Adrian McKinty - Fifty Grand

“What are you thinking about?” Paco asks dreamily.

“My belly,” I tell him, and he laughs and laughs.

“You don’t even have one,” he says finally.

I do, Paco. I have a cop gut and it tells me that Mrs. Cooper is innocent and time is running out and the real killer’s days to walk this Earth are few.

Black orchid sky. Black moon. Black dreams. Back on bruised-mouth island. The beat in Vedado. Doctors. Informers. Tourists. Whores. Secret policemen. Secret asylums. Secret prisons. Calling me home. But not yet, I’ll come, but not yet.

I dream the song of waking and lie under the sheet, awake.

I pull back the curtain, look through the window.

It’s well before dawn. The night is full of dying stars and hidden mass.

A noise on the outside steps. A person.

Who is that over there?

My eyes adapt to the light.

It’s Paco. Kneeling. Fingering his rosary.

Does he do this every morning?

Poor kid. Must be scared shitless to be here.

I watch him, fascinated.

He finishes, lifts his head. I let the curtain fall back, lie down again.

A key in the lock. The door creaks open. He comes in.

He looks in my direction, squints, tries to see if I’m awake. Deciding that I’m not, he tiptoes to his bed and takes off his shoes. He removes a white bag of powder from his pocket and puts it carefully in the drawer next to his bed. He lifts the duvet, slithers under it, and rolls onto his side.

He drapes an arm over his eyes and tries to sleep. After a couple of minutes the arm falls to his side. His face assumes a different, more feminine posture. His eyebrows are thick and his features fine, his hair wiry but containable. It’s the eyes that give up his wildness, his begging years, his time running with gangs in Managua, or his time-probably exaggerated-as a camp follower of the Sandinistas, a wannabe boy soldier.

Sleeping, he has the face of someone deeper than the front he projects to the world. It’s a shame, Paco, that you love America so. You shouldn’t fall so hard on the first date.

Not me. In matters of love I take my time. Too choosy, everyone says. The Havana girl whose exception proves the rule.

But you, Francisco, everything’s coming to you too easily and too fast. Didn’t you listen to Esteban? There’s another side to this land, there’s a-

His eyes flip open and he catches me staring at him.

“I could feel your look,” he says.

“Did I wake you?”

“No. I was awake.”

“What time is it?” he asks, sitting up.

“Six… Wait a minute, are you just getting in?”

“Yeah.”

“Where were you?”

“Denver,” he says after a pause.

“Denver? What were you doing there?”

“Manuelito came by at midnight, you were asleep. He was looking for someone to go with him.”

“Who’s Manuel?”

“You don’t know him?”

“No. What were you doing in Denver?” I ask, surprised.

“Clubbing, man,” he says in English with a huge grin. He pulls back the sheets and sits on the edge of his bed.

“Clubbing,” I repeat.

“You should go.”

“I don’t think it’s my sort of scene,” I tell him.

“What is your sort of scene?” he says with a bit of an edge to his voice.

“Not clubbing in Denver,” I reply.

He reaches into his boxers and scratches his balls. “You know what your problem is, María?” he says.

“I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“I am going to tell you. Your problem is that you act like you’re fifty, like you’re past it. Christ, man, you’re twenty-seven years old. You’re in a new country, full of opportunities and people and things, and you’re over there hunched with the fucking weight of the world on your shoulders, like you’re some old nurse in a cancer ward or something.”

“Tell me about the club,” I say, refusing the hook.

He shakes his head. “Man, those prices. And those white chiquitas . Shit, American girls. College girls,” he says to annoy me, which, bizarrely, it does.

“You’re disgusting,” I let slip.

“Is that what you think?” he says, standing up and walking across the room.

He’s all points and edges, and the booze or that white powder has loosened him up.

“Is that what you fucking think?” he repeats.

Oh hell, what next? The punch to the face? The stoned attempt at rape?

“You’re high,” I tell him.

“I’m not high, didn’t you hear what I was saying? I couldn’t afford to drink at those prices. Blow my hard-earned cash on ten-dollar beers? No thanks,” he says, folding his arms, glaring at me from a few feet away.

“I saw the bag.”

“Spying on me? Not that it’s any of your business, Esteban asked me to sell it for him and his buyer didn’t show, ok?” he says, his voice rising to an indignant bark.

“You’re scaring me, Paco. Go back to your own bed, please.”

“I’ll go wherever I damn well please,” he says, but after a moment he sits on his bed.

“We shouldn’t even be sharing a room now that all those guys went to L.A. I’ll talk to Esteban about it,” I say firmly.

“Esteban’s in Denver with his lady until Monday morning,” Paco says. “But he’ll do what you want. You must be the fucking golden girl.”

“What does that mean?”

Paco throws something at me. Two things. I pick them up. It’s the key to the Range Rover and a cell phone.

“Franco’s using the car today but Esteban says you can use it tomorrow to get supplies. Just give him a call.”

“I see. That’s good.”

Paco shakes his head and continues to glare at me.

I’ve hurt him somehow. I don’t need complications, I have to defuse this, now.

“Please, Paco.”

“‘Please, Paco,’ ” he repeats mockingly.

“You are high,” I say.

“So? You’re not my mother. Been working hard. I earned two hundred dollars this week already. I’ll make three hundred next week. Pretty soon I’ll be foreman of one of the work gangs. And when it gets too cold in January and all these Mexes fuck off to L.A., they’ll be begging me to stay.”

He grins again, wolfishly. He’s acting the big man but he can’t hold it for long. Finally the lines crack and a wave of unhappiness spills across his face. He crosses the room, sits on my bed, takes my hand, and kisses it.

“María,” he says.

“No, Paco,” I say, pulling the hand away.

“No, I’ll tell you what your problem is: you’re a virgin, that’s what’s wrong with you. You’re a virgin or a fucking lesbian.”

“Get off my bed and get the fuck away from me.”

“Fuck you,” he says, and clicks his fingers in front of my face. He walks back to his side of the room with a satisfied look on his face, but again it doesn’t last long. I’m in no mood for this game. I tell him so.

“Oh shit, I’m sorry, María, I’m not high. I tried a little, but I’m not high. I’m, I, I don’t know. I’m tired.”

He sits down heavily on his bed and closes his eyes. I know he’s young and he’s emotional, but there’s something about his behavior that smacks of… what? I can’t quite put my finger on it.

“You have every right to be tired. You’ve worked hard all week,” I say conciliatingly.

“Not that kind of tired.”

He rubs his hands through his hair, thinking about something. Suddenly he sits up straight, places his hands carefully in his lap, and looks at me. He takes a deep breath and begins: “Listen, María, I don’t know who you are or what you’re doing here, but I know you’re not what you say you are. I know you’re not from Mexico and that accent, that’s not Yucatán. I had a cousin who played baseball, professionally, for four years in the Cuban league. His wife talks just like you. I don’t know who you’re running from or what you did, but I know you’re not some fucking peasant girl from Valladolíd. You picked a pretty bad disguise. You don’t talk like no Indian, you don’t look like no Indian. You’re a liar and not a good one, either.”