Your piece should have an introduction that presents your argument (thesis) and provides context for your discussion of the essay topic. You should introduce the concept of constructive ambiguity––or a central ambiguity that is functioning in a constructi

from: Brownsville (2003), by Oscar Casares

OSCAR CASARES

when they ran out of things to do. Maybe it was still alive.

Bony grabbed a broom off the porch and swung hard. He

stopped an inch away from the monkey's little black eyes, and

it didn't blink. He poked the head with the straw end of the

broom and it tipped back and forth. The short black hairs on

its head were pointed straight up at the cloudy sky. The nose

was flat and wrinkled around the edges like it'd been a nor-

mal nose and then God decided to push it in with His big

thumb. The ears were old man's ears with whiskers growing

on them and in them. And it kept smiling. It smiled from one

monkey ear to the other. Bony's mother said it was the ugliest thing she'd ever seen.

jQue feo! She wanted it out of her yard. What were the

neighbors going to think? What were her customers going to

say? Who would want to buy perfume from a woman who

lived with such an ugly thing in her front yard? She wouldn't.

His father said it was a dead chango. He didn't care how

it died or where it came from. All he knew was that Bony

needed to stop lying around in his calzoncillos every morning

and go out and find a job, earn some money. He was tired of

corning home for lunch and seeing him sleeping on the sofa.

He didn't know how a police sergeant's son could be so damn

lazy. Brownsville wasn't that big a town. People talked. Bony

was thirty-one years old. Ya, it was time to go do some-

thing with his life. His older brothers had good jobs. What

was wrong with him? That chango wasn't going to get him

anywhere. It was dead.

"I want to keep him," Bony said.

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BROWNSVILLE

"Keep him?" his father said. "iEstas loco o que? You

want to live with monkeys, I'll drive you to the,zoo. Corne

on, get in the car, I'll take you right now. Marta, por favor,

help your son put some clothes in a bag. He wants to live at the zoo."

"You're making your father mad, Bony."

"I didn't do anything," Bony said.

"No," his father said. "All you want to do is drink beer

with your new best friend, your cornpadre, instead of going out to make a living."

Bony should have known his parents would say some-

thing like that. So what if he didn't have a job? Everybody had his own life.

His father drove away in the patrol car. His mother

walked back inside the house. And Bony stayed in the yard

with the monkey. It wasn't so bad. It's not like the head had

been chopped off right there in front of the house. Except for

it not having a body, the monkey was in perfect condition.

The head must have come from the alley that was next to the

house. People were always walking by and throwing things in

the yard. It was Bony's job to keep the yard clean. His father

said it was the least he could do. Every few days Bony found

something new: candy wrappers, empty beer bottles, used

fireworks, a dollar bill ripped in half, a fishing kni(e with

dried blood. A few weeks earlier he'd found a busted pocket

watch in the grass. Another time he found a bunch of letters

from a man named Joaquin to a woman named Veronica.

The letters were in Spanish, and as best as Bony could tell,

43

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OSCAR CASARES

Joaquin loved Veronica and things would've worked out if he

hadn't had a wife and five kids. Most afternoons Bony sat on the tailgate of his dark blue

troquita, the sound system cranked up to some Led Zeppelin

or Pink Floyd. He'd been listening to the same music since

high school and said he would change if another band ever

came out with anything better. That afternoon was different,

though. He forgot about the music and sat in a lawn chair on

the grass. The shade from the fresno tree covered most of the

yard. The wind was blowing some, but it was a warm breeze

that made him feel like he was sitting in a Laundromat wait-

ing for his pants to dry. He stayed 'cool in his chanclas, baggy

blue jean shorts, and San Antonio Spurs jersey. Across the

street, a crow walked in circles in front of Mando Gomez's

house. Bony cracked open his first beer. The palm tree stood

between him and the street. He liked being the only one who

could see the monkey as people walked by that afternoon. He

stared at the monkey and the monkey stared back at him.

The first ones to pass by were the chavalones walking home

from school with their mommies. A few of the mommies

were young and fine, but they never looked Bony's way. Next

were the older kids from the junior high who lived in the

neighborhood and knew better than to walk by without say-

ing hello. "Ese Bony," they said. He pitched his head back

slightly, just to let them know he'd heard them and he was

cool with them. Later, people in the neighborhood drove home from work.

