Este’s eyes are wide.

She just can’t wait!

“Mamá, can we start yet?” She asks, bouncing up and down on her light up sneakers.

Ever since Roman got her them for her birthday, she refused to take them off.

They’re so pretty, lighting up in pink!

“Soon, mija. Jeremiah is getting Roman.”

“Yay!” She exclaims, clapping her hands. After Mamá and Miah, her brother’s soulmate, Ro, is her favorite person.

He is funny and makes her laugh. And when she hurt her knee, he took her pain with his powers.

And he makes her brother smile which means a lot of happy plants in the house. So there’s that.

As if summoned by a fairy’s magic spell, Miah and Ro appear.

“Family game night can commence!” Miah announces, scooping up Este. She squeals as he throws her over his shoulder like a bag of patatas instead of the 7 year old that she is.

“You’re the guest, so you can choose Roman,” Mamá suggests.

_Guest?_ Este frowns. “I thought Ro is family?” Familia is the people that you love. At least that what Mamá and Miah always tell her.

“Of course he is,” Mamá agreeing.

“But you said guest?”

Miah picks her up again and sets her between him and Ro. “Someone can be a guest of this house and also be familia, hermanita,” Miah explains.

She guesses that’s an ok answer. “Ok.”

“Hey Este, what is your favorite game?” Ro asks, leaning over to her level, his breath tickling her ear.

Immediately, Este grins and goes off. “I love Candyland. But that makes me want candy and we haven’t had cena yet.”

“Good point.”

“Uno!” She shouts.

Mamá must have guessed that. She had the cards ready. Este likes Uno. It uses Mamá’s language.

And she wins a lot.

They play a few rounds and Este is winning. She likes winning.

Getting down to three cards, she says, “Tres.”

“You don’t have to say how many cards you have until uno,” Ro advises. He has five cards, having just had to pick up from a great plus four move by Miah.

“But Mamá likes us talking español,” Este points out.

“I don’t want you to lose your roots, mija,” Mamá agrees. Este beams at Mamá’s smile.

Though the words puzzle her. “My roots? Like árboles?”

“She means where your family came from. Before moving here,” Ro says, putting down a cinco verde.

Este likes the image of a tree with roots of español sprouting into a strong trunk with bonito blossoms.

Miah places a ocho verde. “Uno. Your move, hermanita.”

She chooses her card carefully. In her hands, there is two options, a card of the same number but different color and a +dos in verde.

Looking at her hermano, he is practically shaking from excitement. The plants in their casa are perking up from his abilities being tied to his emotions.

Smiling, she puts down the ocho rojo.

He throws down a wildcard. “Yo gano!”

When they all laugh at his win (since he never wins), Este looks around and doesn’t feel bad for losing. At least not this time.

There will be more games and more family nights.

———

(I always pictured Jeremiah being Latino. I only know Spain Spanish (which I know is different than for example Mexican Spanish) that I had two high school classes of, so please forgive my lack of knowledge. I’m not sure exactly how a bilingual child would think, so I’m just been incorporating some Spanish words. I think you can guess for most of the words. “Yo gano” means “I win.”)