Sister in Basement, Manny Again Elsewhere

Robert Lopez

Manny would love for the woman behind him to shut the fuck up. Manny is on the train ride home and the woman behind him is on the same train. The difference is Manny wants the woman to shut the fuck up and the woman wants nothing at all from Manny. She doesn’t even know he’s there, that he exists, that he’s a person.

Sofia and Esperanza are tangled up two doors down from where Sister is in the basement doing dishes with cold water.

It’s been one month since Sofia and Esperanza met each other, so it was okay now for Sofia to clean and redecorate Esperanza’s apartment. Sofia said she’d wanted to do this since the first time she came over, the night they met at someone’s going away party.

They’ve both forgotten who was going away or where it was they were going, now that they are so caught up in each other. A mutual friend had asked each to the party and this is how they met and why it was okay now for Sofia to clean and redecorate Esperanza’s apartment.

Sofia said there was something bad wrong with Esperanza. She said she could see spending the rest of her life with her, but that didn’t mean something wasn’t wrong. Esperanza told her it was true, that there was something wrong. She told Sofia that she was allergic to dust, that if she tried dusting she could have an anaphylactic reaction and die.

Sofia said, That doesn’t sound right to me, and started in with a dust rag on one of the end tables. She said, This is me after dance class. I always have an abundance of energy.

Esperanza told her she wasn’t kidding. She said, My throat could close and I could suffocate and die. Sofia looked at Esperanza straight in the eye, did a pirouette. She said, That isn’t the half of it.

Manny and Sister don’t even know who they are, Sofia and Esperanza, have never met them.

But they are all connected by proximity and certain relationship dynamics and unbeknownst to all they were in the same restaurant three weeks ago late Friday night. Manny and Sister were having dinner after a bad movie as Sofia and Esperanza were finishing a dessert of flourless chocolate cake.

Manny doesn’t want to turn around, doesn’t want to know if the woman is one seat behind him or two. He doesn’t want to know what she looks like, doesn’t want to see what she’s wearing. Manny knows none of it would make a difference to anyone, least of all him.

Perhaps the woman is not going home or perhaps she will be abducted before she gets there.

Two women and one child have gone missing in the last month and everyone is worried about who might be next.

Everyone is making sure to have their guns with them when they leave the house in the morning. Some carry in a holster and others have it tucked inside a belt buckle or boot or shoe.

Sister is in the basement, washing dishes with cold water. She doesn’t know where Manny is, but she thinks he might be at work or on the train. It’s also possible she doesn’t care.

The woman is on the phone and two seats behind Manny. She says, He doesn’t understand because he’s a man. Then she says, Don’t think about Benjamin for the next twenty-four hours.

It’s unclear who this woman might be talking with and what it has to do with Manny.

That Sofia and Esperanza are tangled up two doors down doesn’t mean anything in this context, as it’s almost certain that the woman is not talking to either Sofia or Esperanza.

This means it’s impossible to know who Benjamin is or why anyone should care about him.

Sister did know a Benjamin in grade school, but it’s probably a different Benjamin.

Manny has never known a Benjamin, has never even met one.

Grade-school Benjamin wore parachute pants and was cross-eyed. He had both a trick knee and a plantar wart. The Benjamin being discussed by the woman sitting behind Manny has no such afflictions and it turns out is both stylish and athletic.

But Benjamin doesn’t matter at all, regardless of how he dresses. The woman talking about Benjamin doesn’t matter, and Sofia and Esperanza don’t matter, either.

Because this has to be about Manny and Sister and what might happen between them moving forward. It’s also about everything that’s already happened between them and against them.

What’s happened between them is so complex it would be impossible for anyone to articulate it without the benefit of hindsight or omniscience.

It’s going to take years for all of this to come out.

So we have to wait and while everyone waits everyone will go on with their lives.

For right now, though, Manny is on the train ride home, where he’ll find Sister in the basement, doing dishes with cold water.