‘Disgusting people,’ spat Mamá. ‘We should call the police on them, get them carted back to their Tropical Dream Hotel to deal with Maduro.’
‘We can’t call the police for them. The police would also want to get rid of us, remember?’
‘You think I could forget, Zulema? Forget that we live like rats in a hole?’ She carried on, spitting the words out while packing away the groceries as aggressively as possible, slamming every cabinet and tugging drawers open like limbs she was tearing off. Not wanting to get sucked into their spat, I mumbled that I was going for a run. I had to get away from the Manriques and the noxious mood they’d spread throughout the house like tear gas.
I drove to my usual running haunt – the Savannah, a large, leafy park-cum-roundabout that’s a sort of fitness hub. At any given time of day, there are outdoor boot-camp classes whipping pot-bellied women into shape, bare-backed fitness buffs stretching their hamstrings on the backs of benches, awkward-looking tourists with blue-veined legs strolling among the hordes of jogging and power-walking locals. The only downside to running the paved loop of the park is getting ogled by all the drivers cruising around the Savannah’s perimeter, but the setting makes it worthwhile anyway: sprawling trees, grand old colonial homes, a backdrop of sloping green hills, fresh coconuts being sold from historic trucks. And right beside one of those very trucks is where Román appeared out of the motherfucking blue.
I’d already run more than a mile when I saw him sitting on a bench in the near distance, scraping the jelly from inside a coconut with a shard of green coconut shell.
I stopped dead. I couldn’t believe it was him: Poof! Right there before me. My very own Houdini. A gamut of emotion overtook me – surprise, anger, need. Then, once I’d managed to collect myself, there was nothing else for it but to walk on over.
I kept waiting for him to turn to me as I approached, but he continued his phlegmatic scraping at the coconut flesh while the runners, joggers and pasty foreigners cruised by. He was as tranquil there with that coconut as an iguana lounging in the sun.
I was feet away. Nervous now. He still hadn’t looked over. Did he know I was there? Was this really a Houdini-style reappearance or was I just running into him as a genuine coincidence? Verga. Maybe I should turn. Maybe I should run back the way I’d come …
Too late. I was standing beside the bench, but he just kept looking straight ahead and eating the goddamned coconut jelly. I didn’t know what else to do but say something.
‘Getting a little stalking off your Christmas Eve to-do list?’
He kept eating. No reaction. Now my cheeks were more flushed from embarrassment than the exertion of running. I waited a few seconds until I’d hit my limit for humiliation and was about to turn and jog away or possibly hurl myself into the moving traffic. But: ‘You sure took your time strolling over here.’ Another casual scoop of jelly.
‘I … I didn’t think you saw me.’
‘You sure you get what a surveillance expert does, Yola?’
His head dipped so he was looking up at me from above his sunglasses. Then he raised his head again, tilted it as though he were examining the historic house directly opposite us on the other side of the road – a beautifully filigreed black-and-white mansion with a domed roof.
‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘I had no idea Surveillance Expert was your official job title. And you’re surveying local architecture today? I’m surprised. I thought you had strict orders to keep an eye on us scheming Palacios at all times.’
‘What do you think I’m doing here, flaca? You’re a Palacios. I’m hard at work.’ He rested the empty coconut husk on the bench, still looking straight ahead at the house as though he wasn’t talking to me at all, but to himself.
More at ease now, I sat beside him. But the second I did that, he gave me a nod like I was a stranger he was politely acknowledging, then immediately stood. Confused, I went to stand up again.
‘Sit,’ he said abruptly.
I stayed put, my temper sparking like kindling at his gruff order.
‘Look straight ahead of you at the house. We shouldn’t be seen talking.’ He feigned a sudden fascination with a jacaranda tree stretching into a purple-blossomed bouquet above us.
I did as he said, my stomach knotting. ‘Why’s that?’
‘Ugly’s not a trusting man. It’s always best to err on the side of caution – never know if he might have someone checking up on me.’ He made a move like he was cracking his neck, but something told me it was a more purposeful movement than that. ‘Let’s say I’ve learned the value of caution in my line of work.’
