GETTING ANYTHING DONE QUICKLY in the Dominican Republic was nearly impossible. It was a poor country with barely any infrastructure, mired in corruption and red tape. Strangely, though, filing for divorce was easy. A change in local laws in the 1970s enabled foreigners to obtain legal, uncontested divorces, free of the hassle and expense of doing it at home. As a result, the island became a divorce hotspot.
Dr. Manuel G. Espinoza was the king of the quickie Dominican divorce. He made the big leagues when Barbra Streisand and Elliott Gould sought his help to go their separate ways. Soon big-name couples were flying in from all over the United States to have their marriages dissolved. The wood-paneled waiting area outside his office at the El Embajador was decorated with framed newspaper clippings, showing the celebrity marriages he’d had a hand in dismantling. As I waited to see him, I found myself faced with a picture of Mike Tyson’s recent Valentine’s Day divorce. I was nervous but determined. My marriage to Tony was over.
Under California law I would have been entitled to half of everything Tony owned, but I had no intention of delaying the process any more than necessary. Espinoza promised me I could be divorced in twenty-four hours if I met the criteria, and after what Tony had put Justine and me through, a single day sounded long enough.
Espinoza ushered me into his office and got down to business without any formalities. He asked me if I was seeking spousal support, and I answered in the negative. I had already spoken to Ron about my plans to divorce Tony. He assured me that I had a job at Information Unlimited for as long as I wanted. I knew I could support myself. I didn’t want or need Tony’s money. The only property to divide was the land that Tony had bought at the golf course, and he was welcome to that. The sole issue was child custody. Espinoza explained that uncontested divorces usually meant that the parents would have joint custody. Yet I knew I would be the one taking care of Justine. I already was. Why would anything change once we were divorced?
Espinoza gave me a list of documents he would need to start the process, and I raced home to get them. Stepping into the bedroom, I wrinkled my nose at the rank odor of sweat and stale booze. Tony was asleep on top of the bedsheets, fully clothed. I went to the closet, opened the safe, gathered the papers, and took the eight-hundred-dollar divorce fee from my savings.
I opened the blinds and stared at his grimy, bloated body in disgust. His shoes were still on. His zipper was down. His shirt was covered with blood and his nose caked with white powder.
“Wake up!” I shook him roughly. His bloodshot eyes opened a crack. He moaned, shielding his eyes from the sunlight that streamed in through the windows.
“Sign this.” I shoved the papers toward him.
“Huh?”
“Sign this. I’m starting divorce proceedings, Tony. You have to sign this.”
He was coming around now. A look of intense pain filled his face. “Huh? Babe … what? Why?”
“Why?” I laughed without any humor. “I’ll tell you why. Because your daughter is terrified of you. Because she doesn’t want to come home until you’re gone.”
He sat up with difficulty, then staggered to his feet and hobbled toward the bathroom.
I followed him, jabbing the papers toward him. “Sign!”
In the bathroom he caught sight of his reflection. He stared in confusion at the three-day beard, swollen eyes, and bloodstained shirt. “What the fuck happened?” he groaned.
“Do you even know what day it is?”
He ran unsteady fingers through his hair. “Wednesday?”
“It’s Friday. You’ve been missing for three days. Half the office was out looking for you. I had no idea if you were dead or alive. Your car’s out in Boca Chica with the front smashed in.”
“Babe … ”
“Justine woke up this morning to find the complete stranger you brought home in her bedroom. He was vomiting on her carpet. I woke up when he wandered into our bedroom. You didn’t even notice. You were too busy ransacking the kitchen trying to find more booze. At seven o’clock in the morning.”
Tony was completely stunned by this. He obviously had no recollection of any of it.
“You want to know what happened next?”
Justine, hysterical, had watched her bloody, disheveled father, his face twisted in rage, pushing me up against the wall and screaming at me. She had run, terrified, from the room.
I looked at Tony with a mixture of anger and pity. He was a pathetic shadow of the man I had once loved. He shook his head, wincing. “I don’t remember … anything,” he said.
I handed him the paper and a pen. “Sign it,” I said. “Then … get out.”
Dr. Espinoza was true to his word. The following Monday, Tony and I were legally divorced. When I returned to the apartment, Tony was gone. His drawers were empty; every last trace of him had been removed. Only then did I breathe a sigh of relief. Only then did I allow myself to grieve for the end of my marriage.
THE DIVORCE DECREE ARRIVED by messenger twenty-four hours later. I dropped one set of copies on Tony’s desk that same afternoon. He snorted when he saw the fat Manila envelope. His response to the divorce was denial. He simply sulked and tried to ignore what had happened. “I can’t believe you’re still mad at me for something I don’t even remember doing,” he said.
