by Meg Medina
“But what you don’t know is that your father never told me a word about his wife when we met. He just swept me off my feet with his church music and the way he talked to me about my own playing. That’s how I got this piano, in fact. He had a friend who played on Sundays at the bar inside the New York Hilton. Agustín bought it for me when they were getting ready to update the place. I was crazy with joy.” She runs her fingers along the keys but doesn’t press down.
“You never play anymore,” I say.
“No.” Ma shrugs. “This old thing blinded me to everything, and I guess I can’t forgive myself for being so gullible. I thought I had met someone worthwhile, someone who really wanted to make me happy. But his gift fooled me; he fooled both Laura and me, really.”
I stare straight ahead, but from the corner of my eye, I can see Ma’s silhouette in the dark as it comes into sharper focus. She’s sitting up tall, her hands folded. I’ve struggled to imagine her having a boyfriend, much less having sex. But now something else occurs to me. Ma was made a fool of. Suddenly that’s harder to imagine than anything else.
“So, how did you find out?” I finally ask.
Ma purses her lips and goes quiet for a long time. Finally she takes a deep breath.
“We were engaged and living together in our new apartment in Lila’s building. Agustín had gone home to visit his mother — or so he said. Looking back, I should have known it was a lie. No grown man is so attached to his mami — not even a Latin mama’s boy. Gifts and money and —” She shakes her head. “Anyway, I was working part-time at Salón Corazón and getting things ready for you. I had your crib and everything.
“But one afternoon, while I was at the shop, a tall mulata came in. She said, ‘I am looking for Agustín Sanchez’s whore.’ Imagine it! She was one of Laura’s cousins, who lived in Elmhurst. There were rumors, and a few nosy bodies in the neighborhood told her that Agustín was making a fool of her primita with another woman. Naturally, she’d asked questions, and soon enough she found out my name and where I worked.”
The whole tableau floats before my eyes. Ma, fat-bellied, with her broom, the sting of people’s stares on her back. A young Gloria fighting to keep her smile. This is a decent shop, señora, she might have said. We’re all good women here. You’ve made a mistake. Come. Come have a cookie.
“Then what happened?” I ask.
“I said, ‘I’m carrying Agustín Sanchez’s child, so careful who you call a whore, señora. I’m his fiancée. Now, what business do you have with him?’ Then she told me everything the way it really was.” Ma sighs. “A whole family over there that had nothing to do with me. He never even bothered to come back to explain. No matter how many letters I wrote to him demanding answers, I think he just believed he could keep two secret families forever. After that, I was furious. I burned every last piece of him I could find.” She pauses for a second. “Well, almost.”
She stands up and moves the candle and tea to one of the boxes crowding us. Then, from inside the top of the piano, she pulls something out that’s been taped inside. I hold it close to the flame when she hands it to me and find a photograph of a handsome guy with slick hair and green eyes like mine.
“You look a lot like him,” she says.
It’s the only picture I’ve ever seen of my father, the one thing I’ve searched for. But now a strange emptiness fills me as I ask Ma the one thing I’ve always been afraid to know.
“Did he ever really want me, Ma? Does he even know I have his last name?”
When I look at her, I see tears in Ma’s eyes, and I can guess the answer. My stomach squeezes into a fist.
Ma leans forward and her voice is a whisper.
“He didn’t know what he wanted, Piddy. But I wanted you — more than anything. You are the only good thing that man ever gave me.”
I stare at the picture in my lap and nod stupidly. Ma wanting me should be enough, but somehow it’s not.
“A girl deserves a decent man for a father, but that’s not what you got, Piedad, and I’m sorry,” Ma says. “The important question now is: Who are you going to be?”
She gets up and goes to bed, her tea still untouched.
Lila is the one who calls us with the news early Saturday. It’s just before nine o’clock, and with only a few hours of sleep, Ma looks pale and dazed as she listens. I know it’s bad news before she even tells me.
“That animal,” she mutters, crossing herself. “It’s his fault. Are the police there now?”
“What’s wrong?” I ask from the couch, where I fell asleep with my father’s picture. Ma shakes her head and turns her back, but I follow. “What’s the matter?” I say louder.
