“Certainly, madam.” They giggled together, and let the car bump over the hills on Divisadero Street. It felt like a roller coaster as the sharp swoops and drops lifted them off the seat.

“Want to stop for a taco?”

She smiled in answer and nodded her head. “Me, I get turned on by the bay. You, it’s the tacos. Welcome home.”

“And not a pizza in sight.”

“Don’t they have pizza out here?”

He made a face in response. “Yes, but we keep them under control. Not like New York. One of these days, a mad onslaught of crazed pizzas will take over the town.” He made fierce monster faces and she laughed.

“You’re a nut. Good heavens, look at that car!” They rolled into a drive-in food place on Lombard, and waiting at the window was a hot rod with the back all jacked up. “You’d think they’d fall on their faces.”

“Of course not. What a beauty … vrooommm … rooom!” He made the appropriate sounds and grinned broadly. “Haven’t you ever seen one like that?”

“Not that I can remember—and I daresay I’d remember—except maybe in a movie. What a horror!”

“Horror? It’s a beauty! Wash your mouth out with soap!”

She was laughing and shaking her head. “Don’t tell me you had one like that! I’d be shocked!”

“Well, I did. A lowrider special. My first car. After that I screwed up my image and got a secondhand VW. Life was never the same.”

“It sounds tragic.”

“It was. Did you have a car as a kid?” She shook her head, and his eyes opened wide in disbelief. “You didn’t? Christ, all kids in California have cars by the time they’re sixteen. I bet you’re lying. I’ll bet you had a Rolls. Come on, tell the truth!” She giggled, furiously shaking her head, as they drove up to the window to order their tacos.

“I’ll have you know, Mr. Vidal, that I did not have a Rolls! I borrowed a crumbling old Fiat when I stayed in Paris, and that was it I’ve never owned a car in my life.”

“What a disgrace. But your family had one, right?” She nodded. “Aha! And it was …” He waited.

“Oh, just a car. You know, four wheels, four doors, steering column, the usual stuff.”

“You’re telling me it was a Rolls?”

“It was not.” She grinned at him broadly and handed him the tacos that had just appeared at the window. “It was a Bentley. But my aunt has a Rolls, if that makes you feel any better.”

“Much. Now hand over those tacos. You may have come three thousand miles to see your old man. I came for the tacos. A Bentley … Jesus.” He took a bite of his taco and sighed rapturously. Kezia leaned back in her seat and began to unwind. It was comfortable being with him; she didn’t have to pretend. She could just be herself.

“You know something funny, Alejandro?”

“Yeah. You.” He was into his third taco.

“No, I’m being serious.”

“Yeah? How comer”

“Oh for chrissake, put a taco in you and you get all full of yourself.”

“No, I get gas.”

“Alejandro!”

“Well, I do. Don’t you ever get gas? Or is that bred out of your?”

She blushed as she laughed. “I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that …”

“I’ll bet you fart in bed.”

“Alejandro, you’re awful. That’s a highly unsuitable remark.”

“Pobrecita.” He was a ceaseless tease when he was in a good mood, but she liked it. He had been so quiet on the plane, but now the atmosphere was festive again.

“What I was trying to tell you, Mr. Vidal, before you got outrageous …”

“Outrageous? Fancy that!” He had switched from tacos to root beer and took a long swallow.

“What I’m trying to tell you …” she lowered her voice, “is that the weird thing is, I have really come to need you. Isn’t that strange? I mean, I’d be totally lost without you. It’s so nice knowing you’re around.”

He was silent, with a distant look in his eyes. “Yeah. I feel that way too,” he said, finally. “It feels funny when I don’t see you for a couple of days. I like knowing you’re okay.”

“It’s nice to know that you care. I guess that’s what I feel, and it feels good. And I worry that maybe someone’s killed you on the subway when you don’t call.

“You know, that’s one of the things I like best about you.”

“What?”

“Your unfailing optimism. Your faith in the human race … killed on the subway…. Asshole. Why would I get killed on the subway?”

“Everyone else does. Why shouldn’t you?”

“Gee. Terrific. You know what I think, Kezia?”

“What?”

“That you fart in bed.”

“Oh, so we’re back on that again, are we? Alejandro, you’re a shit. And a rude, outrageous shit at that! Now drive me to the bay. And what’s more, I do not fart in bed!”

“You do!”

“I don’t!”

“You do!”

“Ask Luke!”

“I will!”

“You dare!”