The divorce made me a pariah at the office. Tony was constantly in a foul mood and he took it out on the clerks, who in turn blamed me for their misery. For Remo, the break-up was personal. He’d celebrated the previous two Christmases and Easters, as well as various birthdays, with us. Justine called him “Uncle Remo.” He reacted as if his own parents had just gotten divorced.
“Marisa—” he began.
“I know what you’re going to say. Tony loves me. That’s not the issue here. He’s completely out of control.”
“He never cheated on you.”
Hearing the same old excuses was maddening. Why did everyone always stick up for him?
“This is worse,” I snapped. “You have no idea what it’s like to lie awake at night wondering which Tony is going to come home: drunk Tony, horny Tony, or the Tony who doesn’t take no for an answer. Everybody thinks he’s such a great guy because all they see is the side he wants them to see. You have no idea how brutal he can be. Neither does he, for that matter, because he blacks out. He wakes up with no recollection of what he’s done, then acts as if I’m the asshole because I won’t talk to him! He turns into a monster and thinks he doesn’t have to take responsibility for it. You think I deserve that?”
Remo looked uncomfortable and dodged the question. “He’s under a lot of pressure.”
“Big deal. So am I. My concern is Justine’s future, and frankly, I don’t think Tony should be part of it. Not when he values drinking and getting high more than us!”
Remo’s entire demeanor changed with this revelation. “What do you mean, getting high?”
“He’s doing cocaine.”
Remo blanched. “Jesus Christ. You can get away with a lot of shit in the D.R., but not drugs. You can’t even buy your way out of that kinda trouble. If Tony gets caught with coke, he can kiss his ass goodbye.”
“Yeah, well, maybe someone should tell him that.”
Remo looked terrified at the idea of Tony being involved in a drug bust. “They’ll lock him up and throw away the key. Tony’s money won’t mean anything. You know where he’s getting it from?”
I had my suspicions. “Horacio. Who else?”
“No. He wouldn’t risk it, not even for Tony. He probably hooked him up with someone, though. Marisa, you have to talk to Tony. I know you’re mad right now, but unless you want to see him serving twenty years—”
“I’m done talking. He doesn’t listen to me anyway.”
“Then let me try.”
WHAT FOLLOWED WAS A war of attrition, waged by Tony, in an effort to punish me for leaving him. He took away all the perks I’d enjoyed when I’d been the boss’s wife. I was given a fixed schedule along with everyone else, and asked to hand over half the rent since it exceeded the allotted living allowance for a clerk. I accepted these conditions without complaint. As far as I was concerned, they were a small price to pay for my newfound freedom.
Tony found adjusting to single life difficult. I would notice his car parked outside the apartment building at odd hours of the evening, presumably checking to see that I was home. Then the late-night phone calls started. I knew it was Tony calling, though he’d hang up as soon as I’d pick up. Tony, who had never kept tabs on me when we were married, who’d never cared about where I was as long as it didn’t interrupt his hard-partying ways, was now playing the role of the jealous lover.
Leslie invited me to go out with her, but I declined. I didn’t want to inflame the situation. But when Tony left for a routine probation meeting in California, I no longer had an excuse. Leslie twisted my arm and I reluctantly agreed to accompany her to Atlántico. I was still at the height of my “Constanza girl” fame, and felt all eyes turn to me as I entered the club. Suddenly the idea of rejoining the world of single people filled me with anxiety. Several men made a beeline for us. They chatted to Leslie in perfect English while I glanced awkwardly around at the packed club.
A man approached. To my relief it was Remo.
“I need a word,” he said.
“Sure.”
“Not here.” He took me by the arm and led me to the relative quiet outside. “Please don’t go back in there,” he said gravely.
I was stunned. “Why?”
“Coming here alone sends a very bad message, Marisa.”
“I’m not alone,” I laughed, “I’m with Leslie.”
“That’s worse. Leslie’s … friendly. People will automatically assume that because you’re with her, you’re friendly, too.”
I didn’t know whether I should be angry or amused. “What is this, the 1950s? You’re being absurd.”
“Marisa, please. I know what I’m talking about. Those men in there want nothing more than to—to fuck the Constanza girl. Okay? They want to get in your pants so they can brag about it to their friends!”
I stared at Remo, utterly appalled.
Leslie came out and found us. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing!” Remo barked.
“Tony put you up to this, didn’t he?” Leslie said. Remo reached out for my arm, but I shrugged him away.
“No one you meet in there will ever love you the way Tony loves you!” he said.
“Grow up, Remo!” Leslie laughed. “She’s not looking for love! She’s just here to dance and have a good time!”
“Marisa, please!”
As angry as I was at Remo, I knew that he had my best interests at heart.
