As I came out of the Safeway pushing my cart, Isabel’s tan. Mercedes pulled up. I felt a stab of embarrassment. I had made myself sound so busy, but there I was at the store. I could have bought the sour cream. Isabel saw me and hurried up. Her gray-streaked hair straggled from its bun, and there was a brownish dirt smudge on her usually immaculate white tennis dress. My embarrassment turned to pity; after all the hours she toiled for the museum, we had scorned her gift.
“Isabel,” I said quickly, “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I’d have to stop at Safeway, but my mother needed some things. If I’d known, I would have bought the sour cream.”
She brushed the apology aside with a flick of her hand. “That’s all right. How is your mother, anyway?”
“She’s fine.”
“Good, good. Actually, I’m glad I ran into you. Don’t you think we should have sugar as well as sour cream for the guests to dip the strawberries in?”
“That’s not a bad idea.”
“Both brown and powdered sugar.”‘
“Yes. Do we have any dishes to put it in, though?”
“I have some silver bowls at home. I’ll bring them.”
“You’re so good to us.”
Again, she flicked her hand. “De nada. I like my work for the museum. Unlike a few other charities I could name. I met with that restoration group this afternoon-you know, the one that’s trying to get the old Sanchez property. They have no idea what it takes in terms of organization…” She launched into a long, distracted account of the troubles she had encountered with the group, then began telling me about the impractical outlook of a church group that was assisting illegal aliens. I shifted from foot to foot, leaning on my grocery cart. Isabel didn’t seem to notice my impatience, and I didn’t have the heart to interrupt. The woman had obviously had a rough day, and it was in part my fault. When she finally ran down, I loaded my groceries in my car and drove to Goleta.
I parked in a visitor’s slot near the spacious lawn in front of the redwood and shingle recreation center of the mobile home park. Beyond the building were a pool and a putting green, and the trailers stood on U-shaped culs-de-sac around this central area. Each had its own little yard and shade tree.
The smell of chile verde-pork and beef chunks simmering with green chiles and spices-filled my mother’s trailer. She and her latest boyfriend, Nick Carrillo, sat in the living room drinking white wine. I got myself a glass and joined them.
“So what’s new with you, Miss Elena?” Nick asked. “You ready to take up running yet?” He was a tall, white-haired man of seventy-eight who jogged several miles a day. He was always trying to get me interested in running, but to no avail.
“I told you, I’m the sedentary type.”
“You were on the women’s swimming team in college.”
“That’s different. I’m good at swimming.”
“Then you’d be good at running.”
That was probably true. I had a very slow heartbeat and when I swam it slowed down even more and my endurance grew. It would work the same if I ran. But I didn’t want to run. Besides, if I started running, Nick and I would have nothing to argue about.
“Sorry, Nick.”
“You ought to do something about exercise,” Mama said.
“You’re a fine one to talk. You hate to exercise, and look at you-you’re as slim as I am.”‘ My mother was the youngest-looking woman of sixty-seven I’d ever seen. In fact, except for her hair being straight and gray instead of curly and dark brown, she and I looked a lot alike. We had the same regular features, and hers were almost as unlined as mine. Only her hands attested to her lifetime of hard work.
“I’m talking about exercising for your health, not your figure,” Mama said. “You don’t look so good today.”
“Now, Gabriela, leave the girl alone,” Nick cautioned.
“I’m just tired.” I took a sip of wine. “The museum-”
“You need food.” My mother stood up. “Go put your laundry in. Nick will help me with the salad.”
I went to the laundry room in the recreation center and stuffed my clothes in the machine. When I got back to the trailer, the table was set and Mama was ladling out the chile verde and rice. “Sit and eat,” she said.
Over dinner Nick asked,“ That Frank still giving you trouble?”
“Always. Now he’s threatening to fire me and give my job to the Colombian.”
“Isn’t the Colombian some kind of moron?”
“Yes. Frank doesn’t mean it…I don’t think.”
Mama frowned. “What did you do to Frank to make him threaten that?”
“Why is it always my fault? Why do you think I did something to him?”
“I know you.”
