From Around Here

So I’m standing at my register in Stump’s Supermarket, checking people through my line without any of my usual crazy thoughts, when Reynaldo comes into the store with this uppity-looking white woman. I don’t realize that it’s Reynaldo right away because he doesn’t look like the Reynaldo I used to know.

He and this woman look real fancy and sophisticated, so instead of thinking that maybe it might be Reynaldo, I start to think how one day I’d like to be rich-looking like that, with clothes so nice you know they cost a bundle and a way of walking that makes it look like there’s always time in the world.

That’s when some of my crazy thoughts come back, and I start to think about how it would be nice to one day run a big shiny store like Stump’s, where the air always smells of last night’s cleaning chemicals, where the glass is clear and the floor is always super glossy. So my thoughts start to go off into ideas about getting ahead, about one day getting rich and having the next big, new supermarket in New Domangue, until Mami’s voice pops in there.

“You have to have paciencia, Angela,” her voice says. Mami’s always telling me that I need to have patience if I want to make it in the States, especially when I start talking about getting ahead.

Mami doesn’t really understand what it takes. Everything she came for died along with Papi that day he slipped off the refinery scaffold about three years ago. I had one year of high school left, but that had to wait, because I had to start working right away to feed both of us. It’s all right, though, because I’m going to start working on my GED. after this summer.

Now, you look at the owner of this store, Mr. Stump. He lost his wife. But that didn’t stop him from getting ahead. And look at him now, a man who is muy rico. He’s got this big store and he’s living on easy street: got his kid in one of those fancy private schools up in New Orleans, travels, comes and goes when he wants to, got a nice big house in Lakelawn Estates and a great-looking fishing camp (I’ve seen the pictures) down by the Gulf of Mexico. What I wouldn’t give to be rich like that. I tell him so pretty often, and he usually says that I’ll probably make it, all right, if I keep working hard.

I get all sorts of ideas about how to better myself, and I get tons about how to make the store better, and every now and then I tell Mr. Stump about them. He usually laughs at me. But sometimes he doesn’t say much one way or the other and then steals my ideas anyway, like that time I suggested he move the greeting cards from the main aisle and place them on an island near the entrance of the store. When I told him how doing this would give him more space on the aisle for other items while at the same time making the front entrance more inviting, he didn’t say anything to me. He just rubbed and squeezed his cheek and then walked away. The next time I came in to work, I found the greeting cards on an island near the entrance.

And Mami wants me to have paciencia?

But I guess I’ve always been too fidgety, always looking for something bigger or better. That’s what got me to come to Stump’s. Mr. Stump himself hired me straight out of Santiago’s Latin Supermarket when he came in there last year. I used to love working there, cause it always smelled like home, what with the plátanos, the yucca, and the bacalao. But they didn’t pay nothing. So when Mr. Stump came in there looking for some coconut flan his son wanted and ended up giving me a job, I took it. I couldn’t believe how easy it was. The store (which is more like a sardine can with a couple of aisles) was real busy when he came in. When he asked me where the flan was, I directed him all the while taking an order on the phone, handling an upset customer, and moving my line along. When he came back to check out, he said he could use someone like me at his store. I told him to tell me where it was and that he would see me the next day. I’ve been here ever since, going on a full year now.

At first I thought it was a step up. But lately I’ve been thinking differently. He tells me plenty of times how much I’m doing all right, but he hasn’t been in a hurry to promote me.

“Angie,” he says, “you’re going to places one day. You keep working hard and keep practicing that English of yours.”

Now, I don’t mind him that much as far as white bosses go and all that, but I don’t care for his comments about my English. He’s the only person who ever tells me that I need to work on my English. I don’t know what he means by it. I was practically born here, being too young to remember when Papi and Mami left the Dominican Republic. By the time I reached New Domangue Senior High, I didn’t even have an accent.

Maybe he’s got something against women, or maybe he’s got something against brown skin. I don’t know. I have Mami’s jet-black hair and I wasn’t born in the States. Other than that, I don’t see where I look or talk any different than Mr. Stump.

Mami tells me my English is beautiful, but I can’t put too much into that because she can barely speak it herself.

So I’m thinking about all this when I see Reynaldo and his nice-looking woman go over by the wine shelves. I’m still not thinking that it’s Reynaldo because he’s too far away for me to tell and because I’m still thinking about getting ahead, about how much money I need to make, and about how long it would take me to make it.

