The Orange Blossom Express

by Marlena Evangeline

  The balcony outside Esperanza’s room was shaded by a lanky oak tree, and from there the stairs led straight to an overgrown rose garden, skirted on one side by climbing bougainvilleas woven with vines of honeysuckle. She liked the view of the garden because it was pretty, almost like one of the pictures inside Gloria Marie’s great house. When she was not busy in the kitchen, she would slip down the steps to the old untended garden, and pretend that she was part of one of the paintings, inside some other life than the one she was living, a brush stroke on some other canvas. It was in this way she first learned about her imagination, and it came to her like a surprise, suddenly, as if it had sprung like a seed from the garden itself. The thought pleased her, and she kept it inside her like a gift; it was entirely hers, this thought. It was like a dream, but a waking dream; she had never known one of her very own, but she instinctively knew it was important to her. She could keep it in her head wherever she happened to be. Sometimes she even thought about the painting when she made salsa or tortillas, the picture springing to life inside her mind. When it did, she would scoot the thought away, and giggle, because the thought had become like an imaginary friend that wanted her to play when she had the business of cooking to keep her busy. She had learned to love the great kitchen and the smells in it.

  Esperanza even liked the sharp way the onion stung her nose when she sliced it into small pieces for salsa or mole or enchiladas. Aside from perfecting the rhythm of patting tortillas, the morning chore she had learned to love the most—patting masa, her daily bread, patting it to perfect round circles with the cup of her palm, like the tiny beat of a drum, clap-clap clap—a-clap-a, aside from that, she loved most making the sweet flan, because she loved the creamy smooth texture and caramely taste as it sweetened her mouth. When Patricia sent her out to gather corn and beans from the storehouse and to the garden for vegetables, she often stopped to pick roses in the tangled garden, finding immense enjoyment in the beauty of the opening buds. The roses were of many beautiful colors, and here she was able to admire the corals and the reds and yellows. Some of the soft-leafed flowers had two tones, yellows with wisps of pink around the edges of the petals. She studied the roses and their smells, distinguishing between the sweet and pungent colors and wondering why such a delicate petaled flower had such great thorns that often tore her skin if she got too close. She wondered if her mother had ever seen lovely roses, and wished with all her heart she could show her. The thought of Ruby often saddened Esperanza because she wanted to share the beautiful things she had found at the hacienda, but knew that as long as her mother remained in jail, she could not do so. And she often wanted to tell her of the thoughts that rose in her mind like budding flowers, but instead would sadden with loneliness. She could not help but feel bewildered by the pain of her loneliness; she thought of it like she thought of the thorns on the rose, a harshness that seemed irreconcilable to the flower.

  From the garden she could follow the stone path to the main courtyard where the large-leafed plants in large ceramic pots nearly strangled the light of the sun and cooled the tiles making it perfect for afternoon siestas. Parakeets flew noisily from one branch to another, chattering.

  Beyond the hacienda were the worker’s cottages and beyond that the cornfield. The corn bulged under the green sheaves, swelling to ripeness; Esperanza had learned to pay attention to the silky tassels, like Marie, to know when the corn was ready.

  After a few months, Esperanza learned to be proud of the dishes she prepared for lunch and dinner. Patricia left whole meals to Esperanza’s care now, often leaving the hacienda for days at a time, while Esperanza cooked for the workers and learned to decide, from day to day, what to serve and how to prepare it. Patricia was gone the day that Marie said they would be having company for dinner and to fix something special. The tall man and his aunt, Isabel Vasquez, whom Esperanza had met several times already, were seated at the table when she brought in the paella.

  “Sit down, Esperanza,” said Gloria. “This is Ibarrio Vasquez; he has just come from Costa Rica.”

