The Town of Babylon Read online

  Who looked like Andrés? Mom. Dad. Brother. Aunt. Uncle. Cousin. Other cousin. Black-and-white pictures of grandparents. Landscapers. Busboys. Porters. Villains. Speedy Gonzales. Ricky Ricardo, sort of. Anita from West Side Story. The casts of Stand and Deliver and La Bamba (except for Lou Diamond Phillips).

  * * *

  To live in the suburbs required resources and government assistance that only whites had once received freely. Everyone else made their way slowly by working thrice as hard in order to live two-thirds as well. Over time, the town changed. Neighborhoods continued to be racially segregated and majority white, but there were spaces and opportunities for interaction. Primarily in the public schools. But also in the parochial schools, despite the segregationist effect of tuition.

  Fleetingly and intermittently, school was a leveler. Even though everyone ran back toward what was familiar and easy at the close of each day, students couldn’t be prevented from interacting with one another in class, in the cafeteria, on the bus, on the field. A social evolution that was aided by an era in which it was no longer as common or seemly for parents to forbid their children from interacting with others, in particular those others who didn’t look like them.

  Those who adhered to their prescribed quadrants might avert unnecessary troubles. But anyone who occupied a middle place, who sought validation as a salve for insecurity, or who needed attention to compensate for isolation, that person walked barefoot along a pebbled beach.

  Andrés deduced that if everyone liked him, no one would look down on him or accuse him of selling out, of being a poser—after fag, the most dishonorable designation imaginable. Andrés was puny, but smart, funny, and acquainted enough with the powder-keg conditions of home to sidestep the hormone-enabled beefs typical of adolescence. He weathered the few moments of bullying by pretending and outfoxing, and by surrounding himself with kids who bolstered his credibility and protected him.

  By the second week of high school, and after three different kids had called him “undress,” Andrés became Andy. Soon after, he found his speed—full tilt. Andy stood furtively on the perimeters of circles, groups, cliques, waiting, surreptitiously edging his way in, fawning and maneuvering toward a thinned coterie of friendships. Friends became collectible things, useful only for how they inflated Andy’s value. He might not be one of them, but he’d convince them otherwise. Luckily for Andy, the business of subsuming insecurities was addictive. There was no drug more potent than being liked by everyone. The sensation was as life-altering as the pain of being disliked by anyone. To complicate matters, Andy wasn’t only trying to hide something that wasn’t a secret; there was also the secret buried deep within, which he managed at times, sometimes for long stretches, to forget.

  By his third year of high school, Andy felt like minor royalty. His future, too, was taking shape. He scored perfectly on his SATs, and Mr. Shanley, the friendlier of the two beleaguered guidance counselors at St. Ignatius, encouraged him to consider colleges far and wide—Get out of here while you can was the unspoken sentiment during their fifteen-minute monthly meetings. “Whaddaya got to lose?” was what he actually said.

  * * *

  I think you’re in my seat,” said Andy during second-period English lit, to a boy with dirty blond hair, folded blazer cuffs, and a skewed necktie. He must have been new because it was already the third week of the semester, and Andy didn’t recognize him.

  “I didn’t see your name on it.”

  “I’ve been sitting here since the first day.”

  The boy mimed a search of the desk’s metal and wood frame. “Show me where your name is.”

  “There’s a seat over there,” Andy said, pointing to the back of the room. When the new kid didn’t bother to look up, Andy tapped his shoulder. “Excuse me?”

  It was only a small touch, but it lit a short fuse. A fuse that Andy had meant, in a way, to light. He knew, even while knowing he shouldn’t, that he was imposing himself, crossing a line.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you?” The boy shot out of his seat and, with force, shoved Andy, who, along with the desk behind him, crashed onto the ground.

