Oldladyvoice E-Book

Elisa Victoria

• Herausgeber: And Other Stories
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 374

Beschreibung

Nine-year old Marina swears like a sailor and thinks like a novelist; but that doesn't make growing up any less of a mystery. While her mother is in the hospital with a grave but unnamed illness; Marina spends the summer with her grandmother; waiting to hear whether she'll ever get to go home or be bundled off; newly orphaned; to a convent school. There are no rules here; but that also means there are no easy ways to fend off the visions of sex and violence that both torment and titillate the girl. Presenting a fresh; vivid take on the coming-of-age novel; Oldladyvoice reimagines childhood through the eyes of its one-of-a-kind; hilarious; perceptive; and endearing narrator.

Leseprobe

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And Other Stories Sheffield – London – New Yorkwww.andotherstories.org

Copyright © Elisa Victoria - Blackie Books S.L.U., 2019 All rights reserved by and controlled through Blackie Books S.L.U., Barcelona. This edition c/o SalmaiaLit, Literary Agency Translation copyright © Charlotte Whittle, 2021

All rights reserved.

The rights of Elisa Victoria to be identified as the author of this work and of Charlotte Whittle to be identified as the translator of this work have been asserted.

Originally published in 2019 by Blackie Books, Spain, as Vozdevieja First edition in English, 2021, And Other Stories

ISBN: 9781913505103 eBook ISBN: 9781913505110

Editor: Jeremy M. Davies; Copy-editor: Gesche Ipsen; Proofreader: Christian Müller; Text design, typesetting and eBook by Tetragon, London; Cover Design: Setanta Studio.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

And Other Stories gratefully acknowledge that our work is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

Support for the translation of this book was provided by Acción Cultural Española, AC/E

To my Uncle Pepe, faithful protector of childhood

Contents

IntroductionoldladyvoicePart OneChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Part TwoChapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Part ThreeChapter 10Chapter 11

‌Introduction

The cover of the book in your hand – red and white stripes with an overlaid print from which red, pink, and yellow flowers seem to float upward – is taken from a dress that Elisa Victoria’s grandmother made her when Elisa was a little girl. “It was cool and comfortable,” Elisa writes. “When I wore it, hardly anyone messed with me.” The dress is like a talisman or a kind of armor, a protective layer to ward off at least some of the daily troubles of childhood. In Oldladyvoice, protagonist Marina also views certain garments this way, like the palm-tree skirt her grandmother makes her before their Marbella vacation: “Between this and the Minnie Mouse pinafore,” says Marina, “there won’t be much I can’t handle.”

But nine-year-old Marina has an awful lot to handle. She feels like a misfit. She’s been to several different schools. Her family isn’t like others, she knows people think they’re weird. Her beautiful mother is enigmatic and troubled. She hasn’t seen her father in years, and her mom’s eccentric boyfriend Domingo is “more like an older brother with a job than a dad.” The social world of her grandma’s apartment block is a minefield, and she’s tormented by the early onset of puberty, the stirrings of desire in her young body. She has plenty of questions about how she should act as a girl. Or maybe she’d be better off as a boy? She might be enjoying the mild chaos of her grandmother’s world for the summer, but she’s also waiting for news of her mother’s health. Why won’t the grownups tell her what’s going on? Her greatest fear is that if her mom dies, she’ll be sent to live at a boarding school run by nuns.

Marina can let off steam at her grandma’s house. She can watch all the TV she wants. She can stuff herself with fried eggplant and croquetas. She can get away with swearing more than she can at home, and her grandma is open with her in a way that her mother is not. Part of this book’s charm is its representation of the grandmother-granddaughter relationship as a space of freedom, of the grandmother as a source of refuge and stability on one hand and a purveyor of anarchic joie de vivre on the other. In this homage to the bond between grandparents and grandchildren, the two generations meet on the margins and observe, bemused, as those in the middle go about their lives. More broadly, Oldladyvoice is an unsentimental portrait of three generations of women – three Marinas – in a family where men are marginal or simply not there at all. “My inheritance is transmitted only by women, no one else tells family stories, no one else makes important decisions,” Marina tells us. “Paternal surnames don’t mean anything.”

