The Flowers (26 page)

“I did too, I swear.”

“Then I didn't hear you, or I didn't understand.”

“It's that you didn't believe me.”

“How can she call a cat her baby? He won't find out? Maybe he won't understand either. Who would call a cat a baby?”

“This world is a crazy, I don't understand nothing.”

“I thought it was a baby, and that's why Margarito said he would permit it.”

The cat was hiding under the couch, balled up, scared. I got down on my knees. “Come here, baby baby baby.”

Nica laughed the laugh of ten hours of dopey Mexican TV skits, without me talking any French.

Angel was asleep on a small bed in the bedroom across from the master bedroom. She let me follow her to see, and then we both wanted to go into the big bedroom. I couldn't help but want to, neither of us could. I wanted to see the bed and clack the metal drawer knobs on their chest of drawers and untangle bobby pins and clips and earrings and scratch myself with the hairbrushes and open the face cream jars and smell and look inside jewelry boxes and a big wooden chest at the foot of the bed. I saw some
cash. But I already had so much now. I didn't want to scare Nica, if she was watching, which she wasn't, because it was more like she'd fallen asleep with her eyes open, so she wasn't sure whether she was looking at the ceiling or through it. On their floor there was nothing but apartment carpet. Not one corner of a shirt under the bed, not a flip-flop, not a sock, no dirty chones balled up. I say Mary cleaned it all up for Nica's babysitting. On the bedroom walls were a really not too great painting of a desert and another of a snowy mountain with a gold cross at the top, Cristo Rey, and one of baby Jesus with the Virgin Mother, a little like Guadalupe from Mexico but not really. None of them were realistic exactly, and though they didn't seem very good to me, they did seem like they weren't from a store. I say they were hers, that she painted them herself. That she was a substitute art teacher. They had a couple photos of other family people, probably their moms and dads, that yellow-gray kind, and the others, modern in color, were probably brothers and sisters. But there were no pictures of the two of them.

“That's kind of fucked up, I think,” I said in English, until I went back to Spanish. “You don't think? That it's not common?”

“What're you're talking about?”

“That they have no photos of themselves, like, together. Not even at their wedding.”

“Probably,” she said, unsure, uncritical. Then she was on the bed, on her back, watching the ceiling. “Maybe they don't love each other. Maybe they don't love.”

I didn't want her to think I was going to try anything if I got on the bed where she was so I didn't get on it at first. Then I sensed that she trusted me so it didn't cross her mind, and I fell on my back and stared at the same ceiling she stared at. I swear her happiness, which I couldn't see, was changing the air like we were getting high. We could feel the earth under us and hear
the whish of it spinning us, even while our eyes saw only the ceiling and that cottage cheese sprayed on it. We both stared up like it was 3 a.m. and we were outside and the nightsky was far and close and it was real and there weren't any words for any of it. At first we were only squirmy, but that kind of changed, like months and months passed in minutes of not talking.

“Sometimes I forget,” she said.

“What?”

“Everything. That people don't live like I live.”

This was
exactly
what would happen to me when I used to sneak into other people's houses! I'd start thinking exactly like this. But never once had I imagined anyone else being next to me thinking it. I had never imagined Nica before, never imagined a Nica, never imagined a voice like hers, never imagined her so close to me.

“You won't have to live over there forever,” I said. It came out of me like someone else talking. Because I didn't know what I was telling her. What did I know about her or her life, about mine, about life? Not shit. Not nothing, about anything. I guess it just seemed like the right thing to say, and besides being probably true, it had to be. It especially couldn't not be true, not now that we were here. We were changing everything because we were together, because me and her were on our backs on the big old soft bed and were staring up.

“What if I were named Carmen?” she asked.

“I thought you liked Cathy.”

“I like that name too. You don't like the name Carmen?”

“I guess. I like yours already.”

“It'd be so beautiful.”

“Why are you thinking of this?”

