“I’ve no idea about this Bodega, sir. And I’m not your son.” And then, with a more respectful tone, “Sir.”
The captain leaned forward, smiling slightly. “Let me give you a scenario. You have a reporter that gets in over his head. He gets killed and then you find out that reporter was dirty. He belonged to another drug lord. He was killed by that drug lord’s rival. It’s only a matter of time before the other guy fights back, and then what do you have?” He wanted me to say a war.
“Sounds like trouble.”
“He’s jerking us around,” DeJesus said. “He’s been seen with Enrique Guzman. If you know Enrique Guzman you know Willie Bodega.”
“Hey.” I faced DeJesus. “When Frank Sinatra was alive he’d be dining with a bunch of mafiosos every night, but you guys never brought him in for questioning.”
“Sit down, please sit down,” Leary said to me calmly. Ortiz patted the air near his friend, telling him to calm down.
“Look,” I said, “I’ve got things to do. Now, I told you what I know and, like you, I have a job to do. So if you are going to arrest me for something, you tell me what it is and let me call a lawyer. Otherwise don’t waste my time and yours.” I bluffed, because if they were to detain me, Nazario was the only lawyer I knew and that might lead right to Bodega.
“Bullshit.” DeJesus spat. Leary sighed. Ortiz just shook his head.
“You’re free to go,” Leary said. Sounded like salsa to me.
“What! Leary, come on!” DeJesus said, getting up from the couch.
“I’ll walk you out, Mr. Mercado,” Ortiz said to me. I thanked both him and the captain. I had nothing to say to DeJesus.
“Just one thing, son.” This time Leary emphasized the word, patronizingly. “If I see you as much as jaywalking, I’ll have you right back here, and next time I won’t be as understanding.” As if he had been. But it was all right. He had nothing and was just trying to scare me.
Ortiz was silent as we walked out of the precinct and onto the street. I was ready to walk away, but Ortiz wasn’t through.
“Mira, Mercado, I was raised in Jersey, but I’m originally from San Juan. I hope you understand,” he said, “that DeJesus is my partner. I didn’t like what he said about us. But, right or wrong, I have to back my partner.”
“Sure.” I understood.
“Good. Now, I really hope you told the truth. I really hope you’re clean, Mercado,” Ortiz said. “Cuz I liked the way you stood up for us.”
ROUND 10
The Saddest Part Is
Turning Off the Lights
I was still shaking when I got home at about eight-thirty. I wondered if I really was clean, or if I was somehow involved in all of this more than I wanted to think. But what worried me more was that Blanca might not come back. I should have bought a machine so I could check messages, but I had never gotten around to it. So I called her mother’s right away.
“Nancy?”
“Yes, it’s me.” She knew I’d call.
“Everything’s all right, see? I’m home.”
“I wish I was one of those people that stays mad, Julio. I wish I was one of those people who hates forever; you deserve it. You’ve been lying to me all this time—”
“I’m sorry, Nancy.”
“You could’ve told me the truth from the beginning and still counted on me.”
“Nancy, from now on, I swear I’ll never hide anything from you. I’ll tell you the complete truth—”
“I don’t want to know the truth,” she said. “It’s too late for it and I don’t want to hear it. Let’s not say anything right now, okay? I’m going to be staying at Mami’s for a while. At least until the baby is born. I think that’s best. Best for both of us.”
“All right,” I said sadly. “Just promise you’ll come back.”
“I’ll be back,” she whispered. Then, after a pause, “Just not, not right now.”
“All right. But you know I love you.”
“Please!” Her voice sailed a notch. “Just let me stay at my mother’s for a while, all right?”
“All right. Whatever you want.”
“I’ll be there tomorrow with la Hermana Santiago to pick up some things. And Julio …” She paused. “I don’t know how to say this, but I hope you aren’t home when we get there.”
“Okay.” I was in no position to bargain. When your wife says she’s leaving you, whether it’s for a few days or months or forever, you don’t object. You just let her go. You might want to ask her if she needs money, but in our case Blanca always had more money than me.