Then I remember (how could I forget) about Bobby, the little snot-nosed-looking white kid who Mr. Stump made head cashier the other day after the kid was only here two weeks. I didn’t think that it was fair, being that there were some black employees who knew the job better and who had been waiting long to be promoted to head cashier. Or me, I could have done the job with my eyes closed. After Mr. Stump made the announcement, I left my register and followed him back toward his office, which is in the front of the store and is only separated from the registers by a thin half-wall. He didn’t know I was behind him until he opened the door and I called his name.

“I need to talk to you for a moment.”

“Angie,” he said as he paused long enough to look over my shoulder. “Your register light is on and a customer is waiting. Did you ask someone to cover for you?”

“I’ll be back in a minute,” I said. “I just want to tell you that I don’t think it’s fair that you promote Bobby to head cashier. Other people been waiting for a long time to be promoted.”

At first, I didn’t think that Mr. Stump would get angry at me for speaking my mind. I spoke my mind so much that I didn’t think anything of it. Besides, I was right. Usually Mr. Stump is very easygoing with me, laughing away a lot of what I say, but this time he didn’t say anything for a while. He just looked at me kind of strange, and it made me feel as if I should get back to my register. I was about to turn around when all of a sudden he broke out laughing.

“Oh, that’s a good one, Angie,” he said. “That’s tops. Like I said before, you’re going places.”

I thought he was just plain loco right then. He was already halfway to his office when he stopped laughing enough to say something else.

“How old are you?” he asked.

“Nineteen,” I answered.

“Right,” he said. “And how long have you been in the States?”

“Since I was three.”

“A little longer, and you’ll see. In the meantime, I need you to get back to your register before you find yourself without a job.”

When I told Mami about it, she said that I was very dichosa. She said I was lucky I didn’t get fired for my sassy mouth. But I been thinking about it ever since, and now I’m not sure I’m as lucky as Mami says I am.

Bobby’s next to me now. Even with a bag-boy constantly at his line, he can’t handle his job. Looking at him, I’m thinking that if I have to get past him to get ahead I may as well look for some other way to do it.

Then I see Reynaldo and his woman again, and this time they’re walking toward me but they’re still far away. It’s a late spring Saturday morning, and you can tell that people are already thinking about the summer. Around here, summer brings a rush of outsiders who like to go fishing down in the bayous and lakes south of here. We get all sorts at Stump’s, but mostly it’s the type with nice boats, which they always park on the outer part of the parking lot. I saw them last year when they came in waves, most of them from Mr. Stump’s neighborhood, but a good many were from New Orleans, with big pink faces and chubby children, all of them looking for some last-minute items to pack onto their boats. There’s a landing near here, but most prefer to drive farther south instead of boating through all the waterways. From here it’s only another half-hour drive to the last dock, and the ones who come down this way a lot know that Stump’s is the last place to get most of what they need.

So I’m thinking this, and I’m thinking how the couple doesn’t look as if they’re from New Domangue while at the same time thinking that something about the man looks familiar to me. I don’t know why I think this, since I don’t know anybody who dresses nice-looking like that, and since I don’t know that it’s Reynaldo yet.

They remind me of this couple I saw in a fancy shop when I went to New Orleans once. You can tell those people right away because of how they laugh with big, white, fake smiles, how they move with this I-don’t-give-a-shit walk, and how their clothes seem to always look just right.

Then Reynaldo and his woman disappear behind this large imported cheese island, and my thoughts begin to float away from me. As Reynaldo and his woman pop out from behind the island and duck down one of the aisles (I think it’s the cookies and crackers aisle), I follow along in my mind as if I’m with them the whole time while I’m checking my line through like some robot. I begin to see myself giggling alongside my very white boyfriend as I lightly rest my hand on his forearm.

But then, just as I’m in the middle of some of these crazed-out dreamy thoughts, I see the wrinkled-up Señor García pop into my peripheral view. He walks right up to the spot where Reynaldo and his woman turned into the aisle, and the next minute he’s gone.

Señor García is this wandering bum from the Cortojena neighborhood where Mami and I live. I’ve always kind of liked the old man, and I used to talk to him sometimes when he came into Santiago’s, even though he never said much. Sometimes I would find him outside the front lot of Santiago’s talking to older people. Every now and then, he would peddle some prayer cards for change. Nobody minded him much around there. But around here it’s different. If Mr. Stump sees him he’ll ask one of us to watch the old man. Mr. Stump might even make one of us kick the old man out because he’ll scare the customers or something.

