Thirteen Senses by Victor Villaseñor
“Quick, come here,” said Don Victor, when he saw Salvador come up the stairs. “Look at the predicament that this old woman has got me into! I got good cards, take a look, but she’s beat me so many times in the last few days that I’m even afraid of betting on these!”
Salvador nodded hello to Doña Guadalupe, tipping his small-brim Stetson, then he took a look at Don Victor’s cards. The white-haired old man held two kings and two tens. They were good cards. But still, Salvador would’ve thrown them away without a moment’s hesitation if he’d been having bad luck.
“Remember the saying,” said Salvador to the balding old man, “the worst curse of the gambler is having the second best hand.”
“Yes, of course, we all know that,” snapped Don Victor. “The best thing is to have the best or the worst, so then you won’t be tempted to bet, if you don’t have the winning hand.
“But you tell me, Salvador,” he said, looking at his son-in-law in the eyes, “how can a man know that his hand is second best unless he bets?”
Salvador’s whole heart came up into his mouth. Oh, these words, these thoughts, they were what haunted every loser every day of his life. Lady Luck, after all, was a very dangerous woman if a man didn’t know how to court her shapely, beautiful curves.
“Myself, that’s why I don’t gamble,” said Salvador. “I put my money only on a sure thing.”
And here, Salvador, who was in actuality a professional gambler, had said it all, telling the old man the real secret about gambling. But still, even as he, Salvador, told this secret to Lupe’s father, he well knew that this old man would only laugh, and never take this advice to heart. For you could see it in his eyes, especially his right eye, the male side; he loved the feel of risking! This was what got him flying. Not the winning, not the figuring and planning, but simply the risking it all to the wild winds of life, with no plan or scheme for the odds of survival, whatsoever.
But, on the other hand, Salvador could well see that his wife, Doña Guadalupe, did understand. You could see it in her left eye, and so this was why she was the real breadwinner of their family. She, the woman, with the power of the mother pig, had the absolute focus of mind to know when not to buck the odds and, and yet, she also knew when to risk everything, even her own life for the survival of la familia!
“Ha!” continued Lupe’s father, laughing happily. “I’m not going to chicken-out now! I’m a man, and so I’m betting!”
With a gleam in his old eyes, he turned around facing his wife and pushed in his whole pile of beans, betting everything he had. Salvador could see his own father doing this type of macho bravery, and it was so stupid, and completely unnecessary!
Reluctantly, Doña Guadalupe saw his bet, pushing in an equal amount of beans. “Three queens,” she said.
“Three queens!” yelled the old man, throwing down his cards in disgust. “Damnit! I lost again!”
Don Victor got to his feet, pulling his pants up angrily . . . just as Lupe came out the door, suitcase in hand, wearing her royal blue dress and full-length coat with the fur collar that Salvador had bought for her. And she looked so beautiful, so breath-taking elegant. There was no movie star who even came close to Lupe’s natural beauty.
“Oh, how I just hope I get rich once before I die, so I can choke this old woman to death with money!” continued Lupe’s father, half-angry, but still laughing at the same time. “So she’ll realize once and for all, just what kind of man I am!”
“But I know what a good man you are already,” said Lupe’s mother Doña Guadalupe, smiling as she drew in all her winnings.
“Look at her,” snapped the old man. “She has the mouth to say that even as she takes all of my frijoles!”
The roar of carcajadas that came from Lupe’s old mother as her father mentioned his beans, was so loud, so contagious, that Lupe and Salvador started laughing, too, and then Don Victor was laughing, also.
The two old people laughed until they had tears in their eyes, and their stomachs ached. And then Doña Guadalupe and Don Victor looked at their daughter—standing here before them with her suitcase beside her—and they suddenly realized what the moment was really all about.
They weren’t laughing because of their frijoles; oh, no, they were laughing these painful carcajadas because they were losing the baby of the family, and soon they’d also lose Carlota and Victoriano, and then they’d be all alone.
The two old people dried their eyes and took each other’s hand as they stood looking at Lupe and Salvador—two old people who were still at odds with each other, two old people who saw love in this young couple’s eyes, and it caused them to remember that love in themselves.
“Well, well,” said Don Victor, drying his eyes with the back of his hand and reaching for his daughter, “I guess this is it.” And he took Lupe into his old, thin arms, giving her un abrazo. “And only yesterday you were chasing after your deer up and down the hillsides in la Lluvia de Oro as agile as a Tarahumara Indian—oh, my God, how the years have flown by!”
He was crying and crying and hugging his daughter, and then Doña Guadalupe joined them and she was crying, too.
Salvador watched these two old parents hugging their daughter, and he now once more knew, down deep inside of himself, why he’d chosen Lupe above all other women to be his wife; not only was she beautiful, but she knew love deep in her center.
“Please,” said Lupe, kissing her mother and father, “tell my nina Sophia that I’m sorry I didn’t get to see her, but we’ll be back soon, and Salvador and I will spend time with her then.”