  This seemed to her a man of the world, she thought quietly, as she slipped into the carved oak chair. He seemed unlike any of the men who worked for Gloria. He had worked at an airport already, and suddenly, she felt her face flush when his eyes met hers. She felt a surge of recognition as if she had known him before, and looked again at his face to make sure she was mistaken. No, she thought, foolishly, she had never met him, but she knew what an airplane was, and she was very pleased with herself because of it.

  Ibarrio Vasquez was on his way to America, she learned, where he would go to the university. His aunt planned to visit her sister in California, too, so they would go together. Her sister raised Lipizzaners and had a large ranch, she said proudly. Esperanza had heard of America, but she had no knowledge of a university. She sat quietly listening to the conversation, and Gloria Marie would stop from time to time and explain to Esperanza about the university and America and the things that she heard happened in this other country. After the company left, she sat in the large living room with Gloria Marie, and listened to the problems of money that seemed to plague the daily life at the hacienda. The crop needed to be harvested, but there were not enough men. They would need to start work in the fields the next morning. Gloria Marie could see no other way.

  The parakeets woke Esperanza the next morning, early, and she slipped on a light cotton skirt and blouse and padded downstairs to find a pot of coffee on the stove percolating. After breakfast the women went to the fields where Renaldo and his children were already picking the corn. They worked to well past noon, pulling corn from the stalks and throwing it in piles on the ground. The children gathered the picked corn, taking it to a two-wheeled cart, stacking it, and then going back to the field for more.

  The green of the corn shaded them somewhat from the sultry heat of the day, but later, large dark clouds billowed over them. Gloria Marie scowled at the sky, unable to believe that the weather would change now, but not trusting it enough to stop work. They worked into the afternoon, skipping lunch, sweating in the long rows, tearing the ears from the stalks, and stumbling sometimes in the tangled furrows. By three o’clock, the clouds had turned black and thunder roared across the valley. The rain came before the hail, and the crew of workers grabbed what they could of the harvested corn and ran for shelter. Renaldo pulled the cart to the storehouse, drying what he could before stacking it the corn bin. In twenty minutes, the crop had been ruined, and Gloria Marie bowed to God’s will once again.

  As Esperanza walked among the damaged fields she felt as if she were in another life. Everything had changed drastically.

  Gloria Marie and Patricia were gone. The house was boarded and the furniture gone; the damaged crop had forced Gloria Marie to go to return to her real daughter’s house. Patricia had gone to live with a son, and she had even found another job. Already it was as if only shadows had lived there, as if that life were like imaginary friends, but ones that sprang from her past and her imagination of that dreamy past, and not like the ruined fields of the moment she walked through while she made another future to remember.

  Their absence in her presence infused that presence with poignancy, yet Esperanza had no way of defining the feeling the moment made her feel; she just felt it, without thinking it into thought. The feeling was as strong as thinking; it formed the ground of her being that would one day spring to thought; the day she would need thought it would be there. One day, in her future, she would translate the feeling she was feeling into thoughts that would serve her. Necessity would bear her these gifts, but now nothing seemed to speak of life except her own stomach that grew larger, translating Esperanza from the singular to the plural sense of herself. Gloria Marie had told Esperanza to go back to Costa Rica, but it had seemed like such a long way, and Esperanza was tired of traveling. She had come a long way already. The ruined fields seemed comforting somehow, familiar, and the devastation seemed a reminder to her of something, but she could no
t form it into an idea. The baby was due soon, and she would wait there for its birth.

