You remember his name?
No, I say.
Right, says Miguel.
Then he laughs.
You were probably in love with that motherfucker, he says.
I tell him I wasn’t but Miguel waves that off. He drops his chin onto his knees.
We drink and watch the street. The streetlamps bring it to life. There’s a homeless guy loitering in front of the CVS, and I know offering him a sip would make his whole fucking night. But of course we don’t do that, we watch him stalk the road, and once he reaches the island of grass in the street he lies down and shuts his eyes.
8.
My place is smack in the middle of East End, behind the construction and the stadium and a fuckton of traffic. Nearly everyone else’s already sold their property and moved on. Life’s just cheaper in Pearland and Baytown. After Señor Cortez gave in, it was Esmeralda from the corner, and then Jaime and his brothers, these Nicaraguans always scowling at everything. Then Nikeeta sold her place. Francisco’s fam left their house. Joanna held out in her little blue stucco place but the price turned right and she bounced.
Now these blancos live in her house. Our neighborhood’s first white people in fuck knows how long. The whole block’s made a show of ignoring them and a couple of hoods took a dump on their Civic. But all I ever saw those motherfuckers do is smile, always waving my way like we came up together, and they had this kid, this little fucking boy, and one time he kicked me a ball, on some nothing day in the summer, and before I knew what was happening I was kicking it back, just me and this kid and his mom by the window, and for a second it was nice but after a minute I took off because there’s only so much of that shit that can make sense at one time.
9.
Next time I see Miguel I just look at his face and it’s obvious something is wrong.
We’re rolling out for a gala. The Castillo’s buzzing with money. We’ve thrown sequins on the windows and glitter all over the floor. The dinner floor’s packed, standing room only, and Miguel drops like four plates at the feet of some suit.
He flubs his tickets. He mixes up orders. Another waiter, this prick named Raúl, says he thought patos were good with their hands, and Miguel meets him head-on, he calls him a stupid fucking huevón.
I’m neck-deep in my own shit but I manage to grab his collar.
I ask if he’s good. He gives me this look. Then he swallows whatever’s in his mouth and says, Claro.
* * *
• • •
But of course he isn’t.
Shit only gets worse.
Later that night, he’s yelling at a table of blancas, these blow-dried mannequin types just about drowning under their pearls, and Diego comes out of nowhere all decked down in a suit. Hair slicked back. Smelling like soap. He tugs Miguel’s arm, and I’m reading their lips when this güero snaps his fingers in my face for more salsa.
So I’m still in the kitchen when the fight breaks out.
I don’t see who starts it but honestly who gives a shit. Miguel starts throwing hands. Diego covers his face. Miguel socks him in the chin and Diego’s just holding on, and you’d think the crowd would explode or cry out but they just circle up with the rest of us to watch.
I don’t know if it’s the thought of the cash he’s losing or the Salvadoran in him or what, but eventually Diego manages to set his feet. He flips Miguel on his back. Puts his knees on his chest, and his hands on his neck, and if he were anybody else it’d be a wrap.
But he just looks down at Miguel.
Diego wipes his mouth. Spits on the tile.
Javi’d call it a pato scramble. There’s money at these tables so now everyone’s standing, wives clutching their pearls. Some niggas start muttering, and a handful of people head for the doors, but mostly everyone’s still watching to see what’s gonna happen next.
What Miguel does is stand. He doesn’t look up or anything. He turns around, heads for the door, and Diego shouts after him until he’s gone.
* * *
• • •
You’d think he’d have gone straight home or whatever but I find him on the patio. Sitting, shaking his head. Looking like garbage.
Believe it or not the evening hadn’t gone completely to shit. Some people left, but most of them stayed, and Diego came out of the kitchen stronger than ever after cleaning himself up. Wasn’t flustered or anything, talking all polite to everyone, and when I asked about the tables that bounced without paying, he just shrugged and said, Es en los manos de dios.
Now he’s sent everyone home. Gave a big speech about What a great job. That was all some niggas needed, he said Good and they were out, but the rest of us stood around looking lost before we started putting shit back together.
The black outside turns blacker. Drunks start ambling up the road. Miguel keeps his eyes shut, and I don’t say shit either, but then he sighs and tells me they’re gone.
His folks flew out the night before.
They should be back in the capital by now, he says.
Jesus shit, I say.
So you go full lucha fucking libre, I say.
No, says Miguel.
One of our waitresses finds us on the steps. She asks if everything’s all right and I tell her all’s well in the jungle. She looks at Miguel, and then at me, and says, Better out here than in there.
Miguel kneads his eyes, the most tired I’ve ever seen him.
They asked me to come too, says Miguel.
I had the money, he says, and he just shakes his head. I had the money and I didn’t go. I sent them back on their own.
You still have the cash, I say, you can probably leave tomorrow, but as soon as the words leave my mouth I know that’s not why he’s stayed.
