Tuesday, August 2nd
In her nightmare, a recurring one, Patricia saw herself as a fourteen-year-old girl in tears, being interrogated by a police officer. Even though he was speaking, no voice came out of his mouth, as if the sound had been muted in this movie. But she knew what he was asking. Over and over again. “Did you give him consent?” “Were you pressured?” “Did you explicitly tell him to stop?” “Were any of you drunk?” “Did he use a condom?”
She woke up with a hole in her insides and went to the bathroom, disgusted and dizzy, but could not vomit. Having those dreams lately worried her. Wasn’t this event from her past already dealt with and forgotten? Why was it coming back? She went to bed again in the semidarkness of her room, opened her laptop, and launched the search engine, her go-to place for answers.
Wednesday, August 3rd
Los Angeles was developed as a horizontal city so its image could be projected in glorious Panavision. That was Patricia’s personal insight about her hometown as she drove down Olympic Boulevard to the hospital. She made a mental note to share this thought on Instagram along with a photograph of the sprawl she’d recently taken from the Griffith Observatory with an unusually clear sky devoid of smog, fire smoke, or marine fog, the L.A. trifecta of air quality. She’d go there oftentimes just to remind herself that because she lived in the wealthiest city of the wealthiest state of the wealthiest country in the world, she had been bestowed with the ultimate responsibility: to thrive in her endeavors many times over on behalf of all the immigrants who hadn’t been given the chance.
She pulled her phone out of her bag during a traffic light, dialed quickly, well aware of her dangerous habit, and left a message requesting an appointment with a therapist she’d googled.
When Patricia arrived, Claudia was showered and dressed and had already packed her suitcase. Her vision was back to normal, although it still fluctuated at times, distorting the outside world and making her squint.
“Put the discharge papers in your backpack,” she said to Patricia. “I don’t have any space left in my bags. Let’s go.”
In the car, Patricia noticed how pale, sickly, and thin her sister looked. The months Claudia had spent in the hospital had brought out her cheekbones and sunken her eyes, making her resemble a cubist portrait.
“As soon as you feel better, let’s get a spa treatment,” she said.
“Yes, let’s do that sometime,” answered Claudia, uninterested. She looked out the window and into other people’s cars, wondering how much of life she’d missed. Here was an obese guy in a red Mazda, pushing forward on the steering wheel like a granny sitting on the toilet. There was a guy in a white BMW, his left arm hanging out the window with a big bling-bling watch screaming to get robbed. And over there was a woman in her black RAV4 Toyota sticking her finger up her nose. What was she expecting to find in there, a little appetizer to hold her over until lunchtime? Oh, and look, three people riding in the same car? In L.A.? Perhaps she hadn’t missed much of life, Claudia thought. She knew it would be interesting, even with her condition. She could walk with a cane and was quickly regaining strength and range of motion in her legs, but her doctors had confirmed that the noticeable limp in her left leg would be permanent. There was no way to repair the damage the tumor had caused to the frontal lobe of her brain.
Exhausted from the car ride to Oscar and Keila’s house, she slowly made her way upstairs to her bedroom and plopped on the couch in front of the bed. Patricia hauled her bags up, and with Keila’s help, she began to unpack pajamas, sweaters, socks, slippers, and tennis shoes.
“What’s this?” asked Keila, astonished to find a stethoscope in her hand.
“And this?” Patricia had just dug out a blood-pressure cuff from a snarl of underwear in the suitcase.
They went on to unpack two wrinkled pillowcases with the hospital logo in blue; a landline phone, cord and all; an oxygen flowmeter; a wall clock; a universal TV remote; a brand-new box of latex gloves, medium size; a nurse call button; a pair of reading glasses; several slip-proof socks still sealed in their pouches; and a pulse oximeter.
“What?” asked Claudia when she finally saw all the loot sinking from its weight into the bed’s plush comforter.
“This is a good sign, sis.”
Claudia was as shocked as her sister upon being presented with the evidence of her theft, stuff that clearly didn’t belong to her but had come out of her suitcase.
