by Lazaro Lima
I jump out of the car. I hated that car anyway. It’s an SUV that belongs to her uncle. The shit’s so big and high you need a forklift to reach the seat. Fuck it. If that’s the way she wants it, then fine. Fuck her.
Outside the car, I stand there, looking at the ground. I start to feel how sick I am. There’s that extra saliva in my mouth, the kind that comes before you puke. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to throw up now.
I glance up at Peggy and she’s wiping her face with the back of her hand. I’m about to reach for the door when she starts up the engine. I stick my hands back in my pockets. Fine. If that’s what she wants, fine then.
Puti and the Gay Bandits of Hunts Point
CHARLES RICE-GONZÁLELZ
Puti sat in the window of her first-floor apartment facing the auto glass shops on Garrison Avenue. The South Bronx streets below her rumbled with people dealing, mothers pushing baby carriages, kids sucking on sweets, men inhaling, bibles thumping, and guys watching girls watching guys watching girls checking out girls with slick faces wearing clothes wrapped around curves and swells. The sun spilled along the street, creating long, skinny shadows stretching the length of the block. The tinkling music from a Mister Softee ice-cream truck offered Puti a trip back to a simpler time when she would forego the vanilla cones with toxically bright sprinkles in favor of performing fellatio on a cherry popsicle because it created a red pucker. BMF, Before Max Factor.
Now, Puti’s hair needed tending. Her nails needed a visit to the Salome Ureña Salon. Her eyebrows needed plucking. Her face needed a half hour of undivided attention at the Clinique counter at the Macy’s in Parkchester. The housedress she wore belonged to her mother and smelled of chuletas.
But she sat. She watched. The bodies of the shirtless auto glass guys glowed in the sunset. She sighed. She thought if Cuketa and Betty La China, the Gay Bandits of Hunts Point, could see her they’d gasp, swarm on her, and restore her former glorious glamour. But they weren’t with her now. They weren’t leaning on her, trying to push their heads out the window to see the newest auto glass guy. They weren’t rummaging through her closet, asking to borrow clothes. They weren’t incessantly changing the radio station trying, to find a tune to which they could dance. There were no shouts of “nena” or “mija” or “girrrrl” or “miss thing.” She turned to look at her room, but no spirits hovered in the dark corners. The old bedsheets had the colors washed out. The dresser was chipped and lopsided. The bare wood floor was flat and dull. She saw her image in her mirror. She mock gasped but genuinely felt frightened by what she had become and turned her attention back to the street. Watching. Life. Pass.
Puti’s family moved to Hunts Point in 1973, when most people were leaving and when landlords were burning their buildings to collect insurance. Right outside her window, drug dealers and prostitutes conducted business at all hours of the day and night while police cars rolled by and did nothing. Puti couldn’t do anything about the grimy streets or the black smoke pouring out of the trucks rambling down Garrison Avenue, but she tried improving her life in the tenement in which she lived. She complained to the landlord.
“Hey, the lobby is dark.”
“There’s still light in it.”
“But only one light is working and there’s supposed to be four, and the steps are cracked and loose; it’s not safe.”
“Maybe if you were more of a man, instead of a girly boy, you wouldn’t worry so much about being safe.”
“I can take care of myself, but you can’t take care of this lobby.” Twelve-year-old Puti put her hands on her slim hips and walked to the landlord, who was old but big and stared up at him. “Gimme the fuckin’ bulbs and this girly boy will change them.”
The landlord moved closer to Puti and shoved her. “I gotta order the bulbs.”
Even when they moved in, the apartment in which Puti lived with her mother and uncle hadn’t been painted in years. She fell asleep looking at a chipped, cracked ceiling and dreamed of a better life.
Puti met Betty and Cuketa at Junior High School 125 in the Bronx. That year, all the boys were placed in the home economics cooking class and the girls in wood shop. Back then, Cuketa was Máximo Hernández. He wore thick glasses and bright corduroy pants. Betty La China was Lei Lee Jones, a slight boy who was short for his age and never talked. Puti was Pedro Sánchez, who insisted everyone call him P, and was often called faggot—something he got over after the third grade.