“Oh, that little old man next door. He told that story about Russia. When I was a little girl I always wished I were from Spain. He made me think of that, of living in Spain. Then, I would have
pretty white skin and straight black hair, and I'd listen to music and dance beautifully.”

“I don't know,” I said. “I think any of that's Mexican too. You have beautiful black hair. I like your skin. Your skin is beautiful, your color better than theirs. Those people sit in the sun on a beach forever to get their skin to look like yours.”

“Think of how perfect it must be in Spain. I saw photos once. Of Sevilla and Córdova. Have you ever seen photos from there?”

“No, I only saw a Zorro movie. That's Spain, right?”

“You have to see the photos. Then you would want to go. I think the whole city is painted white. It's not like Mexico. I'm from Mexico.”

“I don't know,” I said. I didn't know how to say what I wanted to say. I didn't like what she was saying but not what it was. “I like your name,” I said. “I think Nica's a beautiful name.” I wanted to say so better, but saying I loved her name—well, I wasn't really talking about her name.

“It's not really Nica, you know.”

“Veronica,” I said.

“No,” she said. “It's not Veronica.”

“It's not?”

“My name's Guadalupe.”

“Guadalupe?”

“Like my mother's, María, it is very common. I hate the name María. I also hate the name Guadalupe.”

“I like it, I like that name. It's nice. I knew a Lupe once. I like the name.”

“Wouldn't you want to go to Spain?”

“I never thought about it. I don't know, Spain seems so … I don't know. Spanish. I don't speak Spanish the right way. I almost can't. I almost can't talk to you.”

“Where would you go?”

It was almost like I was set up to say it. “France. Remember,
je parle français.
I'm learning French, remember?”

“France?”

“
Oui, oui.
”

She giggled. It is what I loved about this learning French. It made me get a smile, it made everyone make a smile, and it always worked. Now it made my Nica giggle.

“
J'aime le pizza,
” I said. “
Qu'est-ce que aimez-vous? No avec le faim?
”

“Oh Sonny,” she said. Smiling!

I was going to kiss her. Our eyes were still locked on the nothing ceiling that was our own world. I moved onto my side. She didn't.

“Do you think you'll go?” she asked.

“I don't know. I never really thought of it.”

“You said you wanted to.”

“Yeah, but I don't know, I haven't really thought about it, not seriously.” It was only because of Cloyd and my mom. It was a game I was playing, not a want. I only pretended. “And you? Do you think you're going to Spain?”

That was the wrong thing to say. It changed the mood like someone walked in on us, like Angel cried. I wanted to take it back. “You're right. I ought to go to France,” I told her, trying to go back to the subject of me. I wanted to say,
with you
. I wanted to say we could go together. It was dumb, but it was what I thought, what I wished. “You're right. I could go. If I saved and everything, maybe I could go.”

“Yes,” she said. “You ought to.”

“Paris, France,” I said. “Notre Dame.”

“Sonny,” she said.

“What?” I was watching her again.

She took a long time. “Nothing.”

“What?” I said. Then, when she didn't answer “I want you to go with me. To France.”

“Ay, Sonny. And what would we do?”

I was thinking, fast too, I wanted to answer fast. “Talk French.
Bonjour, Nica! Como t'allez-vous, ma Nica?
But that's not right. Because we talk in the
tu
.”

“Monica?”

“
Ma Nica
.” I think she liked that name too. “I meant my Nica. I don't talk French that good either, you know.”

We both were laughing. “
Je t'aime,
” I said.

“And that?”

“I love pizza!”

“Sonny,” she said. She was watching the ceiling, her long hair under her like it was a shawl. Her dress covered her like a sheet I could see through. It could have been new, an old-isnew style, but it was probably from a used store, washed and pressed and beautiful on her. It could've been a hippie throwaway. Wanting to touch her, I touched the dress at the sleeve. The material was like dried-up crumpled paper, dyed swimmingpool blue. I was thinking of kissing her. I was going to.

She turned her head to me. Every other part of her body was relaxed. “I get scared,” she said.

“Of what?”