We sit on the curb a little longer. The street cleaners come through. They wait until the city’s at its most quiet, right before the first patch of dawn, and they walk from Dallas to Hamilton sweeping at all of the concrete under them. Shit’s actually pretty beautiful if you think about it—all the convicts and baseheads and fuckups giving the city a clean slate—but before I tell Miguel he’s already fallen asleep. Dude’s on my shoulder, arms crossed like he’s deliberating.
A gaggle of cleaners passes, smoothing their route around the car. One of them looks over and waves so I give him one back.
10.
Ma spent the first week we sold the house in bed. She didn’t care how much we were pulling from the sale. She hadn’t grown up in the place, and of course it’d kicked her ass, but even if it’s a bag of shit everyone wants their name on something.
My mother, who’d danced with Mexicans. Who’d kicked a pack of hoods from her bar, told them to roost on some other stoop.
Before she took off to Shreveport, I told her she was running from nothing to nothing.
She made this face like she wanted to believe me. Then she said it wasn’t like I’d given her any reasons to stay.
Me.
You, she said. You’re as rootless as I am.
Ma’d brought it up before—she’d stick around if I started a family.
What, I said.
Jan’s got a whole nest, I said.
You’ve got grandchildren, I said. A son-in-law, too.
It’s different, said Ma.
That’s bullshit. You’re bugging.
Quiet, said Ma.
Look, said Ma.
A daughter who loves you is one thing, she said. Give me the family that wants me around.
She used to ask me about women. When was I bringing one home. Javi had the opposite problem, she said, that boy had Rebecca here and Katrina there. Ma swore my plan was to wait until she rolled over and died, but Javi always told her that I wasn’t the one for that.
She’d shush him. Take a deep breath. Say that plums only ripen with time.
Except
one day she just stopped. It just wasn’t something that came up anymore. I tried chancing it once and Ma said maybe Jan will kick out another one too.
11.
I don’t see Miguel the next night. Or the next few nights after that.
I don’t seek him out.
I know how it feels when shit happens. I know about needing time.
* * *
• • •
Back at the Castillo, one of the cooks asks where my boyfriend’s gone.
I tell him Miguel is in his bed, fucking his wife and daughters.
The rest of the month, Diego looks at me like he’s got a problem, but he doesn’t open his mouth. All he does is stare.
One night he asks if I’ve cleared my receipts for the day.
He’s already found someone to fill in for Miguel. When I get around to talking to him, he isn’t all that bad, but he’s got his wife and kids down south and this sidechick out in Katy.
She cleans houses, he says. It’s good money.
That’s who he tells me he’s saving for.
12.
About a week before she left, Ma actually sat me down. I’d worked the whole night. Some puto’d spilled oil on my kicks.
She had the windows open by the kitchen sink. A gang of cats posted up on the ledge. Whenever the humidity starts biting, they gather on the fence, and Ma was always knocking the shit out of their tails with her broom.
It’d been a few days since I’d seen her but I knew what was coming. I set a hand on her shoulder and she blinked.
She told me she talked to her sisters. She said they were willing to have me.
I knew I should’ve been grateful or whatever, but I gave Ma a look.
I said, Well who asked you to do that.
All you have to do is come, she says. You only have to show up.
Nah, I say.
You think I’m lying?
Can’t be that simple.
Just show up, Ma said. That’s all. You could get a job. They’d have work for a boy like you.
And we’d live happily ever after, I say, in some bumfuck swamp.
Ma really looked at me then. It was like she hadn’t been looking at first, but all of a sudden she was.
You know, she said, you used to be a nice boy.
You and your brother used to be nice boys, she said. Your father, too. All of you nice.
No one could’ve known you’d turn rotten, she said.
She was quiet while we let that sink in. I know that I should’ve reached out and hugged her. Pulled on her shoulder. Something physical.
Your brother would’ve loved it in Louisiana, she said. He’d have loved it. He’d have loved all of the space.
You’re reaching.
He’d have loved it.
Javi’d never leave the city.
Maybe, said Ma. But he tried to stay, and look where it got him.
You tell me what you have keeping you here, she said.
Actually, she said, no. You don’t have to tell me.
You tell yourself why it is that you’re staying, said Ma. When you figure it out, you keep it to yourself.
Ma looks straight at me. It’s the most honest face I’ve ever seen anyone make. A little like she already feels sorry for me. Like she already knows something I don’t.
But it’s a reason you’ll have to live with, she says. Even if it’s nothing. And that is something you’ll have to live with, too.
13.
I hear knocking at my door and of course it’s Miguel. Dude’s in the same clothes I saw him in last.
He asks if he can come in, and I say, Fuck no.
We post up in the kitchen.
He sits. I sit.
You gonna offer me something to drink?
Don’t give me that faggot shit.
He shrugs.
That mean you’re dry?
It means I’ve got nada and I’ve got nada for you.
