The mother apparently died of a drug overdose on December 24. The children were left with nothing to eat, and the mother had barred the door and covered the windows. The oldest child, a boy, apparently decided that the baby would have to be fed or it would die as well. So the two oldest children took turns dissecting the mother’s body for food!
Authorities eventually broke down the door after motel guests complained of a smell and constant crying.
Then “Marvin” added: “The names of the children were not revealed in the article, of course. But I was able to track down court papers. The family’s name was Lopez, the children being Orlando, Hermione, and Jason, who was the infant. Your boyfriend dropped the surname and took his mother’s maiden name. There’s more. But nothing important.”
She sent him the detective a check, which Orlando still had in his wallet.
On the drive to her family’s house, she suddenly said, “I know about you,” tears suddenly dripping down her face. “I paid someone to find out about you.”
This result was not what he had expected. He had figured that anyone reading that news would never believe it, that Marcie would figure out that it was all a gag. He had expected Marcie to say, “You joker,” at best, maybe “You asshole”—although she wasn’t the type to say “asshole”—and then he would confess to everything, while trying to gloss over the fact that he had snuck into her laptop. But he never even got to confess.
Instead, she took the whole thing seriously. Instead, she’d said, “I love you more than ever.”
The thought of what would happen now that he had told her the truth made sleep impossible. He felt ill. He felt angry. He felt the recliner, the king-sized bed, the house with a library inside it, and a kitchen with a kitchen island all disintegrating, all that he had hoped for, all that would compensate for his years of suffering, melting away.
He wandered to the kitchen and outside to the large deck and the enormous backyard. It was cold and his breath clouded in the late morning air, and then he heard something bubbling nearby.
“Hello, stranger.”
It was Joanie, and she was floating in a hot tub at the other end of the deck.
“I’m boiling in here,” she said. “But I love it.”
Orlando stepped closer and saw that she was naked. Her firm breasts were red from the heat of the water, and a thigh that stuck out of the water looked plump. Just then he saw something floating in the bubbling water—it looked like a human forearm. He stepped back, horrified. It took him a moment to realize it was a very realistic-looking flesh-colored dildo.
“I don’t suppose you want to come in,” she said.
“Not now.” He was afraid to move in any direction.
“No. You wouldn’t want Marcie to find you here. She’s probably warned you about me.” She snorted to herself. “Get going. I’m serious. She’ll bite your head off if she sees you standing there drooling at me. Run along.”
When he got to his room this time, rather than concentrating on everything that had gone wrong, he decided to think positively, imagining what it would be like to own this house, how he would give everything a fresh coat of paint, how he would remodel the kitchen, build a home theater. He imagined parking a big car in the driveway and floating in the hot tub, and soon he went smoothly to sleep.
He woke up to the sound of someone screaming. He slid off the bed and ran into the hallway.
On the landing, he saw Daphne running.
“What’s happening?” he said and ran down the stairs after her. He saw Mom on her knees in front of the library and through the double doors he saw Mr. Arens’s wheelchair on the floor and Mr. Arens himself spilling out of it.
“He’s dead,” Roy said. He held an open bottle of pills. “Looks like an overdose.”
“But he’s bleeding,” Orlando said, seeing bright red on the floor.
“Where?”
“Look at his leg.”
Roy lifted the old man’s left pants leg. He gasped. Orlando held back the vomit in his throat. The meat of the old man’s calf had been cut to the bone.
Orlando turned and thought: Poor Marcie.
He ran back upstairs, two stairs at a time. Now he noticed there was blood on the stairs rug, blood on the landing. He ripped open the door to Marcie’s bedroom. She was posed on the duvet. Her face, her hands, immaculate.
“What’s the matter, Boo?”
“Your father. Mr. Arens.”
“Daddy? What’s happened?”
Another scream, this time from down the hall—Joanie’s room. Orlando ran. Inside, Roy and Daphne stood in front of Joanie as she got up from bed. There was blood on her pale face and chest and arms. Something red and tapered as a beef loin fell at her feet.
“No, no, no! Not again,” she screamed. “I was napping. It was her! It wasn’t me! It wasn’t me! Why do you always believe it’s me? Please!”