She cups the receiver and shoots me a look. “Sio, niña. I can’t hear Lila.”
But Lila shouldn’t even be up right now, definitely not making calls. I stand right next to Ma. “What’s wrong with Lila?”
“Por Dios, Piddy. She’s fine. There’s trouble in the building — that’s all.”
“What trouble?”
She pauses, considering her words.
“What?” I say again.
Ma lets out a long sigh. “It’s the Halpers.”
“They got evicted?” I ask.
The whole world goes still as I wait for her next words.
“She’s hurt.”
There’s no sign of Joey when I get to the building, out of breath and panting, but there’s CAUTION tape everywhere and a squad car parked up on the curb. The ambulance has its lights going, but no sound. A few neighbors are hanging out their windows as they chug their morning coffee. Finally I spot Lila at the corner. She’s smoking again, and her hair is tucked under a bandana, like when she’s sick. She should be at work by now, but she’s still in her stretchy pants and sweatshirt from last night. When she sees me, she tosses away her cigarette butt and looks at me carefully. A whole world of questions about last night is in her eyes, but in the end, she just gives me a close hug, letting me breathe in the smell of cigarettes and her perfume.
“What happened to Mrs. Halper?” I ask. The whole way over, I’ve been thinking of Joey’s mom, thin and quiet, her high voice through the pipes. Stop it, Frank. Please, Frank. I’m sorry. I’m thinking of the days long ago when she’d sit on the stoop darning Joey’s dingy socks, waiting for Mr. Halper to sober up. Did he kill her? I want to ask, but I can’t get out the words.
The lobby doors open, and everybody gets quiet as the gurney rolls through. Mrs. Halper is cocooned in sheets, like a caterpillar waiting for her wings. Her face is swollen with bruises, but her skin is so pale that she looks blue.
“What else? He got drunk and beat her until she stopped screaming,” Lila whispers, shuddering. “The kid found her lying in the kitchen this morning. His old man was passed out cold.”
My stomach seizes up at the thought of Joey.
Just then he appears at the lobby door with a cop at his side. I move behind the telephone pole so he can’t see me gawking at him the way he’d hate. His eyes are blank, even further away than they were in my room. If he sees any of us on the street, he doesn’t let on. He looks right through the neighbors watching his catastrophe and climbs into the back of the ambulance with the gurney. His face is hard, his eyes straight ahead.
Mr. Halper comes out next, looking like crap, as usual, his wrists bound in plastic handcuffs that look like enormous garbage-bag fasteners. He’s blinking into the morning light as if he’s just waking up, still in his T-shirt and work pants. Another cop is at his side. They pause at the back of the ambulance, but Joey won’t look at his father, not even a glance. The cop whispers something to the ambulance crew, then leads Mr. Halper to the squad car instead.
“Hijo de buena madre,” Lila mutters.
My head is filled with all the times cops have come on account of the Halpers before. Nothing is happening. I’m sorry for this fuss. He’s drunk — that’s all. That’s what Mrs. Halper always said. But now I can’t help but wonder: Why didn’t she just
tell the truth? Why was she apologizing?
My stomach is squeezed into a queasy knot, and my mouth fills with saliva as the ambulance pulls away. Lila slips her arm around my shoulder to steady me, but it’s too much.
“Piddy?”
I lean over the bushes and throw up.
I didn’t go to the shop with Lila afterward, but she didn’t argue. Instead, after the cops left and the neighbors finished their gossip, she tucked me into her satin-sheeted bed, called Ma, and got dressed for work. All afternoon, I sat by the window, playing with the empty perfume bottles and waiting for any sign of Joey. But even late at night when Raúl finally drove me home, Joey still wasn’t back.
The church bells of Saint Michael’s are tolling the hour in the distance, and a cold drizzle has left my sweatshirt damp as I walk around to the back of Lila’s building. The apartment looks just as dark this morning. I told Ma I was going to pick up the challah rolls she likes from the Russian bakery, but I just had to come back to check on Joey again. I toss a pebble and stare at his dark window and wait. Nothing. What if he’s not coming back at all? Where will he go? I bend down to reach for another pebble when I spot a cat food tin on the ground near the garbage can outside. It’s empty and crawling with ants.