  Pulled into Nazareth, was feeling about half past dead …

  CHAPTER 25

  MAGGIE COULD FEEL THE DANGER NOW; danger lived like another innate creature, but, unlike the money or the marijuana, danger didn’t have to be fed, or cared for, danger fed on them all. Danger, the bleak scavenger, the buzzard, that picked at the emotional remains of the energy the pot left, the rampant energy of eighty thousand bucks in closet and a world of people who’d really like some of that, now wouldn’t they? Danger lurked like some invisible partner, some annoying asshole, invading, hanging around when you want the asshole to just leave, paranoia sulking then in dark corners, swooping down upon them like the buzzard luck it was. Morning coffee seemed a risky affair, perilous now each moment: cooking, cleaning, an adventure in madness: don’t leave the phone, someone might call, don’t leave the house, someone might come, don’t leave the pot, someone might steal it, don’t leave the money, don’t tell the neighbors, don’t talk, don’t blow the cover, don’t don’t don’t. And then all the what ifs, what if, what if someone were the man, the feds, what if? What if that guy rats, what if they don’t really have the money, what if a plane goes down, what if we can’t sell it, what if what if what if what if, what if our parents find out, what if what if. Maggie had a memory of some future now, a future without danger in it, a future without so many dangers and so many what ifs and so many fears and paranoias; she had another future entirely in mind: something not like this dangerous part, this road she kept getting lost on, this dangerous place of turns and twists and things she wanted to go away now. Couldn’t the danger just go now? She wanted something better than tracing this past, this other reality, now hers, blood and bones, breeding chaos, this laboratory, this life, experimenting, on Maggie.

  “It’s not safe anymore, Hank.”

  “Yeah, well it’s not safe to drive on the freeway, and we do that, too.”

  “You don’t need this.”

  “Yeah. Yeah I do. This feels safe to me, Maggie. Away from the tract houses and the tall city buildings. The fast lane where I can pace myself. Safe is the surge of power pulling the Cessna off the ground in Mexico. Safe is six grand on the table, not to mention the other fifty in the safe, and the rest we’re still owed. I don’t hear you whining about the money. You always have enough to spend.”

  “This is not about money.”

  “Everything is about money.”

  “You can go into another business.”

  “This is the only business we have now. It won’t last all that long. Believe me.”

  “What happens when you get popped.”

  “You mean if.”

  “I mean when. You aren’t invisible, for Christ’s sake.”

  “I like being responsible for my own margin of error. I don’t like leaving it up to the next guy.”

  “I don’t either, Hank. And you’re the next guy and you’re my margin of error.”

  “I put the food on the table.”

  “No one else matters.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You might as well have.”

  “I have to go back up to Santa Cruz; we’ll talk about it when I come back.”

  He took a gram of cocaine from his pocket, took a whiff from the bottle with the blade of the serrated edge of a toe-nail clipper.

  “Want some?”

  “No.”

  “Might help your attitude.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my attitude. It’s amazing how quick it improves when you leave.”

  “Well then, it’ll improve in just a second, Maggie. I’m history on this piece of sand.”

  He went to the bedroom and stuffed some clothes in a duffle. There were a couple of stack of hundreds on the night stand and he stuffed those in too. Hank was history in the making.

  Honeysuckle blooming in the wildwood air …

  CHAPTER 26

  Santa Cruz, California

  IN THE DENSE SHADE OF THE GREAT trees a yellow banana slug crept over a piece of moist redwood bark, the fruit-shaped creature left a trail of slime; a fluffy white dog sniffed it as he nosed down the path leading to the creek, then he suddenly jerked his head from the ground and perked his ears when he heard a high-pitched whistle. He scrambled back up the trail, over a log, through a thicket of wild blackberries, and ran across the spacious yard where the wedding party had gathered, wagging his tail. Several children twirled in a circle, flowers tied in their long dangling hair, and the dog scampered to them chasing the circle and whining.

  Beyond the children, closer to the green-shingled house, in a tangle of electrical cords and equipment, a guitarist bent over a speaker, putting his head down, then stumbled back as the twang of his own guitar blasted out too loud. It’s working, he laughed, strumming his fingers skillfully over the chords again, listening with approval to the sound, nodding his head as he played, then spinning in a circle, smiling to a pretty brunette watching him, spinning again, and turning to the bass player behind him whose own sound joined in the melody, jamming, the music rose over the cars and vans parked near the woods, near the old garage that was painted the same thick green as the shingled house, drifting up into the Santa Cruz sunlight, rising. Three guys, two in Guatemalan shirts, and another in a tie-dyed tee shirt, crawled out of a Volkswagen bus, smiling. The man in the tie-dyed shirt carried a fleshy red mushroom the size of a saucer. He held it in the air like a spaceship moving it around like a bomber, twirling, twirling, laughing, moving through the crowd of people with the beautiful red fungus shining in the sunlight. A small cluster formed around him, and when they had scattered, the mushroom had disappeared.

