America's Dream (31 page)
“No,” Ester says, “we have an understanding. We just can’t live together anymore.” She probably gave up drinking while she lived with Don Irving and has now chosen beer over him. That’s the understanding.
América sighs deeply. “Well, you know best. It’s your life.” “Yes,” Ester says with no hint of bitterness. “It’s my life.”
América hears the metallic clack of a can on a table. “Correa came to see me the other day.”
The effect on América is sudden, familiar. A chill, a thud at
the pit of her stomach. In two months of phone calls, Ester has mentioned Correa only once, when she described how she chased him out of her house with a machete.
“What did he want?” She wants to sound nonchalant, unafraid. “He said to tell you he’s sorry.”
“For what?” After the fear, anger, solid and red.
“Just that he’s sorry. I’m sure he figured I knew what he was talking about.” She drags on her cigarette. A gulp. Metal touching wood. “I told him you wanted nothing to do with him. He said he didn’t blame you. He said he deserves your desprecio. He said you were too good for him and he should have appreciated you when he had you.”
“He was drunk, wasn’t he?”
“I wouldn’t say he was walking straight, but he sounded all right.” Like Ester would know the difference.
“You said he came over? I thought you threatened—”
“He just wanted to talk, wanted me to tell you he’s sorry, that’s all.”
“And you believed him?”
“I listened, and then he went away. Didn’t even come into the house.”
“I should hope not.”
“He apologized, said that, after all, we have Rosalinda to con- sider.”
“Have you talked to her?”
“I called her yesterday. She’s in a school play.” “Yes, I heard about that.”
“Did you have a fight with her?”
“Almost every time I call she hangs up on me. I can’t do or say anything right.”
“She’s going through a rebellious phase, that’s all. She’ll get over it.”
“I’m not going to call her for a while.” “Mmm.” It sounds as if Ester is falling asleep. “I’ll call you next week.”
América leans back against her pillows, hugs her stuffed
white cat. They all seem so far away. Ester with her drinking, Correa in a conciliatory mode, Rosalinda rehearsing her life as a vedette. They seem like characters in a story, not like people who until a couple of months ago dominated her thoughts and actions. How many times did Rosalinda slam the door on her face? How many cases of beer has Ester consumed in the past year alone? How many times did Correa beat her?
She’s surprised that this is what she remembers about them. Rosalinda’s sullenness and rebellion, Ester’s drinking, Correa’s beatings. Is that all they are to me? Not people but problems?
I want nothing to do with them, América tells the cat. I’m going to worry about myself from now on, about what I want and what I need. I can’t count on any of them. On anyone. I’m alone, and it’s my life, and I’m not going to let them spoil it anymore.
aulina calls América every night of the week before Orlando’s debut at the nightclub.
“I’m so nervous, mi’ja. It’s worse than if it were me up there.” “But hasn’t he been singing at your church for years?”
“Oh, he’s been singing all over the place, but this is his first time at a nightclub.”
América doesn’t understand what the fuss is about. At the Sunday dinners Orlando hasn’t seemed at all nervous about his upcoming debut.
On Saturday she catches an early train. The plan is for her to accompany Paulina to the hairdresser. “I don’t know why, but I hate to go anywhere alone,” Paulina explains as they walk down to the shopping area near the apartment.
It’s the warmest day América has experienced since she arrived in New York. The street is teeming with shoppers, kids on Rollerblades, teenagers hanging out in small groups. It’s as if the whole neighborhood has come out to celebrate the changing of the seasons.
“This used to be a quiet neighborhood,” Paulina grumbles as they near a group of boys clustered around a lamppost. They’re not doing anything that América would consider loud. They
seem to be doing nothing at all, but their nonchalant attitude is threatening. The teenagers eye América and Paulina as they pass, but they say nothing, as if their silence itself were an insult. Paulina quickens her pace, and América, who’s wearing high heels, has to catch up. Paulina giggles. “You’ll have to learn to walk New York-style,” she says. “Here we can’t afford to stroll like you do in Vieques.”
