Don Jesus By Ben Alvarado
It was five in the morning. Don Jesus sat at the table and ate the oatmeal as he watched his wife feed the chickens in the chicken coop. She looked old and disgusted him. It had been this way for the last five years. She collected the eggs and put them in a wire egg holder. The chair next to Don Jesus lay broken. She shouldn’t make him angry. She favored her back and puked yellow twice. Behind her, across the Rio Grande River, was the Gateway International Bridge displaying dim lights in the foggy morning. He put on his hat over his baldhead, picked up his tool bag and walked out silently.
They lived in Matamoros in the rear of a vecindad that he built and owned. His house was made of cinder block near the river while the rest of the houses were made of wood and the rent that he collected every first of the month from the six families was enough to pay for his wife’s insulin and a few bills. He was father to three daughters whom were all married but lived across the river in the United States. They visited every weekend because their mother could not legally cross but he saw them frequently when they had lunch every other day at the Nuevo Leon restaurant in downtown Brownsville.
“I’ll have your money ready this afternoon, Don Jesus,” said Maria, his neighbor, from the screen door. She was old, skinny, and blind. She had no control of her eyeballs and they rolled frantically in their sockets and she smoked heavily and swallowed the ashes of the cigarettes as she put them out on her tongue.
“Thank you, Maria".
“How is Agustina, Don Jesus? ” she asked and put out a cigarette on her tongue. “Another broken chair in the name of Socorro?” She swallowed the ashes.
“Mind your business, Maria. You should stop smoking.”
“And you should stop paying for them.”
He walked along the sidewalk between the six houses that led to the exit as housewives stood by their doors to watch him. They had heard the scuffle. It was not the first time. The last seven months were the worst since Agustina found the photo in his wallet, the one where he lay naked in a bed with Socorro. She never accustomed to rummage through his belongings. Nowadays he slept with his wallet under his pillow and she disliked it. Every argument started due to the wallet. He would not let her have it. She was the thorn in his side He walked faster out of the vecindad.
Their eyes felt like suns baking into his skin as they whispered to each other.
The bridge was half a mile from his home and in his life he had never owned a vehicle. He had maintained to always attain jobs not too far. Downtown Brownsville was dilapidating and jobs had never been scarce, especially for a skilled carpenter. He met the flower boy in the middle of the bridge like every morning. He was about seven, dark-skinned and very thin, and carried the skill to sell of a car salesman. His Indian mother sat on the floor by the rail of the bridge wrapped in a thick blanket and watched him and his two siblings sell flowers.
“I have the freshest flowers this morning, Don Jesus,” he said. “One for the girlfriend?”
“Sure, why not?”
“That’ll be ten pesos.”
“They were five pesos yesterday.”
“These are fresher. Smell them. You will not find any like these in the United States. These come from Aalsmeer. Special delivery just for us.”
Don Jesus felt the lie. “I’ll give you seven. They look the same to me. You probably stole them from somebody’s garden.”
“Make it eight, Don Jesus,” said the boy and made a sad face. “My momma’s sick. She needs help. Look at her. The curandera said she needs three hundred pesos to remove the evil spell. My younger brother and sister are helping today.”
“Why is it that everyone of you people always have an ill parent? Here, take the eight pesos.” He slapped the money into the boy’s hand. “My wife is sick too. I expect a discount tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Don Jesus. My momma and God will bless you. I will sell Matamoros flowers tomorrow.”
He crossed the bridge straight into downtown. It was still dark and the streets were wet from the fog that lingered in the air and blurred the streetlights. A few blocks down was the Immaculate Catholic Church. Don Regulo was outside sweeping and watering the patio. When he saw Don Jesus he put the things down to shake his hand. They had quite a few beers at the downtown bars when they were young and shared many whores, many whom Don Jesus paid back with side jobs in their homes. Don Regulo had a scar over his right eye after a bar fight where Don Jesus was stabbed and left holding onto a pole bleeding excessively. Don Regulo put him in a taxi that drove them to the hospital. He almost died and after the blood transfusion they felt like brothers. After that night thirty-five years ago Don Regulo became the Immaculate Church sexton and Don Jesus devoted his life to carpentry.
