CHAVATEANDO!

I take my wine and roach and retreat to the backyard. I take a deep hit on the roach. I love fucking stoned. Combined with the pills, which are having their desired effects, I picture a whirlpool stirring placid waters. Strangely enough, I'm trying to conjure the Apostles up as part of my self-flagellation, but I'm unsuccessful in summoning these dastardly characters. They must have gang-banged Fabiola and like a row of executed prisoners are lying on their backs. The sole difference between them and the condemned, however, is that they were doing the shooting. m now I will be standing under another starry, moonlit sky lamenting the departure of Fabiola and the loss of two more boys. My cynicism lifts me out of the depths of despair. Will I be with another beautiful woman and two handsome sons? To its eternal credit, even though its existence is short-lived, the animal refuses to accept its own death. And neither will I. Though I calculate that we have screwed more than 2,000 times, I want to feel my dick sliding slowly into her tonight as I recreate the first time with one of her lovers. The doctor's successful conquest never fails to excite me. They met at a party. He invited her to dinner in Matamoros and they drank excessively. In his car he fingered her cunt while she sucked him. They arrived at his house where they fell off the couch groping each other. Fabiola confessed that she passed out, only to awaken in a tub of hot water as he revived her. "He wanted to fuck again," she told me one night as I pumped her. She mentioned on another occasion that he was one of those "who I liked the way he fucked me" and their rendezvous were strictly about sex."Whenever I knew whomever I was seeing wouldn't find out, I would give him a call." She once intimated that he was rough with her, but I could never squeeze the details regarding his techniques. There had arrived a moment when she realized that she had revealed too much and her words would come back to bite her on the ass as I'm sure he once did. How big was his dick? I can see her face twisted with pleasure and her mouth half-open, her nose flaring and her eyes sunk back into her head as she came. How many times did the good doctor look down upon that contorted face as he stroked her with increasing fury until he filled her with semen and she lay panting, her mind blind except for the pleasing sensation she had both given and taken. The pills are working as I work myself into a state of hate and horniness. I will explode in her. The physical release will be second to none, but the mental peace will be short-lived. I will have relived a brief instant of the doctor's affair with Fabiola, but the high from the carnal experience will plunge me deeper and deeper into the abyss of my own sexual despair. Is the repugnance that I feel for Fabiola turning me into a misogynist? When I have another woman in my arms, I see Fabiola in the arms of another. When I come in Fabiola, it's another man coming in Fabiola. Who is fucking Iliana? Who is fucking Marisa? Who is fucking Jennifer? The last two are married so one can only assume their husbands. Jennifer married a wealthy jeweler and lives in Dallas with three kids. Marisa lives with her lawyer in an affluent neighborhood. She never had children. I saw her walking a fluffy white thing that I assumed was a dog. I've never seen a cat on a leash. I didn't honk. I don't feel anything although I'm sure I would wince should she die before me. I'm not sure about my reaction should I encounter Iliana with another man. We have never crossed paths during these six years except in passing vehicles or when I have visited the boys. I will cry when she dies. A chunk of myself disappears into the darkness. I will look for pictures of her that Fabiola hasn't discovered and discarded. I will stare at the face that brought me to a standstill when she stopped in front of my hotel those many years ago and I will think of the boys suffering without their mother. And Fabiola? Fabiola who inspired me to change directions in my life; Fabiola who had me begging for her hand after a week's courtship; Fabiola who filled me with such ardor that after a month of romance I had a heart tattooed on my shoulder with her name emblazoned across the red background; Fabiola who three times found herself pregnant by me and bore me a handsome son; We are doomed. In my puerile mind I've reduced everything to the finality of death and the futility of life. I should be an old man dragging a heavy body down deserted downtown streets. Or will an event effect a miraculous transformation that will turn me into a faithful and loving husband? And when the end comes: "You were cheating on me?" "What the fuck are you talking about?" "The results from my tests have come back. I have an infection that causes cervical cancer. And you're the only one who could have given it to me." "Give me a break. It's been festering in you for years from all the unprotected sex you had with god knows how many guys. You used to tell me that you didn't use a rubber because it cheated you of your sensations and your ex-lovers didn't sound like the types who were only having sex with you. You were a promiscuous person. I have been living with the nightmare of your past and now you want to blame your past on me. Leave me. Let me have a moment's peace from your past. You don't love me anymore. I am nothing more than a convenience for you that you will look back upon as an inconvenience when you resume your fucking spree again." The hate that I previously felt for Iliana as our messy marriage slinked toward Jerusalem I have transferred to Fabiola. I have no more hate for Iliana as time has cleansed me and left a scintilla of love in its place. What's the point of resolving a problem when another will promptly replace it? Learn to become comfortable with the problem rather than enduring the unnerving surge of a new one. I must now deal with the enervating hate I feel for Fabiola. Iliana deserved better. Fabiola deserves better. There is a knock at the door. "Daddy-O! Daddy-O!" I open the door. Adrian is standing at the threshold attired in an old soccer jersey and a pair of red flannel pajamas. His hair is wet from the shower. "What's up, big guy?" "Will you sleep with me, Daddy-O?" He is wearing his glasses that he puts on as soon as he rises in the morning and wears until he goes to bed. "Sure, papi. But let me go to the bathroom first." I walk into the bathroom and close the door behind me. Like Rembrandt, I study myself in the mirror. The wrinkles are spreading across my face in the same fashion that the cracks in a car's window radiate in several directions, inching their way forward imperceptibly but implacably. I splash water into my eyes and inhale deeply. I take a piss, flush the toilet and walk back to the master bedroom. Fabiola and Marcos are in the shower. I open the door and Fabiola covers her body while Marcos gives me a big smile beneath a snowy head of shampoo. "Can't I have privacy?" she snaps.