Most of the stores have opened their doors, and some display their merchandise on tables on the sidewalk. Outside the bodega where Paulina gets her spices, the piles of ñame, malanga, yautía, batata, and fresh bunches of recao remind América how long it’s been since she ate viandas with eggplant, which Ester prepared for her almost every Friday. She sighs sadly. The homesickness that seemed a new experience a few weeks ago has become as familiar as her own face in the mirror.
“Here we are.” Paulina stops in front of Rosy’s Salon, which is wedged between a pizza shop and a pawnbroker. It is a long, narrow storefront. White lace curtains cover the window that faces the street. When América and Paulina walk in, the women already in the salon fall silent and evaluate them. Once they’ve looked América and Paulina over, the hairdressers and clients go back to their chatter.
Everything in the salon is either gray or pink. The hairdressers’ stations are along the left wall, each with a gray Formica table facing a pink chair. The pink dryers with their gray chairs under- neath are along the right wall, facing the hairdressers. The walls are covered floor to ceiling with mirrors, so that when she seeks her reflection, América is dizzy with the image of herself repeated to infinity.
“And who do we have here?” asks the owner after she embraces Paulina warmly.
“My niece, América.”
“Welcome. I’m Rosy.” She’s a big woman, tall, full-busted with wide hips, but one would never call her fat. She’s solid, curvy, and accentuates her proportions with tight-fitting jeans and a low-cut leotard top from which her bosoms seem about to burst out. Her hair is a shade América knows as “Spring Honey,”
which is what her own hair was supposed to be.
“Who did this to you?” Rosy asks, fingering América’s curls. “Never mind, we’ll fix it.” She leads América to the sinks at the back of the salon.
“I don’t really need—”
“I’ll just trim and even it out. It’s all lopsided. We can’t do anything about the color now, you just did it, right?”
América blushes. “Last night.”
Rosy washes América’s hair while keeping an ear on and commenting upon several of the conversations taking place around them. Most of the talk is in Puerto Rican Spanish, and América closes her eyes and listens to the familiar sounds with gratitude, relaxing in a way she’s not able to do around the Leveretts or even the other maids with their varied accents.
Rosy wraps a towel around América’s head and leads her to a chair. She pumps a pedal under the seat a couple of times to bring América up to the right height. América looks in the mirror at the room behind her and catches the eye of the manicurist, who works from a wheelchair. She looks familiar to América, but she can’t quite place where she knows her from. The woman smiles, and América returns the greeting.
“He looked just like a woman, with tetas and everything,” one of the customers tells her hairdresser.
“Maybe he already had the operation,” the hairdresser offers. “No, you could tell he was a man because even with a ton of
makeup you could still see the stubble on his face.”
América and Paulina, who is on the next chair, exchange an amused smile in the mirror.
“I feel sorry for them,” a customer offers from her spot under the drying lamps. “They try so hard to be women, and they never can be.”
“They can, if they have the operation,” pipes in the hairdresser. “No, they can’t. Just because you exchange a prick for a cunt doesn’t make you a woman.” Everyone turns around to look at
the speaker. “Don’t you think?” she adds in a plaintive voice.
“I think they know more about being a woman than most wo- men do,” says the customer who started the whole thing. “They know how to dress, how to put on makeup, false nails—”
“What you mean,” interrupts Rosy as she rolls América’s hair, “is that they know how to
look
like a woman. The only way to know what it’s like to be a woman is to be one, and no matter how many operations they have, and how many hormones they take, they can never be female.”
“Who’d want to be a woman, anyway?” asks the customer whose fingernails are being painted by the manicurist, and everyone laughs.
After a while, the conversation shifts in a different direction, but América remains thoughtful, asking herself what she would do if she had a choice. Would she be a woman, or would she rather be a man? She has barely enough time to ask herself when the manicurist rolls her wheelchair up to where América sits.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” she asks, looking at América intently, as if by presenting her face so openly, América memory will be jolted.
“You look familiar…”
“Nereida Santos,” the woman says, smiling, “and you’re América Gonzalez, aren’t you?”
“Ay, Nereida, yes, I remember you!” The women hold hands warmly. “I didn’t know you lived in New York,” América says. “Last I heard—” she stops herself, and Nereida lowers her eyes and blushes.
