Gus and Isa loved having their cousin back in Las Vegas. It pleased Coral too. Her boys had so few links to her childhood, now that both Malcolm and Keisha had moved out of town, now that Alabaster and Serenity were not coming to visit Augusta. Of course, the Las Vegas her children lived in was almost nothing like the Las Vegas in which she had grown up. She and her siblings had lived in the middle of a desert—chasing lizards and making playhouses out of old sofas that washed in with the floods—but Gus and Isa lived in a metropolis. They did not walk onto barren earth and see a million mysterious stars above, they did not turn away from a glowing Strip to see a night as black as pitch. The sky her sons knew was never black: the glow of today’s Strip could not be made to disappear with the mere turn of a shoulder.
Trey had lived with Coral and Koji nine years ago, when he was fifteen. It had been a difficult year. Her boys were one and two then, and she and Koji were juggling full-time jobs and diapers and two kids setting records for serial viruses—all without sleep, of course. Then there was Trey: a teenager with a big loop of silver chains, heavy jeans draped around his knees, furious at having been shipped off to his aunt’s.
Ray Junior had called late one night, his voice thin and strained, and asked Coral if she would take Trey, right away, before it was too late. A boy had been murdered, shot dead by another student as he walked out of Trey’s high school. Coral never learned whether Trey had any particular connection to the boy who was killed. It didn’t matter. She and her brother both knew how fast it could all move, how families put it together afterward: who their son knew and what he was doing and how he had ended up at the wrong place at the wrong time. Then you had all the time in the world to figure it out, to see how useless it had been, how trivial—the small details that had cost your son his life.
Ray Junior had seen the signs. He called Coral, and then packed his son into the car and drove ten hours straight to Vegas. Coral would never forget the morning they arrived, and how, just for a moment, she’d panicked, wondering if she could do it. Koji had seen this on her face; he’d given her a wink, and then reached up to give his nephew—already a head taller than he was—a lopsided hug.
Now they could laugh about that year, and look what it meant to her boys to have Trey. He took them to UNLV games at the Thomas & Mack, and showed up at their school events, tall and good-looking and hip. On Saturdays, he drove them to Japanese school and did the end-of-day jobs usually assigned to Coral: washing off the chalkboards and sweeping the floors and taking down the Las Vegas Gakuen poster that temporarily concealed the Clark High School sign in the gymnasium. When Isa introduced Trey to his Japanese teacher, he said he was his brother.
Coral smiled, thinking of this, and then looked around for her phone. What time was it? She’d spent the whole day on the couch. She walked to the study, looking for her phone, and was surprised to see a wash of red light reflected in the hall mirror. What was that? She looked out the window, to the street. A police car in the cul-de-sac. That was unusual. Coral turned away, not interested enough to look further. As she did, she saw the black and white of a second car, then, was that a van? A SWAT van? On Cabrillo Court? She peered out the living room window and was startled to count three black-and-whites, and what was indisputably an unmarked SWAT van. What was going on?
Coral opened the front door, moving slowly, waiting to hear if someone called for her to stop. She stood in the shadow of the entry, where it would not be easy to see her, but where she had a wider view of the street. Two of the cars had officers in them, and two more officers were standing at the mouth of the cul-de-sac, looking at a laptop. She couldn’t see anyone in the van and stayed very still, looking.
Across the way, Mr. Eberle opened his door and stepped outside. The police officer in the car in front rolled down his window and motioned for him to return to his house. Her neighbor looked confused, and then stepped back in and shut his door. Coral didn’t see him go to the front window, though she imagined he was there, crouched down or standing in a shadow, watching just as she was.
The street was oddly still. No motor started, no dog barked, no child rode a bike. There was an air of waiting, and Coral waited too. She couldn’t tell which house might be the problem. A few minutes went by, and then a maroon car pulled slowly up next to the officers on the street. One of them nodded toward the driver of the car and looked back at his laptop. The car sat, silent, but nobody got out. After awhile, one of the cops approached it. Coral saw the window roll down, and the officer lean in slightly, then gesture up the street toward Honorata Navarro’s house before walking back to her companion with the laptop.
