Boston Mike
Shut up, Boston Mike. More from the Chupacabra, please! He kicks it!
La Sirena
Yeah, more Chupacabra… and more Sandy S., too. Show us your cute glasses again. I’d pay to see you in those glasses and nothing else.;)
Donny the Man
You’d better be careful, Donny. I’m pretty sure Sandy’s spoken for.
Michelle
23
Sandy scrolled through the comments on her Chupacabra interview and felt a little sick.
“It’s great, isn’t it?” Angelica had sneaked up behind her like a cat. She was even wearing a leopard-print top. “We’ve received nearly a thousand page views on that Chupacabra piece, and it’s only been up for six hours.”
“Where are they all coming from?” Sandy wondered aloud.
“Some followed links from our sister sites, and some followed links that we seeded elsewhere.”
“Oh.” Sandy hesitated, then ventured to say, “Somehow, I didn’t think the comments would be about me.” She was used to negative opinions from readers, of course; she’d gotten her share of crank e-mails while writing for LatinoNow. But this anonymous commenting on Nacho Papi was a whole new ball game for her. Especially now that the readers could see her online, in digital video.
Angelica leaned over Sandy’s shoulder for a closer look at the computer screen. “Oh, that. Yes, that happens. Just ignore it. Don’t take it personally. Listen, can you interview this Chupacabra character again? Make him a regular feature?”
Sandy nodded and Angelica sailed off to another corner of the office, leaving her alone with the comments of twenty-odd strangers. It was difficult not to take it personally, she thought. At least, she reminded herself, she wasn’t using her legal name on the site. It was small comfort, but it helped to know that potential future employers wouldn’t be able to search for Dominga Saavedra and find out that Boston Mike thought she was politically ignorant, or that Donny the Man wanted to see her naked.
LATER THAT DAY the mysterious Philippe finally put in his appearance. He walked in with Angelica, having come directly from the airport. He was explaining to her about a cancelled event and an issue with his living situation that had allowed him to leave California and fly into Austin early.
The first thing Sandy noticed about him was his extreme physical attractiveness. He was model handsome, practically. Tall, slim, and impeccably dressed. His hair was cropped very short, but, unlike George’s, it wasn’t only because he was starting to go bald. It looked like Philippe’s curly hair was purposely cut short to show every inch of his face and the perfect shape of his head.
Sandy couldn’t help wondering what kind of Latino he was. He was either a very light-skinned Dominican or a somewhat island-looking South American. Or, no, he was probably mixed, she decided. Filipino with Puerto Rican? Salvadoran with Samoan? Whatever the combination was, it had blended beautifully.
She and George were the only staff members in the office at the moment. Angelica introduced them, and Philippe shook their hands and expressed admiration for their work. “George, I really enjoyed your piece about the Minute Men taking on Chuck Norris. It was hilarious. Sandy, I admire your political commentary. And I loved your interview with the Chupacabra.”
Sandy felt herself flush with pleasure as she took Philippe’s hand. She liked this guy already.
“Yeah, it’s nice meeting you, man,” said George. “Can’t wait to work with you. Angelica, I’m out of here. I’ll talk to you guys later.”
With that he made good on his word and left the office. Sandy looked at the clock. It was already six. Where had the time gone?
“Well.” Philippe rubbed his hands together. “Which of you ladies wants to show me the best place around here to have a drink?”
TWO HOURS LATER, Sandy was sitting next to Philippe on a velvet sofa at the Grenadine Lounge, in as deep a conversation as she would have had with Jane or Veronica, or with Daniel, if they ever had deep conversations anymore.
Angelica had joined them for one cocktail, and then left to fulfill a prior engagement. Sandy had enjoyed socializing with her boss, but she was enjoying herself even more now that Angelica was gone and Philippe could tell his stories about her.
“So Angelica told her, ‘Leave your contact at the door, then. Because I can train you for the job, but not if you’re going to spend all your time under my boss’s desk.’ ”
“What? No way!” Sandy squealed.
