Читать книгу Give It To Me - Ana Castillo - Страница 18

12

When Randall came over with his new boy toy, Palma gave them her version of Gulliver’s Travels. Vladimir said, Oh, I should fix you up with my brother.

Vladimir was the prettiest chicanito she had ever seen. His hostess couldn’t place her finger on why she thought that, but Palma did believe in the eye of the beholder being a truism, plus the way he brought his cigarette up to his Sal Mineo mouth and half-closed eyes, the smoke creating a halo around his tragically curly head, was the stuff of gay legends for generations to come. Vladimir from the Lower Valley barrio.

Your brother? Randall said, pouring the Shiraz he brought. She hated red wine. Everyone knew that. He did it so as not to have to share. Pour me a glass, she said, and then left it there. What’s wrong with his brother? Palma asked.

Nothing, Randall said, pursing his mouth.

My brother is younger than me, Vladimir said. Hector is the brain in the family. He practically runs the Apple Store, he added. He’s a poet. (See, right there, she thought, was reason to call out Vladimir, sitting on her white couch, in Randall’s best shirt, holding the Nambe wineglass with a pinky out like he was on a reality housewives reunion show. A poet couldn’t run an electric pencil sharpener much less a store that sold the very definition of high tech.)

He’s twelve! Randall said. He went to the kitchen and came back with the multivitamin bottle that don Ed gave Palma in lieu of a bouquet on their first and last date. It was from don Entrepreneur’s product line and all she had that Randall found to snack on. Palma looked at the boyfriend. He’s not twelve, he said. He’s going on thirty.

Yeah, Randall said. In about five years.

Listen, Mishu, darlin’, Palma said, renaming He-Who-Named-Himself. As Russian names went Palma liked Mishu better. I’ll meet your carnalito, she said, but first I’m on my way to Chicago. I have some unfinished business there.