The kittens.
Even with Lila by my side, a familiar spider of worry climbs my spine as we open the dark cellar. The trash cans are lined up outside for pickup day tomorrow and the whole area stinks of trash. Lila is holding the front of her robe closed as she follows me to the storage area, her hair all points. I leaned on her bell until her groggy voice came through. “I need your basement key,” I said. “Right away.”
“Are you going to tell me why you’ve dragged me out of bed?” She’s holding her nose and eyeing me carefully as I put my ear to the storage-room door and fumble with her keys. Part of me hopes to find Joey here when I push open the door. Maybe he’ll be asleep like a cherub on the pissy mattress. Or maybe he’ll call me Toad and tell me his mom is going to be all right after all. What I don’t want to find is two dead kittens.
The padlock clicks open, and I push open the door. “Hello?” I call, reaching like a blind girl until I find the light cord.
“Rats!” Lila screeches. Two pairs of eyes glow from the corner.
“Shhh!” I scoop up the kittens fast and show her. They’re adorable, of course, with big blue eyes and faint orange fur, but I can see they’re listless. They let me scratch their chins, too limp with hunger to swat at me with their claws. Cat turds are everywhere.
“What’s this?” she gasps.
“The cat had her kittens, and they’ve been living down here. But now there’s no one to take care of them.”
Lila’s mouth drops open, and she shakes her head slowly. “No, Piddy. We can’t keep these. I’m allergic to cats. We need to put them outside to fend for themselves. Don’t look at me like that! It’s the best we can do, chica.”
“I think they’re sick,” I whisper.
She bites her lip, thinking.
“Please, Lila.”
Suddenly the basement door creaks open.
“Who’s back there?” It’s the super, nosing around as usual.
I yank the cord to turn off the lights.
“It’s just me,” Lila calls. She slips a kitten inside each of her robe pockets and shoves me out before closing the door behind us. My fingers are shaking as I click the padlock back in place. He’s standing at the cellar door, his dirty hair damp from the rain.
“This garbage makes quite a stink,” she says coolly as we walk by. We climb the steps without waiting for his reply.
This is stupid. I’m sorry & I miss you. That’s the message from Mitzi that flashes on my phone on Thanksgiving morning. Then another:
I made the team. First game next Saturday night. Please come.
I’m numb inside. It’s like a message from another planet, I think. From a place where things like basketball games still matter.
Joey Halper’s father beat his mother nearly to death, I type. She’s still in the hospital. Then I backspace over the words and close my phone. People like the Halpers are why the Ortegas moved in the first place.
The smell of turkey fills the apartment, but I don’t feel like eating. I try to stay out of the kitchen to avoid conversation with Ma. She’s mad, even though it’s the holiday and we’re supposed to be happy. I know it’s my fault. There were only two and a half days of school this week because of Thanksgiving, so I stayed home. Unfortunately the secretary called Ma again. “Your child has to drop out and get a job or she’s considered truant, ma’am.” She threatened to call the Hotline for Educational Neglect if I don’t show up soon.
The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade has already started. I used to watch it with Mitzi and Lila every year. It’s our favorite, especially the Broadway numbers.
The doorbell rings, and I spot Lila shivering outside and holding a large box. It’s only ten a.m., but we’re going to eat early today — noon — because of Attronica’s Super After-Thanksgiving Madness Sale. Ma will have to go to sleep this afternoon for a few hours because her shift for the big sale starts at one a.m. Only the crazies shop then, Ma says, but everybody is on call, anyway.
When I open the door, I find Lila, red-eyed and sniffling.
“Here,” she says, shoving the box into my arms. “Your babies cost me three hundred bucks!”
I flip open the lid and find the two kittens — asleep but alive. The sight of them is like a mirage. I watch the rise and fall of their bellies without touching them, so tiny and helpless.
