Sensuality

God, what had I done?

Tomorrow, I’ll be good, I vowed. Tomorrow, it will all be about Mamá. She’ll sit up in her bed and scold me for neglecting her. I’ll bow my head, knowing that I deserve it, and be grateful that she’s feeling like herself again.

Maybe I’ll brush her hair.

We walked through the deserted lobby. The gift shop was closed. Tomorrow, I’d bring Mamá irises, tulips, and daffodils—spring flowers of renewal. She’d scold me for spending the money, but she’d be pleased.

“I’ll walk you to your car,” Luis offered.

The door to the hospital chapel stood ajar. It offered sanctuary from an awkward moment.

“I think, maybe, I’ll go in there for a while.” It wasn’t the best way to say good-bye, but at least he could escape cleanly.

Luis followed me inside.

There were three rows of smooth, dark, wood pews, separated by an aisle. A small pulpit stood on a raised dais. The dark-brown carpet showed vacuum tracks.

I knelt and crossed myself before taking a seat. The pew was hard and cool on the backs of my thighs. Luis sat close, but didn’t touch me. I stared at the brass cross on the wall behind the pulpit and wondered why I couldn’t be the girl Mamá had raised me to be. Was it right to face God with fresh sin still damp between my legs?

My head tipped forward. Hair cascaded, hiding my face, but not my shame. I prayed for Mamá, for her nurses, the doctors, and Luis’s abuela, with my hands clutched tight.

Tomorrow, I promised God, I’ll be a saint.

Luis put his warm hand on the nape of my neck. I glanced up at him, hoping the tear stinging the corner of my eye didn’t sparkle. Guilt weighed at the corners of his mouth.

“Do you think we’ll be forgiven?” he asked.

I nodded toward the cross. “If we ask for it sincerely, we’re forgiven. Unless you mean Mamá. She’s a little tougher on me than God is.”

South South Bronx

Hugh Smith

Enormous rats scurried among the shadows, pausing here and there to pick up scraps of garbage that spilled from Dumpsters lining the South Bronx alleyway.

Every so often a face appeared at the alley’s entrance. Addicts, probably, or homeless, wondering what a brand-new Mercedes (with Connecticut plates, no less) was doing parked in a filthy South Bronx alley at this hour of the night. They would have to keep wondering since the streetlight couldn’t penetrate far enough into the murk for them to see what was going on. But I’m sure they wish it did, since my moans and screams made it clear what was taking place.

The night had been much more stressful than usual. My restaurant, Cabaña, was a zoo. Over the past year I had worked my ass off and Cabaña had blossomed into a genuine Manhattan hot spot; a place to see and be seen. In addition to the usual Friday night crowd of rich Manhattanites and wealthy tourists who waited months for a reservation, tonight there was an Oscar-winning actor, a former New York City mayor, a rapper and his entourage, and a private party for an up-and-coming European tennis star.

Everything had to go perfectly, so I personally greeted every table, made sure the food was perfect, soothed the ego of the rapper, who thought the waiter was coming on to him, arranged a private table for the Oscar winner so no one would notice that the young lady he was with wasn’t really young or a lady, and later escorted the young tennis star out through the service entrance so the paparazzi wouldn’t see that she was so high she didn’t even know her own name. By the time the bulk of the patrons were gone, I was exhausted and decided to leave my managers to close up. After a night like I’d had, I needed some relief, the kind my husband, Miguel, couldn’t provide and that I could only find in one place.

I’ve had lovers in the past, but after too much wasted time and effort, I found I had no use for the young personal trainers who only wanted to brag about fucking the rich, older woman. I couldn’t stomach the models either, or the athletes, actors, and assorted trust-fund babies who spent their money at my restaurant and their time flirting with me, trying to seduce me with their looks and Daddy’s money. Even more pathetic were the executives, Fortune 500 types with manicured nails, soft hands, and hair plugs. Those pampered punks didn’t know a thing about what I wanted. Plus, they weren’t used to a woman like me, a sexy, full-figured Latina who overpowered them with more breasts, hips, ass, and thighs than they had any clue what to do with. I needed someone from the streets, a man who knew what it was to come up hard and have nothing except a dick and the ability to use it. I needed someone rough around the edges. I needed someone rough, period, and the best place to find men like that is the South Bronx.

I must be loca; even the cops don’t venture into the South Bronx without a damn good reason. Hell, I could get robbed, raped, or worse. To tell you the truth, the thought of rape turned me on. There was something exciting about the thought of being brutally used to within an inch of your life by desperate men who don’t give a damn about you.

Still, sometimes I wondered whether or not what I did and who I did it with was more to hurt Miguel than to pleasure myself. Miguel would be mortified if he knew his princesa was associating with the kind of people he called “the dregs of society.” He’s forgotten that those “dregs of society” are the same people we grew up with, laughed with, cried with, and dreamed with. The only difference between us and them is our dreams came true.

Miguel and I both grew up in poverty in the South Bronx but we both worked hard. He landed college and law-school scholarships and eventually became an associate, then later the first Hispanic partner at one of the city’s most prestigious law firms. I went to culinary school, then honed my skills working for some of the best restaurants in the city before opening my own restaurant. They were tough, those early years, but those were great times. We didn’t have much, but we had each other and our dreams. We couldn’t have been happier. Now we’re living our dreams and we have everything but each other.

I put those thoughts out of my head and twenty minutes after leaving the restaurant, I exited the Major Deegan Expressway at 161st Street in the shadow of Yankee Stadium. The night was rain-forest humid, typical for August in New York. Ghetto folks, most too poor to afford air-conditioning or even a decent fan, were still outside at this late hour, lounging on stoops or just standing around, leaning against the rough concrete, holding ice-cold bottles in their hands of whatever would help them make it through the sweltering night.

Music from my favorite bump-and-grind CD played from the Mercedes’s Blapunkt speakers as I cruised for my choice for the evening. It didn’t take long to find him. He was a thug, twenty years old at the most, and not too tall, around five nine or ten, dressed in the standard drug dealer uniform—bandanna, white wifebeater, much too baggy jeans, and $150 sneakers. A thick gold chain with a Puerto Rican–flag pendant dangled between his thick, chiseled pecs. He walked with his head slightly down, but always vigilant, not missing a thing.

He and his boys crowded into a cuchifrito spot just off Willis Avenue. I double-parked in front, shot a nasty glare at the crackhead eyeing the Mercedes, kissed mi abuelita’s crucifix, and followed them inside.

The restaurant, if you could call it that, was filthy. The ghosts of fried things lingered in the air. A fan leaned in one corner, wearily oscillating and doing nothing but rea

rranging the humidity. A strip of dirt dislodged from its metal grillwork and soared on an invisible current before coming to rest on a plate of empanadas in the grimy display case. The stools lining the counter were occupied with the type of men I would expect to see in a place like this at a time like this eating food like this.