Corky's Brother (15 page)

“I am Spanish and I am proud of it!” she says. Her chest expands with pride. My pride matches hers. “There is no one like you, Carmen,” I say.

She grabs the hair in back of my head with both hands. “[Hector! ¡Aiee! [Hector!” she cries. A minute later she runs for the door. “My boyfriend will see—” Then, eyes laughing, she is gone into the street. A bottle crashes down from a window and she screams marvelous curses, her head thrown back, her fist raised.

At school Carmen tells everybody about the party I am making in her honor. When Carlos hears, he broods. “She always make fun of us,” he says. I console him, spending my lunch period in his classroom, letting him beat me at knock-hockey. The other boys fight each other for the chance to shine my shoes. The teacher leaves me in charge and goes to the lounge to sleep. Everybody knows about him. He was a boxer in the Marines. He has no discipline problems. On the first day of the year, he takes the strongest boy in the class and beats him up. On the second day he makes the strongest boy beat up the next strongest. Who would believe what a C.R.M.D. boy says? Carlos has a supply of candy bars in the clothes closet. When the period ends, he goes into the hall with his chocolates, getting votes for me. Carmen comes toward us, her radio blasting, her body swaying. “Hey Hector,” she says, and points to Carlos. “You let this moron vote for you?”

Then Carlos curses Carmen's mother. Carmen flies at him, her nails rip into the side of his face, and a minute later the assistant principal is tearing them apart. His eyes bulge from his face when he sees that Carmen's sweater is torn down the middle. He covers her with his jacket and she strides through the crowd with him, her jaw thrust forward. Carlos is bloody. I put my arm around his shoulder and he twists away.

“
¡
Traidor!”
The words cut into my heart.

“Carlos. Please—” But my words will not reach him. The nurse is escorting him away from me. His head is bent, his body tired. When he leaves the school at three o'clock, he sneaks along the fence.

“Is this the Carlos I know?” I say to him, walking by his side. “Is this the Carlos who leaped into the giant war canoe at the Museum of Natural History?” I see a faint spark in his eyes, but it is nothing like the flash that was there when he led the charge into the canoe. I fan the spark. “Is this the Carlos who ran five miles every morning to bring the fishermen their breakfasts at Mayaguez?” His head lifts. “Is this the Carlos who received the praise of the fishermen for the way he sewed their nets?”

We go into Central Park. Sam is waiting for us and we rent a rowboat. Carlos takes the oars and heads for open waters. When we are past the bridge, Sam reveals his newest book:
Ideal Marriage, Its Physiology and Technique
. “I copped it from my father's study.” He reads and Carlos and I go into a trance. The words are glorious:
vestibule of the vagina…phenomenon of erection…first intermezzo of aphorisms…the love-bite…
This is what we have been waiting for. The chapters:
Positions, Converse and Averse…Communion and After-Glow…Contraception…

From the corner of my eye I see Carmen and two friends coming toward us in a boat. Carlos sees them also, and he rows furiously. We ram their boat at full speed, and as they work to steady themselves Carlos laughs. Then Carmen laughs also. “Hey, Carlos—you mad at me?” Carlos sulks. “Rafaela say she like you. You like her?” From behind Carmen, Rafaela smiles shyly. “I got something for you, Carmen,” I say, and hold up the book. Sam laughs. I suggest that we switch boats. The girls say they don't know, but Carmen's eyes dance and Rafaela blushes. We line our boat up alongside theirs. “Come on,” I say. “I give you a good time—we race our boats and ram each other and things.” They agree. Carmen will come in our boat and Carlos will go into theirs with Rafaela. “I help you,” I say. Carmen stands up. Sam holds onto their boat. I give her my hand and she steps toward us. Then Carlos' eyes blaze, he shrieks into the air—
“
¡
Aiee!
¡
Puta!
¡
Ramera!”
—and with superhuman strength he shoves his oar against the side of their boat. For a second I hold onto Carmen's hand. Her eyes and mouth open wide, her skirt flares out, space appears between our boats, and then, her legs spread wide like the sides of a triangle, she descends with a great splash into the water of the Central Park Lake.

Carlos rows like ten men, his eyes sparkling. Carmen rises to the surface, screaming curses.
“
¡
Bastardo!
¡
Idiota barroso!
” Even from a great distance, as boats speed to her rescue, I can see the fire in her eyes. “I get you!” she yells. “I get you!”