“Do you need money?” I asked anyway.
“Do you need money?” she quickly replied.
“No … I’m okay,” I said, knowing I was broke. “Call me when you can.”
“Take care of yourself.” She hung up. I looked around the apartment. It was a mess, so many things out of place. All of a sudden the place seemed empty and dark. The boxes that were stacked up against the wall would remain unopened. There was no need to make this place feel like home.
The phone rang. I jumped at it.
“Nancy!”
“Nah, it’s Negra.”
“Negra, I’ve no time for you, okay?”
“Well, you better make some time, Chino—”
“Blanca just left me.” I wanted anyone’s sympathy all of a sudden.
“You serious? Don’t play with me, play lotto. You serious?”
“Walked out.”
“That’s fucked up.”
“So listen, she might call back. Can you leave the line free, please?”
“All right. I’m sorry to hear that, but you do owe me, Chino. Just remember that.”
“Negra! Get off the line!” I yelled.
“Dag, it’s not my fault my sister left you—” I hung up on her and went to wash my face. The phone rang again.
“Nancy!”
“Chino, you owe me big.” It was Negra again. I sighed and let her talk. “You owe me big.” I sort of knew what she wanted. Blanca had told me.
“Negra, what makes you think I can have your husband beat up?”
“Don’t insult me. I know who your friends are.”
“Even if I could, Negra, I ain’t having Victor beat up, all right? That’s all.”
“Come on, Chino. He won’t even know you had something to do with it.”
“You solve your own marital problems, Negra.”
“Chino, just a little bit. Get Nene to knock him around some or Sapo to bite him. Like the way they tag-teamed that reporter.” I was silent after that. How did she know?
“What are you talking—”
“Come on, Julio, don’t take me for a fool.”
“All right, all right. The cops were here, that’s why Blanca left.”
“No shit. They’ve been talking to a lot of people. But no one’s saying anything.”
“Have they talked to you?”
“Not me. But you ain’t getting out of this one. Victor. What are you going to do about Victor? I want him hurt. You owe me.”
“All right. I’ll see what I can do,” I said, even though I didn’t mean it. I just wanted her off the phone.
“You serious, Chino?”
“Yeah,” I sighed.
“Now, I don’t want him dead,” she said carefully. “Or broken, you know, because I want him back. I just want to teach him a lesson, thass all.”
“Of course.”
“I like his nose. Don’t let anyone break his nose.”
“Is that all?”
“Actually, leave his face the way it is, I always thought he was cute. Go for the body.”
“Of course. Look, I have to go.”
“Leave his balls alone. Like I said, I’m planning on taking him back.”
“Negra, I have to go!” I shouted.
“All right, all right.” And then, Negra allowed herself to become a bit human again. “Chino, I’m sorry about Blanca, okay. You two will patch it up.”
<
br /> “Thanks,” I whispered, and Negra hung up.
I had gone to bed hoping that Blanca would call, but after two hours of tossing and turning I gave up hope. The hardest thing was falling asleep. It was as if I had snorted all the coke in the world and my eyes hurt but my brain couldn’t shut itself off. Thoughts of Blanca, the pastor, the cops, Bodega raced through my mind like the Wonder Wheel at Coney Island. I began to think at what point in time I could have done things differently. Where were those interesting lines that I could have avoided?
I tried to empty my mind, but I still couldn’t sleep. The refrigerator hummed loudly, like a Buddhist on crack. I could hear every noise in the building. A pot fell in 4F, a baby was crying in 3B, they were watching television in 2A. Every sound was magnified. I realized I hadn’t made love to Blanca in over a month.
So I got up. I turned on the television but the reception was bad. I made myself a sandwich. I opened a box where some of my books were and found The Stranger. Maybe I could get lost in someone else’s misfortunes for a change. I fixed up my pillow and began to read. It was a book I had once loved and carried around with me, but I knew the real reason I was reading The Stranger wasn’t because I wanted to drift back into the past. It was simpler than that. I was afraid and missed Blanca. And when you’ve been with someone for a long time and they leave you, the saddest part is turning off the lights.