Her grandma’s conversation is as unfiltered as Marina’s narration. Yet Elisa Victoria always portrays Marina with compassion, because she knows that when you’re young, the little dramas can seem as momentous as the big ones. Waiting for news about your mom’s illness is excruciating, yes – but so is having to walk past a gang of kids playing table soccer. This awareness extends beyond the social, to Marina’s experience of her own body: the scorching summer heat on her skin, the tingling she feels when someone pays attention to her, or that other tingling brought on by lust. The ache in Marina’s chest, her fascination with her “hole.” The feeling of needing to pee. The feeling of needing to take a shit, and the relief when you finally can. This uncensored treatment of physicality is an essential part of Elisa Victoria’s non-hierarchical depiction of childhood, which would be incomplete without sex and other bodily functions. The author has said, “I see all the details of daily life as equally important. From the sleep dust in your eye, to a metaphysical observation. I think you can only get a full picture of the human condition by reflecting it all on the same level.” Likewise, Marina’s fears and the perverse images that assault her are no more or less important than keeping her dolls’ hair looking nice.

Reading Marina reminds me just how deeply felt the perceived injustices of childhood are. She may be small, but her desires – the desire for friendship, the desire to fit in, and to discover her body’s potential – are as large as those of any adult. Her keen sense of the wrongs of the world goes hand in hand with her compassion for others. She is wise, tender, and funny. It was impossible for me not to fall in love with this smart-beyond-her-years girl with a filthy mind and an enormous heart. She’s the friend I would have loved to have when I was nine. I hope you enjoy meeting her as much as I did.

CHARLOTTE WHITTLEBrooklyn, May 2021

‌oldladyvoice

My mom’s dark flamenco dress lurks on top of the wardrobe. It’s green with enormous black polka dots. When she puts it on, she’s the prettiest woman on the face of the earth, but it’s been lying there for months and I’m fed up with seeing it from my bed. It doesn’t bother me too much during the day, but when I take off my glasses to go to sleep, its blurry ruffles turn into a gigantic coiled snake and I have to hide under the blanket so it can’t see me. It would be easier to admit that I’m scared of it and ask for it to be kept somewhere else – which would also be better for the dress – or try and explain the vision away, but this doesn’t even occur to me. Things are the way they are. It makes no difference anyway. I still see the snake as soon as I turn out the light, no matter how tight I shut my eyes.

There’s a loud noise coming from the living room. Mom sleeps in there because we live at my grandma’s house and there aren’t enough bedrooms for all of us. We lived in other places before, but I barely remember them. I have a room of my own. This makes me feel really guilty. An uncomfortable luxury. The wallpaper is pink with white clouds, but the room is way too gloomy, and I only make it worse by covering the window with stickers. I can’t help it, sticking them up there makes me feel rich.

I’m scared, I want to complain, to cry a bit rather than know what’s going on. But I hold it in and wait. Mom comes into the room, gathers me up in her arms, and lifts me out of bed in the dark. I take up about as much space as a baby, and it makes me dizzy to be held at the height of her chest. She carries me into the living room like a precious offering. I have trouble opening my eyes. The light hurts. I don’t know what’s going to happen, and I’m still not wearing my glasses. She’s on edge, lost in a mixture of haste and exhaustion. You can tell she’s just another scared little girl caught up in one hell of a mess. There are some boxes of toys on the armchair that haven’t been wrapped. Grandma is by the front door. I notice she’s wearing her blue bathrobe and a really serious expression. She opens the door and three men come in wearing shiny clothes and making a ruckus. They claim to be the Three Kings. Mom isn’t happy and doesn’t ask me to be happy, and she keeps holding me tight. Her heart is pounding like a bull’s. I can’t reach the floor. Balthazar pushes his face into mine and says something about a gift-laden caravan that’ll arrive later in my honor, with so many camels that traffic will be stopped for miles. Why not now, Balthazar? It’s supposed to be now. The dark smudges on his face make me feel sick, I don’t want them to rub off on me. I’d rather go see those toys up close and open the boxes now, but I’m not allowed. I have to wait until morning.

In less than five minutes I’m back in bed as if nothing’s happened, disoriented and bewildered, imagining an unlikely procession of endless gifts. I get no explanation. Grandma’s snores soon punctuate the stillness of the house like an insistent night watchman’s. I may not be four yet, but I’ve got things figured out. Those men can’t have been the Three Kings. They smelled funny: pungent, acrid, smoky. Their costumes were fancy, but they were wearing them wrong. They showed up empty-handed. The gifts were already on an armchair when they arrived, and Grandma opened the door to them at the wrong moment. This isn’t the kind of royalty I’ve been taught to believe in, that’s clear enough. And anyway, their ringleader was Balthazar. He was the main character, and he was scary. Anyone who knows me knows perfectly well that Melchior is my number-one king.