“Oh, yes, she did.” Philippe took a sip of his dirty martini and nodded. “You haven’t seen yet how she can be. But wait until someone acts up.”
“Oh, I believe it. We’re all kind of scared of her already.”
Philippe laughed. “You don’t have to be scared. Just do your job well and you won’t have to worry. You take care of business, and Angelica will take care of you.”
“She gave me a makeover,” Sandy quietly admitted.
He nodded again. “I could tell. Your look has her signature all over it. Plus she said you were born here in Austin, but you don’t look like it now.”
“Really?” Sandy laughed. It was true. All around them women wore flip-flops with their shorts or jeans, or, at the most formal, cotton sundresses. Sandy almost felt overdressed in her trousers and red patent flats. No, actually, she felt professional, like she had a career that encompassed more than the local scene. “You know, I was scared to death when she made me do it. I was afraid…”
“That you’d end up looking like her? With the big blond hair and long sharp nails?”
Sandy laughed again but lifted her cosmopolitan to her mouth so she wouldn’t have to agree or disagree.
“That’s her own personal style, and everyone who knows her expects her to rock it to the limits. But Angelica keeps up with the rest of the world, and if there’s anything she knows how to do, it’s build somebody’s image. You should feel lucky she’s taking an interest in you. You gave her good material to work with.”
“Thanks.” Sandy felt herself blush again, but completely innocently. Over the course of the evening Philippe had dropped hints that he had at least one man waiting for him in the wings and, therefore, it’d be a waste of time for Sandy to get too revved up by his compliments. She’d had gay friends before, of course, and knew better than to fall for men who were so completely unavailable.
Nevertheless, she was having a really good time with him. Philippe was witty and chivalrous and full of good stories. She had the feeling, already, that they’d be friends.
“Are you getting tired of this place? It’s kind of quiet here, isn’t it?” he asked. “Let’s go somewhere else, maybe get a bite to eat. Do you have to be up early tomorrow? Do you like to dance? Let me treat you—we’ll call it research for my upcoming posts on Austin’s nightlife.”
“Sure.” Sandy reached for her purse just in time to hear her phone ring. It was Daniel calling. She flipped her phone open and, after a second’s hesitation, hit the Ignore button and let him roll to voice mail.
“Do you need to take that?” Philippe asked politely.
“No.” Sandy put her phone back into her purse. “No, I can call him back later.” She stood and smiled at Philippe brightly. “Come on. Let’s ditch this dump and go have some fun.”
They did have fun then. Sandy was embarrassed, at first, that she didn’t know any place to go other than college hangouts. But they called Lori for suggestions and ended up at a much swankier lounge than Sandy would’ve ventured into on her own.
Then Philippe showed her a skill that she’d never learned in J school. “Can you help us out?” he asked their bartender politely. “We write for Levy Media—it’s a national online entertainment syndicate—and we’re working on a story about the best hangouts in all the major cities. Any suggestions?”
The bartender, a young man who looked like he was waiting to be discovered as the next Top Pop Idol contestant, giggled and chatted with them for a while after that before turning to anot
her customer.
“Why’d you do that?” Sandy asked. “We can just ask Lori again if you want to go somewhere else.”
“You’ll see,” said Philippe. In the blink of an eye their bartender was back with a round of shots.
“Here, you guys,” he said. “On the house. Tell me more about your site. Are you going to cover South by Southwest? I have a band, and…”
And so it went, from club to club. Philippe had a knack not only for scoring free drinks, but also for promoting the Nacho Papi brand. People fell over themselves to give Philippe and Sandy their cards and suggest stories to them, and to make note of the site’s name. “So they can check it tomorrow and see if we mention them,” Philippe explained to Sandy later. “So be sure to give shout-outs to the people and places you really liked, and you’ll be hooked up for life.”
At one thirty they met up with Lori at her bar and had yet another free round. Then, at two, she punched out and joined them for an after-hours breakfast at a diner on South Congress. She and Philippe got along just as well as Sandy had known they would, and the three of them talked and laughed through many, many songs on the jukebox.
