Niyati Keni - Esperanza Street

Inside, the air was thick with the smell of coffee and vanilla and it was as heavy to breathe as that on the street, barely stirred by the ceiling fans that churned overhead. A sign on the door said ‘air conditioned’ but the cooler was always just being fixed. Cora usually kept the door wedged open instead which made no difference except that the scent of freshly brewed coffee hung in the air outside.

Ignacio Sanesteban was straightening the tables and putting out the fresh flowers that his wife insisted upon. He looked up as I walked in. Ignacio was a big man with a sleepy voice and heavy-lidded eyes that gave him an air of languor or conceit, though he possessed neither. He rose at four every morning to bake the pastries that drew regulars from as far afield as Cabugon or Pasay, including Eddie Casama, who sent his driver down at least once a week.

I looked round the Shak to see what was new. Every wall and pillar was busy with paintings, mostly Cora’s own. Some were really good, as good as you might see in any gallery. A few were framed, most were stretched between bamboo canes, the canvases ragged at the edges. There was one of Abnor sitting at his tea-stall in a bleached early-morning light, the kind you’d get on a day when it might become too hot to move later. Foreigners were always trying to buy it and Cora invariably refused.

From the back of the Shak, the sound of the Eagles started up from an old Wurlitzer that stood by the kitchen door casting its colours in a fan over the wall.

Ignacio slipped back behind the counter. He smiled at me, pushing a dish towards me across the glass. It was full of coins, tips from customers. I sifted through it, picked out a few. Ignacio started to tip beans into the grinder. I walked through to the back, towards the Wurlitzer.

In the furthest booth, next to the jukebox, sat Cora. She wasn’t alone. Benny was with her, his back to me. I hadn’t seen him for days. He’d stayed in his room, emerging only to eat and sometimes not even that, so that America or Aunt Mary would send me up with a tray, which he’d make me leave at the door. I hadn’t been worried; he often immersed himself in his drawing, filling page after page at his desk, reappearing suddenly to raid the Frigidaire or pilfer food straight out of America’s pans before gathering up garlic bulbs and bunched banana leaves for a still life. It seemed quite natural now that I should see him here, surrounded by so many paintings, even a few of his own. He didn’t look pleased to see me. ‘Joseph,’ he said, with a slight formality.

On the table in front of him his sketchbook lay open, loose pages spilling out, each containing a series of frames like a komik book. The images were bold, arresting. I leaned forward to take a look but he angled the pages away from me. I moved over to the Wurlitzer. Cora said, ‘Tell him I’m wise to him. He never did like the Eagles.’

I shifted the coins in my palm. ‘You think I could get away with Sam Cooke today?’ I said.

‘Not a chance. You know him. It’s got to be a girl.’

I scanned down the list, selected Dusty in Memphis . Cora moved aside on her bench and patted the red leatherette next to her. I sat down. The upholstery, already sticky with the heat, was warm and pliant from her body. Ignacio arrived with three Cokes and a plate of cookies. He slid them onto the table, tapped the rim of the cookie plate with his fingernail. ‘That’s for Dusty,’ he said. He returned to the counter and carried on polishing glasses and cutlery, all the time smiling his approval at the neat lines of pastries layered with fruit and cream and curls of chocolate that sat chilling under the glass. Ignacio said little as a rule. Cora, in contrast, seemed to talk at a thousand words a minute. I thought, as I had many times before, how unlike Aunt Mary she was: prettier, livelier, with a deep, grating laugh. It was hard to imagine they were related. I looked down at the sketches. Benny started to slide them back in between the leaves of his book but Cora placed her hand on them.

‘They’re good,’ I said. Benny scowled at me.

‘Revolutionaries!’ Cora said gleefully. She held up a sheet to look closely at it and as she did so, from underneath it, the gloss of a photograph caught my eye. The girl under the yellow bell tree. I was surprised; it wasn’t like America or Aunt Mary to leave anything lying around. Benny reached out to tuck the photograph away again, but Cora had already spotted it. She took it from him, squinted at it; a pretence, her eyesight was sharp enough when a customer glanced at a pastry or edged towards the door without paying. ‘Girlfriend?’ she said.

‘No!’ Benny said.

‘Who then?’

‘She used to work for Mom.’ Benny’s tone was light enough but I looked hard at him then; his voice carried something new. He avoided my eye.

‘Pretty. Bet your father was always sniffing around her,’ Cora said. Then, a second later, ‘Sorry.’

Benny shrugged.

‘You know, I think I remember her. Doring or Dora or Doreen or something. She didn’t last long.’

‘What was she like?’

‘Oh, well, I have no idea. Never really spoke to the girl. Never really spoke to any of them. The pretty ones were always gone in no time.’ Benny stared fixedly at the sketches on the table.

‘Did you know Pop?’

‘Not as well as he’d have liked!’ And then again, ‘Sorry.’ Cora sighed. ‘You know how it is, baby. A snake only knows how to be a snake. In case you’re worried, you’re nothing like him. More like your mom.’

Benny’s eyes jerked up at her and then, unexpectedly, he exclaimed, ‘I wish you’d been my mom.’

Cora gave a high, crisp laugh. She sat back and studied him and after a minute reached out and stroked his cheek with her thumb. ‘Just look at you! She did a great job. Really she did.’

‘I just meant … ’ but he didn’t continue.

‘I hear your Lola’s in town,’ Cora said. From behind the counter, the sound of the grinder stopped.

‘Yeah,’ Benny said reluctantly.

‘Give the old lady my regards.’ The sound of the grinder started up again. Ignacio started humming along to Dusty, his eyebrows arched, a faint smile on his face.

‘She broke her wrist,’ Benny said.

‘Shucks,’ said Cora. Benny’s eyes flashed at her and she added remorsefully, ‘Ok, ok.’ She leaned across the table, planted both palms flat on it as if she were about to push herself up, but she stayed sitting. ‘I know just what’ll cheer you up. You want to help me paint something really big ?’

‘Sure, why not,’ Benny said.

‘Come at the weekend. Your mom won’t mind.’

Ignacio brought a bag over to the table. The smell of freshly ground coffee puffed out of it as he set it down. ‘With compliments,’ he said.

I reached out and tugged gently at Benny’s sleeve to uncover his watch. He looked annoyed for an instant but then he held his arm up for me to take a look, tilting it so that the clockface was the right way up. I slid towards the edge of the booth and as I did so Cora started after me, bouncing herself softly along the upholstery. Seeing her move, Benny got slowly to his feet. He looked at me ruefully.

We walked back to the Bougainvillea together. The rhythm of walking seemed to soften his mood and he started to talk about the komik he was working on, The Black Riders . His voice had deepened recently and he’d grown so much taller than me and I noticed now too how, like his brother, he’d started to carry himself differently as his body filled out. I felt a flush of pleasure as he talked; he’d hadn’t discussed his ideas with me for a long time. He talked about the komik all the way home and it was only after he’d gone up to his room and closed the door behind him that it occurred to me that he’d left no openings in which I might have asked about the girl in the photograph.