America's Dream (5 page)

She’s the first one at work. As she enters the house, she takes her apron from her pocket and ties it snugly around her waist. From the supply room behind the kitchen she fetches a mop and begins to dry off the walkway puddles so that guests will not slip on their way to the back porch where breakfast will be served. She swishes the mop in clockwise circles, backing away from the area she has dried. Her mop erases the faint tracks of toads who claim these halls once the lights have been turned

out, after the last guest has stumbled by exhausted from too much relaxation or too much drink, wanting only to collapse on the crisp sun-dried sheets.

She likes these early mornings. The sharp, sweaty smell of sleeping bodies. The rustling of the sheets as people awaken. The creaking box springs. The mumbled good mornings, the slap of bare feet against tiled floors. Toilets are flushed. Showers run. Glasses clink against porcelain sinks, the narrow glass shelf be- neath the mirrors. A few electric razors buzz behind the louvered doors of some guest rooms, doors that look so charming but afford no privacy. She can hear, as she mops the halls, everything that goes on in each room she passes. The huffing and puffing of couples making hurried love, the groans as some turn over or try to get up, creaking knees, morning farts, bumps against unfamil- iar furniture in dim rooms.

She finishes wiping down the ground floor, squeezes the mop in a pail, then climbs up to the second story, where she repeats the ritual, backing away from the spot she has dried, around the square of light and air, the tops of the ficus tree under which the birdcage stands. Light streams in, moist sun that makes her sweat inside her nylon uniform.

Downstairs, Feto rattles pots, runs water. He wheels the squeaky breakfast cart, topped with a coffee urn, mugs, and spoons, onto the back porch. Within minutes the passageway fills with the scent of brewing coffee, and the tourists emerge from behind their doors. One by one, as if the aroma were drawing them out, they leave their rooms, some with hair still wet after a shower, some stopping to check that the buttons on their shirts and zippers on their pants are secured. From rooms 9 and 12 children burst into the hallways, followed by parents shushing them not to run, not to yell, not to wake up the other guests. Be- hind door number 7 someone snores, then whistles, then snores again. From room 1, reserved for disabled guests, a man emerges pushing a walker in front of him, followed by a woman who walks step by laborious step beside him, every so often touching his elbow as if to steady him or, perhaps, herself.

What does América think about as these people emerge from

their rooms dressed in bright vacation clothes? She thinks the women are too skinny and the men too pale, even the Puerto Rican tourists. She thinks people with enough money to stay in a hotel must have many other luxuries in their lives. Fancy cars, probably, lots of clothes, jewels.

She knows more about them than they will ever know about her. She knows whether they flail in their sleep, or whether they sleep quietly on one side or the other. Whether the tropical night is so cool they have to use blankets, or whether they sleep exposed to the foul sereno. She knows the brand of toothpaste they use, whether they have dentures. She knows if the women have their periods. She knows if the men wear jockey or boxer underwear, and what size. She notices how they look right past and pretend not to see her. She feels herself there, solid as always, but they look through her, as if she were a part of the strange landscape into which they have run away from their everyday lives. Those who do see her, smile guardedly, then slide their gaze away quickly, ashamed, it seems, to have noticed her.

She cleans each room clockwise once she makes the beds and picks up the dirty towels. She dusts, sweeps, and mops the guest room, then disinfects the shower, sink, and toilet. She scrubs the floor after a guest checks out but only mops it down if the same people are staying for a few days.

She checks that there’s enough toilet paper, empties the trash, tidies the bedside tables.

“Izeveydinalride?” América nearly jumps out of her skin at the unexpected voice. Don Irving stands at the door of room 9.

“Excuse?”

“I didn’t expect you to come today.”

She doesn’t know how to respond, whether he’s being kind or critical. “Is busy day.”

“Yes, well.” Don Irving sticks his cigar back in his mouth. “I have to change the lightbulbs in that bathroom.” He goes in, and she hears him puttering as she dusts. Tomás usually does things like change lightbulbs and fix what’s broken in the

rooms. When Don Irving leaves, closing the door behind him, América breathes a sigh of relief.

