Surviving Santiago (8 page)

“Do I get a thirty-minute grace period for Chilean Standard Time?”

She presses her lips together and frowns. No sense of humor. “Your father called from the station and expects you back.” She gives me the number at the place where she and Berta are going with their empanadas.

At the door, a smiling Frankie bows. “I'm sorry I'm late. Bad traffic.” He hands me a small bouquet of windblown purple flowers. I pass them to my aunt. She'll probably put them in a vase, but I'd like her to give them to Berta, to make this a romantic evening for all.

Frankie wears his leather jacket, but underneath is a freshly pressed button-down shirt instead of the T-shirt he had on yesterday. Even his jeans are pressed. “I'm Francisco Zamora,” he says to my aunt.

“Ileana Aguilar de Gaetani,” she answers him, inserting the “de” where there isn't supposed to be one, pretending to be married. And straight. They shake hands. She asks him where we're going.

“I thought we'd see a movie,” Frankie answers.

“That's good. I told Tina no nightclubs.”

“I don't drink,” Frankie says.

My aunt's eyes meet mine. “I'd like to speak with Francisco alone for a few minutes.”

“He goes by Frankie,” I tell her.

She leads him into the living room, as if she were the master of an obedient big dog. I take the opportunity to refresh my makeup, which got smudged during my long wait. My chest is tight, not from worry about Frankie passing Tía Ileana's test, but me passing Frankie's.

On my way downstairs, I see Tía Ileana giving Frankie an approving nod. “Tina needs to be home by midnight,” she says.

“Yes, ma'am.” They shake hands, thus sealing my on-time return.

Frankie has chained his motorcycle to a streetlamp all the way up at the corner, which strikes me as a bit strange, though I'm glad my aunt can't see it and take back her nod of approval. The crate on the back is gone, and two helmets are attached to the bungee cord. The lights in the living room flicker off, but I suspect Tía Ileana is still spying on us.

“What did she say to you that was so private?” I ask him, my voice barely more than a whisper.

“The usual. Making sure I won't get you drunk and take advantage of you.” He smiles, and his teeth shine white under the streetlamp. He pulls a folded copy of
El Mercurio
from the inside of his leather jacket. “
Die Hard
is playing near here. I've seen it, but I'd like to see it again. Unless you have another idea.”

I take the paper from him. He points to the theater's ad, which he has circled in pen. His aftershave smells like pine needles. Below
Duro de matar
I see
Gorilas en la niebla
. I missed
Gorillas in the Mist
when it came to Madison. None of my friends would go with me to see what Max called a science class flick. I couldn't even get Mamá to take me because someone at work told her she'd end up depressed, though she wouldn't tell me why. “Can we see this one?”

“It's your night. But in return, speak to me in English.” Frankie flashes me another smile.

On the way, I squeeze him extra tightly to feel his muscles. Despite what he said at the house, there's little traffic, and it takes only a few minutes get to the theater, a triplex next door to a different shopping plaza. Though the stores are now all shuttered with metal gates, the plaza looks like the one where I met him yesterday, only a bit newer, with shinier signs and less trash strewn around. Even the supermarket is from the same chain. A line snakes down
the block, but when we get closer, it turns out to be for
Duro de matar
. There's only the stump of a line at the ticket window for
Gorilas en la niebla
.

“See the long line I spared you,” I say.

He doesn't answer me in English, but I hear him mutter in Spanish, “Because everybody wants to see the other one.” I don't think he's angry, though, because he puts his arm around my waist.

I love the movie, but it leaves me in tears. Not just because Dian Fossey gets killed in the end like her gorillas, but also because she sacrifices everything—family, friends, comfort, and safety—for them. She starts to go crazy because of what happens to the gorillas and the fact that the world doesn't care.

It's like when Papá lived with us in Madison. He'd write articles or give speeches about his time in prison, which left him with horrible nightmares afterward, but no one would publish the articles and hardly anyone showed up to hear him speak. That's when he started drinking—because of the nightmares, Mamá said—and now he can't stop. And now I know why Mamá didn't want to take me to the movie or see it herself.

When the lights go on in the theater, Frankie lays his arm across my shoulder and pulls me to him. His long fingers stroke my upper arm. The warmth from his fingers spreads through my body. “I'm sorry,” I say. “We should have seen
Die Hard
.”

“Es okay.” He kisses my cheek. His lips are moist.

“And we only have twenty minutes.”

“We'll get dessert. Five minutes.”

I don't know whether he means it's five minutes to my house or he expects to spend five minutes getting dessert. But there's an ice-cream place a block away from the theater.

“Do you always cry at movies?” he asks while we wait in line for our cones. Actually, in three lines. One to pay for the ice cream, one to choose our flavors—I pick chocolate, Frankie
manjar
, which our Argentine friends in Madison call
dulce de leche
—and one to pick up our order. It's major-league inefficient, and I'm amazed if we get out in anywhere near five minutes.

“No.” I don't want to tell him my life story, especially in this crowded place, but I don't want him to think I boo-hoo every time a movie character dies. “The gorillas getting killed was pretty awful. They're just animals—they don't understand. And then they killed her, too.”

Frankie takes the two cones and hands me mine. He pushes a strand of hair from my forehead. “That woman I meet. She is . . . how you say
madrasta
?” The way he says the Spanish word for “stepmother,” I think “wicked stepmother.” I imagine myself as Cinderella at the ball forced to come home at midnight, though I know Tía Ileana is nowhere near that evil.

“My aunt. She lives with my father. He's disabled.” With these words, I feel as if I'm letting go of my old
papá
forever.

“What's that?”