“Exhibit A,” said Patricia with a grin, pointing to the array of items. “For better or for worse, you’re back to your old self.”
Thursday, August 4th
Precisely at 11:47 A.M., when the day was hottest (eighty-four degrees was his guess), Oscar walked along Van Nuys Boulevard in Pacoima, an old neighborhood in the northern San Fernando Valley, thinking about Claudia. If she could not work as a chef anymore, if her income consisted only of the residuals from her canceled show, something that would surely dwindle over the years if not months, if she was not going to get any alimony from Gabriel, how was she going to support herself? Would he have to take care of his daughter? Would he be able to if he lost the almond orchard? He had always admired her spunk and drive to succeed, a very fitting attitude for a firstborn, but wondered if she had lost that part of her personality. She seemed so frail now, so helpless.
He examined the commercial storefronts, taking notes in his mind: fast-food restaurants; churches in former movie theaters; pawnshops and check-cashing and money-transfer businesses on every other corner under the relentless August sun. He passed big soundstages where Hollywood magic was surely being created and snaked in and out of residential side streets, observing life in the different houses he came across. Most of the people he encountered were Latino. They were his people, and he felt right at home.
When he was in high school he had promised himself to walk all the neighborhoods of Los Angeles in order to be able to understand his city in all its complexity. As he continued to fulfill his goal over the years, he realized that the exercise would prove impossible. In every area he got to roam, he’d confirm what he already suspected: there were hundreds of cities within his city, each telling a different story. He’d need several lifetimes to understand its many incarnations. One of them, the most obvious one, perpetuated by many out-of-towners, was the entertainment mecca, with streets and parks named after movie stars, familiar locations, and neighborhoods banned by the film industry due to shoot burnout. People who knew little about L.A. imagined everyone walking around with a screenplay soggy with sweat under their armpit. This was the birthplace of Hollywood, after all. But in truth, Los Angeles was whatever you wanted it to be, and that was thanks to the constant influx of immigrants arriving with their dreams, not only from other countries, but from other states within the nation. Even its famous palm trees came from somewhere else. He imagined a reality show host selling Los Angeles to a live audience: “Are you a surfer dude hitting the waves? You’ll fit right in. How about a hipster starting a gluten-free cookie brand or a new church? Of course. And is there a place for a young family raising small children? You bet. How about a retired couple wanting to play bingo all day? Indeed. High-powered executives? Yes! Lawyers, doctors, agents, and managers? Best place to thrive. Gym buffs, starlets, chefs, yoga teachers, students, writers, healers, misfits, trainers, nurses? Right this way, please. Are you into cosplay, improv, porn, Roller Derby, voyeurism, cemetery movie screenings, food truck drag racing, AA, relapse, rehab, open mic, plastic surgery, wine tastings, biker meetups, karaoke, clubbing, S and M, or escape rooms? Come on over!”
Every race, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, and food preference was well represented within Los Angeles County, and this is what Oscar loved most about his city; how it welcomed everything and everyone. It was true that History had spared it from centuries-old clan clashes, like the Battle of Glen Fruin in Scotland; it hadn’t been the epicenter of horrendous religious massacres, like the Crusades, the Hundred Years’ War, or the Ho
locaust; or lived through ghastly battles, like the one that took place in Verdun, France, that produced one million dead young soldiers, their destroyed bodies strewn about the battlefield. But in its young history, Los Angeles had had its own share of human hurt, drama, and bloody events, from the Spaniards’ Indian exploitation, to the U.S. invasion when it was still part of Mexico, to the Chinese Massacre, Japanese internment, and even uprisings as recent as the Los Angeles Riots in 1992. Sadly, when tourists visited Los Angeles’s special landmarks, riding on roofless tour buses under a scorching sun, all they’d hear was things like, “This very place is where the Terminator rips out the punk’s heart.”