“Flowers again, Jesus?” said Don Regulo. “This is the third week in a row. Her husband is starting to suspect. I don’t think she throws them in the trash when she goes home.”
“He is a fool for not loving her. A good woman deserves a good man.”
“He came by the church yesterday afternoon. He asked about Socorro.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That she was gone and then he asked about you.”
Don Regulo expected concern in Don Jesus’s eyes, but there was none. Instead he licked the top front of his teeth with his mouth closed. He was nervous.
“What does he want?”
“He said that he had a job offer for you.” Don Regulo fished out a torn piece of paper from his pocket. “There is the address and telephone number. You don’t need this piece of paper, do you? Wasn’t this the place where you photographed yourself in bed naked beside her? Be careful, Jesus, I think he knows. His eyes looked hurt.”
“I better go inside.”
“How is Agustina?”
“Sick.”
By sick Don Regulo presumed another beating by Don Jesus. Many people crossed the border for mass on Sunday mornings and rumors spread quickly within the attendees, especially after mass when most of them congregated at the Nueno Leon.
“Is Agustina a good woman? Doesn’t she deserve a good man?”
Don Regulo’s sincerity frustrated Don Jesus, but only a brother or true friend will expose the bad flesh under the skin. Don Regulo would never let him swim within his troubled thoughts; he might drown. He understood that his device to express his opinion safely to him migrated through method of question. They never argued during the life of their friendship.
“Maybe she should find him.”
“What makes you a good man for Socorro and not for your wife?”
“Socorro makes me feel young. Agustina makes me feel old.”
“You’ve been married to Agustina for forty years, Jesus. Why throw that away?”
“Have you opened the doors to the church yet?” said Don Jesus, staring straight into Don Regulo’s eyes. He licked his teeth again. “I need to go inside.”
“I bet you do. Socorro will come in a few minutes. Don’t worry.” Don Regulo picked up the hose. “Do you believe in God?”
“Don’t ask stupid questions, Regulo.”
“God forgives, right? Wash away your sins, Jesus.”
He entered the church, removed his hat, and dipped two fingers into the font of holy water by the entrance to wet his forehead and cross himself. The church felt cold. Most candles were lit and a few half melted. His footsteps echoed. He inserted two coins into the deposit box next to the table of votive candles. He recited a prayer for Agustina to the statue of Saint Martin de Porres and lit a candle with the flame of another candle. The altar at the front of the church was still dark except for the lights above the fourteen Via Crusis sculptures on the walls. The giant crucifix upon the altar was covered with a long white sheet. He carried fifty-nine pennies in his pocket and operated them like rosary beads. Don Jesus knelt to pray to the sculptures. He looked at his watch and was on time to pray to all fourteen.
“Am I not good enough for you?” a man started to scream.
“Stop it, Eulojio!” the woman screamed back. “You’re scaring our little girl!”
Don Jesus rose to his feet and saw a woman and a young girl cornered by a man in the shade of a recess. The woman saw Don Jesus and gestured at him to stay away. The man turned around.
“You’re a damn drunk, Eulojio!” said the woman. “That’s all you’ve been for the last five years!”
“This is what you’ve turned me into, Socorro, with all your fucking infidelities! What are you looking at?” he asked Don Jesus.
He smelled of alcohol and cigarettes.
“Look, stay away from the woman and the girl!” said Don Jesus, holding the flower in his hand.
Eulojio looked at the flower, took an angry sip from a small whiskey bottle, and wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.
“You’re the son of a bitch!” He examined Don Jesus from head to toe. “What’s so good about you anyway? What does Socorro see in you? You’re an old fart, bald, and from what I heard last night at the Sportsman bar, a wife beater!” He fell to his knees and started to cry. “Why did you have to sleep with my wife? We’re young, we have a little girl, and we built a new house last year. But I’m going to fuck you up, you pieces of shit! Both of you!”