I have no idea who those three guys are, but all they’ve done is made me lose sleep and messed up tomorrow’s surprise. The real Kings weren’t as in tune with me as I was hoping, and they didn’t bring what I asked for. I wanted a big stuffed Snoopy dressed as a pilot and a Rainy Day Chabel doll, the one from the commercial where they dance at night, like in that movie I saw some bits of. I love old movies with music and dancing on big stages, where everything’s clean and polished, the colors look painted on, and there’s never a single curl out of place. I also like the ones set in Roman times. If I could only be grown up and get away from all this confusion. I’d choose a life in black-and-white and the kind of high heels that don’t hurt your feet. I’d have a Christmas tree as tall as the ceiling and smother my friends with gifts. Everything would be easier if I weren’t so precious. I try to hide it, but it’s written all over me. Perfume commercials, TV dances, dolls’ houses, Xuxa. I adore all things corny. That thick, tame snake is still looking at me from the top of the wardrobe, but now I have other things on my mind.

A different, bright, yellow light shines on the morning of January 6. What happened last night doesn’t bother me much. I’m used to seeing clear skies but today it’s like squinting at scenes on postcards from way back in time. I open my presents as if I’d forgotten about them, and I admit that the new toys give off a special magic. There’s a St. Tropez Barbie in a bathing suit that comes with a sizeable comb. I admire the comb for quite a while before opening a box with a pink armoire, also for the Barbie. I don’t know what I’ll put inside, I don’t have any dresses for her, but it comes with three hangers and it’s nice and roomy. The seven cotton handkerchiefs decorated with mice, one for each day of the week, don’t do much for me at all. Maybe the fad for giving hankies as gifts will pass. Things would have to get pretty bad for a kid to resort to using one of those little rags. I’d rather wipe my snot on a dishcloth. But the pink teddy bear is cute. I hug it and jump up and down and stand it next to me to see how far up it comes. They ask me what I’m going to call it. I know exactly. I’ll name it after the uncle I worship, my hero, the doctor who looks out for me every time I need looking out for.

“Pepe!” I answer.

“Another Pepe?”

“Yes!”

“But you already have two Pepes.”

“Well, another Pepe. This one’s going to be Pink Pepe. Pepito!”

“All right then.”

The teddy bear melts my heart and now I can even look at the hankies fondly. I take one out and stroke it to make up for the uncharitable thoughts I had earlier. The Monday mouse is dressed as a mailman. Really cute. This didn’t turn out so badly after all. The king cake is delicious. A few kids parade their new toys around the patio while I have another helping of breakfast. Some neighbors knock at the door. It looks like a package addressed to me has shown up at Tata’s apartment. Tata isn’t family, but she lives on the next floor up and I’ve known her all my life. The word tata means something sweet and hard to define, but nonetheless very specific. I think it’s something less than grandma and more than aunt, but definitely more than neighbor. If I was alone and faced with some unexpected problem, her apartment’s the first place I’d go.

The news of this surprise gift piques my curiosity. I find it in the midst of a tangle of grown-up legs. It’s a carrying case full of sparkling princess accessories. A crown, some bracelets, and who knows what else. I glare at it without a word. Being corny is one thing, but being tacky is quite another. An awkward silence prevails among the towering bodies, until Tata asks lovingly, “Do you like it?”

I’ve been taught not to lie, so I look up and shake my head. Everyone is deflated. I thought I was doing the right thing, but now I feel horribly guilty. Tata snatches up the gift and stalks off muttering about returns. I look at Mom and shrug, not understanding what just happened. She crouches down and says, “Marina, sweetheart, when someone gives you a gift you have to pretend you like it even if it’s not true.”

“Why?”

“Because if you don’t, the person who gave it to you gets sad.”

“Why?”

“Because they thought you were going to like it and they feel bad for not getting it right.”

“And did Tata get sad?”

“Yes.”

“But I didn’t want her to get sad.”

“I know, sweetheart.” She hugs me and sighs. “But do you understand?”

“Yes, but that means no one will ever give me anything I like.”

“You tell me what you like, you’ll see. And if you don’t like something I give you, you can tell me and it doesn’t matter.”

“Are you mad, Mom?”

“No, it doesn’t matter, you couldn’t be expected to know what you were supposed to do.”

“And Grandma?”

“She’s not mad either.”

“And Tata?”