Some of them waved hello, some didn't. Mrs. Rivas, who

lived at the other end of the street, waved only because she

44

BROWNSVILLE

was friends with his mother. The old lady worked part-time

in the church office and led the Rosary whenever anybody

from the neighborhood died. Every Christmas, for as long as

Bony could remember, she added a new animal to her Baby

Jesus setting. A few years ago they sent a guy from the news-

paper to take her picture surrounded by all the plastic sheep

and cows in the manger. Bony did his best to avoid Mrs.

Rivas, but one time she stopped her car in front of the house

and invited him to a prayer group for men who were having

trouble finding God. He said he wasn't having any trouble.

Mrs. Rivas told him he wasn't going to find Nuestro Senor ' Jesucristo, inside a can of beer. She got back in her car when

Bony looked inside the can he was drinking from and said, "Hey, anybody in there?"

Domingo, the old guy who cleaned yards, usually walked

by in the late afternoon and waved. Bony figured he had to be

at least eighty or ninety. He'd been old like forever. Every

time Bony saw Domingo he was working in people's yards

and only getting older and darker. He wasn't getting rich pushing a lawn mower, that was for sure.

If it was the weekend, Ruben Ortiz might drive by. He grew up on this same street and now he was a teacher. The

guy drove a nice car, wore nice clothes, even had a good-

Iooking wife. He lived on the other side of town and came over

to visit his parents. Bony could tell the guy had chan~ed since he left the neighborhood. He'd stay in his car and wave like

he was passing by in a parade. Bony thought it looked like a

good life, but it wasn't for everybody, not for him anyway.

His friend Mando had big plans and look what happened

45

OSCAR CASARES

to him. He was working full-time and taking drafting classes

at the college. The army paid for the classes, but he needed

extra money because his girlfriend was about to have a baby.

. He wanted to marry her after the baby was born and buy a

house, maybe a trailer to get started. Manda worked for a

shuttle service that took businessmen into Matamoros. It was

his job to drive them to their offices at the maquiladoras, un-

load any extra packages from the van, drive back across the

bridge, and then pick up the same businessmen later that day.

So he was driving back alone one morning, right? It was

foggy on this narrow road and a truck hit him head-on.

Manda died instantly, at least that's what his family hoped.

Because if he didn't, it meant he was still alive when some-

body stole his wallet, his gold chain with the cross, and his fa-

vorite pair of boots right off his feet. The owner of the shuttle

service said the company would pay for the funeral and set

aside $ 5 ,ooo to give Manda's kid when he turned eighteen,

but nothing more for the family. Nada mas, the owner was

nice enough to translate for Manda's father. The family hired

a lawyer to represent them, but he was young and inexperi-

enced and the company's lawyers weren't. Nada mas ended

up being all the family got. Manda's girlfriend and the baby

moved in with his parents.

This thing with Manda happened a few years ago. Bony

had an okay job around that time. He worked for the city, in

the Parks Division, where his job was to open one of the

gyms in the afternoon, hand out basketballs, break up any

fights before they started, and make sure nobody stuffed any-

thing down the toilets. He played ball if a team needed an

46

BRO\YNSVILLE

extra player, and he had a killer jump shot from the base-

line, three-point range. Nothing but net. Swoosh ff f Then one

night he sneaks inside the gym with a girl he met at a party.

She's a gordita who weighs almost twice as much as Bony,

but she wants it and he has a set of gym keys that are burning

a hole in his pocket. And they're having a good time, when all

of a sudden the security guard pops the lights on and catches

Bony and the girl rolling around at center court like they're

wrestling for a loose ball. The guard is an old guy who's seri-

ous about his job. He walks into the Parks Division office the

next morning and reports Bony. By the end of the week, the dude's at home without a job.

Now Bony made his money installing car stereos on the

side. People paid him what they could - twenty or thirty

dollars was the usual - but if he knew them, he might let

them slide with a case of Corona or Negra Modelo. He also

helped out his mom with her Avon deliveries. She paid him a

few dollars for this. At first he thought there might be some

nice-looking women buying perfume, but they all turned out

to be as old or older than his mom, viejitas like Mrs. Rivas.

Some of the women would tip him a couple of dollars, which

was better than nothing. He was getting by, and except for

his parents hassling him about finding a real job, he didn't have any complaints.