“Mama, that’s not fair!”
“Ladies, ladies,” Nick said.
“All right, maybe you’re right. Maybe I did do something to Frank. But it was justified.”
“What did you do?”
“I… uh…I told him someone should kill him. And I called him a terrible name. In front of everybody.”
Mama looked triumphantly at Nick. “See?”
“Well,” Nick said in a conciliatory tone, “he must have done something to cause that.”
“You bet he did!” I told them in gruesome detail about the tree of life.
Mama sighed. “Isabel. She means well, poor thing.”
“Poor thing!” I said. “She has millions.”
“And nothing else.”
“That’s true. She threw old Doug Cunningham out after he started playing around with that twenty-five-year-old model.”
“Well, Douglas was no prize even before that. Isabel could have done far better. She was a Vallejo, you know.”
During the three decades of Mexican rule in the 1800s, a landed gentry had emerged in Alta California. Spanish by birth, most often soldiers who had served loyally, the dons who founded such aristocratic lines as the Vallejos were granted huge tracts of pastureland by the government. On them they raised horses, cattle, and sheep and built elaborate haciendas. The elegant life-style of the ranchos has been romanticized in story and song and even now is recreated in yearly celebrations such as Santa Barbara’s Fiesta Days. Isabel had indeed descended from a privileged background.
“No,” my mother said, “Isabel didn’t have to marry the likes of Douglas Cunningham.”‘
I poured myself more wine. “What? You think she shouldn’t have married an Anglo?” Mama didn’t approve of mixed marriages, and she was ominously silent whenever I dated an Anglo.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You meant it.”
“Ladies,” Nick said.
“Maybe you think she should have married someone like Frank De Palma?” I smiled as I said it, picturing the immaculate Isabel trying to reform Frank.
My mother’s face, however, was serious. “Certainly not. A marriage like that would have destroyed her.”‘
“What do you mean?”‘
“Look at Frank. If anyone ever lived the tradition of machismo, he is it. Frank demands complete obedience from his women. He would have broken the spirit of someone like Isabel.”
“But Isabel was raised in that tradition, too. You should see the way she defers to Frank at the museum.”
“That’s at the museum. I’m talking about in the home. A man like Frank would have driven Isabel mad. At least with an Anglo she could let her anger loose and divorce him.”
“So why are you always hinting I should marry one of our own kind? You think someone like Frank wouldn’t drive me around the bend?”
Mama sighed. “Not all of our men live and breathe machismo. Frank is an extreme. Look what he’s done to his wife.” Her eyes became faraway, remembering. “Rosa Rivera-as she was called then-was the loveliest girl. Why she married Frank I don’t know. He was the grubbiest little boy when we were growing up in the barrio. And he hasn’t improved much.”
“Well, there’s no accounting for tastes.”
She looked sternly at me. “Your mother would certainly know that.”
“My taste isn’t so bad!”
“Oh? What about that Steve? The one with the motorcycle?”
“Admittedly, he was a mistake.”
“And Jim? All that hair.”
“He wasn’t so bad!”
“No?”
“Well, he wasn’t.”
“Yes,” she said darkly. “I know what you liked about him.”
“Ladies.”
“If you mean, was he good in-”
“Ladies!”
Both of us looked at Nick.
“Enough.”
Quietly we returned our attention to our plates.
In a few minutes Nick got up and cleared the table for dessert. Fresh fruit. Mama liked sweets, but she didn’t dare serve them when the old health nut was around.
Nick wolfed down some grapes and stood up. “I don’t mean to run out so fast,” he said, “but I’ve got a meeting at the rec center to plan for the marathon.”
“Marathon?” I looked up from the apple I was cutting.
“Yes.” His eyes sparkled. “A bunch of us old fogies are organizing a marathon race-show you young folks how to do it right.”
I rolled my eyes. “What next?”
“Next I get you out there. Thanks for dinner, Gabriela. Maybe I’D drop back later.”
“Do that, Nick.”
He went out, and Mama and I sat there in silence. Finally she said, “Is your job really in trouble, Elena?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Sometimes I feel I should chuck it anyway. The pettiness is getting to me.”