“I don’t know, but if she gets mad it won’t last long, and anyway there was no need to make such a fuss. If the kid doesn’t like the gift, then fuck it, what can I say?”

After lunch, I throw the loot onto my bed. I pretend that the Barbie is beautiful and evil like the witch in Snow White and that she’s trying to destroy everything I own, without any success. Mom comes in to say hi. The wallpaper only looks pretty when she’s there. The afternoon light gives her naturally pale face some color. As she comes closer, some reddish highlights glint in her loose black curls. She’s wearing pajamas and lipstick. That’s her usual look at home, though she’s out a lot of the time. She’s thirty-one years old and has a whole lot of problems.

“How are you doing?”

“Good.”

“Do you like the doll?”

“Yes.”

I’ve learned my lesson. I’ll have a chance to let her know what I really want when we’re both more prepared, but for now we’ve had enough. It’s not what I asked for, but the Barbie is pretty, and it’ll be good for me to practice with. I’ve called her Katrina, because she has the face of a true villain, and the name Katrina suggests terrible evil. It makes me mad that I’m still too clumsy to handle more valuable presents. I want someone to give me a Michael Jackson cassette.

“But Mom.”

“What?”

“Those guys who came last night weren’t really the Three Kings, were they?”

“No, that was your father and a couple of his friends. The real kings are magicians, and you can’t see them.”

“Oh, right. And which one was my dad?”

“Balthazar.”

“Well, I like Melchior better.”

“Of course. Me too.”

It puts my mind at ease to know that the guy last night was my father. You can’t ask too much of mere mortals. Who were his friends? No doubt they meant well. I’ve made Mom laugh, so she gives me a kiss. Her wet lips make it awkward, but my lungs still swell with delight. I wonder how long it’ll take Tata to forgive me, how long this excitement will last.

‌Part One

‌1

I’ve just turned nine, and Tata hasn’t let go of her grudge. I live in a different neighborhood, go to a school that doesn’t totally terrify me, and spend lots of afternoons in Amate Park, keeping tabs on what’s going on at the pond. It’s full of stuff that people throw in. A stroller, a walking frame, a crutch. Sometimes a kid shows up with a remote-controlled boat. One winter, I thought I saw a big fish leaping out of the water. I heard it too, but only caught the last flick of its tail when I looked. I have a theory it was a sturgeon, but no one will back me up. It’s a pretty small pond, to tell the truth.

I’ve gotten taller and more observant. I never forget a thing. I miss Grandma pampering me every day, but now I understand that it’s Mom who’s the real queen, the only one in this world, and she’s getting sicker by the day. I like it better now that we have our own house, even though we have to share with Domingo, the latest weird boyfriend she’s found for herself. This neighborhood is a little more modern than the last one, and there’s lots of red brick, which makes it more welcoming too. The three of us have reached an understanding by now. Things aren’t going too badly. The problem is me, inside. I do my best to hide it, do my best to pretend that everything around me doesn’t totally creep me out. It’s hard to trust other people when it seems so easy for them to perform their roles. This worries me. I wouldn’t even say they’re acting, life just seems to come naturally to them, while for me it’s an effort. Whenever I talk to anyone my voice comes out weird, my palms get sweaty, and I realize my human disguise is second-rate. When I’m alone I feel like myself, but then I have to fight the abyss of freedom and terror opening up at my feet. I’m constantly craving an ally to keep me company. At school, in the apartment block, in the little plazas.

Today I got up early to go to class, but luckily that’s a long way away now. From Friday to Sunday I leave the school routine behind, spending all weekend back in the mild chaos that has always ruled at Grandma’s house. It’s just me, Grandma, and Canica, a fluffy little dog with a black back and a white belly. She’s really sweet. Supposedly Santa Claus brought her, but I always had my doubts about how she arrived, since it was a young guy, about twenty, who actually came in and put her on my lap. I was expecting the real Santa Claus to show up that afternoon and ring the bell, or at least someone in fancy dress. Canica was so small and adorable that I pushed her around in a toy baby carriage for weeks. I’d keep doing it, but she won’t let me anymore. She stayed at Grandma’s when we went to live with Domingo. We throw some croquetas together in the cramped living room with the TV on. We like mysteries, though Grandma can always sleep afterward and I can’t. She’s tired; we undress in her room together. There’s a flesh-colored slip beneath her cool-looking red dress. I don’t understand the point of a slip, which must be really hot just by itself, and Grandma still has to take off multiple layers, the stiffest ones. You could squeeze a whale into all that armor, between the bra, girdle, and panties. They dig into her soft brown skin.

