In the months after her little brother came to New York City, Rosa met many of his girlfriends. One or two were fellow Peruvians, but most were Puerto Ricans. This was because from the moment that her brother landed in New York, he fell for the music of Puerto Rico – salsa – harder than he ever did for any woman. Emilina was the last and the sweetest of his girlfriends.
Rosa knew all about her brother’s life and his love of salsa because in those early days, when Rosa too was new to New York, he lived with her. From morning until night, all that Rosa and her husband heard was the trumpets and claves and conga of Tito Puente and El Gran Combo on the record player until Rosa thought she’d go loca. During that time, she wrote to Lima, Peru, to their mother, complaining about her brother and his noise. And about him corrupting Lucho, Rosa’s husband. Rosa explained that Lucho was being taken along to her brother’s favorite bars nearly every night to hear live salsa and to dance with the ladies.
“Rosita,” their mother wrote back, “Look out for your little brother. You hear me! We all know everything that boy has been through.”
So Rosa shut her mouth and let her brother stay. And she shut her eyes when he came home walking into walls and overturning lamps and leaving his mess on the new carpet; and when Lucho stumbled into bed beside Rosa at four in the morning smelling of another woman’s perfume.
It must have been on one of those nights out that her brother first met Emilina. By then, he was so taken by salsa that he had taught himself the vocals better than any native Puerto Rican. Having perfected many songs alone in the apartment, he auditioned and caught the attention of one group that played at his favorite bar. Emilina heard his voice at one session, and fell in love with him, as all his girlfriends before her did – just by hearing him sing. He must have noticed Emilina with her silky hair falling over her rounded shoulders, but probably with the floor lights down he couldn’t see the pale brown color of her hair or how blue, blue her eyes were. But later he did, and he must have appreciated how rare those eyes were.
Ten years passed. No, it was probably more, since by then they had a son together who was already ten with Emilina’s same blue-jewel eyes. The couple never went to church for a wedding with a priest but to everybody in Rosa’s family – and to the world – Jaime and Emilina were married. Such affection existed between the couple that Rosa’s eyes would tear up seeing it, reminded of what she had missed in her own marriage to Lucho, who she had fallen for back in Lima, and with whom she had tried hard to build a good life in New York. By then, their fragile marriage was over, the children they had together, grown. For her second marriage, she decided with her head and not her heart to wed an American, who had a big house not far from New York City in New Jersey. There were none of the tender moments that a marriage should have, and the American thought he was doing her a favor by marrying her, a Peruvian. He sincerely believed he had rescued her, which Rosa thought was nonsense.
Making the best of it, Rosa used the big house to host celebrations – baby showers, birthdays, baptisms – of course including Jaime and his family. Another sibling, Adelita, a year younger than Rosa, also lived in New Jersey near enough to join in. Adelita’s youngest son, a singer like Jaime, brought his band and entertained everybody with covers of the salsa classics, doing duets with the female singer – before the son’s wife eventually put an end to the band and the son’s singing career. The wife had noticed that the female singer was putting the moves on her husband and sensed that he had the same weakness for women that other men in the family had.
Jaime loved these parties, though by then, time and alcohol had exacted a toll on him. Nevertheless, with some badgering, the family once got him to perform with the band, and were treated to the most melodious number ever. Jaime looked at Emilina in the room, where she stood with their son Jimmy beside her, as if no one else was there.
Back then – and even now – every August, Emilina went home to her island for the summer to spend a month with family. She brought little Jimmy so he could enjoy time with her people. Though welcomed by Emilina’s family to come along, Jaime always stayed behind in New York, in their apartment, up by Yankee Stadium. This time, however, before her trip, Emilina called and begged Rosa to take him. “I can’t leave him here alone,” she said.
She gave no details but Rosa understood Emilina had good reason to believe that Jaime could not be left alone.
Rosa called and talked over the situation with another sibling, who didn’t live far from Jaime. This brother had taken advantage of the good deals in Harlem and completely renovated a brownstone and moved in with his lover (a nice gentleman, Rosa thought, even if she was still adjusting to the idea of this type of relationship). Together, Rosa and this brother, Rafael, paid a visit to Jaime’s to see what was going on. By cab, they went and when they got out, Rosa was not afraid of the rough neighborhood, having seen worse in the slums of Lima where some of her family still lived. Rafael too wasn’t put off; he was fond of visiting poor relatives and leaving impressive gifts so they’d know that, if only they worked hard enough, like him, there was a way out.
Emilina let them in, and Rosa was immediately impressed by the apartment’s tidiness, then realized it was no wonder because Emilina cleaned offices in the city by profession. Judging from Rafael’s expression, even he agreed, noteworthy because Rafael was known as a discerning, fastidious man, with his crisp white Nehru-collared shirt and gleaming sterling silver cufflinks.