The maroon car did not move.
What could be happening at Honorata’s house? Was it something to do with Malaya? Honorata and her daughter were going through a difficult year, and although the boys still asked if Malaya could babysit, she was rarely available anymore—and sometimes Coral was relieved. She loved Malaya, but she was not an easy teenager, at least not now. Coral felt sorry for Honorata; she tried so hard. She owned four houses on the street: her own and three she rented out. And she was a good landlord; her renters almost never left, the yards were neat, the cars were kept in the garages. It was probably because of Honorata that Cabrillo Court looked mostly untouched by the housing crash. A block in either direction, and every street had houses standing empty, with yards turned to flash dry tinder, and bits of trash lodged in the brown branches of dead euonymus shrubs and spikey pyracantha.
Coral shifted position in the entry and peered up the cul-de-sac to her neighbor’s house. It looked as silent and still as the rest of the street. A curved concrete bench stood in Honorata’s front yard—an oddly welcoming detail for a woman who didn’t make friends easily—and the only movement on the street was a mockingbird resting on the back of the bench, his tail upright, and his body weaving a bit as he looked to and fro.
Coral looked back at the police officers.
There was a third person now, perhaps the driver of the maroon car, and Coral studied him, thinking it might be her friend Tom. Tom Darling wouldn’t be here unless something big was happening. He might come out if there was a negotiation. Was that what this was? The man turned, and it was Tom. Coral had met him in a Leadership Las Vegas class nearly a decade ago. They were paired for the shift in a patrol car, and Tom had needled the officer driving them. “Hey look at that lowrider. Think his plates are right?” And the officer had thought Tom was serious, but Coral knew that Tom was being ironic, messing with the patrol officer to see how he thought. Or maybe he was trying to make a connection with her, a black woman riding in a white cop’s car. She hadn’t really known, even then, why Tom had needled their driver or what he really thought. Who was he making fun of? Maybe himself.
Still, Coral liked Tom. What was he doing here?
Coral almost went back inside. She wanted to get her phone. Maybe there was something on the news. But she was looking at Tom, thinking about whether she might go tell him she was there, when she saw the flash of the school bus pulling away in the distance. She looked at her watch. Three thirty. Malaya would be coming home.
30
Ms. Navarro had stopped talking.
The man had told her about the paternity test, and at first, she kept protesting. She yelled out, “You don’t know Malaya! She gets these cockeyed ideas. She’s very wild. She’s tricked you, gotten some blood. You don’t know how wild she is.”
And the man stood there. Listening. Not saying anything. Not moving.
It was obvious that Ms. Navarro was wrong. This man, this huge man with a gun and a ring larger than her wristwatch, was Malaya’s father. And Ms. Navarro did not want him to know. Had somehow hidden the child from him.
Now here Engracia was, with memories of her own child filling every cell in her body, in this ridiculous moment, with a man who might kill her, who might kill Ms. Navarro, who might kill himself. Who really, after all, had some reason for what he was doing. Because who would not hate the p
erson who had stolen your child from you?
She thought of Juan, and of how Diego had missed him, and, for some reason, of a time when Juan was galloping around the little apartment with Diego on his shoulders, and somehow galloped too high and banged Diego’s head on a low section of the ceiling. Diego started to cry, and Engracia was annoyed. Then she saw Juan’s face, crumpled and aghast. Diego saw it too, and the boy stopped crying to lean over and kiss Juan’s cheek, saying, “Papa, it’s okay. It didn’t hurt. Papa, it’s okay.”
“Rita,” the man was saying, “My lawyer phoned you as soon as Malaya and I did the tests. He sent you a letter. It was certified mail. I know you got it.”
“I threw it away.”
“You threw away a certified letter? Without opening it?”
“It was from Chicago.”
“Did you listen to his messages?”
