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“Las Aparicio” recap: Episodes 18-20

Rafaela

Mama Rafaela continues to be suspicious of all the men in her daughters’ lives. She even goes as far as inviting Leonardo (Alma’s boyfriend) to a game of chess (and lets him win even though she’s a chess genius). The two of them spend a while chatting, being suspicious of each other, and generally being passive-aggressive.

 

Alma

Alma is starting to unravel a little bit because she doesn’t know how to move forward with Leonardo. She can’t be totally honest about her Top Secret Male Escort business, but she doesn’t know how to be in a serious relationship and still keep so much of herself hidden. I’m sure if she knew that he was secretly investigating her, following her, and lying to her she’d feel a little less uncertain about things. Leonardo isn’t all bad though. His feelings for Alma seem genuine despite all the lies. He’s sort of stuck too, now, because he’s in love with her but doesn’t trust her, and is still doubtful as to whether or not Alma had anything to do with Maximo’s murder.

To further complicate things, Alma has grown closer to Male Escort Alejandro, who is also in love with her. With him, she can be totally honest since he knows all her Deep Dark Secrets. But she still seems more into Leonardo.

At the end of episode 20, Leonardo asks Alma to meet him at the bar where they first met. Alma shows up and the two of them make a game out of revisiting their first conversation, line by line. But eventually Alma changes the script and tells him that instead of saying what she’d originally said, she’s going to say what she should have said, which is that he looks like a man that can complicate her life and that she doesn’t want to go home with him. And then she walks away from him. So I’m not sure whether that was her way of breaking up with him or not. Regardless, I doubt that’s the last we’ll see of Leonardo.

In related news, Alma’s daughter, Ileana, is still dating Male Escort Mauro, who has agreed to a vow of chastity in order to date her. Ileana is still oblivious to the fact that Mauro is not actually a male model but rather a semi-retired manslut that used to work for her mother. When the truth comes out it’s not going to be pretty.

Mercedes

Not much has been going on with Mercedes beyond her aiding a client whose situation closely mirrored her own (husband cheats, dies, leaves behind mistress for the wife to deal with). Mercedes, though, is on a slightly different boat because she doesn’t know who her husband’s mistress was and the not-knowing is driving her carayzee. She wants to know why her husband cheated. She wants to know why her husband chose this other woman over her. After all, Mercedes has looked in the mirror once or twice and I think all of us can agree that she’s hotter than 99% of the female population so I can understand her confusion.

At the end of episode 20, she begs Claudio (her dead husband’s BFF) to tell her who the woman was. Claudio struggles with the request but succumbs to the Power of Womanly Tears and gives her a name.

Julia/Mariana (and Armando)

I’m glad I waited until episode 20 to recap because episodes 18 and 19 were depressing. When last we left our ladies, they were on their way to a night on the town and Julia was still angry at Armando and ignoring his phone calls. All of which seemed, to me, like a good thing. I had visions of Mariana and Julia waking up in bed together the next morning. But no.

Instead, we have Armando coming home to a still-empty apartment and calling Julia on the phone, which then transports us directly to…

… Lesbian Hell!

Lesbian Hell. Let me show you how it looks.

It starts out innocently enough. Just your typical emo lesbian sleeping on a futon. Alone. Where is Julia, you wonder? Making breakfast? Maybe just sleeping on Mariana’s bed. Why didn’t they sleep in the same bed? Ah well.

But hey, the camera is moving. Where is it going? Oh… there’s Mariana’s bed. And there’s someone in it. I guess it’s Julia. But wait … is that someone with her?

WHY YES. THERE IS SOMEONE WITH HER. AND HEY, IT’S A GUY.

Let us pause for a moment to take this all in.

Lesbian in love with her best friend is sleeping on a futon, while the object of her affection has sex with a guy on her bed.

There are no words. So I will just screencap.

And that, my friends, is Lesbian Hell.

After that, everything goes down into the pooper because Mariana is overwhelmed with emotions she can’t convey to Julia.