“I don't know”—sounding more like she did know.

“Tell me. You can tell me what.”

She didn't say. I was touching her arm, her skin, with my finger. The light of it came at me like a silver wind.

“You can't,” she said.

“Can't what?” It was warmer than just blood moving through her, warm not like what people call a feeling, but warm like a liquid, like a juice inside, heating. This little touch of skin, it was too much for both of us.

“You know.”

“What?”

“We can't kiss.”

I didn't say anything for a long time. I wanted to say I'd take her to Spain. And couldn't we go to France together? I really thought I meant it too. I had that money, you know? She'd turned on her side, she put her hands under her head. My hand came off her.

“What if I want to?” I asked.

“No,” she said. She said it nice, sad, not mean or angry.

“You don't want me to?”

“Please, we can't.”

“Whatever you want.”

“Híjola, man, I wouldn't know what to do,” said Mike. It was that I just told them both about Nica. I told them how I wished I could do something, how I didn't see why she had to live like that.

“I would, vato,” said Joe. “I know I would.”

Mike shook his head so hard at his brother that his glasses almost dropped off. “Cállate, güey.”

“What?”

“Que shut up, cabrón.” He said the words loud but like he was saying them soft.

“Why're you saying that?”

“Por cause,” Mike said, dragging out the
cause
part. His head and eyes bobbled toward me. Even though I was not looking at either of them, I could still see from the corners. I was starting to get sick to my stomach. I was feeling all messed up.

“What?” said Joe. He didn't have a clue.

I caught something in the corner of my eye and stopped walking. It was an ugly brown car parked in a lot with more than a few nothing, shitty cars in an apartment complex that didn't have a name, only the not very fancy number 2131. It was that perv's car in the oil-stained lot, near a set of dumped apartment
doors and windows and a couch without cushions turned on its side. “Wait,” I said. “Stop for a second.”

“What?” one of the twins said.

“It's that sickie's car,” I said. “See? See where the windshield's cracked?” It was a big spiderweb, a wide and pretty one.

“Híjola,” said one of them. “He's right.”

“Hijo de la chingada madre,” said the other. “He has raisins, he's very right.”

“Whadaya wanna do?” That was Mike talking to me.

“Whadaya think we should do?” That was Mike talking to Joe.

“Nothing yet,” I said. “Except give me a fucking second.” I wasn't moving.

“Pues, I think we should take off,” said Joe.

“Me too,” Mike said. “I don't think it's a good idea to stay here.”

“Véngase, Sonny,” said Joe. “Come on.”

“Yeah, Joe,” said Mike. “What más hay to do?”

I wasn't ready to leave yet.

“I think we should take off,” said Joe.

“Me too,” said Mike.

“Let's take off,” said Joe. “Come on, Mike, we're going.”

“Bueno, simón, come with us, Sonny, vámonos, let's go.”

They took off walking, fast, toward the railroad tracks, which were up another block or so. I saw them look back, even though I wasn't really looking at them.

“What's the matter, muchachito?” Mrs. Zúniga asked.

“It's only that I'm not hungry,” I said.

“How can you say you're not hungry? You're always hungry.”

“It's only that I'm not.”

“I'm going to bring you a hamburger and chocolate shake.”

“It's not necessary, seriously. I only want to bowl.”

I found the ball I used in my spot on the wooden rack. Not that I had to look hard. I was the only one who ever used it. As far as I could tell, I was the only one who ever bowled any of the lanes ever.

I needed to get some concentration. I rolled a few that were off, as off as I felt. I concentrated, stretched my body to the ceiling. Held the ball and focused until the pins got closer to me. I made a strike, but it still felt lucky. Then I got another strike, and this time it didn't feel lucky, more that my body had it all from the moment I released. “
Voilá!
” I said. Suddenly that French made a smile take over my face.

“Here you are,” Mrs. Zúniga said, leaving me a hamburger on a plate and a thick chocolate shake in a big fountain glass. She'd never brought food to the lanes before. I always ate at the bar.