It was dark when his father came home with dinner. He'd

picked up a family box from Kentucky Fried Chicken. Bony

liked the chicken at Church's better, liked those papitas they

47

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OSCAR CASARES

served, but the manager at KFC gave his dad a discount for

being a police officei; and that was that. If Bony wanted Church's, he'd have to buy it with Bony's money.

His mother set the table with paper plates and napkins.

Bony sat by the open blinds so he could keep an eye on the

monkey. He served himself a chicken breast and some mashed

potatoes. His father served himself two legs and a roll. His

mother liked the wings and coleslaw. They ate without talk-

ing. The opening and closing of the red and white box was

the only sound in the room. Bony's mother stood up once to

find the salt. His father was scooping up the last of his

mashed potatoes when he finally spoke.

"Did you know that Colonel Sanders, the man who in-

vented Kentucky Fried Chicken, tried one hundred and

twenty-four recipes before he made the perfect one? One

hundred and twenty-four. What does that tell you, Bony?"

"That he should've gone to Church's."

"Why do I even try to talk sense to you?" His father

shook his head and looked at Bony's mother, who stared

back like she was waiting for the answer. He bit another piece

off his roll, chewed it, swallowed, and spoke again.

"The Colonel, he didn't give up because he didn't get it

right the first time. That's what I'm trying to say here."

"What was he a colonel of?" Bony asked.

"(Pues, quien sabe? He was just a colonel, of the army,

of the marines, of all the chickens and roosters. It doesn't

matter, Bony. The point is, the man didn't give up and you

shouldn't, either. You can't stay home the rest of your life be-

48

BROWNSVILLE

cause a job didn't work out. Look at the Colonel. Let him be your example."

"I'm not going to wear one of those uniforms they wear at Kentucky Fried Chicken, no way."

"Bony, all I'm saying is, there are people I can call.

People who know the name Sergeant Timo Hinojosa and could help you."

"What's wrong with that?" his mother asked. "What's

wrong with accepting some help from your father? That's what parents are for."

"Nothing." Bony glanced out the window.

"Don't be thinking you're going to keep that chango," his father said.

"Why not?"

"It's a dead chango," his mother said. "Do you need an- other reason?"

Bony walked outside and sat in the lawn chair. The porch

light was on and he could see the monkey watching him.

There were only three cans left in his twelve-pack. In an hour,

the beer would be gone. He was about to walk to the Jiffy-

Mart again, but instead he decided to hang out in the yard

with the monkey. Back when Mando was around, the two of

them partied all night. One time they stayed up until five in the

morning, taking hits off some hash, drinking beer, and eating

Doritos. Bony had heard that a volcano erupted ln Mexico

and was going to turn the moon a different color. And sure

enough, the moon turned a dark red like there was a heart in-

side of it pumping blood. Mando called it the werewolf moon.

49

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OSCAR CASARES

Bony stood in the middle of the street and howled as loud as

he could. He howled like he'd been bitten and he was turning

into a werewolf, growing fur and fangs and claws and a tail.

He howled until his father opened the window and told him

to shut the hell up.

Bony was sitting in the lawn chair when his father turned off

the porch light. It was almost eleven o'clock. He sat in the

dark staring at the monkey and barely making out the shape

of its head. Usually there would've been more light in the

yard, but some pendejo had busted out the streetlight again.

Bony finished his last beer and closed his eyes. When he

woke up a few minutes later, a cat was sniffing the monkey.

"iPinche gatol" Bony yelled and threw a rock at it. He

pegged the cat on its backside right as it was starting to lick

the monkey's ear. Bony went over to make sure the monkey

was all right. He cleared the dirt around the palm tree so

there wouldn't be any bugs crawling on the head.

It was time to go to sleep, but he couldn't leave the mon-

key outside. Not if he wanted to see it again. If you left any- thing in the yard overnight, it was as good as gone. People

chained their barbecue pits to trees. Unless you drove some

cucaracha, your car better have an alarm on it. Most of the

neighbors who could afford them had steel bars installed on

the windows and doors of their houses, and even that didn't al-

ways keep the cabrones out if they thought there was some-

thing worth stealing. The Sanchez family had a full-grown

50

BROWNSVILLE

chow in their backyard, and one day it disappeared forever.

No way was he leaving the monkey in the yard.