Room 9 has a sleeping porch walled with shutters, so that it’s really two rooms. Usually, it’s rented to couples with children, because there’s enough space in the porch for a bed and a crib. This time there are toys scattered around, and a couple of mangy- looking stuffed animals on the small bed and in the crib. In the bathroom there are three baby bottles with nipples. The garbage can is stuffed with dirty diapers.

From the clothes, she can tell they’re boys, one of them under three perhaps. Overalls and sneakers with cartoon characters are neatly folded on top of the dresser. So many clothes! A stack of Huggies for toddlers, a few clean diapers on the bedside table. A box of wipes.

She dusts, noting how much this couple has brought. They must have needed a separate suitcase for all the toys, books, puzzles, and plastic figures of muscular manlike creatures with loin-cloths and green skin. On the bedside table closest to the sleeping porch, the mother has left a pair of earrings in the shape of bananas, and a purple suede headband with the rounded tips worn to the plastic. On the husband’s side, a pair of glasses with severe black frames, a thick paperback book with a gavel pictured on the cover.

They read a lot, the tourists who come to La Casa del Francés. They always bring fat books with them, the women’s with lace and flowers or beautiful girls entwined with brawny men, the titles in cursive writing. The men’s books are austere, usually no more than the title and the author in block letters, with few colors, no gilded edges or ornate designs. Sometimes they bring magazines, and she’s noticed that they too seem designated male or female. On one of them, the cover was nothing but a white background with a large dollar sign in red. The women’s magazines have pictures of movie stars, or teenage girls with pouty lips and smooth skin where there should be a cleavage. When the guests throw them out, América saves them and brings them home to study the fashions, the picture-perfect din-

ners, the tips for making rooms over. In one, they changed the look of a room by draping sheets on the walls, the windows, the furniture. To América, it looked like a house abandoned, protected from dust, ghostly and unwelcoming.

“Buzzzz…You’re an airplane…. Buzzzz…. rat tat tat tah…” The door flies open and a man carrying a toddler comes in. “Oh, I’m sorry!”

“Is okéi,” she says. “I finish later—”

“No, no, that’s all right. You can keep working. We just came to change a stinky.” He drops the child on the bed, tickles him with one hand, while with the other he reaches for a clean diaper in the box next to the bed. “You’re a stinker, yes, you are, a stinker…” The little boy is delighted with his father’s silliness, and giggles.

“I’m a stinker…stinker…”

América watches as the father deftly slips a clean diaper under the dirty one, wipes his son’s bottom with a wet tissue from a plastic box, blows air on the child’s belly before fastening the tapes.

“There you go!” He pulls the child up, slings him over his shoulder. “All done!” he says and pats his padded bottom. “See you later,” he says to América, and they leave the room.

All the while he was changing the baby, América had to restrain herself from offering to do it for him. His movements were con- fident, as if he had done it many times, but she couldn’t help herself. She wanted to change that baby’s diaper.

If Rosalinda is pregnant, there will be a baby in the house. América has no doubt that her daughter will be home before a baby is born. Yamila and Roy are not about to sacrifice their son for Rosalinda’s sake. What mother would do that to a sixteen- year-old boy? If Rosalinda was stupid enough to get pregnant, she’ll have to take responsibility for what happens next. As Ester said, “You’ve made your bed, now lie in it.”

A dull ache forms in América’s chest. She didn’t learn from Ester’s mistake, why should she expect Rosalinda to have learned from hers? Maybe it’s a family curse. Just as Ester left her mother with a man who promised her God knows what, América left, at

the same age, with Correa, whose promises she doesn’t remember. Perhaps there were none. Maybe, when you’re fourteen, no promises are necessary, just the insistent need to be with a man in a way you can’t be with your mother or your friends. Maybe, when you’re fourteen, you’re not running toward something, you’re running away from it. Maybe all girls go through this phase, but only some act on it. América doesn’t know. América has no idea what she’s done to make Rosalinda do what she’s done. Or what Ester did that made her run off with Correa, come back to the island, and remain his woman all these years, in spite of the fact that he has betrayed her again and again.