He got up and pulled out a knife.
“You’re making a big mistake”, the woman cried “I never saw this man in my whole life”
Eulojio sneered
“It’s true” screeched the woman “I don’t know him, you’re drunk”.
Don Regulo walked in. “Is everything okay, Jesus?”
Everyone ignored him. He ran out.
Don Jesus took a step back. “Stay way, you drunk!”
“This man is a stranger to me”, the woman lowered her head”
In the distance Don Regulo heard the old cock crow three times.
Eulojio chased Don Jesus around the church holding the knife in one hand.
“I’m going to kill you now, Jesus! Don’t run!” he screamed. “It’s my turn to have fun in this party!”
They jumped over church benches, ran out the back door, and went back into the church to the altar, breathing heavily. Don Jesus sought safety behind the covered giant crucifix and caused the white sheet to slide off. Eulojio put the knife down. Christ was beheaded. He drank the remainder of the whiskey in one and sat on the altar steps. Don Jesus tiptoed out of the church. He stood by the side of the street where five patrol cars screeched their tyres as they came to a stop.
Don Jesus ignored the men that yelled his name from the Lopez Supermarket wall, where they waited for the contractors to offer work. He was their best carpenter and many of them depended on him.
He walked for hours.
By noon he was standing on the bridge behind the rail. A fat woman stood next to him, looking down like everyone else. They were watching a man drown as he tried to cross the Rio Grande River into the United States. There were about ten people on the bridge and five more by the river on the Mexican side. No one would jump in to rescue him. The Border Patrol agents waited in their trucks.
“Poor man,” the people whispered. “Why don’t they stay in Mexico?”
The man kicked, trashed his arms, and struggled on the surface. He fought for a few minutes until he submerged. The he emerged. His eyes were glassy and unfocused; his head low in the water with the mouth at water level, his hair covering his forehead. His body rolled slowly, belly down, and floated. The Border Patrol agents put a rescue boat in the water. They took his body in a bag.
Don Jesus could see Agustina from the bridge. She was washing his clothes by hand and then hanging them on the line. She looked beautiful from the other side. He felt he would hate to lose her.
He crossed the bridge slowly back to Matamoros, his heart heavy with the need for forgiveness.
Copyright Ben Alvarado 2012
They lived in Matamoros in the rear of a vecindad that he built and owned. His house was made of cinder block near the river while the rest of the houses were made of wood and the rent that he collected every first of the month from the six families was enough to pay for his wife’s insulin and a few bills. He was father to three daughters whom were all married but lived across the river in the United States. They visited every weekend because their mother could not legally cross but he saw them frequently when they had lunch every other day at the Nuevo Leon restaurant in downtown Brownsville.
“I’ll have your money ready this afternoon, Don Jesus,” said Maria, his neighbor, from the screen door. She was old, skinny, and blind. She had no control of her eyeballs and they rolled frantically in their sockets and she smoked heavily and swallowed the ashes of the cigarettes as she put them out on her tongue.
“Thank you, Maria".
“How is Agustina, Don Jesus? ” she asked and put out a cigarette on her tongue. “Another broken chair in the name of Socorro?” She swallowed the ashes.
“Mind your business, Maria. You should stop smoking.”
“And you should stop paying for them.”
He walked along the sidewalk between the six houses that led to the exit as housewives stood by their doors to watch him. They had heard the scuffle. It was not the first time. The last seven months were the worst since Agustina found the photo in his wallet, the one where he lay naked in a bed with Socorro. She never accustomed to rummage through his belongings. Nowadays he slept with his wallet under his pillow and she disliked it. Every argument started due to the wallet. He would not let her have it. She was the thorn in his side He walked faster out of the vecindad.
Their eyes felt like suns baking into his skin as they whispered to each other.