ECSTASY & VIAGRA

"I know that you don't respect me," Fabiola sneered at me recently. I recall telling her about the same time that gays turned to meth to fuel their orgies and she responded that there was no greater aphrodisiac that ecstasy. She would drop a pill and within an hour she would want to fuck. She was high in the bathroom combing her hair when her date entered, sat her on the sink, pulled off her panties and ate her. Then he fucked her. They returned to the party where everyone was high and in various stages of amorous activity. "I started getting excited again so I pulled him into a closet and we fucked." Why did she bring up ecstasy knowing very well that we have never done the drug together and that she has refused to indulge in the drug with me? Sometimes when I'm stoned I chuckle about the whole absurdity of my predicament and attempt to spin my impossible situation into a positive. I tell myself that this constant tension keeps me in a heightened state of excitement, which keeps me hard. I remind myself that this precipitous mental state infuses my writing with an edgy quality. But what kind of writing are we talking about? The musings of an exiled journalist submitting stories to a second-rate newspaper about a Third World city where crime, corruption and violence reign and the best I can do is provide a superficial sensationalism to an audience that accepts that the druglords rule, that politicians survive on bribes and that murders shock no one. A soap opera mentality permeates the border. Nobody takes anything serious unless you're the victim. After the condolences and the whispered insinuations that so-and-so was at the wrong place at the wrong time, everyone returns to his existence that fluctuates between the surreal and the mundane. I am a professional writer who can't escape the Triple A circuit and make it to the big leagues. Where are the novels? Where are the short stories? Where are the books of poetry? I've considered collecting my best columns and compiling them in chronological order so I could have the pretense of publishing a book, but why? I am no artist. I write a few hours a day because I would hate myself for not exercising my brain even if it's only nonsense that I'm scribbling. I am thinking of Fabiola in the car with her previous lover who fingered her while she sat on top of him before going to his house where "he kept turning me over and over while he fucked me." Should I take my pills so I can give her the hard dick she rhapsodises about? I have sworn to myself to fuck her as much as possible in order to smooth out the grooves worn into her by her previous lovers and inflict the same torture on those who follow since she will outlive me by 30 years. But I'm fooling myself. They will see her as a strange piece of ass and she will look at them as hard dicks. I hate her. I hate her. She should have known that there would be a day of reckoning. And my day of reckoning? More children that hate me? AIDS? A lonely old man inhabiting a hot apartment who spends his days shuffling downtown until absent-mindedly walking across the street in front of a car? I search for my pills at the bottom of a basket on a shelf lined with an impressive collection of classics. I have read them all, but I don't remember a single scene or character. I find the magic potion and swallow two pills with a swig of wine. In an hour I will be able to spin like a top on top of my dick. I will wake up in the morning with a boner and I will punish her with another fuck. The Apostles may have collectively outfucked me five to one, but individually I've assumed first place. Except they're still fucking her. When I'm fucking her, they're fucking her. And when I can't evoke any of them during sex, my dick shrivels back into into its inconspicuous state. "I've had lots of hard dicks in me" echoes in my marijuana sensitive state. Her floppy tits sag to her flaccid belly as I attempt to concoct a picture of her that repulses me and will permit me to forget her when we are no longer together because I don't want to spend lonely nights regretting that we are no longer together and imagining that at that very instant she is fucking someone. But I will fuck and fuck and fuck her until the day we part. I look at the several pictures that were taken during our first year together. In ten years I will contemplate them with the same disbelief that I contemplate my oldest sons. Just like my boys and I once sat in mutual adoration, the photos of Fabiola and me convey the ecstasy of two people wildly infatuated with each other. She has the most remarkable face in the world and a camera enhances her beauty. Man are fascinated by her face. Her beauty makes her seem untouchable, yet she is one of the easiest fucks in the world. She craved coming and if the opportunity presented itself, she had no second thoughts about succumbing to the animal in her. I am feeling a stirring. These pills are fantastic. I don't know if I was this hard in my youth. It's a welcomed relief to the limp fucks that I've tried to coax out of myself in the mornings when Fabiola lies half-asleep twisting my nipples while I attempt to concoct images of any of the Apostles who is endeavoring to start his day with a fuck as he pushed into her with no other objective than the pleasure of ejaculating in her again. Between her pinching my nipples and erotic images playing themselves out inside my head, I succeed in adding another fuck to the record. I won't be taking no for an answer tonight. Tomorrow morning may be a different story, but armed and dangerous, there are other options when I have a full day ahead of me.

