GENESIS
Penelope Goh pulls me into a hug as she steps out of the back of the black car. “Sorry I’m late. We got stuck behind a blockade. My driver said the police found two bodies in a burned-out van last night.” “Of course they did.” Holden shrugs. “Because why wouldn’t my girlfriend’s sense of adventure drag us into a war-torn third-world country?”
“You sound like my father.” But Colombia is a different place than it was when my dad and his widowed, pregnant mother emigrated. Nana wouldn’t have moved back if that weren’t true. “We’re perfectly safe here,” I insist.
“Then why does it look like you’re fleeing the country?” Penelope eyes the hiking packs lined up on my grandmother’s front porch.
“Because once again, Genesis has confused danger with excitement.” Holden wraps one arm around her as the driver opens the trunk to retrieve her luggage, and his stage whisper is perfectly audible. “Maybe we should show her what real excitement looks like.”
I roll my eyes at him. Holden likes to push boundaries, but we both know what lines not to cross. “We’re going hiking in the jungle.” I link my arm through my best friend’s arm and pull her away from him. “A shopping spree was the only way to talk Neda out of her four-hour mud facial in favor of actual mud and sweat. I got you some gear.”
“You’re serious,” she says as the driver carries her luggage past us into the foyer. “Does Neda understand that there’s no Wi-Fi or filtered water in the jungle?”
“The cabanas have both, and I might have downplayed how little time we’re actually going to spend in them.”
Penelope laughs as her gaze wanders over the supplies I had packed for each of us.
“I probably shouldn’t be surprised by the 180-degree pivot from spa day to jungle hike, but . . .”
“You really shouldn’t. The car will be here in half an hour. Come say hi to Nana, then you can change clothes and stuff your swimsuit into your pack.”
“So how was the event?” Holden says as Penelope’s car pulls out of the driveway. “Actually, what was the event that made you willing to forgo the private jet in favor of flying commercial?”
“Judging for the Special Olympics, jackass.” Penelope and her Olympic silver medal on the uneven bars are in high demand for appearances since she retired from competition two years ago. She reaches around me to give Holden a playful shove. “You should try giving back.”
“We’ll be there next time,” I promise. Holden grumbles, but doesn’t argue. He’ll do the right thing, even if it makes him uncomfortable. I never have to worry about him when there’s a live audience.
“Speaking of private jets, your dad offered to have his pilot drop me off in the Bahamas after my event. I had to tell him I’d already booked a flight to keep this trip on a need-to-know.”
I squeeze her arm tighter. Only a true friend will lie to your father’s face for you.
“So what’d I miss?” Pen asks as we head toward Nana’s front door, her couture sandals clicking on the colorful stone walkway.
“A true sign of the end times.” Holden holds the door open for us and we step into the foyer, where Pen’s bags are waiting and the scent of arepas con huevo still lingers. “Neda and Maddie agree about something.”
“About what?”
“That we shouldn’t have let Genesis plan this trip.”
I shrug. “Maddie’s mad because I didn’t ask her mommy if she could come.”
Pen laughs again as she grabs her makeup case and the smaller of her two suitcases. “So your preachy cousin has fresh material for a new sermon, your hot cousin doesn’t drink anymore, and Neda’s just been denied the spa treatment you said would help her drop two pounds of water weight in a day. Remind me why I came?”
“Because you love me. Because you’re my best friend. And because when we get back from Tayrona, the full-day spa package is on me.”
My phone buzzes again with another message from my dad.
Genesis, WHY aren’t you on the plane?
88 HOURS EARLIER
MADDIE
“Is anyone else being eaten alive by mosquitoes?” Neda slaps at a bug on her calf. “No,” I say, even though I have three bites on my left arm. During the four-hour drive from Cartagena to Parque Tayrona, her voice surpassed the shrieking of my alarm clock as my least favorite sound on the planet. “The rest of us found the risk of contracting malaria more compelling than the possibility of staining our clothes with bug spray.” Which is especially ironic, considering that she’s already splattered with mud.
“Why can’t we just go back to the cabana?” Neda whines. “Hiking isn’t a vacation. Hiking is work.”
I’d rather sleep in the sand with a rock for a pillow than bunk in the cabana with my cousin and her spoiled, ignorant entourage.
Neda complains about every step, and Nico’s jaw clenches tighter and tighter until I’m sure he’s going to dislocate his own jaw. Finally he pulls a small radio from his bag and drowns her out with salsa music. When the first song ends, a newsbreak reports that police found two bodies in a burned-out van on the edge of Cartagena last night.
My insides twist into knots. My father’s body was discovered the same way, nearly a year ago.
“What’s wrong?” Neda demands, and Nico summarizes the Spanish-language newscast.
Her forehead furrows. “It’s probably guerrilla warfare,” she announces, turning to me with an “I told you so” expression.
Genesis scowls at Nico. “Why would you translate that for her?”
“It’s not guerrilla warfare,” he snaps at Neda, his accent thickened with irritation. “FARC has disbanded. It’s just an isolated incident.”
He’s right. The conflict between activists and the Colombian government is all but over. This has to be a random act.
“Then it must be drug violence,” she insists.
I speak through clenched teeth. “Believe it or not, Neda, sometimes people in Colombia commit crimes unrelated to drug trafficking. Just like in the rest of the world.”
Still, I wish Ryan hadn’t heard. The reminder of our father’s death might not send him into a backslide, but it won’t help him either.
