He hated when his horse took the lead too early. He preferred that they come off the pace and wait for the other horses to tire out.
White Noise held his ground, digging in his hoofs and increasing his lead at the top of the stretch.
Both Nestor and Hernan jumped up and down as the horse crossed the finish line. They made spectacles of themselves but they did not care.
Cashing out their ticket, Nestor realized that he'd not felt this happy in a long time. He whooped as they exited the gates and Hernan did the same. They high-fived each other and made their way out of the track.
“Celebration time, amigo!” Nestor said as they passed an alley. They were crossing between a doughnut shop and a bridal store. They had no interest in either. Merritt had much more to offer.
“Give me the fucking money!” a voice called out from the shadows before stepping up toward them
The punk looked to be in his early twenties. He had the practiced deadeye look of a wannabe gang-banger. He wore a bandana bearing the Mexican flag around his forehead, but Nestor could tell he was native born from the lack of an accent.
A few feet behind him stood a Samoan. He wore a sleeveless t-shirt showing his massive arms. His hair was a frizzed out afro, adding to his intimidating appearance, but his facial expression suggested something other than a tough guy.
He looked nervously behind himself and to the side. Probably his first robbery, Nestor thought. The punk had a practiced air about him. He grabbed Nestor by the shirt. Tattoos of crosses dotted the man's forearm. His bicep read, “RIP Antonio.”
“You speak English, mother fucker?”
The punk pressed the gun to Nestor's stomach.
Nestor eyeballed the young man with disdain.
“Don't look at me, bitch. Give me the fuckin' money. All of it. Now.”
Nestor slowly took the wallet out of his pocket. The punk reached over and snatched it from his hands.
The punk took out the money and dropped the wallet to the ground.
“Where's the rest of it?”
A blue 1980s style Camaro came screeching out. A skinny Latin girl sat in the driver side. Her eyes narrowed at both Nestor and Hernan before glancing to her side to make sure they were alone.
“I said, where's the rest of it?”
Nestor wanted to get a look at the license plate but then the gun smashed against his temple.
He woke up to the bass line of a car stereo rattling his windows. Then a siren.
Looking up, he saw Hernan eating a bowl of Boo Berry cereal at the window.
“What happened?”
“Two guys jumped us.”
“Yeah.” Nestor massaged his throbbing head. “Then what?”
Hernan did not answer immediately as Nestor felt his pant pocket for the money. Then he looked on the coffee table and saw the bills neatly bundled up.
“How did you?”
“I took care of them.” Hernan shoveled a spoonful of the cereal into his mouth. Then he idly looked out the window.
CHAPTER 4
Nestor went to the refrigerator, took out an ice tray and dumped two cubes into a napkin.
He turned on the lamp and flopped on the couch, holding the ice to his eye. He wanted silence but the apartment was full of slamming doors from the neighbors, thumps, and scrapings. The distractions were worsening his headache.
“Even with our winnings.” Nestor shook his head exasperated. “We don’t have enough to cover the back rent. Guy came over yesterday and they'll throw us out tomorrow.”
“Can't we figure something out?” Hernan asked, sounding desperate. His eyes pleaded, hoping Nestor would take the lead.
“I am just as bad at figuring things as you.”
Nestor pressed the ice harder to his forehead, as if it trying to comfort his stress as well as his bruise. He glared up at the ceiling and didn't speak. The room filled with the sound of a plane going by. We're a pair of deaf idiots in the dark.
“You all right?” Hernan sat down on the couch and stared at Nestor.
“I think I have a concussion.”
“I should have brought you to the doctor.”
“No,” Nestor said, waving off the suggestion and tossing the ice bag on the coffee table. He looked up at the ceiling again as if waiting for his frustration to dissolve into numbness. “That would mean just more bills.”
“My abuelita said people worry about money too much. Makes them forget about what is important.”
“Your abuelita wasn't grounded in reality. People say things like that but it takes money to enjoy the important things. Like eating for one. A roof over your head.”
“She said God would provide.” He said it with bravado.
“God hates us.” Nestor whispered, trying to get up and Hernan sprang over to assist. Nestor waved him off and got up by himself. He walked over to the window and looked out at the graffiti painted walls. The landscape burned in his brain like a future bad memory then sank into darkness as one of the street lamps blew out.
Nestor felt shame. He thought about getting a one-bedroom apartment. He would sleep on the couch. It really didn't matter. His gambling got them into this hole. He needed to stop denying that he was the loser. Not Hernan. He just brought the kid along for the ride.
“I have to do some thinking, amigo,” Nestor said.
He went to the refrigerator and took out a bottle of Corona. Covering it in a paper bag, he exited through the door.
Nestor walked past the street vendors peddling tamales for a dollar. He laughed at how he couldn't even afford that.
What will we do?
