XI

Life Goes On

The unfathomable dimension of some women, Antonio thinks, no matter how much their minds are open to learning, is the one where they keep their moods. They most often fail to fit the moment, these moods. Like now, with the sun about to rise and relief overflowing, she seems tentative and uncertain. Perhaps the truth is too much to accept all at once. Surely she can’t be pouting over the few short hours of delay in the homecoming. They were required for gratitude. Still, she seems nearly nervous.

Not Baldo though; like a pup left home alone, he’s all romp and ready to go, a certain beast of simple pleasures but noble in his simplicity and motivation. Lyria gathers her things about her loosely and hugs her betrothed, telling him they will talk in a little while, but for now she must hurry home to prepare for work. Today is Monday, when everyone must look sharp. And be sharp.

Baldo stretches like a rubber man, bringing a smile to his big brother, who must look up today to meet Baldo’s eyes. Antonio laughs, “Two days I’m gone, and you’re grown higher than the top of the door.”

Baldo stands tall under the door to see if the top of his head will touch the frame.

“Mm,” Antonio says. “Monday already. What a lovely weekend.”

Baldo nods, moving to the table to stoop and care for his bird, who gurgles and squawks when he pushes a piece of fish down its maw. At the sink he squeezes too much toothpaste onto his brush.

Antonio watches him brush with pneumatic vengeance, but the elder brother only smiles. “Baldo. Where is your machete?”

Baldo mimes the hurl over the breakers, flinging toothpaste in his ardor.

“And the pillowcase?”

Baldo indicates Lyria and the other, grasping imaginary melones for the other. He shrugs.

Antonio nods. It seems too slapdash for comfort, but at this point a reasonable man can only feel good, having Simón Salvador on his side rather than having an underpaid civil servant, even if the civil servant was as resourceful as Quincy and Quincy had nothing.

In a few minutes the young threesome stands together close enough to hug, because it’s Monday, and the bus is full.

Antonio feels the giddy current among them.

Baldo makes elbowroom when his bird complains.

Lyria looks annoyed, as only she can be over such simple things.

And Antonio grins for no other reason than life goes on in the sweet air of freedom to bring his life to its rightful fulfillment. The future feels intact. Which is no small feeling and certainly nothing to sneeze at. Whether more hurdles await is another story that must be examined sooner or later. But not today. Today is meant for joy.

Baldo feels it too, laying his head first on Antonio’s shoulder, then on Lyria’s.

Lyria adjusts to a reality too good to be true, looking at one and then the other and then at neither, as if sorting a reality that only yesterday seemed out of reach.

Antonio shivers in mere anticipation of the rich, hot cafe con leche that will soon flow through him as prelude to the renewed flow of life’s simple pleasures. In a few minutes more he tastes the warmth and richness, sipping in overview like a lord of the manor.

To the west, just inside the laundry room, stocking her cart, Lyria is industrious, stolid, a strong-willed woman with a pleasing if not dramatic figure, with good hips and handsome titas that already point and swell in preparation for Antonio’s own two hands. One day soon she will be his. She will bear his sons and, in keeping with the modern world of right values, his daughters. Soon seems sooner still with advances into the future like last night’s, filling the jar with another five big ones. At this rate, the rim will be met by the end of the year, and they will wed. That will be something, both the wedding and the wedding night with such a rare tomato, so pure and ripe she nearly splits with too much juice. Antonio will ease her in as only a man of experience can do, with gentle compassion for the inexperienced.

Does marriage portend the end of Mrs. Mayfair?

He needn’t make any drastic decisions just yet. For one thing, twice a year can hardly be called unreasonable. For another thing, little Tono boy will want the very best in clothing and education, and such a standard can hardly sneeze at five hundred a night. For yet another thing, Mrs. Mayfair must be disengaged easily, both as a sensitive, generous woman and a proven and trusted friend.

For one more thing, there she sits, making the most of her last day, lying back with her eyes closed, watching the replay that makes Antonio smile as well. She seems happy, all greased up for a last hurrah of Mexican sun, her grasping hands bikini lifting and spreading as if revealing her heart for sacrifice to the gods of poolside joy.

And there is Baldo, archangel of mercy and justice delivered. Antonio observes his brother’s oblivion and focus, as if recent events are merely part of life’s spicy mix, as if killing and caring are equal to a time for every purpose under heaven, as if he, Baldo, is the meadowlark on the fencepost singing this sentiment sweetly.

The bird is swaddled in a clean bandage and feeds again.

