The Unseen Pain at Venice Beach

The hour strikes 1am. The aroma of tacos al pastor fills the starless night sky of Venice Beach. What’s left of the restaurants still open begin to finally close with the preparations for the morning flow, however one truck stays open with trinkets of small lights humbly shining out for potential customers. The few passersby that remain are adolescents drinking their worries away. Yolanda looks out the window of her truck and hears rolling waves in the distance now that the flow of traffic has slowed. The dazzling street lights pollute the midnight sky enough for Yolanda to catch a glimpse of the dark and illusive beach.

Yolanda feels the cool breeze against her amber skin before popping her head back into the large food truck. She grabs her apron to see her lover Pedro sleeping in the corner of the truck next to the boxes of various fruits. “¡Levántate Pedro, tenemos que limpiar!” shouts Yolanda, her curls starting to pop out of the corners of her fishnet caps around her ears. She sighs before using the apron to rat tail the sleeping boyfriend. He snaps awake, almost falling from his chair.

The man finds balance only to see his beloved staring at him with her chest puffed out. She gestures at the dishes in need of washing, then back at him again. Despite rolling his eyes, Pedro did as he was told. His small revenge was trying to play with Yolanda’s curls on the way to the dishes, but she moved too fast for him, while cleaning up the rest of the counters. The vintage truck was large enough for Yolanda to avoid his tickling attempt, and she intends to start the closing rituals before a certain time.

Pedro and Yolanda have known each other for as long as they could remember; some would consider them childhood friends, however they didn't pursue a romantic bond until six years prior. It was her down to earth yet goal oriented personality that had caused him to fall in love with her when they were children. While he washes the dishes he sees her going from cleaning the countertops to the stove, grinding out every bit of the dark grease. “I’ll organize the boxes and get the sign outside, is there anything else you’d like me to do?” Pedro asks. It took him focusing on washing the dishes (rather than staring at Yolanda’s ass while she works) to realize the more he helps and the faster he works the sooner they can go home.

“Si amor, porfa, ahorita te digo” Yolanda began putting some of the salsas away and into the fridge, meticulously cleaning as she went, except for one salsa in case another customer would pass through. She turns on the radio for the sake of cleaning music. Selena's “Amor Prohibido” erupts from the radio right before Pedro hops off the truck. Yolanda begins to dance around the kitchen while she works, not a single beat of the song to be missed and not a spot left unmarked.

It took Pedro slamming the truck and calling out Yolanda’s name for her to realize he was trying to get her attention. Her mind originally lost in the music, her lungs clouded from cleaning supplies and the steam of the hot stove, she lowers the volume and pops her head out to see that he was getting her attention for a customer. A young Latina dressed in yoga pants and a hoodie, Yolanda’s first thoughts are if she was old enough to be out on her own at this hour at all. Behind the young girl, she sees Pedro waving with his chest pumped out staring at her in an attempt to lock eyes. He flips her off only to receive the same hand gesture when seeing her body upon entering the truck with their wooden specials sign.

Leaving Pedro deadpan with her head still popping out, she grabs her notepad ready for the girl’s order despite her silence. Moments turned into minutes, she starts to wonder if the girl is even going to order at all. “¿Necesitas ayuda? Solamente tenemos tacos y burritos ahora.” Her words seem to have awoken the girl out of a dream, as if she were only glazing over the menu. “¿Estas bien?”

The girl looks at Yolanda's curly head. “S-si.” At that moment, Yolanda knew. “Lo siento, no hablo mucho español, necesito practicar!”

“It’s fine, I was just saying we’re only serving tacos and burritos right now, is that ok?”

“I understand, I’ll just have three tacos please.” The girl shuffled her feet, her sneakers worn out from age. The more she moves shyly, the younger she seems to Yolanda.

“¿Que tipo de carne?”

“I’m sorry?”

“What type of meat?”

“Oh, sorry, do you have al pastor?”

“Yes, all three?”

“Yes please, y una horchata porfa?

“Claro.” Yolanda looks to Pedro who is already cooking the pastor for serving. She sets up the to-go box for him, noticing him only cooking in the areas she hasn’t cleaned yet. It’s the little things that warm up Yolanda’s practical heart. She pours the horchata into a cup and brings it out to the girl from outside the trunk. She thanks her with the same shy body language. “If you don't mind me asking, where are you from?”

The girl’s brown eyes sunk down for a moment as if in defeat. “I was born in Merida, Mexico, but I moved here when I was a baby so I remember very little of my home land. English is basically my first language.”