The three of them discussed the situation without Jaime joining them, for he was too under the weather to come say hello. Shortly, excusing herself on the pretense of using the bathroom, Rosa went down the hallway to look for Jaime, passing an open door. It was a feminine room, by any measure – white walls, a pink-edged mirror, a can of hairspray atop a dresser. Jaime was not there. To the opposite side of the hall she saw another room, and peeked inside. It appeared to have withstood the kind of tremors, not quite earthquakes, that they had known as children in Lima. An odor coming from there reminded Rosa of autumn, of charred leaves. She poked her head inside a bit more, and the smell grew stronger, still not giving a clue to its source. But she spotted Jaime — with shoes still on — snoring in bed.
Returning to Rafael and Emilina, she said nothing, but must have had a questioning look on her face because, unprompted, Emilina said, “Seven years. That’s how long it’s been. I had to put him in a separate room.”
He would come home late, staggering, his breath thick with booze, and she was afraid to sleep with him, Emilina explained. She didn’t know where he had been and she was afraid she’d pick up a sickness. Rosa said she understood.
The situation was getting worse, Emilina said. “The neighbors, they’ve been complaining. I get terrible looks.”
“Well, he can’t be the first person to come home tipsy,” Rafael said.
Emilina shook her head. “You don’t understand.”
She explained that when he came home he was like an untrained dog, though sometimes he would give them the courtesy of using the landing for his business. Often she would find him there in the morning on her way out to work, passed out, caked in filth.
Rosa commiserated with Emilina, a good mother, who wanted only for her little son Jimmy to grow up alongside his father, her reason for putting up with Jaime all these years. Rosa respected her for this. For it matched Rosa’s own efforts in marriage. She had endured Lucho, who, while not a drinker, was a first-class philanderer and bully. Rosa had worn big sunglasses in winter to hide puffy bruises. She had stayed put, and only after Lucho started taking their kids to spend time with one favorite blanquita did Rosa make plans to build a separate household, taking the marriage off life support. Emilina, too, understood that a woman must do everything possible to keep her family together.
“While I’m away, he can’t be alone. Take him please,” Emilina said, grasping Rosa’s hand. “The other day, I left him home alone, and he started a fire.”
“In his room?” Rosa asked, remembering the smell.
“Yes.”
Rosa briefly met Rafael’s glance before returning her gaze to Emilina, who, clearly, needed Rosa to take Jaime. Rosa wanted to help her, but her own children naturally took priority. She was on call for her oldest daughter, who was very sick; Rosa had to be available to take this daughter to the hospital at a moment’s notice. And Rosa took in her granddaughter, a baby, every day to babysit.
After saying this, silently, Rosa asked for forgiveness. She could not forget the promise she made at their mother’s bedside. Jaime had just left, after resting his head on their mother’s bosom and weeping; and after this, their mother’s final words to Rosa were of worry. After all, Jaime’s father – their mother’s second husband – had died with his lips to the bottle. Jaime, his only child, was the one sent to fish him out of the bar or pull him from the gutter, prop him up and walk him home.
“Promise me you’ll take care of little Jaime,” their mother said. Rosa had agreed.
Emilina took Rosa’s hands and repeated her request, begging Rosa to take Jaime. It was painful for Rosa to say the words, but she did: “I can’t take him.”
Turning to Rafael, Emilina clutched his arm. “Take him. Please, say you’ll take him!” she said, eyes wide. But Rafael, adjusting his Nehru collar, said it was too much for him. Finally, when Rosa herself begged, reluctantly Rafael agreed.
The next day, Emilina brought Jaime to Rafael‘s house in preparation for her flight to Puerto Rico that evening. She’d been to Rafael’s only once but remembered the way, where to get off and transfer trains to Harlem. She had been there with Jaime last fall when Rafael needed her to clean his windows; and Jaime to help knock down a wall. Now, she carried Jaime’s packed black duffel and a grocery bag filled with homemade meals and emergency funds of six hundred dollars from a check she cashed from a tax refund. With her free hand, she held Jaime’s hand. She put down the duffel and grocery bag and rang the bell, but no one came.
“I called ahead. I spoke to Rafael and he knew I was coming. But he didn’t answer,” Emilina said, phoning Rosa late that afternoon. “We sat on the stoop and waited. We asked neighbors; they said they didn’t see Rafael leave. Where can I put him?” Emilina asked, panicky.
Given the situation, Rosa could think of only one solution. She told Emilina to try Adelita.
She explained that Adelita’s children were – like Rosa’s – grown. So Adelita’s rooms were empty, except for one, occupied by Adelita’s youngest who had returned after a failed marriage to raise her own son. That boy was a teen, so it wasn’t as if Adelita was busy watching babies anymore, nor was she sewing labels into bras anymore; she was retired. Her children were giving her a little each month, and the rents were reasonable over there in Adelita’s part of New Jersey. She had money to spare to take care of someone else.
“Call her. It’s worth a try,” Rosa said and explained how to get there by train.
But when Emilina called, Adelita just gave her a piece of her mind. This was because Adelita, like many Peruvians, looked down on the people of the Caribbean, believing Peruvians to be from a longer, richer history tracing back to the Incan empire and wondrous Machu Piccu. The seed of this prejudice was planted by their mother in all her children, but sprouted only in Adelita.
