a.y. tanaka - story


Red Wings

Ruiz woke early, like yesterday, like the day before.  The
steel-gray sky still hung low over the city.  On the sharp far
edge of the earth, a slice of red sun.  He fought down his groan
and his shiver, sat up the best he could, while the rest of his
body got used to it, while his feet found and fought the cold
slippers.  These moments --

He heard the garbage cans kick each other on the sidewalk (not
their fault), tossed back against their iron side-stair
railings, hydrants, park/don't-park signs; heard the garbage
trucks heave and grumble down the street, the men's short
shouts.  (One told him once, "Nobody orders us around -- they
need us bad.")

He pulled on his jeans.  In the dim light he couldn't tell
if his sister had ironed himn the blue or the dark gray. Not
that it mattered; everything went with everything else.

He left the room, careful to not wake up his kid brother, and
tried the kitchen, didn't expect it to be warmer.  He
stretched there, the biggest room in the apartment.  The
ancient builders must have had a lot to eat, and invited
neighbors in to share. 

He made black coffee.  If he didn't need the jolt, he'd load
it with milk, like a human being.  He felt disloyal for not
doing it, for putting up with all sorts of wrong things.  He
sipped at the coffee and watched the toaster fizzle.  More
sips, and he shook his head, poured in the milk anyway, but he
still felt disloyal.

It was good they weren't up this early, it wasn't their hour,
Benita still asleep on the sofa in the living room, Rufino on
the cot in the other room, call it a bedroom.  Not the hour
for talking.

He left the apartment, made sure the door clicked and locked. 
He knew he'd forget one day, it happened to the smartest, but
he pushed the day as far ahead as he could.

No use fighting the long-tailed smell in the hallway, nobody's
dog, the Come And Get Me clues anywhere the walls had empty
space.  He used to think poets and artists were popping up,
cracking their shell. 

He paused on the quiet landing.  In the soft air a lonely
alarm clock, a lonely groan, lonely ice wailing in cold pipes. 
Soon, waves of pachanga, merengue lim¢n, plena llen¡sima,
salsa picante, rug, rag, reggae splashing out of little
buckets you plug in (even better -- guts, lungs, bongos,
l2-strings, throats and tongues), pots-pans banging,
knives-forks-dominoes clattering, kids chattering, kids
complaining, kids crying, mothers scolding, mothers
comforting, drumsticks rehearsing, rehearsing.  Soon.  Now, in
the soft air, he stepped downstairs, heard each step creak.

Outside, the smashed jars and the chunks of rust (chunks from
what, couldn't tell) were still covered with snow, just
enough.  The wind slapped his face and shook his teeth.  He
dug into the flannel jacket and pushed his legs toward the
subway.  He passed a rag pile or an old rug or some Thing in
front of what used to be a store.  He thought fast, was it
worth the bother.  No, the guy or whatever had to be dead
already from the cold -- shouldn't have drunk all his wife's
money, mainlined it, puked it out.  

Ruiz pushed on to the subway.  His teeth tingled.  A scrawny
cat drifted near the Thing, sniffed, drifted away.

He made it to the station.  The platform was crowded with
silent men.  Most wore his flannel jacket and dark jeans.  He
couldn't make out the blue from the dark gray, not that it
mattered.  Some men wore old dark overcoats, worn years ago by
men who were never up this early.  Some in the silence read El
Mundo.  Not so many read El Sol.  He nodded to the old
Mundo/Sol vendor, but didn't buy.  This early, don't mess with
the world, it'll do you the same favor. 
Only a few women on the platform, but they knew they were
safe.

The train roared in, grabbed up anyone with flannel jackets,
dark jeans, old dark overcoats and sucked them into the
tunnel.  Now and then a lamp on the tunnel wall flashed a
glimpse of truth: oil streaks, an MTA man's lost glove, a
spider prowling for mice.

Like a tongue, like an endless tongue chasing a bug, the train
shot from the tunnel, and the just-now fully-risen sun burst
through the almost-cleaned windows, sealed forever.  He
thought: All wrong, all wrong, too warm.  Go home, change,
come back later.  Too late. 

The train rumbled limp on the elevated, above the highway. 
He no longer soaked up the sights, was full, knew them from
yesterday, buckets of yesterdays, knew them cold:  Rolling
fields of chassis and fender, black tire dunes; 'spoons,
bowling domes, taverns, motels; the bulldozed pit for next
year's happy hour. 

