As the months passed, Felipe dealt with change, all of it unpleasant. Monique brought mortgage papers to the visitor’s room for him to sign. Thanks to the real estate boom in Tampa, their bungalow and garage apartment in the near-downtown was worth over three hundred thousand dollars. Signing the home equity line so Monique could continue her studies at the community college was an easy choice. Signing the papers to sell the store was harder. The little store his father had worked so hard to keep: struggling with the county health inspectors when he installed the deli; opening at five every day to serve the migrant workers; closing at ten most nights, sometimes nine o’clock. Felipe had spent many of his after-school afternoons at the store, doing his homework on the old door stacked on t
