90 Miles to Havana (12 page)

Angelita looks at me and asks, “What's the matter, Julian?”

“Alquilino and Gordo are on the list,” I say to Angelita.

“What's wrong with that? We gave him what he wanted; now he's giving us something back. That's the way it works,” Angelita says. “Maybe he's not such a bad guy.”

“Why aren't we all on the list?” I ask as Alquilino and Gordo crowd around me.

“I wouldn't worry about it, Julian,” Angelita answers, leaning over Alquilino's right shoulder. “A lot of other kids want to go on that trip.”

I look at Alquilino and notice his ears are turning a bright shade of red. Angelita has draped one arm over his shoulder.

“Ma-maybe Angelita's right,” he barely manages to blubber out. I don't know why but whenever she gets that close to him his brain just turns to mush. I turn to Gordo; I can always rely on him for the blunt truth.

“What do you think, Gordo?”

“What do I think?” he says as he watches Alquilino and Angelita out of the corner of his eye. “I think it's going to be great to get out of this place, even if it's just for a day.”

It's early Saturday morning and I'm watching a rectangle of sunlight creep up the green-tile wall. I'm too nervous to stay in bed, so I roll up my mattress, get dressed, and walk out past the other sleeping campers. The camp station wagon is already parked in front of the dormitory; its rear gate is open and Caballo is tossing a red blanket into the back. The other kids going on the trip are starting to stumble out the door; they mill around to let Caballo know they're up and head for the cafeteria to get breakfast. I walk back to the bathroom, gently pushing the door open so it won't make any noise, but when I look inside, Alquilino and Gordo are already up, both wearing clean shirts. We stack the three blue suitcases one on top
of the other so they'll fit in the closet and then head for the cafeteria.

Caballo and one of his helpers are standing by the door of the dormitory as we walk out. Last night I tried to tell Alquilino and Gordo about the feeling in my stomach, but they just laughed at me and said that they knew what they were doing.

“Make sure you get some breakfast before you go. It's a long day,” Caballo says with a strange smile on his face.

“He's up to something,” I whisper to Alquilino, but he just nods and walks out into the morning sun. He's not too talkative in the morning.

Gordo and Alquilino walk into the cafeteria ahead of me. Before I go in I look back and see Caballo standing alone by the door. When he sees me looking at him he waves me toward the cafeteria door. “Go have your breakfast!” he yells and smiles again.

After breakfast we walk out of the cafeteria and there's Caballo standing by the back of the car holding his clipboard. When he sees us he says something to his helper, who slams the back gate closed.

As Gordo slides into the backseat next to Alquilino, he looks at me and shakes his head. “If you could see your face right now.” He laughs. “Hey, Alquilino, I know what it is,” Gordo says. “He's afraid to be without his big brothers.”

“We'll bring you something back. Don't worry, Julian,” Alquilino says right before Gordo closes the door.

Caballo signals to the driver and the station wagon
pulls away, a cloud of red dust rising up behind it as it picks up speed. When it turns to go through the gate the cloud shifts and I think I see a familiar blue color peeking out from under the red blanket in the back of the station wagon. Our suitcases are the same shade of blue. I run after them trying to get a better look, but the swirling curtain of dust blocks my view. I keep running until the cloud and the car disappear out by the paved road.

As I walk back toward the camp, the gray metal buildings look even stranger than they did the first time I saw them: the distances seem bigger, emptier. I feel like there is nothing keeping the wind from picking me up and blowing me over the chain-link fence along with the red dust.

“You're not alone, you know,” I hear Pepe say behind me.

Angelita is waiting in the shade of the building closest to the fence. When she sees us, she calls out, “Hurry up, Julian, we've got things to do. Don't worry; Alquilino and Gordo will be back by dinnertime.”

I nod and follow Angelita and Pepe out to the fence.

“Pepe?” she says as Pepe looks around to see if anyone's watching. “Clear,” he says.

Angelita sweeps away a pile of dried leaves, lifts up the trap door covering their tunnel, and points into the garbage can–sized hole. Pepe jumps in first, then she points at me. “Get in, before anyone sees us.”

