Earl’s garage occupied the corner of Esperanza and Prosperidad, only a couple of blocks from the jetty. Prosperidad was an old, narrow street, shabby but still respectable, where the bustle of Esperanza was abruptly curtailed by dense wooden apartment blocks just like my father’s, within which lived families whose children might become kindergarten teachers, factory foremen, tour guides. After Dub started work at the garage, I found myself there often, dispatched by America with another of his forgotten lunch parcels or a message from his mother.
It was late morning, the sun high, as I made my way there yet again, America’s reheated fish and rice warm in my hands. I walked quickly. I was due at the curandero’s afterwards to deliver payment to him for treating America’s latest ailment and I was looking forward to it: the curandero’s shop was interesting; his daughter, Suelita, even more so. Besides, he’d also known my mother and, unlike my father, talked about her freely when we met.
When I arrived at the garage, Dub was on the forecourt talking to a woman. I couldn’t see her face; she was wearing a headscarf and sunglasses like the middle-aged rich women at the top of Esperanza. Dub was smiling, but a little uncomfortably, so I figured she was giving him a hard time over her car repairs, reminding him that she knew his mother. My thoughts were full of Suelita, and it wasn’t until the woman spoke that I realised she was young. ‘You think you’re Jimmy Dean?’ she leaned forward, looking over her sunglasses at Dub. ‘You know who Jimmy Dean is, right?’ Her voice was like water on a hot day.
Dub didn’t reply. He just stood there staring at her and, because I felt affronted on his behalf – even I knew who Jimmy Dean was – and because her voice made me feel like an intruder, I thrust the food parcel at him and said quickly, without thinking, ‘Your mother sent lunch.’ He looked at me as if he’d only just seen me and reddened.
‘Mommy’s little boy, huh?’ the woman said. ‘She cut the crusts off too?’
‘Fish,’ I said, feeling the need to defend Dub, ‘and rice. No crusts.’
The woman smiled at me, a little uncertainly perhaps, and I felt like I’d been wrong-footed. Dub made no move to take his lunch parcel. I waited for a signal from him that would let me leave but he was looking at her. ‘So when will the car be ready?’ she said.
Dub recovered enough to ask, ‘Will you be coming every day to remind me until it’s done?’
‘Will it make any difference?’ she asked.
‘Well now,’ he said smoothly, ‘it’ll take a whole lot longer then, my lady.’
Earl came out looking for Dub, but when he saw the woman and the look on Dub’s face he retreated, smiling to himself. After a minute, he came out again and said, ‘A little help.’ Maybe he’d decided Dub could flirt on his own time. Dub walked back inside, but from the way he moved, every step as soft as a cat’s, I could see he was conscious of the woman’s gaze.
The woman watched him go. Still holding Dub’s lunch, I turned to follow him, but she started talking. Even as she talked, she stared into the gloom of the garage, to where Dub and Earl were bent over a bike. ‘I moved in two weeks ago,’ she said, pointing to the building opposite. ‘I told Eddie I wanted the top floor. It’s always cooler on a top floor, right? I get two rooms, a kitchen, my own bathroom. And a balcony. I leave the balcony doors open all day until I have to close them in the evening to keep the bugs out. I open them again later, when the bugs are gone, to let the night air in. I don’t like to feel like I’m in a box. Anyway, fresh air is healthy, don’t you think?’ I looked up at her balcony. She had a clear view of the garage forecourt. Recently Dub had taken to working out there with his shirt off. I wondered why she was talking to me; did she think I was his brother? I stood up a little straighter in what I wore: Benny’s old jeans and a t-shirt that said Sampaguita Chemical Corp, a present from one of Aunt Mary’s friends.
‘It’s a good kitchen,’ she continued, ‘I get it all to myself, but I don’t get to use it that much – only the refrigerator. Meals are sent over ready-made most times. Eddie arranges it. I know when he’s coming because he sends over double, or more if he’s not alone.’ I wondered if Eddie was the name of her husband. I thought if I had a wife that looked like that, I’d be home every night. She said his name as if he were someone familiar to both of us, a mutual friend. ‘It’s mostly from the same restaurant,’ she continued. ‘Rosaline’s. Not real expensive as you might expect with Eddie. He took me there for our first proper date. When I saw it, I thought he was testing me. He said he used to wash dishes there and sweep up when he was a kid. I guess he wanted me to see that part of him.’ I knew the place she was talking about, though I’d never eaten there. It was near the jetty, one of a line of noodle joints and eateries. It had been there for as long as I could recall. I couldn’t imagine a woman like her in it. ‘It’s a rat-hole really, but Eddie says he’ll miss it when it has to close for the first phase. He imagined when he was a kid that it would always be there. But it’s like he always says: change is inevitable. He says he’ll have to make sacrifices like everyone else.’ I didn’t know what she was talking about but I didn’t care to ask; looking at her, it was hard to think straight. She carried on, her voice low, conspiratorial, eager to fill any gaps. ‘I’m a village girl,’ she said, but I didn’t believe her; she looked nothing like the village girls that came through Esperanza on market day. ‘When I first came, I slept on the floor of my friend’s room. There were four of us just on the floor. We had to go for a walk when her boyfriend came.’
When it became clear that Dub wasn’t coming out any time soon, she said, ‘He thinks he’s Elvis, right?’
‘He plays the guitar,’ I said, ‘and sings.’
‘Who doesn’t?’
‘I don’t.’
‘You want to?’
I’d never really thought about it. I tried to picture myself holding a guitar and singing, and it made me laugh out loud. She seemed to like that. ‘What’s your name?’ she said.
‘Joseph.’
‘Maria Luisa. But I get called BabyLu.’
I looked at her smooth brown face, her arched brows that made her eyes look as if they perennially harboured a question. ‘He has long hair,’ I said.
‘Elvis?’
‘Dub.’
‘What kind of a name is Dub?’
I shrugged. ‘He’s a musician.’
She started laughing. She was still smiling as she crossed the street back to her apartment. I watched her go. Even after she’d disappeared into the building, her scent hung over the forecourt.
Dub came back out. ‘Did she ask about me?’ he said.
I held his lunch out and he took it automatically. ‘She said you looked like Elvis.’
He stood looking at her apartment block for a couple of minutes until Earl came out and said, ‘I gotta do all the work by myself today?’
After Dub had gone back inside, I turned to leave and, looking up, I saw BabyLu on her balcony. She waved at me and I waved back. Lucky Eddie, I thought.