“Okay, okay, okay,” Judge Warpick interrupted. “I believe it.” She paused, looked at the papers on her desk, and then asked, “Do you have any friends? Do any family members ever come to visit you?”
“I don’t have any family here, just my children. There is a woman upstairs who used to come to visit me. She’s so nice. But she’s a sick woman … she’s in a wheelchair. She had a stroke and …”
“I see,” Warpick cut her off.
Señora Rama looked at me. I put a finger to my lips to indicate that she should shut up.
“Dr. McDowell,” Judge Warpick said, looking exasperated. “I’m going to swear you in. Please stand up.”
I could see the doctor didn’t like having to stand up to be sworn in. He was tall like a basketball player and maybe a few years older than me. He wore a light brown summer jacket and a pale tie and a yellow shirt. When he was seated, the judge said, “Dr. McDowell, you have had an opportunity to hear Señora Rama’s testimony. Have you gone over her medical file as well?”
“Yes, your honor,” he said, turning to look at me.
“And could you tell me what you’ve found out?”
Dr. McDowell’s handsome face turned red. He cleared his throat. “Based on my review of the documents, I’ve found no evidence, your honor, of severe physical impairment. According to Dr. Cummings, she can lift a twenty five pound bag of potatoes on an occasional basis. Furthermore, under article 11, 876, section B, rider H, paragraph 16,” he read from a book, “Mrs. Rama doesn’t meet the requirements for supplementary income. Moreover, it says here that …”
Señora Rama looked intently at the doctor, then at me, but I wasn’t supposed to interpret his testimony. I observed Raisa, who did speak English and when I saw the expression of outrage on her face, I looked out the window, away from her anger. In the distance, I saw the Hudson and the Jersey shore, and tiny buildings billowing gray smoke. In the morning haze, this part of the world looked muted, ghostly, like an old painting whose colors are fading.
Señora Rama left in tears, but vowing to reappeal the decision in case it was unfavorable. I had the judge’s assistant sign my form so I could get paid. Then I went to say good-bye to Jeff, who was disappointed I wasn’t staying to play a game. Waiting for the elevator, I ran into the claimant and her daughter.
“Thank you, guapo,” she said, opening her purse and pulling out a five dollar bill.
“No, no,” I said, embarrassed but touched. “I get paid by the court,” I explained. “You don’t have to give me anything.”
“Just for the cigarettes and coffee,” she insisted.
“Thank you, but no,” I said firmly. “Goodbye, Señora Rama; bye, Raisa,” I said, heading for the restroom to escape them. When I returned, they were gone.
It was mornings like this that I wished I had kept my job as a reporter for Modern Grocer. Sure, it was dangerous and at least a couple of times I had come close to getting shot; but the lives and problems of bodega owners were glamorous Judith Krantz stuff compared to the plights of the social security claimants. And how could I change careers at thirty-three years of age? Wasn’t that the age of Christ when he was crucified, anyway? I hadn’t one skill necessary to do well in the Age of Libra, in which everything had its weight in gold. I hadn’t learned to use a word processor—the most complicated machine I knew how to work was my answering machine. I cursed the fate that had made me be born in Colombia. If only I had been born somewhere in the California Valley, I thought, I would have been perfectly attuned to the needs of this age.
I was crossing the street, automatically heading for the subway entrance, when I heard someone call, “Yo, Santiago, are you ashamed of your old friends?” I turned sideways and saw my friend, the painter Harry Hagin, dressed in a white uniform and hat, standing on the curb next to an ice-cream cart.
“Don’t you want to talk to me?” he called.
“Harry, I’ll be damned. When did you start selling ice cream? Did you quit your job unloading fruit?”
“Yeah, man. I was becoming a hunchback. And it’s not ice cream but ices, natural ices. Hey, you know, I figured there’s no escape being a Rockefeller slave in America, so I decided to take it easy. I love being on my own; nobody gives me orders. I have delusions of being free: I go home in the evening, take a shower, drink a beer, eat something and paint for a few hours. So, how are you doing? How’s old Mr. O’Donnell? Did you frame my drawing yet? Some day it’s gonna be worth big bucks, you know.”
