America's Dream (33 page)

“I wouldn’t worry about him.” Carmen stands behind her and massages her shoulders. “Believe me, he’s seen worse.” Again, Elena gives her a look, and Carmen once more doesn’t know what she’s done wrong.

“Enough,” Paulina interrupts. “Go get dressed so you can help me here.” Elena and Carmen turn to their mother, who, with a look, lets them know they’d better leave América alone.

“Grown women, and they still behave like teenagers,” Paulina grumbles after them.

América’s head throbs, even after three aspirins and two cups of coffee. She’s only half awake, she thinks. Her reflexes are slow, and she’s conscious of a general malaise like when she had the flu three years ago.

I wonder, she asks herself, if this is the way Mami feels every day after drinking all night. This is probably the way Correa feels too, those days when I make him caldos de gallina to help his hangover.

She shakes her head, as if to erase the image of a drunk Correa. The motion makes her dizzy. If Correa had seen her last night, she wouldn’t be sitting here today. All those men, one after the other, their hands all over her. A couple of them whispered things in her ear that she couldn’t hear, but she got the gist of it just the same. They were propositioning me, she tells herself with an amazed smile. She looks up at Paulina, whose back is to her, as if about to share this news with her aunt. But another thought interrupts her intentions. They propositioned me because I was alone and unprotected. It chills her to think of herself as prey.

“Let’s go for a walk, it will clear your head,” Carmen offers when she returns. The last thing América wants to do is move,

but Carmen grabs her hand and pulls her up. “See you later, Ma,” Carmen calls out, followed by América, whose knees shake as she descends the stairs.

“Where are we going?”

“Just around the block. It’s so stuffy in the apartment.”

They head away from the avenue and turn right onto a treelined street with two-and three-story houses divided by driveways.

“This is nice,” América comments.

“Most people think of the Bronx as rundown and poor, but a few of these old neighborhoods are thriving.” Carmen walks fast. América has trouble keeping up and, after the first block, is out of breath. Carmen stops in front of a row of brick houses. “These homes were built in the thirties,” she says, “and those over there are later, the forties, maybe.”

“How do you know?” América asks.

“I can tell by the style of construction, by the details on the windows and along the roof.” She starts walking again. “I wanted to be an architect when I was younger.”

“What happened?”

“Oh, I just lost interest, I don’t know.” They turn the corner. “Actually I messed up by falling in love with the wrong guy.”

América looks at her, expecting more, but Carmen just bites her lip. She looks at América from the corner of her eye and laughs. “Don’t look so worried! What happened was, I had an affair with one of my professors and flunked out. I’ve always had a weakness for Germans.”

She laughs merrily, and América can’t quite figure out why. A love affair, she thinks, is nothing to laugh about. But if, like Paulina says, Carmen has many lovers, maybe affairs have a dif- ferent meaning, although she can’t imagine what makes them funny.

At the end of the block there is a playground and basketball court. A game is in full swing, the fences surrounding the court are crowded with people cheering the players. The playground is filled with children and their parents. América is sure these adults are parents because they look like the children, not like in

the playgrounds she frequents, filled with white children watched over by Latina and Caribbean empleadas.

“Hi, Carmen! Hi, América!” Janey and Johnny are atop the slide. Near them, Darío is sitting on a bench reading a newspaper. América groans. He jumps up when he sees them.

“I swear I didn’t plan this,” Carmen says in a low voice, then, louder, “Hi, everyone!” She bounds over to the bottom of the slide to catch Janey when she comes down, leaving América stranded in the middle of the playground with Darío rapidly advancing toward her.

“How do you feel?” he asks softly, and she wishes she were wearing makeup to hide the blush she knows is coloring her cheeks.

“Okéi.”

“There’s no need to be embarrassed,” he says. “That sort of thing happens.”

América is not sure what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t this preemptive forgiveness that leaves her feeling like she owes him something. “Thank you,” she says.

She’s happy to see Carmen and the children running toward them so she doesn’t have to think of something more to say.