Each baby turtle is lifted and inspected and in silence encouraged to grow and be strong, as the silent boy has done. Anyone whose heartstrings ever plucked a chord for nature knows the tune flowing into the little turtle ears. The babies listen in perfect stillness until he’s done, then they flop their flippers in thin air as if the depths are felt by what he imparts to them.

Antonio feels the richness rising with the rising Sun, who seems equally pleased with his lovely planets in orbit. Soon Antonio is ready for the new guests who have come to let their hair down and have fun! With his cards neatly stacked, his dry-bean jar full of new, clean beans, his numbered balls loaded in his spinning basket, his public address system tested and working with hardly any warp or static, the first morning bingo can begin. “Er! Er-er! Er-errrr! Wake up! Wake up, everybody. No more siesta!”

Oh, how they moan and groan but move lovingly in compliance, rising for their cards and beans. This looks like a very good group indeed.

“Okay! Not even lunchtime, so we play for one Bloody Mary! You need it, so only one line, up or down or diagonal. Okay! Wake up! No more siesta! Er! Er-er! Er-errrrr!”

With only a brief respite after lunch so that Antonio can relax on the eighteenth floor to revive and refresh himself and further repay the generosity shown him, life returns to normal.

Mrs. Mayfair merely touches his cheek with her fingertips to thoroughly convey her sentiment. She will miss him. Gone by one, airborne by two, she is winging overhead by two oh five, looking out the window as he looks up. You are my saint, he thinks.

Oy, the pillowcase, she replies. But looking down on the adobe and asphalt miasma called civilization, she reckons that a taxi was likely the best place to lose Exhibit A. Lingering in the few thousand feet between them is her promise to see him soon and his fervent desire to make it sooner.

So the days and nights settle as they once were before Mrs. Mayfair’s last visit.

Antonio saves his money.

Lyria works hard and then works some more, and though her beloved wonders what happiness she finds in life, he doesn’t press.

He rather goes along with her unspoken premise that these shall be the days of struggle so that those ahead may fill with ease and security. He marvels at her resilience and womanly resolve at such a tender age.

Baldo will not come home until way after dark, until the night sentries arrive, most often near ten o’clock.

So Lyria takes him his dinner, which he eats on the beach by the turtles, or else he takes it with Lyria to the laundry room, where a good maid can sort her needs for an orderly tomorrow. She looks healthier now, though her diet has not changed and she gets no more exercise. She fills out like a woman does, her breasts rising and heaving like competitors sprinting in the stretch. Not as big as Mrs. Mayfair’s, they grow rounder with a youthful exuberance defying gravity and the aging process.

Antonio keenly observes this change with pride and pleasure, not to mention anticipation. Yet he is fearful as well. For one thing, a bosom so resplendent will draw strays no less than stink will draw flies.

For another thing, hefty chichis are one thing, a good thing. But they often precede hefty thighs that chafe and blot all light in the gap beneath the sacred place, and that’s a thing of a different nature; call it bad. He fears the way of Rosa, and his heart and eyes grow heavy with apprehension of a gorda wife.

Just so, she reflects his worry. What will he do when she grows fat, go fishing?

He presents her with a pair of shorts, rayon and form fitting to show off the mystically succulent orbs, donde las espaldas pierden su nombre. But reference to where the back loses its name is only polite language; her luscious buttocks ride high and inviting with such luxuriant spread that any man popping an eyeful will need no words, polite or otherwise, to convey his love. Ogling as well her rich, tawny thighs, Antonio realizes that his mad lust can only derive from love. And from waiting, as purity and virtue dictate.

You can’t really avoid the stray dogs sniffing the bush on a package like this one. Antonio wants to see her figure on display, because soon she will be his, fore and aft, to have and to hold for all time, and seeing her exquisite componentry now will provide a baseline from which to compare the fat, if it comes. He won’t press her to wear the shorts for fear of another emotional failure like the one following his innocent request for a picture of Rosa in youth. She will wear them in time, maybe not until the night of nights, but she will. No woman can find peace forever in a maid’s baggy dress.

Meanwhile, life brings a change for the worse to Rosa, who takes to drink and melancholy. No one can say why or when, except that the evening of finding the old photographs and drinking through her nostalgia seems to mark the beginning of her downturn.

Baldo and Antonio awaken most mornings to retching sounds from the casa next door. They try to ignore the awful discharge, until Antonio winces and shakes his head. Sometimes he mutters about an old, fat woman who can’t control her drinking in spite of the awful dues she is made to pay.

Baldo shrugs and shuffles to the table where he stoops to feed his bird and then shuffles to the sink to brush his teeth.