Someone called an ambulance. The poor girl had lost her mind. How sad for the family. Orlando was glad to be there for them. Everything would be okay.
He felt Marcie standing behind him, he felt her warmth. He felt her hand wrap around his left bicep. Like a claw. Like teeth.
Back to TOC
BOBO
Hel-lo-o! Dios te bendiga! It’s good to hear you voice. Yeah, yeah, everybody’s okay. When are you coming here? We just got a new generator and we got plenty food now. I don’t know about cake. Ja ja. I know you like cake! The bakery over here’s still closed because la tormenta de la bruja Maria put a car right through the kitchen, tu sabes. But your Titi Blanca can fix you something, whatever you like. She is the chef of the house. Me, I only eat. When’s the last time you been here? Must be two, three years. It’s not as bad as it was right after la tormenta de la bruja Maria, oh my god. Pero, Dios aprieta pero no ahoga. You should have been here, ja ja.
But really it’s better, a lot better. The hospital over here got a big donation. Everything is new there. There’s still lines for gas and for water, but it’s not bad like it was. No te apures. There’s always a bed for you here. Hey, you know your cousin Nick? He was just here. Hold on—
Blanca! BLANCA! When was Nicky here?—It’s Raphael. Mi sobrino!—Tu sobrino, tambien.—Si, the big one with the glasses.—Si, que le gusta bizcocho, ja ja.—It was January, right?—Que?—QUE?!—Nicky!—Enero!—E-NE-RO!—He was just here, right?—noviembre? Right after the hurricane?—Mujer, no me mientas—No me mientas, mujer—gwow—No!—Oh, yeah, that’s right, that’s right.—Before the police. That’s right.—You’re right.
She’s right—the woman’s always right. Don’t forget that when you get married. When are you getting married? Ja ja. No, I’m just kidding! Ja ja.
Like I say, Nick, he was just here. My memory’s not too good. I tell you: Don’t get old. The last year has been terrible, tu sabes, terrible. I’m getting old. That’s why you should come soon!
So Nick, we hadn’t seen him in ten, fifteen years. Hold on, let me ask—
Blanca!…BLANCA!—
Oh, she go to get the diesel. She be there all day. ’chacho. So Nick, he just show up, he didn’t tell us he was coming. Pero, the phones no sirve pa’ na’, it works one day, then no, tu sabes? Anyway, we was surprise to see him.
What a funny guy. He had one big bag, and he knock on the door, and before he say “Hi” he say, “Who do I have to f to get a drink around here?”
I no recognize him almost. He’s a big guy, tu sabes, all muscles, with tattoos here, tattoos there, even on the neck, ’chacho. But he got green eyes just like his mother, God have her in heaven. I told him we got no ice today, did he still want a drink. He say, “Muerto quiere misa, Tio Luis.” What a funny guy, that guy, oh boy.
He say he tried to rent a car but they had no car. So he had to take a taxi from the airport and he pay two hundred dollars. Two hundred! What a big spender. But if you got it…, tu sabes?
Nick say he needed to stay here. I say, “Sí, claro q
ue sí.” Like I say, we got plenty of room. We had a few people here because of la tormenta. We had your cousin Chuche and her husband, Carlos, they lost their house, and then the neighbors Ana and Felix, and your Titi Inez, and Blanca’s friend Adriana. They all lost their house. Adriana, she was sleeping in her car after her apartment got flooded, and Blanca saw her and tell her to come here. “Don’t sleep in the car. You can no live that way.”
Oh, y Bobo was here, too. You remember Bobo! Blanca’s baby brother. They call him that because when he was little he put a dress on a pig, and the pig no like it. He’s tall, big, with crazy hair and a big beard. You remember, you used to play with him when you were a kid. He would throw you like a football until you got too chubby.
Bobo, he live by himself up in the mountains. He’s like a big kid, tu sabes, in his head. But he build a little house all by hisself for him and his goat, and he say the house stay up in the hurricane, but he came here, with his goat, Doña Olga Tañón, to see how we doing. Once he saw everyone staying here, he say he want to stay here to keep us safe. Imagine. Anyway, he didn’t stay in the house, though, he sleep on the roof every night. With the dog and Olga Tañón.