“No,” she shook her head. “But you did look for me. You said you didn’t.”
“Malaya gave me your address. I didn’t look for you.”
Honorata stared at him defiantly, but all he said was, “You hated me this much?”
“Yes.”
His voice was very soft. “I didn’t hate you. I missed you.”
Ms. Navarro looked at him, and Engracia could see the tremor in her back and her shoulders.
“I never meant for you to feel like that about what happened,” he went on. “I thought you wanted to come. I thought you chose me.”
The pain that crossed Ms. Navarro’s face was unguarded and intense. Engracia understood that she could not speak.
“I’m not what you think I am. But I know why you feel that way. I’ve had years to think about it. To think about what I did. To think about how you felt.”
Engracia looked from one face to the other. What had happened between these two? She thought of Malaya—that odd girl with the striped hair and the tattoo. This man might be surprised by Malaya.
“It didn’t matter what you wanted. It was what you did.”
“I know. I know that, Rita.”
“Honorata.”
“Honorata. I know what I did. I’ve spent seventeen years thinking about it. About your uncle. About how angry I was. About how I didn’t care what that meant for you.”
“She’s not your daughter.”
“She is.”
“No. No!”
Engracia watched Ms. Navarro fold over then, her face in her hands, and she saw the tears leak out from her fingers, and she saw the way the man watched those tears, watched Ms. Navarro. And the room was very quiet.
The telephone rang.
Engracia jumped.
“Don’t answer it.”
They had all been sitting, frozen in place, for a while. Ten minutes? Half an hour? It was impossible to tell. Engracia’s mind wandered. She felt her mother near, though she knew her mother was in the village—she would be making tortillas, and talking with one of the other women while she waited for her sons to come home—and yet Engracia could feel her presence, as she had longed to feel her presence when Diego was hurt, as she had tried to feel it night after night in the months since. But her mother was here, somehow, now.
The phone stopped ringing. And then started again.
They all ignored it.
Engracia shifted her position, and the man said, “You have to stay here. We stay here until we figure this out.”
Engracia settled back into her seat. Ms. Navarro did not move, the man did not move. It was not clear what would break the stillness.
“Honorata, I’m not here to hurt you. I tried every way I could to reach you.”
“That’s why you bring a gun? To my home?”
The screech in her voice startled all of them. A vein in Engracia’s temple throbbed. She looked at the man.
“I shouldn’t have brought the gun.”
“Get rid of it! Get it out of here! I’m not talking to a man with a gun.”
“Will you talk with me if I put it in my car?”
Ms. Navarro stopped speaking again.
The phone rang.
“Honorata, I don’t want this gun. I shouldn’t have brought it. I wasn’t going to bring it in. But I—I don’t know, I couldn’t reach you. I’ve been sitting in that car, outside your door, all morning. I got—I got crazy. Sitting there. Thinking.”
Ms. Navarro would not look at him. She had moved inside herself; Engracia could not guess what she was thinking or feeling anymore. Had anyone heard her say “Gun. Man”? Was there anyone who had an idea something was happening here?
Engracia was not afraid—or not completely afraid. Her body still shook; she feared the rip of the bullet. She feared how death would happen. She waited for Honorata to grab the gun. She waited for the struggle, the sound. How much would it hurt? Dios had put her here. He had put her here for a reason. So she would pay attention. She would be ready. She would be grateful for these last moments, how it felt to see and smell and hear, how her skin tingled, how she could sense her mother—but not Diego. Her son was too young, she had decided, too young to let her feel him.
Just a few months ago, Diego had asked her about a gun.
“Mama, have you ever held a gun?”
“No, Diego. Why are you asking me this?”
“Mateo says his brother has a gun, and he got to hold it.”
“Diego, you must not go near that gun. Mateo shouldn’t be touching a gun.”
“I didn’t touch it. I didn’t even see it.”
“Guns are very dangerous. Where does Mateo live? Who’s this brother?”
“Forget it, Mama.”