Bony found a plastic trash bag on the porch, but he wasn't

sure how to put the monkey's head inside it. He hadn't really

touched the monkey, and the truth was that actually putting

his hands on it was kind of freaky to him. He told himself it

wasn't because he was afraid - he just didn't want to mess up

its hair. If he were a monkey, he wouldn't want some guy grab- bing him by the head. He wrapped his hand inside the white

bag and held the head against the palm tree until he could

scoop it up. When he walked into his room, Bony could see

the monkey's black face pressed against the white plastic.

Where to put the monkey was the next question. There

was room on the dresser if he moved his boom box, except he

liked having it right under his team poster of the Dallas Cow-

boys. He also had a poster of the cheerleaders hanging on the

back of the door, where nobody could see it and his mother

wouldn't complain every time people came to the house. Two

leather basketballs were sitting on the recliner he didn't use

anymore. He tossed the basketballs in the closet and placed

the monkey's head on the recliner. The monkey looked sharp, looked like a king sitting on his throne.

Bony turned off the lights and climbed into bed. It was

pitch-black in the room except for the eyes and shiny white

teeth that he swore he could see on the chair. Boi'ly turned

towards the wall, but he kept seeing the smile in his mind. He

imagined what would happen if the monkey grew back its

body in the middle of the night. Hairy arms and legs, long

5 1

OSCAR CASARES

skinny tail, sharp pointy teeth, hands that looked like feet, feet

that looked like hands. And what if this new monkey was out

for revenge against the people who had cut off its head, but

since it was a monkey, it didn't know any better and attacked

the first person it saw? It started by ripping out the person's

eyes so he couldn't fight back and then it chomped on his face

and neck, eating up his cheeks and tongue, gnawing on the

bones and cartilage, until the whole room was covered with

blood. Bony folded the pillow around his head and tried to

make himself fall asleep. After a while, he stood up and put the

monkey in the closet and pushed the chair against the door.

He woke up earlier than usual the next morning. His parents

were sitting at the kitchen table when he walked in holding

the plastic bag. The monkey was pressed against the white

plastic, staring at the chorizo con huevo on the table.

"jAy, Bony!" his mother said, "No me digas que you

brought that chango inside my house."

"I didn't want somebody to steal him."

"Who's going to steal a monkey head?" his father said.

"You never know."

"Take him outside, ahorita mero!" his mother said. "I will

not have a dead chango inside my house. No sefior, you're

going to ruin my business."

"You heard your mother. You better get that chango out

of here." Bony walked outside and placed the monkey back in the

same spot where it had been the day before. This time he went

52

BROWNSVILLE

ahead and held the monkey in his hands. Its fur was soft and its

ears felt like human ears, kind of. His parents, as usual, were freaking out about nothing. The fur around the monkey's left

ear was messed up from being inside the bag. Bony licked his palm and smoothed down the fur.

The sun was already up and it was getting warm in the

neighborhood. Bony grabbed a can of Coke from the refrig-

erator and sat in the lawn chair. The Herald was lying next to

the fresno tree. He opened the paper and checked out the

local news, halfway expecting to see an article about some-

body finding a monkey's body without a head. There was

news about two Canadians getting busted at the Interna-

tional Bridge with heroin sealed inside cans of tuna news ' ,

about even more Border Patrol agents being hired, news

about the farmers needing rain, news about the effects of the

peso devaluation on downtown, news about the owner of El

Chueco Bar on Fourteenth Street being attacked with a ma-

chete and surviving, but nothing about the monkey.

After he finished with the first section, he turned to the

want ads. They were taking applications at the Levis plant.

Parra Furniture needed a deliveryman. The security job at

Amigoland Mall looked cool. All those guys did was drive

around the mall and make sure your car didn't get ripped off

while you were shopping. How hard could that be?

People had it wrong when they thought Bony did~'t want to work. He was only trying to have a good time before it

was too late. Bony used to think he and Mando would be

partying for the rest of their lives. Mando had told him about

school and getting married, but he never took him seriously.

53

OSCAR CASARES

Guys talked, and lots of times that's all it was, talk. It wasn't

until the accident that he realized Manda had a whole differ-

ent life he was planning. At first, Bony couldn't believe he

was dead. It messed him up. He didn't know how to make

sense of his friend dying. Bony hadn't been doing much except

hanging out and partying. So why did God take Manda and

not him? A couple of times he'd seen Manda's kid playing

alone in the front yard and had gone over. He was a happy

kid, but playing with him made Bony miss his friend, so he

didn't go over that much anymore. It was better just to wave

at him from this side of the street. "1Todavia?" Bony's father was standing on the front porch.