Emilina hung up the phone. Since it was almost evening already, and nearly time for the flight, and there was nowhere to put him, Jaime stayed home.
Before leaving, Emilina looked at Jaime in bed and, putting her hand to the back of his head, which was still thick with hair, she said, “This is your last chance.” If she came home and the place was upside down or burned down, that would be the end of their life together. Jimmy would not grow up living with his father. She left the emergency fund of six hundred dollars on his bedside table.
Emilina visited her family in Puerto Rico with little Jimmy. At odd moments, when Jimmy was stretched out in the backyard in the shade of a tree, the air heavy with salt from the sea, or Jimmy was changing into his tee-shirt for bed, he’d say, “I miss Papi. I wonder what he’s doing right now.”
“Maybe he’s singing,” Emilina said, though that was unlikely; he hadn’t sung in a few years. But maybe. You never knew. And from so far away, surrounded on all sides by water, it seemed possible that he was restored to the Peruano with jet black hair that Emilina had fallen in love with all those years ago.
During Emilina’s absence, Jaime called Rosa saying there was no food in the house, which Rosa knew wasn’t true. Emilina was not just a good mother, she was a good wife and had left the place better stocked than most of the bodegas around there. The home-cooked meals were labeled in the refrigerator. Emilina had stored canned beans that he could open; even if he wasn’t sober enough to do it, he could find a neighbor to do this small favor.
Later, Rosa learned that those meals and those cans were sold for booze – after Jaime ran through the six hundred dollar emergency fund. He kept calling and calling when Rosa’s baby granddaughter was over, interrupting Rosa dressing the baby or reading to her. Finally, Rosa walked to the post office and express-mailed him a check for twenty-five dollars.
When Emilina returned home, she had little Jimmy wait at the door to the apartment with their luggage while gingerly she entered. She sniffed the air. It didn’t smell charred, nor did it smell soiled. Slowly, she proceeded. Jaime was not in the living room nor in his bedroom. She found him in the bathroom. He was face down on the floor in his underwear. She checked his pulse the way she so often did – it was as strong as ever — and for the first time, she found herself wishing for something no loving wife should ever wish for. But maybe it was precisely what a loving wife would wish for. Peace for her husband.
She had Jimmy stay with a neighbor so he wouldn’t have the memory of his father looking like this. Then she managed to turn Jaime over, putting a towel roll under his head, because she couldn’t bear seeing him on the dirty floor. She got to work cleaning the place and later called Rosa. “The house is still standing,” she said. “But that’s it. I’m done. Please take your brother.”
Emilina’s voice had grown stronger, Rosa sensed. She thought of Emilina’s strong, thick arms and how many times they must have held Jaime under his arms, doing her best to drag him inside the house. (The same way Rosa used to do after finding Jaime outside her door in the early days.) She thought over what Emilina had said about sleeping in separate rooms for the last seven years. That meant that for most of the marriage, they had lived apart. Rosa thought it surely was possible: at a certain point, a person could have enough.
Rosa knew she couldn’t take her brother. She also knew that Rafael was a dead end. He had sent them that message by never opening his door to Jaime, probably believing that his brother’s care was for the women to sort out.
“I’m sorry but I can’t take him,” Rosa said and then again suggested Adelita, for it seemed only right that this sister should take him in, this sister who had the luxury to do so. “She’s not watching any babies now. She’s retired. Having her cafecito in her slippers in the mornings. It’s worth taking him there.”
Emilina cleaned Jaime up enough to follow Rosa’s suggestion. But when they reached Adelita’s doorstep in New Jersey, no one answered the door. Emilina waited with Jaime on the front stoop until long after the porch light came on and Adelita eventually came home.
“Take your brother. I’m leaving him. Take him, please,” Emilina said.
Adelita turned from her and looked at Jaime. With her face dark with anger, she rebuked him for making his own problems. She reminded him that their mother warned them this sort of thing could happen if they married down, if they married a cholo.
Emilina shook from the insult. She did not say anything more before leaving Jaime, she simply raised her chin and walked away.
The next morning Adelita called a taxi and put their brother in it to the hospital, directing the driver to drop him there. At the hospital, they told Jaime he would need a month’s rehab and handed him a ticket to a shelter where he could stay during the treatment. From the shelter, Jaime called Rosa, complaining, but Rosa said, “Good. You can finally get help. And everyone can sleep at night!”
Her family and Rafael’s and Adelita’s – and especially Emilina’s – could finally rest. But even as Rosa thought this, she knew that as long as Jaime lived, he would bring more trouble.
Shortly after his call, Adelita called. “Why’d you tell her to bring him to my house?” she yelled.
Rosa answered, “Because she’s a very nice lady and she has done her best.”
*****
Karen Regen Tuero is a Pushcart-nominated writer whose fiction has appeared in North American Review, Glimmer Train, Lunch Ticket, Potomac Review, Iron Horse, The Literary Review, Hawaii Pacific Review, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. For links to her published work, go to: https://linktr.ee/kregentuero