Visit your aunt in the big city

At twenty and a half, out of high school for two years and with your muscles finally filling in -- your here-and-there jobs gardening, drywalling, and construction helping out -- you decide you really need to move out on your own. Not only are Mom's rules cramping your style, but she's starting to nag about going to college. You've been going to college -- community college, anyway -- and in two shakes you could get a certificate. There's a lot of money in property, and you feel like you're starting to get a sense of how to get a piece of it. But it's just too hard to know how to get things started.

You end up using your Aunt Linda as your sounding board a lot -- she's Mom's younger sister, who lives in the big city -- maybe because Mom doesn't much like her, but you've always liked her -- she's always made you laugh, taught you games, but never talked down to you. Every time you tell Aunt Linda your story, she says to you, "Douglas MacArthur Hua-wei Lee! You just need to get off your ass and move out! Move to the city! Go fight forest fires! Do something!"

But it's not until you're best man at your best friend's wedding -- knowing he and his bride are moving off to Arizona for his new job -- that you actually start thinking hard about what you're going to do. In some ways it's good, you know, since both of you were dating her pretty heavily until she settled on him, and it'll be good to have some breathing room. But with both of them flying off toward their future, Linda's advice really starts chewing at you.

"Aunt Linda," you tell her on the phone, "so, if I wanted to move out to the city, what would I need to know?"

"Did your mom ground you again?" she asks, with a teasing lilt in her voice.

"No, it's just, you know, my friends are starting to move away and it's like I feel like I have to get something going in my life. I mean, I've been doing a lot of house construction and repair stuff, and painting, maybe restoring houses in the city would be a good way to start out. Do you know anyone doing that?"

"Hm, maybe," Linda says. "Why don't you come out for a visit and we'll talk."

Linda meets you at the bus station. You stuff your duffle bag into the front cargo compartment of her little old rear-engine VW Beetle. You fold yourself into the front passenger seat.

As Linda drives you for a little spin around the city, showing you a few sights and pointing out the bus and transit stops, she quizzes you a bit more about what you've been up to, and what your hopes and interests are. As she talks, one of her hands waves in the air in time with her speech. The nails are a glowing coral red, and not long, but gently pointed. The same coral red highlights her lips. Her straight black hair hangs down to her shoulders, and her smooth golden skin looks like it's never seen a bad day.

You ask her what's been going on in her life lately.

"The same, you know, I'm still managing the apartments," she says. "I've got a new roommate, things look good there. I might be looking for some new maintenance help. Louie, the man who's been doing it for forty years, he wants to cut back to half time, and start taking some vacation trips. The owners want to hold on to him -- I mean, he knows all sorts of things nobody else does about fixing things, and how things go wrong and all -- but there's more routine fix-it jobs than he can handle at half-time, and it's such a pain getting help from a service, half the time they don't know what they're doing and Louie needs to fix it again."

Aunt Linda's sharp, dark eyes spy out a parking place, and she expertly works clutch, brake, and steering wheel to wedge herself into a parking space you wouldn't have considered. "All right, dinner now, you're still a growing boy." She looks up as you unfold yourself onto the sidewalk. "Better not grow any more, or you won't fit in my car!"

Linda herself is petite, with an almost boyish figure, and at 5' 4", a little smaller than your mom. With you, it seems like your dad's build and stature are showing true, and you remember grinning at yourself in the mirror a couple of months ago when it was clear you'd finally hit six feet.

As you approach the restaurant, you raise an eyebrow and ask Linda something that's been puzzling you.

"Aunt Linda, if you're the resident manager, why do you have to have a roommate?"

There's a Black woman of dark bronze skin tone standing in front of the restaurant. Her short, curly hair is frosted with gold highlights, and she wears gold hoop earrings. She looks up and smiles as you approach.

"Linda! Mi cariña!" she calls out. She throws her arms around your aunt and kisses her on the mouth. One hand goes down to give your aunt a pinch on the bottom. "And this must be your dear nephew!"

Your eyes widen and you feel the tips of your ears getting warm.

Linda looks at you. "I have a roommate because I like having someone to come home to at night," she says.

You swallow. Now some of your mother's remarks about Linda's unfeminine habits make more sense.

"Doug, meet my roommate Aurelia Reyes. She is also my girlfriend. My lover," Aunt Linda says.

"Linda has told me so much about you," Aurelia says. Her voice has some sort of Spanish accent. "I am pleased to meet you." She reaches out her arms toward you, offering a hug.