Pepe looks like a big rodent in shorts as he scurries ahead of me in the dark narrow tunnel.

“Where are we going?” I ask.

“Shh.” I hear Angelita behind me.

Then Pepe stops. He stands up and the light streams in. Angelita whispers, “When you climb out, run as fast as you can into the reeds.”

We squeeze out of the tunnel. Angelita drops the trap door, and then carefully covers it with dirt.

“Where are we?” I ask, but they're already running ahead of me. As they disappear into a stand of reeds growing in brackish water, Pepe calls back to me, “Watch out for snakes!”

“Snakes?”

I follow them into the reeds, jumping from one clump of grass to another, holding my arms out for balance just like Pepe. I'm just starting to get the hang of it when I hear Angelita say, “This is where we saw the alligator the other day!” That's when I lose my concentration, miss the next clump, and fall through a curtain of cattails.

When I drag myself out of the reeds Angelita and Pepe are waiting for me at the edge of a big open field with rows of tomato plants receding into the trees.

“I bet you thought we were running away,” Pepe says, before I have a chance to ask.

“It's always good to make a little money,” Angelita says and leads the way to a cluster of trees where a dark-haired woman is standing by a stack of bushels. She hands us each one, copies its number into a ledger, and nods toward the field. “Row eleven,” she says as the sound of an engine
sputtering and coughing behind a shed almost drowns her out. I think of how Bebo could have that engine running smooth as silk in no time at all.

We walk out into the sun carrying our bushels past dozens of men and women stooped over the tomato plants. Their broad straw hats hide their faces, but I can see their hands dancing into the vines, gently twisting, pulling, then carefully placing each tomato into the bushels.

When we get to row eleven, I start picking the delicate fruit, trying to imitate the twist and pull. It looks easier than it is.

The pickers are talking about the meals their families will eat, the roof that will be fixed, and debts they'll pay off with the money they send home. All the while someone has been singing the same song, over and over.

“Two dollars a basket, three baskets a day, seven days a week.”

“Seven days a week. Forty-two dollars!”

Now the midday sun is stinging the back of my neck and when I stand up my head starts spinning. I drop down on my knees.

“Are you all right?” Pepe asks.

I feel light-headed and hungry. “Yeah, sure. I just dropped one.”

Angelita helps me up on my feet. “I wanted you to see this, Julian. So that when you start feeling sorry for yourself you've got something to compare your troubles to. These people are here alone, too, but they have to work
seven days a week, for forty-two dollars! That's just enough to live on, but they still send money home. They get tired and lonely, but they just swallow it and keep going. They have to.” She looks at me, to make sure I get the point, then gets up. “Let's take the bushels in,” she says, and we start walking toward the shed. “Before you and your brothers arrived, Pepe and I used to come here a lot. The very first time Pepe saw this, he stopped acting like a spoiled little brat.”

“I was never a brat,” Pepe complains.

“That's a matter of opinion,” Angelita says and pushes both of us into the shade. “Let's turn our bushels in. I'll buy the sandwiches.”

The dark-haired woman is now behind the shed standing next to a three-sided wooden box that seems to be bouncing on its own. Pepe and Angelita tip their bushels into the box; the woman examines the tomatoes, deftly picking out the bruised ones, and then herding the rest through the open side. A rolling conveyor belt, made of rubber doormats joined by links of metal wire bounces the chosen ones happily along until they are gently dropped into a shaking frame of wire mesh. They jump like red-faced children on their wire trampoline. Then one by one the smaller ones drop through openings in the wire and roll left on a tin funnel to a basket, the larger ones roll to the right.

A tall skinny guy, just a little older than Alquilino, walks up and stands right next to me.

“I call it the Toma-Tron!” he announces proudly, as I walk closer to inspect the amazing clicking, squeaking machine.

“I made the whole thing out of stuff that I found lying around,” he says and beats on the fender of a rusty black truck raised up on cement blocks. “I pulled this truck out of a ditch.” He leans into the cab to adjust a brick resting on the accelerator. The engine speeds up and the long rubber belt, stitched together out of inner tubes, spins faster around the metal rim of the right rear tire. I bend down to follow the rubber belt spinning under the Toma-Tron. I can recognize every part. There's a wheel from a baby carriage, chrome racks from a refrigerator, chain and sprocket from a bicycle. Each part had another use, another life, but the way he fit one to the other they look like they've always belonged together. I wish Bebo were here to see this.