Carlos' grin will not leave. But Sam does not smile. “Couldn't you wait till after the election?” he asks. I sit next to him in the rear of the boat, my arm over his shoulder. I tell him there is nothing to worry about. I have calculated. Even without all of Carmen's votes, we will win by a handsome margin. “What is important now,” I say, “is not the election—but the victory party.” My heart swells. “It will be a party no one will ever forget.” I take the book from Sam. “Is it not for us to see to the educational needs of our students?”

I explain my idea and his face is alive again. He pounds me on the back and praises my imagination. He is prepared to take risks, he says. We bring our boat in and sit at the café which overlooks the lake, eating hot dogs and plotting our adventure on Department of Parks napkins. Sam smokes a cigar, Carlos looks at the illustrations in the book, and I lean back, satisfied.

At school we let it be known that we are the educational party, and when I reveal our plans to Carmen she says she will swing her girls back to our side. She says she does not hold us responsible for Carlos' actions.

We proceed with our plans. At four o'clock we meet outside Mr. Weiss' pharmacy. Sam has the rubber masks—Kennedy, Ringo, Fidel. When the store is empty, we slip inside and I put the sign on the window:
STORE
CLOSED
.
WILL
OPEN
AGAIN
AT
5. Carlos is lookout. I draw the shades. Mr. Weiss laughs when he sees our masks. “What can I do for you boys?” We tell him what we want and he laughs again. With one sweep of my arm I clear a counter of its merchandise. I show him our briefcases, open and empty. He goes for the phone, but Sam is ready and cuts the cord with his scissors. “The pills,” I say. His eyes dart this way and that. I show him in the book. “The pills!” I repeat. “Your daughter, she in my class—you want her safe?”

“My God!” he says. “Who
are
you?”

“The pills!” Sam says in his most vicious voice. He splat-ers bottles of perfume against a wall. I reason with Mr. Weiss, telling him he will help the population problem, keep innocent girls out of trouble, prevent half-breeds. He fills our briefcases with pills. We head for the door. “There are men planted across the street,” I say. “If you leave here during the next hour, you will pay.”

“I want diagrams,” Carlos says. “I don't trust pills.

“Give him what he wants,” Sam says. “All sizes.”

We stay at the door while Carlos gets what he wants. Behind the face of John F. Kennedy there are happy eyes. “Let's beat it,” Sam says.

We leave the store and take our masks off, stuffing them into a garbage can. We proceed up Columbus Avenue. Then, coming toward us, we see them—three cops. “Act natural,” I say, but when we come to them, they stop us. “Let's see what you got in those briefcases,” they say. In a doorway I see her, smiling triumphantly.

Sam looks at me. I look at Carlos. “Now!” I say, and we break from the cops and run down Columbus Avenue. Carmen grabs at Carlos but he kicks her to the curb. “Stop or we'll shoot!” I hear. We turn the corner, into a side street, streaking between cars. But it is no use. More cops are in front of us. “This way,” I cry, and we head into an apartment building, knocking over the ancient doorman. Carlos stops.

“I stay here and make trouble,” he says. I look into his eyes. “It's the only way, Hector. You and Sam are leaders—you must not get caught.”

“Carlos—” I say.

“Go!” he says.

“Carlos—!”

He kicks at me as the cops appear in the doorway. We open the door to the courtyard. “If you shoot him, we will demonstrate. He has no knife or gun. Remember Gilligan the cop!”

“Come quietly, kid, and we won't hurt you,” they say.

“C'mon!” says Sam.

I look at Carlos, my friend. “Good luck—” I call. Just as the police go for him, he turns and tosses me his briefcase. “The diagrams!” he yells, and then he has slipped between them and is running like a maniac, in circles, screeching Spanish. Sam and I leave, satchels in both my hands. The police open the door to the courtyard, but Carlos throws himself between their legs. We hurry down and journey through a network of cellars, making our way to freedom.

At night I confer with the man who protects the rights of the Puerto Rican people. He is my friend, and he says he will represent Carlos. Jail, he believes, cannot be avoided. I have my own idea, though, and we discuss it. Instructions are sent to Carlos.

