Guarding Los Angeles: Short Story

 

Guarding Los Angeles

By Armando Ortiz

He entered the room complaining, “The problem with Los Angeles is the fact that what represents Los Angeles is not really spoken about.” Timur was a bit startled, both as a surprise and as if being awakened by a dream after spending a steady 20 minutes on the novel he was reading. 

“Today I was reading a magazine that United Airlines supplies on its flights, and there was an article about Los Angeles, and it just bothered me so much!” complained Juan as he looked down to the ground. The other guard, Timur, was packing his things to clock out and inquired, “huh, what are you talking about?” 

“There was nothing meaningful about it,” he continued to ramble, “The first two paragraphs were dedicated to the ethnic communities in Los Angeles making and taking root. Yet, as soon as that was done it began to talk about spending three nice fulfilling days in Los Angeles, but most of the places were for shopping,” he paused as he placed his duffle bag on the table and began to take out the tie. “None of the days included a walk down Olvera street or a meal in Little Tokyo, Chinatown, Little Armenia, nor Little Ethiopia. Why?,” he stood erect and looked out the window deep in thought. “Is only the fact that Los Angeles is one of the most cosmopolitan centers in the world enough to satisfy a tourist? What about the person who has lived all his life here in Los Angeles? I think not.” 

He turned to look at the Timur who was already packed and holding the clipboard. He kept going with his speech,  “Los Angeles is more, at least to me, than Beverly Hills and Santa Monica Beaches. I mean give me a fucken break. What happened to visiting places that actually set the trends, where people are eking out a living, eating and wearing what their hard-earned money get them?”

Timur placed the board on the desk and turned around, “well, feel lucky to be living where you were born.” Tim took a deep breath to look at Juan, “There isn’t a Little Ulaanbaatar here in LA, and I am constantly being mistaken for an Asian.” 

Juan stopped and thought about what Timur was saying. “People only know two things about Mongolia, Genghis Khan and Mongolian barbecue which really isn’t. They don’t know of our history, our wrestling, our religion, our inclusiveness, we are just some former bearded savages that were tamed by the Chinese or Russians.” He grabbed his bag, moving out of the chair, and sat placing the bag on his knees. He stared at Juan who was listening.

Juan restarted, “Although I love this place, I feel a detachment. I feel like I don’t belong here, but how can that be? I grew up going to the Griffith Park Observatory, and going to the LA Zoo, but now it seems that these things are becoming less and less accessible, and yet places like Chinatown or Grand Central Market that were once overlooked are now trafficked by new faces and fatter pockets.” 

Timur listened to him intently, he too got lost in the ramble and began to think of going to the countryside in the summers, and eating stew in the winters. He took another deep breath, and replied, “Somehow I feel like you are describing my current situation. You know what I try to remind myself is that I am where I am and I will be the best of whatever opportunity comes my way.”  

Juan resumed with his river of complaints, “It seems like more material silicon is being applauded and praised than what Los Angeles really stands for. I refuse to see Los Angeles only for its entertainment and high life. There are more working class people living in Los Angeles than those with money, and the worst thing is that our leaders do not seem to point this out, and so I will write about the city that raised me and took part in my upbringing. 

Timur searched his chest pocket for a cigarette, but remembered the smoking policy and let go of the cigarette and adjusted his seat. “You might be right, Subotai, another one of our great generals, who people don't know about once spoke about appearances. How at a distance a little army could resemble a great army, yet a huge army could look like a single warrior walking the step.” 

“What do you mean by that,” enquired Juan. 

“Things aren’t what they seem to be in reality or on paper,” he paused. “Before moving here I thought I’d be living in a neighborhood where only white Americans live, but when I came here I came to live in a community that’s called Little Tel Aviv, but my neighbors are mostly Mexican or I think they are, and Ethiopian or I think they are. We thought that the streets were clean and that all people ate hamburgers, but that wasn’t the case. In short, my friend, I was disappointed, I too was fooled, and every day people show me their foolishness.”

El Dorado: Sketches of Los Angeles

El Dorado: Sketches of Los Angeles

By Armando Ortiz

They rushed towards the park knowing very well that there would be kids with their parents everywhere. They unloaded their carts from the pickup truck, and as soon as fat rubber tires touched the ground they began pushing towards the direction where Pan Pacific Park was located, as if all roads lead to that place. For these paleteros all sidewalks led to the park, it was their Rome, their source of income, where the circus was, and the money flowed into their pockets, while their popsicles left their carts at equal pace. 

