Super America

by Anne Panning

  “Let’s go check out the town square,” Toby said, and looked at his watch. Why would he look at his watch? Alice wondered. And why must they immediately storm out into the town and investigate when they had all day, and the next day, and the next day, which would be their five-year wedding anniversary? “Or do you want to wait here? Rest?” Toby smiled at her, but Alice sensed he was forcing himself to be patient and pleasant.

  Alice sighed. She walked to the window that boasted a view of twisting cobblestone streets, a hodgepodge of chalky white buildings with clay roofs seemingly built on top of one another. Streams of white vw Bugs, the ubiquitous Taxco taxis, groaned and sped up the tiny winding streets.

  Toby came up behind her and held her. She leaned back against his solid chest and enjoyed the sense of being enveloped by something larger than herself. He smelled brightly of the hotel soap and of slightly worn deodorant. She rubbed his arms, dry and hairy and familiar. “Did you know,” he said, and she could feel his warm breath on her hair, “that Taxco is a historic district? The entire city. There are actually rules that state residents can’t paint their homes—or rather, the exterior of their homes—anything other than white. It’s a Spanish colonial city, and you can see how the roof lines reflect ...”

  Alice let him go on, amazed by his inability to turn off his professor-lecturer role, even with her. She could hear his voice change into a smoother pitch; he paused more emphatically and drew out the ends of his sentences.

  “Toby, please,” she said, and he stopped. Although she was also a professor, she welcomed the opportunity to abandon her role of Dr. White whenever possible. Whenever a student called her Dr. White, she felt as if a surgeon should come rushing around the corner, ready to perform emergency surgery. “Call me Alice,” she’d tell them at the beginning of each semester, but they would never dare. A couple kind-hearted but dim students, always female, would routinely call her Mrs. White, which she didn’t like either, but she never had the energy to correct them.

  “Don’t you care about the history of the place?” Toby asked, suddenly sounding angry. “There’s a quote by someone about travel—I can’t remember now who said it, but it goes something like: ‘He that would bring home the wealth of the Indies must carry the wealth of the Indies with him. A man must carry knowledge with him if he would bring home knowledge.’ I believe it goes something like that.” Toby pulled open the curtains of the other window, which overlooked garbage cans and dust mops.

  “What if you’re a woman?” Alice asked. She fished out her Ziploc of Tylenol and shook two into her palm.

  “What?”

  “If you’re a woman?” she said, and swallowed the pills dry. “It says a man must carry knowledge, but what if you’re a woman?”

  Toby sat on the edge of the bed beside her, and the rocklike mattress barely budged. For a moment, he hung his head. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s not do this. We’re tired. Let’s go get something to eat.”

  He reached for her hand and she took it.

  The only place they could find to eat with a balcony was called Vicky Cafeteria. To reach the restaurant, Alice followed Toby up a tiny spiral staircase inside a silver shop. Toby hit his head at the landing, and Alice cooed with him to be careful. Their small table overlooked the busy town square, and Alice was so distracted she couldn’t focus on the menu. She looked out over the zócalo, which was full of people listening to an odd vocal medley from Cats, in Spanish. Three people dressed like cats sang into a fuzzy microphone, spun in circles, and clapped their hands. On the corner, a man with upwards of thirty straw hats atop his head yawned and stretched. Another man sold bright pink cotton candy, and Alice could see, even from this distance, how it melted in the humidity.

  The waitress came by, and after Toby handled the formalities in Spanish, Alice was pressured to order. “Burritos with queso,” she said. She always ordered the easy items she could pronounce: tacos, burritos, enchiladas.

  The waitress, a plump young woman with large curled bangs, looked at her eagerly. “Con jamón?” she asked.

  Alice looked at Toby for translation. He asked her did she want ham. Did she want ham in her cheese burrito?

  “Well, I suppose,” she said. “Okay.”

  When Toby said sí, the girl walked away quickly.

  “Sounds kind of breakfasty, though,” Alice said. “A little like McDonald’s.”

  “Maybe,” Toby said.