"I thought we told you to get that chango out of here."

h 1 " "I thoug t you meant ater, or tomorrow. "Now, Bony.''

"Pues, I don't know where to take him."

"That's not my problem, Bony. That's your problem. You

can drive it all the way back to Africa, or wherever it came

from. I don't care." His father crossed his arms and leaned

against the porch. "And I'm going to wait right here until you

do it." Bony took his time standing up and putting the monkey

back in the plastic bag. He could feel his father's eyes on his

back, but he didn't let it get to him. He walked down the

street, trying to look like any other guy walking down the street

with a monkey's head in a plastic bag. No worries. He waved

to Domingo, but the old man was busy trimming the grass

around a neighbor's tree. A few houses later, Bony threw a

rock at the same cat from the night before.

54

BROWNSVILLE

Lincoln Park was at the end of the block. It looked more

like a long, skinny island than it did a park. The palm trees

were one of the few things that stood out when the resaca

flooded. The water usually took a couple of weeks to go back

down to its normal level, which was more than enough time for all the mosquitoes to show up.

He crossed the small bridge over the resaca. The park was

empty at that hour. He climbed the wooden fort that the little

kids played on during the day. This was also the fort where

Manda and Bony convinced a couple of girls to come hang

out with them one night. The guys were sixteen, the girls were

fifteen. Bony scored two bottles of strawberry wine and they

took turns going down the slide. After a while, Manda and

his girl went for a long walk. Bony stayed with his girl in the

fort, where she let him do everything but go inside her.

He took the monkey out of the plastic bag and set it next

to him. From where he was sitting on the fort, Bony could see

most of the park. If you played basketball here, you had to be

a fast runner or the ball was going to be rolling into the water

every game. This was the court where Bony first got his shot

down. Next to the basket were the picnic tables that filled up

fast on the weekends. You could forget barbecuing here un-

less you started setting up way before noon. If they were hav-

ing a lowrider show in the park, you'd be lucky to find a place to sit.

By the water fountains was where Bony had stopped a

guy named Javier Ortiz. The girl Mando had been with that

night in the park was Javier's old girlfriend, and now Javier was saying he was going to jump Manda.

55

OSCAR CASARES

"I heard you were talking shit about Manda."

"What's it to you?" "You got a problem with Manda, you got a problem

with me." "No, man, I don't have no problems with you," Javier

said. "It's cool." "I think you do, puto. And I think I'm going to kick your

ass," Bony said;

And then he did. Bony looked down and saw that flies were buzzing around

the monkey's head and landing on its nose. He shooed them

away with his hand, but they kept coming back. Looking at

the long whiskers on the monkey's cheeks, the deep lines

around its eyes, made him want to find out where the head

had come from. Bony thought about calling the zoo and ask-

ing them if they were missing any monkeys, but then he fig-

ured that if a monkey had been kidnapped, they might be

tracing the phone calls and he'd get blamed for the whole

thing. He didn't need that kind of trouble.

He walked back to the house remembering all the monkeys

he'd seen on TV or at the movies, but none of them looked like

his monkey. He thought how weird it was that he'd never seen

one like this before. When he made it home, he put the monkey

in the truck and drove out of the neighborhood. He passed the

park and headed down International, in the direction of the

library. Pink Floyd was on the stereo and the woofers were

maxed out enough for people to feel the vibrations two cars

over. The monkey was riding shotgun.

56

BROWNSVILLE

The library parking lot was full, so Bony had to circle

around a few times to find a spot. He left the monkey on the

floor mat, where people couldn't see it. As soon as he felt

how cold it was inside the library, he wished he'd worn long

pants. The encyclopedias were on a short bookcase close to

the entrance. He sat in a chair and read about the differences

between monkeys and apes. The most interesting part was

how much they were related to humans. He'd never been

completely comfortable with that idea, but at the same time

he didn't know what to make of the story of Adam and Eve

and a talking snake. Even if he did believe people came from

monkeys, he had to ask where the monkeys came from.

