‘Hello, there!’ he said. He was very friendly with a lot of false teeth in his mouth.
‘Hello,’ I said.
Vida smiled.
That really pleased him because he became twice as friendly, which was hard to do.
‘Foster sent us,’ I said.
‘Oh, Foster!’ he said. ‘Yes. Yes. Foster. He called and said you were coming and here you are! Mr and Mrs Smith. Foster. Wonderful person! Foster, yes.’
He was really smiling up a storm now. Maybe he was the father of an airline stewardess.
‘I have a lovely room with a bath and view,’ he said. ‘It’s just like home. You’ll adore it,’ he said to Vida. ‘It’s not like a hotel room.’
For some reason he did not like the idea of Vida staying in a hotel room, though he ran a hotel, and that was only the beginning. ‘Yeah, it’s a beautiful room,’ he said. ‘Very lovely. It’ll help you enjoy your stay in San Diego. How long will you be here? Foster didn’t say much over the telephone. He just said you were coming and here you are.’
‘Just a day or so,’ I said.
‘Business or pleasure?’ he said.
‘We’re visiting her sister,’ I said.
‘Oh, that sounds nice. She has a small place, huh?’
‘I snore,’ I said.
‘Oh,’ the desk clerk said.
I signed Mr and Mrs Smith of San Francisco on the hotel register. Vida watched me as I signed our new instant married name. She was smiling. My! how beautiful she looked.
‘I’ll show you to your room,’ the desk clerk said. ‘It’s a beautiful room. You’ll be happy in it. The walls are thick, too. You’ll be at home.’
‘Good to hear,’ I said. ‘My affliction has caused me a lot of embarrassment in the past.’
‘Really a loud snorer?’ he said.
°Yes,’ I said. ‘Like a sawmill.’
‘If you’ll please wait a minute,’ he said. ‘I’ll ring my brother and have him come down and watch the desk while I’m taking you upstairs to the room.’
He pushed a silent buzzer that summoned his brother down the elevator a few moments later.
‘Some nice people here. Mr and Mrs Smith. Friends of Foster,’ the desk clerk said. ‘I’m going to give them Mother’s room.’
The brother clerk gave Vida a solid once-over as he went behind the desk to take over the wheel from his brother who stepped out and he stepped in.
They were both middle-aged.
‘That’s good,’ the brother desk clerk said, satisfied. They’ll love Mother’s room.’
‘Your mother lives here?’ I said, now a little confused.
‘No, she’s dead,’ the desk clerk said. ‘But it was her room before she died. This hotel has been in the family for over fifty years. Mother’s room is just the way it was when she died. God bless her. We haven’t touched a thing. We only rent it out to nice people like yourselves.’
We got into an ancient dinosaur elevator that took us up to the fourth floor and Mother’s room. It was a nice room in a dead mother kind of way.
‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ the desk clerk said.
‘Very comfortable,’ I said.
‘Lovely,’ Vida said.
‘You’ll enjoy San Diego even more with this room,’ he said.
He pulled up the window shade to show us an excellent view of the parking lot, which was fairly exciting if you’d never seen a parking lot before.
‘I’m sure we will,’ I said.
‘If there’s anything you want, just let me know and we’ll take care of it: a call in the morning, anything, just let us know. We’re here to make your stay in San Diego enjoyable, even if you can’t stay at your sister’s because you snore.’
‘Thank you,’ I said.
He left and we were alone in the room.
‘What’s the snoring thing you told him about?’ Vida said, sitting down on the bed.
She was smiling.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘It just seemed like the proper thing to do.’
‘You are a caution,’ Vida said. Then she freshened herself up a little, washed the air travel off and we were ready to go visit Dr Garcia in Tijuana.
‘Well, I guess we’d better go,’ I said.
‘I’m ready,’ Vida said.
The ghost of the dead mother watched us as we left. She was sitting on the bed knitting a ghost thing.
The Bus to Tijuana
I don’t like San Diego. We walked the few blocks to the Greyhound bus depot. There were baskets of flowers hanging from the light posts.
There was almost a small town flavour to San Diego that morning except for the up-all-night tired sailors or just-starting-out sailors walking along the streets.
The Greyhound bus depot was jammed with people and games of amusement and vending machines and there were more Mexicans in the bus depot than on the streets of San Diego. It was almost as if the bus depot were the Mexican part of town.
Vida’s body, perfect face and long lightning hair performed their customary deeds among the men in the bus depot, causing a thing that was just short of panic.
‘Well,’ I said.
Vida replied with a silence.
The bus to Tijuana left every fifteen minutes and cost sixty cents. There were a lot of Mexican men in the line wearing straw and cowboy hats in sprawled laziness to Tijuana.
A jukebox was playing square pop tunes from the time that I had gone into the library. It was strange to hear those old songs again.
There was a young couple waiting for the bus in front of us. They were very conservative in dress and manner and seemed to be awfully nervous and bothered and trying hard to hold on to their composure.
There was a man standing in the line, holding a racing form under his arm. He was old with dandruff on the lapels and shoulders of his coat and on his racing form.
I had never been to Tijuana before but I had been to a couple of other border towns: Nogales and Juarez. I didn’t look forward to Tijuana.
Border towns are not very pleasant places. They bring out the worst in both countries, and everything that is American stands out like a neon sore in border towns.
I noticed the middle-aged people, growing old, that you always see in crowded bus depots but never in empty ones. They exist only in numbers and seem to live in crowded bus depots. They all looked as if they were enjoying the old records on the jukebox.
One Mexican man was carrying a whole mess of stuff in a Hunt’s tomato sauce box and in a plastic bread wrapper. They seemed to be his possessions and he was going home with them to Tijuana.
Slides
As we drove the short distance to Tijuana it was not a very pleasant trip. I looked out the window to see that there was no wing on the bus, no coffee stain out there. I missed it.
San Diego grew very poor and then we were on a freeway. The country down that way is pretty nothing and not worth describing.
Vida and I were holding hands. Our hands were together in our hands as our real fate moved closer to us. Vida’s stomach was flat and perfect and it was going to remain that way.
Vida looked out the window at what is not worth describing, but even more so and done in cold cement freeway language. She didn’t say anything.
The young conservative couple sat like frozen beans in their seats in front of us. They were really having a bad time of it. I pretty much guessed why they were going to Tijuana.
The man whispered something to the woman. She nodded without saying anything. I thought she was going to start crying. She bit her lower lip.
I looked down from the bus into cars and saw things in the back seats. I tried hard not to look at the people but instead to look at the things in the back seats. I saw a paper bag, three coat hangers, some flowers, a sweater, a coat, an orange, a paper bag, a box, a dog.