So Nick, when he came, we had a good time drinking and making jokes. We told him he can stay in the living room, and we put a pillow and blanket on the couch. But he laughed. I thought he told a joke, but I no understand. But he say, “No, no, no, I can’t sleep on no couch. My back kill me.” ’chacho, pobrecito hombre. He’s a hard-working man.
Qué? Oh, no, no, I don’t know his job.
So, yeah, right away Ana and her husband Felix, they say, “Take our room, it’s okay. We small people, we stay on the couch.”
Nick, what a guy, right away he took twenty dollars and gave it to Felix, and Felix say, “No, no, ’sok.”
And Nick say, “You say my money’s no good? You don’t want my f’ing money.”
And Felix say, “No, no, no, ’sok.”
And Nick, he pushed the money into Felix pants. “Take the f’ing money.”
Nick, what a guy, but his mouth, oh my god. Everything is f this and f that. Well, what can you do? He’s from New York.
The next day Nick say he need a car. Blanca right away she say, “All the highways are close. You crazy, you can’t go nowhere.” That’s how she is.
Nick say he want to take a tour. “To see what?” she say. “It all looks the same. Stay near the house. It’s dangerous.”
But he say he need a car, and no one can tell him no. I tell him we got the truck but it’s underneath the mango tree. It fell on top, smash everything, lo rompio todito. I told him the only car that work here belong to Adriana.
Adriana, she’s young. Very pretty. Very smart. She went to colegio, pero she work at El Pollo Tropical because that’s all they have. Ain’t no work here.
So, Nick say, “How about it? I gotta rent your car. How much you want?” He say he give her twenty dollars a day.
She say, “You want it, you gotta pay.” Because she saw how Nick was with money. She say, “Fifty dollars a day.”
He say she was crazy, but he was smiling.
Then she say, but she got no gasoline.
So that day we all went to the lines. Blanca to get the water. Chuche and her husband went to get food. Nick say he go with Adriana, and Bobo want to go to because everywhere Adriana go, he want to go. I went with them to get the diesel for the generator.
The line was very long and go very slow.
So Nick, he say, “Hey, Bobo, you look the f’ing same forever. They tell me you live in the mountains. You got a goat for a wife? Ja ja ja.”
Nick, he always making jokes, always.
No, no, Bobo say, “I don’t have a wife! I would like a wife!”
“Ja ja,” Nick say, “you gotta get a girlfriend before you get a wife. You got a girlfriend, Bobo? Or do you just use a hole in a coconut tree?”
Ja. That Nicky. Very funny.
That line, it takes five, six hours sometimes. Nick, you could see, he no used to it. He see the guy coming back con dos jarras de gasoline and he told him, “I give you fifty dollars for the gas.” But the guy no want it. Nick say, “Hundred dollars.” The guy say, “Que se moje los pies.” Tu sabes? El que quiere pescado que se moje los pies. Like that.
By the time we got back it was too dark to go driving. So, we tell Nick we would have a party. Tu sabes, not a real party, but para celebrar that he came to see us when things are really bad.
All we had to eat was Chef Boyardee, Spam, and rice. I told Nick I feel bad that’s all we had to give him. “Pero, cuando hay hambre, no hay pan duro.”
He say, “I don’t like that can stuff. What about cabrito? That thing’s just right there. Cabrito’s f’ing delicious.”
“Ja ja.” I laughed. But Bobo, he no laugh. Right away, he took Olga Tañón and he hide her.
So we didn’t have cabrito, but we had rum! And we had lamps all around the backyard, and Chuche started playing old records from her phone. Everything around was dark, black dark, and you see campfire and lights here and there, and you hear the coquis singing.
Nick, he got up and he grabbed Adriana to dance. And she had a few drinks and she was laughing. Everyone have a good time.
But then Bobo he come back from the woods, and maybe he had too much to drink. Blanca would know. Anyway, I think he want to dance, too, so he tried to get in with Adriana, but Nick no let him cut in, so Bobo took Nick’s hands and started dancing with him! Ja ja ja. You should have seen Nick’s face.