DOPE, WINE & BEER

A bat whooshes overhead. Maybe I should do a story about bats. I'm supposed to be an expert on Brownsville and the border, yet I know nothing about bats. Is this the right time to smoke a joint? I'll have to send Adrian into the house because I don't want him observing me. Marcos is too young to note anything unusual. I used to see both dope and alcohol as recreational activities, but now I'm utilizing them to assist me throught the day, particularly in the evenings when I'm doing nothing and I strictly want to endure three or four hours without incident until I go to bed and sleep. Sometimes I feel as if I'm merely enduring until I die, hoping that I can escape this existence without getting caught for doing something stupid. I'm as crazy as the next guy and capable of any outrageous act, but I'm banking on dying before doing anything ridiculous." "Throw me a pass, Daddy-O," says Adrian. "Not right now, papa. I want you to work the soccer ball with your feet. Forget about the football. You have a big game Saturday and you have to improve your ball control." If I had been stoned, I might have thrown the ball with Adrian because dope sparks an interest in life. These aren't the good old days when dope made me goofy, sleepy and hungry. Dope energizes me, enlightens me and exorcises the demons by providing me with another perspective on my private hell. It gives me that existentialist groove. I walk through the enclosed patio into the frontroom where Fabiola is sitting on the couch watching television. "Where are the boys?" "Where do you think they are?" "You can't leave them outside by themselves." "I'll be in my room for a second." "Why are you going to your room?" "I'm in need of inspiration." "Don't you think that you're doing a little big much of that?" "It doesn't do any harm. In fact, it brings me relief." "You don't have to smoke it in front of the boys, do you?" I retrieve the joint, retrace my steps and tell Adrian he needs to go inside until I call them. "Why?" asks Adrian. "Just do as I say." "Okay." Marcos acts confused with Adrian's sudden disappearance. "What's wrong, papa? Don't worry. Your brother will be out here as soon as I finish this joint." I hold the joint in front of me. It catches his curiosity. When I reach for a box of matches that I have hidden next to the screen window, he cocks his head to one side. He remembers a pattern. A light goes on in his head. I'm going to strike a match. I hold the flaming match in the air before I take a hit. I count to ten, a marijuana Zen exercise, and exhale. Marcos follows the smoke as it dissolves into the air. If my calculations are correct, I have a half-bottle of wine in the kitchen and two or three bottles of beer in the refrigerator. I'm sufficiently stocked for the balance of the day.