“Help me unfasten this.”

I kneel on the bed and free Grandma from the thick shell. It doesn’t seem to bother her a bit during the day. She sighs and sits down, and I crouch to pull off her stockings. She sighs again and begins to speak.

“Now, tomorrow…”

“What?”

“Hang on, I’m thinking.”

A few seconds go by while she squints, her wrinkled index finger at the ready. With her other hand she takes out a cigarette and lights it. She exhales her first puff of smoke and goes on hatching her plan.

“Now, tomorrow I’m going to put my feet in a plastic tub with some salt water.”

“Yes.”

“And then you can take the scissors, snip snip snip, and cut my nails.”

“OK.”

“All right.”

“OK.”

“I look like a hawk.”

“That’s true.”

“I’m going to poop now.”

“I’ll go with you.”

The thought of cutting her toenails makes me uncomfortable and even a little scared, but I think I’m up to the task. She suggests it in a fun way, and there’s no point objecting. She does all kinds of things for me quite happily. I follow her slowly into the bathroom and as she turns the corner she loses her balance.

“Fuck!”

“What happened?”

“Nothing, I just crashed into the corner of the wardrobe.”

She’s seventy-two, short, pot-bellied, and has no regrets. Until recently, the only thing that ever embarrassed her was her own smile in some of the photos where she looks happy. But last year she put her false teeth in for the first time to go to Expo ’92, and since then she’s been feeling invincible. The only thing that seems to get her down nowadays is that she was sewing me a really elaborate flamenco dress and back in March I told her not to keep going since I wasn’t going to wear it and had no intention of going to the Feria ever again. I mean, I get it, dressing up as a gypsy is a huge deal in Seville, and it must have made her mad to abandon a project like that so far along. She gives me an earful about it nearly every day. But apart from that, I don’t think she’s ever been this happy. She sits down with her cigarette in her hand and I keep her company squatting on the floor. I like watching her take a shit. Sometimes we talk and sometimes we don’t, but I’m always mesmerized by her toilet-paper ritual. She tears off two pieces the same size and lays them delicately on her thighs with zen-like calm. She often mentions that she had a Chinese grandma, and when Mom’s around she says that actually, on the quiet, her grandma was Filipino, but it’s all the same to her, and then there’s a squabble. She flicks ash into the bidet. It’s three thirty in the morning and the only sound is her slow breathing. I find the plopping sound very satisfying since I’m a constipated kid. There I am, a white-knickered minion at her feet. She’s sitting upright and stark naked on a throne she’s been enjoying for only a third of her life, relishing the convenience modernity has to offer, the cigarette in her mouth and pieces of white tissue hanging at equal distances off her legs. Now a howl shatters the warm peace of the neighborhood. I shoot a pitying glance up at the ceiling. An unfortunate family lives on the third floor with their disabled son, enormous and lumbering like a rhinoceros crying for its missing horn in the forest.

“Poor little angel, he can’t sleep,” Grandma murmurs, tilting her head.

“How old is he?”

“Almost forty.”

After she’s done, she puts on her white floral nightgown, turns on the radio, and we lie down together in the double bed. I try to think about something nice to scare off any ghosts.

“How long till we go on vacation?”

“Hmm… I’m not sure, let’s count the days. Where are we now?”

“Who knows.”

She takes a little calendar out of her nightstand and we calculate as her eyelids begin to droop. Twenty days until Heaven. I stay awake and listen to the humming radio, which keeps me company as I gaze at Grandma’s nightgown. It’s my favorite but also the one that troubles me most. It gives me a sense of freedom since I associate its pattern with summer vacations, but it also represents the precise moment the dark side of life became clear to me. I’d seen it coming for a long time, of course. Lurking in the silhouettes of Princess Knight, in chairs with high backs, in the lights that flickered across Mom’s thighs in the few taxis we’d taken at night, and in Grandma’s sewing machine, the same heavy Singer with the same fake mahogany stand it’s had since the sixties. Then the dark side finally stuck its paw under the door in 1990, when three key events happened at the Worker’s Resort in Punta Umbría.

