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  “But what about the trophy? Mr. Koch called me personally and said how much he was looking forward to seeing it. He called twice.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of that. This is just a minor inconvenience. You know me: Whatever task the Lord puts in front of me, I can conquer it. Nothing stands in my way.”

  “Yes, Señora.”

  “And remember to dress up nice, okay? Dress up real nice.”

  Analiz was about to say something again, but Señora Lopez hung up. Gassy from the milk and flan, she knew she would never sleep, so she got out of bed to plan and get ready. When the maid arrived at 6 a.m., Señora Lopez told her not to bother making breakfast, she’d already had a little something, and that she didn’t have to worry about cleaning up for the brunch meeting. She called up her chauffeur and told him he no longer had the day off.

  When he arrived soon afterward, Señora Lopez rushed to the car. The day was already heating up, and she was grateful the air conditioner was blasting at full power.

  “Alejandro, we have a mission.” She told him to take the 52 Expressway, because it would take them less than two hours to drive from San Juan to the southern side of the island, to Ponce. She would be back in plenty of time.

  During the drive, she tried to sleep but couldn’t. Starving, she ate three pilones, one after the other, from a bag she had in her purse.

  Ninety minutes later, they stopped in front of a single-story, concrete house painted mint green and white. The doors and windows were covered with metal gates. Señora Lopez had grown up in a house like this, had known many houses like this. Except here the front yard was covered in trash. A shame. She told Alejandro she would be right back.

  When she exited the car, the thickened morning heat hit her like a fist. There was broken glass along the walkway. A horrible thought came to her. She looked closely. No, thank the Lord, it wasn’t the trophy. She crossed herself three times and whispered, “En la gloria de Dios!”

  She stepped onto the porch and pressed the doorbell. She heard no bell ring, so she began to knock, and then bang on the door gate. Halfway through her second bang, the inside door swung open.

  A young woman stood in the dim light of the entryway, behind the gate and the screen door. Maybe a teenager, maybe even a girl. In the shadow, Señora Lopez found it hard to tell.

  “Good morning, miss,” Señora Lopez said. Loud music came from inside the house, so she had to speak up. “I realize it’s very early but I would like to see Idalia Lopez. She has done something very foolish, and I need to speak with her. I know she’s here.”

  The young woman said nothing, so Señora Lopez began to repeat herself in Spanish. But the girl or woman said, “I heard you the first time.”

  “Please tell Idalia to come to the door.”

  “‘Tell Idalia to come to the door,’ she says.”

  “I am her mother. I have a right to see her.”

  “She has ‘a right,’ she says.”

  Señora Lopez was beginning to suspect this girl or woman was what they called “learning disabled.”

  “Miss, may I speak with your father?”

  The girl or woman covered her mouth as she laughed, like a child would. Señora Lopez could see more of her now. She had long, black hair, straight. Over her thin frame, she wore a loose t-shirt and very tight, very short cutoffs. She could have been thirteen or eighteen or thirty.

  “How about your mother?”

  “I have no parents.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Everyone has parents.”

  “I’m not everyone.” She laughed to herself again. “Who needs parents, really? They’re super annoying.”

  Señora Lopez felt herself dripping sweat. Although she was in the shade of the porch, the heat wave that had settled over Puerto Rico in the last few days had turned the air to steam. She wore a jacket over a polyester blouse and a skirt over stockinged legs—she had not expected to be outdoors so long.

  “May I please speak to the owner of the home then, miss?”

  “‘Can I please speak to the owner of the home, miss?’”

  Señora Lopez had enough. “I can see I’m not going to get anywhere with you.” She hated having to deal with fools like this. Hadn’t she worked hard all her life to get away from fools? “Could you please tell my daughter to contact me, miss? It’s very important.”

  “Why?”

  “Simple human courtesy, my dear. Is that so difficult for you to understand?”

  “I no speak inglés.”

  “Oh boy.” Señora Lopez threw up her hands and went back to the car, careful not to step on any broken glass. Her driver popped out and opened the door, and she slid into the chilled air inside.

  Right away she saw a red light blinking on the dashboard.

  “What’s wrong with the car, Alejandro?” Señora Lopez asked.

  “The engine? I’m not sure.”

  “Not sure? Of course it’s the engine. It’s overheating. You’ll have to have it checked, but that can wait until after I get to the office. Let’s get out of here.”

  They drove down the block of houses colored pink, orange, pastel-blue, grapefruit. She said, “This is terrible. Terrible! Idalia should have known better—she should have! You try to raise a daughter in this world, and see what happens. She was a beauty queen once, you know.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “She won contest after contest, even when she was a little girl. Little Miss Ponce. Miss Teen San Juan. I took her all over. I had her teeth fixed. I bought her singing lessons and dancing lessons. And now this. Look at that place. Look what she’s come to. All I can say is I hope I’m wrong, Alejandro. I’m never wrong, but I hope I am.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “The insurance company will just have to handle the trophy. They’ll pay to replace it. That’s all. I did my best. Take a left here, Alejandro. This street will get us back to the expressway faster.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  They were stuck at a corner only because the car in front of them refused to run the red light.