Ah, that was a nice party. We keep going until Chuche’s battery die.
Anyway, the next day, Nick put the gas in the car and he go.
He came back in two hours, wet from his feet to his head.
He say, “What happened to the f’ing bridge to Utuado?”
“Inequivocamente la tormenta de la bruja Maria,” I say.
He say he try to swim but that corriente was something else.
Blanca told him, “Why you want to go to Utuado? You crazy? It’s the same as here. But they got less food and more mosquitoes.” That’s how she is.
“I need to get across the river,” he say. “You know someone who got a boat?”
I told him there was my best friend Juan Pablo, but I had not seen him since la tormenta when he went to go check on the boat.
Blanca she cross herself when I say Juan Pablo, and then she say, “You should ask Bobo. His old teacher lives in Utuado and he goes all the time to bring them food.”
So Nick go and talk to Bobo, but no joking this time. He say, “I have to get across.”
And Bobo, say, “Como no! Vamos!”
So they go and in two hours they come back, and Nick is wet again, his feet to his head. Bobo, estaba todo seco.
I say, “What happened?”
“This f’ing idiot,” Nick say, “he takes me to a f’ing rope bridge, a rope bridge out a f’ing Indiana Jones movie, twenty feet about the f’ing water, three thin-for-nothing ropes, and he expects me to get across on that. So I tell him, I can’t walk that f’ing thing. And you know what this motherf’er does, he picks me up like I’m a f’ing baby and starts carrying me across.”
“So what happened?”
“What the f do you think happened? I’m not going to have a guy carry me like a baby? I fight him.”
“He fell in the water. Splash!” Bobo say. Ja ja ja.
“I need a drink,” Nick say. Then he tell Bobo, “One of these days I’m going to find your f’ing goat and barbecue it good and eat it. After I f it to death.”
Bobo, he no think that was funny. So he walked away, into the woods. Nick, he started drinking—he finished almost all the rum we had in the house—and he use the generator to start his phone and he played music, and Adriana came by from the line with five gallons of water, and she say she need a drink. And then those two be very close, and we left them alone.
Later, after all the lights were of
f, Adriana came to say good-night to Blanca and me because she always did that. Ella muy cariñosa. She knock on the door, and we were under the mosquito net, almost sleeping. I could tell she had too much to drink. Blanca told her to come in and she did and she sat on the floor and start crying.
Blanca, her hand to her heart, she say, “Niña, tienes que tener cuida’o. He’s a nice guy, but you know how men are.”
I didn’t say nothing. I know to keep quiet. Women are always right, remember.
Adriana, say, “He my only chance to get out. I got nothing. I lose everything.”
And Blanca got up and she heat up some leche evaporada for her.
The next day, on the line for gasoline, I was with Nick and someone tell him that if he drive up this mountain road and come down, the river is small and there’s a little bridge right there and the road to take you to Utuado. That made Nick happy, so the next day he went out again in Adriana’s car.
And when he came back, this time he was covered in mud. Blanca no let him in the house and she gave him un galón de agua to clean himself outside.
He say, “I need workers. A couple of strong guys.”
I told him, yeah, he could go to the gasoline line and ask people and they would help him. “Cada cual sabe donde le aprieta el zapato.”
“It can’t just be just anybody. They can’t be snitches,” he say, and I say, “I’m sorry I’m too old, Felix is too skinny, Carlos is too old. But Bobo, Bobo is big and strong like ten men. Just ask Bobo.”
So later he tell Bobo, “Adriana and I are going on an adventure tomorrow, and we want you to come.”
So, Bobo, he like adventure. He’s like a kid. So he say he go.
The next day, I get up and they left, no good morning, see you later, have a nice day. Nothing. And someone came in the night and took my tools, my shovels, un pico, tu sabes, a pickaxe. Ai yi yi. Then it started to rain. Un aguacero. All day. Not like la bruja Maria, tu sabes, but lluvia and wind and lluvia. ’chacho, the last thing we need.
Noiryorican Page 12