"You're sensitive about it aren't ya? It's ok, you can practice with us any time and we won't judge you!"

"R-really?" Her innocent eyes finally rise from the ground.

"Of course! Everyone deserves a safe space to learn." Tears start swelling up and flowing out of the customer's eyes. At this point Yolanda thinks she made a mistake. “Pobrecita mi hija, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to-”

“No it's okay, I just haven’t run into someone as nice as you in a while, that’s all.” The girl begins to giggle at herself as she wipes up her tears with the napkins Pedro gives her along with the tacos she requested. He gives a lot of purposeful gestures to Yolanda, particularly with the way he darted his eyes to ask about the customer, but she only understands about half of them. The little girl tries to pay for her tacos but Pedro and Yolanda both shake their hands away from the money she takes out from her pockets. Pedro disappears in the truck within the boxes of fruit assortments leaving the two alone.

“No silly, you can pay instead by giving us your name,” says Yolanda.

“Paula.” The girl takes a bite of the taco del pastor. Some of the salsa spills from the tortilla but she still manages to swallow a chunk of pears from the salsa. The heat of the pastor was cooled by the pear juice in a similar way the traditional pineapple chunk sweetness would counteract the savory taste of the pastor. " Mmmm, esta delicioso!”

“The salsa is not really traditional but it’s original.” The approval has Yolanda smile, crossing her arms proudly. “My papa made the recipe. There are so many taco trucks here in LA that my papi insisted he had something unique to stand out from the others, so he made this salsa after his neighbor wouldn’t stop giving free pears away because his pear tree would supply so much.” Paula stares at the woman, listening intently to the origins of the blessed food.

It didn’t take much effort to recognize who inspired Yolanda to become the person she is today. She grew up with a man who taught her important lessons while treating the women in his life with respect. He would never speak ill of others, always extending kindness to those unexpected. He even gave Pedro a home when he had nowhere else to go, sealing his fate to meet the woman of his dreams. Its actions such as these solidified Yolanda's desire to extend the same compassion onto others. “Did you want some tacos to bring home to your parents Paula?”

“My mom and dad aren’t home right now.” An awkward silence unfolds.

“Do you know when they’ll be back? Do they know you’re out this late?”

“They haven’t been home for a few days.” Paula’s eyes begin to swell up once more. “My mom took me to school and never came back to pick me up. She always remembers to pick me up.” Her tears turn from sniffles to sobs.

“I see...Paula, how much English do your parents speak?”

“Not a lot. They’re why I understand some Spanish.” Yolanda looks over to Pedro who’s heard everything. Their eye contact with each other is synchronized this time, almost telepathic. They didn’t need more information to know that her parents weren’t coming back.

“Paula?” The little girl picks her head up from her slouched, insecure posture. “Do you have somewhere to sleep tonight other than your parents house?” She shakes her head. “Would you like to come with us?” Hesitant at first, Paula nods in excitement. "My dad's neighbor still lives next to me and we share a garden with that pear tree I mentioned before. It’s what makes the salsa so different. We can cook you more of the same tacos and even make a nice pear dessert, does that sound good?” Yolanda’s never ending kindness leaves Paula unable to hold back her tears. The overflowing tears simply leaves Yolanda knowing how rough the past few days have been for Paula.

Pedro, who finally finished the closing chore cycle, steps out of the truck with the same blanket he used to nap with earlier and wraps it around chiquitita Paula, turning the little caterpillar into a cocoon to battle out the cool desert winds brushing off the tears on her cheeks. The little girl nods excessively in attempts to communicate an answer. "¡Pobrecita esta niña! Girl you're gonna make me cry, stop crying, you're too cute for tears!" shouted Pedro before delivering the biggest bear hug. Out of the two of them, Pedro is the one who knows Paula's situation all too well. It wasn’t until Pedro turned 18 was he finally able to meet his parents again in a legally safe situation. Both of them know that in order for her to find peace she would need a safe environment in order to establish a solution to her chaos, a chaos that would take over the majority of her future. These sudden disruptions in everyone’s rose-tinted childhood perceptions are obstacles outside of one's control, but with a hand from caring strangers, a child can have a chance to find a stable foundation in which to jump and soar from, for without a support group, life becomes much harder.

More lights go out as time passes by, signaling for drunkards to go home. Darkness becomes peace as the roaring waves became the dominant sound for the few left outside. The homeless made their way to their designated sleeping corners as consumers returned home from their fill. The two taco truck co-owners give Paula time to stop crying before they set course for home, where hope springs forth for the child who is enduring a pain unseen by privileged eyes.