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“Close in, make a circle!” Dark pants, light pants flourished in the air.
“Quick, here come the maniacs with the razors! Right leg on, left leg, there!”
“The zipper, cows, zip my zipper!” babbled Vamenos. The siren died.
“Madre mía, yes, just in time! They arrive.” Vamenos lay back down and shut his eyes. “Gracias.”
Martínez turned, nonchalantly buckling on the white pants as the interns brushed past.
“Broken leg,” said one intern as they moved Vamenos onto a stretcher.
“Compadres,” said Vamenos, “don’t be mad with me.” Gómez snorted. “Who’s mad?”
In the ambulance, head tilted back, looking out at them upside down, Vamenos faltered.
“Compadres, when … when I come from the hospital … am I still in the bunch? You won’t kick me out? Look, I’ll give up smoking, keep away from Murrillo’s, swear off women—”
“Vamenos,” said Martínez gently, “don’t promise nothing.”
Vamenos, upside down, eyes brimming wet, saw Martínez there, all white now against the stars.
“Oh, Martínez, y
ou sure look great in that suit. Compadres, don’t he look beautiful?”
Villanazul climbed in beside Vamenos. The door slammed. The four remaining men watched the ambulance drive away.
Then, surrounded by his friends, inside the white suit, Martínez was carefully escorted back to the curb.
In the tenement, Martínez got out the cleaning fluid and the others stood around, telling him how to clean the suit and, later, how not to have the iron too hot and how to work the lapels and the crease and all. When the suit was cleaned and pressed so it looked like a fresh gardenia just opened, they fitted it to the dummy.
“Two o’clock,” murmured Villanazul. “I hope Vamenos sleeps well. When I left him at the hospital, he looked good.”
Manulo cleared his throat. “Nobody else is going out with that suit tonight, huh?”
The others glared at him.
Manulo flushed. “I mean … it’s late. We’re tired. Maybe no one will use the suit for forty-eight hours, huh? Give it a rest. Sure. Well. Where do we sleep?”
The night being still hot and the room unbearable, they carried the suit on its dummy out and down the hall. They brought with them also some pillows and blankets. They climbed the stairs toward the roof of the tenement. There, thought Martínez, is the cooler wind, and sleep.
On the way, they passed a dozen doors that stood open, people still perspiring and awake, playing cards, drinking pop, fanning themselves with movie magazines.
I wonder, thought Martínez. I wonder if—Yes!
On the fourth floor, a certain door stood open.
The beautiful girl looked up as the men passed. She wore glasses and when she saw Martínez she snatched them off and hid them under her book.
The others went on, not knowing they had lost Martínez, who seemed stuck fast in the open door.
For a long moment he could say nothing. Then he said:
“José Martínez.”
And she said:
“Celia Obregón.”