I've gone way beyond Frankie's English vocabulary, but I hate the Spanish word,
minusválido
, even more than
madrasta
. I mean, take it apart.
Minus.
“Minus.” “Less.”
Válido.
It too is a cognate, “valid,” with the same definition in Spanish. So
minusválido
makes it seem as if someone like Papá has less worth, less reason even to live. I explain the translation to Frankie.

“You know, you're right,” Frankie says as he throws open the door for us to go outside. “They should save the word for the rats that drink and don't work.”

He spits out the word “
ratones
,” then hurls his unfinished cone into a trash can and rips the chain from around his motorcycle wheel.

I recoil from him. “I . . . I'm sorry.”

Frankie presses his hands to the side of his head and mutters, “Old man, he'll wreck my life.”

His father? Just like mine?
I nod. “I know how you feel.”

Frankie grunts and shakes his head, like he doesn't think I'll ever understand. Like I'm a little kid who couldn't get past the first date without picking a movie he hated, crying during the show, and then saying something incredibly stupid. My heart puddles in my stomach along with the chocolate ice cream. I climb on the motorcycle behind him.

Frankie gets me back to the house three minutes before midnight. The light is on in the living room. A car is parked next to the wall, two tires on the sidewalk and two in the street.

“Looks like you have guests,” Frankie calls back to me. He makes a sudden U-turn. I grab two fistfuls of leather jacket to keep from flying off.

“Careful, Frankie!”

He stops at the corner and turns back to me. “I'm sorry,” he says. “I'm not used to taking riders. Only packages.”

My heartbeat returns to normal. I lift off the helmet and slide down, for the first time relieved to be on solid ground.

“Well, uh, good night,” I say.

Frankie jumps down beside me and asks, “We can meet again?”

Wow.
Maybe I was wrong when I thought he didn't have that good a time. I don't want to seem too eager by suggesting tomorrow, even though Papá's working all day. “Is Monday good for you?”

He looks away. “Monday, no. Tuesday at eight? We go eat and speak more English.”

“Yes!” I pump my fist. He bends down and kisses me on the cheek. His breath is sweet, like caramel. He waits while I fumble with the keys, dropping them twice. As soon as I open the gate, he rides away.

My head swirling, I unlock the door and skip up the few steps from the entryway to the living room. A man
I've never seen before—I guess late twenties, with horn-rim glasses, dark wavy hair, and a beard—sprawls in one of the chairs. He's reading a book. Papá lies facedown on the sofa, his left arm and leg hanging, his leg brace on the floor next to his boots. On the coffee table are his glasses, ten crushed Coke cans, and an empty bottle of pisco.

“What's going on?” I ask.

Papá lifts his head and slurs, “I'm being a responsible parent and waiting up for you.” He props his head on his good arm. “Be sure to tell your mother.”

I glance over at the other guy. “And who's he?”

The bearded man sets down his book—something about musicians reflecting on their lives—stands and stretches. “I'm leaving.”

“That's your name? ‘I'm leaving'?” I can't help being flip when my mind is somewhere else—especially somewhere happier than this scene.

The man laughs and holds out a pudgy hand. “Ernesto Moya. I'm your father's producer.” After shaking my hand, he slaps Papá on the back. “See you tomorrow, Nino.” He walks to the door in a straight line and lets himself out, leading me to wonder if Papá finished off all ten cans of
piscola
by himself.

“How was your date?” my father asks as soon as the front door clicks shut. His head is still propped on his arm. He stares open-mouthed at the cushion in front
of him as if it were about to roll toward him and swat him in the face.

“I had a good time.”

“Wha'cha do?”

“We saw a movie.
Gorilas en la niebla.
”

“Great film. I had someone on my show to talk about it when it first opened.” In slow motion, he struggles to a sitting position, squeezes his eyes shut, and rubs his forehead. “Listen, could you help me to the bathroom? I gotta take a piss.”

“Where's Tía Ileana?” Taking care of my wasted father is the last thing I want to do. I almost barfed when I had to brush his teeth last night.

“At her old place. Staying over with that other one.”

I lift his bad arm over my shoulders and grab him around the waist. My fingernails dig into his side underneath his rib cage, but I don't think he feels a thing. He teeters. Without his brace, he can only bear his full weight on one leg, and he's way past any ability to balance himself. He drapes himself over my shoulder, his wrist splint chafing my neck and his warm pisco breath—bitter and sour with a touch of salt—in my face. I tell him when to step.

In the kitchen, he reaches blindly toward the wall. “I'm working tomorrow.”

Another step. “I know.”

“Ernesto's picking me up at nine.”

“I can set your alarm.”
Better set two alarm clocks.

“No worry. Birds'll wake me.”

Instead of taking him upstairs or to the downstairs bathroom, I guide Papá down a few steps and through his office to the backyard. The minute he gets out into the clammy night, his body stiffens. “Where am I?” His voice trembles.

“The yard.”

“Why am I here?”

“To pee. Your aim is terrible when you get like this.” I slide him off the patio and onto the dirt. “I'm not stepping around it like I did in Wisconsin.”

“
Puta la güeá
, you sound like Vicky.” He tries to imitate me, but trips over his words. He's right, though. That's exactly what my mother said. Except in the apartment complex where we used to live, she couldn't take him outdoors as if he were a dog, so we had months of stepping around and cleaning up disgusting accidents.

I wedge his body into the corner of the barbecue and the wall separating our garden from the neighbors. While he unzips his jeans and waters the bushes with what's probably pure poison, I stare into the birds' cage. I can't find either of the little parrots; they're camouflaged in the darkness.