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Sofia Reyes is a great big sister thank you very much. Which is why when Carlos goes radio silent for a few days more than normal she insists that they meet up for lunch on his day off. Which is why she’s currently sitting on a patio sweating under the Texan sun with nothing more than an umbrella and a margarita keeping her cool waiting for her baby brother to make an appearance. He’s punctual as always though, she can see him peering over the tables trying to find her until she waves her hand to catch his attention. He threads his way between the tables and leans in to lay a quick kiss to her cheek before taking his seat.
“Long time no see little bro,” She tilts her sunglasses down to better look him in the eye and she can see him squirm a bit in guilt. “Too busy fighting crime to check in on your favourite sister every now and then?”
“You’re my only sister,” Carlos rolls his eyes. This is a familiar song and dance, Sofia always tends to a dramatic opening when she’s really not upset at all.
“And don’t you forget it!” A wide grin graces her face. “So what’s new in the life of Carlos Reyes? Please tell me you haven’t actually just been working non-stop for the past two weeks.”
“Nothing much really,” Carlos shrugs. “Same as always really: work, house work, hanging out with friends.”
“Not nervous about ending your first quarter century on Earth?”
“I think you are the only person on this planet who worried about turning twenty-six.”
“I blame it on mami, I was fine about it all until she told me I was closer to fifty than birth. And then Tia Rosa made a big deal about me being single and ‘didn’t I know that mami had me by that point.’ Be glad you’re a man and gay.”
“Yes because being gay in Texas has been so easy,” Carlos deadpans.
“Oh shush you, you know what I meant,” Sofia takes another sip of her margarita. “Mami and Tia Rosa and the lot of them aren’t going to make a big deal about you getting older. Be grateful it’s all working in your favour for once.”
Carlos just laughs and then the waiter arrives to take their orders which gives Sofia a bit more time to determine how she’s going to start on the whole reason she dragged him out here. She really wants to plan him a party for his birthday next week. She knows it’s going to be a bit of an uphill battle with him, she doesn’t exactly have the best track record on parties for Carlos. She’s still stirring her straw around in her margarita trying to formulate a plan when Carlos grabs her attention.
“Just tell me.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I know you and I can tell you’re stewing over something so just spit it out.”
“Fine, I wanted to throw you a party next week for your birthday. It’s falling on a Saturday for like, the first in forever so most of the family will be able to make it!”
“Absolutely not,” Carlos crosses his arms and leans back in his chair.
“Oh c’mon Carlos,” Sofia’s not above begging if it gets her what she wants. “Give me one good reason why not other than you being completely lame.”
“You mean like the time you decided to throw a party for my tenth birthday and instead almost burned down the kitchen?”
“I was twelve! How was I supposed to know the difference between wax paper and parchment paper?” She throws her arms up in protest.
“It’s literally written on the box Sofia!”
“Ok fine, but that’s literally ancient history and I know the difference now. I’ll even promise to not cook anything myself, I’ll rope mami and Tia Rosa into it,” Sofia’s willing to make concessions to get this party to happen and not cooking is a fairly easy one.
“Or what about the time you decided to throw me a coming out party and instead managed to give me a black eye instead?” Carlos eyebrows tick up like he’s won the argument but Sofia has a whole lot more fight in her yet.
“I still maintain that those two things were unrelated. The party itself was awesome, who doesn’t like a pool party?” She feels a smirk form on her face. “Besides I think it was pretty genius to throw a pool party and then invite all the hot guys from my class, I was doing you a solid. A teenage gay boy’s wet dream.”
“Ugh, please never say those words again,” Carlos turns his head in disgust. “It was also your idea to start a game of chicken and then kicked me in the face so hard mami had to bring me to the hospital.”
“Ok so maybe that part wasn’t so great, but the party up until that point was good. Don’t think I didn’t see you eyeing up Travis Bolton,” Sofia continues quickly cutting off the argument she can see Carlos was about to make. “Also, we’re not teenagers anymore so it wouldn’t even be a pool party so no possible chicken mishaps.”
She thinks she’s finally won him over when he pulls out the big guns, “College graduation.”
“Ok yeah, I admit that wasn’t my finest moment.”
“Not your finest moment? Sofia you got wasted, told a bunch of embarrassing stories to the guy I was seeing and then barfed on his shoes. He barely talked to me after that!”
“Alright, I have no defense for that one. But can’t you see, this is why I need to redeem myself!” She’s full on begging at this point. “I promise if you give me this one chance you’ll never doubt my party planning skills ever again.”
Carlos sighs and just gives her a look. “I’m working that Saturday, I won’t be off until 8:00 so it’s all a moot point anyways.”
Their food arrives and Sofia decides to let it go at that point but now she has a new idea forming in her head. She’s never thrown Carlos a surprise party before.
The next Saturday Sofia is hiding out in Carlos’ apartment and trying not to pat herself on her back but she has truly outdone herself on this one. Everything is perfect. She managed to convince mami and Tia Rosa to cater the event and they spent all day making tamales which smell absolutely divine. And then Hector and Hernando and all the rest of their favourite cousins made the trip across town, and in some instances across the state, to attend. Her crowning glory is that she got in touch with Michelle who not only took the day off to help her decorate but also managed to rope McCoy, Carlos’ partner, into texting her when Carlos leaves the precinct. Carlos will never doubt her party planning skills ever again.
