When Tito Loved Clara (33 page)

“Fine,” he said. “Really good, actually.”

“Your mother said you moved out.”

“I did,” he said. “Not far. I'm just over on Arden.”

“We really miss you,” she said. “The building just isn't the same.”

“Yeah,” said the husband. “Wyatt here asks about you all the time.”

“I miss you, too,” said Tito, looking at the boy.

“Can we ride trains together, sometime, Tío?”

“You got it,” he said.

“Can we go back to the airport?” asked Wyatt.

“Sure,” said Tito.

“Whoo-hoo!” said Wyatt, pumping his fist.

“There you go, buddy,” said the husband. “Give us a call. We'll set it up.”

“I will,” said Tito. “I'll call you tomorrow. I promise.”

“Yay!” said Wyatt, bringing smiles to everyone's lips.

“Well, we should get going,” said Tito, not wanting to push his luck.

“Sure. Have a good day,” said Tamsin, and then to Clara: “Nice to meet you.”

“You too,” said Clara, her only contribution to the conversation. She and Tito walked on, turning right on Seaman, going uphill along the boundary of the park where they had spent so many Friday afternoons together.

“Who was that?” Clara asked.

“Just a kid who lives in my papi's building. I looked after him for a while over the summer. The mother—Tamsin—was here by herself and needed some help.”

“I see,” said Clara. “Where was the husband?”

“Peru. He's some kind of scientist. Studies the chicken flu.”

“You know . . . it's the weirdest thing.”

“What?”

“I think I saw you and that kid in Newark Airport a couple of weeks ago, maybe a month.”

“Yeah. It was us. I took him there to ride the monorail. Wyatt's crazy about trains. So, you saw us? Why didn't you come over? Why didn't you say something?”

“I was with my sister, rushing to catch her flight to D.R. Besides,
it looked like the two of you were having a, well, a moment. You were holding him and stroking his head.”

“Yeah,” said Tito. “That's true. I lost him for a minute in the airport. I thought he was gone for good.”

“What do you mean, you lost him?”

“He took off when we got out of the monorail. There was a big crowd.”

“That must have been awful.”

“Yes. It was pretty bad.”

“My God,” said Clara. “Did you tell his mother?”

“No,” said Tito. “She doesn't need to know that.”

“Kids,” said Clara, shaking her head. “They can make you lose your mind.”

By this time, they had reached the side entrance to his father's building and Tito felt that things were going well, that the farmers' market and the encounter with Tamsin and her family had helped him. He wasn't going to dwell on the airport thing, on Clara not coming over to him. He wanted to stay positive. He drew a set of keys out of his pocket and turned the locks. They went down the three steps into the apartment. Tito's father was sitting at the kitchen table dismantling a faucet with a wrench. The faucet was old and rusty and looked like it had been ripped forcibly from its fixture. He was probably salvaging parts from it, Tito thought. Thrifty as ever.

“Papi, look who I've got with me,” said Tito as jovially as he could. He had not warned his parents that he would be coming by, not warned them that he might be bringing someone with him. His father looked up from the faucet and squinted.

“Who?”

“Clara Lugo.”

Tito crossed the room and Clara followed him. His father stood up, wiping his hands on a grease-stained rag. He looked bewildered.

“
Hola,
Don Felix,” said Clara, kissing his father on the cheek without hesitation. Tito felt the sting of jealousy. It was the greeting he'd wanted.

“
¡Dios mío! Hola,
Clara. What a surprise!” Tito's father put his hand on Clara's arm. “You look more beautiful now than you did as a young girl.”

Clara said nothing, but smiled at him. Tito had to admit that his father had a way about him. He could charm anyone.

“I am very sorry about your papi.”

“Thank you, Don Felix.”

“We may have had our differences, but I knew him a long time—long before he opened that store. I wish we might have been friends again. Nobody deserves a death like that.”

Clara nodded, and again said nothing.

“You live in the city?” he asked.

“New Jersey,” she said.

“She came for the funeral of one of our old teachers from Kennedy,” said Tito, hoping to cut off his father's line of inquiry. “We're heading over there now.”

“The mother of one of our teachers,” said Clara.

“Right,” said Tito. He was no longer sure why he'd wanted to bring Clara here and was surprised by his father's obvious affection for and familiarity with her. It showed him up somehow.

