The Affairs of the Falcóns

by Melissa Rivero

  “You have been working a lot,” said Ana, eager to get back to her room.

  Valeria smiled, the same forced smile she gave Betty or Carla when she greeted them. “I need to get the place back in order.”

  Rubén had hinted about the state of the business. It was why Valeria didn’t have her car back. She wondered how Valeria had come home now, but she didn’t dare ask.

  “Anyway,” Valeria continued, “I wanted to talk to you about something. You’ve been so sick lately, I didn’t want to bother you. You looked much better this morning, so here I am.”

  “Is something wrong?” she asked, though she suspected she knew what it was that Valeria wanted to speak to her about.

  “This may not even matter since you’ll be gone soon,” said Valeria. “But I don’t like how friendly you are with my husband.” There wasn’t a hint of anger in her voice. Instead, Valeria was calm, poised. It was as though Ana were catching a glimpse of the woman Valeria once was. A well-traveled translator who looked more like a pastel-porcelain souvenir, the kind of recuerdo handed out at lavish weddings and quinceañeras, than she did an academic. Valeria had always had an obsession with language, enunciating words with a precision that could cut a tongue. There was no argument she couldn’t win, largely because no one understood what she was saying. She was sharp of mind and soft of face, and carried herself with enough pride and confidence to fill a village.

  No one was surprised, then, when she caught the eye of a Peruvian who lived in America during one of his visits back home. Rubén was bold, walking right up to her when he spotted her, dressed in a fuchsia bikini and a pair of aviators, along the beach in Punta Hermosa. Soon, he was driving her around Lima, showing off his Japanese car as much as he was showing her off. Although Rubén didn’t lack flash, he lacked her polish, but this didn’t stop them from marrying only six months after they met on that beach.

  Time had tempered whatever passion had driven her to Rubén, and as the seams of the marriage came undone, so did Valeria. She began to lose her words, forgetting how to say this in Spanish or that in English. Instead, she relied on the right adornments to make her feel empowered, things she could point to and say where she bought them and how much they cost. Her gaze was often lost in some thought, falling deeper into a void every time she drank. It was her marriage, Ana concluded, that had done this to her. Of course she was threatened by her. Rubén had cheated on her in the past; he still did. How could an infidelity not change a person? Why wouldn’t she be suspicious of Ana?

  But she wondered if there was a deeper reason for Valeria’s suspicion. Would she feel threatened by someone that was more like her, an educated white woman? Or was she only suspicious of women composed of a different clay?

  Ana tried to mimic Valeria’s calm when she said, “Valeria, Rubén and I were just talking.”

  “I know,” she said. “About my marriage. About that woman.” She stood, rubbing the back of her neck as she walked to the sliding glass doors of the balcony. She stared out over the rooftops and into the gray sky, her arms crossed at her chest. “You know about her,” she said. “You know about the girl.” She was matter-of-fact, as if there was no shame in acknowledging her husband’s transgression, except that she couldn’t face Ana when she said it.

  Ana wished she could have said yes and told her everything it was that she knew. Not just about the affair or the other child, but how it came after years of Valeria trying to have another one; how Rubén’s betrayal was likely as painful as the deaths of her own parents because here she was, alone again, this time in a foreign country with a young child and no family to catch her; how she suspected that Valeria wasn’t all right after she had Michael, and hadn’t gotten the help she needed.

  But Ana couldn’t say these things. Valeria would only mistake her sympathy for pity.

  There was a long silence before Valeria straightened. “I know he’s still with her,” she said. “I wish I could say that I don’t care.”

  It was the first time Valeria had ever seemed vulnerable to her. Ana could tell that she loved Rubén, despite what he’d done. Valeria’s gaze always stayed on him whenever he danced with other women. She laughed at his jokes even though she objected to their vulgarity. And whenever she passed by the television, her fingers sometimes lingered on the picture frames beside it: snapshots of the couple in a limo on their wedding day, on a boat as it passed in front of the Statute of Liberty one summer night, of the family poolside while on vacation in Miami.

  “I can’t do much about the situation,” she continued. “He’s a man, and that’s the kind of thing men do. But I treated her well. I thought she was a friend.” Her eyes were downcast, then as if catching a mistake, she said, “I never should’ve trusted that prieta.”