Harry and I had met as students at Queens College, where he majored in arts and business, and I had majored in medieval Spanish studies. After graduation we had remained good friends.
“Mr. O’Donnell is living overtime. I took him to the vet a few weeks ago, and he says that he wished he had made a mistake diagnosing his condition, but Mr. O’Donnell is going to croak any day.”
“That’s rotten, you know. Such a nice cat. After all that trouble we went through trying to find him when he ran away. Sorry to hear that. That’s a damned shame, you know.”
“I know,” I agreed, and shook my head, making an effort to push away the gloomy subject of death, which of late seemed to follow me everywhere. A customer approached to buy an ice. I stood thinking of how Harry, while still in college, had settled into a gutted building in the Lower East Side. It had taken him years to rebuild it, but now it was a hot piece of property. Besides, I knew he had invested successfully in the stock market and gotten out while it was still good.
“First sale of the day,” he said, pocketing his change, when the customer wandered away.
“Harry, you’re worth a lot of money. Why do you get these crazy jobs?”
“Look, Santiago,” he said, becoming very excited, his big blue eyes dancing wildly. “It’s heartbreaking, man. It took me ten years of heavy shit to fix my building and then, you know, I make a terrible mistake, all because I’m such a good-hearted asshole. Instead of renting the apartments to yuppies, I rented to Puerto Ricans. And you know, these Puerto Ricans, no offense, man (and you know I’m not racist!), will kill their mothers, fry their babies, jump out of windows to break every bone in their bodies, so they can sue the landlord. I’m involved in three litigations right now, you know. So I have to work to pay the lawyers to keep my building. And these fucking lawyers … man, the vermin capitalism produces! Santiago, let me tell you, never have anything to do with a lawyer.”
If Harry had been a racist he wouldn’t be my friend, but I was becoming alarmed. “Harry,” I said, looking around nervously, “there could be a Puerto Rican going by.”
He chortled. “Puerto Ricans on Wall Street? That’s a hoot, man.” He paused. “Hey, do you subscribe to Business Monthly?”
I shook my head.
“See, man, that’s the problem with you. You’re probably still subscribing to The Tierra del Fuego Literary Review, right? In any case, I read this article that says that a guy who sells joints in Battery Park during lunch hour makes $125,000 a year, tax free. Weekends off, you know, plus ninety-day vacations in the can. And a hot dog seller makes twice as much. Of course, I wouldn’t sell hot dogs. I’m sure they make them out of cancerous cats, no offense (you know I’m crazy about Mr. O’Donnell). So I says to myself, it’s hot in the summer, you know. And what do people want when it’s hot? Ices. Besides, if I want to play the market, if I get a hunch, I just push my cart to the stock exchange.”
“It sounds good,” I said.
“It sounds better than it is. Yet these capitalists warmongers love joints and crack and hot dogs. But ices, which are made of natural fruit—forget it! If I were selling diet drinks and other carcinogenic products, I’d be loaded. Even when it’s 100 degrees they’ll think twice before buying an ice. If it keeps going like this, I’m going to have to diversify. You know, Coca Cola or some degenerate capitalist product.”
I didn’t feel like getting involved in an argument about the final stages of the collapse of the capitalist state. So I said, “Harry, it just
dawned on me. Why don’t you bring your easel and paint when business is slow. You know, maybe a reporter from the Wall Street Journal will notice you and write an article, and you’ll be taken by Castelli or somebody.” I paused, remembering Harry’s subject matter. “Are you still painting skeletons exclusively?”
“Santiago, that’s a great idea. You know, just take a look at these people. Wouldn’t you say they look like walking skeletons dressed in expensive suits? How about an ice? It’s on the house. Maybe if they see you sucking on it they’ll get the idea. Sheep!” he yelled at the passersby.
It was hot; an ice sounded like a wonderful idea. “What flavors do you have?”
“Tamarind. That’s all I have this week. I make it myself.”