“Where's Mami?” he asked.

“Out. Shopping, I think. Who knows? Are you married, Clara?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Any kids?”

“A boy. Guillermo.”

“Aha! You have a picture?”

“Yes,” she said, and brought out her wallet, unsnapping the clasp to show a photograph of the boy posed on a white stepladder in a photographer's studio. It was cute beyond belief and seeing it ignited a slow-burning rage in Tito's gut.

“He's beautiful,” said his father. “God bless you. There's nothing harder than raising a child.”

“Thank you, Don Felix.”

This was unbearable for Tito. What a fool he had been to bring her here.

“You know any nice girls out there in Jersey for Tito?” asked his father. “My boy wants to die alone and childless.”

“Papi, that's not true!” Tito protested.

His father looked at him. “What? You got some master plan you're not telling us about? You got some new girlfriend we haven't met?”

Tito looked at Clara, who smiled and lowered her gaze, not answering the question about girls in New Jersey. She snapped her wallet closed and put it back in her purse. “Didn't you have to get something here?” she asked Tito.

“Yes, hold on,” he said, and went into his old bedroom and opened the closet he and his father had always shared, the closet in the master bedroom being given over to his mother's wardrobe. Tito's room had become a storage space for deliveries and supplies. There were two UPS boxes and a big white carton with a diagram of a sink on the outside. In the closet, he found the jacket and an old black tie that he hadn't worn since the last funeral he attended—for one of his mother's cousins. He quickly knotted it and put the jacket on and went back out.

His father and Clara looked up, as if they'd been disturbed during a confidential meeting.

“OK,” he said. “Let's go.”

“Thank you for coming to visit,” Don Felix said to Clara. “It is good to see you.”

“You too,” she said, and kissed him again. “Tell your wife I said hello.”

“I will. Look after that boy of yours.”

Tito was drifting toward the exit and Clara at last began to
follow him. Outside, as he locked the door, Tito asked her, “What was he saying to you?”

“Nothing,” she said.

“It didn't look like nothing.”

“He's worried about you, Tito. They both are. Don Felix and your mother.”

“He hasn't seen you in fifteen years and all of sudden he's talking to you about stuff like that? He's telling you he's worried about me?” He tried to contain the anger in his voice.

“Yes, that's what he said.” She looked at him. “Listen, Tito, I'm not sure I want to go there—to the wake.”

“Why not?”

“I'm just not comfortable with it. I made my peace with all of this a long time ago and I don't want to go and reopen the wounds.”

“That's great for you, Clara, but some of us haven't made our peace. My wounds are still open. The old ones are still open and new wounds keep opening up, too.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I know why you don't want to go to the wake. I know why you don't want to talk to Ms. Almonte.”

“Why is that?”

“She told me something else about you.”

“What did she tell you?”

“She told me that the last time she heard from you—that summer—you were pregnant.”

Clara turned away from him. They had walked up to the waist-high park wall on the corner of Indian Road and Seaman Avenue. By turning away, Tito noticed, she appeared to be looking down into the playground where he had taken Wyatt earlier that summer, the same playground where he had once kicked her in the mouth. He suddenly wanted to change the subject, to ask her about the scar on the inside of her lip—to know if it was still there. He remembered how talk of that scar had loosened her up on the afternoon
in the Bronx when he'd helped her gather the swirling papers from her binder, the day all of this had been set in motion. He'd taken the wrong approach with her. It was stupid. He'd rushed into it again. The whole thing with his father had made him so mad. He shouldn't have mentioned the pregnancy. That should have come much later. Instead, he should have talked about the good things they had done together, not the regrettable thing Clara had done on her own, leaving him like that. But it was too late now. He felt everything tipping over, his hopes spilling onto the ground and washing away like a pail of water, impossible to gather up.

“I was,” she said. “I was pregnant. I didn't realize it until after I'd moved in with my mother.”

“It was mine.”

“Yes, Tito. It was yours.”

“And what happened to that baby? Is Deysei that baby? Is she my daughter?”

“No.” Clara shook her head. “I'm sorry,” she said. “Deysei is not that baby.”

“Clara, what happened to that baby? Ms. Almonte said you were going to put it up for adoption. Did you put our baby up for adoption?”

