Fifteen Gabriel touched the wrinkled picture
that he’d gotten from Lucía after begging and swearing that he would hide it in a safe place. Lucía, radiant in a black bikini, was posing on the creamy sands of Acapulco. In fact, the only reason he wanted to meet with Moco and Bolillo was to show off his woman. His lifelong friends: they were all going to hit the States together, until they bailed on him. Later he found out they were resentful and had made fun of his trip. He found them on their eternal break outside of Flacher, Moco’s brother’s body shop, where they were busy dismantling cars.
“What’s the deal with this bro? He is a fucking schmo. He prefers Uncle Sam to the nopal. Fucking loser, güero wannabe, you live in Las Lomas, and you never come see me, you are not my homie,” sang Bolillo, showing off his questionable talent as a rapper. He wanted to give Gabriel a hug but held back.
“Motherfucker, since he got here from the other side, he thinks his shit don’t stink,” said Moco.
“At least I’m not the one who bailed,” said Gabriel, extending his hand as a gesture of peace.
“What brings you here, Güero? Did you come to hand your mom some dirty cash?” Moco said, shaking his hand.
“No, I came to say hello, homes. See what you’re up to.”
“Here we are, practicing automotive engineering, as usual.”
“And your raps, Bolillo, how are they coming along? Have you been signed by the Banda Machos record label?”
“Keep laughing at me, cabrón. At least no one would have kicked my ass like that, motherfucker.”
“You would have scared yourself to death before you even reached the border, pinche gordo maricón—you fucking fat faggot,” interceded Moco.
Just as if they had slept together.
“And how’s life in las Lomas treating you, güey? What do you do?” said Bolillo.
“I’m a driver.”
“With your old man, right? And what ship do you captain?”
“More than one: a Focus, a Jetta, a BMW, and a Mercedes. And, once in a while, an Audi TT.”
Gabriel began to savor his little revenge.
“No shit. They work your ass off at the car dealership,” said Bolillo.
“Your bosses, they shit money, or what?” asked Moco.
“Well, yeah, they’re something else. They wipe their asses with 500-peso bills.”
“If you lift anything, you gotta share,” said Bolillo.
“No way. I am a trusted employee,” Gabriel replied.
“Yeah, a fucking boy scout,” said Moco.
“And what’s up with your old lady, Moco? How many offspring have you brought into the world already?” asked Gabriel.
“I have three enanos, dude. But one is not Lety’s, so don’t open your mouth.”
“How about you, Bolillo?”
“Not even a hooker would go anywhere near this one,” Moco answered.
“Well, I got a broad like you bitches have never seen,” said Gabriel.
“Imported or domestic?” asked Bolillo.
“Imported from las Lomas.”
“Fuck you!”
“She’s my boss, cabrón.”
“Are you screwing the Señora de la casa? ”
“Her daughter, güey.”
“You think we’re pendejos?” said Bolillo.
“Her name is Lucía. Wanna see her picture?”
Gabriel took out the photo from his pocket and was delighted by the astonished faces of his friends.
“Come on, güey, you stole this,” said Moco.
“Don’t believe me if you don’t want to.”
“She sucked it already?” Bolillo inquired.
“Many times.”
“Sss, you fucking liar,” Moco protested.
“It’s for real. How much do you want to bet this is my bitch?”
“A million dollars,” Bolillo proposed.
“A thousand pesos,” Gabriel countered.
“Deal. How are you going to prove it?” asked Moco.
“I will introduce her to you.”
“Maybe she is a hooker you hire to put on a show,” said Bolillo.
“You’re going to meet her in person. Next Sunday in Chapultepec, so it’s not too far for us. At the entrance of the zoo, around 11 am. Yeah?”
He sealed the bet with a handshake for each friend.
“Start getting the dough because you’re going to owe me a thousand pesos. Five hundred each.”
All week long he dreamt of the moment they would see him approaching, Lucía’s hand in his. He didn’t expect them to pay up and didn’t care. This would shut their holes once and for all.