  Ana cleared her throat. “We don’t always know people, Valeria.”

  “That’s true,” she replied, “but I know how some women are. I want to think that you’re different. So I’m asking you not to meddle in my marriage.”

  “I never have,” she said.

  “Then why does my husband want my son to meet that whore’s daughter?”

  Ana stammered. She hadn’t expected Rubén to tell Valeria about their conversation. It was clear that Valeria didn’t want the children to meet at all. If they were going to, why tell her? Why not keep it a secret?

  She wondered what else Rubén might have told her.

  “He brought it up the other night,” Valeria continued. “I said ‘no,’ of course, and to never mention it again. He said I was being unreasonable. Do you know why? Because you didn’t think there was anything wrong with it. You. He said I was unreasonable because I don’t want my son to know that whore or that girl, or how his father humiliated me.”

  Her voice was even, but a blue vein swelled beneath the thin skin on her temple. There was no point in arguing with her. In a matter of weeks, Ana would be out of unit 4D anyway. If all she needed to do was nod and apologize to get through the next few weeks in peace, then she’d keep her head moving and set her mouth on repeat. “You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry. I should never have said anything to him.”

  “No, you shouldn’t have.” Her ice cubes clinked as she threw back her glass and walked back to the recliner. “I’ve tried to look past what you did to my family. To Lucho and Carlos. God knows the whole situation brought enough shame to our family.”

  Valeria had only alluded to Ana’s relationships with the Falcón brothers, never asking her about what happened with Carlos or how it was that she came to be with Lucho in the first place. Instead, she viewed it like the rest of the family. The whole mess was an embarrassment for them, and so they avoided speaking about it in the first place. Don’t say anything and it’s like it never happened. A criollo from a good family getting involved with a chola, probably another terruca. If it happens, the how and the why isn’t talked about. His brother then falling in love with her could never happen. Growing a bastard in her belly never really happened. Because Ana had married the child’s father, a forced marriage in the eyes of his family, but at least that had righted the wrong.

  “Valeria, por favor,” said Ana, shaking her head. “You know as much about what happened with Carlos as I know about your marriage. I didn’t love him, and he clearly didn’t love me. He left me. I wasn’t going to wait for him.”

  “He went to Spain to get a better education,” she said. “It wasn’t an excuse for you to pounce on his brother.”

  “I didn’t ‘pounce.’ I fell in love with Lucho. We fell in love. And that was years ago. It’s not Lucho who keeps his distance now. It’s Carlos.”

  When Lucho first spoke to his brother about Ana, it wasn’t to make sure he didn’t have any lingering feelings for her before he began courting her, or even to say that they’d already started a relationship. They were in Tía Ofelia’s living room, on the ground floor of her house in Bellavista. By then, they had told her aunt and Doña Filomena about the pregnancy. While the news drove his
mother into silence, Ofelia only wanted to make sure she wasn’t going to have another mouth to feed. She’d done enough for Ana; she couldn’t do anymore. Lucho reassured her that Ana and the child would be taken care of, and so Lucho was welcome to visit his fiancée as often as he liked.

  It was there, in Ofelia’s living room, with Ana by his side, that Lucho called his brother to tell him that he’d been seeing her and that she was pregnant.

  Carlos didn’t speak to Lucho until he returned to Lima for a visit nearly a year later. It was then that he held a lanky Victoria, with the same widow’s peak as his mother, for the first time. The phone calls eventually became more frequent, coming always on birthdays and sometimes on holidays. He married a woman from Sevilla, one neither Ana nor Lucho met but whom they saw in the pictures Doña Filomena occasionally included with her letters to her son. For a time, whatever it was that Carlos resented fell away. It wasn’t until Carlos found out that Lucho had taken the deed to their childhood home that the phone calls stopped.

  “Lucho should reach out,” said Valeria. “He’s the one who made the mistake.”

  “Being with me wasn’t a mistake,” said Ana.

  “Well, God knows you were not what we expected my cousin to marry,” she said. “But he’s a dutiful man. You’re his wife and the mother of his children, and that’s not going to change, is it?”