He passed on the tamales but he did not take a pass on the six bottles of beer he bought at the liquor store.
Nestor walked to the park, ignoring the bums exchanging needles under the swing set. He went under the furthest tree, laid flat on his back and drank himself drunk.
***
The restaurant would be empty from two until around six. The last to leave on the swing shift, he intentionally left the back entrance unlocked. He left the apartment exactly at two o'clock. Nestor fell asleep in front of the television, the smell of beer strong around him.
The quiet of the East Oakland night put Hernan on edge. He entered through the back door as planned and turned on the kitchen light. He already had his story straight. If someone caught him, he would say he forgot his coat. He would say the lights were on so he just went in and retrieved it.
He opened the front cash register and found an empty drawer.
The safe?
He remembered Cisneros kept the spare key in his office. Good luck trying to find that.
His eyes turned to the register at the cocktail bar. He jumped over the counter and popped the machine open. There were twenties and a few hundreds. A lot of small bills. Hernan stuffed them into his backpack. Pushing his luck, he went back to Cisneros' office. He rummaged through the drawers looking for a set of keys. He found some but there were about thirty on the chain. He went over to the side of the safe and began inserting them one by one.
Hernan didn’t like to steal. Whenever he did, he imagined his abuelita looking down at him from heaven and he felt shame.
He rationalized his actions because he worked overtime numerous days the prior week and did not get paid for it. He addressed the oversight to Cisneros but the man just brushed him off.
He did not tell Nestor about being cheated out of his rightful pay. Nestor would demand revenge, but he was starting to see things Nestor's way. People will take advantage of you when you play by the rules.
So, Hernan was striking back.
Annoyed that he did not find the master for the safe right away, he dropped the keys back into Cisneros’ drawer.
He looked through the kitchen and thought of other items he could steal. Maybe he should steal some of the fish meat and sell it to some of the street vendors? Too messy and selling it would be a hassle. He took some of the fish meat anyway and figured he and Nestor could fry
it for a few dinners.
Hernan exited the back door and made his way down the dark alley. He took a few steps when the blue light hit him.
“Don't fucking move!”
He turned around anyway and the cop had his gun pointed at him.
“I said don't move!”
The cop slowly came toward him.
“Hands up!”
Hernan complied with the officer's request. In Mexico, if you were caught committing a robbery the cop might shoot you first and ask questions later. Hernan remained strangely calm as the police officer approached, knowing that the rules were different here.
The cop pushed him to the ground and he could feel the cold metal of the handcuffs go tight around his wrist.
Another officer arrived and the two escorted Hernan to the squad car. They tossed him in the back seat causing Hernan to hit his head on the floorboard.
Hernan sat in front of a bored looking, but cute Latina with a name badge that read L. Marcos. She inputted data into the computer. The arresting officer hovered above him. He had a wrestler's physique with a bulldog neck. His badge read S. Scott and he looked down at Hernan through narrow brown eyes.
“Tell the woman your name.”
“Why? I have done nothing wrong.”
“What is your name?” the Latina girl asked in Spanish. She looked at him flatly but he felt an unspoken camaraderie with her considering she addressed him in his native language. Maybe she could be his ally.
“Hernan. Hernan Vasquez.”
The girl's fingers danced across the keyboard.
“What were you doing in the restaurant?” the cop’s voice echoed in the old, high-ceilinged building.
“I was … I forgot my coat. I went to go get it. I work there.”
“So you decided to go ahead and break in after hours to get your coat at two o'clock in the morning? With a bag full of cash?”
“That's right.”
Hernan thought that he must have tripped the silent alarm. He could already hear Nestor's angry voice in his head. He would berate him for robbing the restaurant without consulting him first. By trying to rectify the money situation, he made matters worse.
They took Hernan's photo, fingerprints and showed him to his cell. An open-air toilet stood at the center. A plank jutting out of the wall served as a bed. He lay down and blinked back tears as he looked up at the cobwebbed corners of the ceiling.
Nestor awoke to an empty house. He looked in the shower and in Hernan's bedroom.
Home alone. Where was he?
A knock on the door. He looked through the peephole and recognized the man in front of the door as Cisneros.
“I had your friend arrested.” Cisneros said before Nestor had the door fully open.
“What?”
“He robbed me,” Cisneros walked in without an invitation. “Left the back door to the restaurant unlocked. Came back at night and took out about three hundred dollars from the cash register.”
Cisneros had a giant mole on his left cheek. His salt and pepper hair on bushy eyebrows gave him an owl-like appearance. He talked behind a pair of blue shades which he wore night or day.
“I have had tons of guys try that same trick,” Cisneros said. “My wife keeps telling me I need to hire nice little white kids. But nice little white kids don't apply to be dishwashers.”
“Where is he now?”