“Come on,” Leslie pleaded. My best friend was worried about me shutting myself away in the aftermath of the breakup. All she wanted was for me to have fun. “Demetrio’s inside. I want you to meet him!”
Remo started bickering. “Leslie, Demetrio’s married!”
Suddenly I spotted a vaguely familiar face. He was standing behind Leslie, chatting with two young, beautiful women. As if he’d felt me staring at him, he looked over and our eyes locked.
In a flash, I realized who he was. The last time I’d seen him he’d been leaning back against his Mercedes, holding his gun. It was the man who’d shot a Haitian in cold blood because he’d dented his precious car. Everything stopped dead, all the sound faded away, and I was suddenly awash in the eerie silence that had followed the shooting.
Leslie grabbed my arm, pulling me back to the present. Now tonight didn’t seem so fun anymore. The idea of meeting some divorced guy on the prowl seemed tawdry and cheap. And the fact that I was a stone’s throw away from a cold-blooded murderer wasn’t helping my fragile emotional state.
“Let’s go somewhere else,” I said.
IN THE WEEKS THAT followed, Tony tried everything to get me to reconcile with him, but I refused. When he realized that I wouldn’t budge, he tried the next best thing—he focused on Justine. He began to slowly build up his relationship with her. He began stopping by the apartment to read her a bedtime story, or taking her down to the courtyard to ride her tricycle. Soon she was looking forward to his visits, and he started spending whole days off with her. I was happy to see Justine finally enjoying time with her father, but this turn of events also saddened me. Why did a crisis have to happen for Tony to decide to get to know his daughter?
It wasn’t an easy time for me. My emotions swung up and down. Some days I felt strong, while others were a real struggle. The fact that my marriage was over broke my heart. Tony kept up the pressure, but I refused to give him another chance until he confessed to using cocaine. He dug in and denied, causing a stalemate.
He was so adamant that I started to doubt the evidence of my own eyes. Had I really seen the traces of white powder around his nose? Was his weird blinking and hyper behavior really the result of cocaine use, or was I jumping to conclusions? I was scared of the prospect of ending up like Tony’s mother, constantly forgiving her husband and taking him back no matter what he did. But now that Tony’s drinking was back under control, I became conflicted. On one hand, I felt that I would never love anyone the way I had loved him. On the other, I remembered his drunken rages and those long, worry-filled nights he wouldn’t come home.
The situation came to a head when my sister called and announced that she would be coming to visit. The political situation had stabilized, and Heather was determined to come down while things were relatively calm. She and her boyfriend Joel would be here in August.
This posed a problem. Nobody in my family knew that Tony and I had divorced. I’d spent three years convincing them that I was happy and safe in the Dominican Republic. If my family learned that Tony and I weren’t together, they’d pressure me relentlessly to leave the island.
While Heather continued talking, I desperately tried to think of a way around this awkward situation. Should I lie and say that Tony was out of the country? Or confess and swear Heather to secrecy? I knew that wouldn’t be fair to her. I jotted down the dates and hung up the phone.
Tony moved back into the apartment the day before Heather and Joel arrived. The deal was that he would only stay for the week. Once my sister left, Tony would move out again. I made it clear that sex was not going to happen and he agreed—albeit with a cheeky smile. Heather’s arrival gave Tony an unexpected second chance. He planned on making the most of it.
Tony surprised us all by renting a beautiful villa at Casa de Campo, the premier resort in the Dominican Republic. We spent five blissful days there, sailing, waterskiing, and exploring the beautiful Altos de Chavon, a replica of a 16th-century European village. We dined outdoors and strolled the cobblestones hand-inhand. In the mornings Tony and Joel played golf, while Heather and I hit the beach with Justine.
“You’re so lucky,” Heather told me one morning. “After all the years you’ve been together, I can still see how much Tony loves you.”
At first our being together was a charade, but after a few days the atmosphere infected me. Being around Heather and Joel, who were still in the early flush of love, certainly helped. Plus, the idyllic setting removed us from the stress of our real lives. Whatever the reason, I started letting my guard down. My life had been so sad and strained before this visit. Under the circumstances, not having sex seemed pointless. One night as we lay intertwined, a full, clear moon streaming through the bedroom window, I wondered why our relationship couldn’t be like this all the time. As if reading my mind, Tony kissed me and said, “I want it to stay like this, Marisa. This is the way things should be.”
When Heather and Joel returned to Canada, Tony stayed at the apartment. I started to believe that the divorce was the best thing that ever happened to us. It kept us both on our toes. We learned not to take the relationship for granted. It seemed our relationship had just weathered another huge storm.
But every time I thought things were getting better, it seemed that bad news came knocking. This time it announced itself with the furious ringing of the front doorbell.
