On a slip of bar napkin, the boy had drawn the outline of her eyes, which peered out at the world with all the emotive power of a stained sheet. A blotch of picante sauce sat congealing near the left corner of this would-be canvas. This absence of artistic expression was not for a lack of earnestness, for earnestness was etched into every line of the drawing, and the boy had meant everything that he’d heard and felt that night. And everything that he’d said. She was his heroine, his savior, and he held her with all the desire in him, or all that he was capable of manifesting in his thin, thirteen-year-old arms. He cupped her breast with love in his heart, for she had made him a man that night, and the tenderness they had exchanged would surely stay with them all their lives. Just as he was settling in to the certainty of their future together, his reverie was cut short by her sudden businesslike tone.
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Portland
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Re: a night in juarez
Thu, July 7, 2005 - 2:01 PM"okay...i gave you ten extra minutes....you a nice kid. too nice. you wanna come back, we end on time. you don' wanna get me in trouble with juan, do you?" she walked over to the wash stand where there hung a tarnished, cracked mirror. she cast a perfunctory look at herself, pinched the nerves between her eyes with her left thumb and forefinger, and then with both hands pinched the apples of her cheeks. The boy looked on, his jaw slack, his eyes wide, full of confused hurt. she proceeded to fluff up her hair, and to show herself all her teeth..she took a quick dab out of the vaseline jar nestled amongst the picante sauce, the wooden bowl of stale tortilla chips, the mouthwash, and ran the goo along her plum-ripe lips, her best feature. satisfied, she snatched her faded peignoir from the chair next to the wash stand and turned to him as she slipped her arms one by one into the nylon ruffled sleeves..she fixed the boy with a glance. "well? cat got your tongue?" -
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Re: a night in juarez
Thu, July 7, 2005 - 2:25 PMSurely, he thought to himself as he gazed up at her with the doe-like eyes of an innocent, surely she was joking. This could not be the same Dolores who just a moment ago had called him her little man, who just five minutes ago had been privy to the finest and most complete moment in his life. In his moment of ecstasy, he had sworn undying love to her, and she had pulled him to her all the more desperately, drawing every last drop of sap from his young body. Surely she could not demand money from him after what they had been through together. But that is precisely what she was demanding, and in her eyes (he might have drawn them differently now, had he the chance) he could read nothing even faintly resembling the love they had shared. And that he still felt for her. -
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Re: a night in juarez
Fri, July 8, 2005 - 2:47 PMwhat the boy didn't know was that Dolores, who's very name means sorrow, was "paid" at the beginning of last night's magic by Raymundo, his eldest brother, who loved nothing more than to humiliate the local girls that worked in the rooms above the bar. Dolores had a habit that Raymundo kept satiated, and of course, he attached conditions.....last night he had amused himself by holding out on Dolores until she took his baby brother up the bar's "stairway to heaven" and made him "see stars" for the 1st time....the passion the boy saw in her eyes, the fervor with which she called out his name, all that was simply her feverish manifesto of longing for the pharmaceutical compound that she so badly craved and was needing more than ever by now......Dolores saw the boy's panic and guessed what he was thinking.....how could she tell him he owed her nothing without giving him the impression he was special? -
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Re: a night in juarez
Fri, July 8, 2005 - 4:40 PMHe WAS special. He HAD to be. The boy kept telling himself that, needing to believe it—for tonight would be the night that all of his mettle, all of his manhood, would be tested. And the boy knew it would be tested in blood. He had made the decision weeks ago, planning carefully, imagining the deed, waiting for the right moment. Getting shut of his inocencia was just the first step. For tonight, in the city of Juarez, his name would pass into history. Perhaps into legend. When dawn once again came crashing through the streets of boystown, invading the bars and brothels and sending the taxi dancers and whores scattering home to bed, the boy would no longer be just "the boy". He would be Reinaldo Maruño Federíco de la Garza, the man who sent his hustling, wife-beating, gun-slinging pusher of a brother straight to hell. -
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Re: a night in juarez
Tue, July 12, 2005 - 4:34 PMA series of lazy knocks on the door startled them both. "Dolores, you wanna come on down now, i think..." muttered Julio, the barback, alluding to the fact that Raimundo was downstairs, waiting, no doubt busy waxing his moustache and hair with his pomade as he did everyday when he stopped by the bar as he made his rounds throughout boystown. "I'm coming, just a minute." Dolores couldn't stop her hands from shaking as she flung the peignoir from her body and scrambled into a sundress that she wrapped around her diminishing curves and tied into a careless knot at her ribs. She slid her feet into a pair of sandals. "Look' she said attempting a tone of tenderness as she addressed the boy "your brother took care of everything....you don' owe me nothing....'. She crossed the tiny room and steadied her hand long enough to tousle Rainaldo's hair. The prospect of her fix made her feel compassionate, even indulgent. "I had a nice time last night; a real nice time. Your brother told me you were a sweet kid. He was right. You stay outta trouble. Find yourself a good girl and you'll be just fine." She leaned down towards the boy and taking his face into her moist hands she kissed him on the forehead, and then on both cheeks. The look in her eyes was faraway. One lone, imperative knock interrupted her farewell. "Dolores....how many times I tell you not to keep me waiting?" There was no mistaking who's voice it was. Their moment was over just as surely as the next one had inevitably arrived.
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