In court, Carlos' teacher testifies that he is truly a C.R.M.D., Carlos attacks the court psychiatrist, he sings dirty Spanish songs while the judge speaks, his grandmother tells of a home with ten children and no father, and the man who protects the rights of the Puerto Rican people makes an eloquent speech about sickness instead of sin, help instead of punishment.

The plan works. Carlos is sent to a state hospital. The hospital is far away on Long Island and Sam and I travel there on Sunday afternoon when all the other families come, their shopping bags filled with food and clothing, their eyes glazed. Carlos is happy to see us, but he cannot shake our hands. He is tied in a strait-jacket. Around us the other patients and visitors communicate with each other. All the attendants are Negro and Puerto Rican and Carlos says they take special care of him. He asks how the election is going and we tell him that his heroic act has made our victory certain. He asks me what he should do to stay out of jail and I look at the strait-jacket and I tell him he is doing fine. I ask him if he wants anything. He says he wants to return to Puerto Rico.

We go back to the city in the hot subway. Everybody is out on my street. They ask me about Carlos. Children are playing with the garbage, the men are drinking beer, and music fills the air. Everybody is talking about Mr. Sanchez, who threw his baby against the wall that afternoon. The police have taken him away. Carmen's big sister, her hair bleached a crazy pink color, comes switching down the street, looking for business. It is too hot. Everybody is sweaty and greasy. Under a lamppost she comes to me. “When you get some money, kid,” she says, “I be your first. Okay? I give you a good time.”

“Carmen gives it to me for nothing,” I say. “She gives it to everybody for free.”

She curses me and says she will kill Carmen. I go home but I roll around on my bed in the hot room and I cannot sleep. On the next visiting day I see that Carlos is changing. He does not smile. His eyes are almost closed, his neck is stiff. We tell him that we will wait until he comes out to have the victory party. He does not listen. He says that if he cannot go back to Puerto Rico he will stay in the hospital. He says it is not so bad in the hospital. It is like C.R.M.D.

“I stay here a long time,” Carlos says. “I getting to like it here.”

The next Sunday we come with good news. We have won the election.

“Hector had it figured right,” Sam says. “It was a landslide.”

“Now we wait for you to return,” I say. “So that we can have the victory party.”

“If I get out, I kill Carmen,” he says. “I tell my doctor that.”

I talk to him about the party we are going to make—the food, the music, the girls. “We got you to thank for being where we are,” Sam says.

“I din do nothing,” Carlos says. We keep talking to him, building his confidence, telling him what we feel. I speak to one of the Spanish attendants and point out to him how calm Carlos has become.

“Carlos,” I say. “If you say you will not make trouble, Mr. Garcia will take the jacket off.”

“I no make trouble.”

The jacket comes off, but Carlos continues to sulk, and I have little hope for him. He talks of only two things, the return to Puerto Rico and the murder of Carmen. When we are ready to leave, he asks if we will do his laundry for him and we say yes. He goes to his room and returns with a bundle of clothes. When we leave him, his eyes are almost shut, his thin body stiff, and I wonder if I do the right thing. Maybe he be better off in jail.

“Tomorrow in assembly they swear us in,” Sam says when we are standing at the corner of Columbus Avenue and 8oth Street. Downstairs in the basement my people are singing with Pastor Ayala. The neon lights blink on and off:

The sound of electric guitars and tambourines fills me with joy.

“Yes,” I say, and finger my medallion. The music is fierce.

“It's really something,” Sam says. “We have what we want—but with Carl where he is, it doesn't seem to matter, does it?”

“No,” I say.

Carmen is standing against a building, in the shadows, alone. She comes to me and I spit. “Go walk the streets,” I say. “Like your sister.”

“Hector,” she pleads. “I am sorry. Forgive me—”

Sam slaps her. “Your mother sniffs bicycle seats,” he says.

“Please,” says Carmen, but I turn my back on her. She walks away from us, slowly. I feel something for her—but it passes. Her old friends exit from the church and shun her. They say they have prayed for Carlos. Rafaela says she sends candy and cards to the hospital. Everybody wants to visit him. I look beyond our circle of friends and see Carmen fade into the lights and noise of Columbus Avenue, heading uptown toward Harlem,
las tetas grandes
drooping toward the ground.