“Tamarind? Are you crazy? No wonder you don’t sell your ices! People buy watermelon, cherry, lemon ices. But tamarind is not a Wall Street fruit, Harry. It’s not a Wasp fruit, or an oriental fruit, or a black fruit, either. It’s for Colombians and Hindus—for brown people.”
“The way you talk about colors you should have been a painter, you know. Anyway, I’m trying to give them something good. Tamarind is medicinal and it’s also a laxative. I wanted to offer my customers an alternative, something unusual, you know. It’s just that it hasn’t caught on yet, you know.” He filled a paper cup with two scoops of a shit-colored substance. I tasted it.
“Well?” Harry said, frowning and twitching his red Fu Manchu mustache.
“It’s refreshing. Maybe a bit too acid.”
“I don’t want to use sugar, you know. Listen, Santiago, do you have any connections with the coffee crops in Colombia? You should invest in coffee commodities and make a pile of money that way. Isn’t that where you grew up? A coffee plantation?”
“My father had a banana plantation.”
“Hum, bananas. That’s a thought. Banana ices, what do you think? Perhaps we can play the banana market. The market is very hot again, you know. And what I say is, let’s make a killing before it collapses again. I don’t see why Rockefeller has to be the only person who makes money in this country.”
“I’ve got to go. I’m worried about Mr. O’Donnell.”
“It’s great to see you, man. I’ll give you a call next week, you know. Maybe we can catch a flick, okay? Take care of yourself, and my regards to Mr. O’Donnell.” He patted me on the shoulder and looking toward Broadway, he started yelling, “Natural tamarind ices. Treat yourselves to the fruit of Buddha and Montezuma.”
It was noon by the time I arrived home. During the day, when the front door was open because of the employment agency, I’d go in and out quickly to avoid running into my landlady. But there were several items in the mailbox and I had to stop briefly to get them before the crack heads broke into the mailbox as they did almost on a daily basis.
One of the envelopes was from Unlimited Languages and it contained a check for $350. This was a lucky break. I had been hounding the agency to pay me for several jobs I had done for them back in June. For a second or two I stood there wondering whether I should run to the bank to deposit it and make a withdrawal. This interval of indecision was long enough for Mrs. O’Donnell to open the door leading to the bar. She grabbed me by the arm, as if I were a thief caught in flagrante delicto.
“Santiago, why haven’t you answered my calls? Come in.”
“Hi, Mrs. O’Donnell,” I said, trying to fake a smile.
With her free hand, Mrs. O’Donnell indicated that I should go into the bar. Many alkies sat at the counter, and several of the booths were already taken up by the lunch crowd. We marched toward an empty booth in the back, near the kitchen. I said hi to Pete, Mrs. O’Donnell’s oldest son, who was the head bartender; and to Sean, Pete’s son. Both nodded, acknowledging me. I smiled to a couple of waitresses—they were Mrs. O’Donnell’s relatives too. Need I add that the entire operation was run by Mrs. O’Donnell’s many retainers? I wanted to become invisible. I knew they were all familiar with my situation, and although each and every one of them was always nice to me, I was under the impression they regarded me as the guy who ripped off the matriarch of the clan.
We sat at a booth. With her mass of auburn hair, and a map-lined face, Mrs. O’Donnell was the exact replica of Lillian Hellman. She also had the writer’s whiskey-honed voice. “Well, Santiago, where’s the rent?”
“I’m so sorry I haven’t answered your phone calls, Mrs. O’Donnell,” I said, trying to distract her from her one-track mind. “But I was planning to come to see you today.”
“You’re here now, so where’s the rent?”
After eight years of being perpetually behind in my rent, I was hard up for excuses. “Mrs. O’Donnell, I was hoping I could give you one thousand dollars like you want, but I don’t have that much in the bank. I haven’t been working much lately. If it keeps going like this, I’m going to have to get a full-time job.”
She had heard this argument so many times before that my words seemed to have no effect whatsoever on her. “I give you twenty-four hours to pack your things and move out. And don’t make me evict you by force. That’s final.”
“Mrs. O’Donnell,” I remonstrated, “you don’t really mean that. You wouldn’t do anything like that, would you?”
“What’s to prevent me?”