“That good-for-nothing vet is a thief — you know that?” She sneezes and blows her nose. “He told me they were dehydrated. ‘So give them water!’ I told him. But no. They needed IVs and shots and who knows what else.” She shakes her head. “You’re lucky they’re cute.”
“Thanks,” I say. “I’ll pay you back.”
“Pay her back for what?”
Ma is wiping her hands in the kitchen doorway. She looks from Lila to me, and then her eyes land on the box I’m holding. “You bring dessert, Lila?”
Lila blows her nose again and kisses Ma on the cheek. “Anything good on the parade yet?” She hurries off to the living room and leaves me to fend for myself.
Ma’s not thrilled with our furry guests, but not even she is heartless enough to kick kittens out on Thanksgiving. All morning, we play with them and watch the parade. I beg nonstop until she caves in and says I can keep one — but only one.
“How am I supposed to choose?” I ask, but Ma goes deaf.
Maybe there’s hope, though. When she thinks I’m not looking, Ma cuts them tiny pieces of turkey wing and drops it in their box. Even Lila, whose eyes are red and itchy, can’t seem to resist them.
“These two fur balls definitely have something to be thankful for,” she mutters as I let them walk across the piano keys, too light to even make noise.
When the three of us hold hands before dinner, I bend my head in prayer. I don’t know what Ma and Lila are asking for, but I have my list ready:
“Thank you, God, for keeping these kittens alive,” I say. “And thank you for letting me keep them.”
“Only one,” Ma warns. “Uno.”
Then I go to my private list.
Please, God, let DJ burn to the ground before I have to go back on Monday. If that’s too much trouble, at least make Yaqui move.
Please, God, keep Joey and Mrs. Halper safe.
Please, God, help me deal with this mess.
Bright and early Saturday morning, Lila lets herself into our apartment. The sound of the door swinging open scares me when I hear it. Ma is working, of course, but she forgot to tell me she finally got around to making Lila her own key. I rush out to the front door in my T-shirt and underwear, expecting the worst.
“You’re not ready for work yet?” she says. She’s dressed in black pants and heels, her coat flapping open. “Hurry up! Gloria’s shorthanded, and it’s the Saturda
y after Thanksgiving. It’s going to be Grand Central Station in there!”
Lila heads into the kitchen before I can answer. The kittens are padding around, stalking the cords dangling from the window blinds. They’ve already gotten stronger in just two days.
“Shoo — you’ll have my mascara running in no time,” she tells them when they spot her. She pulls a carton of milk from the refrigerator, sniffs it, and pours herself a glass. Then she looks at me.
I stand there stupidly. The truth is, I don’t have the energy to be a happy and soothing Alka-Seltzer for Gloria’s customers today. Besides, what if Yaqui shows up at the shop?
“I don’t feel well,” I mumble.
“Maybe you’re hungry. You eat yet?” she asks.
“No.”
“We’ll stop at the deli, then.” She glances at her watch. “Shake a leg!”
“I’m not going in today,” I say. “I’m busy.”
“Busy?”
“I have to find a home for one of the kittens, remember?”
Lila crosses her arms.
“Piddy, I love you more than if you were my own kid, but you’re starting to piss me off.”
“No, really. I feel . . . sick.”
“Mmm . . .” She taps her red nails on the rim of her glass, thinking. “I know what you need: a pick-me-up. Wait here.”
She comes back a few minutes later with Ma’s makeup case, the one with eye shadows from before I was born.
“Pitiful,” she mutters, surveying the contents. “Da vergüenza. You’d think I would have rubbed off on her at least a little by now.”
“I don’t need makeup,” I tell her.
But she guides me to a chair anyway and sits close.
“Be serious. Everyone needs makeup.” She squeezes the last dollop of concealer against the back of her hand. “Look up.”
With Lila this close, I can see the lines around her mouth. Her mascara is clumped in spots, but she has pretty specks of green in her eyes. She frowns in concentration and dabs my eyelid with her pinkie, fading the remaining damage as best she can. Then she reaches for an eyebrow pencil. Her breath is milky as a baby’s as she sketches back the old me. I’m grateful she doesn’t criticize the butcher job I did.