They all pushed their carts at an ever increasing speed. Some hadn’t walked a full block from where they had started and tiny little sweat droplets were beginning to form on their forehead, perfect popsicle weather. Equivel couldn’t pick up their pace because he’d been assigned the cart that had other items besides popsicles, like automated bubble makers, bags of potato chips, water guns and sand box toys. His, and others’ ill fated attempts at pushing the cart faster only made their mobile store shake and rattle, while the wheels began to feebly turn unevenly. The others, though, were able to make a beeline to the park, because their wheels were like those of a small all-terrain vehicle. The weight of the cart and aggressive tire pattern were perfect for sidewalks and green parks.

Raul and Diburcio were the ones ahead of everyone else, which meant that they’d be the first ones inside the park and would get to hustle the prime areas where the real money was made. Nevertheless, there was one area that was deemed “El Dorado.” El Dorado means the gold nugget, but it could also mean the fried one, and with this weather they’d be cooking themselves by the time noon hit. This tiny little spot was called that because of the amount of kids that gravitated to the playground and the total number of adults that kept their eagle eyes on them. 

There one could find single moms taking their sons and daughters to the park, nannies that had recently arrived to the US, and came from countries like Mongolia, Mexico, Cambodia and El Salvador. There were the old grandmothers strolling around with their kid’s kids, and the dads that didn’t have anything else to do but take their children to the park to run around and let the sun exhaust all the energy from their child’s bodies. 

This wasn’t the only thing that made this particular spot into prime paletero real estate, no there was more, beside the playground there was a baseball field that had people playing baseball, practicing Frisbee and kicking soccer balls. People were always there and they always seemed to be tired and sweaty, which made a nice cold popsicle an alluring and refreshing snack. 

All five paleteros had to make it to the park and get to their tiered spots. Esquivel, pushing the cart with all the other goodies couldn’t help but reflect on the day he’d have, walking around the park and honking his horn, all while the blazing sun was out. He took a deep breath and accepted that the heat would be tough, but with the rays it was a good chance he too would sell out. Diburcio and Raul were half a block away from the park and at points their short bodies seemed to stretch beyond the limits and make their legs give leap-like steps. They were young and their early years of working alongside their parents on the maize fields had built them up a bit.

As they came to the last stretch before entering the park both had to turn their carts on the corner. Diburcio had taken the lead and had managed to cross the intersection, while Raul instead of waiting for the green light to turn on decided to make a left on his side of the street and push the cart with more leverage in order to catch up and surpass Diburcio. They were like deer running towards an unknown destination, two tugboats pushing their goods to port where all the people would soon swamp them like flies and take all the popsicles away. They both wanted to reach the spot and claim it as their own. Of course, to think that today was the only time that this happened was to think that in Los Angeles the sun came out once a month. No, this was a daily occurance, and a daily challenge, but they all took it with good stride, because all the paleteros knew each other. 

Parks in the Los Angeles area is where the popsicle market was always, always hot. It only rains about a month out of the year and the rest of the time it is nice and sunny. Even in the middle of winter, their customer base would change and you’d have people from the Midwest or East Asia proudly buy popsicles and state that the cold of L.A. was child’s play compared to their lands of origin. To the paleteros money making was their aim they’d all come from the same small town somewhere in Mexico or Central America and they gladly sold to anyone.

Raul and Diburcio were cousins, but both were very competitive when it came to sports and meeting women, but when it came to making a day’s wages they were cut throat with each other. Raul had finally caught up with Diburcio, but he was still across the street. They were pushing their carts at a similar pace, they were neck to neck, the scene was beginning to resemble a horse race, but in this race the photo finish would not tell who the winner was, no, who ever managed to roll his cart down the hill and onto the playground would win, and competition amongst human beings, like horse races, sometimes included cheating or chance circumstances. 

Raul knew he had to cross the street and start heading to the park soon, so he knew that despite his precarious lead he would have to push the cart much harder and much faster than he already was doing. Diburcio on the other hand seemed to relish the challenge, and let Raul pass him, and began to slowly let Raul get ahead of him. Hopefully he’d get exhausted pushing the cart by the time he got to the park, or he’d trip over the protruding root of a tree. 