So life fills another day with bingo, pool volleyball, beach volleyball, swimming pool aerobics, and shapely gringas shamelessly exposing themselves. Now and then they make shameless proposals that a practical man pursues only when the return is handsome.

Stocking the cart and cleaning rooms, feeding the turtle babies, and changing the water in each tub, counting and encouraging and staying late; all these things roll together, but not as tedium. No, they form a rhythm. Life is good with repetition and method.

Antonio feels himself change as well. His compliance with the rich gringas is now casual compared to his former exuberance.

Hello, how goes it for you? Thank you for your business.

He accepts these women as they accept him, as a convenience and a bounty, just as every sunrise needs a sunset in order to come again. Between the two are the goodly pursuits of every day. Antonio cashes in on his rippling abdominal rack, pectorals that look cut by a sculptor and veins popping on his biceps. He knows that these things too shall pass. In the meantime, a hundred sit-ups and a hundred push-ups are insurance. Money in the bank, mas o menos, as long as a demand needs a supply.

Crunches?

Mañana.

Baldo too finds a new complacence, no longer holding each dead baby as if grief can bring it back. Learning that life brings grief no matter what, he inures to difficulty, plucking the dead and walking them down the beach to the water’s edge, gurgling incantation in his muted, hoarse way until hurling it with God speed over the surf. From the hundred twenty-three babies, a hundred four survive with only six weeks until release.

And on a day like all the rest with no fanfare or indication, it’s time to give back that which nature gives.

Baldo unwraps his convalescent bird for the last time. It huddles uncertainly, perched on his arm, so he sets it on the arm of a chaise lounge and opens its wings, working them gently, stretching them to flight position. He holds a piece of fish up to the bird, who reaches for it. But this time Baldo pulls the fish away. He shows it to the bird once more and flings it toward the water.

By now the guests on the other chaise lounges sit up and watch, and those poolside gather for the show, which isn’t a show, really, unless your contact with nature is limited and most often expressed with sunscreen.

Baldo ignores his audience with aplomb equal to his brother’s fervent courting of the same audience. He lifts the bird to his arm again and walks it to the water’s edge, all the while whispering something confidential in its ear. Perhaps he reminds it of the beauty of flight and freedom. Perhaps he asks it to refrain from eating las tortugas chicas and warns it as well to stay clear of the nursery. Perhaps he assures this exquisitely winged creature of the rich days and nights ahead that only such a bird will experience.

The guests can only speculate, which they warmly do, some enthused to the point of emotion.

With a gentle uplifting of his forearm, he delivers the gift of flight, delivering the bird to its proper life again. He watches for a minute in a fanciful flight of his own. Turning away, he wipes a tear from his eye and sees on his walk back up the beach, as if for the first time, that many guests observe him.

They cheer with a standing ovation. He is the man of the hour.

Nobody from management praises Baldo, because Milo squelches all praise not for himself. Even so, any fool and Milo can see the lavish good cheer of the guests. They view las chicas frequently now and talk of the amazing man who guards them.

Baldo doesn’t mind the turtle babies being held for photos, but only after inspection of the hands for sun grease and other hazards.

They love his diligence, the guests, and he brings home tips no one could have foreseen, especially Milo. Not as big as Antonio’s tips but formidable; these tips rising from the heart, not the pocket.

Whoever heard of tipping the turtle guard?

Nobody is who. But on another eventful Saturday a quiet man from Chicago and his quiet wife, both decrepit and very near the end of their journey, give Baldo a hundred dollars.

They smile and say nothing in deference to his special dialect.

He stares back for what appears to be a lengthy exchange, until they too shed tears and hug him. He gives the money to Antonio, who puts it in the jar with a fervent Er! Er-er! Er! Errrr!

Milo sees. Milo knows. Who cares?

Nine hundred twenty pesos are more than a tip; they are tribute. They make history and set the bar so high that no man or woman will clear it anytime soon.

Baldo is known, and then he is renown. He is secure in security, and top management takes only an hour to grant his requisition of six more plastic tubs to accommodate the babies, now twice as big as six weeks ago. A second requisition comes from his big brother, always with an eye on the future, who foresees the day after the day of turtle liberation, when El Capitán de las Tortugas stands alone with nothing to guard.

Antonio makes a memo to management, through Milo, in which he anticipates continuing need among those guests experiencing thirst and hopes that a position to serve such thirst can be reinstated on the staff ledger. Job description: coconut cleaver and server.