“No, Tito.” A sob escaped from her and she brought her hand to her face as if to hide behind it.

“What happened to that baby, Clara?” he asked her again.

“It was never born,” she said, her hand still at her face.

“Please, Clara. Please. Tell me you didn't.”

Slowly she lowered her hand and looked at him, nodding, the tears running in quick succession down her cheek. “Yes,” she said. “I did.”

“How could you?” His voice sounded strange to himself. It sounded weak. It sounded like a child's voice. “I would have married you. I would have raised that baby with you.”

“I know,” she said. “But that was not the life I wanted.”

Now it was his turn to look away. He took a few steps back from her and placed his hand on the wall. Even on this warm afternoon, the coarse surface of the stone was cold. “How can you say that to me, Clara?”

“I can say it because it is true, Tito. I'm sorry. I don't think it's the life you wanted. To be a father at eighteen.”

“How do you know what I wanted? How do you know that wouldn't have been a better life than the one I have now. Any life with you would have been better than what I have now. Any life with that baby alive.”

“Don't say that. Don't blame me.”

“Why not? You made that decision by yourself. Who should I blame?”

“Tito—”

“Look,” he said, reaching into his pocket for the photograph he'd taken of her husband in front of the rich white woman's house. “You think your life is so great now? Look at this.” The photograph shook in his hand as he held it out to her.

“What is that?” said Clara.

“That's your husband. And that's the woman he's been fucking behind your back.”

“Where did you get this?” she said, taking the photo from his hand and holding it closer to her face.

“I took it.”

“
You
took it? You've been spying on me and my family, Tito?”

“I followed him. It was just one day. I wanted to see what kind of man you'd married, Clara. And this is what I found. Not much of a man at all. I thought you ought to know.”

“This is insane,” she said. “You think this is going to make me come back to you?”

“I would never do that to you, Clara. I would never treat you that way. I would be faithful. I've never loved anyone but you. Please.”

“I can't believe this. I haven't seen you in fifteen years and you
want me to leave my husband and child for you? You have to be joking.”

“I'm not joking, Clara. I'm serious.”

She folded the photograph methodically and put it into her jacket pocket. “Goodbye,” she said.

“What? Where are you going? We aren't finished talking yet.”

“Yes we are. I'm sorry about what happened when we were eighteen. I'm sorry that you had to find out this way. And I'm sorry that you can't get over it. People get over much worse things.”

“There's nothing worse than this,” he said. “There's nothing worse than losing a child.”

“Yes there is,” said Clara. “It's worse to give up. It's worse to stop living. That's what you've done, Tito. You stopped living when you were eighteen. You're stuck there and I'm not going back. I moved on. Do you understand? Goodbye, Tito. I am leaving now, and if I see you near my house or my family again, I will call the police. Goodbye.”

She turned and went away from him, jogging across Seaman Avenue to avoid an oncoming car and running up the steps into the little strip of greenery called Isham Park, heading for Broadway, for her car, for her home in New Jersey.

“Clara!” he called.

She did not look back.

T
ITO STOOD ON
the corner outside his parents' apartment dressed in his black jacket, holding a bouquet of funeral flowers, watching Clara ascend those steps, watching her go until he could see her no more, until she reached the top and descended the far side, her head dropping out of view. He stood there for a few more minutes, just in case she decided to come back. He was not in any haste to move from that spot, not in any haste to admit that that was it, that he'd had his long-hoped-for reunion with Clara, that the reunion was over, that there would not be another one,
and that he'd fucked the whole thing up. He stood there a long time, long enough that he became worried that his father might come out to the side of the building to smoke a cigarette and see him—or that his mother would come walking up Seaman Avenue from shopping and ask him what he was doing standing there like a
pariguayo.
That was the only way this could get any worse—to have to face
her
now—and the fear of it getting even worse motivated him, got him moving along the sidewalk toward the wake. He shouldn't have shown Clara the picture. That was his mistake. Maybe something could have happened, but the picture had killed off any hope of his ever seeing her again. Why had he shown it to her? Because he wanted her to know that the great life she thought she had maybe wasn't so great. Because even before he showed it to her he'd known that nothing was going to happen between them. If she wasn't going to be with him then he wanted her to feel at least a small amount of the pain he'd been carrying all this time.