TOMORROW

"Honey, Brett's on the line." "Thanks. What's up, big guy?" "We're going with the Mexican officials discussing the murder with the body in the background and another of her with children seated at her feet. There are three men in the first photo. Do you know their names?" "One is the chief of police. His name is in the article. I have no idea about the other two. Use the cutline: 'Mexican authorities collect evidence from macabre scene.'" "Macabre?" "Macabre. What's wrong with macabre? I use the word in the story. We're educating the public." "I don't think I can spell it." "M-A-C-A-B-R-E. Macabre. If you don't like macabre, put gruesome." "What are you doing?" "I'm sitting in the backyard, drinking wine, watching the kids play and debating on whether to smoke a joint." "It's been my experience in the many years that I have known you that there is seldom much of a debate. You get stoned." "Since I have the joint rolled, you're probably right. Coincidentally, I was thinking about you five minutes ago. I ran into Clara a few nights ago." "Where?" "At the Little Austin." "How did she look?" "She's packing too much weight these days, but I was literally so drunk I could hardly keep my feet. I was ready to fuck her although I would have had a difficult time getting it up." "Did you tell her you wanted to fuck her?" "What do you think?" "What did she say?" "No way. She said that she had renounced sex since she dumped you. She lamented that she could never hope to find anyone as good as you." "I doubt that. If my recollection serves me right, she had a good appetite herself. Nasty shit in Matamoros." "I didn't go. The boys at El Bravo took care of the details. I lost my interest in dead bodies many moons ago. Why don't we get together tomorrow? I'll come by the paper at nine and we'll go across. We'll visit the family. Photos of the grieving family should suffice. Afterwards, we'll eat lunch. It's been a while. We won't be able to drink because I'll have to go back to El Bravo and write a story, but it'll be fun. What do you say?" "Why not? You'll meet me at the paper?" "Around nine." "Perfect. I'll see you then." "Great. I'm looking forward to it." Tomorrow is taking shape. A joint to start the day and then Brett and I will cross to the other side. After the photos, lunch and writing a story, it will be four or five in the afternoon and I'll be right back here playing with the kids, staring at the sky and wondering if I'm going to be doing this--if I'm lucky to be alive--for the next 20 years.

DRUNK & HORNY

"Marco! Adrian!" I yell on my way to the backyard. "Let's go outside." They follow me out the door and we resume our previous positions. I'm sitting, they're playing. I sip my wine. Fabiola is going about her chores thinking that we're set for the rest of our lives while I pursue a deleterious and salacious existence. I will live tomorrow like I'm living today, a combination of creation and copulation. I'll wander into Matamoros, attend a funeral, write a story. I'll wander back to Brownsville, a lackadaisical day filled with sex, drugs and alcohol, a sprinkling of friends and and acquaintances, and quality and quantity time with the family in the evening. "Daddy-O, can you play catch with me?" asks Adrian. "Sure, big guy." We lob the ball back and forth. The breezes have increased. It will be a perfect night for sitting in the backyard, smoking dope and drinking wine. Fabiola couldn't believe me when I suggested that I was an alcoholic. A week ago I stopped at Estanislao's in the late afternoon because I needed his assistance on building a website. I brought along a bottle of wine and he had a joint. An hour later I departed with the intentions of going home, but the five o'clock traffic had cut the flow to Brownsville's northside and I decided to visit Ambrosio Zamarrippa, a vice president at the university. I had half bottle of wine and I knew he wouldn't mind if we wiled away a part of the afternoon while the traffic thinned. He married Marcia after she and I had divorced and they remained married for 15 years before their relationship dissolved in a bitter divorce. They never had any children, but she felt entitled to half his property and successfully litigated for much of his nest egg, the lawyer representing her marrying her after the proceedings. I had encountered Marcia by chance during the cantankerous case and she had complained that she had told her friends that I had never treated her as bad as Ambrosio had treated her. "I never treated you bad." "That's what I mean," she said. He was home with his new wife after returning from a week in San Miguel. Over the next four hours we opened two more bottles of wine. I staggered to my car, but before I arrived home, I stopped at a small club. I was incoherent. A band was playing and like a mad prophet I walked onto the stage and screamed profanities into the microphone. The band took a break and I picked up a guitar and started playing, but the owner turned off the amplifier. I stumbled toward a table where I met Clara Luna. She was married to a musician had had a long affair with Brett Donovan. There was a period Brett and I used to run together, splitting most our bachelor time between Matamoros and the Island. One night Charlie was fucking Clara on the floor while I was fucking her best friend on the bed. I figured it was only a question of time and circumstance before Clara and I would find ourselves frolicking with each other's genitals. When I spied her through the fog, I thought the moment might be right. "You know that I've wanted to make love to you," I blathered after a few minutes of small talk. "Ain't gonna happen, Tommy. And I don't think you're in any condition to make much happen." I muttered something about her nipples and pubic hairs before staggering backwards against the wall and collapsing in a heap on the floor. I felt like a boxer who had been tagged with an unexpected right and after grasping for something to pull me off the canvas, I regained my footing at the count of eight. "You'd better go home," counseled Claire. "Or maybe the bartender should call you a cab." Though the latter idea made plenty of sense, I knew that if I arrived home without the car, Fabiola would fly into a rage. She would never appreciate the good sense of my decision. "Where is my car?" she would be demanding as I faded into an inebriated unconsciousness. I made it home. Fabiola was waiting for me at the door and started slapping me, landing a right with her clenched fist to my stomach that caused me to gasp for air. I fell on the couch. During the night I had a headache that I thought was the prelude to a stroke. In the morning I started on the xanax. Two days later I was savoring wings over cold beers.