  “No, it’s not,” Ana replied, and darted up. One more insult, and she might regret whatever she might say or do next, and there was so much she wanted to say, so much she wished she could do. Douse Valeria with the water that remained in her glass. Tell her that she had no marriage. That the only reason Rubén didn’t divorce her was because of the business and the money and the shame it’d cause her. Talk about duty. Rubén was the one who stayed out of a stupid sense of duty. He owed her something for having had the affair; that something was saving her from the embarrassment of a divorce. She should’ve let the affair go long ago, and she hadn’t. She let it sicken her, and now look at her, a borracha, drinking her woes away. Stupid, thought Ana. Stupid for letting him win.

  But Ana didn’t say these things. Just a few more weeks, she kept telling herself, and so she apologized once more and reassured her that it would not happen again.

  “I know it won’t,” said Valeria softly. “I don’t like you, Ana. I just hope that Lucho might one day see you for what you really are. Maybe then we could finally be rid of you.”

  A smile she had no desire to suppress touched Ana’s lips. “That’s too bad, Prima,” she said. “I might be leaving your home, but believe me, I’m not going anywhere.”

  * * *

  SOON AFTER, RUBÉN DROPPED OFF THE CHILDREN AND VALERIA WENT with him back to the body shop. Lucho still wasn’t home, and Ana was in the middle of preparing toast with cheese for the children’s afternoon snack when the phone rang. It was Carla on the other line, which came as something of a surprise. There was never a need for either one to call the other. Whatever they needed to tell each other was almost always said at work. Carla, however, was clearly annoyed that Ana hadn’t returned her calls. “Didn’t Valeria tell you?” she asked, and Ana remembered then that Valeria had mentioned Carla’s phone calls while she was still in bed. She simply hadn’t thought to call her back. She was going back to work tomorrow, she told her. She thought it could wait.

  Carla’s breath was heavy. “I saw Mama on New Year’s,” she whispered.

  “Oh,” said Ana, distracted as she searched the refrigerator for slices of cheese. “How is she?”

  “Frustrated,” said Carla. “She said you haven’t been paying her.”

  “I have been,” said Ana. “I’ve just been a little short, that’s all. You know Lucho just started working again and then it was Christmas—”

  “I get that,” she interrupted. “But I vouched for you, Ana. I told her you were dependable, responsible. It doesn’t look good when someone I refer doesn’t pay.”

  “Will you calm down?” she said. “I’m paying her, Carla. I’m just a little behind, but I’m catching up.”

  “How? With the few hours of overtime you’re supposed to do this week? You need to make up for what you missed today. And then you’re supposed to move? How do you expect to do that, Ana? With what money?”

  “That’s not your problem, Carla.”

  “But it is my problem,” she said, her voice hushed as she spat into the phone. “I need her help too. I’ve got my three kids now and Betty. It’s not good for either of us if you keep falling behind.” There was genuine concern in her voice. Carla had introduced Ana to Mama, but after that introduction, she had never spoken to Ana about her, let alone about her dealings with the woman or Ana’s payments. The fact that she knew Ana had fallen behind was unsettling. Her words sounded more like a warning than a reprimand.

  She hung up and sat at the table, butter knife in hand. She remembered that afternoon, when she cowered in Mama’s armchair as the woman glowered over her. It was the first time in years that she thought she’d get hit. Something held the woman back. Ana thought it was her age; after all, how hard of a blow could a sick, elderly woman actually give? But she realized that wasn’t what held Mama back. It was simply that there were other, stronger ways she could strike.

  She plated the sandwiches and let the children eat in Michael’s bedroom. She needed to catch up with those payments, and she wondered if perhaps staying with Valeria a little longer was the best thing to do. Living with her had certainly taken its toll. It was not unlike living with Lucho’s mother. There was always that truth that hung over them: that she had once been with Carlos, and that Lucho married her only after she got pregnant. Each woman, in her own way, made sure Ana never forgot that, no matter where she was.

  Still, after her last visit with Mama and now Carla’s phone call, she hoped that Sully might have found another tenant, one without children and with all the right paperwork, who didn’t blink when he asked for three months’ rent. If they stayed a little longer, she thought, they could see the Valentine’s Day decorations go up, and maybe even celebrate Victoria’s communion in the communal recreation room.