Anyone who can’t see through this transparent nepotism is enlightened by Milo, who protests that his own annual efficiency rating is based on service relative to payroll, and that another person poolside is unaccountable, as well as irresponsible and frivolous and, for all we know, dangerous. No, Milo insists, we cannot justify an addition to the staff. Brother Baldo will certainly be considered next year for another stint as El Capitán. We’ll be in touch. Thank you.

In the meantime, what? You think we would allow him near our guests with a potential murder weapon?

Checkmate. No other persons are now required.

Antonio coyly concurs, but in the cordial aftermath he suggests that we’re not talking increased overhead here. We’re talking standards in service.

My assistant can cut and serve the coconuts. He has experience. With his young charges already beating the reaper by a hundred percent growth with only twenty percent mortality, and with care and feeding down to a routine that El Capitán de las Tortugas can do in his sleep, slicing a few coconuts amounts to nada. What’s more, Baldo is now a man of esteem, willing to serve it up with expertly presented coconuts.

They love him, the guests.

This proposal requires a day and a half gestation, but it too achieves new life from on high. Halfway into week seven as El Capitán, Baldo approaches Antonio himself in tips, because now he, Baldo, has two sources, which anyone even remotely aware of personal advancement can tell you is better than one source.

Antonio anticipates approval and buys a new machete, since a requisition for that item could draw attention to an unsavory and as yet unresolved circumstance. Not that circumstance remains unchanging. In week two and again in week five, Señor Simón Salvador himself makes personal visits poolside in irrefutable proof of Antonio’s innocence. At least such a visit proves Antonio’s inevitable exoneration, or at the very least it proves that Antonio’s benefactress is deeply solvent and will go the distance on this one.

Antonio rises to these occasions of svelte, suave dialogue with a man in a tailored suit and shoes of appropriate pliability. In his heart of hearts, Antonio wishes Señor S would wear a different fine suit from one visit to the next, from the many fine suits obviously hanging in his closet. Never mind; the staff won’t notice that it’s the same suit as last time, what with three weeks between visits, and the guests can’t know, because they only arrived last weekend.

Señor Salvador assures his client, though he describes a reality based in motions, filings, response times, defaults, summary judgments, and possible proceedings. This is all very good indeed, Señor Salvador reiterates, assuring Antonio that Mrs. Mayfair is staying in touch, just as he too will stay in touch. So don’t worry.

Well, to tell the truth, Antonio wasn’t worried, not like he is now, for Mrs. Altmont Caruthers of the Dallas Carutherses steps serenely into the personal space between Antonio and the lawyer. She glistens in full sheen between the two, plucking a pesky gnat from its death wallow in the grease pooling just below her sternum. The portentous tributary running down the center of her chest is not as spectacular as that of Mrs. Mayfair with her grasping hands, but Mrs. Caruthers knows how to work a crowd, even if only a crowd of two, as long as they’re men. “You are so good at that water exercise. Are we going to, you know, do it again today?” Not waiting for the affirmative but turning quickly to Señor Simón Salvador, she offers her hand. “Hello. I’m Elizabeth Caruthers. Call me Liz.”

“Con mucho gusto.” Señor S responds on cue with his instant non-click of the heels and a gracious bow that puts his lips a hairsbreadth from her greasy hand, his nose a whiff’s distance from the dazzling cleavage. Antonio smiles, proud as a facilitator on ascent among the long-standing denizens of the social stratosphere. He feels perfect, knowing when to stay as mum as a mute brother so nature can take its course, which it most often wants to do.

Mrs. Caruthers understands that Señor Salvador is of professional status in the legal field and wonders if he might be available for, you know, legal advice on the purchase of real estate here on the, you know, beach.

“Si claro. But please, Liz, I am not well-versed in such matters. I have a friend who will call on you, if he may.”

“Well, yes, I suppose. I just thought it might be nice to …”

“Yes. It will be very nice. We will be in touch. Tomorrow. Or the next day.”

Mrs. Caruthers is unaccustomed to such power than can avoid a well-preserved woman more easily than a mighty river can avoid a rock.

Here may lie a lesson for a young man on the rise. Would not a romp with Mrs. Caruthers be a good and possibly lucrative experience for a rapidly developing portfolio? Of course it would. Yet this man long ago risen tells her that it may be a good thing, and maybe not.

¡Ay! This is power.

So a time is set for nature to play out, which may be tomorrow or the next day. Or never! Such is the whim of power.

At this juncture Antonio worries less and accepts more the idea that the steep fees piling up are well spent. This is not only defense but also continuing education toward the advanced degree. Besides, the expense of a thing is of no concern to a man so thoroughly covered.