‘Then why follow me here if we can’t even talk properly because it’s that dangerous?’ Anger hit me sharp as a slap. What was his game? He’d stoked my fire so I had more pent-up heat in me than Krakatoa and now he was telling me to snuff it out like it was a flame on a candlewick, that we couldn’t so much as risk a conversation. What was the point of any of it? I was confused enough without him playing games then putting me in unnecessary danger to boot.
Without giving him a chance to answer, I got up from the bench to face him. A salty breeze sent the jacaranda’s violet blossoms fluttering down around us. I reached out to yank his sunglasses off, so I could look him in the eye while I told him to fuck off with his noir intrigue and sinister warnings. But in a feline reflex, he snatched my wrist and lowered my hand to my side before I could do any of it.
‘Have you lost your mind?’ His voice was calm. I was not.
‘Listen, Román, if you want to talk to me, then talk to me. And if you want to fuck me, then do it, but enough with the cloak-and-dagger bullshit. Obviously we both want the same thing, so let’s just get it out of our systems and move on. Figure out how to make it happen, Surveillance Expert.’
I wrenched my wrist out of his hand and strode away in the direction I’d come from, chin lifted, ponytail swinging indignantly behind me.
I didn’t have to look back to know he was watching me walk away.
PAGAN TRADITIONS
Judging by the turnout at Mass that night with my family, Catholicism Inc. was booming in Trinidad. Everyone was decked out in red, green and gold, singing lustily, smiling warmly at one another in acknowledgement of what upstanding blind papists they were.
As the Mass dragged on, I was pleasantly surprised that my mind didn’t churn with muddled thoughts of Román as it had after our last couple interactions. I didn’t pick apart a single snippet of our dialogue. I cruised through the homily and the singing and chanting and incense-swinging high on quiet confidence: I’d laid my cards on the table and knew now for certain that Román wanted me as much as I wanted him. Why else would he let me speak to him the way I had? Why would he have risked talking to me at all?
When it came time to put money in the collection basket, though, it wasn’t Román I thought of but Aunt Celia. I remembered Christmas the year before, when she’d leaned into me while the little wicker baskets were making the rounds along the pews. ‘Why should I have to pay for a bunch of priests to swan around with their noses in the air, giving people bullshit twelve-step plans for getting to heaven? Those false advertisers. Let them get their money from some other fool.’ Then she’d dropped a mint wrapper in the basket.
I wished I could lean in and whisper that to Zulema as she dropped in a ten-dollar bill. But she wouldn’t get it. She’d put a finger to her glossy, cherry lips like a schoolteacher. She passed the basket to me. I added a five.
God, I missed Aunt Celia.
Back at the house, we ate our traditional pan de jamón, one of the few Venezuelan customs we kept up. We ate it every Christmas Eve after Mass with a pitcher of homemade punch-à-crème strong enough to put everyone to bed well before St Nick stuffed himself through the window (no chimneys in the tropics). The Manriques, claiming an entirely unsurprising gluten intolerance, didn’t eat any pan de jamón, and were horrified at the caged eggs we’d used to make the punch-à-crème. So they stayed inside wat
ching reruns of Friends Christmas episodes with Spanish subtitles (so much for their high standards for rich cultural content) while we sat on the porch drinking and eating together, marvelling at Sancho’s ability to down the thick, creamy punch-à-crème like it was lighter than water.
As he guzzled, Sancho told us about his illegals: a university professor and his blind common-law wife, who were incredibly dull, according to my brother. ‘I can’t believe people that boring have the balls to sneak into another country,’ he chortled, crunching chipped-up ice between his back teeth.
We laughed, but were cut short by Papá: ‘It goes to show how bad things are. All the thinkers are leaving. That’s what will break our nation. “Brain drain”, they call it in English. No turning back now.’
We went quiet, chastened, until Mamá raised her head from where it’d been tucked against Papá’s shoulder. ‘Should I bring the jug of punch-à-crème out here?’
We nodded in unison. And to power through the sombreness of Papá’s musing, we all hit that jug like we were in competition with Sancho. Within an hour we were good and drunk – too drunk to make it to midnight, when we usually toasted Christmas and opened gifts, another of our lingering Spanish traditions. So drunk even Sancho decided not to attempt the drive home and passed out face down on an air mattress on my bedroom floor before I’d even had a chance to fully inflate it.
