“I remember,” she said. “I told you that there were only two things you needed to learn in life. You needed to learn how to forgive. And you needed to learn how to be happy.”
“I am happy, Mima.” I was lying to her, but not all lies were bad.
“That means you’ve learned to forgive.”
“Maybe not.” I didn’t say anything about wanting to go around punching guys’ lights out.
She grinned as she rolled out a perfectly round tortilla. How did she do that? She put the tortilla on the comal.
I was ready with the butter. She always gave me the first tortilla, and I’d slather it with butter and wolf it down.
“Ay, Salvador, did you even taste it?”
We both started laughing. Laughing was part of the way we talked. I could hear my uncles cheering about something, and Mima and I looked at each other. “I hate football,” she said.
“Popo loved football.”
“And he loved baseball. He didn’t have to talk to anybody when he was watching his games.” She shook her head. “Your Popo didn’t know how to talk to people.”
“He liked talking to dogs.”
“That’s true.”
“Do you miss him?”
“Of course I do.”
“I miss him too. I miss his cussing.”
She smiled and shook her head again. “Ave María purísima, your Popo never met a bad word he didn’t like. He knew every bad word in two languages. And used almost all of them every day of his life. He fooled me, you know. He never said one bad word around me when we were dating. Oh boy, was I in for a surprise. But he went to Mass every Sunday.”
“I don’t think God minded—?that he liked to cuss.”
“Don’t get any ideas.”
“I like ideas,” I said.
“Hmm,” she said.
“Hmm,” I said. I liked the hmm thing. Dad got that from her. And I got it from him. Maybe a part of me was old-school too.
“Como te quería tu Popo.”
“Yeah, I know. But he had a funny way of loving people, didn’t he?”
“You know, when I met him, I thought he was so beautiful.”
“Maybe it was you who was beautiful, Mima.”
“You know, you’re a lot like your father.”
“Not really, Mima.”
“Yes, you are.”
I wasn’t going to argue with her.
And then she said, “You like to talk. Just like Vicente.”
“Yeah. He’s good that way, Dad. He talks about things that matter.”
She nodded. “He should have become a writer.”
“Why didn’t he?”
“He said there were too many words in the world already.”
I nodded. “He’s right about that.”
“Yes,” she said. “Creo que sí.”
“Dad, he’s more like you. He’s not like Popo at all.”
“That’s right. I loved your Popo—?but there’s enough men like him in the world already.” She laughed. “I’m mean. Your Mima’s mean.”
“No,” I said. “You’re sweet. Dulce, Mima, that’s what you are.”
She stopped rolling out tortillas and looked at me. I looked back at her—?and then I said, “Are you afraid, Mima?”
“No,” she said. “I’m not afraid.”
I didn’t know I was going to start crying. She put down her old rolling pin and sat next to me. “Maybe they’ll take the cancer away at the Mayo Clinic.”
I couldn’t understand how she could be so calm. If I were dying, I would be really sad. And pissed off. And I was pissed off. I was pissed off as hell.
She held me in her arms. I wanted to hold on to her and never let go. But I was going to have to let go. And that hurt. Why does it hurt when you love someone? What is it with the human heart? What was it with my heart? I wondered if there was a way to keep her in this world forever. And it was as though she were reading my mind. “No one is meant to live forever,” she whispered. “Only God lives forever. You see these hands? Hands get old. That’s the way it’s supposed to be, mijito. Even the heart gets old.”
She let me go and went back to her work. She handed me another warm tortilla. “This will make everything better.”
She watched me slather butter onto the fresh tortilla.
“You have big hands,” she said. “Your Popo had big hands.” She nodded. I knew that nod. It was her nod of approval. “You’re turning into a man.”
I didn’t feel like a man just then. I felt like a five-year-old boy who didn’t want to do anything except play in a pile of leaves. A five-year-old boy with a greedy heart who wanted his grandmother to live forever.
My Uncles and Aunts (and Cigarettes)
WATCHING MY UNCLES and aunts was much better than watching the Kardashians. Not that I liked watching the Kardashians. I only watched because Sam wouldn’t shut up about them.
I sometimes joined the conversation—?but mostly I listened. Mima was taking a nap, and everyone was sitting around the television, watching the Dallas Cowboys game. My Uncle Mickey was about to light a cigarette. Aunt Evie shot him a look. “Take it outside.”
“I’m watching the game.”
“Ah, a multitasker. Take it outside. Your mother’s sick, idiot.” Aunt Evie liked that word: idiot.
Uncle Mickey headed out the front door, cigarette and beer in hand. I was raised in a family of smokers. For the most part, I didn’t much care for cigarette smoke. Not that it kept me from liking my uncles and aunts. Uncle Mickey said that smokers were more interesting than nonsmokers. Aunt Evie told me not to listen to my Uncle Mickey. “He’s an idiot.” She never sounded mean when she said things like that. I wondered how she managed it. Maybe it was because she was really sweet. Everyone loved her. My Uncle Tony said that Evie was Mima with a potty mouth. “She got the potty mouth from Popo.” I thought that sounded about right. And my Aunt Lulu, well, she was the only one who didn’t smoke. And she didn’t drink beer, either. She and my dad, they were the wine drinkers. They were also the only ones who went to college. Uncle Mickey said that going to college turned you into a snob. My dad usually just listened to his brothers talk, without adding his own commentary.
I walked out the door and joined Uncle Mickey on the front porch.
“So, vato, you gonna graduate or what?”
“Or what,” I said.
“You’re a wiseass.”
“Yup,” I said.
I really liked my Uncle Mickey. He had long hair and a goat-ee and the straightest teeth I’d ever seen. His skin was weathered from working in the sun, and he didn’t seem to give a damn about what anyone thought about him. He was tall and had tattoos, and a lot of people were afraid of him. But he was really a sweet guy. When I was a kid, he used to pick me up, and I thought I could see the whole world as I sat on his shoulders. And he was always sneaking bills into my hand—?ones, fives, tens, twenties—?his way of loving me.
“When are you going to quit smoking those things?” I asked.
“When I fuckin’ die.” He laughed. My uncles loved using the F word. Dad said they threw that word around like it was a football. That was his way of saying that just because my uncles loved that word didn’t mean I had permission to throw it around the house. Nope.
I sat there next to him, not saying much. “You’re like your dad,” Uncle Mickey said. “You like to sit and think too much.”