Todos Los Años
by Robin Hirsch (February 2015)
MR. S
MIGUEL
My dearest, sweetest Maria,
Here it is terrible and wonderful. In the city—in Manhattan—the buildings are so tall there is no light. In January when I came it was winter and the cold so bitter. February was worse. March I started here and Carlos, the day manager, gave me a sweater. How good and kind some people are, even in this hard city. Now it is summer and it burns so hot. The heat is wet and stays in the streets—there is nowhere for it to go, it is trapped. I travel every day except Sunday on the train from our apartment in a place called Queens to my stop—23rd Street—in Manhattan. Sometimes when I come out into the air, the buildings are so beautiful—sometimes in the day the sun hits just right, sometimes at night the lights in the buildings are like a million luminarias as high as you can see. But mostly now the day is dark and heavy and wet and the night is hot.
Maria, I am sending you also a necklace and for Juanita a bracelet. For the boys I am sending two baseball caps from the Yankees. I wanted to send bats but Raimundo has no room. Please with some of the money buy them bats from me. You can also pay Jaime the last of the money—two hundred dollars. This is it. We owe him no more. Raimundo will owe him for this trip—and the trip back. But he is a grown man now, your nephew, and he has his own money. In two months it will be my turn to come. The journey is long and difficult. But I will see you and my big growing ones and we will have a week of sunshine and ostiones and a trip to the beach.
You are in my thoughts and in my heart and in two months you will be in my arms. I think of you all and send with Raimundo all my love,
Your husband and father,
Miguel
MR. S
RAIMUNDO
I am never frightened. I came all the way to New York City and I was not frightened. I travel the city day and night, I am not frightened. I earn good money. Late at night when I finish work I go sometimes down to a club on Avenue C. There is dancing, there is drinking, there are drugs—I do not touch—there are girls, even sometimes white girls. I am frightened of them sometimes, but if you have two tequilas it is not so frightening. There are girls here who, if they came in the restaurant, they would not see me. But here I know they like me. Sometimes we dance. Sometimes I stay till it is light. Back home in Mexico my father would beat me if I came home late. But here it is different. He has nothing to say. We work together. We are men together. He calls me Raimundo. I call him Plutarcho. Some of the clubs he was the first to take me to. He dances well. He drinks, too. More than me. Too much. I told him once. He hit me. For the first time I hit him back. I am no longer frightened of my father.
MR. S
MARIA
Jaime wants me to sleep with him. He is tall and thin and hard and sometimes in my bed I miss a man. What is a woman to do when her man is gone? Tall and thin and hard. Sometimes in the dark when the children are sleeping, finally all three, breathing like one, I too relax, my fingers find themselves down there and I think maybe, maybe the rains will come, this murderous heat will subside, money will pour down like moonshine, and then, no more white sheets, no more towels and tablecloths and petticoats, no more Señora Guzman, but I, with lipstick, stockings and a dress like Rita Hayworth, and something sparkling at my throat . . . And, oh, if the rains come, Jaime, you bastard, if they come, oh, Jaime, oh, will Raimundo, oh, Jaime, what will Miguel, oh, mother Maria, oh, oh, oh . . . In my bed at night it is still hot. And here in the sun as the bells of San Martin strike eleven the stones under my feet are burning. This load is heavy. These steps are steep.
CARLOS
RAIMUNDO
It is cool in the dark. But I can feel sweat under my hair. It collects behind my ears, at the nape of my neck. I wipe it away but still it trickles down my back. My shirt is stuck to my body. I stick my hand inside my pants and it comes out wet. On my thigh a shape is beginning to appear, blacker than the black of my pants in this black night. It is the envelope, wrapped in plastic, strapped to my thigh. I feel it. Twenty-seven hundred dollars. It is my comfort and my cross.
MR. S
MIGUEL
CARLOS
MR. S
MARIA
MIGUEL
But Plutarcho, your brother, is a different story. He is drinking too much. If he loses his job now what hope is there for him? He can stay here still, of course, he has to stay. Ranulfo and I will look after him. But I am afraid for him. I have tried to say to him, slow down. Raimundo tried also, but Plutarcho hit him and now it is worse, and worse still since Raimundo left. It has never been good between our families. Plutarcho is still jealous that I married you. If I speak to him now, will it be the end? Carlos explained to me today that in churches there are meetings for people who drink, even in Spanish. No questions. No police. No checks. No green card. Can this be true? What shall I do, Maria?
RAIMUNDO
Jaime is not coming. But the rains are coming. I feel them. I can feel them. Let them come. Oh, let it come. I cannot bear the waiting.
MR. S
RAIMUNDO
I am running. I am running. The rain is falling out of a thick sky. I am wet already and more wet. There is no shelter, only trees. And the lightning has struck a tree already, huge cracking and a fire like the end of the earth. Where can I hide, where can I hide?
CARLOS
MR. S
Todos Los Años was performed at the Cornelia Street Café in 1991/1992. This is its first appearance in print.
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