“You are lying,” I said. “It was a man you were going to meet in Quiapo.”
“Now, Pepe,” she said, her voice pitching. “Don’t you start suspecting things. I forgot, that is all.”
“Stop it then,” I said, unconvinced.
It was our first quarrel. I went to her and kissed her softly on the cheek, then the lips with passion. But she was holding back; it was as if she was expecting someone anytime to knock at the door, for she would turn that way, although her hands were all over me. After a while, I looked into her eyes. “What is disturbing you? Who are you expecting?”
She blushed, and quickly her arms encircled me again. But I pushed her gently away, looked into her troubled face. “It was not your sister you were going to see, Lucy. It was your lover.”
She got angry; she pushed me roughly saying it was none of my business, then she marched off to the kitchen.
I followed her. “Lucy, it’s two months now. This is not something that I do as a machine. There is some feeling here,” I held her hand and pressed it to my chest. “You must know that. If you do not have feelings at all, I have.”
Her countenance softened. She turned to me and touched my face in a caress. “Do not ask questions,” she said. “We have not known each other for more than two months, like you said. And look what we are already doing. What more do you want?”
“Honesty,” I said.
“But my life is my own.”
“Not anymore, not after what we have done. You are now a part of my life.”
She must have realized how hurt I was, for she kissed me softly and then led me up the stairs to my room again.
I did not put on the greatest show on earth—my mind was too troubled—and when we were finished and relaxed, she said, “If you were the first I am sure that I would have been very hurt.”
She was being honest finally, and though it had not occurred to me to ask, on reflection, I had known that I was not her first. There was no bleeding, and though I had read somewhere that this might not be the case if the girl was athletic, I realized that she had not expressed pain but had, instead, acted with confidence.
“Tell me who was the first,” I asked, turning on my side to look at her pretty, brown face.
She faced me, “You will not be angry?”
“I can bear it. What can I do about the past?”
“I had some difficulty. Of course, I bled. Three times, and each time, I bled a little. But Pepe, he was not like you at all.”
“Who is he?”
She drew away and pinched my nose. “Now, you know enough and I have been truthful. Let us not talk like this anymore.” She kissed me once more, and we would have lingered but for an infernal rapping on the door below.
In fright, she bolted up, put on her clothes, and ran downstairs. I took time putting on my clothes but did not go down. I lay in my cot, turning over in my mind what she had said and was sad and yet a little comforted. Lucy had begun to be honest with me.
It had been my uncle at the door, and his voice was angry although I could not make out what he was angry about, and Lucy was trying to tell him something, but he had rushed up the stairs, slammed the door, then, after a while, rushed out again.
I went down wondering what it was all about. “He seemed very angry,” I said. Lucy was preparing the evening meal and dusk had come. Soon, the Lucena Express would thunder by.
“He forgot an important paper, I think,” Lucy said. “He had been at the door a long time and we did not hear him.”
“I hope he did not suspect you were upstairs with me.”
Lucy tweaked my nose. Uncle Bert did not stay long at the door, even the slightest rap on it could be heard in the house, and I wondered what it really was that had made him angry at Lucy.
* Po-po: Tease.
† Kuya: Eldest brother.
‡ Lutong macao: A manipulated outcome or result.
Remember the Oppressor
Kuya Nick was in his green Mercedes, apparently waiting for me. He was bright as a lightbulb as I emerged from the alley, and he beckoned to me to take the seat beside him. I demurred but he was insistent. “I will take you to school,” he said. “It is on my way anyway.”
It would be my first ride in a Mercedes and I would be hypocritical to let the opportunity pass. Besides, there was also the promise of a job. The engine purred quietly to a start and we headed toward Dimasalang. “How is my toro this morning?” he asked, nudging me with his elbow.
“All right,” I said. A protracted silence. He was not just giving me a lift; he had something to say. “Are your classes this morning really all that important? I am about to give you a job in the afternoons if you want it. Let us go somewhere we can talk.”