“Let’s go to my room,” he said to her the following day, leading her up the service stairs.
“You’re nuts,” she said.
“I always go to yours. Now it’s your turn.”
Agustín had taken Señora Natalia and Zenaida grocery shopping, and the maids were cleaning the house, deafened by the noise of the vacuum cleaner. Lucía followed Gabriel up the winding white tile stairs which had seemed like an endless spiral when she used to play hide and seek. In reality, they were just ten narrow steps. The servants’ quarters, which she had not set foot in since then, still reeked of gas and damp. As she walked into Gabriel and his dad’s room, she remembered that her childhood furniture had ended up there. Lucía bounced on the mattress of her old bed. It felt looser and lumpier. The headboard still bore the stickers she had placed there in elementary school; the lamp was still adorned with Smurfs. Gabriel hardly fit in that tiny twin bed. Lucía recalled that when she had first discovered how to touch herself, in that very bed in the dark, the Virgin Mary and her own family would materialize above the headboard. Sister Márgara, the priest confessor, her dad, her mom, her girlfriends, and even her pediatrician, would gape at her, craning their necks in disgust.
“Hurry up, Gabriel, I am freaking out that someone will come in.”
Gabriel took his time and held on as long as he could. She had one of those orgasms that fizzle into a shudder. While she got dressed, Gabriel proposed going to Chapultepec, omitting certain details he did not consider relevant to divulge.
“There are too many people on Sundays,” Lucía replied.
“We always do what you want,” Gabriel complained. “I’ve never been to the zoo. We get there early, see the little critters, and then we go to the hotel, okay?”
As he got in the car three blocks away from the house, Gabriel was disappointed to find Lucía at the wheel wearing a jogging suit and no makeup.
“You dress up for Ricardo, but for me, you go out like a sack of potatoes.”
“I am not going to get all dolled up to go to Chapultepec!” she retorted. “We’re going to undress anyway, right?”
“I’m just saying I like it better when you put yourself together.”
“Whatever. You drive.”
Lucía had tied her jacket around her waist, like a schoolgirl. A plastic patch in the shape of a turquoise heart bobbed in the middle of her breasts. Gabriel held her by the waist, and they entered Chapultepec Park, among stalls selling fried snacks and sodas, soap bubble vendors and baskets with giant chicharrones as rough as elephant ears. The leaves of the ahuehuete trees rustled in the breeze. Metallic pinwheels spun flashes of light. Silver balloons bounced happily, shimmying their cartoon characters against the blue sky. Gabriel squeezed her hand, stroked her hair, rubbed her back, kissed the top of her head. These public displays of affection in front of “The Great Mexican Family” embarrassed her.
“You’re sticking to me like glue today,” she said.
Gabriel saw them from afar. Moco and Bolillo were looking for him among the crowd. He got near enough for them to spot him and as soon as they saw him with her, he stopped and kissed her at length. They approached, astonished. He greeted them as if he hadn’t seen them in years, with hearty handshakes and backslaps.
“Wow, no way! What up, homes? Did you come to see the little baby panda? Lucía, let me introduce you to my friends, Beto and Toño, better known as Moco and Bolillo.
“Hello,” Lucía smiled uncomfortably. Moco had a long and ghoulish face, and Bolillo was chubby and spongy, just as their nicknames indicated.
“Pleasure to meet you,” Moco said, extending his hand. Bolillo followed suit.
Lucía shook hands.
“They’re my buddies from the neighborhood,” said Gabriel.
“Oh, which one?” asked Lucía. She hadn’t yet asked Gabriel where he came from.
“San Gregorio Tepehualco,” Bolillo replied.