Two weeks later, just after Baldo’s promotion to the double tier, Señor Salvador returns. He waits in the shade watching Antonio until a break in the action presents itself. Antonio is schmoozing with a guest, delivering happiness and the exotic charm that memories are made of, if you’re a certain kind of guest. He pours it on so Señor Simón Salvador can see the substance of his performance.

Señor S nods warmly, indicating his appreciation of a job well done and says that it’s time. The hearing is set for next week, in which the future may be told, whether they will proceed to further legality, or if the matter will be resolved with prejudice. The lawyer is optimistic toward the latter, anticipating best-case scenarios and potentialities of varying parameters. Antonio need not attend. Strategy calls for a straightforward motion for summary judgment in favor of the defendant. The appropriate, shall we say, powers are, shall we say, in place. Mrs. Mayfair will be here.

“With prejudice?”

Señor Salvador broadens his smile in effusive tolerance of the legally uninitiated. Grasping the muscles across Antonio’s shoulders again precisely on the sore spot, he tweaks it with uncanny effect. “Don’t you worry, my friend. It is good.” He scans the face of his client as the little massage finds deep tissue.

Antonio bows his head for the relief of the thing if not in abeyance, and he moans. Yet he wonders how a best-case scenario can be good with so many variable parameters.

Señor S says, “I know you’re a busy man, and really, I must go.”

Antonio is left standing alone rubbing his own shoulder and assessing legal prospects. He smiles over prospects for a romp with Mrs. M, only a week away.

True, he releases the pressure from time to time among the poolside women, but such frolic has limitation and risk. A man in the spotlight with such a fantastic body must never initiate sexual contact with a guest, no matter if she is gringa or Mexican, for that is grist for the harassment mill, and many would as soon share this spotlight as soothe the swollen pinga. Besides, after a day of nonstop entertainment and optimism, a nonstop night can leave a man sorely pressed to shine tomorrow. And what if the level of tipping is less than decent? Sure, it is mostly enjoyable with these women, once initiative is established as hers and the charming chitchat is done and the piston properly slides in the cylinder at adequate rpm so the little engine purrs. But with the lights out it all feels the same. Maybe not exactly the same but close enough. Falling fast asleep at two a.m. with a rise and shine only four hours away, the days seem terribly long. They start again with too little rest in between.

At least with Mrs. Mayfair initiative is foregone and it’s money in the bank. The cock crows an hour before sundown and an hour after with gymnastics uniquely hers. Then it’s all comfy cozy with three pillows each, lying in bed with thirty-two channels and the remote in hand. He wonders briefly if Mrs. Mayfair will have enough money to see him through. But of course she will.

He wonders how a natural beauty like Lyria could approach her prime in life and turn suddenly morose. Like now, with one foot in the laundry room and one foot out, sorting and folding and watching the clouds in sad resignation. He suspects she is hitting the bottle with Rosa and hopes this is the case. The bottle would explain her depression and sudden weight gain. He has seen a special report on heredity and alcoholism. Could it be the gin that turned Rosa gorda? Her gut, Rosa’s, is not the low-slung tub of fat hanging like a water bag from most gordas but is round and firm like Joaquin the bartender’s.

Can it be that Rosa has guzzled gin all these years when he thought her so nice and so caring and so much the mother in place of his own? Of course it can be, and such a state of affairs would require re-examination of those events, in which Rosa was actually dead drunk on gin. She must have been. Drunkenness wouldn’t make her less loving.

If it’s the whiskey gut growing spherical on Lyria too, then she can be spared. With help and guidance and Antonio’s encouragement, Lyria can break any habit.

And yet: Caras vemos, corazones no sabemos; faces we see, hearts we don’t know. Could it be that a thing exists, of which he had no clue whatsoever? If so, what else could be misperceived, misconstrued, and unknown?

At least he doesn’t need to wait ten years or ten months to see if his betrothed will turn fat, nor must he press his beloved to quit the gin to spare the gorda. In a month or two we will see if a thing is true, a thing so strange a man can hardly imagine. He will speculate no further, because worry is a futile endeavor, and numbers cannot lie.

The women in their last days of voluptuous glory need what Antonio can give. They pose and look their best for sultry seduction with many cocktails and low lights. They love the power of a Latin hot-blood with tantalizing charm, high spirit, and rippling body. They swoon to conquer, then whimper in submission. Yet they know nothing of humble origins or manifest destiny. Except for one who does, who offers respite from his current uncertainties.

Soon Mrs. Mayfair will arrive. Perhaps she will help sort things out.