“Today we are making cupcakes from scratch.” Mrs. Ellis passed out warped cupcake pans to each section. They all went up to get eggs, butter, sugar, flour, and vanilla. The trio coordinated their efforts, but like all the other boys they made a mess and produced lopsided, partially baked cupcakes. But from recipe to recipe they created a bond and a force field against the abuse hurled at them daily. Sissy! Faggots! ¡Patos! They made a pact that if one was sick she would call the others so that they could stay home too. It was all for one and one for all.
At sixteen years old, the summer after her second year in high school, Puti began her quest to personify glamour. Cuketa and Betty joined her on her crusade. They’d all go to Puti’s house to study fashion magazines. They’d steal makeup from their respective mothers and experiment on each other. They spent most of the summer of 1977 perfecting their craft while studying reruns of the first season of Charlie’s Angels.
“I hate you, Betty.” Puti continued to apply honey-plum lipstick to Betty’s full lips. “You look so real.”
Betty La China was the product of an African American father and a Vietnamese mother. She was the youngest of four kids—three females and Betty. All four children looked like their mother, but Betty had more of her father’s richer, creamier, darker skin color and she had wild, curly hair. She was slim and petite.
“Don’t hate, Puti. You turning out real fierce too. But it’s Cuketa we gotta work on.”
“Fuck you both.” Cuketa pulled out a blonde wig from her knapsack and placed it over her head. “What do you think? Blondes have more fun, right?” Cuketa was Dominican and Puerto Rican. She had dark copper skin and shoulder-length hair that was considered pelo bueno. She was short, just over five feet. And she learned to skip before she learned to walk.
Puti picked up Cuketa’s knapsack. “What else you got in here, nena?”
“My tampons.”
“You wish. Let’s go shopping.”
“You got money?” Cuketa stuffed her mother’s blonde wig back into her knapsack.
Puti shook her head. “Leave your mami’s wig here, we gonna need the space.”
Betty’s afro bounced as the three scurried across Garrison Avenue on their way to all the stores on Southern Boulevard. They were wearing men’s polyester shirts with wild prints, zipper pants that were snug on the buns with super bell-bottoms, and women’s platform sandals, all in fashion in the late 1970s. Puti’s hair was tied back in a ponytail and Cuketa had cornrow braids that streaked from the front to the back of her head. The instant they were spotted, the guys on the corners began hurling comments. “Hey patitos, you don’t have to run. Nobody’s gonna hurt you … today.”
“Fuck you!” Puti spit in their direction.
Three of the six guys on the corner charged them and quickly caught them. Freddy, who was their age, sixteen, but about a half foot taller, grabbed Puti by the neck and pulled her toward the spot where her spit had landed. “You gonna lick that shit back up. Don’t go polluting our neighborhood.”
“Leave her alone!” Cuketa and Betty shouted and squirmed while the other two guys held them back.
Freddy shoved Puti to the ground. “Lick it up, faggot.” He pushed her face into the spit.
“Yo, Freddy, leave him alone, already,” one of the guys from the corner shouted.
Freddy raised his hand as if he were going to punch Puti. Puti stared up at him. The spit and flecks of dirt stuck to her face.
“Get the fuck out of here, you little faggot. You better watch your step.”
&
nbsp; Freddy waved the two guys across the street back to the corner. Puti got up and wiped her face. She crossed the street to her two friends. “Let’s go shopping.”
Discotheque 1 Boutique had a big, mirrored ball spinning in the middle of the store, with lots of track lighting to keep the store dim but the clothes lit, and a small wooden platform where customers danced the hustle. The large mirrors throughout the store reflected shiny halter-top dresses, satin blouses, loose silk-blend skirts, and jumper suits with thick, sequined belts.
“Can I help you?” The sales rep had a feathered Farrah Fawcett hairstyle and glitter eye shadow.
“It’s my sister’s birthday; we just want to look around.” Puti picked up a multicolored sequin tube top.
“Let me know if you need help.”