“Papi, can we have an ice cream cone?” Janey asks, and her brother seconds her.

“My treat,” Carmen adds.

“Sure.” Darío turns to América. “Would you like one too?”

América has been making faces at Carmen to indicate that they should go, but when Darío turns toward her, she says, “No, thank you.” Carmen gives her a mischievous smile. “I’ll just take the kids then,” she says, grabbing each twin by the hand, and off they go.

“Well,” says Darío, “we can walk back to the apartment.” “Okéi.”

One good thing about Darío, he walks slowly. One bad thing about Darío’s slow step is that América takes mental count of how many blocks they have to go and can’t imagine what they will say to each other until they reach the tall green building.

“I’m glad we have a few minutes alone together,” Darío con-

fides after a while, and América’s heart flutters with fear because she thinks he’s going to ask her out. He clears his throat. “It’s so hard to talk with everyone around.”

“Yes.” They pass an old man sitting on a stoop. He gives them a dirty look and mutters something under his breath. América and Darío quicken their pace until they’re past him.

At the next corner, Darío stops and faces her. “You must know I like you…”

Three kids go by on Rollerblades, and América uses the distrac- tion to collect herself. “You stare at me,” she says as they cross the street.

“You’re so beautiful,” he counters, unfazed.

She pretends not to have heard. “And you drive like a maniac.” “Occupational hazard.”

She smiles. When did he become charming?

“I’d like to know you better,” he says seriously, “and for you to know me.” When she doesn’t say anything, he continues. “I’m aware that you’re recently separated…”

It sounds so official, “separated.” It sounds surgical. Like when they separated those twins from the Dominican Republic who were born connected at the head.

“I don’t think—” she starts. They turn the corner.

“We can just talk on the phone. We don’t even have to go out if you’re not comfortable.”

They’re in front of the green building. He looks at her earnestly, as if every second she vacillates is torture for him. “I’ll give you my number,” she says after a while.

The smile on his face is so happy, so hopeful, that it makes her laugh. He opens the door for her, follows her up the stairs to Paulina’s apartment without stopping at his own. When they walk in, Elena and Paulina exchange a look. América finds a scrap of paper by the phone, rummages around for a pen, and finally has to fetch one from her purse. She writes her number down, thinking that she must still be drunk and will probably regret this in the morning.

On the train to Bedford, she can’t stop thinking about this new development in her life. Other than with Correa, she’s never been on a date, has not been alone with a man in fifteen years. Just to talk, Darío said. Do men do that? It doesn’t seem possible. There’s too much sexual tension. But maybe that’s me. I’m oversensitive because of Correa. Because he’s so suspicious of other men, I’ve become that way too. Maybe it’s possible to be friends, although I’ve never seen it. Mami doesn’t have any male friends. She doesn’t have any female friends either. Rosalinda had some boys who were friends. But look what happened. No, it’s not possible. Besides, what could she and Darío talk about? He’s so quiet, so timid. Although the few minutes they were alone together he seemed a different man, charming and open. Maybe when we’re with family he’s respectful, like his father and Tío Poldo, who let the women do all the talking and planning. That must be it. He

doesn’t want to seem too forward in front of my relatives.

The Leverett house is dark. She goes into her room and prepares for bed, her mind preoccupied with Darío.

Just to talk? I could tell him how many beds I made and how many toilets I scrubbed. She laughs. I wonder what it’s like to be a taxi driver. Well, that’s something to talk about. How many people did you run over today, she asks the stuffed cat on her pillow.

By giving him my number, I’m encouraging him. I’ll tell him right off that I just want to be friends. That way, he won’t get any ideas. ¡Qué presumida! Just because a man wants to talk, I think he has other plans. But that’s how it was with Correa. He started talking, and next thing I knew, I was running away with him. Maybe that’s what happened to Rosalinda. You talk to a man, and when you run out of conversation you have to do something to spice it up. A kiss here, a hug there, and before you know it, you’re not talking anymore. You’re listening to him yell at you. No, forget it, I don’t want to talk to any men right now. When he calls I’ll tell him straight out that he shouldn’t call again. Put an end to it right away.

