every turn. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Shouts behind her made her feel the heat of the sand again. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Flavia! Flavia!&#8221; It was Yelenis. &#8220;Girl, this truly only happens in Miami! This is so wild, running into you here.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">They hugged earnestly. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yele, it\u2019s so good to see you, and you look so beautiful.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Why didn\u2019t you tell me you were here in Miami, pretty girl? Are you staying or just visiting?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Oh, Yele, <i>m\u2019ija<\/i>, I only came for a few days and I thought you were still in Brazil.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;No, girl, I couldn\u2019t renew my residency papers over there so I had to come up here two years ago. When it comes to Cuba\u2014I\u2019m not even going back there in a coffin. But come on, let\u2019s go sit at the beach. Do you have time? This is such a coincidence! I come here every day to watch the sunset.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">The joy of meeting quickly dissipated. Fifteen minutes after their first hug, Yelenis became the sixth person in Miami to sing the same old song: <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;You\u2019re leaving in a week? Are you crazy? Opportunities like this don\u2019t come twice in a lifetime, Flavia! Stay, girl, this is the best decision I\u2019ve ever made.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">At this point Flavia had run out of patience. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Well, Yelenis, don\u2019t waste your breath with that same old <i>estey jir <\/i>or<i> estey dear.<\/i> I\u2019m not staying in Miami.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Yelenis had always seemed smarter than Marisol even though Flavia had stopped seeing both friends around the time they all started studying different majors at the University of Havana. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">The sun started to disappear into the ocean in front of them, just like the last afternoon they had gotten together on the boardwalk in Havana. The southern coast of Florida is a very strange place. This area bestows the most beautiful orange sunsets in the world, but because of its position over the Atlantic, the sun\u2019s silhouette does not reach the horizon. Perhaps that\u2019s why Cuban migrants here can never escape the ghosts of Cuba. Because even though they have turned this city into a replica of their country, they still don\u2019t have the shape of the stoic sun that melts into the ocean each afternoon.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Flavia felt that such an uncomfortable silence was unnecessary: <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Hey, do you know anyone who\u2019s going to Mexico this\u2014\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;What you\u2019re doing is right,\u201d Yelenis answered. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cWhat?&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;You\u2019re right not to stay here. I came from Brazil because I had no other option. But this is hard, Flavi. This is really hard. And no, I don\u2019t know anyone traveling to Mexico. I\u2019m basically alone. This city is a machine that grinds up people, a work machine\u2014shit with blush on.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yele, what about your aunt? Hasn\u2019t she been here for years?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yeah, yeah, but I almost never talk to her. She has her things, her work, her grandchildren, you know, her life.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;And do you talk to Marisol often?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Not really\u2014just on her birthday, the Fourth-of-Yulai, other dates like that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Do you know if she\u2019s still with Augusto?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">The strangest thing about all this is that Miami\u2019s orange sunset always becomes more intense the moment before it disappears. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yeah, yes,\u201d answered Yelenis. \u201cShe\u2019s still with Augusto, poor man, working like a dog in construction; he\u2019s always working, but that dumb girl Marisol says that in order for the bank to not revoke their car loan, she has to tell everyone that Augusto is an architect and makes a ton of money.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;And what\u2019s that about, Yelenis? How does she pay for the car?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;She doesn\u2019t pay for it, sweetie. They say a Mexican is paying it, the bank manager, the one she\u2019s cheating on poor Augusto with. Didn\u2019t you see she even got silicone boobs?\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">They both laughed with their entire bodies. They giggled slowly and with the ease of people with a shared history. Flavia experienced a certain schadenfreude with the story that was less dramatic than Pepe\u2019s heart attack. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Gray filled the entire horizon. Flavia thought she heard in the distance, \u201cPeanuts, hot roasted peanuts, get your peanuts here!\u201d It was either by the street or in her memory from Havana. <i>A peanut vendor in Miami?<\/i> she thought. She was going to ask Yelenis but her friend stood up suddenly and said she was leaving:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;I\u2019m on my bike. I don\u2019t want it to get too dark.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;Yeah, <i>m\u2019ija<\/i>, I have to go too,\u201d Flavia answered without clarifying that \u201cleaving\u201d meant leaving the beach, leaving Miami, the United States\u2014that \u201cleaving\u201d meant changing her plane ticket to Mexico for the next morning, or that very night. <i>As soon as possible, please<\/i> she would say to the airline representative. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Aware that another goodbye was coming, when the two friends hugged after the fact, it seemed strange for them not to recognize the thinness in each other\u2019s bodies that had remained consistent in their minds. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">&#8220;It\u2019s so good to see you, my friend,\u201d Yelenis reacted to the strangeness. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cIt\u2019s so good to see you too, friend,\u201d and she hugged Yelenis again, pinching her butt. They were the same girls they had been, and they were also the women they had become. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Flavia saw Yelenis\u2019s black shorts bouncing along through the warm sand, getting further away among the palm trees that looked like a tourist brochure, among an even thicker silence than the one that had signaled her arrival. A little beyond where the sidewalk started, she also thought she saw the silhouette of a bicycle, rusted and lonely, chained to a post. She thought about Esteban again and how happy he would be when she brought back the signed partnership papers in person, even though this would mean that she had sacrificed a few extra days at Miami Beach. By changing her flight, she was certain to get to Mexico City in time to dine with the shareholders of the business she and Esteban had started five years ago. This had been her greatest achievement, and had paid for her trip to Miami: her hotel, her Uber to go and see cousin Hilda, her new sandals\u2014this had been her success. She hadn\u2019t been able to tell her old friends about it, and even if she had told them, they might not have even been able to hear her. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Who would have thought that she would feel closest to her real self in Mexico City\u2014that overcrowded desert-like place so far from the ocean where she had arrived as an exchange student at twenty years old.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">She had to admit that maybe the problem wasn\u2019t the ocean, maybe her problem was Miami, a too identical copy of Havana where, in spite of everything, something was always missing. Who could be sure \u2026 Maybe this was really all about the orange silhouette of a stoic sun melting into the horizon each afternoon. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">Flavia slipped her iPhone out of her pocket and took a selfie. It wasn\u2019t gray. The entire phone screen was black. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\"><span class=\"s1\" style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cIt\u2019s good like that.\u201d There are moments we need to capture and keep forever.<\/span><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-1981 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-225x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"135\" height=\"180\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-1536x2048.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-360x480.jpg 360w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JT-Pic-scaled.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 135px) 100vw, 135px\" \/><strong>Jesse Tomlinson<\/strong> is a Canadian literary translator and interpreter living in Guadalajara, Mexico. Her portfolio of Spanish into English translations can be found here: <a href=\"https:\/\/tomlinsontranslations.com\/portfolio\/publications\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tomlinsontranslations.com\/portfolio\/publications<\/a>. You can follow her here: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/tom_trans\">@tom_trans<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/jessedoinginsta\/\">jessedoinginsta<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Jesse Tomlinson es una traductora literaria e int\u00e9rprete canadiense que vive en Guadalajara, M\u00e9xico. Su portafolio de traducciones del espa\u00f1ol al ingl\u00e9s se puede encontrar aqu\u00ed: <a href=\"https:\/\/tomlinsontranslations.com\/portfolio\/publications\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tomlinsontranslations.com\/portfolio\/publications<\/a>. S\u00edguela aqu\u00ed: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/tom_trans\">@tom_trans<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/jessedoinginsta\/\">jessedoinginsta<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-1982 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"135\" height=\"202\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-681x1024.jpg 681w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-768x1155.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-1022x1536.jpg 1022w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-1362x2048.jpg 1362w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-360x541.jpg 360w, https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Dainerys-Machado2-scaled.jpg 1703w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 135px) 100vw, 135px\" \/><strong>Dainerys Machado Vento<\/strong> is a Cuban journalist, writer, and literary researcher. She is the author of <i>Las noventa Habanas,\u00a0<\/i>a collection of short stories published by Katakana Editores in 2019. Dainerys is a PhD Candidate in Literary, Cultural, and Linguistic Studies at the University of Miami. You can follow her here: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Dainerys_MV\">@Dainerys_MV<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/dainerys_mv\/\">dainerys_mv<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Dainerys Machado Vento es una periodista, escritora e investigadora literaria cubana. Es la autora del libro de cuentos <i>Las noventa Habanas <\/i>(Katakana Editores, 2019). Es candidata a Doctora en Estudios Literarios, Ling\u00fc\u00edsticos y Culturales por la Universidad de Miami. S\u00edguela aqu\u00ed: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Dainerys_MV\">@Dainerys_MV<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/dainerys_mv\/\">dainerys_mv<\/a>.<\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;Opportunities like this come once in a lifetime, Flavia,\u201d said Marisol in an officious tone. She was holding one of Flavia\u2019s hands and looking into her eyes as if she were disclosing the mystery of the Apocalypse. They had been in the same position for ten minutes, ever since Marisol had said, \u201cWe need to [&hellip;]<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":1986,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[181],"tags":[425,304,256,416,418,427,424,421,417,429,207,426,305,428,257,235,184,420,415,423,422,419],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.13 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>STAY - Spanglish Voces Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.spanglishvoces.com\/index.php\/2020\/10\/11\/stay\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"STAY - Spanglish Voces Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&#8220;Opportunities like this come once in a lifetime, Flavia,\u201d said Marisol in an officious tone. 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