“Okay,” Rosy says, “we’re all done here. Let’s go to the dryer.” Oh, my God, América thinks, as she lets Rosy adjust the height and temperature of the hair dryer, this woman is from Esperanza. Now everyone in Vieques will know where I am. América glances toward Paulina, who has observed the encounter with a concerned
expression.
Nereida pulls her manicure table and places it in front of América. América had planned to do her own nails later but doesn’t want to offend Nereida by refusing the manicure. She
dips her trembling fingers in the warm sudsy water Nereida puts before her.
Nereida asks about Ester and Rosalinda, and América answers in as few words as possible. To change the subject, she asks about Nereida’s family, and similarly evasive answers are given.
“Mamá mentioned you had left Vieques,” Nereida says as she wipes América’s nails with a cotton ball dipped in polish remover. “But she wasn’t sure where you had gone.” América doesn’t re- spond. “I don’t blame you for running away,” Nereida says con- spiratorially. América doesn’t know what to say to this, so again she remains silent. “I had to do the same thing.”
This time América stares at Nereida with surprise, and the latter curls her lip in what might be a smile if there weren’t such bitterness in the gesture. “I guess the story didn’t reach Esper- anza,” she says softly as she clips América’s cuticles.
“I heard you had an accident—”
“The hijo de la gran puta ran me over with his car,” Nereida says with immeasurable anger. América pulls her hand away. “I’m sorry, did I cut you?” She wipes and disinfects the pinprick of blood on América’s finger.
The last time she saw Nereida, América was standing in the Santos’s yard, urging on the single girls vying for Nereida’s bouquet after her wedding. América remembers vividly that she wore a lilac dress with a bow at the hip, and that Rosalinda was six years old and had been the flower girl. América also remem- bers that the Yanqui sailor Nereida married had befriended Correa and asked him to be one of his groomsmen.
“What color?” Nereida asks, and América answers “Lilac” be- fore she realizes she’s supposed to chose from a trayful of nail polish. She feels like crying, as if the memory of Nereida’s wed- ding day were as bitter to her as it might be to the manicurist. She points to a bright red bottle, and Nereida sets it aside.
“How did you…you said he…” Unused to prying into other people’s lives, América can’t bring herself to come right out and ask Nereida about her “accident.” In Vieques, the story was that Nereida slipped on an ice patch and fell behind her husband’s car while he was backing out of their driveway.
“My own mother won’t accept the fact that Gene tried to kill me,” Nereida says. “He still sends her Christmas presents.” Again that crooked smile, but this time América’s detects the hurt, the betrayal. Nereida paints América’s left pinky in two strokes. “He started beating me on our wedding night.” Left ring finger, middle finger, index. “When I told Mamá, she said men do that to see if you still love them.” Left thumb, right thumb, right index. “She said if I was a good wife, he wouldn’t have to hit me.” Right middle finger, right ring, right pinky. “I was a good wife,” she says, using her thumbnail to wipe streaks of polish from the edge of América’s nails. “And look where it got me.”
América coughs to relieve the tightness in her chest. But for the hum of the dryers, the salon is quiet. Nereida applies a second coat of polish on América’s nails without seeming aware that every eye in the room is on her, every word she has uttered has been heard and one woman is weeping quietly.
“Perro!” Rosy spits out, as if by calling Gene a dog she will clear the air in her shop of the sadness that has descended on it. “Why is it,” she asks, “that the minute we talk about men we all get depressed?”
A few women chuckle, others don’t get the joke. Paulina and América again exchange a look, but this time América sees pity on her face and doesn’t know to whom it is directed.
The nightclub is on a dark street lined with warehouses between empty, burned-out lots. The only lit doorway, in the middle of the block, is guarded by a large bald man in a tuxedo, who con- sults a clipboard as gaily dressed people give their names. He checks the Ortiz party off the list. “Table one,” he says, and waves them in.
Another large man is at the foot of steep stairs. He stamps their hands with a smiley face and points up. Leopoldo leads the way. The stairs are lit by a yellow overhead bulb on the landing and Christmas lights along the banisters. At the top there is yet another muscular man in a tuxedo, who opens a heavy black door that admits the partygoers into a loft.
