Jorge Zaldivar fretted over the buffet table as guests began to arrive. Christina, his wife, told him to relax, but he kept fiddling with the food.
They'd spent the morning getting their daughter, Aanahny, into her fluffy, pink quinceañera dress. It was time to celebrate her birthday, but he needed things to be perfect.
After all, up until a few months ago, there was a chance he wouldn't be here for the big day at all.
Jorge was undocumented when he drove into a guard rail more than 10 years ago. The incident put him the crosshairs of federal immigration officials, who worked to have him deported after the accident.
It took more than a decade for his case to conclude, casting a cloud of fear over his family as they built their lives together. As they made a home and raised their kids, they had to contend with the very real possibility he'd be removed from the U.S. and sent to Mexico, a place he'd long ago left to pursue better fortunes. Then, in 2020, it finally happened. Jorge was forced to leave the country and Christina was left to manage by herself.
But Jorge's future took an unlikely turn.
After a series of court rulings related to technicalities in his case, officials allowed him to return to the U.S. last October to face a judge one last time. Then, in March, his family heard the news: He'd clinched a very rare win, overturning his deportation and opening a pathway for legal permanent residency. His green card arrived in the mail just in time for Aanahny's party.
"It was a very beautiful dream to be at my daughter's birthday and with my family," he told us later, in Spanish. "For us it's a new beginning."
After celebrating so many milestones via video chat, the birthday was a piece of that new future. They could eat and drink and dance without the sinking feeling in the back of their minds that it could all be taken away. But the trauma from all those years worrying and fighting still remains. In this new beginning, they must reckon with the scars left from their battles with the U.S. immigration system.
Healing will be a long road.
Christina and Jorge bickered a bit as they finished setting up:
Where is the gift table?
Can you grab more chairs?
Yes! I'm handling it!
This is the kind of stress they expected from marriage, normal nits that every couple deals with. But "normal" is tough to define these days, after so much has happened to their family.
"Normal is not a real word," Christina told us later, laughing and crying as she spoke. "It's like starting to date all over again, you know? You can't just leave that stuff behind."
She'd become an armchair immigration law expert as she and Jorge navigated their case. She was the one who traveled back and forth to Mexico after he left. She was the one who handled school and karate classes and the bills while he was away. They'd drained their savings to pay attorneys - and they'll be paying legal fees for a long while to come.
The stress she felt in her body ate away at her, while her kids and her husband felt each of their own strains. Jorge's two-year absence was hard to comprehend.
"You're mourning, but you don't know why, because he's alive and you don't know why you can't see him," she told us. "It's the loss that you feel inside of you. And that's the hole that we have to patch up. Because you don't take somebody away like that and then expect: yep, there you go."
The distance created rifts between them as they relied on texts and calls to stay in touch. Meanwhile, their kids settled into new routines, taking on new responsibilities to fill the void their father left. It was harder than they expected to go back to how things were once their legal battle concluded.
That fight caused "18 years of hardship, of burden, of hurt and pain," Christina said. "He wants to move forward. But it's gonna be hard. It's gonna be a process. But he just wants to be happy and try to let it go."
She's been pushing Jorge to see a counselor. He's open to it, but asking for help can be difficult, too.
"We are going to need therapy," he said, "because this process practically destroyed my marriage, my family."
Christina said their task now is to close the "Pandora's box" that was forced open during their odyssey. Their family could still shatter, she told us, but they also honed their grit through the struggle.
"Our marriage is so strong," Jorge said, optimistic.
Their kids have had an easier time bouncing back. They've been delighted to see both of their parents when they get home from school. While her parents work to close their own wounds, Aanahny said she's found comfort in watching them fret over the mundane.
"It makes me feel good seeing everyone around the table eating and talking about their days and my dad complaining about the grass, and it's just good to hear," she told us. "We eat dinner, talk about our day and it's just like - like you feel safe."
With each new milestone, the family moves closer to being whole again for the first time in a very long time.
Jorge hardly stopped working all night. As more guests poured in, he rolled tables across the room to accommodate them. As they ate and laughed and spilled things on the floor, he steered a mop bucket into the crowd to clean up.
But then it was time to dance with his daughter. Jorge stood in the middle of the dance floor, staying put for the first time that evening, as Aanahny waited for her moment to join him. She took his hand, and they embraced. Tears welled up in Jorge's eyes. Aanahny tried not to cry.
"I didn't want my eyelashes to fall off," she remembered. "The only thing that really made me happy, other than having everyone there, was that I didn't have to worry about my dad being taken."
Jorge said his emotions stretched beyond joy.
"It made me relive both parts, being alone in Mexico and being here. But the most emotional thing, the most beautiful thing, was to be dancing face to face with my daughter and having my mother, my mother-in-law and my wife there," he said.
That dance once seemed impossible, one of many things that fell into the abyss wedged between them.
"It is no longer a dream," Jorge said. "Our nightmare is over."