Of course, I wanted it! Me, with a job at last, me with something to add to my little spending money, money that was almost gone. He stepped on the gas, and we sped toward Dimasalang, Quiapo—to the boulevard, to one of the coffee shops there.
I was not hungry but he ordered a hamburger and a cup of coffee for me anyway. The shop was almost empty and we had a corner to ourselves.
He was no longer jovial; his face was serious, with a hint of brutal coldness. He folded his hands on the table, the morning sun glinting on his diamond ring, on his polished nails. “I will speak to you frankly,” he said, “and you are free to reject what I offer. But you are not free to talk about it to others. If you do, God have pity on you because you will not live long if I find out. Is that clear, Pepe?”
Goose pimples pricked my skin. “What do you want me to do?”
“First,” he said, toying with his cup, “I want you to make deliveries on the appointed time, at the exact place. And no mistakes. If you cannot make it or if no one shows up, report to the same place in thirty minutes, on the dot, and after that, if no one shows up, then leave.”
“What am I going to deliver?”
“Drugs,” he said simply.
I had lost all appetite; the hamburger became tasteless mush in my mouth and rocks started forming in my throat.
“Speed?”
For the first time, a smile crossed his corpulent face. He shook his head. “That’s for children. No, the real thing. Heroin.”
My anxiety must have been etched all over my face.
“Afraid?”
I nodded.
“I am not surprised,” he said, touching my hand briefly. “They are all afraid in the beginning. But it is not really all that dangerous. You don’t have to worry about the police. I take care of them. It is the customers you have to worry about. But you will learn quickly. And besides, just think, it’s big money, you will get ten percent of all the deliveries. Easily two hundred pesos in a week. And you will make only a few deliveries in a day. And not every day. It all depends, of course, if you can bring in new clients—but not from your school. They don’t have money in Recto. That is why I said you should go to Ateneo or La Salle. That’s where the money is. All those spoiled brats. And if they don’t have it, they will give you their mothers’ jewels, or their fathers’ watches, anything they can lay their hands on. They live in Pobres Park, in those fancy places.”
Two hundred pesos a week, about a thousand a month. Who cares for the Brotherhood?
“Kuya,” I asked, breathing easier, “why did you pick this day? Why all of a sudden?”
Again, the fleeting smile. “You are the best candidate. You live close to my wife.” I had to get used to his calling his mistress his wife, and I wondered how many women he had. “Communication would be no problem. The truth is”—he lowered his voice—“the one you are replacing got too ambitious. I think he was trying to blackmail one of his customers. He was killed yesterday. His body was taken probably in a car and abandoned in a field in Marikina. And all his stuff was stolen.”
Could that happen to me? The unspoken question was answered immediately.
“Even though they are addicted, one must not deal too harshly with them. Sometimes, when they don’t have
the ready cash, it may be necessary to give it to them, but be sure to collect it at the following meeting. They always come through because they know that if they don’t they will not be given another chance.”
He could see the indecision in my face. I was going to be a pusher—that was farthest from my aspirations. I may have stolen and lied, and I may have been plastic to my mother, but now I would be putting my neck on the block.
“Try it for one week—just one week. And if you don’t like it, then stop. And no hard feelings. But no talking—that is very clear, isn’t it?”
I nodded.
Time was important and I had no watch. We stood up, got into the car, and drove to Makati. At the first jewelry shop he bought me my first Seiko.
I did not go to school that morning, but spent time studying the code, the hazy description of each customer I was to meet. Kuya Nick had seen them from a distance, he knew where they lived, how they could be contacted, and he had a long list. He must have had in his employ at least ten pushers.