  The humiliation and fear jostling for dominance inside of Andy weren’t unique—many times, his parents and his brother had laid their hands on him—but these circumstances were unfamiliar. He got to his feet and instinctively approached the boy, who had taken a wide-armed stance, shoulders raised, chest inflated. He had a faint, almost translucent mustache. His skin was as blond as his hair. Up close, his eyes were the bluest Andy had ever seen. And despite the clenched jaw and flared nostrils, the boy’s countenance had an almost delicate quality, something soft yet radiant, all the more incongruous for the vapor it was emitting. In addition to the warm moisture speckling Andy’s face, a trail of cologne had found its way inside his nostrils. There was also a vibration in his arms and a fire in his chest. It was too late to back down.

  Andy knew nothing about this boy except that he was white. And while Andy might be able to back down from a Black boy or even another brown kid, he couldn’t back down from a white kid. Not a new white kid. This was the constructed order of things.

  If Andy were to throw the first punch, he thought, it’d have to be done soon and repeatedly because the moment he stopped punching, the other boy would find his footing and overpower him. He’d seen it many times before, but always at a remove. His fights with Henry hadn’t prepared him for anything. Theirs were living room brawls that mirrored the wrestling matches on TV, and typically ended with him smothered beneath his brother’s weight. This, here, was something else, and it wouldn’t end well for Andy unless he hit the new boy first. Even still, it wasn’t likely to end well.

  Or maybe not. The boy wasn’t actually much larger than Andy. He was, however, rabid. A crimson spread across the golden-white face and receded from his knuckles.

  Andy doubted his chances.

  “Mr. Pugliese!” shouted Ms. Cardinale, the English teacher, as she scurried toward the boys and squeezed herself between them. Her hair was large and blond with dark roots that had crept nearly midway up each strand, styled as if from the era when groups of people stared up at the sun in order to watch astronauts disappear into space.

  “This is not a very good first impression,” she said to the new boy, before turning to Andy. “What is happening here?”

  Silence.

  “Well?”

  The two boys remained locked in their stances, arms and shoulders tensed, eyes wet.

  “Okay, you leave me little choice. Class, meet your new classmate: Jeremy Pugliese. Unfortunately, Mr. Pugliese will be spending the first day in detention.”

  “You too, Andy,” she said, before Andy could flash her a penitent look. “It takes two.”

  Jeremy grabbed his notebook and made his way toward the door, but not before kicking an empty desk in the front row.

  “Two days in detention!” Ms. Cardinale shouted.

  “Oh, snap!” someone from the back of the room called out. Paul, Andy thought. Always it was Paul with his running commentary. Paul, the scrawny Polish kid who made everyone laugh and had spent all summer lifting weights and now walked the halls punching one hand into the palm of the other.

  Andy grabbed his books from the floor. Simone picked up Andy’s pen and handed it to him. Her large dream-catcher earrings were flipped upward and tangled. Simone had walked into the room after Ms. Cardinale had stopped the fight. She might have otherwise stepped between Andy and Jeremy. Apart from loyal, Simone was also impulsive and the tallest one in the room. As Andy walked past, she held out her hand for him to slap. “You okay?” she asked.

  Andy nodded.

  “I’ll swing by at lunch,” she whispered. “Chicken fingers today.”

  7

  MOM & DAD

  ¿ Y? How was it?”

  My mother keeps her back to me as she swirls a wooden spoon through the yellow, white, and clear pools of slowly solidifying egg. An apron is loosely knotted at her wai
st, mostly for effect because she is a punctilious cook.

  “Did you see all those girls that used to follow you around?”

  “Mom. No one followed me around.”

  “They were in love with you. You could have gone out with any girl you wanted.”

  “Too bad I couldn’t be with all the boys I wanted.”

  “Oh, Andy!”

  “What?”

  My mother turns the stove off and moves the pan with scrambled eggs to a cool burner. She turns to face me. “Did you really have dates with boys in school? Did we know them? ¿Quién?”

  “Are you kidding me with these questions?”

  “You can tell me.”

  “I didn’t have dates, but I had crushes here and there. Can we please change the subject?”

  “Why didn’t you tell us?”