The first one caused me a kind of unease I’d never felt before. We had a packet of chocolate sandwich cookies in our room. Each cookie seemed like it would never end – dry and hard and difficult to chew. They filled me up straight away, leaving me stuffed but unsatisfied. I decided to handle the problem by eating just the chocolate filling, the part of the cookies I liked, scraping it off with the still intact baby teeth I miss so much. I knew I might get a major scolding for wasting food if I got caught, so I would sneak over at night, under the cover of darkness, lick the cookies as clean as a dog bowl, then leave them discreetly in a corner of the balcony, on the floor. It would’ve been pretty unclassy to throw them off the balcony, definitely beneath me. But it didn’t take long for them to discover my secret cache, and the dressing down they gave me was epic. The lesson was clear: in this life, if you want to eat just the chocolate, you’ve got to have a decent place to stash the dry cookies.

The second and most important of the three events happened that same night. I was anxious and couldn’t sleep after the row, lying in the roll-out bed next to Grandma’s box spring, and I started feeling scared about being down on the floor. I crept onto the mattress and pressed up against her. She was wearing the same nightgown then that she’s wearing tonight. There were mosquitos wandering across her soft and tanned old skin but she hunted them down, giving herself the odd slap and scratching away the bloody corpse in her sleep. When I finally began to doze off, I saw my first image of the night: a huge army in formation listening to the orders of its colonel, a skinny and shifty character who marched up and down as he yelled. Soon the colonel dissolved mid-speech as if his limbs were made of string, leaving a tangle of flesh-colored vines. When I opened my eyes, I was facing Grandma’s sturdy back covered in colorful little flowers and felt suspicious of my own mind, an unexpected traitor.

The third dramatic moment was hardly unusual in itself. Some boy I didn’t know decided out of nowhere to hold me under water in the swimming pool and try to drown me. From beneath the surface, I saw the shape of alarmed adults coming over, but even then I didn’t think they’d be able to coax the boy out of his fit of rage in time to save me. It wasn’t such a big deal, but kids are weak and accidents happen. I thought I’d probably die then and there. No, I wouldn’t want to go back to Punta Umbría. This year will be different. This year we’re moving up in the world: we’re going to Marbella, the capital of luxury and comfort.

It’s Saturday. We’ve had fried eggs and potatoes and an endless feast of croquetas. I got up late and lunch was after the usual time. Grandma’s been awake since noon, she’s dressed and her eyebrows are already penciled in. I’ve only just got up so I’m disheveled and in my panties and a T-shirt. There’s a movie on TV called Banana Joe. I really wanted to watch it, I saw the trailer and it made it look so fun. The jokes and the plot are a little bit disappointing, but the soundtrack more than makes up for that. I chalk up the letdown to my immaturity and pretend like I totally get it, like I can appreciate all the finer qualities that the movie doesn’t actually have. Our first dessert is two slices of watermelon. The second is Neapolitan ice cream. Strawberry, vanilla, and chocolate. We scoop some out for each of us, and Grandma puts her feet back in the salt water. She splashes and watches the process. She’s been in this position two hours.

“Grab the scissors, honey, it’s time.”

“OK, OK.”

She makes the cutting gesture with her gnarled fingers and says again, “Snip snip snip.”

“OK!”

“Well, if you want you can wait for the commercials.”

“No, no, it’s really no problem.”

I feign sacrifice and interest when really the movie’s a drag. That way I look good. It’s win-win. Her little hawk talons terrify me, which is exactly why I want to get this over with as soon as possible. I kneel and hold her wet foot like an enormous mushy chickpea, a bite of vanilla still melting in my mouth. I rest her calloused heel on my knee covered in scabs from various falls and do my best not to touch any of her nails with my bare hands. The scissors are big and sharp. They’re her sewing scissors, but they’re all we have.

She smokes contentedly while I conduct the operation.

“You’re so good at this,” she says. I smile with my mouth closed, swallow the vanilla ice cream and wrestle with the nail on her big toe, the thickest, most stubborn one, curled in on itself in a spiral.

“Jeez,” I grunt. “Does it hurt?”

“No, it doesn’t hurt a bit. Give it a good chop there, squeeze tight.”

I squeeze the scissors with both hands and a chunk of yellowish toenail goes flying.

“Bravo! What did I tell you? You’ve got talent. Your mother wasn’t even half as bright as you at that age.”

“She wasn’t?”

“No way. She was very pretty and very quick and fun, I’m not saying she wasn’t, but you’re a real smarty-pants. It’s something else! The only trouble is your mother keeps you on such a tight leash that one day you’ll have a seizure.”

“What’s a seizure?”

“It’s like a throwing a fit, but in your head.”

“Oh.”

“In your brain.”

“Right.”

“You’re not even allowed to say jeez. I’m telling you, there’s no need for her to be such a drill sergeant. You’re no trouble at all.”

