for little huevos. Did you look for eggs? I asked. No, he said, I no look. Ah, I said, but did someone look for your little huevos? Yes, he said with a grin, someone find my little huevos and they eat them.
When he calls me to run food he always says Maestra, don’t hate me, you take one mash and one mush to twenty-three please. Or Maestra, ¿sabes que te amo, verdad? I do anything for you; just do this one poquito thing for me please. Sometimes he sneaks me a crab cocktail at the end of the night because he knows I love it, the tender jumbo lump crabmeat lightly dressed with lemon and parsley, a bit of cocktail sauce on the side.
Often the Mexicans ask me if I am enojada, or ¿Por qué estás triste, Mari? they wonder. ¿Que te molesta, Mariquita? It’s because I’m perpetually lost in thought and wear a sunken, anxious face. I say No, I’m not mad. I’m not sad either. Nothing’s bothering me. Miguel asks me Maestra, what are you thinking about? He doesn’t love you anymore? I say He never loved me, he just fucks me. Miguel tells me that last year the woman he loved was pregnant with twins, his first children. For reasons no sabemos she decided to have an abortion and she left him. He tells me he couldn’t work, he would cry while he was running the line every day, every night he would get so drunk. He kept trying to quit but Danny wouldn’t let him. He says to me And now, Maestra,I’m fine. See? Look at me. I want to die then. But now—what can you do? Stop thinking about it, thinking is no good for you. I say Okay, Maestro, claro. No más thinking.
He’s right, it’s important to buck up every night and breathe deeply and be happy for the people so they’ll want to believe you when you call the $140 Kobe filet the best beef in the world and promise it will actually melt in their mouths. You have to stay bright to get them on a bottle of Caymus or Cakebread, you can’t be lurking in the back of your melancholy head. Sometimes I think this is why Danny says Suck my balls whenever I walk past him—it’s spoken with the utmost affection and the utmost defiance. When he says Suck it he’s saying It’s a circus, honey-love, so fuck those motherfuckers. And when my retort is Get it out I’m saying Here we are being hard and relentlessly dazzling in spite of whatever shit. We are saying to each other If you have an affliction, any remorse or anguish, eat it, drink it, snort it, fuck it, use it, suck it, kill it.
I work five shifts and I pay for your after-school care and your health insurance and I give your dad a third of the money I make. He brings you by the restaurant each Friday, because I have to come in to pick up my tips for the week and it’s closer to him than my apartment. Plus you like it, and I like showing you off. You’re just old enough to know we’ve been through something and young enough to not hold it against me. Your dad drives through the porte cochere around dusk, before many guests have arrived, and you get a kick out of how the valets open your door and call you ma’am. I wait for you in the lobby, enjoying the luxuries of sitting and street clothes. The maître d’ greets you with Good evening, miss, and a peppermint and you run to me.
One Friday Cal intercepts you, asking you where you’re going so fast, like you’re in trouble. When Cal is giving you all his mischievous attention like that you feel like you’re the one. To my mama, you say, laughing. No you stay with me, Cal says, stay with me until you tell me where you got those blue eyes. From God, you say. That’s right, Cal says, and then to me, You been takin this child to church? No sir, I say, it wasn’t me. Well Miss Mamalisa is it that time? Cal asks you. Ana -lisa, you laugh. That’s what I said, he says, isit time, Mamalisa? Ana -lisa! you say, not laughing. That’s what I said! You got a hearing problem? He looks at me. Have you had her ears checked? I think it’s yours that are malfunctioning, I say
When he calls me to run food he always says Maestra, don’t hate me, you take one mash and one mush to twenty-three please. Or Maestra, ¿sabes que te amo, verdad? I do anything for you; just do this one poquito thing for me please. Sometimes he sneaks me a crab cocktail at the end of the night because he knows I love it, the tender jumbo lump crabmeat lightly dressed with lemon and parsley, a bit of cocktail sauce on the side.
Often the Mexicans ask me if I am enojada, or ¿Por qué estás triste, Mari? they wonder. ¿Que te molesta, Mariquita? It’s because I’m perpetually lost in thought and wear a sunken, anxious face. I say No, I’m not mad. I’m not sad either. Nothing’s bothering me. Miguel asks me Maestra, what are you thinking about? He doesn’t love you anymore? I say He never loved me, he just fucks me. Miguel tells me that last year the woman he loved was pregnant with twins, his first children. For reasons no sabemos she decided to have an abortion and she left him. He tells me he couldn’t work, he would cry while he was running the line every day, every night he would get so drunk. He kept trying to quit but Danny wouldn’t let him. He says to me And now, Maestra,I’m fine. See? Look at me. I want to die then. But now—what can you do? Stop thinking about it, thinking is no good for you. I say Okay, Maestro, claro. No más thinking.
He’s right, it’s important to buck up every night and breathe deeply and be happy for the people so they’ll want to believe you when you call the $140 Kobe filet the best beef in the world and promise it will actually melt in their mouths. You have to stay bright to get them on a bottle of Caymus or Cakebread, you can’t be lurking in the back of your melancholy head. Sometimes I think this is why Danny says Suck my balls whenever I walk past him—it’s spoken with the utmost affection and the utmost defiance. When he says Suck it he’s saying It’s a circus, honey-love, so fuck those motherfuckers. And when my retort is Get it out I’m saying Here we are being hard and relentlessly dazzling in spite of whatever shit. We are saying to each other If you have an affliction, any remorse or anguish, eat it, drink it, snort it, fuck it, use it, suck it, kill it.
I work five shifts and I pay for your after-school care and your health insurance and I give your dad a third of the money I make. He brings you by the restaurant each Friday, because I have to come in to pick up my tips for the week and it’s closer to him than my apartment. Plus you like it, and I like showing you off. You’re just old enough to know we’ve been through something and young enough to not hold it against me. Your dad drives through the porte cochere around dusk, before many guests have arrived, and you get a kick out of how the valets open your door and call you ma’am. I wait for you in the lobby, enjoying the luxuries of sitting and street clothes. The maître d’ greets you with Good evening, miss, and a peppermint and you run to me.
One Friday Cal intercepts you, asking you where you’re going so fast, like you’re in trouble. When Cal is giving you all his mischievous attention like that you feel like you’re the one. To my mama, you say, laughing. No you stay with me, Cal says, stay with me until you tell me where you got those blue eyes. From God, you say. That’s right, Cal says, and then to me, You been takin this child to church? No sir, I say, it wasn’t me. Well Miss Mamalisa is it that time? Cal asks you. Ana -lisa, you laugh. That’s what I said, he says, isit time, Mamalisa? Ana -lisa! you say, not laughing. That’s what I said! You got a hearing problem? He looks at me. Have you had her ears checked? I think it’s yours that are malfunctioning, I say
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