At exactly one that afternoon I walked hesitantly to a red Volkswagen 1500 parked beside the Rizal Theater. The young man inside, about eighteen, thin, with glassy eyes, was startled when I approached him. He was about to start the engine and leave when I said that Joe—that was the old pusher—would not be servicing him anymore. I gave him the numbered envelope, which he immediately recognized. He opened it, took the small packet out, and sniffed its contents; a benign smile spread over his face. He gave me an envelope in return. I opened it in his presence, expecting two hundred pesos as Kuya Nick said. I was wrong. Joe had been upping the price—it was three hundred—and I had a hundred pesos more for myself.
In a moment he was gone. I had two hours to waste before the next delivery at the supermarket. I had become hungry so I went to the Japanese restaurant across the shimmering expanse of parked cars. I had never been to a place like this, but now I had a hundred pesos and could afford it. It was almost two, but there were still people eating. I had read about Japanese cooking, the subtle taste of raw fish, seaweeds, and all that. It was fashionable for young people to be in jeans, in faded T-shirts as I was, and though I felt uncomfortable in these strange and elegant surroundings, it was the experience I wanted. “Raw fish,” I told the kimono-clad waitress. “Then sukiyaki.”
“And what would you like to drink, sir?”
“Sake,” I said.
She brought the sake first and it was a bit warm like I read it would be, then the raw fish. It was then that she knew it was my first time in a Japanese restaurant, for I did not know the chopsticks were joined and she parted them for me while I watched with fascination.
If she had any doubt about my capacity to pay, it disappeared when I brought out the wad of bills from the boy in the Volks. Fifty-six pesos for a small dish of raw fish, squid, and sea urchin insides, sukiyaki cooked before me, and a tiny bottle of sake, but it was worth the adventure. This bastard from Cabugawan living it up at his first opportunity in this precinct of the rich. I would tell the Brotherhood not to tear down the walls of Pobres Park; we should take over the Park instead.
At three on the dot I was in the supermarket’s book section, browsing over the cookbooks and paperbacks, then this girl came in not a minute late, the yellow scarf on her neck the recognition sign. She went to the magazines; there was no one close by, so I walked over and said softly, “Tessa, the two envelopes are here.” She turned to me, and again the look of surprise, of fright, and she turned aside as if she had not heard. Again, I had to tell her. “Joe is not coming; I have taken over.”
It was then that she turned to me, her face sunny as a flower, and she shoved the two envelopes immediately into her bag and handed me an envelope. She did not tarry; when she went out I followed her at a distance. Below the marquee, she waited briefly. Soon, a Mercedes with a uniformed driver drew up. As she went in, I could see that her legs were shapely.
My last delivery was at six at the Intercon; she sat in one of the sofas near the bar—a forlorn, emaciated creature in her late teens. She wore a series of colored bangles, the recognition sign, and I passed her once on my way to the men’s room, then I hurried back, afraid that she might have gone after the appointed time. I sat opposite her. She glanced at me and watched with interest as I brought out the envelope from the folder. No one was looking, so I bent forward, “Joe is not coming, Mary. I am taking his place.”
No emotion rippled on her face, no recognition lighted her eyes; she opened her notebook, threw the envelope at me, then took what I gave. I had expected her to leave, but she just sat there, looking straight ahead as if I did not exist. I felt so uncomfortable, I left after a while.
Five deliveries in one day, all within the Makati area. Inside the toilet, I counted what I had legitimately made: a hundred twenty pesos. And Joe’s take which was now mine was six hundred pesos! Some poor clerk slaved for two months to earn that much and here I was raking it in in one afternoon. I could cry at the irony of it all.
Outside, I flagged a taxi. It was already dark when I got to Antipolo. The door of the apartment of Kuya Nick’s mistress was open and she was there, waiting. She had been instructed, and though we had never talked before, now it was as if we were old friends. After all, she had seen me, and perhaps appreciated me more than Lucy did.
“Please come in,” she said. I handed her the envelope with the money and she gave me a larger one for my deliveries the following day. She closed the door.
“We are alone,” she said. The house was shadowy, but she did not switch on any of the lamps. In the soft dark I could see the mounds of her breasts thrusting through her simple sack dress, the full lips, the eyes shining like jewels. “My maid,” she went on, “she went to see her sister, but will be back soon.”