So much anger flashed in her almond eyes that I became afraid of her. “Because … because you’re a good woman,” I said. “You know how fond I am of you.”
“I’m a good person, that’s true. But I’m not an idiot, Santiago. That’s why you’ve been taking advantage of me all these years. My family thinks I’m crazy. My lawyer can’t believe I’ve let this situation go on for years. I could rent that apartment for $1,500, even right now. You know I would’ve never let you move in if I had known you were Colombian. I thought you came from Venezuela, like Ben Burztyn,” she said, referring to my friend Ben Ami who had lived in the downstairs apartment before Rebecca moved in.
Now that she had insulted my nationality, Mrs. O’Donnell softened. “I need some money today. Con Ed is turning off the electric if I don’t pay the bill. You must have some money you can give me. Otherwise, I’ll have to call Lucy. The poor thing; with all her problems with her husband, I hate to do this to her.”
“Please, Mrs. O’Donnell, whatever you do, don’t call my mother. I’ll give you money right now. Here,” I said, handing her the check from Unlimited Languages.
Instead of thanking me for the check, she became irate. “So you do have money! You must take me for the greatest jerk that ever lived.”
“I swear to you that’s all the money I have. But take it; it’s all yours.” I signed the check over to her.
She folded the check and pocketed it in her apron. “Here,” she said, flinging some bills on the table. “I don’t want you to go hungry.”
I counted five twenties. “Thanks,” I said.
“You now owe me $14,760 in back rent.”
I couldn’t repress a chuckle. “Mrs. O’Donnell, you do love to exaggerate; it must be your Irish temperament.”
She cringed again. I should have never smiled; she was only forgiving when I acted remorseful. Maybe I should burst into tears, I thought. Or better yet, beg her for a job washing dishes.
“Santiago, you can’t go on living like this. You’re a young, bright guy. When are you going to get your act together?”
I wish I had a mother who owned a bar, I was going to say, pointing at her children. But that was inappropriate, so I said, “When I finish my Columbus poem. Then I’ll get a full-time job. I promise you.”
Mrs. O’Donnell held her head between her hands. “Santiago, wake up. This is New York. People here don’t care about poetry. If you must be a writer, for God’s sake write a book that can be made into a miniseries. Why don’t you write about,” she stretched her arms toward the front of the bar, “Forty-second Street. Write about the crack people; how they’re ruining my business, my family’s way of life. That’s what you should write about. That’ll m
ake money. Everybody already read about Columbus in high school.”
I was sick and tired of people telling me what to write about, but I knew better than to argue with her.
“I fully agree with you,” I said. “I hate those creeps. They’re driving me insane, too.”
“Whatever you do, don’t do it.”
“Mrs. O’Donnell, of course not.”
“Santiago, I have an idea. This is also a good way for you to pay some back rent. We’ll paint a sign, an anticrack sign, and you’ll parade in front of the porno shop. A few hours every day. Maybe that’ll get somebody’s attention.”
“No way,” I said, getting up. “I’d rather become a homeless person, do you hear me?”
She got up too. “How about standing outside the Times building with the sign? Maybe we’ll get them to write an exposé about it.”
I was rendered inarticulate by her ridiculous proposition. I was infuriated too, and if it weren’t that she was my landlady and I owed her some respect and a lot of money, I would have blown up. “I got to go,” I said. “I’m worried …” about Mr. O’Donnell, I was going to add, but luckily caught myself in time. I lived in terror that she would find out I had named my cat after her late husband.
Reading my mind, she asked, “How’s the cat?”
“He’s fading quickly. I’m afraid this is the end.”
“I know how it is. I had a cat like that; I had to crush his medicine and mix it with his food.”
It seemed highly impossible that she had ever loved a cat; nevertheless, I said, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Mind you, it was a long time ago. Before I married. I loved that cat so much I never had another one after him.”
“Well, like I said, I have to go.”
“How about a cheeseburger on the house? When was the last time you had a hot meal?”
I was hungry, but not hungry enough to stand the torture of having her whole family stare at me while I ate. “Gee, thanks a lot. But not today. I’m really in a hurry.”
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