Her phone dings and she looks down to check the message, ‘He just left. ETA 20 min.’
“Alright everyone! The birthday boy has left the building, please assume your party positions! I repeat assume party positions!”
She rolls her eyes as she watches her cousins grab fresh drinks before hunkering down around pieces of furniture. Sofia gives her phone to Michelle and asks her to record his reaction, she’s going to want to watch this on repeat for years to come. She quickly flicks off the rest of the lights and then waits.
They can all hear when his Camaro pulls into the driveway and an extra level of silence settles around them. She holds her breath when she hears the sound of car doors closing and the scuffling of feet and was that laughter? Who had she missed from the invite list? She looks around the room, she’s pretty sure all his friends are here. There’s a thump at the front door and then the tinkling of keys being inserted into the lock.
The door swings open much quicker than anyone expected and Carlos is back on to the crowd and that’s when Sofia figures out what’s happening. Carlos is going to kill her. Everyone is stood in shock as they watch a man back Carlos into the wall behind the door and absolutely devours him while reaching a hand behind Carlos’ body, possibly down the back of his pants. Neither of them have noticed their audience until there’s a loud bang from a beer bottle hitting the floor and then the two of them are staring at the room full of people. They’re both pretty ruffled and their lips are obviously swollen and Carlos is going to kill her and she totally deserves it. Nobody has uttered a word so Sofia decides to break the stand-off, she’s about to die anyways so might as well get it over with.
“Um, surprise?” It’s not as loud as it was meant to be but everyone hears her and then the room dissolves into absolute chaos.
“Who the hell is this?” She can hear her mother grilling Carlos while his face turns red and the still unidentified man lets out a slightly hysterical laughter. Carlos seems to be avoiding eye contact while trying to stammer out answers but finally Carlos’ eyes meet hers and she’s going to have to leave the state, no the country, hell maybe even the continent because there’s no way she's getting out of this one.
He’s making his way across the room now, ignoring the jeers from various friends and family members. She can’t help but notice that his companion is crossing the room with him, which is surprising. As they get closer she’s even more surprised to see that Carlos has his hand firmly clasped in his own as if to stop them from being separated in the ten steps it took to get to her.
“Sofia,” Carlos’ voice is low and she’s pretty sure the large crowd of friends and family is the only thing stopping him from yelling at her. “I take it you’re responsible for this lovely event?”
“Um, happy birthday?” She tries to play it off with a little smile and then turns her attention to the man beside Carlos. “I don’t think we’ve met before, Sofia Reyes.”
“TK Strand,” TK untangles his hand from Carlos’ to offer it to her, it’s a ballsy move considering they all just witnessed where exactly that hand had been but she doesn’t have it in herself to refuse.
“What did I say about planning a party?” Carlos brings her attention back to him and his face is stony.
“I mean, technically, you said you didn’t get off until 8:00 so it was a moot point?” She tilts her head and gives the biggest puppy dog eyes she can manage. “You didn’t actually say no.”
TK breaks into laughter at that and she can see Carlos’ resolve start to break. She’s found a weak point, maybe there’s still hope for her yet.
“If he told me he wanted to spend his birthday banging his hot boyfriend?” She looks to TK for confirmation and he gives a little nod. “Then I obviously would have altered the plans a bit.”
“You don’t say,” Carlos is struggling to keep a straight face now and TK’s whole face is glowing with a smile.
“Well hello boys,” Michelle interrupts with a smirk and holds a phone out to Sofia. “That was quite the show you gave us.”
“Too soon, chica,” Carlos groans, covering his face with his free hand and then narrows his eyes at her. “It didn’t occur to you to, I don’t know, at least give TK a warning?”
“Well TK is supposed to be twelve hours into a twenty-four hour shift so I didn’t think it was necessary,” Michelle is showing exactly zero remorse at her apparent helping hand in that little display. Sofia glances down at her phone and realizes she had actually recorded the whole display and didn’t delete it. Damn, she’s good.
“I, ah, cleared the time off with the Captain.” TK is fidgeting a little bit now but Carlos runs thumb back and forth over their clasped hands and that seems to calm him. Sofia still feels like she’s missing some crucial piece of information here.
“So, wait, are you a cop too?” Sofia can’t see how dating a coworker could possibly be a good idea.
“Firefighter actually,” TK’s smile is back again and she can totally understand what Carlos sees there. “I work over at the 126 with Michelle.”
“Now that we’ve completed the introduction I think it’s time to get back to the matter at hand,” Carlos turns on his sister. “Remember that conversation we had last week about how all the parties you plan end in disaster? I’d like to include today as another bullet point.”
“Ok fine, you win! I’m the worst party planner of all time and I promise to never plan another party for you ever again.”
Carlos seems satisfied with that and he pulls TK away to start the round of introductions to all the party goers. She watches as TK moves his arm to wrap around Carlos’ waist as they’re surrounded by a group of cousins like it physically pains him to be further apart. Sofia can admit she made a few tactical errors with this party but TK seems to be rolling with the punches in a way that makes her sure he’s going to be around for years to come.
She might be bad at planning parties but she bets she could throw one hell of a wedding.