Sandy climbed the stairs to her apartment at four thirty in the morning, dead tired but elated by the instant memories of the most exhilarating night she’d had in months. She dutifully undressed and washed her face, but was too tired to transform her sofa into a bed and so fell asleep facedown on top of it.
On the coffee table, inside her purse, her phone kept up the weary flashing it’d repeated all night. One, two, three, four voice mails and text messages from Daniel. But Sandy had been too busy to notice, and was now deep in neon-lit dreams.
24
Girl, where in the hell have you been?”
That was Veronica, on Sandy’s cell phone. Sandy took her macchiato and a bottle of water from the drive-through clerk of a chain coffee place before answering. She was hungover and didn’t have the strength to endure her usual coffeehouse, Calypso, on a Saturday morning, when it would doubtless be crowded and noisy.
“I’ve been working. You know, running around looking for stories, like I always do.”
“I guess,” Veronica said, as if that didn’t quite explain it. “I just haven’t heard from you. I have to get online to find out what’s going on. Oh, my God!” Her voice modulated up into a higher pitch here. “Sandy, who are these crazy people talking about you on Nacho Papi? About seeing you naked and stuff? Do you know them?”
Sandy winced at the shrillness of her friend’s voice, and at the memory of the comments left by Donny the Man and others. She had pulled into the parking lot of an old-fashioned mall that no one ever visited because she couldn’t drive, talk to Veronica, and drink coffee simultaneously. But she needed to drink the coffee immediately. So she sat behind the wheel of her parked car, enormous bug-eye sunglasses shielding her from the unmerciful mid-morning sun, and double-fisted her macchiato and water while using her shoulder to press the phone to her ear. A hundred feet away, the mall entrance sat sullen and dark. Sandy could just make out poster-board signs attached to the glass doors. They proclaimed “Say NO to GIGA-MART” and “Keep Austin WEIRD, DAMMIT!” It wasn’t an inspiring scene.
“No, I don’t know those people,” she sighed into the phone. “They’re just random people who read the site. Some of them are crazy, I guess.”
“God, Sandy. Don’t you worry about them seeing you on the videos and maybe stalking you or whatever?”
“No.” Sandy took a long pull of water to counteract the dehydration caused by her hangover and espresso, and considered the question. “No. I mean, what’s a stalker going to do? Follow me back and forth to work? Watch me type stuff on my laptop? He’d get bored after a while and go back home.”
“I guess,” Veronica said again. “What about your blog, though?”
“What about it?”
“Don’t you worry that people will find out that it’s you writing it, and they’ll—I don’t know—get jealous and kill Daniel or something?”
Sandy laughed. “Not even.” But it made her stop, again, and imagine the potentials. “Why would anybody do that? They wouldn’t even be able to figure out Daniel’s real name, first of all. And I don’t even talk about him that much. If anything, I’d be worried that a stranger would take pity on me and call my mom to tell her to get off my back.” She laughed again at this thought.
“Well, I saw that you’re not mad at Danny Boy anymore. That’s good, huh?”
“You read that on my blog?” Sandy couldn’t keep from sounding surprised. Veronica never mentioned her blog.
“Yeah. You know how I read Nacho Papi every morning, right after I read Hate-O-Rama. Then, after that, I like to go check on your blog and see if anything you’re saying there relates to what you said on Nacho Papi. Kind of like getting the inside scoop, you know?”
“Well, you already have the inside scoop, right? Since you’re my friend in real life and all?” Sandy didn’t know whether to be amused or annoyed. It sounded as if Veronica hadn’t been interested in her writing until it’d been validated with Hate-O-Rama’s stamp of approval.
Veronica laughed. “Well, yeah, of course. But you know what I mean.”
Sandy didn’t, exactly, but she decided to let it go. She was probably overreacting because of the hangover, she told herself. So what if Veronica had only started reading her personal blog recently? At least she was reading it, which was more than Sandy could say for her other friends.