  The burrito that came for Alice was nothing like the fold-and-wrap variety to which Alice was accustomed. These tortillas were smashed flat and flipped in half like a taco. The cheese was a bright yellow spread; the ham was a single smooth sheet. Toby’s meal looked luscious. Two large fried tortillas smothered in a rich brown sauce called mole. It came with a dollop of bright green guacamole, a circle of dark refried beans with a single tortilla chip sailing in its center, and a gravy boat full of green salsa. The waitress uncapped two bottles of Corona for them and was about to pour them into glasses with ice.

  “Please, no thank you,” Toby said. He looked at Alice to instruct her also to refuse the ice, for health reasons, but her hand already covered the glass.

  At last, they ate.

  “So, I’m about to ovulate,” Alice said. “If ever there was a more perfect time.” She squeezed lime and sprinkled salt in her Corona. She figured this would be the last of her drinking.

  Toby raised his eyebrows, and Alice thought she saw him wink. “So tonight’s the night,” he said.

  “Or this afternoon,” Alice said. “The sooner the better, really.”

  This endeavor was not new; still, Alice felt a manic glee, a certain boisterous anticipation at the sheer maybe of it all. So far, nothing was “wrong” with either of them. Their doctor had told them to just keep trying, even though Alice feared it was almost too late for her, at age thirty-six, with so many good, unused eggs gone to waste ever since she was fourteen. The doctor told her that 80 percent of healthy couples took up to a full year to conceive a child. The important thing, she’d said, was to relax and just keep trying. They’d agreed a trip to Mexico might be just what they needed.

  A small girl in a yellow dress wandered up to their table, selling tiny packets of Chiclets: purple, pink, red, white, and green squares the size of postage stamps.

  “Señora,” she said, and looked up at Alice with big, pleading eyes. “Chiclet. Barato. Por favor. Barato.” She rubbed Alice’s arm softly with her hand.

  “Toby,” Alice said, “ask how much. How much for one pack.”

  He did, and told Alice in English.

  “Ten,” Alice said. “I’ll take ten little packs.” The girl didn’t respond to her English but looked as if she knew she was in for a good sale. She leaned her elbows on the table and waited patiently. Alice could see her flip-flops had been many times repaired with tape.

  “It would be three pesos,” Toby said. “For ten.”

  “That’s thirty cents, right?” Alice said.

  “More or less,” Toby said.

  “Let’s give her twenty pesos,” Alice said. “That’s only two dollars.” She fished through her trim black travel pouch, which she kept inconspicuously inside her dress, strung around her neck. “Here,” she said.

  “Don’t flash all your money around,” Toby said, and physically shielded her from the street, even though they were up two stories.

  “I’m not,” she said. She paid the girl, scooped up her ten packs of Chiclets, mostly pink and maroon, and set them by her plate. She didn’t even like gum, but the girl was so charming and such a convincing little salesperson. What was two dollars to Alice?

  She gave Toby a look that said what? but soon a group of children flooded around Alice, hawking their wares: beaded necklaces, silver chains, brightly painted ashtrays shaped like sombreros, Aztec paintings on sheets of bark paper, clay vases banded in cobalt blue, bags of fried pork rind drenched in hot sauce like splattered blood.

  “No thanks,” Alice said. But the children woul
dn’t go away. One of them pointed to Alice’s plate, where the ham and cheese burrito sat cooling, hardening, and Alice could feel a pained expression cross her own face.

  “I’d give it to her,” she told Toby, and crossed her legs uncomfortably. “But then the others—”

  “It’s okay for you to eat your meal, Alice,” Toby said. “I’m sure they scam all the tourists. They don’t look emaciated or anything.”

  Eventually, much to Alice’s relief, the waitress sent the children back down the curving black staircase, and Alice watched them spill into the street below and zero in on other easy targets.

  How she hated to say no to children, to anyone for that matter.

  On the way back to their hotel, Alice feared they’d be run down by the white taxis constantly speeding through the narrow streets. She pulled herself up against buildings whenever one passed. She never turned her back on the traffic. She leapt into open doorways when a taxi got too close. As it turned out, it was Toby who got hurt. He did not get run down but lost his footing on the steeply pitched, wet brick street and twisted his ankle. Luckily there’d been a break in the taxi traffic. Alice had never seen him in such a state before. He lay on the ground, grimacing, gripping his leg at midshin, his face a dark shade of red. Fortunately they were just two doors down from Hotel Los Arcos, and the proprietor came rushing out and helped Toby hop down the street and into the hotel courtyard.