NOBODY EVER USED THE front door at Information Unlimited. I joined Roger at the door and peered through the peephole. A middle-aged blond woman stood next to our guard. She looked like she was crying.
“Can I help you?”
When I stepped outside I got a better look at her. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks wet. She was wringing a Kleenex between her trembling hands. “I need to speak to Tony Santino,” she blubbered. “I’m Isabel Walker. Edwin’s wife.”
As I led her around the side of the house, she rambled on about how Edwin hadn’t been home in days and nobody had a clue where he was. She’d trawled the city’s hospitals and morgues, to no avail. Even his car had vanished. I left her pacing nervously on the terrace and went to get Tony. As soon as she saw him, she burst into tears.
“I don’t know who else to turn to,” she wailed. “Codetel won’t help me!”
Tony nodded sympathetically and asked Remo to call Captain Garcia. He did his best to comfort Mrs. Walker, and promised he’d do whatever he could to find her husband. As I led her back to her driver, I felt that something was amiss. I sensed from the way Tony had reacted to the news that he knew something.
When I returned to Tony’s office, he was pacing the floor in a rage. “That son of a bitch!” he said.
I closed the door behind me. “What?”
Tony took a deep breath. “Walker. I gave that cocksucker over a hundred and eighty thousand dollars on Monday morning to settle the phone bill. And now he’s gone. Vanished into thin air.”
“You’re not suggesting …?”
“I sure am. He took off with our money.”
I told him he was being ridiculous. “Walker probably earns twice that working for Codetel,” I reasoned, but my words did nothing to soothe him. Not until the following afternoon did Captain Garcia discover what had happened to Edwin Walker. He had been arrested in a sting operation, changing dollars on the black market.
Although illegal, changing dollars on the street was a common practice because the black market gave a higher rate than the banks. Walker was in the habit of changing Information Unlimited’s money on the black market and then pocketing the difference. This time he’d waltzed right into a police setup. He was being held at a police station in Sabana Perdida, a poor barrio forty minutes outside the city. According to Garcia, it was the perfect place for someone to “disappear.” So far the captain’s attempts to see Walker had been denied. Tony feared that the police might kill Walker, take his car, and pocket the cash.
Walker showed up at our office three days later. He was pale and unshaven, and looked like he’d aged ten years. The police had confiscated the money, as well as his company car. As the money had not been declared when it came into the country, Gustavo was unable to recover it. He warned Tony to simply let it go, or run the risk of having the police broaden their investigation. Nobody wanted the authorities looking into the financial dealings at our office. Tony, unsurprisingly, was spitting blood.
“You useless prick! You ripped me off, lost my money, and brought me to the attention of the police!”
Everybody in the office heard the merciless dressing-down Tony gave him. By the time he left Tony’s office, he looked like a broken man. He was immediately fired from Codetel, a huge blow to Information Unlimited. Despite his money changing, Edwin had been a key player. That night when Tony stormed out of the office, he didn’t come home.
For the next two days the atmosphere at Information Unlimited was one of quiet sadness. The clerks were all painfully nice to me as we anxiously awaited news of where Tony was. He resurfaced two days later. He never said a word. He went straight to his office and stayed there. When I went home that evening, I saw that he’d already stopped by to clear his things out. I’d warned Tony that if he ever disappeared on another binge again, the truce was over. This time he didn’t try to justify or defend his actions. I had opened my heart to him, and once again he had chosen drugs and alcohol over his family.
Devastated, I took time off work, unable to face the holiday festivities alone. Leslie tried to get me to join the rest of the gang in ushering in 1992, but I stayed home. I spent a quiet New Year’s Eve in sober self-reflection. I would be thirty years old soon. I needed to take charge of my life. I needed to start planning for my future.
While Tony had failed me, to his credit his commitment to Justine never wavered. On the morning of January 8, he arrived at the apartment just as I was leaving. Neither of us felt any animosity now. The final disintegration of our marriage had sapped us of all the bitterness and anger we had for each other. We shared nothing more than a resigned sadness these days. He asked me where I was going so early.
“Picking up a check,” I told him. I had completed a modeling job months earlier, and was finally getting paid for it. Then I would head over to the office. I was in the courtyard when I realized I had forgotten my passport. The accounting department had insisted on seeing official ID before releasing a check for that much money to me.
I ran back upstairs to get it. Before I left, I glanced back into the living room. Justine was sitting on Tony’s lap as he read to her. Her left arm was draped over his neck, and she was absentmindedly toying with his earlobe, just as she did with me when I read to her. They were so engrossed in the story, they had no idea I was watching them. I felt a pang deep inside, a bittersweet sadness. I realized I was crying.