  “Do you really think you would have wanted to hear that back then?”

  “We are very supportive. We love you no matter what. And we love Marco.”

  “Now you do, but who knows how you would have reacted back then.”

  My mother digs a clean wooden spoon out of a drawer, tips the pan, and pushes the eggs onto a clean plate. “¡Ay! Let’s not get stuck in the past. We all had to grow up, and we did. Your family could be worse. Don’t worry, they’re organic. Todo es orgánico.”

  “What?”

  “In case you’re wondering about the eggs. Your mother doesn’t give you anything that isn’t good for you.”

  “I know, Mom. Don’t worry. I’m happy, and non-organic eggs are also wonderful.”

  “I understand sarcasm.”

  “I’m not being sarcastic. I just don’t want to talk about this stuff.”

  “I didn’t bring it up.”

  The eggs are in fact delicious. So is the whole wheat toast with raspberry jam. As well as the coffee. “Perfect breakfast,” I say. “Thank you.”

  “I’m glad you like it,” she says as she wipes down the counter.

  My mother is mistaken. I couldn’t have come out to her in high school. Neither of us was ready. My mother is also mistaken about my high school fan club. Although I had many friends who were girls, none of them were fawning over me. And many of the ones who may have been interested in me wouldn’t have been allowed to pursue anything.

  I know this because Donna Buccio’s parents pulled her out of St. Ignatius when they discovered that she was dating Eric Leconte. Eric’s crime was being Black. It was the second time that year that a white girl had been taken out of the school for dating a Black boy. Not long after the Donna-and-Eric affair, a group of us (all white, except for me) were hanging out in Marie’s basement—surely drinking from her mom’s liquor cabinet—and someone asked how our parents would have reacted to a similar situation. All of the girls, except for Marie, said that their parents would have likely done the same as Nicole’s parents. Not only that, one of them said, “I wouldn’t even be allowed to date you, Andy.” Several of the girls nodded along, matter-of-fact, as if it were obvious and I should have known all along. I’d been in the same class with a few of these girls since first grade. I’d shared first, second, and third kisses with some of them. Their parents adored me, sat next to my family at church, had taken me trick-or-treating, and driven me home from birthday parties. I was the kid that all parents liked and trusted, I thought. I didn’t want to date any of those girls to begin with, but I certainly didn’t want to be told I couldn’t.

  I didn’t breathe a word about that night to anyone, least of all my mother. She would have refused handshakes and peace-be-with-yous at church. She would have stopped smiling at my friends whenever they came over. It would have hurt her immensely to know that all of those families looked down on her children. And she would be as upset about it today as she would have been back then.

  * * *

  ¿Estás bien?” my mother asks, as she leans against the counter.

  “A little hungover. That’s all.”

  Like a gentle robot, my mother walks to the cupboard, grabs a glass, fills it with water, and sets it next to my plate. Then she puts her mug of coffee in the microwave. After ten seconds, it beeps three times.

  “Thank you for coming here. To take care of us,” she says as she perches herself on the edge of the chair, ready for her next move. “Old and useless. That’s what your parents have become.”

  “You’re not old or useless. You lead full lives. What’s happening now is a perfectly normal way for humans to behave. That’s what we do. We take care of each other.”

  “Tu tía Beti can come this weekend, if you want to go back to the city.”

  “I’m already here. There’s no need for her to travel so far. It’s great if she comes, but it’s not necessary.”

  “De pronto … you want to spend time with Marco?”

  “Por dios, Mom. I’ve only said it thirty times. Marco is on a business trip.”

  “¿Seguro?”

  “Of what? That he’s in Namibia? Yes, I’m pretty sure I took him to the airport!”

  “Oh, are we being disrespectful to each other this morning?”

  “Fine,” I say, and take a bite of the toast.

  “Are you sure everything is okay between you two?”

  “Yes. Why are you asking me?”

  “A mother knows her children.”

  “Well then my future children will be screwed.”