Firm but Fair

very morning the corner of Green and South Moger streets in Mount Kisco is crowded with men waiting to be picked up for work. They’re dressed in jeans and work boots, many of them wear western-style hats, and some carry a thermos. Pickup trucks drive past slowly, and the drivers study the laborers, who turn their eyes hopefully in their direction. The drivers don’t get out of the trucks. They lean over to the passenger side, make their deals, and wave the lucky few selected for that day into the truck bed. In the evening the same trucks drop off the men at the corner, and they drag themselves home to the rundown houses on the periphery of the village, or to the high-rise apartment building

at the edge of the commuter train tracks.

“They make even less money than we do,” complains Mercedes, who has fallen in love with an Ecuadoran man who, she says, was an accountant in Quito. “You should see his hands at the end of the day. They’re all cut from the rocks.” Reinaldo has helped build many of the stone walls that border the mansions in the Bedford area.

“The same thing happened to Ignacio,” says Adela, “until I bought him a pair of gloves.”

They’re at Mercedes’s house, which has an indoor swimming

pool. The six children they care for are happily splashing in the water, while the empleadas sit at the periphery, watching them and warning them to stay on the shallow end. The only empleada who knows how to swim is América, who is sitting with her feet on the steps of the pool.

“Did Liana hear from her kids?” América asks.

“Last she heard they were in Mexico. The coyote took the money and left them stranded.”

“They’re not traveling alone?”

“Her father is escorting them. But he’s an old man. He got sick, and she had to send them money for a doctor.” Adela adjusts the button on her blouse, which has popped open. “If you ask me, she’s crazy to bring those kids here.”

Since no one has asked her, no one responds. Adela has no children, so it’s difficult for her to understand how desperate Li- ana is to have hers near. Desperate enough to risk their lives by hiring a coyote to sneak them into the United States.

“Frida and I went to church on Sunday,” Mercedes announces. “We lit a bunch of candles for those kids.”

“They’re going to need all the help they can get,” Adela says somberly.

Kyle is a good swimmer. The younger kids wear floaties on their arms to help them stay above water. One of the little girls Adela watches is drifting away. “You stay on the shallow end, Annie, don’t go deeper than that.” The little girl drifts back.

“How’s your daughter?” Mercedes asks América.

“She’s in a school play,” América responds, and the other two nod. She has told the empleadas she has a daughter but hasn’t gone into any details they don’t need to hear about. She sees no sense in telling them that Rosalinda ran away with her boyfriend, or that her life’s ambition is to be a vedette. If someone told her that story about their child, América would criticize the mother for allowing her child to run wild.

It’s different when it happens to you, she thinks, so she has withheld most details of her life. She has told them she’s divorced, without mentioning Correa beat her. Nor has she revealed that her mother is an alcoholic. She has told them

Rosalinda is a student at a parochial school, which América pays for by working as a maid. The women know about sacrificing their lives for the sake of their children, and respectful in front of her, they don’t press her. América wonders, however, what they say about her when she’s not there. They all talk about one another when the others are not around.

Often América feels guilty around the other empleadas. Their lives back home sound so bleak. Two of them come from rural areas where there is no electricity or running water. Their first encounters with American homes were shocking. The excess, the way Americans live apart from their families, are a constant source of discussion among the empleadas, all of whom describe lives tied to the fates of large extended families dependent on them.

“Americans don’t like their parents,” they’ve concluded, since not one of them has ever seen their employers’ parents at the house. “They send them to Florida to get rid of them,” is the consensus.

They all make less money than she does, even after Karen Leverett deducts taxes from her salary. They get paid in cash and are nervous about being robbed because all their savings are kept in boxes under their beds or in their closets.

“If I open a bank account,” Mercedes once said, “la migra will find me and send me back.”

They dispatch most of their salary home via courier services set up for that purpose. And they pay rent for a room for week- ends, since they don’t feel comfortable or welcome when they’re not working in the houses where they live during the week.