The bridge was half a mile from his home and in his life he had never owned a vehicle. He had maintained to always attain jobs not too far. Downtown Brownsville was dilapidating and jobs had never been scarce, especially for a skilled carpenter. He met the flower boy in the middle of the bridge like every morning. He was about seven, dark-skinned and very thin, and carried the skill to sell of a car salesman. His Indian mother sat on the floor by the rail of the bridge wrapped in a thick blanket and watched him and his two siblings sell flowers.
“I have the freshest flowers this morning, Don Jesus,” he said. “One for the girlfriend?”
“Sure, why not?”
“That’ll be ten pesos.”
“They were five pesos yesterday.”
“These are fresher. Smell them. You will not find any like these in the United States. These come from Aalsmeer. Special delivery just for us.”
Don Jesus felt the lie. “I’ll give you seven. They look the same to me. You probably stole them from somebody’s garden.”
“Make it eight, Don Jesus,” said the boy and made a sad face. “My momma’s sick. She needs help. Look at her. The curandera said she needs three hundred pesos to remove the evil spell. My younger brother and sister are helping today.”
“Why is it that everyone of you people always have an ill parent? Here, take the eight pesos.” He slapped the money into the boy’s hand. “My wife is sick too. I expect a discount tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Don Jesus. My momma and God will bless you. I will sell Matamoros flowers tomorrow.”
He crossed the bridge straight into downtown. It was still dark and the streets were wet from the fog that lingered in the air and blurred the streetlights. A few blocks down was the Immaculate Catholic Church. Don Regulo was outside sweeping and watering the patio. When he saw Don Jesus he put the things down to shake his hand. They had quite a few beers at the downtown bars when they were young and shared many whores, many whom Don Jesus paid back with side jobs in their homes. Don Regulo had a scar over his right eye after a bar fight where Don Jesus was stabbed and left holding onto a pole bleeding excessively. Don Regulo put him in a taxi that drove them to the hospital. He almost died and after the blood transfusion they felt like brothers. After that night thirty-five years ago Don Regulo became the Immaculate Church sexton and Don Jesus devoted his life to carpentry.
“Flowers again, Jesus?” said Don Regulo. “This is the third week in a row. Her husband is starting to suspect. I don’t think she throws them in the trash when she goes home.”
“He is a fool for not loving her. A good woman deserves a good man.”
“He came by the church yesterday afternoon. He asked about Socorro.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That she was gone and then he asked about you.”
Don Regulo expected concern in Don Jesus’s eyes, but there was none. Instead he licked the top front of his teeth with his mouth closed. He was nervous.
“What does he want?”
“He said that he had a job offer for you.” Don Regulo fished out a torn piece of paper from his pocket. “There is the address and telephone number. You don’t need this piece of paper, do you? Wasn’t this the place where you photographed yourself in bed naked beside her? Be careful, Jesus, I think he knows. His eyes looked hurt.”
“I better go inside.”
“How is Agustina?”
“Sick.”
By sick Don Regulo presumed another beating by Don Jesus. Many people crossed the border for mass on Sunday mornings and rumors spread quickly within the attendees, especially after mass when most of them congregated at the Nueno Leon.
“Is Agustina a good woman? Doesn’t she deserve a good man?”
Don Regulo’s sincerity frustrated Don Jesus, but only a brother or true friend will expose the bad flesh under the skin. Don Regulo would never let him swim within his troubled thoughts; he might drown. He understood that his device to express his opinion safely to him migrated through method of question. They never argued during the life of their friendship.
“Maybe she should find him.”
“What makes you a good man for Socorro and not for your wife?”
“Socorro makes me feel young. Agustina makes me feel old.”
“You’ve been married to Agustina for forty years, Jesus. Why throw that away?”
“Have you opened the doors to the church yet?” said Don Jesus, staring straight into Don Regulo’s eyes. He licked his teeth again. “I need to go inside.”
“I bet you do. Socorro will come in a few minutes. Don’t worry.” Don Regulo picked up the hose. “Do you believe in God?”
“Don’t ask stupid questions, Regulo.”
“God forgives, right? Wash away your sins, Jesus.”