He reached his SUV and with a snort snatched the parking ticket from under his windshield wiper (one more for the collection), then drove off to Happy Crunch Almond Orchard, where his beloved trees waited for his embrace. But on arrival, he realized someone else was already hugging his trees. A bride and her groom were striking romantic poses for a photographer who seemed to be directing the shoot in the middle of Oscar’s orchard. At least these people were not as intrusive as the dirt bikers zooming through the rows, kicking up dust and rattling the trees with their god-awful engine noise, as had happened before. But still, these lovely people were trespassers and they had to go.
“Hello, excuse me. I will have to ask you to leave. This is private property and you’re disturbing the almonds.”
“I’m so sorry,” said the bride. “There was no one here.”
“It’s past four. My guys have gone home to rest, but that doesn’t mean this place belongs to no one.”
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” said the bride. “We’re almost done. Could we shoot a couple more shots and then we’ll leave? I promise.”
“This isn’t even the best time of the year to take pictures! You should have come in the early spring, when the trees are blooming. Now, that’s a sight for the ages,” he said.
“We hadn’t even met in the spring! It’s not easy to time when love arrives,” said the groom, giggling.
Or when it leaves, thought Oscar.
“All right, but just two more,” he said. How could he deny these young people a morsel of happiness?
“Can you hold this light reflector for me?” asked the photographer, handing Oscar a flexible, round moon of silvery canvas. “Angle it this way to get the afternoon sunlight on the bride’s face.”
That’s some chutzpah, Oscar thought, but at the same time he followed orders, moving the reflector this way and that as the shoot continued. Here was a new couple, fresh and tender and promising, ready for the future, while his daughters’ marriages unraveled. So much for so-called once-in-a-lifetime opportunities. And what about his own? He’d have to come clean, confess to Keila about the orchard, and hopefully save his own marriage. He knew flowers and a love letter would not cut it.
Harvest season was a few days away. He’d wait.
Friday, August 5th
With the news fresh in his mind—officials had just announced that the Sand Fire had been fully contained after scorching 41,432 acres—Oscar entered the numbers in his log and put it back in his nightstand’s drawer. He knew there would be more fires, less water. L.A. had grown so much as to encroach on its surrounding deserts—Palmdale, Victorville, Palm Springs—and its mild Mediterranean climate, the one that had convinced the original Angelenos of El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de Porciúncula to settle here, was now in jeopardy. The city owed its existence to William Mulholland’s construction of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, which brought the city’s water supply from Owens Valley hundreds of miles away. But had that been a reasonable strategy? Without its own water, was the growth of the megalopolis he lived in justified? If L.A.’s access to water faded away, would the city become another man-made atrocity engulfed by sand, like the neighboring Salton Sea, a terrible mistake of death and pestilence?
He went from one gloomy thought to the next, this one more pressing, urgent, a recurring dread that upstaged the wildfire’s final and horrific acreage count, one whose outcome he had the possibility of controlling: he couldn’t stop wondering how he could support his daughters about to start a new life at home. What if they lost their home to fire? Where would they live, now that Claudia was back at home? And Patricia. And Dani. And Olivia and the twins. And hopefully Keila.
Saturday, August 6th
This was where things stood at the Alvarados’ on that Saturday morning: Keila and Oscar kept the master bedroom and the adjacent sitting area where Oscar watched the Weather Channel. Keila had considered for some time asking him to move to the TV room couch, but now with the girls back home and after her promise to try to mend things with Oscar, she listened to her better self and stayed put, at least while she figured out how to erase from her mind her night with Simon. Olivia and the twins had settled—temporarily, as she had emphasized to Keila—in Olivia’s old bedroom, large enough to fit the two portable cribs arranged lengthwise below the window to form a choo-choo train of sorts. As soon as she arrived, before unpacking suitcases, she set out to rearrange the furniture to her present-day liking, wondering how she could have lived in that room for so many years without minding the bed’s orientation. In her own defense, she had only learned Chinese geomancy after she’d moved out and gotten married, so she forgave herself and proceeded to put her stuff away. Dani, who had lived in Claudia’s old bedroom since early childhood, moved to the boudoir across from the sitting area. “Cozy” was his polite way to describe its small size. In order to fit the bed in he had to remove the shelf where he kept his toys and donate his dinosaur collection; the Legos; numerous cars, trucks, and motorcycles; most picture books; all stuffed bunnies and cute animals (except Mr. Monkey, who was actually a bear); and the dehydrated piranha embedded in an acrylic cube that his mother had brought from Brazil at his request (but which gave him countless nightmares that resulted in him running to sleep with her in the middle of the night). Patricia stayed in her own bedroom, simplifying the already complicated logistics. Later that evening a thought came to her, and she wondered if it was scary because it was supposed to be scary, or if it really was scary: She’d always lived in that room. She’d never lived anywhere else. She was twenty-eight years old.