ROUND 11
Worth All the Souls in Hell
THE next day I went to work. It felt good to go, because it took my mind off things. It felt good to be busy and not have to think about my own troubles. I wanted to see Bodega like I wanted to see a leper, so I avoided the places I knew Sapo might be driving around collecting. Besides, I had Detectives DeJesus and Ortiz to worry about. As for Blanca, I didn’t want to think too much about her, for I might have broken down and started crying in public, embarrassing the hell out of myself. I kept telling myself that she was safe and that she would return to me once she’d had the baby, maybe sooner. I kept telling myself that Blanca believed strongly that all kids should have a father and a mother. With that in mind, I tried to let it go.
After work, I had class, so I went home to pick up my books. As soon as I entered I knew that Blanca had been there. I saw that some of the boxes in which she had packed her clothes had been emptied and some were even missing. It made me feel sad. I gathered up the books I needed and got out of the apartment as quickly as I could.
After a few blocks, I bought a piragua from the old man dressed like a sailor who walked around the neighborhood pushing his piragua cart, which had fake sails. On the side of his cart read, “Aquí me quedo”—here I stay. He made the best piraguas in the neighborhood. I was asking for a tamarindo piragua when someone called my name.
“Chino. So, like, I hear you were asked to dinnah?” It was Sapo. His car was right next to the curb.
“Look, man,” I said, checking for DeJesus and Ortiz, just in case, “they want your boss. Now I told them nothin’, but from now on he’s on his own.”
“Thass cool. I heard you were a fucken rock. Like they brought in the nuns and even them bitches couldn’t make you talk.”
“I have a class,” I said, tired of Sapo and all the rest.
“I hear that. So, mira, Chino, I know your alleluia wife booked—”
“What the fuck—? Who the fuck told you that?”
“Negra, thass who. Somethin’ about gettin’ Victor beat up? Anyway, don’t sweat Negra, cuz—”
“Look, I have to go. Wan’ a piragua, tell me now,” I said to him.
“You. I wan’ you, bro. I was sent to get you, homey.”
“I ain’t going nowhere with you.”
“Yes you are, cuz Vera’s husband is waiting for you at Ponce de Leon Restaurant, you know that restaurant, doncha? That place by 116th and Lex?”
“I ain’t goin’.”
“You told Bodega you was gonna go.”
“Not anymore.”
“Well, this might change your mind. Afterward Bodega and Vera are gonna pay a visit to her sistah. Thass right, your alleluia wife’s mother.” I perked up. “Thought that’d get you horny.” Sapo smiled his Sapo smile and the old man finished scraping his big block of ice and packed the tiny icicles in a paper cup.
“See, Chino, this will make you mad happy. Bodega and Vera plan to stick up for you. Vera plans on convincing her sistah to convince her daughter to return to you. I mean, it’s not like you been dickin’ other women. Thass all the bochinche I have for you now. Still goin’ ta class?”
The old man colored the tiny icicles a light orange-brown by dripping a homemade tamarindo syrup all over my piragua. He wrapped a napkin around the paper cup and offered it to me. I paid, thanked him, and got in Sapo’s car.
“You know those two detectives, Ortiz and DeJesus?” I asked Sapo.
“Yeah, they sorry niggas.”
“This is serious, bro.”
“I know. They been sniffin’ at Bodega fo’ evah. They been like askin’ Bodega’s tenants questions and shit. Thass how they got to you, some fucken person in da buildin’ pointed your way. We’ll find out who and make the nigga homeless.”
“Sapo,” I said, “I know you didn’t exactly kill Salazar.” He didn’t answer me and I left it at that. Sapo then made a left turn and we were on 116th and Third.
“ ‘Memba the Cosmo useta be here?” Sapo pointed at a department store that was once a theater.
“Yeah, they showed the worst movies in all the nine planets.”
“You got good weed, though, and the movies were mad cheap.”
We reached the restaurant, which was down the block, just opposite where the Cosmo used to be. I got out of the car. I finished off my piragua and threw the paper cup in the trash.