DOPE, COKE & VIAGRA

I stop at my room before exiting to the backyard. A sudden gloom has settled over me. I don't know if a joint will improve or exacerbate the situation. I reach toward the top shelf where I have a bag of dope I scored two days ago from District Judge Mike Salinas. Mike and I are the same age. We have been friends since high school although we never socialized until 30 years ago when his work as a prosecutor for the D.A.'s office made him a good source for me. He has been my lawyer in all three divorces, doing the paperwork for a pittance. A decade ago he surprised the community by winning a seat on one of the district court benches. Everyone is cognizant of his alternative lifestyle, but he is charismatic and nobody holds his personal habits against him. Whenever I'm short of dope, I pay him a visit. Last week I took Adrian along to play with his ten-year-old son. I ended up staying past midnight, coming home when Fabiola called: "It's midnight. Adrian should be in bed." I had extended my stay at Mike's after he pulled out a bag of coke. When I came home, I went to the computer and wrote about this deep unhappiness I felt, an unhappiness that dates back to my youth when nightmares engulfed me and thoughts of suicide afflicted me. Engrossed in my writing, I didn't notice Fabiola standing over me. "What are you doing?" "I'm writing." "I thought you were drunk?" "I am." I hadn't told her that I had been snorting coke, particularly with Adrian accompanying me. I followed her to bed to avoid a further ordeal. "What were you writing about?" "I was writing about my unhappiness. I don't want you to misinterpret what I'm saying. I've always fought this unhappiness. It goes back to my youth. It must be a chemical imbalance." The cocaine raced through my body. "I wish I had known about your unhappiness when we married. You're always depressed. You've depressed me. I used to have friends. I used to love Easter and Thanksgiving and Christmas, but you're a drag to be around because you say those holidays bring back memories of your boys. I'm very unhappy." "We had a nice Christmas last year," I say. I had made a serious effort to be merry, not only because I didn't want to hear the annual complaint, but because I owed it to the children to act festive. "As to your friends, I have never stopped you from seeing them. I have my friends. They never abandoned me because I was seeing you. Yours vanished." I explained to Fabiola that my dark perspective explained my calling as a writer. She thought it was exciting to be with a writer when we first met, but now finds my writing more a nuisance, some of my articles causing her public embarrassment. "Are you married to the columnist?" "Yes, I am, but I'm not responsible for anything he says." I find a bud and crumble it on the desk. I'm finishing rolling when someone fumbles at the door knob. "Why is this door locked?" asks Fabiola. "I'm involved in illicit activity. I'm almost done." "Why don't you come and collect your son? "No problem. I'll be out in a second." I will smoke the joint later. If I'm stoned, I'll be more inspired to feel my cock sliding into Fabiola's cunt. I should take one of those natural tablets that are as good as Viagra without the side effects. I can't remember how I discovered them, but it was by chance and they are remarkable. The proof? I'll wake up in the morning with one of those break-of-day hard-ons.

