THE WAGES OF SIN

Rudy, the gringo and the lawyer have beaten me senselessly. I wobble back to my corner after a rocky first round and slump onto my stool. It is not a peaceful slumber. When Fabiola and I celebrated our sixth year of fucking each other, I dwelled more on the anniversary of my six-year separation from César and Octavio. I said that I would be willing to pay any price regarding Fabiola, never anticipating the agony of losing César and Octavio. If their daddy wasn't their coach, they would tell Iliana that they didn't want to play for that team. If it weren't their soccer, baseball and basketball teams I was running, then I was teaching them tennis, golf and boxing. We'd go to the track and jog. "Let's see how many times you can go around without stopping." Other times I would preach, "You need to do push-ups and sit-ups. And you must stretch between each exercise." Iliana has never helped my cause. She has used them to exact her revenge, but I have been too eager to make her the scapegoat for the breakdown between the boys and me. I abandoned them. Before destiny had taken its final course and our futures hadn't been settled, they were standing in front of the apartment throwing the football. Iliana, her arms folded, was waiting at the foot of the stairs. "Your sons have something to say to you," she stated in her grim voice. They approached me, César leading Octavio, the oldest in charge, the youngest juggling the football. César, his strong jaw trembling, looked me in the eye and delivered his ultimatum, "I need a father." "I'm here. I'm always here, César. I haven't left you." His mouth twitched. I could see his mother's vindictive stubbornness. As he stalked past me in anger, he slammed his open palm into my chest and climbed upstairs. I searched Octavio's countenance for encouragement. "Why did you leave us for those two kids?" he spat. His mother had exploited every opportunity to bury the dagger. "That's not true," I pleaded, but he was ascend the stairs before the last syllable had escaped my mouth. I glared at Iliana. She turned abruptly, a matador contemptuous of the bloodied bull. The boys and I were the best of friends. César and I had a standing night together the three years that Illiana and I were a separated couple. He and I would go to the movies and when we exited the theatre, he would have his arm slung around my shoulder. Octavio and I never spent as much planned time together. Our outings were more spontaneous. Though César looked like a Tamaulipas, he had a Bocanegra personality. Octavio had his mother's large eyes and fleshy lips, but he had my humor. We shared the same appreciation for the absurd. I would give him my columns to read and he would howl with laughter, guffawing at my description of local characters and events. I have photos of the boys plastered to the back of my office door. I look up from my computer and these pictures suck the air out of me. I fear we will never be reunited until one of us is dead. I don't fear a fatal disease consuming me because my approaching death might serve as an opportunity for reconciliation. I grasp at anything. Besides the Apostles, these are the two other machos who show me no mercy. I never talk to Fabiola about my desolation because she was little more than an innocent bystander at the crossroads when the train roared past and changed the present forever. With the implacability of Iliana, they have been relentless in their contemptuousness. When I visit them, they stand at the threshold of their new home and reply either "yes" or "no" to my inquiries. And when they do address me, it isn't "Dad". It's "Tom". "They're boys and they're protecting their mother," Estanislao and others tell me. I have no doubts they were traumatized when their mother was beating her head against the wall and crying hysterically. "There's no person more beautiful than mother," César told me as he tried to comprehend my cruel exit. God knows the furious utterances she cast on me in their presence. She telephoned my mother and informed her that she and the boys would no longer have any communication with anyone in the family. She also added that I hated my parents. "My son isn't perfect, but I know that he doesn't hate his parents," my mother reproved Iliana. "Oh yes he does, yes he does. You don't know your son." I was at a soccer game when I encountered an acquaintance who knew Iliana and the boys. He asked me about them and I answered that there had been an estrangement, but time might turn the tide. "My father had three daughters when he left their mother for my mother," he explained. "I was the oldest of the next three children. His daughters never forgave him. When he died, they didn't attend the funeral. Good luck."