“Jeez is no big deal, right?”

“How could it be a big deal? I even let you say shit when you’re here with me, isn’t that right?”

I laugh and carefully snip off a toenail.

“Not fuck though, eh. That would be going too far. You can’t say that. I only say it if I’ve hurt myself or I’m upset over something serious.”

“All right, all right, not that one – just thinking about saying fuck aloud is too much. Oops, I said it!”

“Hey! You can’t even say fuck as a joke, all right? If it slips out in front of your mother she’ll have my guts for garters.”

Grandma lets out a puff of cigarette smoke and her belly wobbles as she laughs. She opens her mouth so wide I can see her dentures against her palate from below. I laugh too, and lift up her other foot. The second is always easier than the first. You know how it goes. You only have half left to do.

They’ve just picked me up and I’m back in the red-brick neighborhood. I wish they’d let me have lipstick the color of these walls. It’s seven in the evening and I’ve already got my backpack ready with Monday’s books for school tomorrow. I go buy cigarettes with Domingo. Even though he’s my mom’s boyfriend he seems more like an older brother with a job than a dad. He’s got a stutter and is also a know-it-all, which is a tricky combination, but it didn’t take me long to get used to it. Other people have trouble understanding what he says, but not me. I’m the one who’s spent the most time with him, for better or worse, so he stutters less when we’re together. He usually gets stuck on the Ms, Ss, Ls and Ts. The vowels aren’t exactly a picnic for him either. He studies me like a nosy imp and teases me mercilessly, year after year. He and Mom have had plenty of fights, but I don’t think he’ll ever ditch us. Back when Mom figured their relationship was getting serious, she gave Domingo a nudge one day and left us alone on the couch.

“Listen up, little girl.”

“What.”

“Let’s talk terminology.”

“What’s that.”

“About words.”

“OK.”

“Great.”

He cleared his throat and plowed on, feigning confidence.

“You know even though I’m not your father you can call me Dad.”

We stared each other down with our poker faces. Eventually some hysterical giggles snuck out of both of us.

“No,” I said, “I don’t think I need to do that.”

“OK, that’s clear enough. But, look, I’m just saying, if you’d like to, we can do it that way.”

“No. I said no.”

“You sure?”

“Yes! It would be really weird.”

“I mean, I agree,” he said. “I figure it’s kind of weird too. I just asked in case you wanted to. And maybe weren’t brave enough to ask me.”

“I think we’re good as is,” I said.

And we shook hands on it. I noted a mixture of sadness and satisfaction in him, perfectly balanced. He’s one of the few other people I know who are obviously just barely getting away with pretending, but the fact that at his age he still wouldn’t admit it unnerved me. After a minute of our both feeling weird, he proposed a new plan.

“All right, well, since we’re in agreement and we’ve got to define the situation somehow, let’s go into business together.”

He took out a piece of paper and started to write out a contract. I was six at the time. He was twenty-eight. I thought he must be older, since he was balding and had a dark beard, but he had this playful, mischievous, boyish air about him, like a kid just out of high school. His contract detailed his promise to support me until I was no longer a minor, at which point it became my responsibility to support him until his death to pay off my debt. He was offering me the loan with the highest interest in history. Once again, that typical blend of mild humor and cruelty began to gnaw at my stomach. It was a perverse sort of deal. I didn’t get whether he was serious or not. Obviously, it would be forever until I turned eighteen, but he was rubbing his palms together greedily like an immortal villain salivating over my soul. From that day on he called me Partner, an affectionate nickname that summed up the arrangement to both our tastes. I’ll admit I was about as keen as he was on being soppy. We were in the same boat as far as that was concerned. Soon it’ll be three summers since we moved in together, but running into him in the hallway still gives me a shock. When we’re alone, him and me, something keeps me on the alert, the same kind of suspicion I figure kids with erratic siblings must feel. The difference is he’s been given authority over me. I still long for a real father figure, sometimes. But given the choice maybe I prefer Domingo.

As we go out in search of a packet of Winstons, I beg him to take a detour past the toy store, an essential source of comfort to me in the neighborhood. It’s closed, but just looking in the window is enough. This year is getting really boring, and the Three Kings are the only religion I can get behind, so that’s what I feel like dwelling on. Most kids have already stopped believing in them, and I’ve been through a few crises of faith myself, but I decided a while ago now to hang on to the few crumbs of innocence I’ve got left as hard as I can.