DINNER

Fabiola is at the stove and I give her a soft whack on the ass. "Stop that!" "That's what it's for." "Is your mother going crazy?" "She's okay. This is the worst crisis for both my mom and dad. You know how much they adore my brother." "You have never felt jealous?" "Jealous about what? I love all my children the same even though I may love them differently. My parents had that special gift when we were children to make all of us feel that each of us was an only child." I stare at Fabiola as she moves about the kitchen. She is attired in tennis shoes, jeans and a sleeveless blouse. She has lost ten over the last six months. Those who haven't seen her take a second look and ask her for her secret. I look at her ass and want to know how many have touched it, how many have jammed their fingers up her cunt, let alone their cocks, and how many have sucked her tits? How different this relationship might have been if she hadn't been so promiscuous and if my sons hadn't exacted their revenge. Or would I be in the same predicament...an endless series of cheap thrills? "How much longer until dinner?" "Fifteen minutes." "I'm going to pour myself a glass of wine and sit in the backyard. Do you want a glass?" "Sure." I uncork the bottle, pour two glasses and set Fabiola's on the counter next to the stove. I take a slice of cheese from the refrigerator, call the boys who follow me outside. The Gulf breeze has begun to blow. It is going to be a beautiful night even though the sun won't set for another hour. Adrian kicks the soccer ball and Marcos pushes a four-wheel vehicle across the concrete slab. "I'm starting you in the midfield. Oscar is hogging the ball so I'm leaving him alone as a striker. Do you think you can handle it?" "Sure, Daddy-O." Adrian is ten-years-old, but I've placed him in an under-twelve league. He has played well. He began his career six years ago as a forward and scored more than 20 goals that first year. His mother couldn't understand his relocation to the defense because she's more interested in the glory rather than the guts. I want him to feel the pressure that he can't make any mistakes or the other team scores and I want him to gain a feel for the game from the back. I've tried him at midfield previously, but he was lost. "You need to move and you need to stay behind the ball. If you follow the ball, scoring opportunities will come. Most importantly, don't let anyone pass you with the ball." The backyard is an expanse of green grass with annuals climbing the fence. It's the perfect sward for kids to run wild. I consider returning to my room to grab from my six-inch stack of unread New Yorkers, Sports Illustrateds and Newsweeks. I'm presently reading two world histories, a book of Zen and another of astronomy, The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry as well as two books of French and Portuguese grammer. I finished a Charles Bukowski novel last week. I need more books like his that are short and easy to read and leave me with a sense of accomplishment. I'm too unsettled to read for any length of time. I enjoy reading about Zen practice and philosophy, but I can't meditate. I accept my nothingness, particularly when I read that there are a 100 billion galaxies with a 100 million stars in each one, and therefore go from day to day navigating as carefully as I can. I crave nothing materialistically. I've reached a point where the essentials arrive as long as I keep my job and maintain my health. The sexual cravings are beyond my intellectual control. I'm not a monk nor was meant to be. I am an animal. It's not my needs that convince of that, but my inability to accept Fabiola's past. The wild animal roars. I cannot reason my way through her past because the beast won't let me rest. The end is coming and it will be sooner rather than later. If six decades have zipped past in the wink of an eye, then my remaining years are doomed to a flash in time. We are fascinated by our birthdays. What about our deathday? I wouldn't necessarily be interested in the year, but I would be curious about the day. It's much like my last name Tamaulipas. I never gave much thought to Thompson, my mother's maiden name, until I thought about Latins who honor both parents by including the two names in their surnames. I grew up never thinking of myself as a Tamaulipas even though I am as much a Thompson as I am a Tamaulipas. If I follow that concept to its logical conclusion, then the same thinking in a parallel fashion must apply to my deathday. "Marcos, stay away from those bushes and stay on the concrete!" I feel a gust of air sweep past me. The bats are early tonight. "Dinner's ready," shouts Fabiola. "Let's go, boys. Mommy says it's time to eat." The table is set. The nightly ritual commences. "What time is your game this