Salvador had no idea what Lupe was talking about. But Lupe was very upset. Sophia was Lupe’s oldest sister and she was also Lupe’s nina. meaning her godmother, and so Sophia and Lupe were very close, but still Sophia and her husband, Julian, hadn’t come to Lupe’s wedding. Sophia had sent their older children to Salvador and Lupe’s wedding, but she and Julian hadn’t come, because these were hard times and they hadn’t thought that they had the proper clothes.
It had bothered Lupe tremendously, but she also hadn’t dared to ask Salvador to buy them clothes—fully realizing that he’d already spent a fortune as it was. And besides, her sister Sophia was as stubborn as she was tiny and cute, and once she’d made up her mind, that they needed special clothes to come to Lupe’s wedding, she just wouldn’t change her mind.
“Of course, mi hijita,” Doña Guadalupe now said to her daughter, “please don’t worry about your sister Sophia anymore. As soon as Victoriano gets another truck, things will be better for all of us again.”
“Excuse me,” said Don Victor to Salvador, “but while these women talk, I’d like to see you alone, Salvador.”
“But they need to be going,” said Doña Guadalupe anxiously. “You can talk to him some other time.”
“Look at her,” snapped Don Victor. “During your courtship, she’d steal you for three hours at a time—ruining your ears! But now I only wish to speak to you for a moment and she says no! Women, I swear, they’re impossible! But what can we do? Pigs are only good for eating!”
Saying this, the old man put his long, thin arm about Salvador’s thick, heavy shoulders and walked away with him. “Tell me,” he said, taking a little stone out of his pocket and rubbing it with his thumb and index finger, “do you remember me telling you about all the gold that’s still left in the canyon where we came from in Mexico?”
“Yes,” said Salvador. “I remember well.”
“Well, see this little stone,” said the balding old man, “I picked it up on the trail when we were walking out of the canyon. Look, it’s got color, and if you look close, you can see little spiderwebs of interlaced gold. In any other place, this stone would have been considered wonderful ore, but in our canyon, we had such a wealth of pure gold nuggets, that stones like this we just threw away.”
He laughed. “Look at it, look at it real closely. I’ll tell you, all these years this little stone is what has given me the heart to go on.” He bre
“Sounds good to me,” said Salvador, seeing the old man’s eyes aglow with fire.
“Really?” said the old man, surprised by his son-in-law’s quick response. “You’ll then go with me!?!”
“Sure, why not? Then we’ll all be rich!” added Salvador, giving the old man exactly what it was that he wanted, fully realizing that the old man was really all talk, all bluff, just like he was in cards. But what the hell? We all had our dreams, and dreams were such an inexpensive gift to give, his mother always told him. And then, also, who knew? Miracles did happen. And dreams were to miracles like manure was to a plant, giving them each the power with which to grow.
Well, the joy, the gusto that now came into the old man’s eyes, lit up his whole face. “Then it’s settled!” he said with a sudden rush of newfound vitality. “And we’ll take Victoriano, too, and then we’ll all come back like kings! And I’ll buy frijoles by the truckload, so this damn old lady won’t be able to win them all from me even in a million years!”
Lupe’s old father now laughed with carcajadas, pumping Salvador’s hand up and down on the deal, and—in this moment of supreme joy and feeling of abundance—he handed Salvador the little stone that he’d held so dear for all these years!
“For you!” he said with tears coming to his old, wrinkled-up eyes. “That you will be a better man with my daughter than I was with my wife. For the truth is, Salvador, that I’ve never been un hombre much good at cards, or gambling, or even at life, itself. But you, oh, you are different than me, I can see it in your eyes, your clothes, your confidence. You are a man among men, a real macho?’
And saying this, the tall, thin, old man hugged Salvador close, kissing him on his right cheek, then on his left. Salvador’s eyes filled with tears, too, holding the little stone in his right hand. His own father—a powerful giant—had never shown him such love and honor! But still, taking this old man’s little stone made Salvador feel a little bit uncomfortable.
“No,” said Salvador, “you keep the stone. It is yours, Don Victor.”
“Mine?” asked the old man. “You take our heart, the soul of our family, with the taking of our baby daughter, but now you don’t accept this stone? Here, take it, Salvador, and rub it like this between your thumb and fingers when life gets tough. Please, I’ve been where you are going, and we men need our little stone, or else we never stop playing with our tanates,” he added, laughing.
Salvador breathed. “Well, then, I accept,” he said.
“Good,” said Don Victor, smiling grandly.
All this time Lupe and her mother had been watching, and they didn’t really know what the two men were talking about, but it made them feel very good to see such joy and warmth between them.
It had been a long time since Don Victor had shown any spark of his old self.
Salvador picked up Lupe’s two bags and carried them down the steps to the Moon. Putting the suitcases in the back, Salvador then opened the car door for Lupe and got her inside. Then he waved his good-byes to his in-laws, and walked around, jumped in the Moon, started the motor, and they were off.
He took Lupe’s hand as they sped away. And just the touch of her sent him flying!
Part Three
MOONTALKING
End of August 1929
Carlsbad, California
4
And so they’d now entered into the Garden of Eden, God’s first couple—a man and a woman who of their own freewill chose the way of the Almighty!
