My father was Portuguese and my mother’s family emigrated from Mexico City in the sixties. Her father has roots that stretches all the way back to Spain, when they ruled Mexico in the eighteenth century.
I climb from my truck and stretch. It’s mid-morning and I’m beat. I’ve been up all night with the club, and then add in the drive here, and I am done.
Ma doesn’t know I’m prospecting for the Kings of Carnage. And God willing, she never will. She wouldn’t approve, and I don’t want to break her heart. Whenever I visit her I bring my pickup truck and leave my Harley behind.
I use my key on the front door, and walk inside. “Madre?”
“Mijo?”
I follow the sound down the hall, finding ma in her bed. I walk over and stroke my hand over her forehead brushing the hair back. “How’re you feelin’, Madre?”
“My hip aches. I took a pain pill.”
“Do you need to see a doctor?”
“No, I’m just sore. I’ll be fine. It’s just my arthritis acting up. That’s why I couldn’t get up when I fell. You didn’t need to come down.”
“I wanted to come and check on you. I’m gonna make you something to eat, Madre. You rest.”
“Thank you, mijo.”
I make sure she eats, and do some choirs around the place while she rests. I do a load of laundry for her, and take the garbage cans out to the street. The lawn needs mowing, so I spend the afternoon taking care of that. By sunset, I’m exhausted. I walk in the back door and drop tiredly in a chair. I slouch back, and feel what energy I have left draining from me. I look up at the clock, and know I need to make sure Ma eats again. I shove to my feet and go about getting ma a light dinner; make sure she’s okay, then collapse into my old bed.
The next morning, the sun streaming in awakens me. I roll out of bed and go to check on ma. Her bed’s empty. “Madre?”
“Santos? I’m in the kitchen, mijo.”
I walk through the small living room to the dining room and into the kitchen at the back of the house. The aroma of what she’s making wafts to me before I ever enter the room. Her special caramel apple empanadas.
A baking pan of them is cooling on top of the oven. She’s sitting at the table whipping some handmade whipped cream. I go to reach for one.
“I’ll smack your hand with a spoon. Those aren’t for you.” She stands to hug me.
I grin and move to the table, dipping to kiss her forehead and stealing a dab of whipped cream from the mixing bowl. “You must be feeling better. Up and baking, I see.”
She hugs my waist, the top of her head barely coming to my shoulder. “I’m fine. I told you that. You make such a fuss.”
“How’s your hip?”
“It aches. I took a pill. I’m fine.”
“I’m grateful Senora Mansfield was able to come over and check on you.”
“She’s been good to me, and she’s just sick that she had to let me go after all these years. But I understand. They just couldn’t afford to keep me on any longer.”
“Well, you were the best cook they ever had, Madre. And at least you have the insurance settlement from the car accident to live off.”
“I’d give it all back to have my Angelo alive again.”
“I know, Madre. I miss him, too. Every day.” A drunk driver killed my younger brother when he was just sixteen. It was the year after our father died. The man who hit him was wealthy, and there was a large settlement; enough to keep my mother comfortable until she dies.
She waves her hand in front of her face. “I can’t talk about it.”
“I know, Madre. Sorry I brought it up. So who are the empanadas for?”
“Senora Mansfield. To thank her for coming over to check on me.”
“That’s real nice of you, Madre.”
She takes her seat again, and goes back to beating the whipped cream. “I feel sorry for her, mijo.”
“Why?”
“Being married to that low-life second husband of hers, Drake Mansfield.”
“Kami’s stepfather?” I ask,
“Yes. I owe her a lot for all she’s done for me.”
“No, Madre. I’m the one that owes her. I’ve asked her time and again to take up my slack when I can’t be here.” I rub the back of my neck.
“You okay, Santos? You look tired.”
“I am.”
“You didn’t have to come.”
“I was able to get away. I’m just glad Senora Mansfield was here for you the other night. I should have been.”
“You have a life. I can’t expect you to be here all the time.”
“Still. I’m grateful to her. Takin’ you to all your doctor appointments.”
“Things have been tough for them. Have you watched the news?”
“I caught some of it.”
“She’s going to prison on Monday, Santos.”
My brows arch. “That’s so messed up. She didn’t do anything wrong.” I’d throw in a few curse words, but not when I talk to my Madre.
“Her husband set her up to take the fall for everything he did. Oh, that man! I’d like to take a stick to him.” She shakes her fist and her face gets red. “I heard she made a deal with prosecutors though; in exchange for her testimony against her husband, which sent him to prison for ten years by the way, her own sentence will be reduced to one year. I also heard that as he was being dragged away, he was shouting how he’d get her for this.”
She makes the sign of the cross over her chest. “God forbid he ever gets out.”
“What a son-of a… sorry Madre. What about her daughter?”
“Kami? I don’t know. She graduates from high school next weekend. Can you believe it? Where has the time gone?” She clucks her tongue. “I suppose she’ll go off to college, though I heard they lost everything. This is a small town. Hard to keep anything a secret around here. The house staffs all gossip like old women.”
“Surely they had money set aside for her.”
She shakes her hands in the air. “That loser got his hands on everything, mijo. Lost it all in that crazy Ponzi scheme he was running. Half their friends lost money in that deal. They’re the town pariahs now. It’s so sad. Then the IRS got on them because he was cheating on their taxes. I heard some men showed up last week with orders to take everything of value as restitution. Filled three moving vans. Of course the cars were the first to go, but I think they were only leased anyway.”
“That’s a damn shame. Are they still livin’ in that big house?”
“Yes. Though God knows if there’s a stick of furniture in the whole place now. I wanted to send over something. She always did like my empanadas, so I made some this morning. Be a dear and take some over for me, will you Santos?”
I run a hand through my hair. Going over to the gated community on Skidaway Island is not what I had planned when I came home to check on ma. I spent more than enough time in that exclusive neighborhood in my childhood, helping my father out with the landscaping. Ma was the Mansfield’s cook and Dad was their landscaper until he died five years ago. Keeled over from a stroke on the back lawn while trimming the magnolias. It’s the last place I want to revisit, but I don’t want to tell my mother no. I sigh. “Sure, Madre. I’ll take it over, but you’ll have to call her and tell her I’m coming so the guard let’s me through.”