Free 90 Miles to Havana by Enrique Flores-Galbis Page A

her belly out.
“Mira, mira,”
she says as she swings her refrigerator-sized hips around in a circle.
    I get it: she’s showing us how to put on the apron. Then she dances past the table, grabs me by the arm, and ties the apron around me. She pulls me behind a tin bucket brimming with potatoes, hands me a knife, then leans across the table. “I’ll bet you boys never washed a dish, or made a bed in your whole blessed life,” she says as her pink face floats over a bowl of green peppers. “Raised like little lords, you were. Like most of the kids here you had someone to do all those things for you. Then that mean old revolution came, and now you got to wash dishes, sweep floors like us regular people!” She shakes her head. “Don’t that beat all?” Then she smiles at my brothers. “Now for a little history lesson! A long time ago we had our own little revolution here. That’s when we sent the king and them other highborns back to where they came from. That’s when we became the United States of Ameriky.” She speaks each word slowly and clearly. “Here, ain’t nobody born better ’n nobody else.
Comprendy?
” she says as she picks up her roller. “Here in Ameriky, you gets back as good as you give.” Then without warning she slams the roller down on the metal table, and green peppers bounce out of the bowl and potatoes roll under the table.
    â€œEnough talk!” she yells. “Now, pick up them potatoes and start to peelin’!”
    A mountain of potatoes, onions, and peppers have beenchopped and cooked and one hundred plops of “otsmeel” on little, yellow plastic dishes have gone out the serving window but we haven’t had breakfast yet.
    â€œ!Dolores, tengo que comer!”
Gordo calls out.
    â€œWe eat now?” Alquilino asks.
    Before Dolores can answer, a river of dirty dishes starts flowing back into the kitchen. As she pulls on yellow rubber gloves she says, “You can eat later,” then she laughs. “
Mucho
later,
muchachos
!”
    By the time we finish washing the breakfast dishes and finally hang up our aprons, Dolores is starting on lunch.
    â€œRoom for improvement, but not bad for your first day!” she says, as she deals out slices of bologna onto stacks of white bread. She hands each one of us a sandwich. “See you tomorrow, bright and early and
muchachos
”—she smiles and rubs the top of my head—“welcome to Ameriky!”

    One hour before they turn off the lights, we’re all supposed to be writing letters home or reading.
    Tonight I start on my first letter: “Dear Mami and Papi, I miss you very much. . . .” I don’t know what to say next so I stop and draw one of the weird metal buildings on the left corner.
    Alquilino sees me doodling. “Julian, quit messing around and write something,” he says.
    â€œI don’t know what to write. You said I couldn’t tell them about how mean Caballo is or how bad the foodtastes, or that we’re sleeping on the floor in the bathroom. What else am I going to say?”
    â€œYou know how she is,” Alquilino says. “If you tell her how bad it is, she might do something crazy, like try to sneak out in our boat.”
    â€œYou think she would do that?” I ask.
    â€œIf she thought we really needed her she might,” Alquilino says, and I believe him. If she knew they might separate us—send us to an orphanage or a home for young criminals—one way or the other she’d get here, even if she had to swim!
    â€œBut what can I say?” I ask and start a doodle on the right-hand corner.
    â€œTell her that Angelita and Pepe are here, tell her you’re learning how to cook, and that they have a great swimming pool—I don’t know, just make something up.”
    â€œI guess I can tell her about cooking with Dolores.”
    â€œAs long as you tell her