“Proud, yes,” said Papa Tikas, “but also anxious.” He told Maria Josie that David had become quite the radical, fighting for one cause or another. Fair wages. Affordable rent. It was a noble heritage, he explained. In his own youth, Papa Tikas had been an organizer, assisting his fellow coal miners in the Lost Territory, but it was dangerous—many of his compadres were murdered by company guards, those hired by Rockefeller to corral striking miners into obedience. “He means well, but David only knows the life of a successful shopkeeper’s son.” Papa Tikas winked before turning to Luz. “You and Diego will be there, no?”
Luz nodded. “And Lizette with Alfonso.”
“Of course,” he said, chuckling. “Your loudest accessory.”
On the way home, riding along Sixteenth Street, the streetcar turned a sharp corner, sending Luz and Maria Josie swaying to the right in the back section. Their grocery sacks toppled from their laps, carrots and onions rolling over booted ankles. Luz gathered the items from the dirty floor, scrambling on her knees, arms fumbling as if panning for gold. When her hands fell upon several pounds of pork, a good cut with lots of fat, wrapped in wax paper, she knew immediately the meat had come from Papa Tikas. Either a gift or a handout, and sometimes those were the same thing. Luz shamefully handed the bundled meat back to Maria Josie.
“Damn that man,” she said, turning away from Luz.
Luz said quietly in Spanish, “I won’t tell Diego it was free.”
FOUR
The Trouble with Men
They parked on Curtis Street and scrambled out of Alfonso’s busted-up Chevy in a line of dress clothes, a click-clack of Luz’s and Lizette’s pumps. David’s party was at the end of a strip of dance halls with names like Royal, Empress, Colonial, and Strand. Dime girls danced in rosy windows while corner Romas sold hash and breathed fire from sticks. The night smelled of the far-off meatpacking plant’s manure and metal, and soon mixed with the scent of marijuana and perfumed skin. Diego and Alfonso ducked into an alleyway, their black hair glinting, their secondhand wing-tipped shoes polished bright. They sparked a joint and told Lizette and Luz to keep watch.
“You better not get too owled,” said Lizette. “David won’t like that.”
“Let that pendejo get mad,” said Alfonso, inhaling so deeply that his face resembled a skull. He offered a hit to Diego, who refused and flicked the joint quick and red like a small comet launched into the sky. The alleyway was dotted with stagnant pools of water among dead weeds and fuming sewers. Feral cats shifted in shadows. Beyond brick walls, spotlights rose into the night, white masts shooting into the sky like swords. The air held the strange stillness of oncoming snow. No breeze, only lingering smoke.
“Come on, you guys,” Luz said. “We’ll miss the food.”
Rainbow Hall’s enormous brass doors opened to a lobby that ended in a crushed velvet curtain beneath a stucco arch. In the main room, black bears and trout were carved into stone walls. The ceiling was an elaborate mosaic of covered wagons sailing the plains, their wheels trailed by hordes of buffalo.
Nearly a hundred people had gathered to celebrate David. The space was swampy with their heat. Bushels of roses and white orchids covered dozens of round tables. Cedar wreaths extended from the walls. On an elevated stage, old men played mandolin and guitar, a bobbing accordion, the room exhaling with music and laughter.
“Coats, please.” Papa Tikas had approached them, placing his palms over Luz’s shoulders. He smelled of licorice and paper, something vaguely leather. In a forest-colored suit, he bowed to kiss Luz’s and Lizette’s hands. Lips warm and wet. He greeted Diego and Alfonso with steady embraces. Lizette slid out of her disintegrating fur jacket, passing it over on a hooked hand. Papa Tikas hugged the pelt with one arm, reaching for Luz’s wool jacket with the other. He studied the girls’ red satin dresses. Lizette had made them herself, no pattern or sewing machine needed. “Tonight, we get twins,” he said.
They followed as he weaved through aisles, embracing family and friends, kissing the cheeks of gorgeous women and their ancient grandmothers, parting the thicket of elbows and shoulders, until, finally, they arrived at a lengthy table stretched regal with caviar, eggplant, grape leaves, racks of lamb, fried potatoes, veal sausages, pastries. The scent was overwhelming, fats and yeasts, the citrus of flowers. Luz nudged Lizette, as if to say Impossible.
“Papa Tikas,” said Lizette, in a babyish voice. “Are you really Papa No?l?”
“Kouklitsa,” he said, before stepping away.
During dinner, the glowing chandeliers dimmed and one of David’s cousins announced it was time for the Kalamatiano. The dance floor bloomed, Orthodox girls, newly married couples, children running, scampering over wooden floors. They linked arms in a wide, meandering circle, footwork beating back and forth. The floor thumped with movement.
Luz stayed in her seat, picked at her plate and worried over who’d eventually ask her to dance. She was seventeen years old, eighteen in a few months, and Luz worried something was broken about her. She had never had a true suitor, and waiting for love felt like searching the horizon for a figure in the distance, walking toward her from darkened clouds.
Across the table, Diego twirled a small meaty bone between his fingers. Lizette pretended to poke Alfonso with an asparagus spear, and he bent down, disappearing under the table for a moment before revealing a metal flask. The party was abundant with red wine, but Papa Tikas didn’t want any fighting at his parties, so he rarely allowed hard liquor. Alfonso handed the flask to Lizette, who drank before passing it to Luz. The liquor tasted cheap and stale and went warmly down her throat.
“Why you always have that hillbilly shit?” Diego asked.
“Made it myself, hombre. I’ll bring the good stuff next time.” Alfonso laughed. He yeehawed and slapped his knee. He was good for Lizette, Luz thought. A balance. They’d met at Saint Cajetan’s Memorial Day barbecue. In the green plaza, Alfonso stepped to their table in the springtime weather, the air full with apple blossoms and drifting cottonwood saplings. “Se?orita,” he said, tipping his ten-gallon hat, “the name’s Al.” He thought he was a real cowboy, always dressing in boots and hats and sterling buckles. He’d come to Colorado from the Philippines, a place Luz had never heard of before she’d met him. There were several men on the boat. It smelled faintly of vomit and was filled with young and old alike—there was a gambler named Miguel who’d lost an eye and spent the entire voyage squinting without depth at the horizon. They arrived in San Francisco, but Alfonso wanted the mountains, the desert, a place with no oceans anywhere in sight. “On all the maps, Colorado looked wild,” he once said, “though no one mentioned it’d be so hard to breathe.”
They were halfway drunk now—everyone, that is, except for Diego. Lizette had rushed with Alfonso to the dance floor, her shapely hips knocking couples out of her way like a strong tide. Diego remained at the table with Luz. He slumped in his chair, rolled his shirtsleeves to reveal the small snake tattoo on his left arm, just above his elbow. As the booze worked through Luz’s veins, she felt cradled by the room. She asked Diego if he was all right, but either he didn’t hear her, or he didn’t care. Sometimes men were like that, treating a girl’s voice as if it had slipped from her mouth and fallen directly into a pit.