Julia just goes on and on about whether or not she should tell Armando that she cheated and how awful she feels about it …

Julia misunderstands Mariana’s bad mood, thinking she’s just annoyed because her having sex with that guy got too loud and kept her up. So she apologizes but then goes right back to how bad she feels for cheating on Armando and saying that she feels like a hypocrite.

Mariana: I don’t know if it’s so much hypocritical as it is selfish.

Julia: Selfish? What? What’s wrong with you, Mariana? I’m telling you all this because I don’t know what to do.

Mariana: What’s wrong with you? Are you oblivious to everything?

Finally, Mariana tells her that she’s in a bad mood and that it’s better if she left. So Julia leaves and goes back to her mom’s.

There, Julia has a heart-to-heart with Rafaela but it’s mostly all about Armando and really just a lot of the same stuff over and over. She feels bad, she feels guilty, she doesn’t want to feel bad or guilty, why is love so complicated, she doesn’t know what to do, etc.

Then Julia goes to talk to Armando and tells him that she slept with someone, and at first he flies off the handle thinking it was Mariana she slept with, but Julia tells him it was some random guy. This doesn’t go over any better. And Armando is pissed.

Meanwhile, Mariana is still splashing around in the Pit of Lesbian Despair.

She stands there imagining Julia with the guy, on her bed.

And then she tosses the sheets off the bed and cries out and looks generally miserable.

Poor Mariana. Who wants to go comfort her?

Episode 19 brings us no good news. Armando and Julia continue to argue because Armando can’t forgive Julia for sleeping with someone else, insisting it’s different for him if he does it because he’s got a medical problem. Meanwhile, Mariana ignores all of Julia’s phone calls and generally returns to Emo Land.

But then episode 20 rolls around and we get some better news.

The Las Aparicio sisters stay up all night exchanging tales of woe with each other. And the next morning, Rafaela insists that Julia return home (to Armando’s) and try to fix things instead of hiding out.

So Julia goes and tries to patch things up with Armando. But he is really angry and non-responsive and still insistent that the situation is different for him because he’s sick and she’s not. And that all he can do is imagine her with another man and that he can’t deal with it. Blah blah double-standards blah.

So Armando tells Julia to move out.

Later on, Julia shows up at Mariana’s and Mariana looks sort of torn between wanting to kick Julia out and being happy to be around her again. Mixed feelings, she has them. But Julia is looking all pouty and apologetic and comes bearing edible peace-offerings and Mariana gives up trying to be angry.

Later on, Julia shows up at Mariana’s and Mariana looks sort of torn between wanting to kick Julia out and being happy to be around her again. Mixed feelings, she has them. But Julia is looking all pouty and apologetic and comes bearing edible peace-offerings and Mariana gives up trying to be angry.

Julia: I’m glad that you like them because I really don’t want my best friend to be angry with me and I miss her. Do you still hate me?

Mariana: I never hated you, Julia.

Julia: Good, because you have no idea how much I miss you.

And then comes the Hug of Complicated Emotions:

And then we have a smiley lesbian and a smiley confused lesbisexual again, which just fills my heart with joy.

Mariana: So what’s new?

Julia: Nothing. Just that Armando and I are over.

Mariana’s day just got like a zillion times better.

Julia: The compulsive cheater could not forgive one infidelity of mine.

Mariana: (after a long pause during which she registers the following: Julia is now single but Armando did the dumping but hey he’s out of the picture and I’m not) Well … let’s make cookies, no?

And Mariana sits back and enjoys the moment.

That’s the last we see of Mariana, but later on we see Julia moving her things out of Armando’s apartment and she looks sad and melancholic and thinks back on the two or three times when they were happy. And then eventually goes back to Rafaela’s.

Is it the last we’ll see of Armando? Doubtful. But it’s still nice to feel optimistic.

Ingrid Díaz is the author of Alix & Valerie, a professional blogger and non-recovering coffee addict. In her college days, she was a purple-haired LGBT rights activist. These days, she aims to change the world one lesbian love story at a time. You can read some of her work at www.midnightisland.com.

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