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it was she too who first told Julia what it felt like to be in love. The girls would lock themselves in the big bathroom for long confabs that could go on until dawn. Julia immediately knew when Anna was in love, because she would deny it while batting her eyelashes like butterfly wings. Julia found her sister’s emotional states ridiculous and told herself she’d never be in love that way. But she did feel a prickle ofenvy as she watched her sister plotting to win over whichever young man she’d set her heart on.
    When Anna stayed over, Mama Fina’s phone never stopped ringing. It was Julia’s job to pick up and pretend she didn’t know whether her sister was in, to give Anna time to decide if she wanted to take the call or have the person call back later. If Anna’s favorite suitor, Pablo, called, Julia had to make a huge effort not to roar with laughter. Anna would fling herself to the ground and pedal frantically in the air, unable to control her emotion, while Julia, bent double, did her best to cover the receiver. Anna would exhale in small puffs to calm herself down. When she was breathing normally again, she would take the telephone, acting perfectly naturally, and apologize to the boy for keeping him waiting. As soon as Anna hung up, Julia would find herself racing around the fountain in the courtyard with her, whooping like a Sioux, as excited by the invitation as Anna.
    So Julia went to help with the preparations for the party with the feeling that she had an important mission to accomplish. She’d heard that Pablo had just confirmed his attendance. She took charge of the decorations, making bright garlands from the glossy pages of magazines her mother had collected. She blew up multicolored balloons and hung them in clusters in the corners of rooms and above doors. She fitted colored lightbulbs in the ground-floor lamps and ceiling lights and turned the living room into a dance hall by pushing all the furniture against the walls. Finally she helped her mother stirthe huge pot of
spaghetti napolitana
and stack up plates on the buffet table.
    The guests arrived all at once and Julia felt like an outsider. The boys strolled easily into the kitchen, kissed her mother, greeting her by her first name, and came out again holding the glasses she’d handed them. Standing next to her mother, Julia felt invisible.
    When Anna, radiant in a turquoise print dress, switched on the new record player and Pablo unpacked his collection of LPs of the latest hits by Almendra, Sui Generis, and Led Zeppelin, Julia sought refuge in the small garden at the front of the house. She was too eager to dance, too afraid of not being asked, and even more afraid of being asked and not knowing what to do.
    Through the wide-open door Julia watched the twins spinning all the girls around and Anna changing partners each time a new song came on, under Pablo’s amused gaze. None of the boys was paying any attention to Julia. She was almost ashamed and berated herself for having dressed like a child, in a long blue paisley-print cotton dress with a smocked top that flattened her breasts.
    A young man with rumpled hair and a blasé air came out, glass in hand, and sat down at her side, so clumsily that for a moment she thought he would spill his drink over her. Finally he turned around and gave her a beaming smile. Julia nearly walked away, horrified at the thought that he might be motivated by pity. But she found him so unattractive, with hispockmarked skin and huge lips, that she felt as if their roles had been reversed and allowed herself to be pleasant.
    He held out the glass to her. “An improvement on what your mother’s dishing out,” he said.
    Julia raised one eyebrow, half-offended, half-amused.
    â€œIt’s Coca-Cola . . . with a dash of rum!” he went on.
    â€œIt’s not really my thing,” Julia retorted.
    â€œYou’re mistaken. Not only does it taste good,