The Empanada Brotherhood (15 page)

I said, “Well, do you want to play something while we wait?”

He regarded me as if I was crazy.

“Did Aurelio or any of his friends drop by?”

Jorge smiled. He said, “No.” I don't know if I'd ever seen him smile. There was a gap between his front teeth. He looked vulnerable, especially with those big ears under the brim of his porkpie hat. I had never seen the hat off except the one time Cathy grabbed it.

We sat still for another ten minutes waiting for Cathy Escudero. Jorge bent over to place the guitar in its case, then tapped his wrist again asking for the time. After that he sat immobile, arms folded, head tilted slightly, eyes closed. I stared out the windows feeling nervous. Pigeons perched along a parapet across the street were cooing.

I said, “She isn't going to come, is she?”

Jorge smiled again, his face lighting up, very incongruous.

“How long are we going to wait?” I asked.

“No sé.” He took out an emery board and began filing his nails, shaping them carefully. He was pretending to be bored.

At six o'clock five young girls wearing toe shoes, blue stretch tights, and knitted leg warmers arrived to take over our space. Their lanky teacher asked, “Where's the flamenco hotshot?”

“We don't know,” I said. “Maybe sick or kidnapped.”

The teacher said, “You can't get sick if you're a dancer. Somebody else will take your place.”

Jorge picked up his guitar case, nodded good-bye to me, and left the room. I hastened to catch up and walked alongside of him.

“I hope she isn't sick,” I said.

“She's not sick,” he answered.

Popeye, Chuy, and Luigi were going to Mexico City on Thursday for the first bullfights of spring. Popeye double-parked the diaper truck nearby and hopped out accompanied by Luigi. The sailor and the burnt man were pals again and La Petisa could go screw herself.

Luigi said, “The diaper truck will be our conveyance. Who else wants to come along?”

Gino eyed the truck dubiously. “That cacharro will never make it.”

Popeye was offended. “My truck? You jest.”

“They won't let it into Mexico,” Gino assured him. “It's a wreck. Once in, you'd never get it out.”

“Chuy promised to buy tires and tune the engine. He'll pay the gas. We are going to sleep on mattresses in back. Chuy might bring two girls.”

Everybody, including Roldán, left the stand to inspect the truck. Three mattresses were laid out sideways in back with assorted blankets piled on top of them.

“When is the first corrida?” I asked.

“Two weeks from Sunday,” said Luigi.

“There will be warm weather and mariachis.” Popeye's face glowed. “We're only stopping by to see who else is interested.”

Not Alfonso. “I have exams. I need to study. I'm pretending to be a grown-up.”

Luigi said, “In Mexico City I am going to see the Rivera and Orozco and Siqueiros murals, and also Trotsky's tomb. Then I'm going to hump my brains out with cheap hookers who will have to look at my face because I'm paying them.”

Popeye turned to me. “How about it, blondie? I have a compañero in D.F. who can get us marijuana and we'll go for a ride across the floating gardens of Xochimilco.”

I hemmed a little. “I don't know … I'm working hard … I don't have money …”

What I meant was I couldn't go to Mexico because I had to open my mailbox each day in case there was a postcard asking me to pick up my novel because it had been rejected again.

Roldán said, “Why don't you boys ask Eduardo? He just returned from Haiti. They finished the documentary. He saw a voodoo woman in a trance bite the head off of a chicken.”

Popeye and Luigi drove away to get the oil changed and to put air in the spare tire.

A few days later Popeye reappeared with Chuy, who had a bright red glove on his artificial hand.

Roldán was puzzled. “I thought you were going to Mexico City on Thursday.”

Popeye dropped a quarter onto the window ledge to pay for a coffee. “There was an accident, gordo. Keep the change.” He pointed to a shattered headlight. “It happened on the George Washington Bridge.”

Chuy giggled. “We hit an enormous pigeon.”

Popeye said, “There was nothing we could do. And anyway, the journey wouldn't have been much fun without Luigi.”

“Where is Luigi?” I asked.

“He and his burnt face went to Montreal with a piba.”

“What piba?”

“Adriana, Eduardo's ex-wife. Apparently they developed a friendship while Eduardo was in Haiti. Eduardo doesn't know yet.”