The encyclopedia had a life-size picture of a gorilla's

hand. Bony placed his own hand on top of the gorilla's hand,

and although his was a lot smaller, they did match. The ency-

clopedia had pictures of more monkeys and apes than he ever

knew existed, but he couldn't find a picture that looked ex-

actly like his monkey's head. He finally spotted one in a book

called Monkeys of the New World. In the picture, the black

monkey was standing on a tree branch picking fruit. It was a

spider monkey, from Ecuador. Bony read about what they ate,

how long they lived, how they took care of their babies. He

even checked out a picture of two spider monkeys having sex,

which he didn't look at for too long because he did~'t want the library lady walking by and thinking he was some weirdo.

He put the monkey back on the passenger seat as he drove

home. Now that Bony had learned something about the

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OSCAR CASARES

monkey, he wanted to name it. The first thing that popped

into his mind was to call it Spider Man because he kind of

liked the guy in the comics. He thought about naming it

Blackie, but he knew that was dumb. Zorro was kind of a cool

name, but there was already a black dog on his street named

Zorro. He couldn't remember Tarzan's monkey's name, or

that might have worked. Then he tried to think of a name in

Spanish, but the only name he came up with was the easiest,

Chango. He hadn't liked it when his parents used the word

because they only used it to say it was a dead chango. But the

more he thought about it, it fit. He liked the way it sounded

when he said it to himself: Chango, Chango, Chango. Ese

Chango. Bony and Chango.

Bony stopped at the Jiffy-Mart and bought, a twelve-pack.

It was three o'clock by the time he stopped in front of the

house. His mother and Mrs. Rivas were standing next to the

palm tree. Mrs. Rivas held a small plastic bottle upside down

and squirted water on the ground. Bony placed Chango on the

floor mat and grabbed the beer as he stepped out of the truck.

"Agua bendita," Mrs. Rivas said as he walked up.

He stepped back when he realized it really was holy water.

"(D6nde esta el chango, Bony?" she asked.

"What chango?"

"I already told Mrs. Rivas what you found," his mother

said. "She says somebody's trying to put a curse on our

house, maybe on my business." .

"N 0 they' re not, it's just a monkey's head. What's the big

deal?"

5 8

BROWNSVILLE

"(Que crees, Bony?" Mrs. Rivas said. "Eh, you think God

opened the heavens and dropped that chango's head in your

yard so you could tell him your jokes? No, mi'jo, that's the work of bruj as."

"That's crazy. There's no brujas."

"Listen to her, Bony." His mother held his arm.

"You think brujas are like you see them on the television , flying around on brooms, but that's not the way it is. You

don't know. (Tu que sabes? They shop at the mall, eat at

Luby's, go to bailes and dance cumbias. Brujas are every- where, Bony, probably in this neighborhood."

The old lady looked down the street and then back at Bony.

"Go ask Mrs. Molina, on the next block. Ask her what

happened to her mother. Andale, she'll tell you how some-

body threw a dead snake in her mother's yard, y la pobre

mujer, she stepped on it barefoot. The very next morning her

skin started falling off. I wouldn't lie to you, Bony, her skin.

Until there was nothing left of the woman. Tell me that's not the work of brujas."

" (Ya ves? You're bringing curses into my house."

"Now tell us where you put that chango's head," Mrs. Rivas said.

"We already checked in your room, mi'jo," his mother said. "You what?"

"Your mother was worried about the curses." "He wasn't hurting anybody."

"Tell us where it is, Bony," Mrs. Rivas said. "I threw him away already."

59

OSCAR CASARES

"Where, Bony?" his mother said.

"In the trash, behind the Jiffy-Mart."

"Are you telling your mother the truth, Bony?" Mrs.

Rivas said. "Go see for yourself if you don't believe me."

Mrs. Rivas and his mother looked at each other. Bony

walked to the porch and leaned back in the lawn chair. It was

just another afternoon in the neighborhood. After a few min-

utes Mrs. Rivas drove away. "Mas vale que me estes diciendo la verdad, Bony," his

mother said. "I better not see that monkey in my house

again." Bony shook his head. "Don't worry."

She walked into the house and let the screen door slam shut.

Bony stayed on the porch. Across the street, Mando's kid

was riding his tricycle through the front yard. It was quiet in

the neighborhood. Bony cracked open his first beer. The can

was sweating in his hand and down onto the porch. He took

a drink and kicked back. He wasn't going to let anybody take

Chango. Except for walking inside to grab a piece of leftover chicken,

Bony sat on the porch for the rest of the afternoon. He thought

his mother might be watching him through the window and

he didn't want to make her suspicious. The beer was cold.