  But then Lucho finally came home, gripping bags filled with the items on her grocery list, the ingredients of the Mazamorra Morada she craved, and an envelope. “I called him before I left,” he said as she unfolded the document inside. “He got back last night. I wanted to surprise you.” The long, trifold document was printed on thickly stocked sheets. A shorter piece of paper was stapled on its left-hand corner, the word RECEIPT printed across its top in block letters. She lifted it, and underneath was the address to Sully’s building. Lucho and Sully’s signatures were scribbled on the bottom of the second page.

  They were leaving Lexar Tower.

  As he got ready for his shift, she went into their bedroom and placed the lease and the receipt inside the canary envelope. Two more additions to the collection; proof of the next phase in their journey. Adelante, she thought, yet Ana couldn’t help but feel a sting over what her departure meant. In one way, Valeria was getting what she wanted. She was getting rid of her.

  She tore a piece of paper from her address book and wrote down the street address for Lexar Tower in large letters. She lit the red candle, then held the paper by the flame. She let the fire burn in her hand for a few seconds before she set it down on a small white teacup saucer and watched it turn to cinders. She said farewell to her temporary home.

  She then tore another page from her address book. This time, she wrote the address of the new apartment, and set the paper on top of the ashes. She picked up her mother’s prayer card. The picture printed on its face was the only one she had of her mother. It was the one used on her mother’s government-issued identification card, taken several years before she died. Her eyes were steady; her smile, reluctant. She was younger in that picture than Ana was now. Ana stroked the image. All her mother ever tried to do was to protect what she loved.

  She set the prayer card down beside the
saucer, then touched the statute of La Virgencita and traced the sign of the cross across her body. She gave thanks to La Virgencita, a short prayer of gratitude for a new beginning. She then asked her mother to intercede on her behalf, to ask God to bless the home they were going to live in; to give her patience. To silence las malas lenguas. The evil tongues, she thought. They never seem to stop wagging.

  13

  WHEN ANA RETURNED TO LA FACTORÍA, IT WAS WITH AN URGENCY and vigor that had eluded her ever since Lucho lost his job. She walked onto the fourth floor, smiling even with her eyes. She was relieved to be back at her station, back to her simple and uncomplicated days. She felt fine, she told anyone who asked. It was just the food, she explained. Me cayó mal. No one doubted her. It was always easy to blame food.

  “¿Cómo te sientes?” asked Betty when she saw her that morning.

  “Bien,” she replied.

  “Did you finish all of them?”

  “Yes,” said Ana.

  “You have to take a test again,” she told her. “You want to be sure everything’s back to normal.”

  “I will,” Ana whispered, “and thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me,” she replied. “Just make sure you take care of yourself.”

  She understood what it was that Betty meant, and said, “It won’t happen again.”

  She then told her and Carla about the lease. By the end of the month, she and her family would leave Lexar Tower.

  Carla was stone-faced. “Aren’t you tight on money, Ana?” she asked.

  “It’ll be tough for a bit,” Ana admitted. “That’s why I have to keep the money coming in.” Carla said nothing more, and during lunch, Ana asked George for more hours and reminded him that she also did housekeeping work on weekends, in case the building or a friend of his needed a good cleaning to kick off the New Year. She charged a flat fee for each floor, not by the hour.

  Each day, she prepared for the move. Before she left la factoría for the day, she’d sneak into the supply closet with her saddlebag and stuff it with black Sharpies or rolls of wide tape. On her walk home, she’d ask the salvadoreño at the frutería for any empty boxes he was about to toss. At night, in her bedroom at Lexar Tower, she’d sort her children’s clothes into those fruit boxes, setting aside the ones Victoria and Pedro had outgrown, now destined for Tía Ofelia’s grandchildren. In the sorting and the packing, she realized how little they came with to Lexar Tower, and just how much they’d given away. The clothes, the beds, the dresser, and the television were all that remained of their possessions. Whatever jewelry she still had before Lucho lost his job was pawned; whatever furniture they couldn’t fit into that bedroom was sold. She thought of asking Carla for their couch back, a futon that was already tricky to open by the time they offered it to her. But Carla had given Ana some money for it. Una miseria, she recalled bitterly, but even if the amount was paltry, Carla had paid for it. She couldn’t ask for it back now.