“I hate waiting for the Kings to come.”

“Why?”

“Because it takes so long, and I’m already thinking about what to ask them for.”

“Come on, Partner, don’t tell me you still buy into that charade.”

“What’s a charade?”

“It’s like lousy theater.”

“Like what?” I cry, playing dumb.

“Like a farce.”

I stop dead in the middle of the street.

“Hey, don’t mess with the Kings!”

“I’m not messing with the Kings, I’m just telling you the truth, plain and simple.”

I’m utterly outraged. “Just because you don’t believe in them doesn’t mean they’re not real.”

He gives me a sneer and walks on. I start worrying and rush to catch up with him.

“OK, but if they’re not real, then how come they visit you too?” I ask.

“Mother of God. We just buy each other gifts and give them to each other. That’s all it is.”

“Maybe that’s all it is for you, but Mom believes in the Kings and they come to her every year.”

“We’ll see about that. I’m telling you, I buy her the stuff.”

I’m dumbstruck.

“All right, all right,” Domingo says. “If you’d rather keep kidding yourself, go ahead.”

“Oh yeah? If I’m kidding myself, then how do the Kings always know what I want?”

“Because your mom finds out.”

“Well, there are times when I don’t say anything and I still get stuff.”

“Because your mom finds out.”

I grumble. I’m pretty sad that it might all be a lie.

“Your mom has her methods,” he says. I have no arguments and no hope. I can’t believe how insensitive he’s being. I keep walking in silence. “I’m sorry, kid.”

“I’m not your kid.”

“All right then, Partner.”

He’s clearly in the right. I was the one who brought it up and he gave me an honest answer. I should be grateful he doesn’t take me for a fool. But I’ll still pretend not to believe him and that I buy the other version. Just for a little bit longer. It’s too delicious. We don’t say anything else until we get home. Domingo is smoking a cigarette that looks like it tastes of triumph. At the door to our building, the Banana Joe theme song floats into my head. I adore that song. I wish they hadn’t actually shown the movie yet, so I could just keep hearing it in the trailer.

“Hey, how many Oscars has Bud Spencer won?”

Domingo cracks up. He flicks his cigarette butt onto the street and we go inside. Not a word.

“What’s the matter? Why are you laughing?”

“Nothing, nothing.”

“But do you know how many Oscars he’s won or not?”

“None. I don’t think he’s won any.”

“Seriously?”

“I’m pretty sure.”

“But how can that be? Bud Spencer is super famous!”

“If you say so.”

“Well, I thought they’d have given him at least four or five.”

He keeps on laughing as we climb the stairs and I don’t understand why. In my opinion no one deserves an Oscar more than Bud Spencer.

‌2

I’m the only one in my class taking ethics instead of religion. I’ve been to four schools so far and it’s always been like this. At first, I didn’t know what ethics meant, and got it mixed up with equestrian. I thought they were going to teach me all about horses, and that the rest of my classmates were a bunch of gullible goody-goodies. In the end, I spent an hour a week talking to the teacher about crossing the street at a red or green light, good manners, and simple moral dilemmas. I didn’t mind being alone with her, though it made me feel even more like a misfit, a feeling that plagued me like some horrible goblin whispering into my ear. Mom teases me about the equestrian thing but also assures me I can do whatever I want. Believe in God, get baptized, take communion, even ride horses someday. But I already know that God, and want nothing to do with him. Since my second day of preschool, to be precise. On the first day, I was sitting alone in the sandbox in the courtyard, wishing someone would come over and play with me. I was comforted by the fact that I was wearing my favorite dress, the only one Grandma hadn’t made me, the only one that was bought for me in a store. The skirt and sleeves had blue and white stripes, and on the front there was an embroidered doll facing backward, wearing an embossed hat with a red satin bow I never got tired of stroking. All of a sudden this little girl ran over, yanked out the ribbon, and went off without saying a word. I didn’t say anything either. Grandma noticed as soon as I got home.

“What happened to the little bow on the hat?”

I felt so ashamed I didn’t say anything.

“You already lost it? But you liked it so much!”

“Somebody yanked it off at school.”

“You don’t say. And who was it?”

“Some little girl.”

“And did you do something to her?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“And did you tell your teacher?”

“No.”

Grandma leaned in. She was going to tell me something serious. Her gappy, greenish teeth didn’t scare me at all.

“Don’t you worry, sweetie,” she said. “The Lord will punish that little girl.”

“The Lord? Is that the same as God?”

“Yes, of course.”