In sixth grade, her school had organized a Three Kings toy drive, and the nuns had taken the girls to deliver gifts in that slum. Sister Márgara had called it a “poverty belt.” Lucía remembered it vividly. The students and nuns got off the school bus surrounded by clouds of dust and hungry dogs with hanging teats and swollen bellies. The only half-paved street was the main street, so the students, uniformed with pleated skirts and white blouses, had to walk on their toes to avoid getting mud on their moccasins. Some of the “prosperous” houses were ramshackle gray brick cubes with iron bars on the windows. The other houses were huts made of metal and corrugated cardboard. If they needed water, the neighbors had to bring their buckets to a pipe truck. They stole electricity from the lampposts. The girls visited a typical household. It was a metal hut with a dirt floor with a brazier in the middle, chipped pewter pots, shapeless beds hidden behind tattered curtains, and a TV set with terrible reception turned on to the Channel of the Stars. The nun observed that despite their poverty, the inhabitants of the house managed to keep it clean.
They went by a tiny grocery store that sold Chiclets, Chaparritas del Naranjo sodas, Sabritas potato chips, green bottles of bleach, and Jabón Zote soap bars. The greasy counter, infested with flies and crawling with ants, displayed moldy bread and squashed Twinkies and Gansitos. They didn’t buy anything.
Lucía shuddered at the thought that one of the scrawny kids that got their toys and then got in line again; one of those kids that ogled them with mistrust when they got off the bus and, once they brought out the gifts, slathered them with sticky smiles, that maybe one of those cheating kids, hungry for toys, could have been Gabriel’s younger sibling. The voracious leers of Moco and Bolillo reminded her of the ungrateful and dirty looks of the teenagers who interrupted their street soccer game to whistle and scream obscene innuendos at the girls and the nuns. What if she had seen them once before?
“Have you been?” Moco asked rhetorically.
“No,” lied Lucía.
“Let’s take you there,” said Gabriel. “And you’ll get to meet my mom.”
“Oof, the suegra,” said Bolillo making a terrified face.
“She’s a sweetheart,” Moco said mockingly.
Lucía glared at Gabriel with hatred. He implored her with his gaze not to make him look bad in front of his friends.
“Didn’t you want to go to the zoo?” she asked Gabriel.
“I’d rather you see my barrio. We can come here any time.”
They moved away from the group to confer in private.
“Come on, Lucía, don’t make it hard for me. We’ll drive them in the Focus,” insisted Gabriel. “I have never asked you for anything.”
“You did it on purpose,” grumbled Lucía.
“I did not! Come on, be a good girl. These are my best friends. I haven’t seen them in years. Just a little while and we’ll leave, so you can see where I grew up.”
In the car, Gabriel reclined the seat, stretching his arm to reach the steering wheel.
“This is how your brother drives, like a pimp,” he said to Lucía.
Gabriel stepped on the gas.
“It really rips,” said Gabriel.
“Don’t go so fast,” she said.
“My brother-in-law is a fag,” said Gabriel to his friends. “As Lucía says, he thinks he is the last Coca Cola in the desert.”
“Your wheels are cool, Lulú,” said Bolillo, steering the conversation off the topic.
“Thanks,” she replied.
She did not remember which one was Toño and which one was Beto. Bolillo looked like a good person. Moco looked like a criminal.
After crossing the Viaducto and Tlalpan and several unfamiliar arteries, they arrived at an area of the city she no longer recognized. She did not know which way was west or east and had no idea where they were. They drove through narrowing streets, pockmarked by potholes filled with dirty water and speed bumps you can’t see but you can definitely feel. The houses were painted brightly: mamey orange, lime green, Mexican pink, lemon yellow. Some of them had gilded metal lining on the windows, others had iron bars. They passed tire repair shops, chop shops, glass shops, beer depots, kiosks, and a gym called “Jonhy’s,” where there were apparently aerobics, bodybuilding, yoga, and self-defense classes. Stray dogs sniffed inside garbage bags strewn on the sidewalks. Gabriel parked in front of an auto repair shop.
“Welcome to the beautiful barrio of San Gregorio Tepehualco,” said Gabriel. “Here on your right, you can observe Flacher’s world famous automotive repair center. Yours truly was born two blocks away from here.”