The tube top along with halter-top jumpsuits, blouses, and skirts were rolled up and slipped into their knapsacks while two young women did the Latin Hustle to Tavares’s “More than a Woman” and the customers cheered.
“Let’s go.” The sweat in Cuketa’s armpits was camouflaged by the print of her shirt.
“I checked out a size 2 miniskirt I want to get first,” Betty said as she pulled Cuketa and Puti over to the rear of the store. The security guard watched and walked in their direction.
“Let’s go,” Cuketa repeated.
“I’m gonna go dance.” Puti winked and snapped her fingers. “Then you go get your skirt.” She walked to the security guard. “Can anybody dance over there?”
He looked past Puti and nodded.
On the platform, Puti spun around and her bell-bottom pants flared out. She pointed to the sky with her right hand, stared into the store, and pumped her pelvis. A crowd formed around her. In the middle of the song, Cuketa approached the small platform and mouthed, “Let’s go.” Puti saw Betty heading toward the exit, then bowed to the crowd and hopped off the platform.
The Farrah Fawcett sales clerk congratulated Puti. “Come back and dance any time. Do you hustle?”
Puti nodded.
“Next time we should hustle. There aren’t a lot of guy partners to dance with here.”
“Next time, linda. I love your hair.”
“Thanks.”
The trio slipped out of the store. “Now we need shoes.” Puti eyed the piles of shoes in the bargain bin outside of Fabco Shoes.
Their last stop was the makeup aisle at Del Sol’s Pharmacy. When they reached the checkout counter, Puti purchased a pack of gum, Cuketa bought People magazine, and Betty bought a bar of soap for fifty-nine cents. They walked out with fifty dollars in makeup.
“That was so easy!” Betty held up the size 2 miniskirt back in Puti’s room.
“Let’s try everything on,” Puti said. “We have to hem the jumpsuits. I know it.”
Over the next several months, they expanded their operations outside Hunts Point and visited department stores. They stole bedsheets and curtains to decorate Puti’s room. They kept their parents’ shopping bags from Alexander’s and would bring them in the stores empty and walk out with them full.
Puti’s room was crammed with lace and satin, and her closet bulged with the clothes they swiped. She hung framed posters of Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Van Gogh’s Starry Night, Picasso’s Guernica, Munch’s The Scream, Monet’s Water Lilies, and Frida Kahlo’s Self-portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird. Puti created a plush rug by sewing together fluffy, white bath mats, and she painted the dresser she’d had since childhood a shiny, metallic gold. The trio’s favorite piece of furniture was a small chaise lounge Puti found on 33rd Street (on her way home from “shopping” at B. Altman’s), carried home on the subway, and re-upholstered with red velvet fabric.
“Welcome to our palacio.” Puti outstretched her arms and turned around and around.
“English please, English.” Betty snapped her fingers.
“You need to learn Spanish.”
“Why don’t you just speak English?” Betty curled up on the lounge and sipped a Tab through a slim straw.
“Because, I don’t just speak English.”
“Damn, Puti, you and Betty always gotta be in each other’s face, jodiendo, just call it our palace y ya.”
“Well, if y’all gonna speak Spanish then translate shit.”
“OK, and when we translate you better remember and get with the program, China.”
“I am not Chinese.”
“Oh, you understood that; you a fast learner. You Chinese are always the smartest in the class.”
All through high school, they were weekend divas. They’d dress up and listen to music in Puti’s room. When it was time to go home, Betty and Cuketa cleaned up. Puti stayed in her dress and makeup. She walked past the television and sat in the living room with her mother and uncle. She fluffed her hair and smoothed her dress, but they kept their eyes on the screen.
For school, they had to dress like boys, but since it was the late 1970s, they grew their hair long. Puti’s and Cuketa’s hair was shoulder length and Betty let her hair go natural into a big Angela Davis afro. They wore dashikis and bell-bottoms that came down over their platform shoes.
“I can’t wait to turn eighteen so I can take some hormone shots and grow my tetas,” Puti said as she stuffed her bra with two small balloons she had filled with warm water, double bagged, and wrapped in a ripped stocking.