weekend, Adriana?" "Seven." "Did you call up the team and remind them?" "Not yet." "Make sure that you do." "They have a schedule." "That doesn't make any difference. You have to call them and remind them. And make sure that you tell them to be at the park by 6:45." "You're the coach. Isn't that your job?" "I put this team together so that you would have the experience when your school season begins. You need to call them." "Do what Daddy-O says," intercedes Fabiola. "And what time is your game, Adrian?" "It's at five, Daddy-O." "That's good. At least the two games won't conflict." "Is Adrian going to call his team?" whines Adriana. "I'm going to call them. He's too young." "That's not fair," whimpers my step-daughter. "Just eat your dinner," Fabiola reminds her daughter. "And next year it will be Marcos' turn to play on a soccer team," I say as he consumes his spaghetti as if he were a bird pulling a worm from the ground. "Isn't he too young, honey?" asks Fabiola. "He'll be four." "I don't think they can play until they're five," continues Fabiola. "That's right, Daddy-O," echoes Adriana. "He's too young." "If I'm the coach, he can play," I rule. Adriana talks about a movie she wants to see, Adrian talks about his video football team winning, 105-0, and Fabiola talks about her father's birthday party planned for our house on Sunday. "Who's going to be there?" I ask. "Just my parents. Why?" "I want to make sure. You never know who is going to show up from Mexico. What are we eating?" "I was thinking you could barbecue steaks as well as prepare your shrimp salad." "I can do that. What time?" "About two." "This spaghetti is delicious. You're including onions." "Onions!" whelps Adrian. "I don't like onions!" "You've been eating your spaghetti and you didn't even know there was onion in it," reprimands Fabiola. "Onion disappears once it's cooked." I finish first and take my dish to the kitchen. Fabiola and I have a tradition regarding meals and dishes. The person who cooks, cleans. Once I start in the kitchen, I like to do everything. I want to provide the complete culinary experience. Besides, when I cook, I'm cleaning my mess at the same time while Fabiola piles everything up and returns later to clean. "Do you want any more wine?" I shout from the kitchen. "I'm fine." I take my glass and exit outside. I consider smoking a joint, but I decide to let the food digest before I hit another one. I swish the wine around in my mouth. Somebody's barbecuing in the neighborhood. Beyond waving to them, we don't know any of the neighbors well. On our cul-de-sac there must be ten families and everyone appears to be relatively successful. The neighbors next door have grandchildren and there is a young family with small kids across the street. It is understood that everyone drive slowly. If a maniac were speeding, we would rise as one and hang the bastard from the nearest ebony. Life has changed since my upbringing in West Brownsville when parents sat on their porches and kids ran everywhere. I had unlimited freedom to roam. My parents never asked me where I had been, just that I be at home at a certain hour. My friends and I would have rock fights with kids from other neighborhoods as well as compete against them in football, basketball and baseball in sandlot games. We lived lives right out of Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. We resided near the river where adventure lurked. Whether it was traffic or contraband, there was activity. Wildlife abounded. Coyotes and bobcats moved through the high grass and there were lots of birds. Somebody had a b-b gun and sometimes somebody would lug along a shotgun. Our parents supervised us, but we learned from our peers. In our Catholic family where nobody mentioned the word sex, my dad would have been the last person to sit me down and explain the facts of life. That wasn't his style. We still have difficulty discussing medical conditions that might involve prostate problems or breast cancer. Our conversation thickens when we drag genitals into the talk. I seldom see kids in the streets unless I'm driving through the barrio where the urchins treat a car as if it were a bull and deftly step aside as the vehicle narrowly passes them. There are no spontaneous games at the schoolyards. The gates are locked so the kids can't enter. Everything is organized. Fabiola, and Iliana before her, won't let the kids play in the background unattended. And that's when the kids even want to go outside. Adriana closes her door, receives calls on her cell, texts, listens to music, surfs the computer and watches television. Adrian retreats to his room where he plays video games for hours. He occasionally grows tired of the activity, choosing to roll up in bed and watch TV. Everyone has his own space and wants to remain undisturbed.