Alfonso said, “When Eduardo finds out I bet the top of his head will blow off and sail up to the moon.”

“But they're not even married,” I pointed out.

Chuy scrutinized me as if I was a pitiable and deformed human being.

“Oh,” he said, laying on the sarcasm. “I forgot. Then there's no problem.”

After I bought a secondhand paperback at a bookstore on Fourth Avenue I walked up toward Fourteenth Street to gaze at some sexy posters in front of the burlesque theater. Next, I did a tour around Union Square. As I was back passing the outdoor bargain bins at S. Klein's I spotted Cathy Escudero ahead of me. Just as I realized it was her she filched a pretty red blouse, stuffing it quickly into her tote bag as she moved away. I ran a dozen steps and reached forward, touching her arm.

“Hola, Cathy.”

She spun around with a look of frantic alarm, then realized it was me and her jaw dropped as she burst into tears.

“
Carajo, huevón, me espantaste, che!
”

“I didn't mean to scare you,” I said. “Lo siento.”

“Let's get out of here, blondie, quick.” She grabbed my hand and tugged me around the corner onto University Place where we headed south toward NYU, almost running. It was all so sudden. Cathy searched right and left and repeatedly glanced backward to see if any cops were gaining on us. She wore a faded blue sweatshirt and old black slacks and sneakers, and her hair was in a ponytail. Without makeup her face was pale and blotchy.

She kept holding on to my hand as we hurried across to the west side of the street where she felt safer.

Cathy stopped abruptly in front of the Cedar Tavern and asked, “What were you doing,
following
me? Are you
crazy
?” Finally she let my hand go and rubbed the dampness from her cheeks and eye sockets. “I almost had a heart attack.”

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I'm really sorry. I wasn't following you. It was an accident. I didn't mean to scare you, I swear.”

In Washington Square, Cathy sat us down on a bench near the children's play area. She reached into her tote bag, fumbling for lipstick and a compact, and went to work on her face. She brushed on powder, used a mascara pencil, and applied the lipstick, talking throughout the process.

“I don't have money so I steal,” she explained. “I steal all my clothes. I steal everything. I steal food. I stole this lipstick, I stole these sneakers. I don't care. Everything I earn that doesn't go to my folks goes to my art. I pay my dance teacher. Jorge couldn't steal a pencil so I have to support him. He's helpless. You're almost like him except you have parents, and I bet they have money. If you're shy like Jorge you're dead in this world, blondie. The vultures will pick you to pieces in a minute. There. That's better.”

She rubbed her lips together and observed her face at different angles in the compact mirror.

“
Damn,
you scared me,” she said again.

“I'm so sorry,” I said again.

“Quit saying you're sorry all the time. Girls hate that.”

I shut up.

“I can't ever afford to get caught,” Cathy said. She still looked like a frightened little girl. “If they catch you and you're a foreigner you're dead. They send you back to the trash bin. I hate this country because it's so vindictive.”

I didn't know what to say.

Cathy looked at me.

“Are you still writing books?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“I'm glad. Don't ever stop.”

“I won't.”

“Okay, let's go.” Cathy kissed me lightly and stood up. “Enough hysterics. You can walk me to the subway.”

She glanced around a final time to make sure no police agents were stalking us. There were kids in strollers, dogs on leashes, old men reading newspapers, couples on the grass, squirrels in the trees, but no cops.

Cathy held my hand all the way over to the Astor Place subway entrance where she patted my cheek, gave me a hug, then drew back and said, “You can't come to the dance studio anymore, blondie. Aurelio doesn't like it. No matter what I say he thinks you're a rival.
I'm
sorry.”

She added scornfully, in English: “He doesn't know nothing about girls.”

Then she said “I love you” in Spanish, squared her shoulders, and vanished underground.

Dumbfounded, I stared at the subway entrance.

When I got home there was a note with the travel agency logo on it stuck in my door. It said:

I stopped by to say “hello.” But
you weren't here. Too bad, you
lose. Call me at work sometime.
     Ciao,
           La Petisa

I went to the hospital with Roldán when they were going to remove the cast from his arm. He needed an interpreter along to translate and help fill out the forms. At St. Vincent's an emergency room intern sawed off the cast and put it in a bag. He gave the fat man a tube of cream to rub onto his wrist and forearm. We stopped at the business office to settle up. A groggy bureaucrat asked me questions that I translated for Roldán who answered back and I told the bureaucrat, who wrote down the answers. A half hour later the paperwork was complete. Who knows how, but the cook escaped without paying a cent.