“I will not forget it. I’m very serious. You mustn’t go near that gun. If Mateo has it, you go away. You leave. Entiendes?”
“Sí, Mama.”
That conversation had kept her awake for weeks. Diego walked home from school with Mateo. She didn’t know the boy’s mother. How could she have moved her son into this neighborhood? To Vegas? Juan would have known they should not live on this street.
Juan.
She had called him from the hospital, because he was still in Mexico.
“It’s Diego,” she sobbed. “He’s hurt.”
“Where are you? I’m coming. I’m coming now.”
She didn’t know how Juan had done it, how he had crossed the border, how he had gotten to Vegas so fast. But the next morning he was there, in the lobby of the Children’s Hospital, and when she went down to get him, to explain to the receptionist that he was Diego’s father, that he could come with her to the special room for family, he had started to cry, and his tears came so fast they soaked the collar of his shirt, and he could not speak, and she could not speak, and they had stood in the middle of the room, with people everywhere, some silently engrossed in their phones and others rushing by, wearing pale blue scrubs. She and Juan had stood there, collapsed in each other’s arms, and sobbed.
The phone rang again.
It rang and rang, and finally, Jimbo answered.
“Hello?”
His face was alert. Then surprised. He looked out the window and moved closer to the wall, peering up the street.
Engracia looked too. She saw the red glow against the stucco wall of the neighbor’s house. There was a police car out there. Someone had heard her say gun and man after all.
Her heart quickened its already skittery beat.
She looked at Jimbo’s face. Was he angry?
He looked startled more than anything. Startled, and strangely vulnerable.
“I . . . I don’t know what to say. It’s not what you think. That’s not what’s happening.”
The man was listening to someone on the line. Ms. Navarro stirred, and he looked over at her abruptly.
“Help!” she called. “Help!”
The man cracked the phone into the receiver and whipped around toward Ms. Navarro.
“Stop it!”
Ms. Navarro stood up, enraged now. She scared Engracia. She might do anything. Anything could happen now.
Anyone might live or die in the next seconds and Engracia, who knew what would happen to her, was having trouble concentrating. She thought of Juan, sobbing at the hospital, and she remembered the doctor asking them about the organs, and then, the night after the burial, when Juan drank glass after glass of whiskey.
Diego had gotten hurt in Engracia’s care.
Juan had drank all that whiskey.
“Ms. Navarro.”
Her voice came out small, and at first, Ms. Navarro did not look at her.
“Please sit with me?”
Ms. Navarro looked confused, and even Jimbo seemed unclear about what Engracia had asked. He started to say something, but stopped. Engracia motioned to the seat beside her, and Ms. Navarro stood a moment there, looking from Jimbo to Engracia, looking at the spot where the gun was hidden beneath his shirt, looking at the phone behind him. Then, awkwardly, as if she had not quite committed herself to the act, she stumbled toward Engracia and sat where the younger woman had indicated.
Engracia took her hand. Her bones were small, smaller than Engracia’s, smaller even than Diego’s, and Engracia could feel the beat, beat, beat of Honorata’s heart through her skin.
Taking Ms. Navarro’s hand helped Engracia.
At almost the same moment, she and Honorata looked up at Jimbo.
He looked back at them, and for a moment, Engracia saw it in his eyes: he was wondering what the hell he was doing. How had he gotten here, in this room, with a gun, and two women cowering beneath him?
“I’m sorry, Honorata.”
She did not reply.
Engracia could still see the red glow of the police cruiser against the stucco of the house next door, and she noticed that the man stayed near the wall, out of reach of the window.
“Where’s Malaya?” Jimbo asked. “I’d like to see her.”
He did not say it, but Engracia thought that even Ms. Navarro must be thinking it: he wanted to see her before he died.
Silence.
Ms. Navarro was silent, and Engracia was silent, and the man did not ask again. Instead, he leaned against the wall and lowered himself slowly to the floor.
'Round Midnight Page 24