The Day It Rained Forever

Gomez snorted. ‘Who’s mad?’

In the ambulance, head tilted back, looking out at them upside down, Vamenos faltered.

‘Compadres, when … when I come from the hospital … am I still in the bunch? You won’t kick me out? Look, I’ll give up smoking, keep away from Murillo’s, swear off women –’

‘Vamenos,’ said Martinez gently, ‘don’t promise nothing.’

Vamenos, upside-down, eyes brimming wet, saw Martinez there, all white now against the stars.

‘Oh, Martinez, you sure look great in that suit. Compadres, don’t he look beautiful?’

Villanazul climbed in beside Vamenos. The door slammed. The four remaining men watched the ambulance drive away.

Then, surrounded by his friends, inside the white suit, Martinez was carefully escorted back to the kerb.

In the tenement, Martinez got out the cleaning fluid and the others stood around, telling him how to clean the suit and later, how not to have the iron too hot and how to work the lapels and the crease and all. When the suit was cleaned and pressed so it looked like a fresh gardenia just opened, they fitted it to the dummy.

‘Two o’clock,’ murmured Villanazul. ‘I hope Vamenos sleeps well. When I left him, he looked good.’

Manulo cleared his throat. ‘Nobody else is going out with that suit tonight, huh?’

The others glared at him.

Manulo flushed. ‘I mean … it’s late. We’re tired. Maybe no one will use the suit for forty-eight hours, huh? Give it a rest. Sure. Well. Where do we sleep?’

The night being still hot and the room unbearable, they carried the suit on its dummy out and down the hall. They brought with them also some pillows and blankets. They climbed the stairs towards the roof of the tenement. There, thought Martinez, is die cooler wind, and sleep.

On the way, they passed a dozen doors that stood open, people still perspiring and awake, playing cards, drinking pop, fanning themselves with movie magazines.

I wonder, thought Martinez. I wonder if – yes!

On the fourth floor, a certain door stood open.

The beautiful girl looked up as the five men passed. She wore glasses and when she saw Martinez she snatched them off and hid them under a book.

The others went on, not knowing they had lost Martinez who seemed stuck fast in the open door.

For a long moment he could say nothing. Then he said:

‘José Martinez.’

And she said:

‘Celia Obregon.’

And then both said nothing.

He heard the men moving up on the tenement roof. He moved to follow.

She said, quickly, ‘I saw you tonight!’

He came back.

‘The suit,’ he said.

‘The suit,’ she said and paused. ‘But not the suit.’

‘Eh?’ he said.