Warriors in Paradise (8 page)

“Who mentioned breakfast? I’m famished,” said Valentina, coming down the stairs.

“Oh my, what a crazy house,” said Sandra, walking back to the kitchen.

Valentina pecked Charlie and Caleb on their cheeks and kissed me full on the mouth. She tapped Caleb’s shoulder, suggesting that he vacate the chair next to me. Hell, I thought, I am in trouble with this woman! She has claimed me, placed a flag in me: I was here first, he’s mine, mine. It felt nice to be her territory.

Shortly after that, we heard the voices of Juliette and Camille before seeing their shapely legs come down the stairs and then make an entrance into the dining room.

Breakfast in Paradise

We all had this inner glow of fulfillment and self-satisfaction, of a mission well accomplished.

As everybody found their seats around the table, Sandra appeared with a large plate of cut fruit with mangoes, papaya, and piña. We all dug in, and while Valentina, Charlie, Caleb, and I were squeezing the limes and dusting our fruit with chile piquín, Juliette and Camille asked, “What is that?”

“This is something that you should try,” said Charlie.

Camille was the first to lift her fork and grab a diced mango soaked in lime and dusted with chile from Caleb’s plate. As she tried it, she lifted her gaze from her plate and thoughtfully said, “This is good! We have a similar red pepper in Chinese cooking. What do you call this?”

Caleb told her.

Juliette said, “I don’t think I like the idea of chile on my fruit. It is like having chile for dessert, sweet and spicy hot. That is crazy!”

Charlie turned and looked at her and then kissed her. He moved back and said, “Did you like that?”

“Actually,” she said, “it doesn’t taste half bad at all.”

We all started laughing.

After the fruit, Sandra brought an immense plate of maize
sopes
, each covered with a thin bean paste and topped by a slice of ham and a fried egg with grated melted cheese on top. She brought a separate plate of sliced tomatoes with provolone cheese in olive oil, dusted with oregano; a bowl with shredded lettuce; a bowl with sour cream; and a bowl with freshly chopped onion.

Valentina and I went to the kitchen and brought back chipotle sauce, a mild green sauce for the unadventurous at heart, and a fresh pot of Veracruz coffee. Charlie, Caleb, and I had three sopes each, with slices of tomatoes, topped with lettuce, onion, and sour cream. Valentina, Camille, and Juliette had two sopes each with a few slices of tomato, provolone, and the rest of the toppings. We all had coffee, except Camille, who preferred chamomile tea. When it comes to food, I believe that the entire plate should be covered with food before you start to eat and that it is very poor manners not to have an empty plate when you finish. I was happy to see that Charlie and Caleb shared the same views.

As we were finishing, the man of few words, Caleb, said in Spanish, “
Esto es vivir
!”

***

We talked about the hurricane warning. I was a little concerned, and I told them that the confluence of hurricanes Ingrid in the Atlantic and Manuel in the Pacific was causing too much rain. I told them that we could expect flooding in Acapulco today and tomorrow.

I asked my foreign guests, “Would you like to go to Mexico City or back to your own countries?”

“What? You want to get rid of us so soon?” said Juliette in mock distress.

“No, not at all! It is just that conditions here might get progressively worse. The roads might become flooded and unusable, the airport might close, food and water might become scarce. Look, I am just telling you this. You are welcome to stay here for as long as you want to. We have a large cistern with enough water for all of us for a whole week. We also have enough food and drink for several days.”

“Nobody in the world has that amount of food! The way you, Charlie, and Caleb eat, we will be starving within three days!” said Camille.

We all started laughing, and, of course, the girls were laughing even louder.

We decided to chance it and stay in Acapulco and wait out the storm. We decided on a plan of action for the morning, which was to go to the hotels to pick up the girls’ suitcases and stop, on the way back, at the supermarket to buy food and household supplies.

Moving in

Given space limitations for both passengers and luggage, Charlie and Caleb stayed at the house while I played chauffeur for the ladies.

I drove for an hour and a half to Acapulco Dorado, where both hotels were located. We stopped first at Valentina’s hotel. She was in and out in a few minutes, telling me as I was putting her suitcase in the trunk that she had called her parents in Monterrey. They had been worried because of the storm, but she told them she was staying with some friends and gave them my telephone number. I said, “I hope the house phone keeps working in this weather!”

Juliette and Camille’s hotel was a couple of blocks away, so we were there inside of ten minutes. The girls took almost an hour to check out. As they came down to the CR-V with a bellboy carrying their luggage, Juliette said, “Sorry for the delay. Not only were we being overcharged, but we were talking to a very nice American guest we met a couple of days ago, and she invited us to an Independence Day party on her friend’s yacht. We would really like to go. We asked her if it would be OK for all of us to go together. She said no problem; the more the merrier. Can we go? Come on, let’s all go. We have never been to a yacht party before. Come on. Say yes.”

I looked straight at them and told them, “We are expecting extreme weather. Being on a yacht in these conditions is dangerous.”

Juliette answered, “We asked her that, and she told us not to worry. The yacht is a big one, suited for extreme weather conditions, including hurricanes. It is a super-yacht, seventy meters long, with a party room, seven suites, and twenty crew members.”

Well, I thought, a seventy-meter yacht should be safe, but I was still uncomfortable. I said, “Why don’t we wait until we get back and talk to Charlie and Caleb before deciding? However, if you two girls want to say yes to your friend right now, go ahead.”

“No,” said Camille. “Either we all go, or nobody goes.”

I liked her response, so I said, “Good. Then it is settled. Juliette, why don’t you go back to your friend and tell her that we will call her back in a couple of hours and let her know?”

