Dallas Called My Ex Rich and Barren, So I Found Out He Was Neither novel · Chapter 23 of 24
Chapter 23: The Tape Measure
On Sunday afternoon Levi stood in my grandmother's kitchen with his straw hat in both hands and turned it by the brim.
Chayo sat at the old door-table with a bowl of masa and did not look up.
I stood by the stove with my arms crossed and a coffee I was not going to drink.
"Ma'am," he said.
"Mijo."
"I came to ask you something," he said.
"Have you eaten?"
"Yes, ma'am. I had two plates of rice at the corner."
"Rice," said Chayo, with deep disappointment, and got up and put four tamales in front of him.
He sat.
He looked at the tamales.
"Ma'am, I want to marry your granddaughter."
"Eat," said Chayo.
"I'd like your blessing first."
"Eat," she said, "and I will give you my answer."
He ate two.
My grandmother watched him with her chin on her fist, and the kitchen was silent but for the clock over the stove.
When he had finished the second one, she put out her hand and took the hat out of his lap.
She turned it over and looked at the sweatband.
"You framed houses for this?" she said.
"Yes, ma'am."
"With your own hands," she said.
"Every week since March."
She nodded slowly.
"The first time, you had a hundred suits and no sense," she said. "Now you have one hat and some sense. Better."
She handed the hat back and looked at me.
"Abuela," I said.
"Mija, you didn't touch your coffee."
I opened my mouth.
"Or the café con leche last Sunday. Or the chile."
I put the cup down.
"Sí, mija. I know."
She came around the table, short and fierce in her apron, and took Levi's face in both hands as she had the first Sunday.
"You will take care of the two of them," she said, in Spanish, and then in English, so that he could not pretend. "Yes?"
He went white, and then red.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of Dallas Called My Ex Rich and Barren, So I Found Out He Was Neither are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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