I still haven’t figured out that it’s Reynaldo with that woman on his arm, but when I see them it hits me again that there’s something familiar about them. As they come up the middle of the store, walking up lazily toward the international section (which isn’t very international at all because it’s mostly fake tacos-in-a-box stuff with soy and teriyaki sauces added for variety), I start to get a good look at them.

Even though his clothes are all fancy, his hair’s cut short, and his teeth look like they belong to somebody else when he smiles, I recognize the same old Reynaldo from the neighborhood. He always used to talk to Mami and me from behind his dirty-looking eyes about his plans to get fancy clothes and a fancy car and a fancy house. I never put too much into what he said, even though he sure tried an awful lot to impress me. Then, one day, he just disappeared. Must be three years now since the last time I saw him. But now he looks whiter, like he hasn’t been out in the sun or something.

It doesn’t take long for Reynaldo and his woman to see that the international section doesn’t have anything worth getting, because they don’t pick out a thing. Then they start walking up the aisle directly toward me, which is when I start to make out the woman pretty well. She has long auburn hair, which is shiny and very, very straight around her pale, European face, a real white beauty, which I can tell Bobby notices because he starts to get all excited, nudging at his bag-boy to look over at her.

Of course, Reynaldo is not as good-looking as the woman, but he carries this kind of I’m-better-than-most type of air that really bothers me. As Reynaldo moves his white beauty closer to the front, I suddenly think of him as some cheap Latino lover. He’s probably come back to show his woman the small town where he used to live.

“Miss? Miss? What’s my total, please?”

As I take this lady and ring her up and get her out of my line, I notice Señor García come around the corner of the aisle, slowly catching up to Reynaldo and his woman.

Bobby, who can’t stop looking at the woman, nudges the bag-boy again. As soon as Señor García comes into view, Bobby flies out from behind his register and moves toward Mr. Stump’s door.

The woman, who is very pretty (though I can now see that she’s much older than Reynaldo), stops at the front of the aisle and looks around as if she’s searching for something. Reynaldo, who hadn’t looked my way once, looks straight at me now. He acts like he doesn’t know me and turns slowly around, real smooth-like, until his back is to me. Then, Señor García comes right up to them. When the woman sees the old man, she moves behind Reynaldo. They’re close enough for me to see what’s in Señor García’s hand when he stretches it out toward Reynaldo and his woman. He’s peddling one of those prayer cards. Reynaldo tries to act as if he doesn’t understand, but then I hear him speak in clear Spanish.

“No, gracias,” he says.

Right after that, Mr. Stump comes toward them, his head moving quickly between Reynaldo and the old man. I want to jump out from behind my register and go over there, but Bobby follows Mr. Stump, and I’m left alone as this lady with a large, overfilled basket creeps into my line. So I stay put and begin checking the order through while my mind races with all kinds of crazy thoughts about what might happen next.

Señor García looks at me, his face twisted up with confusion, which then becomes something like concern and fear when Mr. Stump walks up to them.

“Good afternoon,” Mr. Stump says to Reynaldo and his woman. He talks only to them, as if Señor García doesn’t exist. “Is this man troubling you?”

Reynaldo begins to shake his head (to his credit, I think), but the woman takes over and speaks loud enough for everyone up front to hear (which is just me, the bag-boy, and our customers—Bobby’s standing next to Mr. Stump).

“Yes, please,” the woman says in very clear English, and I think that maybe she’s one of those fancy New Orleans types who’s out for a little country tour. “This old man is harassing us for money.”

The moment she said that, I felt like jumping out of my line and punching her in the mouth. But I’m still checking this large order through my line. So I start thinking about how I could turn that pretty face of hers into raw pulp. Then Reynaldo looks at me quickly, as if he’d like for me to do something for him.

He used to give me that same look when he would come in to talk to me at Santiago’s, or when he’d see Mami and me on the street and stop to talk to us. He always used to want me to go out with him, but I never could stand the way he looked at me. Mami liked him a lot, though, especially when he talked about how he was going to have everything like the Americans.

“Sir,” Mr. Stump says to Señor García, who is now trying to back away, “if there is something you want to purchase in this store, please do so and promptly leave.”

Señor García probably doesn’t understand a word Mr. Stump says, so he stays put, looking extremely confused about what to do. He lowers his head as if he’s trying to figure out what to say and just sort of stands there.