  “Ai, who am I kidding?” she said. “We need that trophy today. Mr. Koch is obsessed with that thing. He’s not a pro golfer, but he lost the celebrity tournament here. Two or three times. But now he’s rich enough to save all our skins. And I think he doesn’t only want to see that trophy, he wants to buy it, so he can pretend he won. And he can have it, for the right price. Whatever brings him to the table. And I need him at the table.

  “We have to go back. Damn that stupid girl—oh, I’m sorry, Lord, please pardon my language. You know one time she got me so mad…”

  Señora Lopez was going to say it, to tell the story, but decided against it. The chauffeur didn’t need to know all her business.

  At fourteen, Idalia had been a spoiled, conceited little beauty queen. She had wanted to go to a concert—Señora Lopez had forgotten the name of the band. The cost was ridiculous. Señora Lopez refused, and Idalia screamed and screamed that she made enough money from the beauty pageants and that she deserved to spend it. The girl didn’t understand how to save money. Her mother knew better, Idalia would realize that someday. But then the girl went behind her back, stealing money from her purse. When Señora Lopez found out, she made the girl kneel on the floor to pray and kiss a wooden cross to show her repentance. When Idalia began to pray for “concert tickets and a real mother,” Señora Lopez lost control of herself and broke the cross on the girl’s head.

  Alejandro stopped the car in front of the house again, and Señora Lopez let herself out. As she walked up to the door, an older man in a doo rag and rotted jeans came out. He gave her a big smile filled with broken teeth as he passed and then said something vulgar.

  Señora Lopez was too hot to communicate her disgust.

  She got to the door just as the door gate swung shut. The same young woman stood there behind the screen, this time smoking a cigarette.

  “H
ello, again,” Señora Lopez said, trying her friendly voice. “My name is Olga Lopez.”

  “How super for you.”

  “Hm,” she said. May I ask your name?”

  “Awilda.”

  “Awilda. That’s a lovely name. I have a cousin named Awilda.”

  “Everyone in Puerto Rico has a cousin named Awilda. It’s a horrific name.”

  “Well,” Señora Lopez said. “That’s very sad for you then. Now, miss, I have to know if Idalia Lopez is here. Can you at least please tell me that?”

  “This is not an office, and I am not a secretary.”

  “I’m just asking a simple question,” Señora Lopez said. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead and upper lip. “You know, I could call the police on you people.”

  “You could. You have a cell phone, you have a fancy old car with a driver. He could even drive you to the police station. Do you need their address or do you know where it is? I could google it for you.”

  “Awilda, listen to me. You’re being very rude. You’re giving me an attitude, and I bet you don’t do that with everyone. For example, who was that gentleman who just left here?”

  “Why do you ask? Was he your cousin too?”

  “I don’t like my daughter being around people like that. I know she is here, and I know she needs to get out of here. Because of people like that.”

  “People like what? Jehovah’s Witnesses? People with bad teeth? Vegans? You should be more specific. My teachers always taught me to be more specific. Didn’t they teach you that? I bet you went to private school.”

  “Listen, I know this area. I grew up just a few blocks over. I knew plenty of people like that man, growing up. Those are not good people.”

  “You know, that could have been my father, and you were rude to me and my family.”

  Señora Lopez gave the young woman a long look. No, she was definitely not a child, but she wasn’t healthy, and hadn’t been eating. This was a sick environment. Sour smells came from inside the house, like vinegar, then a stink like a skunk. She knew what all that was. Then she wondered: Maybe it wasn’t this young woman’s fault.

  “Tell me, Awilda. Is there someone in there stopping you, is that it? Is there someone you’re afraid of, that’s not letting you give me answers?”

  “You think there’s somebody behind me with a gun, telling me what to say like a puppet? You’ve got a super imagination, lady.”

  “Fine then,” said Señora Lopez. Then she turned around and went back to the car. “I know how to deal with you people.”

  In Spanish, Awilda called after her, telling her to have a nice day.

  “Drive to the nearest Banco Popular,” Señora Lopez told her driver. “There should be one near the Parque de Bombas. It’s after nine o’clock. We still have plenty of time.”

  She felt warm and asked Alejandro if the air conditioning was on.

  “I turned it off, on account of the car overheating,” he said. “I can open the windows?”

  “Yes! Lord help me.”

  Alejandro rolled down the windows and, as he drove, a tentative breeze entered the car. Without the tinted windows, Señora Lopez saw a furiously blue sky and the sun roasting everything, the pavement, the concrete, the street signs. Gray palm trees bent like old men into the road. The corpse of a dog bloated in the gutter.

  At a stoplight, a man came up to her door with bags of quenepas for sale. She had finished her bag of candies and would have loved to have something sweet, loved to have popped the little green balls open in her teeth and suck out the sweet-sour pulp. But who knew where this jibaro had got them, or stolen them from, or how long he’d had them. No thank you.

  Across the road was a water distribution center. A long line of people stood in the sun in front of a giant cistern. People walked in the road, slowing down traffic. They carried plastic bottles and barrels. After the recent hurricanes, there had been strict water rationing and weekly cutoffs, and so the locals had to get water at places like this. Walking away from the cistern, a mother emptied a bottle of water over the head of her little boy, who giggled like an idiot. What a waste, Señora Lopez thought. They would need that water later. That mother is going to regret that.