“Aha! Then he’d tell me the truth, wouldn’t he! You do!”

“I do not! Damn you!”

The debate continued as he backed out of the drive-in, and finally dissolved in gales of their laughter. They chuckled and giggled and teased the remaining few blocks to the bay, and then they fell talent. It lay stretched before them like a bolt of darkest blue velvet, and there was a veil of fog high overhead, not low enough to obstruct the view from across the bay, but just enough so that it sat suspended on the spires of the bridge. A foghorn hooted sadly far off in the distance, and the lights around the rims of the shore sparkled.

“Lady, one of these days I’m going to move back here.”

“No, you won’t. You’re in love with your work at the center in Harlem.”

“That’s what you think. That bullshit is getting to be more than I want to have to deal with every day. People just don’t get as crazy out here. You never know, maybe that interview I have lined up out here will pan out.”

“And then what?”

“We’ll see.”

She nodded pensively, unnerved by the idea that he might leave New York. But it was probably just talk, to let off some steam. She decided to ignore what he had said. It was safer that way.

“When I see it like this, I want to stop time and stay in this moment forever.”

“Crazy girl. Don’t we all wish we could do that. Did you ever come down here at dawn?” She shook her head. “It’s much better then. This city is like a beautiful woman. It changes, it has moods, it gets all gray and baggy-eyed, and then turns beautiful and you fall in love with her all over again.”

“Alejandro, who do you love?” She hadn’t thought of that since the day they’d shared hot chocolate in Yorkville. He was almost always alone, or with her.

“That’s a strange question.”

“No, it’s not. Isn’t there someone? Even an old flame from the past?”

“No, none of those. Oh, I don’t know, Kezia. I love a lot of people. Some of the kids I work with, you, Luke, other friends, my family. A whole bunch of people.”

“And too many. It’s so safe to love lots of people. It’s a lot harder to love just one. I never did … until Luke. He taught me so much about that. He isn’t afraid of that the way I was … and maybe you are. Isn’t there even one woman you love, as a woman? Or maybe a few?” She had no right to ask, and she knew it, but she wanted to know.

“No. Not lately. Maybe one of these days.”

“You ought to give it some thought. Maybe you’ll meet someone out here sometime.” But deep in her heart, she hoped he wouldn’t. He deserved the best sort of woman there was, one who could give him back all that he gave. He deserved that, because he gave so much. But secretly, she knew that she hoped he wouldn’t find her just yet. She wasn’t ready to lose him. Things were so lovely just as they were. And if he had someone, she would lose him; it would be inevitable.

“What are you thinking about, little one? You look so sad.” He thought he knew why, but he didn’t.

“Just silly stuff drifting through my head. Nothing much.”

“Don’t worry so much. You’ll see him tomorrow.”

She only smiled in response.


Chapter 32


They saw it as they rounded a bend on the freeway. San Quentin. Across a body of water, a finger of the bay that had poked its way inland, it stood at the water’s edge, looking ugly and raw. Kezia kept it in view the rest of the way, until finally it vanished again as they left the freeway and followed an old country road around a series of bends.

The mammoth fortress that was San Quentin took her breath away when they saw it again. It seemed to stand with its body jutting into her face, like a giant bully or an evil creature in a hideous dream. One felt instantly dwarfed beneath the turrets and towers, the endless walls that soared upwards, dotted only here and there by tiny windows. It was built like a dungeon, and was the color of rancid mustard. It was not only fearsome, but it reeked of anger and terror, loneliness, sorrow, loss. Tall metal fences topped with barbed wire surrounded the encampment, and in all possible directions stood gun towers manned by machine-gun-toting guards. Guards patrolled the entrance, and people emerged wearing sad faces, some drying their eyes with bits of handkerchief or tissue. It was a place one could never forget. It even boasted a long dry moat, with still active drawbridges to the gun towers that kept the guards safe from potential “attack.”

As she looked at the place, Kezia wondered how they could be so fearful. Who could possibly get free of that place? Yet now and then people did. And seeing the place made her suddenly know why they’d try anything, even death, to escape. It made her understand why Luke had done what he had to help the men he called his brothers. Prisoners of places like that had to be remembered by someone. She was only sorry it had been Luke.

She also saw a row of tidy houses with flowers beds out front. The houses stood inside the barbed wire fences, in the shadow of the gun towers, at the feet of the prison. And she guessed, accurately, that they were the houses of guards, living there with their wives and their children. The thought made her shudder. It would be like living in a graveyard.