Zulema and I went to bed shortly after Sancho passed out, leaving my parents still drinking on the porch while the Manriques continued their Friends marathon, the laugh reel echoing late into the night, as comforting in its sitcom cheesiness as the red, green and gold Rasta-themed Christmas lights twinkling in the street and the sight of my parents slow-dancing in the backyard, which I glimpsed just before shutting my curtains. Proof that although our Christmas was sullied by a dead family member, a violent blackmailer, and a pair of aristocratic assholes, consuming just the right amount of liquor could salvage any holiday.
I woke up at six a.m. on Christmas morning, head throbbing. Sancho was still splattered across the now completely deflated blow-up mattress, snoring loudly. I got up, the room out of focus, tongue like a wad of cotton in my mouth.
Water. I needed water.
I crawled off my bed, wishing there was a mute button for Sancho, and padded out of the room, overwhelmed by thirst. As I emerged from the bedroom hallway, I stumbled backwards, taken aback by the scene in the living room.
No one in the family had decorated their homes, as a nod to the loss of Aunt Celia. Yet there was the Christmas tree, with all the trimmings, twinkling away. The coffee table and end tables held clusters of ceramic Santa Clauses Mamá had made during an artsy phase. The double doors to the porch were framed by green garlands with fairy lights twisted into them, glowing bright in the early-morning greyness. Hanging beside the doors were another product of Mamá’s prolific artsy phase: hand-sewn Christmas stockings. The crèche had also been set up, with all the straw and stones Mamá usually added to give it a ‘lifelike effect’. On either side of the crèche were two lit candles wafting artificial scents of gingerbread and apple-cinnamon, a serious fire hazard considering all the straw scattered around the Holy Family and their entourage. At the eye of this holiday hurricane were the Manriques, matching lumps on the fold-out couch.
My parents must have gotten utterly shit-faced and decorated. I pressed my fingers against my temples. Too much thinking and too little water. I dragged myself to the kitchen, keeping a hand against the wall to ease the vertigo.
Bent over the sink, slurping cold water from the faucet, I noticed that Christmas-coloured curtains had been hung, the regular tea towels replaced with holiday towels showing seasonal icons prancing around in wintry scenes. I straightened up, nauseated by the excessive Christmas crap and too much water too quickly. Coffee and my beach chair. That’d do the trick.
I brewed myself an enormous mug of black coffee and headed through the Christmas cornucopia. As I was pulling the porch door softly shut behind me, I recognized Sancho’s snores coming from the hammock strung up between two pillars. Except it wasn’t Sancho, but Papá. I went to the edge of the hammock and peered in at my father in the swinging cocoon. His mouth was open, face slack and relaxed. I almost didn’t want to wake him, but was too curious not to. I poked his shoulder until his eyes opened – a visible struggle. He tried wetting his lips, but it seemed he was having the same problem I’d had when I woke up: a tongue made of sandpaper.
‘Merry Christmas,’ I said.
‘Oh God.’ He squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Get me out of this thing.’
I helped him climb awkwardly out of the hammock to plop himself into a low Morris chair.
‘Coffee. Please.’
I handed him the mug. He took two gulps, not caring or noticing that it was scalding hot, then handed it back to me before resting his head in his hands.
‘What happened last night?’ I asked.
‘What do you mean?’ he mumbled. ‘What happened with what?’
‘Uhhh …’ I pointed behind me. ‘With the house. It’s like the North Pole in there.’
Papá looked over his shoulder through the glass-paned doors. He slumped forward again, driving his fingers through his hair. ‘The Manriques.’
‘The two laziest human beings on the face of the Earth did all that?’
‘No, no.’ Papá shook his head. ‘They came outside after you all went to bed. Venera-whatever-her-name-is started going on and on to your Mamá about the importance of traditions and being a good Christian, and oh God, she wouldn’t shut her mouth.’