  Hank squatted near the musicians with a patty of Afghani hash that he crumbled onto a platter. Then he took the plate of hash to the picnic table and put it amongst the buffet of fruit salads with nuts and raisins and dates and garden salad with fresh tomatoes and avocados and four kinds of fresh lettuce, butter, red leaf, romaine, iceberg, and the spinach salad with sunflower seeds that was tossed in a blue ceramic bowl that Maggie had made, and he left a pipe on the plate and some matches, and took a paper plate and put some pasta salad with olives and pimentos and celery on it and scooped some in his mouth as he walked back over to the music. He waved to Mark and Rebecca getting out of a rusty old Chevrolet; Mark carried a casserole dish of green rice, and Rebecca held a rectangular cake dish of lasagna. Hank loved Rebecca’s lasagna and wished, rather unconsciously, that Maggie was more like Rebecca. He watched her carry the dish to the table and set it down. She walked over and sat down next to him on one of the bright red Moroccan rugs that were spread haphazardly over the grass in front of the band and under the oaks. There were thirteen rugs in all, three primarily red, seven blue, and three white; they were all wool and new. Gary owned four of them, and the others belonged to the Kingfish who had bought them back with the load of Afgani, all hundred and sixty-nine pounds. By the end of the day Hank would buy two of the nicer reds, 6 × 9s, and one smaller white. There were several big pillows thrown here and there, and the startling vision of the luxurious carpets and pillows against the bright green grass gave the gathering a distinctively privileged atmosphere, the extra attention to detail being Gary’s idea. The rugs, thought Maggie, were exotic and made her feel nomadic, like they all might need to pack their possessions, put them on a camels, and travel again to new camps only to unpack and settle until it was time to move on again.

  After Lucy and Gary were married, the band started up again and played a wedding march kind of rock-and-roll rag while the sun moved over towards the ocean. The fog rolled out Old San Jose Road in a rather untimely fashion and settled over the back yard. The Kingfish had passed out on one of the pillows, probably to an overdose of the mind-fucking Afghani that he had just smuggled into the country. He’d shipped it to Canada first and then down by train in regular suitcases, without a hitch, and now, with half of the load sold, the Kin
gfish was by any standards a rich guy. His wild head of Afro-style blonde curly hair and small round glasses perched over his thin beak-like nose made him look childlike asleep. Maggie picked up the dirty plate he’d left and threw it away, and then took his glasses off and stuck them in the pocket of his faded coveralls, as he snored a little whistling sound. She fluffed a pillow and sat down next to Patrick; he put his arm around her and pulled her close.

  “I’m going to leave, Maggie,” he said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m quitting.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m getting out of the whole thing. The drugs. All of it.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. I’m gonna finish school. Then I’ll figure it out. I’ve only got a few units left. I don’t know. This can’t last. It can’t last forever. That flight scared the shit out of me. We came close to dead.”

  “I thought you liked this shit so much.”

  “I’m not quitting smoking it or anything, but the pressure’s on. I don’t know. I need to try something else.”

  “Does Hank know?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Good-bye.” He laughed.

  “Is that it?”

  “That’s about it, not much else, I mean, it’s my decision, he knows that. He thinks I’m nuts, of course, says I can’t make this kind of living anywhere else. He might be right about that. But I might not go to jail if I quit now. Alan, that guy from Frisco, just went down. They popped him with a big stash. He’s in trouble.”