“What would you do?”
“I don’t know. I’d have to move away. There’s not much available in my field in Santa Barbara. And I don’t want to do that.”
“What, my little girl is not adventurous?”
“Not really. I like it here. I like the house.” I looked around the cozy trailer. “I guess I have my mother’s nesting instinct.”
She looked fondly at me. “Both you girls do. I don’t think Carlota would have moved away either, if there hadn’t been such a shortage of teaching jobs.”
“Probably not. Have you heard from her?”
“On Sunday she called.”
“Anything new?”
“No.”
I went to switch my laundry to the dryer. On the way through the rec center I spotted Nick and his “old fogies” conferring in the lounge. There seemed to be some disagreement on how the marathon would be run, because they were all talking loudly at once. Nick waved cheerfully at me, though. I guess they enjoyed shouting.
Back at the trailer, I found Mama unfolding a couple of lounge chairs on the little spot of lawn. “Come and sit awhile,” she said.
I sat. For a few minutes we didn’t speak. Then she said, “Are you sure everything’s all right at the museum, Elena?”
She must really be worried. My job had always had its ups and downs, some more serious than today’s. “Everything’s not all right, but I don’t see why you’re so concerned.”
“I have a feeling.”
“Oh, your feelings!” Mama often laid claim to premonitions. When I scoffed at them, she would merely give me a dark look that said, There are things more terrible here than you can imagine. Unfortunately, her premonitions were usually right.
“So what do you think is going to happen?” I asked.
“I don’t know. It’s just a feeling.”
She sounded forlorn, and I tried to reassure her. “Okay, what’s the worst that can happen? I can lose my job. There are other jobs.”
She didn’t say anything.
“Okay, suppose the opening’s a bust. Or the volunteers forget the strawberries for the press preview. Or Maria elopes with Vic.”‘ I decided to joke her out of her mood.“ Or maybe Tony will run off with Isabel. A rich person might will us a whole bunch of arboles de la vida, uglier than what we’ve got now. Or Frank will get even fatter. Or I’ll elope with rotund Robert.” None of it was very funny, however, and Mama wasn’t having any cheering up.
“I just have got this feeling.”
“Mama, Mama, you’re depressing me.”
“I don’t mean to.”
I patted her work-worn hand. “I know.”
We sat there in the silence, listening to the crickets and occasional conversations of people passing by. Around ten o’clock Nick reappeared, and I took it as my signal to leave. Collecting my clothes from the dryer, I waved good-bye to the remnants of the group of “old fogies” and went to my car.
I wasn’t sleepy. In spite of a straight week of lying awake nights, I wasn’t tired at all. I sat in the dark, tapping my fingers on the steering wheel, then started the car and drove toward the museum. All was dark, except for the floodlights on the lawn. For a moment I debated going in, checking the collections once more, but decided against it. I was getting obsessive about my work, and I didn’t like that. Finally I drove to the palm-dotted park on Cabrillo Street along the waterfront and sat in my car, watching the lovers on the grass.
I didn’t have a male friend right now. Jim-the one who was good in bed-had gone out of my life she months ago, and since then the museum had taken all my time. That wasn’t right. I should be getting out, going to parties, meeting people.
But why? Somehow the old game didn’t interest me anymore. I would much rather sit in my house reading art journals and novels than go out partying. Maybe I was going to be alone all my life. Maybe I would never find anybody to be comfortable with. Mama never said anything, but I knew she worried about grandchildren. What if she’d raised Carlota and me to be too independent?
Children. Did I want them? I didn’t know. Children were such an unknown quantity when the man who would father them was faceless.
A husband? Did I really want anyone on a permanent basis? I didn’t know that either.
Angrily I shook myself. “You’re too damn introspective these days, Elena,” I said aloud. “No wonder you don’t sleep at night.”
The words echoed in the little car. Then the sound died, and I felt more alone than ever. Mama had a feeling. Her feelings were usually right. But what did it mean?
I sat there for a long time, until the moon disappeared behind a giant palm tree and the lovers were gone from the grass.