  “I think it’s sprained,” Toby said, back in their room. Alice pulled the drapes closed and sat on the opposite bed, unsure what to do.

  “Should we try to find a doctor?” she asked.

  Toby tried moving his ankle around but winced. “No,” he said. “Maybe just an Ace bandage. I think there’s a little pharmacy around the corner. Do you think you could do that? It’s really swelling. Maybe some ice, too.”

  Alice panicked at the idea of venturing out on a shopping trip, alone, with her poor Spanish skills. “Sure,” she said, then fished the dictionary out of her bag. “I just need to look a few things up. Give me a sec.”

  Toby lay on the bed with his eyes closed as Alice frantically flipped through pages. Even the simplest request, the simplest sentence, caused her stress. She wanted to be good at it, to blend in, even though it was impossible with her rich, red, bobbed hair, her green eyes, and her milky white, obviously North American skin.

  Finally, when she felt ready, Alice grabbed her money pouch and slid into her sandals. It was almost dark outside, and loud salsa music drifted in through the windows. Maybe she would buy an ice-cream treat, or a couple bottles of beer, or some garlic fried peanuts. She felt the Chiclets in her pocket as she reached for the door.

  “Babe?” Toby said, startling her. He opened his eyes, sat up, and looked at her with an odd combination of apology and love. His beard, she noticed, had gone more gray than black, and she wondered, if she ran into him on the street, a total stranger, if she’d be attracted to him. It was his eyes, those piercing dark brown eyes, that got to people. He was dashing, you could say. He looked smart. He looked like someone who took good care of his belongings and drove a sensible but not unattractive car.

  “Yes?” she said.

  “It’s probably not going to happen,” he said. “I mean, with this ankle and everything. I’m good for nothing at this point.”

  “Right,” she said, and although she tried to sound upbeat, she couldn’t help the disappointed flatness that lingered in her voice. “It’s just—I mean, of all possible times. You know? This is it,” she said. “I mean, the doctor said as soon as the ovulation test is positive ... I was just so hoping this time.”

  “I know,” Toby said. He held up his hands in surrender. “I’m really sorry.”

  “Don’t be silly,” she said. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. It was an accident! At least you didn’t get run over by those crazy taxis.” She strode over and planted a quick kiss on his cheek, which landed more on his ear. “We’ll try again next time.”

  “I love you, you know,” Toby said, and blew her a kiss with two fingers.

  “You, too,” Alice said, but her heart fell.

  Out in the street, Alice imagined herself a single, reclusive expatriate. She exchanged knowing glances with a couple of young backpackers who had to be in their twenties. At home, they could be her students. They would hate her for giving them poor grades. They would call her Dr. White and complain about her difficult Introduction to Psychology exams. Here, they nodded at her in solidarity as if to say: This travel thing’s a trip, isn’t it? Around the corner, dogs barked and growled at her. Men glanced at her in her linen sundress as if she were merchandise for sale. Her new sandals creaked and groaned at the straps.

  At the pharmacy’s glass counter, a woman dressed in nurse’s whites looked at her expectantly and asked what Alice assumed to be “May I help you?”

  Alice’s carefully practiced Spanish melted away. She was without words, utterly incapable of asking for anything, much less an Ace bandage or ice. She couldn’t remember the verbs or the nouns. Nothing. Without Toby as her guide, she was rendered mute and ridiculous. Here, all her education couldn’t get her a single bag of ice. The woman spoke again, in Spanish, this time more rapidly.

  “Inglés, por favor,” Alice said, her own worst joke, but the woman wrinkled up her nose and shook her head.

  “Okay,” Alice said, in English, and slowly. “I need some ice and an Ace bandage. For a foot?” She lifted up her own ankle and pointed to it.

  The woman looked at her blankly, then produced a small package of Band-Aids from underneath the counter.

  Alice shook her head but felt they were finally getting somewhere. She acted out walking and then twisting her ankle. She made a painful face, then pointed to her wedding ring. “Mi amor,” she said. She didn’t know if that was the right word, but the woman’s eyes lit up.