Claudia, on the other hand, had left for college, promising herself never to go back home, no matter how much she had loved growing up there. It had been part of her plan: to become fully independent in all areas of her life. So much for that, she thought as she straightened the pillow on her armchair. The initial idea had been to set Claudia up in Lola’s room next to Keila’s studio by the detached garage in the back of the garden so she wouldn’t have to use the stairs, but ultimately she decided she’d stay in her own bedroom. “I can handle the stairs,” she said, not sure if she really could pull it off on a daily basis. So, Lola was pleased to get her old bedroom—with plenty of privacy and a nice view of the garden—where she had slept for years on weekends while the three sisters were growing up. It took Keila several hours to move the artwork and materials she had stored there to a corner of her studio to make room for Lola’s things. As much as Keila hated clutter, she loved having a full house.
Monday, August 8th
A stream of urine bathed Patricia’s pregnancy test. Within minutes, two well-defined pink lines appeared in the tiny screen of the stick. Patricia held on to the sink for balance. She could not tell if she was made light-headed by the news, or if this was the first physical sign of her gravidity. She composed herself, wrapped the test in tissue, and got in her car, leaving the driveway with a tire screech.
Olivia was in the middle of passing stucco inspection at a construction jobsite high up in the Hollywood Hills. Standing on the scaffolding with the inspector, she saw Patricia park her car on the curb and get out wearing a Gioconda smile.
“I need to speak with you in private. Now!” said Patricia as she started to climb the ladder to reach her sister.
Olivia asked the inspect
or for a few minutes of privacy and he obliged, puzzled, making his way down to the sidewalk.
“I have this for you, Olie.”
Patricia dug in her backpack for the pregnancy test and put it in Olivia’s hand.
“A baby!” she yelled.
“Maybe twins!”
Olivia held up the test stick to the sunlight and started jumping up and down on the scaffolding. Patricia followed suit, kissing her sister, and dancing and yelling incomprehensible shrieks of joy without minding the fact that they were on a precarious contraption of planks and pipes.
Downstairs, as the scaffolding perilously shook and wobbled with the weight of the Alvarado sisters, now joined forever in motherhood, the inspector looked up at the scene dumbfounded.
“Women,” he mumbled.
Sunday, August 14th
“It shouldn’t be so hard. You already speak some decent Hebrew,” said Keila to Dani over a hefty brunch of pancakes and bacon.
“But we’re not even that religious. We eat carnitas! We could just skip the Bar Mitzvah altogether and no one would care,” said Dani.
“It’s not just about religion. Your grandparents were Jews, I’m a Jew, your mom is a Jew. It’s identity we’re talking about here. Do you feel Jewish?”
“I guess so.”
“When asked, what do you say?”
“That I’m Jewish.”
“There you have it. Even if we don’t go to temple, we are who we are. I already made you an appointment with Rabbi Nebenzahl, our go-to rabbi for all things Jewish. He’s Reform, so it will all be fine. When the whole thing is done, you’ll be glad you did it.”
“Can we hire a cool band to play at the party? Poetic License played at Ezequiel’s Bar Mitzvah.”
“Why don’t you focus on the importance of chanting Torah and what the whole ritual means to you for now? We can discuss the music later.”
L.A. Weather Page 21