I did not want to poach on another man’s domain; I had the envelope for the following day and I turned to leave.
“Wouldn’t you like something to drink, a beer maybe?” It was an unmistakable invitation. I held her close—so close I could feel the mound pressed against my thigh. “This is what I want,” I said.
I had expected her to resist, but she did not. She did not put her arms around me as I kissed her, and her lips were cool.
“Please,” she said. “There will be plenty of time. Not here … I don’t want to … not here. You understand.”
“When?” I asked impatiently.
In a whisper, “I’m not prepared.”
“When?”
“I can go to three places: my beauty parlor, my dressmaker, and church. On Friday,” she was saying softly. “On Friday, in the morning, we can meet there, or any place …” She started to kiss me but stopped abruptly.
“I must control myself,” she said. I kissed her again, and she let me plumb the crevices of her mouth.
We walked to the door, and she unlatched it slowly. There was no one outside, and I knocked immediately on ours.
I could not sleep that night thinking of the woman next door, of Friday and its allure and promise. And the money in my folder—how would I explain it? I even had to hide the watch that Kuya Nick bought me. Who was the fool who said one can hide wealth but not poverty? He did not know of my predicament. I had several hundred pesos for the first time in my life and I did not know where to put them; not in my old canvas bag, which had no key, not in my folders. Tomorrow I would go to a bank, open a savings account, and hide the bankbook. It would never be the same again now that I knew what it was like to have money, to be able to buy anything I wanted or to eat anywhere in this wide, wonderful city.
I woke up with a start; Lucy was in my room with my freshly ironed clothes, which she gingerly placed in the old cabinet that my father used. As we went through the morning ritual, she was unusually coy. “You did not tell me what you did the whole day yesterday. I only overheard you telling your uncle about a job. What is it?”
“Nothing for sure, Lucy,” I said. “I was just interviewed. I went to Makati, to the big companies. Even just a jan
itor if they will take me. But I don’t know any skill—except this,” I said, pumping.
“You are so good,” she said, arching her back.
Slowly, we savored every movement and, as usual, I was late for school.
In the jeepney to Quiapo I wondered how Friday—two days away—would be, how Mila would take me. It was one of those humid mornings when the rains had lifted and the sun stole out, drenching the sidewalks and the sweating people as they jostled about in the plaza, the asshole of Manila. It was much worse underneath, in the cavernous underpass, the tile floor now blotched with dirt, the lightbulbs konked out, the stench of the broken urinals, but still people came to Quiapo, whorled up from the depths, borne out of despair, for here there was light and hope, and they knelt in prayer or wobbled to the altar on their knees, repeating the rosary, invoking the spirit, praying for good fortune and good health and all the handsome rewards that befell those who believed.
For me it was not belief; it was something deeper, inexplicable, recondite as sin. I entered the church and thanked them up there for the goodies that had fallen my way and for what was yet to come; then, having done my duty, I went back across the burning asphalt, to the bank and made my first deposit.
It was past eleven when I got to school. I had just one more class and when it was over, Toto was at the door. “Now,” I said, “I can treat you to siopao and mami.”
He asked if I had become a call boy and I said, “No, the money from my mother arrived.”
Then, “Where were you yesterday?”
I did not want to lie, but how could I tell Augusto that I had become a pusher? That in a single and uneventful afternoon I had earned more than six hundred pesos? Yet I suffered no twinge of guilt about the money—it came from those rich young punks across the river, they had trunkfuls of it and they did nothing to earn it. If they went straight to perdition I would not have shed one solitary tear.
I thought quickly. “I am terribly ashamed, Toto. My mother, you know she slaves for me. And my auntie Bettina, too.” I was speaking the truth, at least. “I went out the whole day looking for a job, in Makati, after reading the ads, in government offices—”
The Samsons: Two Novels; (Modern Library) Page 34