The entrance to the park was next to the public library. The library was also a decent spot to have a popsicle cart, but it wasn’t as exciting. Most people that walked into the building stayed there longer than expected. They all guessed it was because of the air conditioner that kept the library at a cool 68 degrees in the middle of summer. Both their goals were to be the first to reach “El Dorado,” and to spend a few hours there and sell everything inside the cart and then go catch a soccer game at the other side of the park where there was a barren soccer field. The field had a rotating order of use, children’s teams practicing, grown up leagues from the community, and recently arrived folk from down south that played against each other.

Raul got far ahead of Diburcio, managing to cross the street, and go through the entrance and straight to “El Dorado.” But before doing that he needed to go down hill while keeping his 75 pound cart steady. He pushed the cart across the parking lot and kept adding speed to his pace, finally reaching the giant oak tree that was the marker where the down hill began. They both paused for a moment to adjust their baseball caps, Diburcio’s was blue with the logo of Barcelona’s yellow, gold and red embroidered on while Raul’s was off white and had MFC stamped on for Real Madrid.

He couldn’t help laughing and looking back as he reached the oak tree, he saw Diburcio sweaty, pushing his own cart, and with a smirk on his face. He began his descent to the playground. Pushing now became holding and keeping steady the cart. He soon realized that keeping the cart steady was difficult, but he thought he’d manage, and besides he had all the momentum on his shoulders, the Virgin Mary was on his side. Today would be the day he’d get to relax two hours before the truck came bye and whisked them away to their homes.  

The cart kept going faster, and his legs began to leap, and at times he felt that he’d missed a step and was being led by the cart itself. He was reaching the base of the playground and there was only a few more meters of descent before claiming his territory. He’d been so busy looking at the spot where he was going to be posted that he failed to see that the cart was heading towards an empty water bottle. When he finally refocused his eyes to what was in front of him, he immediately feared that the bottle was unopened. He tried to move the cart a bit towards the left by pushing the right side, but then he remembered that that was a bad idea, and instead he was supposed to slightly pull the left side of the handless and let the cart move to the left, but it was too late, in his attempt to avoid the bottle he forced the cart to uncontrollably shake, like a car misfiring on its last mile, and the next thing that happened was all but too comedic.

The cart began to shake, and after the front wheel hit the bottle it flipped over and rolled a few times, popsicles of all the flavors that children and adult alike enjoy, flew everywhere, like kids splashing into the water, everything flew like candies flying out of a pinata after the biggest kid in line strikes it right in the center. There were strawberry, walnut, rice pudding popsicles, choco pies, push-ups, water based popsicles, and all the dry ice flying everywhere. Raul tripped, landing on the grass and rolled down the hill a bit before stopping and managed to get a look at what was happening.  The cart kept flipping, spreading its goodies everywhere.

People that were busy doing their own thing immediately turned to see what was happening. The bells of the cart, along with the cart itself made a thumping and brass jingling sound as it kept rolling towards the bottom of the hill. The kids immediately thought about running towards the popsicles lying on the grass, but were held back by their parents. Those that were walking or laying on the grass sunbathing kept staring at what was happening. In a matter of seconds the popsicle cart rolling down the hill caught everyone's attention, all eyes were on the cart that had finally made it to “El Dorado.”

Clouds at a Distance: Sketches of Los Angeles

Clouds at a Distance

by Armando Ortiz

He sat on the slope of the hill, under a tree, watching the tears fall onto the ground. Every falling drop looked like dense soap bubbles, shimmering on the surface. It was an oily substance which the sun had been extracting from his body all afternoon. Disillusionment had betrayed him far too many times, but today it was replaced with a tremendous sadness that he hadn’t felt in years. Time, it seemed, was suspended within those tears, creating a whirlwind of tie-dyed colors. Sitting there, sobbing, watching every teardrop soak the ground unveiled a terrible beauty in that falling liquid which came from the core of his being. His heart, ever since he’d decided to take the journey north, had turned into a tiny factory of tears, and it seemed that blood no longer pumped through his veins, instead it was an emotional substance of which he had yet to know the name.

The recent heat wave brought back hidden memories, when as a kid his grandfather would threaten to put his hand on the comal, which he had the luck to feel twice, but the warnings and threats never really amounted to much. He covered his face by bending it a bit, and pulling his baseball cap over his forehead. Memories of his past youth rushed through his body like a cold river, giving him a slight shiver. He recalled playing street ball on the dirt roads, where his imagination was as wide as those rural streets, where most of the time those roads were trampled by cattle and sheep. In that old town, where he bought frozen topos from the old lady down the street, small plastic bags filled with sugar cane water mixed with vanilla. It tasted divine, and immediately cooled his body.