“I’m not taking no hormones.” Cuketa adjusted Puti’s bosom. “I’m a natural woman.”
Betty lay across the chaise lounge. “I’m thinking about it, too. I mean this is all fun, but I feel like I want to be a whole woman and get a real man.”
Cuketa began brushing Puti’s hair. “A whole woman? You getting snipped?”
“Maybe.”
“Me too,” added Puti. She and Betty high-fived each other.
“You two are crazy. I’m not messing with my shit. Besides, we look real enough.” Cuketa pulled Puti’s hair back to make a ponytail. “And there ain’t a operation to fix our voices.”
“True.” Puti examined her newly manicured nails. “Oh, what if we took sign language so that way we don’t have to talk?”
Betty got up from the bed and stood next to the other two. “I know sign language.” She gave them the finger.
“Hey, you two, don’t start,” chided Cuketa. “I have some news. I’m in love with David Maldonado.”
“Cuketa, everybody’s in love with him, right, Puti? But he likes pussy. Real pussy. That’s why I’m gonna get snipped.”
Puti shook her head. “For David Maldonado?”
“Not him, but to get a real man.” Betty blew kisses at her reflection in the mirror.
Cuketa stopped brushing Puti’s hair a moment and pointed to Betty. “I’m not getting snipped over no man. I’m not getting snipped, period.”
“We hear you, Cuketa. Me and Betty La China will do it together.” Puti and Betty danced around the room chanting, “We gonna be re-al, we gonna be re-al.”
“You two are stupid. Can I change my outfit?” Cuketa pulled a black, strapless gown covered in diamond rhinestones out of Puti’s closet.
“Do what you want.” Puti looked out the window. “Check it out. Hector took off his shirt. Damn, he looks good.”
Cuketa joined her at the window. “Why do we torture ourselves with those assholes? Zip me up.”
Betty obliged. “To land a man like that, you gotta be a woman. Full out.”
“Then forget men like that. I want a man who wants me as is. How do I look?”
“Cuketa, girl, you look like a beautiful boy in a dress.” Betty snapped her fingers. “Be prepared to be alone for the rest of your life, because gay boys want guys, straight guys want women, and nobody wants us.”
Puti watched Hector. “We got each other, muchachas.”
Betty put an arm around her two friends. “Yes, but even with all the love I have for you two, I still want a man.”
Hector notices them and gives them the finger.
They weathered high school, th
en attended the Wilfred Beauty Academy right after graduation but quit after six weeks because of all the math and biology classes they had to take.
“Well, muchachas, we’re all eighteen. It’s Saturday night. I think we should go out.” Puti sat at the console table that she’d converted into their three-person vanity table. She’d nailed a long, slim mirror, meant for the back of the door, horizontally to the wall above the table. For seats she had three plastic milk crates with square pillows attached to cushion their bottoms.
Betty applied plum-colored eye shadow. “Where would we go?”
“I’m not going out.” Cuketa stopped applying makeup and sat on the lounge.
“Then stay here, but I need to be a woman here and out there.” Puti pointed out her window.
“I’m with you. We talk about getting men and being fierce, but it’s all talk.” Betty applied passion-plum lipstick then leaned back to take in her face.
“Those guys fuck with us when we’re boys. Imagine if we go out like this.”
“Then when?” Puti asked. “I feel like a woman 24/7; I am sick and tired of switching back and forth. We had to for high school, but that’s done.”
“I can’t wait for my mother to see me like this.” Betty spun around to show off her miniskirt. “My parents will kill me. They gonna kick me out. I know it.”
“Then you come live with me, Cuketa.” Puti slipped her arm around Cuketa’s shoulder. “My mother would let you. Shit, you practically live here already. Oh, then we can get jobs and get our own apartment.” Puti snapped her fingers. “Hairspray. Please.”
“Who’s gonna hire us?” Cuketa stood up, fluffed Puti’s hair, and sprayed Final Net liberally. The fumes from the spray reminded Puti of beauty school.
“Maybe we could get jobs at a salon.”