  “Sí, sí,” the woman said, and walked purposefully back among shelves of supplies. She returned quickly, placing a bright red condom packet in front of Alice. Profiláctico, it read, the absolute last thing Alice needed. Clearly, they’d reached an impasse.

  Alice was about to give up but couldn’t stand the thought of Toby’s disappointment at her returning empty handed. Hands in her pockets, Alice came upon the Chiclets and fished them out, as if they could explain something. She set them on the counter, pink and maroon, like little valentines, sweet nothings. “You can have these,” Alice said. “Give them to your kids. You have kids, right? Everyone in this country seems to have plenty.” The woman looked at her suspiciously, then said something else that Alice didn’t understand.

  Alice shrugged her shoulders apologetically. The woman finally produced a small notepad from under the counter; she pushed a pen towards Alice and stood back. Alice took the pen, thought for a second, then wrote, in English, “I’m out of luck. It’s not your fault.” She lay the pen down and left.

  On the short walk back to the hotel, she gave money to every beggar who asked for it. She gave until her pockets were empty, then went back to Toby, who lay waiting in the dark.

  CRAVINGS

  I first started eating chalk when I was in kindergarten, and couldn’t keep my hands off the box of pastels, which reminded me of miniature colored marshmallows. My teacher, Mrs. Finch, who actually looked like a bird with her clipped little mouth and tight white nose, caught me gnawing on a pink stick behind the kitchen center. I remember trying to hide the mushy, grainy mess in the toy refrigerator, but she reached in and grabbed my arm like I was a criminal. Later, Mrs. Finch told my mother, who thought it was very funny, that she was merely afraid I would choke and die. I’ll never forget her famous line, which our family still quotes to this day: “I don’t care to be picking up any corpses in my classroom due to chalk!” That was the end of it, although my craving never ceased, and I’ve since read about women who cannot quench their desire for dirt and eat it, pure black and crumbly like an Oreo, right out of their yard with cupped, savage palms. So I am not alone
in this earthy, mineral insatiability.

  I’m twenty-one now, in my sixth month of pregnancy, and the craving is back. I’m a thin woman and have barely gained more than the baby’s weight so far, but every night when I’m lying in bed, I get such a craving for chalk that I finally walked down to Ben Franklin the other day and bought a stash, which I keep in my nightstand, tucked in the drawer. My sister, Ardeth—a law student and my roommate—thinks I need to eat more and sleep less. She’s a constant, sensible woman with short auburn hair, round tortoise-shell glasses, and heavy limbs. Most often you’ll see her in long, floral dresses, navy leather flats, and dark blazers, all ordered from the same catalogue she’s been steady with since high school. She’s older than me by five years, and smarter than me, and more disciplined than me. You couldn’t exactly call her matronly or dowdy, but she rides the edge: she wears only white cotton briefs, listens to country, and won’t dare zip from the bathroom to her bedroom unless she’s got her full-length “Little House on the Prairie” robe wrapped around her tight, even when no one’s home. I know because she told me. We live on Main Street above Paesano’s Pizza Parlor in Greenwood, Ohio. It’s a small college town, but we get a lot of traffic. She’s afraid someone might see her dripping wet, half-naked in a towel—that’s what she’s concerned about. We’re very close, actually, which makes what’s happened worse, or rather, very complicated.

  My due date isn’t until December 30, which is nice because I’ll be able to finish out fall semester and keep working at Briante’s Basement Bistro, which is the best restaurant in town. The professors from the university like to go there with their spouses, cozied against the brick walls, elbows leaning on the red-checkered tablecloths, little candles flickering in jelly jars. Occasionally one of my current professors will come in and sit in my section, which used to be awkward, but if they’re men—bearded, balding monologuers—I flirt and wink at them, then sashay off with my empty tray, leaving their wives to wonder. I don’t have too many male professors anymore, though, since I’m a junior majoring in women’s studies and have most of my core requirements out of the way, except for biology/chemistry, and an annoying, worthless physical education requirement that demands two bogus semesters of exercise. I’m planning to take ballroom dancing and golf, but still.