Lucía wondered who owned the cars parked on the streets, some of which were quite recent models. Perhaps they were stolen. She couldn’t understand how else they could be there. She pictured herself on the front page of the Casos de Alarma tabloid, naked, bruised, covered in mud, next to the mugshots of her alleged rapists and murderers — better known as Gabriel, Moco, and Bolillo — three thugs frightened by the flash of the camera at the prosecutor’s office.
As for Gabriel, he held his woman by the waist as if he had purchased her at a slave auction.
“How do you like our hood?” he asked his girlfriend. “Lucía went on the subway with me for the first time the other day. She was scared shitless,” he said. “She refuses to ride the minibuses. She thinks someone will kidnap her. Right, my love?”
“Shut up,” said Lucía.
“Your mother-in-law lives around the corner,” said Gabriel, leading the way.
Lucía didn’t want to guess which one of those miserable cement cubes belonged to Gabriel’s mother. She prayed with all her might that the señora wouldn’t be home. They stopped in front of a washed-out blue cube with a white metal door. Gabriel knocked, pressing his ear against the cold metal.
“Mamá! ” he yelled.
The pale woman who opened the door was as diminutive as Gabriel. From her, he had inherited his fleshy lips, melancholic eyes, and ashen complexion. She wore grey cotton jogging pants with a white stripe on the side, a short-sleeved blouse with small flowers, and black plastic flats. She eyed everyone with suspicion.
“Hi Ma! We were passing by and came to say hello,” said Gabriel.
His excitement escaped his pores the minute he saw her long-suffering face.
“Mamá, let me introduce you to my girlfriend, Lucía Orozco.”
Lucía saw a flash of surprise light up the woman’s eyes. She was very young but looked old. Lucía guessed she was in her late thirties.
“Nice to meet you, Señorita.”
“Likewise,” Lucía whispered.
“Afternoon, Señora,” said Moco.
“You’re not going to invite us in?” said Gabriel.
“I haven’t swept, hijo.”
“We came all the way from las Lomas, mamá.”
She let them in. Once her eyes got used to the dark, Lucía noticed she was standing on a cement floor that was unevenly smeared, like cake frosting. She could make out a broken gas range. The oven door had been ripped away and now it served as a pantry. A chipped wooden table and two chairs sat in the middle of the room. A dresser held a small TV set, and a curtain divided the sleeping area. Gabriel handed her a chair.
“Siéntate.”
“Can I offer you something to drink?” asked her suegra.
“No, thank you very much.”
“If I had known you were coming, I would have fixed something to eat.”
“Don’t worry, Señora.”
“A little Coke?” insisted Irma.
Moco and Bolillo found it amusing that Irma, whose temper was legendary, had suddenly become so polite.
“Okay, thanks.”
Irma took a single glass covered with fingerprints out of the oven and from the shadows, a half-empty two-liter bottle of Coke, the kind Lucía detested because the soda always went flat. She barely wet her lips. It was just syrup, and it was lukewarm. She felt a sudden, intense cramp. A cold sweat blossomed through her pores. Her bowels rumbled. She mustered a feeble smile.
“I need to use the bathroom,” she whispered to Gabriel.
“Behind the curtain,” he showed her.
Lucía took her backpack with Kleenex and hand disinfectant. The metal door opened towards her, screeching against the cement floor, making it hard for her to get inside the enclosure, dark and narrow as a catacomb. Lucía searched for the light switch, which she did not find. She discovered a white toilet bowl, without a lid or a seat. There was no toilet paper to be found. She peeked into the plastic barrel next to the toilet and saw it was half-filled with water. A little bucket floated inside. She tried holding it in, walking around in circles, hoping the pain would subside, mortified because she knew that otherwise, the noise would thunder through the entire neighborhood. But the pain overwhelmed her. She had no choice but to squat and expel the inferno that was piercing her bowels. The fucking sushi. The explosion seemed to blast out in quadrophonic sound.
“You okay?” She heard Gabriel’s voice on the other side of the door.
“Yes. Coming.”