“Oh, hey, I wanted to tell you. I have a huge show coming up. June ninth. Can you come?”
“That’s two months from now,” Sandy pointed out. There was a pause, and Sandy realized that Veronica was expecting her simply to say yes. “I mean, yeah. I’ll be there. Where’s it going to be?” Most of Veronica’s shows were at restaurants and coffee shops. They’d let her display her art there, usually with other people’s, and then hold little “openings” that were basically excuses to sell food and coffee to the artists and their friends. It wasn’t exactly the big time, but Veronica had sold a few of her collages at those things and was gradually building a fan base in the Dallas area.
“This is a really big show. There’s a new gallery opening up in Oak Cliff, and my boss knows the owner, and he got me in!” Her voice pitched higher again. “It’s a real gallery, Sandy! With real art! I get to show my stuff there for six weeks!”
Veronica’s enthusiasm was contagious. Sandy was glad to hear she was finally catching a good break. “That’s awesome, V. That rocks. I can’t wait.”
Sandy made a mental note. She’d put Veronica’s show on her calendar first thing, then cross her fingers that Angelica wouldn’t have something more important for her to do that night.
25
Post from Nacho Papi’s Web Site
Selling Out and Selling Back In
by Sandy S.
Shawna Douglas has just joined the list of undercover Latinas who’ve decided to come out of the closet in the hope of making money. On the cover of her new reggaeton [This should be italicized, I think—DT] album, “Todo Mi Cuerpo,” [This should be italicized as well as in quotes—DT] Douglas writes:
The album title means All of My Body, but I want this album to reflect all of my mind and soul, too. Not just the black part of me but my Ecuadorian heritage, as well, which I have always cherished but which my fans haven’t yet gotten to appreciate. I hope you enjoy this new me. [This quote is a little vapid and doesn’t present the subject in a flattering light. Maybe find another quote?—DT]
Bravissima, Shawna. Way to cash in. Not since Linda Ronstadt’s “Canciones de Mi Padre” (which translates to “Finally, Being Mexican is Marketable”) has anyone so blatantly de-cloaked for dollars. [On the whole, this piece is clearly written, but slightly inflammatory. Watch tone.—DT]
26
They were back at Samurai Noodles, but this time Sandy was trying the tuna and Daniel was eating a bowl of fried rice. He picked out and set aside everyt
hing in his bowl except the rice itself while waiting for her to read the edits he’d made on her post. He kept grinning at her, as if he were being an especially good boyfriend who deserved some recognition, if not an outright reward.
Sandy read the first few pages—there were about ten, total—and then had to stop because her temper was rising. “I don’t get it.”
“What? The part about the tone being inflammatory?”
“No.” Sandy felt herself losing patience. “That’s the part you didn’t get. The tone of the whole site is inflammatory. It’s supposed to be. That’s what readers expect from us. Didn’t you read their comments on this piece?”
“No. I didn’t have time to read the comments. I only printed and read your posts.” He added in a defensive murmur, “I barely had time to do that.”
“Well, I don’t know what you expect me to do with this. The piece has been online for a week, and, last time I checked it had almost thirty comments from people who obviously enjoyed reading it. You didn’t see that my tone is right in line with the rest of Nacho Papi, and you didn’t notice that we don’t italicize Spanish on the site at all because it’s supposed to be bilingual. You didn’t even say whether you liked the piece.” The words came hurtling out of Sandy’s mouth. She paused for breath, then added, “You know what, Daniel? If you couldn’t say something nice, maybe you shouldn’t have said anything at all.”
Daniel sat up indignantly, spilling a little rice from his fork onto his shirt in the process. “Oh, right, I shouldn’t have said anything. Sure. With you giving me the silent treatment for weeks now, and then oh-so-casually asking if I’ve read your latest post, every time we talk? You know, Sandy, I’m really busy at the university. I know you don’t think so, because you don’t really take an interest in what I do there, but you could at least appreciate that I took the time to comment on your work. That”—he pointed to the pages in her hands—“is more than I’d do for my best students.”
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