What more did he need, right? His parents ate dinner at seven, but Bony stayed outside

on the porch. He went in later and microwaved what was left

of the tacos they'd had for dinner. His father was in the

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kitchen cleaning his work shoes. The patent leather was shiny

and Bony kept looking at his own reflection.

"You drink too much," his father said.

"So what?"

"So what? This isn't a cantina, where you can get pedo

and stare at somebody's shoes. What's wrong with you?"

Bony didn't answer and took another bite of his taco.

"Your mother says you're sad because we made you

throw away the chango."

''I'm not sad."

"You look sad."

"I'm just thinking."

"Are you thinking about what kind of job you're going to

look for tomorrow?"

"Not really."

"I didn't think so."

After Bony was done eating, he drank another beer and

watched a baseball game on TV. He hated baseball, but he

was waiting for his parents to go to sleep, which they finally

did a little after ten. He grabbed Chango from the truck and

put him under the small palm tree. The moon was almost full

and its glow filled the yard with light. Bony brought out his

lawn chai1~ just like old times. There was half a can of beer

left, which he placed next to Chango. He could see himself

doing this every night. His parents never had to Hnd out.

Maybe one of these nights when they were away from the

house, he and Chango would cook out in the backyard. Some

fajitas, some chicken, some beer. It'd be badass. People would

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OSCAR CASARES

be walking by and going, "i Que onda, Bony?" And he'd be

like, "Aqui nomas. Just cooking out, man." And they'd walk

away thinking the dude knew how to do it right.

It was after midnight when Bony put away the lawn chair

and carried Chango back to the truck. He didn't want to risk

taking him inside the house and his parents finding out. Ear-

lier he'd left a crack at the top of the windows, but now he

rolled them up in case there was rain. He locked the truck

and went inside the house. He tried to relax in bed and enjoy what was left of his

beer buzz. Tomorrow he'd figure out what to do with Chango.

Maybe his mother would forget about what Mrs. Rivas had

said. His father might be okay with him keeping Chango if he

went out and found a job. Bony thought anything could

happen. He might even fall asleep and turn into a monkey

overnight, and then his parents would have to keep him and

Chango.

It felt like he'd only been asleep for five minutes when he

heard a fire engine driving through the front yard. He sat up

in bed and realized it was already morning and the siren was

really the alarm on his truck. His father was standing next to

the truck with his hands cupped over his ears. Bony's mother

walked towards the house when he opened the front door. He

deactivated the alarm and then locked the truck again before

his father could open the door.

"jYa lo vi, Bony!" his mother said. "I knew you were ly-

ing. jGiierco embustero! jAhora veras!"

"What? He'~ not even close to the house."

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"Bony, you knew what I meant."

"Ya foe mucho," his father said. "I'm going to call the city

to come pick up the chango and take it away." He walked in- side the house and grabbed the phone.

"I'll keep him somewhere else," Bony said.

His father shook his head and opened the phone book. "What ifl get a job?"

"It's too late, Bony." His father dialed a number.

Bony finished getting dressed and went to his truck. He

drove out of the neighborhood, not sure where he was going

exactly. Chango sat in the passenger seat, smiling as usual.

Bony rolled down the windows and listened to the wind.

There wasn't that much traffic on International that early in

the morning. He drove past Southmost Road and slowed down

for the flashing yellow light in front of la Porter, his old high

school, so he wouldn't get pulled over by a cop. When he was

on the other side of Four Corners, he stopped at a conven-

ience store. A carton of orange juice and a package of cinna-

mon rolls were what he needed right now. Jumping out of bed so fast had made him feel extra crudo.

The orange juice came with little chunks of ice, the way he

liked it, but he had to be careful not to get the steering wheel

sticky while he was driving and eating the cinnamon rolls. It

felt like a road trip is what it felt like. They could drive any- where they wanted to, Corpus, San Antonio, Houst~n, any- where. He and Mando had always talked about someday

taking a trip to see the Dallas Cowboys play. If he had more than two dollars in his pocket, he might have taken off right

6 3

OSCAR CASARES

then. Instead, he turned down 51 r and drove around the

edge of town. There were a couple of new subdivisions, but it

was still mainly farmland out there. Back in high school,

Bony used to like to party and then go cruising. He remem-

bered driving on this road alone one night and almost hitting

a cow that was standing in the middle of the road. It came

out of nowhere. He blinked and there it was, staring into the

headlights. Bony had to swerve to miss it and then swerve

back onto the road so he wouldn't hit a telephone pole. It

could've easily been his time to go, but it wasn't. And now

here he was with Chango.

