When Victor Salazar decided to come out to his parents on the night of his first Spring Fling at Creekwood High School, he let out a major sigh of relief that could be felt as much as it could be heard.
But, Victor assures, the summer is not a complete bust.
Since his mom is planning to make pollo guisado on Saturday, Victor suggests that Benji, Felix, and Lake come over for dinner before the bonfire, which would be a disarming way for Benji to step foot in the Salazar house for the first time since they started dating.
As they wait for the pizza, Victor, Pilar, and Felix all try to sing Benji’s praises — insisting that Benji and Isabel share a common love for music and Billie Holiday — but Isabel reaches her breaking point when Benji calls Victor “my boyfriend.” “Victor, if I don’t feel good, I don’t feel good.
Yet when she arrives, Mia sees the two couples sitting together at a distance and realizes that, as a fifth wheel, there would not be a place for her at the bonfire either, so she turns around and leaves without a word.
Back at the Salazar house, Armando, who is dropping off Adrian for the night, has a tough conversation with Isabel about their indefinite separation — which they think was the right move to break the unfair “cycle of fighting and guilt-tripping” in their marriage — and about Victor being gay.
Seeing Armando and Isabel both struggle with Victor’s sexuality in different ways will leave plenty of room for compelling story lines this season, but I have to admit that I was pleasantly surprised to see that Armando was slightly more accepting of Victor’s sexuality than Isabel, because we have seen the story of a bigoted father too many times in these coming-out stories.
• After returning home from the bonfire, Felix finds his single mother, Dawn , who has manic depression, in a depressive state, and we discover that their rent is overdue.
• While he does not get as much screen time in the premiere, Adrian briefly steals the show with a one-liner that explains why he doesn’t want a new pet turtle named Heather if she can’t move from one apartment to another.