Evenings at the Argentine Club by Julia Amante

do?”
    “Never mind. Tell me about taking over the restaurant. I didn’t think you had any interest in that.”
    “I don’t. But it’s a job.”
    “There are lots of jobs. Didn’t you want to be an interior designer once?”
    So he remembered her grand plans. One rainy weekend in particular came to mind, when their parents had gotten together. Carmen
     sat on the phone talking to her friends for hours, then actually did homework. She and Eric settled in his room, their shoes
     off, radio on. He playing video games and she drawing new interiors for his room. “How about this?” she’d say, interrupting
     his game. “I’m not changing my room,” he’d said over and over again to each of her new designs. He barely looked at what she’d
     done, keeping his eyes on the TV screen. They’d been, what? Fifteen.
    She watched him now give a final stroke of the brush to his mother’s shutters and wondered what he thought of the way she’d
     redecorated his old room. “I do that for fun,” she said. “I helped your mom decorate her place.”
    “She told me. You did a great job.”
    “Thanks.” Neither one of them mentioned his room. She’d found all her old designs packed away in his closet and left them
     where she’d found them. Instead of using any of those teen sketches, she painted his room in a nice, neutral taupe, exchanged
     his twin bed for a mature double with dark, masculine bedspreads instead of the sports quilt. Only one wall highlighted his
     childhood and provided evidence that this had been his personal space. A display case held his trophies, rock collections,
     model cars, airplanes, and houses. And a collection of pictures of Eric from baby to young man were framed in various sizes
     and hung on the wall beside the display case. Lucia had cried and told her again and again that she loved it, even though
     she’d been hesitant to let her touch his room at the beginning.
    He watched her as he took his paintbrush over to the hose and ran water through it, droplets spraying in all directions. “I
     know your dad’s not retiring. He told me about his business plans.”
    Victoria found that hard to believe. Why would he tell Eric of all people about something he was being so secretive about?
    “He asked me if I’d be interested in finding good, cheap commercial property for him. Scouting out good locations for his
     expansions.”
    Victoria listened and frowned. “Why you?”
    “Well I asked myself that, too, especially because I have a feeling he thinks I’m a major fuckup. But I guess my dad convinced
     him that I do know what I’m doing.”
    “Which is?”
    “I’m a real-estate investor. I buy houses, fix them up, and resell them at a profit. Apparently your dad figured I would know
     where to find what he’s looking for.”
    Victoria nodded. “Would you?”
    “Possibly. But I turned him down.”
    “Why?”
    He shrugged. “I work for myself.”
    That was a typical, self-centered Eric response. “I see.”
    “I suggested he use you, but he wasn’t thrilled with that idea. Didn’t think it would be something you could do.”
    “He’s right. I don’t know where he should open new restaurants,” she said, though it stung to hear that her father had told
     Eric that he lacked confidence in her abilities. “In fact, all this is very new to me. I just learned of his plans recently,
     and I’m not sure how I feel about it.”
    He dried his hands on a towel he’d hung on the porch rail and walked around the porch. “You weren’t in on the planning stage?”
    Seen through his eyes, she realized how it must look. She didn’t know what was going on in the family business. He must think
     she was either an idiot or self-absorbed to the point that she didn’t care what went on, or what was closer to the truth—her
     father didn’t think enough of her to let her in on the daily running of the business until now. “I found his paperwork in
     the back office, and he explained