A word about Pedro.
Who keeps his salt-and-pepper hair in a state of managed chaos, jutting out from four nimble legs and hindquarters, muscular from distance walking. Whose brown eyes hold the world-weariness characteristic of a bon vivant. Who is enough Yorkshire terrier to exhibit daffy wonderment, and enough Welsh Scottie to accomplish a goal with focus. Pedro hops up on his hind legs in an effort to secure the candy Mrs. Santiago is currently figure-eighting over his snout. She takes too long to relent so when she does, Pedro respectfully declines. He is a gentleman wanderer who yearns to explore. Madeleine yearns for an exit. Rosalind yearns for a lover.
A blond head with pigtails approaches the store. Jill McCormick enters, in a clatter of bells. Seeing Madeleine, she narrows her eyes. “Did you get your hair cut? You missed lab.”
Madeleine checks to see if Mrs. Santiago is listening. “I was there but you didn’t see me.”
“My eye doctor said these glasses give me better than twenty-twenty vision.” Jill is a practical literalist. On hot days when Saint Anthony’s is too broke to turn on the air-conditioning, the kids fold paper into fans. Jill likes to point out: you expend more energy fanning yourself than you do just sitting there.
“Can you see this?” Madeleine says.
“You’re sticking up your middle finger.”
Mrs. Santiago calls hello from behind the counter.
“Hello,” Jill says. “I’ve come for a pound of coffee for my mom. The Sumatran. She wants to branch out.”
Mrs. Santiago winks at the portrait of her late husband. “Daniel’s favorite!”
“Who’s Daniel?” says Jill. “Oh. Your dead husband.”
A plan forms in Madeleine’s mind. “What are you doing today?” she says.
Jill stiffens. “I’m organizing my stuffed animals into color order and then I’m reorganizing them into size order, why?”
“Can I come over?”
Jill peers at her through her thick glasses. “Are you good at organizing?”
“Who will read to me?” Sandra says.
“I’ll read to you, dear.” Mrs. Santiago hands Jill a brown bag of coffee stamped with Daniel’s likeness. As Madeleine expected, she is delighted that she wants to play with another little girl. She comes out from behind the counter holding a leash, on the end of which is a miserable Pedro. “Take him with you. At least he can see some of the outside.”
“Pedro seems blue,” Jill says.
Mrs. Santiago nods. “His heart is broken.”
Pedro backpedals and about-faces, snapping at the leash. Mrs. Santiago asks Pedro what he thinks of a nice walk through the market, a nice walker-oo, wouldn’t he like that, a walkeroni roo?
Sandra says, “Why don’t you marry that dog?”
Madeleine giggles, in spite of herself. Sandra laughs, too. It takes them several minutes to get themselves under control as Mrs. Santiago waits, unsmiling. Sandra dabs tears from her eyes with a napkin.
“Are you finished?” Mrs. Santiago says.
Madeleine says, “Let’s go, Jill.”
“Don’t forget to ask Jill to come to your birthday par—”
Madeleine slams the door.
“You know who should go to London,” Sandra says. “You. You’ve never been anywhere.”
“With all of my spare time.” Mrs. Santiago hoots. “Now that’s funny.”
Outside, Jill asks Madeleine why she will hang out with her all of a sudden. “Did you want to get away from that crazy lady? One of my aunts forces me to read the Bible to her while I comb her hair.”
“That’s weird,” says Madeleine.
“Do you live at Santiago’s?”
“I live on Ninth Street in the market with my father.”
“Where’s your mother?” Jill slaps her forehead. “Oh right! She’s dead.”
“This is where I leave you,” Madeleine says.
Jill blinks several times. “I thought you were coming over.”
Madeleine is already legging down the street. “Later skater,” she calls over her shoulder.
“You’re just mean!” Jill calls to her retreating figure.
Madeleine extends her middle finger above her as she and Pedro gallop toward home.
4:00 P.M
Outside the Red Lion Diner, a girl wearing an expedition coat and pajama bottoms yells into her cell phone that he’d better be coming to pick her up, not whenever he feels like it, but right the hell now.
The lobby no longer has arcade games, but it does have a pay phone. Lorca punches in the number. He holds a plastic container of sausage Mrs. Santiago gave him in thanks for returning her dog. The pajama-ed girl paces outside the window where Lorca stands, listening to the line ring. She wants the person on the other end to explain exactly what kind of asshole he thinks she is. She speaks with the matter-of-fact cruelty of a Northeast girl. They’re making young people younger. Or else Lorca is older than he’s ever been.
Fiinally, a woman picks up. “Mongoose’s.”
“I’d like to speak with Mongoose.”
“He’s not here. May I ask who’s calling?”
“When will he be back?”
“He went up the street for sandwiches.” The voice inhales sharply. “Lorca? Is that you?”
“Yeah.” Lorca closes his eyes. “It’s me.”
Her tone changes to repentant. “Lorca? How are you?”
“I’ve been better.”
“He’ll be happy you called,” she says. “I’ll tell him as soon as he’s back. Take care of yourself, Lorca.”
He hangs up. The sudden, quiet lobby. The walls are blue with deep yellow flecks. Lorca smells syrup and weak coffee. Inside the glass doors, families sit at plastic booths eating eggs. A waitress borrows a ketchup bottle from one table to give to a family whose food has just arrived.
There he is five years ago, untattooed, fiddling with the knobs of the booth’s personal jukebox. It is his first date with Louisa Vicino, snake girl at The Courtland Avenue Club, and he had to bring Alex because the kid threw a tantrum. Louisa doesn’t seem to mind. It is going well. In the car ride over, she and Alex discovered they both like Ray Charles and Swiss cheese with no holes.
“When they say vanilla shake”—Louisa studies the menu—“do they mean French or bean? I like bean but not French.”
“Me too.” Eleven-year-old Alex readjusts himself on the plastic seat so he can sit higher. Lorca is certain his son doesn’t know the difference between the two kinds of vanilla. Alex detests Lorca because he won’t let him play guitar, but detests being without him even more. Louisa is the first woman his father has allowed him to meet, albeit by force. She is an extension of his father ungoverned by obligatory familial resentment. Alex is free to be fascinated by this full-hipped woman who carries a purse the size of a fist and who declared in the car, “Anyone who doesn’t think Ray Charles is the best is a chump.”
They order milkshakes. Lorca wants to play Ray Charles on their personal jukebox, but it is broken. Sweat blooms in the fabric of the only button-down he owns.
The Courtland Avenue Club is a combination strip club/bowling alley, a glowing, neon dome you can see from the highway. Louisa dances three times a night and works shifts at the bar in between. Lorca has never seen her dance, and doesn’t want to. Her mouth is still red from the outside cold. Lorca likes how her chin moves when she is emphatic. “I didn’t finish college,” she says, “but I want to take classes. In what I’m not sure.”
The milkshakes arrive. She swallows a strawful, then turns to Alex. “How is it?”
He thinks about it. “Good.”
“Mine too. If you can flip a spoonful of it over and it doesn’t drip, it’s good.”