“Inside, go to the back, Chino. All the way to the back. Behind the kitchen. You’ll see him back there. Can’t miss ’im. Nigga is old. I don’t know where the fuck Bodega dug up that fossil.” And then Sapo took off.
I walked inside to great smells. Arroz asopado, pasteles, lechón asado, empanadas, camarones fritos. A waiter saw me and seemed to recognize immediately that I was not there to eat. He ushered me all the way to the back of the restaurant and into a small room behind the kitchen. I could hear the sounds of dishes hitting against one another as they were washed by hand.
In the room was a small table with a candle and an old man sitting with a suitcase at his feet. He was well dressed. His suit looked expensive and he wore cufflinks. He smelled of good aftershave and his shoes were polished to a high shine. His watch was expensive too. But his face was a wasteland, as if his best years had been spent working in a coal mine. It made me want to trade in the watch and the suit in return for him not having worked as hard as he obviously had to get those things. I went over to him and introduced myself.
“Hi, I’m Julio Mercado.” I extended my hand and he got up from his chair to shake it.
“John Vidal,” he said in a tired, old voice. “Could you please tell me what this is all about?” I didn’t say anything. “My wife called me a day ago hysterically crying, and told me to come up to New York.” He sounded worried. “I asked her why. Why she didn’t just return. She continued to cry, so I agreed to come. On the phone she gave me this address. I thought this was a hotel.” He sat down. I felt a little bad for him; he was lost and Miami was far away.
“I met your wife, she’s my wife’s aunt.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. He jumped to his feet again.
“Then you must know where my wife is. Vera is not like this at all. She wanders … but always comes back to me.”
“She’ll be here,” I said.
“The waiter said the same thing. But I’ve been waiting for hours.”
“Have you eaten?” I was desperate for something to say.
“No, I’m not hungry. I just want my wife.” He sat back down defiantly. “I’ve got things, important things to do back in Miami. Vera, you better have a good reason f
or doing this,” he said even though she wasn’t there. When the waiter walked through the door and brought us coffee, placing the cups carefully on the table as if they were live grenades, Vidal didn’t even bother to look up.
“Who are you really?” he asked.
“I’m Vera’s niece’s husband. My wife, Nancy, is her—”
“Yes, yes, yes,” he said, and waved away the rest of my response. “Yes, yes, you’ve told me. Now, look here, young man.” I would never have guessed he was Latin. He was more American than Mickey Mouse and just as old. “I’m going to go to the police. I get the feeling my wife is being held against her will.”
“Your wife will be here.” Bodega was punishing him. I was too tired to feel bad for Vidal or anybody; I had my own problems. I started to get hungry. The good smells were overpowering. I asked him if he was hungry again but he didn’t answer me. It felt uncomfortable to be in that room with him, but I had to stay. If what Sapo had told me was true, I knew that Vera’s talk with her sister would influence Blanca. I needed allies to get Blanca to return. What better ally than Blanca’s mother?
The time dragged. So I thought about Blanca and the early days. All the places we went to and the things we had done. Like the day she told me she was pregnant. How she had wrapped a present for me and, smiling, said happy birthday. I told her it wasn’t my birthday and she punched my shoulder and said she knew. When I unwrapped it, there was a baby rattle. She hugged me, telling me that unplanned babies are the most loved. I got nervous because we were still in school and didn’t have real jobs, but I was happy. God, that was only a couple months ago. When did things start going bad? I needed to get this all fixed up. I wanted my wife back.
Finally Bodega and Vera walked in. Bodega was wearing a new suit. It wasn’t all white like the one I had last seen him wear. This was a very fine dark blue suit, probably Italian, with a satin red handkerchief poking out of the breast pocket. His shirt, tie, and shoes were color-coordinated, evidence that Vera had dressed him for the occasion.
When Vidal saw Vera, he shot up from his seat and headed over to her, but Bodega stopped him. I could see he didn’t want the old man to touch her. Vera was silent. Her head hung low. She looked like she had been crying.
Bodega Dreams Page 20