On the sidewalk we halted for a moment, blinking our eyes against the bright sun and the noisy bustle around us. My chubby friend bent his arm up and down, twisted his wrist, and flexed his fingers in and out. They were stiff, the muscles atrophied. His hand looked weird and tiny at the end of such a fat arm.

“Soon it'll be better than new,” he said. “They did a good job. That's what I love about America.”

We strolled at a leisurely pace to Sixth Avenue where the fat man paused at a flower vendor and purchased a dozen colorful carnations.

“Who are the flowers for?” I asked.

“For me, blondie. I deserve them.”

We crossed the avenue and stopped at Johnny's Italian Newsstand for a cigar, then went down MacDougal to the empanada kiosk. It was shortly after one
P.M
.

“Come on up if you want,” he said. “I've got a ham and some lemon meringue pie.”

No thanks, I told him, I wanted to return to work. So I handed over the paper sack holding the two pieces of his cast.

“Why don't you keep it?” Roldán said. “You're the writer. Perhaps you will make me famous one day.”

I was surprised and deeply moved. “Really? You mean it?”

“Qué va.” He gestured impatiently. “What do I want with stupid memorabilia?”

“Okay. Thanks a lot.”

“A pleasure,” he said. “I'm happy to be of service to you, Señor Hemingway.”

Roldán shook my hand and went inside and climbed the stairs. It was painful to watch him through the glass door puffing at every step. If he met somebody they had to back up until he reached a landing where there was room to pass.

When I got home I laid both pieces of the cast on my kitchen table, poured a glass of milk, and contemplated the plaster of Paris creation. Everybody had signed it: Alfonso, Carlos the Artist and his wife, Gino, Eduardo, La Petisa, Chuy, Santiago Chávez, Greta Garbo, Luigi, and Popeye and even Eddie Ortega … but not Adriana, who had refused to sanctify anything contaminated by her ex-husband's John Hancock.

I spent ten minutes inspecting the cast, trying to decipher the salutations. La Petisa had drawn a funny little face with horns on top. Alfonso had written,
Sos un hombre, Patrón.
Eduardo had put,
Suerte, gordito!
Greta Garbo's said in English,
Good luck, baby!
Luigi and Popeye signed their names with a baroque flourish. And Carlos had taken up the most space with an elaborate sketch of a nude woman riding a large wingèd phallus. I couldn't read his handwriting.

Then I fitted the two halves together one atop the other and wrapped them carefully in newspaper, Scotch-taped the newspaper tightly shut, placed the bundle in a paper bag, and set the bag on the highest shelf of my kitchen cupboard for safekeeping.

Cathy Escudero visited the empanada stand again, this time with Aurelio Porta. He had on a Panama hat, a tailored pin-striped suit, and tasseled loafers. She wore a blue velvet jersey, a black skirt, and high heels—very elegant. Her dark hair fell past her shoulders making her look truly sophisticated.

Alfonso, Carlos the Artist, and I hustled clear of the alley to let them in. Then we hung around on the sidewalk at the window. Everywhere pedestrians wearing short-sleeved shirts were talking and laughing.

Roldán said, “Hello, beautiful. Whatever you want, I invite you. It's on the house.”

Cathy smiled, delighted. Men were always giving her stuff for nothing. She leaned over the counter and kissed the patrón, leaving a red imprint on his sweaty cheek. She ordered a beef empanada, a dulce de leche, and a Coke. Aurelio Porta asked for black coffee and a quince pie. Roldán clicked on his fan to blow away some of the smoke.

“I'm so happy,” Cathy announced. “Aurelio and I are engaged. We're going to be married this June in Uruguay. The wedding will be at a big country club where Aurelio plays polo. A week later I'm going to open at La Taberna Gitana in Buenos Aires. We'll visit Patagonia on our honeymoon. Look at my diamond ring. Isn't it beautiful?”