  There was no ATM near the Parque de Bombas, at least not one that looked decent. So they circled around the narrow streets packed with tourists. Finally, they found one in front of a supermarket. The unshaded area smelled of urine, and heat radiated off the stained and graffitied metal.

  Señora Lopez withdrew five hundred dollars and immediately put the money deep inside her purse. Back in the car, she checked the time on her watch and then on her phone—almost ten o’clock already. As she was holding her phone, it rang.

  It was Mr. Koch.

  She took a breath. Then she tapped the phone. “Good morning. How are you this morning?”

  “I hear there’s been a change of plans.” As always, he seemed impatient. He had a pushy, aggressive manner that disgusted her, but he was a means to an end. “No problems, I hope.”

  “Of course not. I just thought the change of venue would be more appropriate.”

  “And that secretary of yours will be there, right?”

  “Yes, Analiz will be there.”

  “She’s a nice piece of cake. Yum. Good, good. Yeah, and I’ll want to talk to you privately afterward, about that condo deal in Toha something.”

  “Toa Baja.”

  “I like those plans you sent me. I like them. We’ll talk.”

  “I look forward to it!”

  Señora Lopez hung up and allowed herself a good laugh that trailed off into a long sigh. “Drive a little faster, okay, Alejandro, please. Ai, and put on the air conditioner. The car will be fine.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Alejandro said.

  They’d only gone a few more blocks when steam began billowing out from the front of the car. Alejandro got out and lifted the hood.

  Señora Lopez stuck her head out of the car and asked him what was wrong.

  “The coolant might be leaking. I should take it to a mechanic now. If I don’t, she might not make it back to San Juan.”

  “Lord help me. And how long do you think that is going to take?”

  “Not long? I think I saw a place by the highway.”

  “Dios mio! Fine. Let me out. I’ll walk the rest of the way. It’s close. You get back as soon as you can to pick me up.”

  “Are you sure, Señora?”

  “Don’t worry about me. Are you sure you know where this mechanic is?”

  “I think so. Yes. Yes, I do.”

  Señora Lopez threw up her hands in frustration and got out of the car. Again, the heat wrapped itself around her. She knew the way. Two blocks over, then a left.

  She recognized a playground where she used to play for hours as a child. Now the rides were busted, trash everywhere.

  Señora Lopez realized she was hungry and thirsty and that she should have stopped to get a little something. But she hadn’t seen a bodega open, at least not a decent looking one.

  When she came to the house, the woman opened the door before she could knock.

  “Hola, Olga from a few blocks over. How super nice to see you again.”

  “Awilda,” said Señora Lopez. She found she was short of breath. “I’d like to speak to my daughter, and I know she’s inside. Maybe this will help.” Señora Lopez put her hand on the door, a twenty-dollar bill between two of her fingers. She scratched it against the screen.

  “Hola, Señor Jackson,” Awilda said. “Why don’t you come in?”

  The young woman opened the screen door and gate and extended her hand. Señora Lopez put the twenty into her palm and stepped inside.

  “Bienvenidos. I’m sorry, but our espresso machine is currently out of order,” Awilda said. “And we don’t have a bidet, but maybe I could find you a midget with a mouth full of water.”

  Señora Lopez paid no attention. The desolation
of the room was mesmerizing. Flies danced in the light glancing through the gated windows. Inside, the sour and skunky smells were much stronger. Dried vomit stained walls. Cans, bottles, fast-food containers littered the worn rug that may once have been orange but was now the color of baby shit. There was no furniture, only an old boombox on a shelf blasting music. It felt like a morgue, a slaughterhouse. She had never thought it would be this bad, she had never thought her daughter had fallen this far. Had she really been such a horrible mother than she could let her daughter come to this?

  “Can you please turn that down?” she said to Awilda. “It’s so loud I can’t think.”

  “Of course.” Awilda bent down and lowered the volume a barely perceptible amount.

  Señora Lopez forced a smile. She knew you didn’t antagonize the enemy, you negotiated, you used honey. “Thank you, my dear. Now, please, can you tell me if Idalia is here?”

  Seeing the young woman now, without the screen in her face, Señora Lopez realized that she was pretty, or once had been. She also saw that beneath the short shorts, Awilda’s legs were covered in a series of scars, of little dark holes. Abscesses. Like a trail of bullet holes.

  “You’re very welcome. As to Idey, do you see her here? I don’t,” said Awilda, taking an exaggerated look around the small space.

  “So you know her nickname then,” Señora Lopez said. “She has to be in one of the back rooms. Has to be.”

  “Could be. I don’t have X-ray vision.”

  “Aha, well,” Señora Lopez said, digging into her purse. When she realized Awilda was watching her, she turned around and dug back in for the roll of money. Her hands were slick with sweat. She peeled off another twenty and gave it to the woman, who took it without looking at it. “I know my daughter has been seen coming into this house many times.”

  “Ah, so you have someone following her?”