He entered the church, removed his hat, and dipped two fingers into the font of holy water by the entrance to wet his forehead and cross himself. The church felt cold. Most candles were lit and a few half melted. His footsteps echoed. He inserted two coins into the deposit box next to the table of votive candles. He recited a prayer for Agustina to the statue of Saint Martin de Porres and lit a candle with the flame of another candle. The altar at the front of the church was still dark except for the lights above the fourteen Via Crusis sculptures on the walls. The giant crucifix upon the altar was covered with a long white sheet. He carried fifty-nine pennies in his pocket and operated them like rosary beads. Don Jesus knelt to pray to the sculptures. He looked at his watch and was on time to pray to all fourteen.
“Am I not good enough for you?” a man started to scream.
“Stop it, Eulojio!” the woman screamed back. “You’re scaring our little girl!”
Don Jesus rose to his feet and saw a woman and a young girl cornered by a man in the shade of a recess. The woman saw Don Jesus and gestured at him to stay away. The man turned around.
“You’re a damn drunk, Eulojio!” said the woman. “That’s all you’ve been for the last five years!”
“This is what you’ve turned me into, Socorro, with all your fucking infidelities! What are you looking at?” he asked Don Jesus.
He smelled of alcohol and cigarettes.
“Look, stay away from the woman and the girl!” said Don Jesus, holding the flower in his hand.
Eulojio looked at the flower, took an angry sip from a small whiskey bottle, and wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.
“You’re the son of a bitch!” He examined Don Jesus from head to toe. “What’s so good about you anyway? What does Socorro see in you? You’re an old fart, bald, and from what I heard last night at the Sportsman bar, a wife beater!” He fell to his knees and started to cry. “Why did you have to sleep with my wife? We’re young, we have a little girl, and we built a new house last year. But I’m going to fuck you up, you pieces of shit! Both of you!”
He got up and pulled out a knife.
“You’re making a big mistake”, the woman cried “I never saw this man in my whole life”
Eulojio sneered
“It’s true” screeched the woman “I don’t know him, you’re drunk”.
Don Regulo walked in. “Is everything okay, Jesus?”
Everyone ignored him. He ran out.
Don Jesus took a step back. “Stay way, you drunk!”
“This man is a stranger to me”, the woman lowered her head”
In the distance Don Regulo heard the old cock crow three times.
Eulojio chased Don Jesus around the church holding the knife in one hand.
“I’m going to kill you now, Jesus! Don’t run!” he screamed. “It’s my turn to have fun in this party!”
They jumped over church benches, ran out the back door, and went back into the church to the altar, breathing heavily. Don Jesus sought safety behind the covered giant crucifix and caused the white sheet to slide off. Eulojio put the knife down. Christ was beheaded. He drank the remainder of the whiskey in one and sat on the altar steps. Don Jesus tiptoed out of the church. He stood by the side of the street where five patrol cars screeched their tyres as they came to a stop.
Don Jesus ignored the men that yelled his name from the Lopez Supermarket wall, where they waited for the contractors to offer work. He was their best carpenter and many of them depended on him.
He walked for hours.
By noon he was standing on the bridge behind the rail. A fat woman stood next to him, looking down like everyone else. They were watching a man drown as he tried to cross the Rio Grande River into the United States. There were about ten people on the bridge and five more by the river on the Mexican side. No one would jump in to rescue him. The Border Patrol agents waited in their trucks.
“Poor man,” the people whispered. “Why don’t they stay in Mexico?”
The man kicked, trashed his arms, and struggled on the surface. He fought for a few minutes until he submerged. The he emerged. His eyes were glassy and unfocused; his head low in the water with the mouth at water level, his hair covering his forehead. His body rolled slowly, belly down, and floated. The Border Patrol agents put a rescue boat in the water. They took his body in a bag.
Don Jesus could see Agustina from the bridge. She was washing his clothes by hand and then hanging them on the line. She looked beautiful from the other side. He felt he would hate to lose her.
He crossed the bridge slowly back to Matamoros, his heart heavy with the need for forgiveness.
Copyright Ben Alvarado 2012