‘And you and Mamá were drunk enough to let it get to you, so you went crazy with the Christmas decorations.’ Even though my father looked like his head was being crushed beneath an invisible asphalt roller, I couldn’t help laughing.
‘Nope,’ he said. ‘She let it get to her, so she went on this Christmas rampage. Of course the Manriques went to sleep before she’d even finished putting up the Christmas tree. Man, those people can sleep – or they can fake it, anyway. Your mother only finished decorating around three a.m., and you know what she’s like when she’s mad – won’t say a word but she’ll make more goddamned noise than a bulldozer.’
Papá reached a hand out for more coffee. I gave him the mug.
‘Finish it,’ I said. ‘So why’d you sleep out here?’
‘I wouldn’t help so your mother told me I had to sleep outside. You know how she gets. But I just wasn’t going to let those two fools guilt me into decorating. My little sister only died a few months ago, for godssake, and my whole family is being blackmailed. I’m not exactly in the Christmas spirit.’
I realized then that his and Mamá’s binge might’ve been about more than just seasonal boozing.
Papá was swilling the coffee in his mouth, wincing at the burn.
‘You know,’ I said, ‘I’ve never asked how you’re doing with the Aunt Celia thing.’
My father raised a wry eyebrow at me, then exhaled. ‘Celia might’ve been a pain in everyone’s ass – she’s still a pain in our asses with this Ugly mess – but she was my sister.’ He lowered his eyes, focused on sipping the coffee. ‘I’m doing how I’m doing,’ he added finally, voice uncharacteristically gruff.
I sat on the arm of the chair and leaned over to the side, touching my head to his at the temple. Our family wasn’t big on physical affection, but we had our ways of showing we cared – a shoulder squeeze, ruffled hair, playful pinches, little ways to make contact and connect. Papá and I stayed with our heads touching for a moment before I stood again.
‘Well, if you want to talk about it …’ I said.
‘Tranquila,’ he said, waving a hand at me. ‘It’s Christmas, let’s not focus on all that right now. Go get yourself a coffee and come tell me what you’re writing these days. It’ll help me get over the hangover – call it a Christmas present.’
Papá and I sat out on the porch drinking a litre of black coffee each, and I actually did tell him about my no
vel draft. It was strange talking about my writing with someone who wasn’t Aunt Celia, but I found myself almost rambling, desperate for an outlet. I talked and talked until the rest of the household slowly woke up. Sancho wandered out into the living room first, stretching and belching and farting without a care in the world for the Manriques who were also now awake. Zulema trotted out shortly after, a Christmas show pony if ever there was one, in a green sundress with a skinny red waist-belt and sparkly red costume jewellery. Mamá emerged last in an ox-blood pencil dress and strappy stilettos, with Golden Globes make-up, hair swept into a chic updo. But even with all that, her face was, to use an expression of Aunt Celia’s, ‘as dark and pinched as a horse’s asshole’. I could see the hangover all over, even through the carefully applied glamour.
‘Mamá, the house is, like, magical!’ Zulema was twirling through the living room, bedazzled by all the Christmas crap. My mother scowled at her, snapping an earring into place, but Zulema didn’t read the mood. ‘Totally a wonderful surprise!’ Still twirling like a festive tumbleweed.
Mamá blinked at my sister, the kind of blink that hits you like a bullet. ‘Zulema, you’re flashing everyone your damn underwear.’
From the safety of the porch, I listened to Mamá’s heels click to the kitchen, then the slamming of a cabinet and: ‘IS THERE NO FILTERED COFFEE IN THIS HOUSE?’
Zulema slumped outside, dejected.
‘Don’t worry, linda,’ said Papá. ‘You’re not the reason she’s so upset.’
He explained about the Manriques’ jibes and finished recounting the story in the nick of time, just as Mamá appeared in the open doorway. Papá, now slightly more recovered from his hangover, got up to try giving her a hug. She stood stiff with her hands by her sides. She was pissed. I think mostly at herself for caving to the Manriques.
Not long after, the Manriques came out to the porch as well, trussed up in matching gold-and-green regalia, and we all politely, if disingenuously, wished them a Merry Christmas. They, with equal insincerity, wished it right back.
One Year of Ugly Page 10