Caramelo Read Online Free PDF

Impala, white Caddy, red station wagon. We hobble forward, each car filthier than the next—inside and out—dust and dead bugs and vomit. The road crowded with buses and big trucks lit like Christmas trees as we get closer. No one even tries to pass each other. Kilometers, kilometers …
    Then, all at once, after we’ve forgotten ya mero …
    —¡Ay, ay, ay, ay, ay! There it is!
    A silence in the car. A silence in the world. And then … The rising in the chest, in the heart, finally. The road suddenly dipping and surprising us as always. There it is!
    Mexico City! La capital. El D.F. La capirucha . The center of the universe! The valley like a big bowl of hot beef soup before you taste it. And a laughter in your chest when the car descends.
    A laughter like ticker tape. Like a parade. People in the streets shouting hurray. Or do I just imagine they are shouting hurray? Hurray when the giant Corona beer billboard appears with its silver spangles. Hurraywhen the highways turn into avenues and boulevards. Hurray when the Mexico City buses and taxis glide alongside us like dolphins. Ya mero, ya mero . The shops with open doorways brightly lit. Hurray the twilight sky filling with stars like twists of silver paper. Hurray the rooftop dogs that welcome us. Hurray the smell of supper frying in the streets. Hurray la colonia Industrial, hurray Tepeyac, hurray La Villa. Hurray when the green iron gates of the house on Destiny Street, number 12, open, abracadabra.
    In the belly button of the house, the Awful Grandmother tossing her black rebozo de bolita crisscross across her breasts, like a soldadera ’s bandoleers. The big black X at the map’s end.

8.
    Tarzan
          W e come in all sizes, from little to big, like a xylophone. Rafa, Ito, Tikis, Toto, Lolo, Memo, and Lala. Rafael, Refugio, Gustavo, Alberto, Lorenzo, Guillermo, and Celaya. Rafa, Ito, Tikis, Toto, Lolo, Memo, y Lala. The younger ones couldn’t say the older ones’ names, and that’s how Refugito became Ito, or Gustavito became Tikis, Alberto—Toto, Lorenzo—Lolo, Guillermo—Memo, and me, Celaya—Lala. Rafa, Ito, Tikis, Toto, Lolo, Memo, y Lala. When the Grandmother calls us she says, — Tú . Or sometimes, — Oyes, tú .
    Elvis, Aristotle, and Byron are Uncle Fat-Face and Aunty Licha’s. The Grandmother says to Uncle Fat-Face, —How backwards that Licha naming those poor babies after anyone she finds in her horoscopes. Thank God Shakespeare was stillborn. Can you imagine answering to “Shakespeare Reyes”? What a beating life would’ve given him. Too sad to think your father lost three of his ribs in the war so that his grandchild could be named Elvis … Don’t pretend you don’t know!… Elvis Presley is a national enemy … He is … Why would I make it up? When he was making that movie in Acapulco he said, “The last thing I want to do in my life is kiss a Mexican.” That’s what he said, I swear it. Kiss a Mexican. It was in all the papers. What was Licha thinking!
    —But our Elvis was born seven years ago, Mother. How was Licha to know Elvis Presley would come to Mexico and say such things?
    —Well, someone should’ve thought about the future, eh? And now look. The whole republic is boycotting that pig, and my grandchild is named Elvis! What a barbarity!
    Amor and Paz are Uncle Baby and Aunty Ninfa’s, named “Love” and “Peace” because, —We were happy God sent us such pretty little girls.They’re so evil they stick their tongues out at us while their father is saying this.
    Like always, when we first arrive at the Grandparents’ house, my brothers and I are shy and speak only to one another, in English, which is rude. But by the second day we upset our cousin Antonieta Araceli, who is not used to the company of kids. We break her old Cri-Crí * records. We lose the pieces to her Turista game. We use too much toilet paper, or at other times too little. We stick our dirty fingers in the bowl of beans soaking