Smokestacks jabbed the young red sun, glowed, brothers,
bishop's fingers blessing the villagers.

It paused, all trains do, preoccupied and lonely in the air. 
He saw the far bird curving slowly down at him, leveling
now, coming, coming, red wings and no experience with glass,
saw it smash against the window. 

                            #

Rufino woke up at ten.  First thing, he checked the other cot,
saw Ruiz was gone, so wasn't sick today.  He got up like getting
up was no problem, and tried the living room.  Benita was gone,
her stuff folded up and tucked away, neat.  A visitor would
never guess.

In the kitchen El Cid was awake and scratching at a cockroach
in the corner.  Rufino set out the milk and cut up the franks,
easy pieces.  Then he got dressed and left.  The door clicked
and locked.

The hallway smelled like it always did -- onions, garlic,
beer, soap, nobody's dog.  Waves of pachanga smashed into him,
and merengue, and plena, and salsa, and reggae, splashing out
of little buckets you plug in, pots-pans banging,
knives-forks-dominoes clattering, kids chattering, kids
complaining, kids crying, mothers scolding, mothers
comforting, drumsticks rehearsing, rehearsing.

He stepped down the stairs and couldn't hear them creak.  
   
Now with the sun high, the old women, bundled up,
huddled on the front steps (pigeons on a statue, he thought)
keeping track of who's in jail, or dead, or gaining weight and
not sixteen yet.

The boss-woman cackled, "They're coming for you." 

The van pulled up.  Rufino was thankful today's driver didn't
honk; it would just get those ladies started up again.  The
van's side door opened, he lifted himself in and plopped on a
pile of today's El Mundo, next to the Kid, who was maybe his
age, maybe older.  

"Sell plenty papers today," the woman said; croaked, he
thought.  "Help your brother and sister."

"And your cat," another one, maybe her helper, said, more of a
screech than a croak, making points with her boss.

Rufino didn't know, never knew, if they wanted a good-natured
smile or a dirty look, so didn't give them anything.

The van dived into traffic.  Big Chief, today's guy, said,
"Rufi, you get Seventh and Broad, no mickey-mouse today, you
can handle it."

"You'd better," the Kid said.  "It's a big mob there --
anglos, blacks, chinos."

Rufino said, "No problem."  His voice seemed firm enough. 
"It's a big city, you get used to it.  And my English is
pretty good."

Big Chief said, "We'll drop you off with two hundred and come
back in an hour."

"Two fat ones?  You'll kill the guy," the Kid said.

Big Chief said, "That's nothing.  Tribune Square, ten times
that.  Rufi, next month Tribune Square, can do?"

"It's a big . . ."

Big Chief saved him the trouble -- "Sure, but for you it'll be
easy." 

The van moved through streets stuffed with people and  cars,
waited forever at each red light.  At Law Street the light
wasn't working, and a black patrolman directed traffic.  And
this was back when the city kept its black cops hidden.

"Look at that guy," the Kid said, and even with his hands down
low it sounded like his fingers were bigger than sausages
pointing, pointing.  "That face -- thinks he's hot shit
bossing all 'em white folks."  The Kid's accent was pretty
good.

"Shut your face," Big Chief said.  "Just who the hell are You? 
One more skinny spic."

The steam rose in the Kid's face.  "And You, Big Chief?"

"One more fat one."  His eyes stayed on the traffic. 

Rufino didn't know whether to smile or look serious.

Beyond that corner, traffic got worse.  The van was stuck in a
jam Big Chief couldn't predict, and sat useless and an easy
target in front of La Guajira.

Not useless.

"Well now, *ya me llamo Einstein*," said Big Chief.  "Rufi,
take ten papers, go bite that restaurant."

"But they're El Sol guys, they spit on El Mundo."

"They never had a choice.  Go on!"

Rufino jumped out with the papers and bit La Guajira, went
table-to-table, mumbled "El Mundo," humble, the hint of a
dare.  Give the kid a break, it's only a dime.  He was out of
there, papers sold, and the van went on.

Around here the stores and coffee shops and bodegas and policy
cribs sat side-by-side street-level and the apartments watched
you from the second and sometimes the third floor.  On some
blocks the buildings stood even higher and the streets looked
like cattle chutes.  Everything was made out of bricks that
used to be red or yellow or light brown, but it was a long
time ago.