“OK,” Juliette responded. She turned around and ran back into the hotel. A minute or two later, she was outside again and climbing into the CR-V.

Park and shop

I drove back in bumper-to-bumper traffic, with broken-down cars in the middle of the street, in six to eight inches of brownish water with all kinds of floating trash. It had taken us just over an hour to drive to the supermarket, a trip that would have normally taken only five minutes. When we arrived, all the parking slots were taken. After waiting for an interminable ten minutes, we made it to the head of the car line. As I waited for the woman in front of us to vacate the parking space, a car at the end of the line swerved left and sped up on the opposite side. The driver tried to cut in front of me and steal the space.

No, no, no. That was not going to happen.

I had already started moving forward into the slot, so he didn’t have enough room to maneuver into the space. We were both blocking the entrance.

I turned to look at the girls. I could see Valentina and Camille getting angry, but Juliette had a look of concern. She immediately said, “Let’s forget about the space and wait for another one.”

Camille turned and told her, “What if another car does the same thing? Should we keep on losing our turn until the store is closed?”

“No, no. That is not what I meant. What I meant is that we don’t want to get into a fight over a parking space.”

“Juliette, it is not a parking space that is the issue here,” I said. “It is about what is right and what is wrong. And it is wrong for this man to barge in ahead of us and take away the parking spot that is rightfully ours.”

As we were talking, a large man had come to my door shouting something we couldn’t hear because the windows were closed to keep out the rain. He slapped my window, and I rolled it down. “
Pinche pendejo
, move your fucking car so I can park, or I am going to beat the shit out of you,
putito
!”

I had lost valuable time talking to Juliette, which had given him the advantage. I was inside the car, and he could easily punch me through the window and kick my car door. To give myself an even chance, I needed to get out of the car, so I said, “Sure, I’m sorry. You’re right. Please let me clean my window because I can hardly see. Is that OK, sir?”

He took a few steps back and said, “Hurry up,
pinche niño pendejo
.”

As soon as I got out of the car, he saw my size, and I could see the beginnings of doubt on his face.

I walked toward him and said, “You only have one chance to move your car—only one.”

He was not a bright man. I guess he was accustomed to getting his way all of his life. He was large in a muscled, chunky kind of way. He had little beady eyes and a dark complexion. I guessed his weight to be about 210 pounds and his height to be about five feet eleven inches.

He went for my right forearm, trying to seize it and pull me toward him so he could reach me with a left hook. As soon as I felt his hand on my forearm, I put my left hand on top of his and grabbed his forearm in a parallel maneuver. I then put all my strength into my right hand, pressing down his forearm while taking a step back and pulling him toward me.

He involuntary cried out in pain. He had to compensate for the pressure on his arm by dropping down on his knees. As he was going down, I was raising my left knee. Just before his knees touched the ground, my knee made contact with his face with a loud, hollow crunching sound. There was a rapid exhalation and the splashing sound of a falling body. I released my hold of his arm and stood back. I didn’t want any blood on me. The bully was down on all fours, dropping blood and mucus in the water.

I squatted next to him and searched his pants for his wallet. I took it out and checked his voting ID card. I stood up, walked to my car, and asked Valentina to write down his name and address. I then went back to him. He had already stood up and was holding his nose with his head up.

I said, “You are a stupid, mean bully, and you have paid with a broken nose. Consider yourself lucky this time. I now know your name and where you live. Here, take your wallet.” As he reached for his wallet, I grabbed his wrist and added, “I want you now to move your car out of here, and if I see any scratches on my CR-V when I come out, I’m going to find you, and I won’t be so nice next time. Do we understand each other?”

He looked dumbly at me holding his wallet without uttering a word. I slapped his face and said, “Look at me!” He was already looking at me, but I wanted to make a point. “I want to hear that you understand and that I won’t have any further problems with you.”

He said in a twangy and resigned voice, “Yes, I understand, and no, you won’t have any problems with me anymore.” Saying that, he walked to his car, backed up, and drove out of the parking lot. I climbed back into the driver’s seat and parked the CR-V.

Despite the rain, a group of onlookers had formed around us. I signaled with my hand to the parking attendant to come close. The attendant was clad in a black garbage bag in which he had made three holes, one for his head and two for his arms. He also had a shopping bag wrapped around his hat. He looked like an apparition from hell.

I gave him a hundred-peso bill and told him to page me in the store if that man came back and did something to my car, or if he came back with company. The attendant said to me, as he was pocketing the money, “Señor, you did the right thing. I know that guy, and he always does the same thing. Sometimes he leaves his car blocking other cars, and when the drivers complain, he insults them and intimidates them into silence.”

“Well, I hope he will be better behaved from now on, although I doubt it,” I said. “Don’t forget to page me if he comes back.”

The four of us walked into the store and grabbed a shopping cart. The store was completely full. People, concerned about the hurricane, had gone into panic-shopping mode and were buying everything in sight. We had not spoken about the incident, and I wanted to keep it that way. I said, “Camille, Juliette, please grab another cart and buy whatever you think we need. You two go through aisles one to five, and Valentina and I will go through aisles six to ten. We will meet at cash register number four in twenty minutes to half an hour. We have to hurry, or there won’t be anything left to buy.” Valentina and I started moving through the store.

Half an hour later, Camille, Juliette, Valentina, and I were at the checkout paying for our purchases. We had twenty-two bags. Generally, I estimate an average of 200 pesos per bag, so I figured the total bill was going to be 4,400 pesos. I was close but a little under. The whole bill came to almost 5,000 pesos—storm inflation, I figured.

We packed the shopping bags wherever we could find space in the CR-V. The parking attendant was holding an umbrella and passing the bags to us. So I asked him, “Did he come back?”