“That's an amazing thing!” I say as I straighten up.

He pokes his hand in my direction. “I am Tomás, inventor-mechanic.”

“I'm Julian. Artist and, I guess, tomato picker.”

Tomás laughs and pumps my hand.
“¿Un hermano, Cubano?”

“How did you know?”

“We've got Mexicans, Ecuadorians, Guatemalans here. We all speak the same language but just a little different. It's as if our tongues are bent and shaped by the mountain, river, or sea we grew up next to.”

When Angelita and Pepe come back they have three sandwiches wrapped in crinkled wax paper. Angelita pats Tomás on the back. “Hey, Tomás, are you bragging about your Toma-Tron again?”

“Angelita, Pepe,
Pedro Paneros,
good to see you again. Will you join me for lunch?”

We sit down under a tree with silver roots that look like big snakes slithering in and out of the ground. Tomás reaches under one and pulls out a big yellow purse made of quilted plastic leather.

“Best lunch box I've ever had,” he says. “It's waterproof—keeps things nice and cold.” He pulls out a milk bottle filled with a cloudy green liquid with ice cubes clinking in it.

“Tomás-ade. People say it's the most refreshing drink in all Miami. Try it!” Tomás fills a dented metal cup, and then passes it to me. At first I take a polite sip, but then I gulp the rest. “Wow, that's good.” I exclaim as I shamelessly hold the empty cup out for a refill. “What's in it?”

“Oranges that roll off the big trucks as they leave the groves; the limes come from a little orphaned tree down by the river, then I sweeten it with the little packets of sugar that Pirate Angel gives away. But that's just what's in it. What makes it good is the inspiration,” Tomás claims as he caps the bottle.

“If you keep selling your inspiration for a nickel a glass along with these sandwiches, you're going to be a millionaire by next year,” Angelita says.

“I don't care about being a millionaire. I'm just trying to make enough money to fix up my boat.”

“What kind of boat do you have?” I ask.

“The kind that doesn't float!” Pepe snickers.

“Pepe is right; she doesn't float yet, but she will soon!”

“Where is it?” I ask.

“Down by the river, under the highway.” Tomás laughs.

Suddenly the old truck engine sputters, the Toma-Tron jumps, and tomatoes bounce out into the sun. Tomás packs away his lunch and then runs over to the conveyor belt. I walk over to the truck, climb up on the fender, and check out the carburetor. This engine is a little different from the one in our boat, but the parts are all in the same place. So I take out a dime and reach in. I try not to touch any of the hot parts as I feel around for the hidden screw in the back of the carburetor. “Here it is,” I say. Half a turn clockwise makes it run even rougher, but one turn counterclockwise and the engine runs smooth. I fine-tune the carburetor by listening and adjusting the screw a hair this way and a tap that way.

“How did you do that?” asks Tomás.

I hold up my dime. “There's a little screw tucked in there; you can't reach it with a regular screwdriver,” I say, trying to sound matter-of-fact about it.

“I can't ever get it to run that smooth,” he says and then smiles at me. “You've got a good ear for this. I could use a good engine man on my boat.”

Just then the dark-haired lady calls out, “Tomás, the little tomatoes are bouncing into the wrong bucket!”

“Oops, I got to go. Nice to meet you, Julian artist-mechanic. Come down to the river, check out my boat. Angelita has a map, and it's not as bad as Pepe says.” Tomás slaps him on the back and bows to Angelita. “Till the next time we meet.”

We manage to pick one more bushel full, drag it back to the shade, and the lady with the black hair checks her ledger and counts out six dollars.

“You can go first on the way back,” Pepe offers. When we get to the other end of the tunnel I push up on the trapdoor, but it will not budge. Angelita squeezes in beside me. “One, two.” We both push; the trapdoor rises just a few inches and then comes down again.