  My mother responds by raising her chin and closing her eyes. The morning light that passes through the gossamer kitchen curtains bathes her. She looks genuinely peaceful. After a moment, she sets a hand on the table—a long, dark wood slab, too large for the small kitchen it occupies—and rises. She positions herself at the sink.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?” I ask, in a conciliatory tone.

  “I ate this morning,” she says, as if my eating breakfast at 7:15 A.M. makes me an immoral sloth. “Arugula, roasted red peppers, un poco de goat cheese, a few capers, and a squeeze of lemon.”

  “Wow, Mom. You’re a proper chef.”

  “I would have made you some, but I know you don’t like arugula.”

  “I was like twelve when I said that. I eat arugula all the time now. I like arugula.”

  “Oh. Then tomorrow you can have that.”

  When she finishes washing the dishes, she sponges down the sink and clears the trap. She dries her hands on a towel and squeezes into her palm a generous dollop of the moisturizer that lives by the dish rack. She lathers her hands in a slow repeated motion, as if she were shaping dough or conjuring a spell.

  “What time is Dad’s appointment?”

  “Tiene que estar en el gastroenterólogo cuarto para las nueve. You should give yourself plenty of time because rush hour on the expressway is terrible before nine.”

  “Is it the same doctor from the hospital?”

  “Yes, but this is at another hospital. Near the Cheesecake Factory.”

  “Is that, by any chance, near the psychiatric hospital?”

  “Exactly. They’re separated by one large parking lot. But it’s all the same hospital. They’re owned by …” She pauses and shakes her head. “El demonio.”

  The devil is Be Well—the hospital conglomerate that bought the psychiatric hospital. For a decade, Be Well has been buying health care institutions, dissolving the unions, and rehiring many of the same employees at significantly reduced salaries—same American tale, different industry. Be Well purchased the clinic where my mom was working as a bill collector after she’d been let go from the bank. Just before the sale took place, the union offered to find her work at another hospital altogether, but most of those positions were graveyard orderly shifts.

  “I cleaned houses cuando vine a este país. Después trabajé en el banco por veintiún años. Do you know what I started as?”

  “A recep—”

  “¡Una recepcionista! Do you know what my title was when the bank fired me?”

  “Vice—”

  “Vice President of Communications! Do you th
ink I’m going to clean floors now? No, señor. I don’t know why I even bothered to join this union,” she lamented at the time.

  But it wasn’t so clear cut. When the bank laid her off years earlier, it did so without warning. It happened on a Friday, just before lunch. The security guards, with whom she’d always gotten along well, sheepishly searched her bags and walked her to the street. Three months of pay and health insurance were her severance package. After twenty-one years. Six months later, the only job she could find was at the clinic twenty minutes from home. For most of her two years there, the union kept her and her colleagues abreast of the negotiations with Be Well. She’d only been an official member of the union for less than a year, but they still made an effort to find her employment when Be Well terminated the contract. The bank, on the other hand, told her at 11:15 A.M. that her position had been terminated, and by 12:30 she was on the commuter train home. After twenty-one years.

  “Remember Simone?” I ask. “She’s there.”

  “¿Dónde?”

  “At Be—at the psychiatric hospital.”

  “Oh, my God. Please don’t tell me that. That’s my worst nightmare. Remember I used to make you and your brother watch One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest when you were little? I didn’t want you to ever end up in one of those places. Pobrecita.”

  “Mom, it’s not a choice, is it? I don’t think Simone was bored and wandered into the loony bin.”

  “That’s not nice. It’s a psychiatric hospital. How do you think that makes people feel—”

  “I know! I was just making a point. Forget it.”

  I get up to slide my dish into the sink. Before I can turn on the water, she takes over.

  “I can wash it,” she says tersely.

  When I was a kid I had chores, and I often cooked dinner for the four of us. As an adult, anytime I offer to do anything, it’s an affront.

  While her back is to me, I wipe the crumbs off the table and into my hand.