WITH HER OPEN HAND, Lupe played with the passing breeze outside her window as they drove down the coast from Santa Ana to Carlsbad. The breeze had never felt so delicious on her naked skin. She just couldn’t get over it; she was now a married woman going off on her honeymoon. And here was her husband, su esposo, sitting beside her, looking so handsome at the wheel of their grand automobile. Lupe purred.
But then, just south of San Clemente, as they came into the great Santa Margarita Rancho—which would one day be the Marine Corps Base of Camp Pendleton—Lupe had a problem. She needed to pee, but there was no gas station or any other facilities. And of course, all of her life she’d relieved herself behind bushes and trees when she and her family had followed the crops, but this was different. She was all alone with this man, a stranger, and her mother and sisters weren’t here to help give her privacy with a blanket.
But then she once more remembered that Salvador wasn’t a stranger. He was her husband. Her esposo! She started laughing.
“What is it?” asked Salvador.
“Oh, nothing,” she said. “Just please pull over. Quick.”
Salvador pulled over to the side of the road. Lupe got out and went behind the Moon automobile to relieve herself, but then she realized that she could be seen by oncoming traffic. She quickly walked across a little slope toward the sea. Here, she found a tree and some tall brush.
Finding a small clearing near the end of the slope, Lupe decided that this was a good place. She turned and saw that Salvador was watching her. She waved for him to please turn around. He did so, and when she squatted down to relieve herself, she’d never heard herself pee so loudly. My God, she sounded like a waterfall.
Finishing, she realized she had no paper, so she didn’t know what to use to dry herself. Standing up, there was a little white butterfly flying about her. She laughed. Then glancing around, she saw that a whole swarm of these butterflies were coming toward her.
Her face lit up with joy, remembering the tens of thousands of great big orange butterflies that had come into her family’s canyon every year back in Mexico.
A hawk now flew over Lupe’s head, giving a great cry. It was a Redtail Hawk, which was known to many Native People of the Southwest as the Red Eagle—a human’s guide.
Breathing in of the butterflies, Lupe suddenly felt so blessed as she now looked out across the gray-green-brown landscape all about her and to the glistening, dancing, vast blue sea. The Redtail called to her again, telling her that she was surrounded by the Almighty Creator’s Beauty!
Laughing, Lupe raised up her arms and the white butterflies danced all about her like Angels. She laughed all the more and the butterflies came in so close that some began to land on the naked skin of her arms. Why, she could hear these butterflies speaking to her, singing to her, whispering good tiding to her just as her mother’s plants had whispered to her when she’d drank her coffee on her parents’ porch, watching the break of the new day.
Then miracle of miracles, up came a mother deer and her two little yearlings, standing at the edge of this swarm of white butterflies.
Lupe couldn’t stop smiling—she was so happy!
The Red Eagle screeched again and again and Lupe felt like she’d been magically transported back in time to her childhood when the whole world had been full of magic and wonder! A time when she and her girlfriends had lived in the Daily Miracle of all plants breathing in and out of the Holy Creator and all animal life was glowing with the Union of Creation.
A time when she and Manuelita, Uva, and Cuca—her best friends growing up—and her sister Carlota had raced up and down the barrancas of their box canyon, when the soldiers of the Revolution weren’t trying to catch them and rape them.
Lupe now felt so blessed—she COULD BURST! She waved for Salvador to come across the slope and join her.
Love was in every breath she took!
Love was in every sight she saw: the trees, the brush
Taking her husband’s hand, Lupe stepped with Salvador over the dark wet-spot where she’d peed and they walked down to the seashore. The butterflies followed them like they were Angels sent by God.
Suddenly, a covey of quail exploded in a quick-burst, flying from a big bush down by the sand. Lupe and Salvador took off their shoes and walked along the shore. Every step they now took, they walked in God’s Beauty. They’d entered Heaven on Earth.
The Father Sun was going down by the time they got back to their car and drove into Oceanside. They stopped on the bluff above the Ocean-side pier and got out of their Moon. There were a few silky-thin clouds out over the sea where the Father Sun, the Right Eye of the Almighty, was setting.
The closer and closer the Father Sun drew to the sea, the whole western sky lit up in colors of pink and gold, red and orange, and the clouds took on beautiful colors of silky-silver.
People gathered on the bluff and watched the miracle of light giving closure to another magnificent day, truly a Gift from the Almighty.
Salvador held Lupe in his arms up against his body as they both watched the Sun now touching the sea and begin to go slipping, sliding into the great Pacific. He could feel the warmth of Lupe’s firm, well-rounded nalguitas up against him. It was delicious!
Then boom, the Right Eye of God was going, going, gone, and here held a little pyramid-like flash of greenish-blue light for a split-second!
Suddenly, it was much cooler.
Quickly, Salvador and Lupe got back in their car.
By the time they got to Carlsbad—only three miles south of the pier— Lupe was going crazy with hunger! It had taken them nearly six hours just to drive down from Santa Ana, and usually this drive only took about an hour. And her sister Maria had warned Lupe of this timeless time and hunger of love.