“Sir?” Mr. Stump says.

“I don’t think he speaks English, Mr. Stump,” Bobby puts in, and I think well there you go, the brat’s good for something.

“I think he was speaking Spanish,” the woman answers, and then she looks at Reynaldo as if to tell him to keep quiet.

“Tell Angie to come here,” Mr. Stump tells Bobby, pointing at me without even looking my way. “She speaks Spanish. Tell her to come here, and you finish her line for her.”

I can hear perfectly well that Mr. Stump wants me to come to them, but I decide to wait at my line until Bobby asks for me himself. When he gets to me, he points to where everyone is standing, as if I can’t see for myself. After he explains what Mr. Stump wants, I stall for a second as if I can’t figure out what I’m supposed to do. When Mr. Stump starts to look at me funny, I walk over to them.

“Angie, please let this gentleman know that he needs to complete his business here and leave the store,” Mr. Stump tells me.

I look at Mr. Stump, pretending that I don’t know what he’s talking about, and turn my face to Reynaldo. I don’t feel like doing what I’m asked.

“Háblale tú en español,” I say to Reynaldo. I don’t know why I do it. All I know is that I can’t help telling that fake-smile-looking fool to take care of this himself.

Mr. Stump, of course, doesn’t get it. After the initial shock at my not-so-nice tone toward one of his valuable customers wears off, he gets angry.

“Angie, what do you think you’re doing?” he spits between his teeth. But he can’t keep going, because he has to tend to his customers. “I’m sorry about this. Please, forgive my employee,” he says to Reynaldo and his woman.

“So am I,” the woman answers. She takes the wine bottle and the cheese and crackers that are in Reynaldo’s hands and puts them in Mr. Stump’s hands. Then, she grabs Reynaldo’s arm and starts for the exit.

Señor García is still standing there as they leave. Mr. Stump looks at me with the sort of look that says he’s going to take care of me as soon as he can get to it. He follows Reynaldo and his woman outside, attempting to convince them that Stump’s Supermarket is their supermarket.

I let Señor García know that he needs to leave the store before Mr. Stump gets back. And as the old man moves toward the exit, I look out the large glass windows and watch Mr. Stump, who is following Reynaldo and his woman. The woman, who is sliding into the driver’s seat of a shiny-looking sports car, accepts a card from Mr. Stump’s outstretched hands. Reynaldo looks back at me before getting in, his face filled with an I’m-sorry-about-this-mess sort of look that doesn’t mean a thing to me, and then they drive away. I notice that her license plate says Louisiana and that she has a sticker on the back window from a popular community college in New Orleans where I hope to go one day. And for some reason, I don’t know why, I wonder if maybe she’s from around here, too.

When Mr. Stump turns to face the store, he’s already aiming for me. Señor García has so quickly disappeared that his presence has already been forgotten, leaving the problem of whatever it is that he stirred up for me to sort out.

I think of Mami and her words about patience, but it’s like I said before, she doesn’t understand about what it takes to make it in the States.

I think about Mr. Stump, about how he runs his store and how he treats everyone, and I think that maybe I’m making a mistake.

As soon as Mr. Stump comes back inside, I walk right up to him and give him my nametag. I tell him that he can mail my last check because I don’t plan on returning to Stump’s Supermarket. The anger he had disappears, and from the look in his eyes I can tell that he’s more confused than he was a minute before.

That’s how I leave him, his face all balled up as if he doesn’t know what to do with it, with only head-cashier-boy Bobby to help him through the shift, which is like no help at all because Bobby will be drowning in backed-up check-out lines in about ten minutes. But I don’t care; I’m leaving Stump’s for good.

When the bus lets me off near my apartment complex, I look around for Señor García, hoping that I will see his face so that I can just wave at him. But he isn’t around.

Inside our apartment, I can smell Mami’s mix of oregano, bell peppers, and cilantro already at work on whatever she’s cooking. She doesn’t know I’m home as I close the door behind me because the bolero she’s singing along to is cranked up high. Instead of going to her, I just kind of linger there by the door, listening to Mami’s singing while I breathe in the spices in her cooking. I let myself (just for a minute) take in the island air that Mami always says we carry with us before I start thinking about how I’m going to have to put off finishing my GED for a little while longer. But then I put that thought aside and take a step forward and figure, heck, gotta have paciencia, right?

“Hola, Mami,” I yell extra-loud as I walk deep inside our apartment. “I’m home early!”