Then I guess I’m fine, says Miguel, after a while, and he rubs his palms over the table.
But there are eggs in the fridge. And they’re beside leftover beans from the Castillo. And those sit in some Tupperware, above a flimsy bag of tortillas, so I crack the yolks into something like a scramble and I fry the pinto beans beside them. And I fold the whole thing onto the tortillas, above some slices of avocado, with shredded cheese, and when I tell Miguel that he’s SOL for salsa, he doesn’t say a word. He’s just got this look on his face.
You didn’t have to, says Miguel.
You wouldn’t have shut up if I hadn’t, I say.
I watch Miguel eat and he watches me watch him eat.
It’s good, he says.
It’s free, I say.
I ask if he’s heard from his parents. He doesn’t look my way, just keeps chewing his food, but eventually he says that they’re fine.
They made it back to their town, he says. But they don’t have a phone. They call from the market in the square. All I hear are the fucking roosters.
Sounds like a terrible time, I say.
It’s what they know.
Maybe one day they’ll wake up.
Maybe.
Miguel runs his fingers across the table.
You think they’ll miss it, I say, and he finally looks up at me.
You go somewhere else and stay there and then go back home, he says. Then you tell me how they’re feeling.
I just might, I say.
You should’ve gone with your mother, he says. You’re being a pussy. A pato.
Just like you should’ve flown back to the jungle, I say. But you’re here.
I knock on the wood between us.
I’m here, he says, and he raps on it too.
He could still go. Miguel could leave tomorrow. He could pack a suitcase and catch a flight, and I know that I could too. I could pack my shit and ghost. It’d cost nothing at all. But the same way that I know this I know that I probably won’t.
I know that even if we don’t always do the things that need to be done, we do the things that we need to. I know this the same way that I know Miguel is beside me, in this room, standing where Ma and my father and Javi and Jan have in the years, in the days, before.
Miguel keeps an arm’s length away. He peeps the photos on the wall. He asks if the boy in the sweater is my brother.
I could hardly tell, he says, squinting. You don’t look anything like him.
* * *
• • •
Of course we end up upstairs. Neither of us says shit about it. In my bedroom, the one I used to share with Javi, and I don’t know how he ends up on top of me but he does.
I’m thinking he’ll laugh or smirk or make some kind of crack, but he’s got this serious look on his face. And then there’s the pressure again. He’s shifting his weight, ripping at our sweats.
Está bien?
No, I say.
Really?
No.
This is not how it usually goes for you.
You asking or telling?
When he slips himself inside of me I call him something I don’t mean to.
Bueno, says Miguel.
It takes a while. He finishes on my chest. He asks why I’m crying and I tell him I’m not. I tell him to stop bullshitting. Miguel opens his mouth to say something, but he doesn’t, just breathes down on my neck, and then I’m hard, again, and then he’s back inside of me, but this time it’s sweeter, like something that makes sense, but I’m telling him to stop, to leave, to get the fuck out of here, and he’s telling me the same, to go, don’t come back, and then the words start blending together, and we’re saying it in chorus, stop, stop, stop, go on, get out, be gone.
14.
Javi told me no one ever went anywhere they didn’t need to.
&nb
sp; It was late. East End was dead. He was drunk and fucked-up and locked out. My brother slapped the door, calling my name. Had blood all over his shirt, and I thought he’d gotten his ass beat but when I really gave Javi a look I saw that it didn’t belong to him.
He sat on the porch, just looking out at the road.
Ma stayed in bed. I watched him from the window. I felt Jan behind me, leaning on the wall. She wiped at her face, yawning above me.
After a while, I said, You should let him in.
Jan gave me a look, a little like she pitied me.
Listen, she said, if a man’s beating on your door this late, you don’t let him in. That’s the last thing you do.
Serves him right, she said.
Yeah, I said.
He does whatever the fuck he wants.
Yeah.
Leave him, said Jan, I’ll let him in later.
I watched her slip back down the hallway.
I opened the door, brought the bowl of menudo we’d picked up for dinner from the stove.
Javi chewed it, quiet as shit. Didn’t have any bruises, no scuff marks. He asked if I’d ever thought about leaving Houston and what I did was blink at him.
People think about things all the time, he said. All people fucking do is think.
But really, he said, you do things or you don’t.
He reached in his jacket for a cigarette, and then he shook the carton at me.
I didn’t smoke and he knew that.
Niggas already know what they’ll do, said Javi. They just play like they don’t.
I took one anyways. The flame grazed the edge of my chin. We sat smoking, watching Harrisburg, and then he finished his cigarette and stomped that shit out.
15.
The first time I spent the night with a boy, Miguel woke up in my bed the next morning.
He’s dark, but not as dark as me. And lanky. And he stinks. But when I watch him snoring on Javi’s comforter I don’t throw up in my mouth. I don’t feel like he’s something I have to get rid of.
Lot Page 16