She patted the cold sweat off her forehead and, as she poured water from the bucket into the toilet, the toilet water started rising, making her panic. Evidently, this was divine punishment for breaking the social, moral, or whatever order she had broken. She kept up her fight with the little bucket until finally the water receded, gurgling.
“We thought you had escaped,” said Moco when she returned.
“It’s time for us to leave,” Lucía declared. “Thanks for everything, Señora.”
“You are welcome. If you will excuse me,” Irma disappeared behind the curtain.
Bolillo asked Gabriel:
“Shall we go for some beers at Burro’s dive? To celebrate you won the bet.”
By the looks in Gabriel and Moco’s shocked faces, Bolillo realized he had fucked up.
“What bet?” asked Lucía.
“None,” Gabriel replied.
“What did you bet? Did you bet something about me?”
“No, nothing, really.”
His friends laughed nervously.
“How dare you, Gabriel?”
If she had brought her cellphone, she could have called an Uber, but she didn’t because she was afraid it would get stolen in Chapultepec.
“Give me the car keys.”
Gabriel knew it made him look like an idiot, but he handed them over.
“Wait.”
Lucía stepped out and started walking towards the car. Gabriel ran to catch up with her.
“Why did you do this?” she asked him.
“I don’t know. I wanted to show you off to my cuáis. I wanted them to see what a fine woman I have,” he replied.
“This is over,” Lucía said.
She got in the car and left without him.
The lights in the living room were on. Lucía peeked through the kitchen door and saw her mother, her father, Adolfo, and Ricardo conspiring in the living room. It was not the first time she’d come home under hairy circumstances. She had presented herself to her parents, relatives, and friends of the family while high, drunk, or both more than once, and like her brother, she was an expert in mimicking the most inconspicuous normalcy when the situation warranted it. For now, her main concern was that she smelled like a sewer and that they could see she had been crying with panic and rage.
She came in the room dragging her feet, as if she had been wandering in the desert.
“Lucía, where were you, hija? Ricardo has been waiting for you,” her father said.
“We didn’t have any plans today,” Lucía replied, sinking into a sofa.
“I left you several messages,” said Ricardo.
“We went to the movies, and I turned it off.”
“The only person in Mexico who turns off her phone at the movies. What did you see?” Adolfo inquired.
“Some gringo bullshit, I don’t remember the name.”
“Tell us the truth,” demanded Natalia. “Were you involved in an express kidnapping?”
“No, mamá ! I was with Ximena and her bodyguards.”
“And you went out with Ximena dressed like that?” Adolfo said.
“What do you care? Why are you interrogating me?” Lucía snapped.
Her parents exchanged mysterious glances.
“Well, we’ll leave you two alone,” her mother said. “Come on, Adolfo.”
The four of them smiled as if they were in on something.
“I missed you,” said Ricardo, sitting next to her once they were alone.
“I missed you too.”
“I don’t understand what the hell you do on Sundays.”
Lucía sighed wearily. Ricardo cradled her in his arms and kissed her emphatically. When she opened her eyes, a small black velvet box was resting on her lap.
“What is this?” she asked.
“What do you think?” he replied, melting with excitement.
Lucía froze.
“You don’t want to see what’s inside?” asked Ricardo.
“Ricky...” she said faintly.
“Open it, mi amor.”
Lucía opened the box with shaking hands. Inside she found a ring with a considerable diamond.
“I designed it. The base is platinum.”
“Did you speak to my parents?” she asked.
“I only told them I had a surprise for you, but I think they guessed.”
Ricardo kissed her hands.
“Marry me, Lucía. I want you by my side.”
Lucía burst out crying. His eyes also filled with tears. He put the ring on her finger. Lucía felt her as though her fate was sealed, as if she had flipped a coin and this was the outcome. She thought she heard Gabriel’s footsteps going up to her room, though that was impossible. She buried her face in Ricardo’s chest and wept.
“Is that a yes or a no?” asked Ricardo.
“It’s a yes,” Lucía said. “It’s a yes.”