“In jail,” Cisneros said. “We need to have a long talk.”
Cisneros drove Nestor to the police station in a brand new Yukon. Custom gold and with leather interior, Nestor sat stiffly in the passenger seat as if unworthy to be in such a vehicle.
“I hire ex-cons all the time,” Cisneros said. “I have a sixth sense about them. I can tell if they are really out to redeem themselves. And I don’t bother with those who are too far gone.”
“Hernan’s not an ex-con.”
“He is now.”
“Don't blame him. Blame me. It was my fault. We’re running short on cash. Scared him. Shouldn’t have been so harsh on him. Shit, he’s doing the best he can. That’s why he tried to rob the restaurant. Because I told him we were in desperate need of money.”
“How bad is it?”
“If we don’t come up with rent quick? We’re being evicted. That’s my fault too. I lost a ton of money gambling. Desperation does that.”
“Hernan is a nice boy,” Cisneros said. “I'm in shock. I shouldn't be. But I am.”
The two men waited in line until they got their turn at the front desk. A ropy officer led them down the hall to officer Victor Tapia
“They gave him to me because he doesn't speak English too well,” Tapia said. “Now he doesn't speak to anyone.”
“He'll speak to me,” Nestor said. “He's just confused.” He pushed passed heading toward his friend.
“Yeah, well he's going to John George.”
“John George?” he asked, stopping.
The dreaded psychiatric facility in the East Bay, Nestor knew Hernan would be holed up for two or three days against his will.
“Can I talk to him? He’s not crazy. Trust me. He has no record. Just a lapse in judgment, that’s all. Cisneros said he would drop the charges.”
Cisneros stood behind Nestor. He nodded his head. “I own the restaurant. I'll drop the charges.”
The officer sighed and shook his head. “Wait here.”
Hernan sat in the back seat and slouched. He stared out of the window in a daze.
“Anything you want to say to me, Hernan?”
“I am sorry.”
“Really? I mean are you really genuinely sorry?”
Hernan nodded his head. “Yes.”
Nestor swallowed his tongue. He knew that Cisneros would make the kid grovel. This was his crime too. His life of empty beer bottles and torn betting slips had gotten his friend into this position.
“If there is anything you need from us, just ask.” Nestor said.
“I might just hold you to that.”
Cisneros turned a corner and they drove in silence for a few minutes. He turned on the radio and let some salsa music play.
“If you need money, just ask. That's all you have to do is ask. People just take and steal and I hate that shit. I have many business interests in the city. If you want to earn extra money—ask. Don't fucking steal.”
The sudden change in tone and language took Nestor aback. Cisneros presented himself to the neighborhood as an honest and charitable family man. He heard things about him in the streets. How he would give to the poor people, host free barbecues in the park and give stirring testimonies about his previous life as a gunrunner and drug dealer who turned his life around.
He stopped the car in front of their house.
“They say our God is a loving God. And to forgive is divine.” Cisneros looked steely eyed at the young man in the rear view mirror. “I don’t forgive. I just forget about certain things and those people that hurt me no longer have any power over me. So what you have done is forgotten, Hernan.”
“Thank you.”
“Now, how much money do you need?
Neither Hernan nor Nestor responded immediately.
Cisneros looked out the window for a moment and then shut off the car stereo.
“How much?”
“Eight hundred,” Nestor said. “We owe some back rent. Eight hundred puts us over the top.”
“You have to work a lot of hours to make eight hundred dollars as a dishwasher. Talk about indentured servitude.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hernan?” Cisneros took off his blue shaded glasses. He looked at the young man again through his rear view mirror.
“Yes, sir.”
“Are you a religious man?” Cisneros fingered the Christ on the cross he had dangling from his rear view mirror.
“My abuelita used to talk about Him all the time.”
“Then why did you steal?”
“Because I am a sinner. I’m still growing in the faith. My abuelita
said I would make mistakes. But that I would be forgiven.”
“Your abuelita sounds like a wise woman,” Cisneros said. He reached into his wallet and flipped out eight one hundred dollar bills. He handed them to Nestor. “Take it.”
Nestor took the money. He started to say thank you but stopped himself as Cisneros stared out the window at their graffiti devoured building.
Hernan took another look at the Christ figure hanging from the rear view mirror before exiting the vehicle.
CHAPTER 5
Nestor’s dreams held no pattern. People from his past life haunted him in different ways. He’d chained his bike up in front of a store and then find it missing. He tried to find it, racing down blind alleys looking for the thief, but finding his aunt Lucia instead, her boisterous laugh making his skin crawl.
When he lived in Tijuana, he thought about going to a fortuneteller or a psychic who could tell him what the dream meant. He didn’t want to know anything about his future because he knew what that looked like. He just wanted to know about his dream.
Once Upon A Wish : Book One Page 3