Is it my fault? she asks herself, but she can’t answer. She’s tried to be a good mother to Rosalinda. She’s told her straight out that she hopes Rosalinda will not repeat her mistakes, that she should get an education and make something of herself. Rosalinda always seemed to understand, to share América’s dreams for her, to have dreams of her own. América shakes her head, as if trying to un- fasten a clue to her daughter’s escape. I’ve brought her up the best I could, she assures herself. I did everything to make sure she’d have a better life than mine. What happened?

“Boys are easier to bring up than girls,” Nilda declares in between mouthfuls of yellow rice with ham. “They’re not as moody, and they’re up front about what’s bothering them. Girls are deceptive that way.”

América eats her lunch under a mango tree behind the kitchen, sitting at a picnic table set up for the help’s meals and coffee breaks.

“I don’t know about that,” says Feto, father of six daughters. “It’s all a gamble. Some kids are easy, others aren’t. It has nothing to do with their sex.”

They chew thoughtfully, considering Feto’s statement. Since they sat down to lunch, the conversation has circled around sons and daughters, their merits and drawbacks, but no one has come straight out and asked América what’s happening with Rosalinda.

“One good thing about daughters,” says Tomás, who lives with his in a small house surrounded by lush gardens, “they never leave you.”

Everyone looks at América.

“Or if they do,” amends Nilda, “they always come back.” Everyone nods.

“Buen provecho,” América says, getting up to carry her half- finished lunch to the kitchen. As she’s scraping the leftovers into the compost bowl, Nilda comes up the back steps.

“We didn’t mean to offend you when we were talking,” Nilda apologizes.

“No offense taken,” she responds crisply.

“There are only so many things we can talk about when we’ve known each other so long.”

“Don’t worry about it.” She knows that they all think she’s conceited and uppity. That when she comes to work with bruises on her face and arms, she deserves it. That Correa has to control her with his fists because otherwise she would be too proud.

She’s heard the men talk about how a man has to show his woman, from the very first, who wears the pants in the house. Especially nowadays, when women think they can run the world. Even Feto, father of six daughters, says a man has to teach women the way he likes things, and if the only way she can learn is “a fuerza de punos,” well, then, his fists should be the teacher. Tomás says he doesn’t believe in hitting women with his fists. An open hand, he says, is as effective. “A man who hits a woman with his fists,” he says, “is taking advantage.”

América doesn’t talk much at lunchtime. Anything she says can get back to Correa, who plays dominoes with these men. And often Correa is part of their conversations. He eats lunch at La Casa three or four times a week and sits with the men on their end of the table while she and Nilda huddle at their end pretend- ing not to hear them.

América gets her pail and rags from the supply room and goes back inside. She’s almost done with the rooms in the main house and has brought down the laundry for Nilda to wash and

hang out to dry. It’s Friday, a busy day for check-ins. Most of the tourists from New York leave early, either on the 7:00
A.M
. ferry to Fajardo or on one of the flights to the international airport in San Juan. There’s a short lull right before and right after lunch between the checkouts and those coming in, but it picks up again before dinner.

Most tourists arrive looking tired but eager. If they’ve never been to La Casa del Francés, they’re impressed by the colonial architecture, the broad verandah that circles the house, the colorful mosaic floors, hammocks strung outside the first-floor rooms, wicker chairs and loveseats with the woody smell of rattan, wrought-iron tables with colorful cloths and vases full of fragrant blossoms.

When they enter the house itself, they’re amazed to discover the central courtyard with flower beds, ficus trees, colorful birds singing inside a giant cage. Don Irving greets his guests on the back porch, seated on a rattan chair with peacock back. He’s al- ways dressed in white, looks like something out of a movie, large, white-haired, with a white mustache, a straw sombrero shading hazel eyes tinder severe white brows. To América, he looks like Anthony Quinn, the Mexican actor, and in the ten years she’s worked for him, she keeps expecting him to speak Spanish when he opens his mouth, but he never does.

When she comes down to return her supplies, Don Irving is in the kitchen boiling water at the ancient six-burner stove, left over from the days when the hotel was the most luxurious house on the island, home to the owners of thousands of acres of sugarcane planted in long rows stretching toward the sea.