In a split second he was transported back to where he was, under a tree, on the side of the cement trail, inside Pan Pacific Park, on the westside of Los Angeles. He could hear the chatter of kids and the splashing of water that came from the public swimming pool that was above from where he sat. The sparrows sang their listless chirps. The croaking crows were especially oppressive, as if they were all opening up beer cans in unison, and gulping down a cold one just for their amusement. They gave off a devilish laughter that could only mean one thing, they knew who the culprit was, but they had no intention of snitching. Birds of all types perched on branches, crossing through his vision and circling around him, as if they were checking to see how he was doing. They were a silent collective witness to what had just happened. A hollow ting suddenly pierced the summer sounds. His eyes wandered for a bit to find its origin and then he spotted the kid, who had just hit the ball and was sliding into first base. The first base umpire’s body language made it clear that the kid was safe.

Los Angeles had been enjoying one of its lingering late summer heat waves, business was booming, and the area where Esquiviel was working was fairly safe. Yet today the cards were not on his side. He had taken the deal, and taken a slight risk. All there was left inside the popsicle cart was dry ice. Dry ice was all that there was inside the cart, and its vapors were quickly disappearing into the invisible air.  Not only had he sold all the popsicles by early afternoon, but he was getting ready to watch a soccer game, when suddenly out of nowhere, a fist hammered his temple, which then became a pair of hands that stole the money he had made that day, all 80 dollars. His wallet, his only treasure, which contained some photos of his wife and child, had been snatched from his pocket.

He laid on the ground for a few seconds. Then some ladies spotted him. A group of ladies taking their afternoon walk noticed him on the ground, unconscious. They ran over to see what was wrong with him. Maybe he needed some medical help. They found him in a complete daze. Seeing the old ladies that were helping him revived scenes of the women that regularly attended mass in his hometown. They wore headscarves, long sleeve shirts, and long dresses, but no, he was here, not over there, and their clothes weren’t as colorful as the ones worn back home. These ladies were simply helping him out.

As the landscape came into focus he saw three sparrows under the shade of a shrub, three small creatures that were dust bathing. He could make out an imaginary triangle that the birds made, while they wiggled and made tiny little dust bowls. He didn’t really understand what the voices were saying, because he didn’t know English well. As he was trying to decipher the strange language spoken to him, one of the ladies pulled out a handkerchief, and walked over to the water fountain to get it wet. She returned in less time than it took to get there and wiped some of the dirt that was on his face. He was dizzy, like when he got really drunk with his buddies. He felt hot, as if he was back in his hometown, under an oppressive humid heat. The sweat on his shirt gave him a tingling cold shiver, but the warm hands of the lady brought him back to the park. Her granite eyes made contact with his obsidian eyes and for a moment he felt like a kid again. The sparrows dared to get closer and see for themselves what was going on. He smiled, and said, “ees ohkay, no problem.” The same lady that had wiped his face sat him under a tree, while the youngest one, who was about twenty-four years old, brought the popsicle cart over to him. Their words sounded like early Sunday mass prayers, he thought. Once they saw that he’d just been knocked unconscious, and nothing serious was happening, they smiled, waved at him and resumed their walk. The sparrows took flight when the ladies left.

He sat under the shade of a tree thinking of what had just happened. Within 5 minutes he’d been knocked unconscious by a stranger, robbed of his money, helped to regain consciousness and cleaned by a group of kind ladies. Yet despite all this drama time hadn’t stopped, the chatter of kids could be heard, the sun above was still there, as hot as ever, and birds continued to fly here and there.

He gazed at the park, moving his head from left to right, and right to left, taking in the moment. Kids were playing baseball, the playground was full of toddlers running around playing tag. Other kids sat on swings that swayed left to right, and side to side. At a distance he saw two sun bathers, laying on the grass on a slight slope, reading some magazines. Not too far away from them he also saw some homeless people sleeping under the shade of a tree, above the cool grass, with their bikes next to them. The soccer match had already started, the one he’d intended to watch, America vs. Chivas.

A nice breeze blew through his face and the palm trees rustled. The pine trees moved, as if the pine needles were sweeping the invisible landscape of time. The wind, and the trees were cleaning the air, and moving the smog to another place. The warm air dried up the tears that had been running down his cheeks a moment ago. There and then his frown became a smile. The whole moment swept him into a realization that all that was before him was beautiful. The clouds at a distance moved unusually fast, and would soon disappear.