He drove around for the rest of the morning and tried to

come up with a plan. They traveled down Paredes, Coffeeport

Road, Fourteenth Street, 802, Central, and Boca Chica. Going

everywhere and nowhere at the same time. People were in a

hurry to get places, but Bony and Chango were taking their

time. On Palm Boulevard, they passed the big, expensive

houses with trimmed lawns and then turned left at the first

light. They drove another block and stopped in a parking lot

across the street from the zoo.

Bony turned off the engine and listened for the animal

sounds. He had to wait for a couple of school buses to turn

the corner before it was quiet. All he could hear were the

birds on the phone lines and a dog barking in the distance.

He hadn't been to the zoo in years, but he was almost sure

the monkeys were on a little island on the other side of the

tall fence. Bony tried to imagine how he would've escaped if

he were a monkey. Chango probably had it planned out

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BROWNSVILLE

months ahead of time, knew when the zoo people left at

night, knew the perfect time to make a break for it. Chango

was looking for something more than what he was going to

find on that little island. Nobody could blame him for that.

Fifteen minutes went by before Bony started up the truck

again. He was pulling out of the parking lot when he heard

the monkey calls from the other side of the street. He looked

at Chango, but Chango kept looking straight ahead.

They drove back to the neighborhood. Bony passed by his

street and saw a city truck parked in front of the house. He

drove on until he was on the other side of Lincoln Park. Two

old men were sitting in a station wagon by the entrance. They

were drinking beer and listening to a ranchera station. Bony

parked a few spaces away from their car. He put Chango in-

side the plastic bag. The old men were laughing hard like one

of the men had told the other a funny joke. They happened to

look up at Bony as he was getting out of the truck, and the

· man in the driver's seat nodded hello to him. Bony nodded

back to him and walked into the park with Chango.

He crossed a short bridge and stepped down to the canal.

He took Chango out of the bag and sat by the edge of the

water. The resaca that surrounded the park ended up here

and then dropped off a small concrete waterfall. Bony and

Manda had learned to fish in this canal. They used a couple

of branches, some fishing line, hooks, and bread that Bony

had taken from his mother's kitchen. Beginner's luck, that's

what Manda called it when Bony caught a shiner that first af-

ternoon. He called it luck whenever Bony beat him at some-

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OSCAR CASARES

thing. In a lot of ways, he was lucky that he'd found Chango.

How many guys could say they'd found a monkey's head in

their front yard? He'd probably never find anything like this

again. He was sure that if Chango were a guy they'd be ca-

maradas. Same thing would go if Bony were a monkey. They'd

be hanging out in the jungle, swinging from trees, eating ba-

nanas. They'd be putting the moves on all the changuitas,

doing it monkey-style. He would miss his truck, but then

what would he need it for in the jungle? It's not like there was

anywhere to go cruising. And if he were a monkey, nobody

would be hassling him to be something else. He'd be a mon-

key. He wouldn't have to go to school, or work, or file for

unemployment. And something else: monkeys were always

together. He and Chango would be friends until they were

viejitos, all wrinkled and hunched over and walking from

tree to tree because they were too old to be swinging. They'd

be hanging out forever. "Right?" Bony said. "Right?" It took

a second before he realized that he was talking to himself.

The water was browner and greener than he remembered

it. A tire had washed up on the other side of the canal. An

army boot floated and got stuck on some lily pads. He broke

a dead branch into four pieces and pitched them into the

water one at a time. When he ran out of branches and twigs,

he threw pebbles. Time was passing slowly and he was avoid-

ing doing what he had to do. Bony skipped a few more rocks

across the water. He wished people would leave him alone,

let him live his own life. If he drank, it was because he wanted to dripk If he stayed at home without a real job, it

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was because he wasn't ready for that yet. There wasn't any-

body who understood him. He and Chango were hanging

out. His mother and father didn't know what they were say-

ing. His mother let herself be talked into crazy ideas by Mrs.

Rivas. People were always talking at him and telling him how

he should live. Sometimes he listened, but most times he didn't.

He was just living. That's the best explanation he could give.

Living. Bony leaned over and held Chango a couple of inches

above the water. It was the last thing in the world that he wanted to do, but he let go.

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