Now the bricks just sort of helped each other.

In tight restaurants and coffee shops sober men ate and drank
with moderation, discussed with calm and reason the day's
problems, stabbed one another in the ribs if they
misunderstood.  Most places this time of day kept a chair
outside on the sidewalk, some regular customer dozing in it. 
You can't tell a regular to beat it.

Bodegas had large baskets propped up on the sidewalk -- sweet
potatoes, string beans, melons, guavas, papayas.  Women poked
through them with doubt on their faces.  Some shrugged and
shuffled away.  Some slowly dug into a purse, slowly brought
out the money, slowly counted it.  One had a large black/white
cat on a leash and tried to hand him/her a sweet potato.

"What do you think, Puch¡n?"

The cat turned away.

"You're right, Puch¡n, let's get out of here."

The traffic got heavier.  Stuck again.  A man -- his  clothes
looked decent but all wrong -- tried not to stagger coming out
to the van.  His eyes said *Can't even get arrested*.

"If you gentlemen could spare a dollar for a cup of coffee --" 

"Beat it, fart-breath," the Kid offered.

"Cool it, Kid," Big Chief said, with the dollar ready.  "Here
you go, fella."

"Thank you sir, God will bless you, have a nice day."

The man made it back to the sidewalk.

The Kid said, "Come on, Big Chief, that guy's no coffee
lover."

"Doesn't matter; he'll be one again."

"How can you tell?"

"I can tell."  

"He'll spread the word we're easy marks."

Big Chief shrugged.

Rufino watched the man steer along the sidewalk. (*And poof,
they don't know you anymore*.)  What good's the dollar anyway? 
  
"It's like methadone," Big Chief sighed, knowing someone
somewhere asked.  "It keeps him going, if you call it going. 
And that mouth -- "  (He meant the Kid.)  "Watch it."

"He got it coming."

"Nobody's got it coming."  Big Chief adjusted the mirror. "A
regular angel of mercy," he muttered.

The van went on.  You saw faces and arms in the windows over
the stores, and sometimes quick shots of girls or women
getting undressed, too distracted to move back enough from the
window.  One of them, everybody knew, was Julieta.  In her
slip she leaned out the window, nothing under the slip.  She
wasn't much older than the boys. 

The Kid perked up:

"Julieta -- lovely as always."
   
"Bull," she answered, and waved. "Where you've been?"

"I must work, madam," he said, as if to remind her of his
legal wife, his sixteen children and his aged parents.

"Don't overdo it," she said, as if to remind him of her many
lonely nights, the dusty guitar in the corner unplucked.

More teases bouncing back and forth, then "See you later,
Julieta."  

Rufino couldn't smile like he was supposed to.  Julieta, the
shadows under her slip calling, calling who?  The Kid, fingers
like sausages, ears perked for a call not meant for him.  And how
those two smiled and flirted, rose and fell and almost rhymed. 
Like they're the same. 

An old man walked by, glanced up to the girl in the window in
her slip.  She smiled and waved, enough.

As the van drove on -- "Catch those goodies, Big Chief?"

"I was watching traffic.  Crack up the van, what girl's going
to pay for it?" 

"But this one's ripe, man."

"Big deal.  Julieta's like the rest, believe me."

"You been checking her oil, Big Chief? What do you know?"

"Not important.  Here you go, Rufi -- Seventh and Broad." 
   
Rufino looked out -- "It's not so bad" -- his voice as firm as
possible.  It was the biggest and busiest corner he'd ever had
to work on.

"Like I told you," Big Chief said.

"Use your orphan-face," the Kid said.  "It always gets them. 
And don't --"  He didn't finish (-- *screw up*); why bug the
guy?

They tossed the El Mundo bundles on the sidewalk, then Big
Chief and the Kid went off in the van, Rufino on his own.  He
cut the wire off the first bundle, then straightened up
to face them all:

"El Mundo . . . El Mundo . . ."

The morning chill was long gone.  The sun warmed the streets
and Rufino.

"El Mundo . . ." 

He took the dimes, shoved them in his pockets, handed over the
papers, dug out change if he had to, said thank you a few
times, didn't notice, didn't care.  He was with Ruiz and
Benita and El Cid, and Julieta in the window in her slip and
nothing else, the body and the smile of Julieta.

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