Pimo

By Arian Garcia

Pimo tells the story of a mute shoeshine boy who struggles to survive amid the corruption of the Dominican Republic, while Adi, an American living in exile, finds that his infatuation with a drug lord has become dangerous. Also included is a short story about baseball and disillusion.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781662420528

Book preview

I

It rained hard all day yesterday, so Israel hadn’t bothered going out with his shoeshine box. People don’t usually get their shoes shined in the rain, when the unpaved roads are riddled with puddles of red mud. Water had cascaded up to the street curb. Garbage floated by the clogged gutters. A majority of it was discarded Styrofoam containers, leaves, and chicken bones. Other fun-loving girls and boys Israel’s age not embittered by the torrential rain had showered in it bare-chested, just wearing their underwear, until threatened by a significant adult in their life to come inside.

Israel heard the static of his guardian’s radio underneath the melodic pounding of the rain on an aluminum sheet roof. He didn’t know how fortunate he was that he didn’t live on the banks of the rebellious river, which would crest and expand. In very rare cases, those whose homes had been swallowed by the river were given subsidized housing by the government, only to illegally sell the homes they had been granted to move back to the banks of the river when it receded.

Israel had gotten up only once to refine the reception as a preacher and radio personality had recounted the kiss of Judah’s betrayal, though most of the day, Israel had lain in bed brooding, with his head resting in between his interlocked fingers.

He remembered what his Ma had told him a long time ago. God helps those who help themselves. So with that inspirational message, he woke up today chipper with an odd sense of ambition.

Israel was in the same shabby clothes from the day before. He splashed water in his face from a barrel that had been filled by the rain. He picked up his battered wooden shoeshine box from under its lid and tucked an empty paint can under his arm, which would serve as his seat. He exited his dwelling too early to be noticed.

As soon as he set foot on the broken sidewalk, he felt the sun’s tremendous heat penetrating. He headed toward the once-abandoned gas station, which was now the town’s unofficial bus stop. It was bustling with action. El Doce was a hub of transportation since it bordered El Trece, where a shipping port was located.

The faces of two of the primary candidates for the presidency of the Dominican Republic were everywhere. The grin of Miguel Vargas and the smirk of Leonel Fernandez were on billboards, plastered on the rear of car windows, and hammered into light posts. The men looked as untrustworthy as politicians could look. Mira la caritas. Look at those lil faces, Israel thought.

The political flavor was ripe with dissension. Some of the public had anticipated the upcoming elections with great fervor, while others were numbed by the rhetoric and skeptical of the voting process. Corruption was rampant. A culture of degeneracy was well instituted. The constitution was violated every other day. The men who ran for office lacked character, honesty, and principles. Their promises had no merit, and their priorities didn’t include helping the majority of the people that had voted for them. Once elected, they deviated from what they said they’d do during their campaign. Politicians only took themselves into consideration. The vast fortunes they amassed while in office were proof of that. The incumbent Leonel Fernandez had been allowed to run for a third term after an amendment to the constitution.

Jitney cabdrivers were swindling fares, claiming a raise as people squeezed in uncomfortably, reluctant to pay the increase. This is an abuse, a man griped, sandwiched tight in between three other passengers in the back seat. Another man with an annoyed look on his face tried to close the battered door, but it wouldn’t close on the initial slam. The car zoomed off with the door still open. A helmetless motorcycle driver weaved through the traffic with reckless abandon. Trucks hissed and gyrated through the street. A broken traffic light and missing traffic controller further hindered transportation. A syndicated bus fare collector yelled out the bus’s next destination. He then unfolded a collapsible seat on the bus and told everyone, including lady or child, to shift so that more passengers could fit on the already congested, dilapidated bus. The fare collector hopped off waving and seeking more passengers in need of transport. Uncouth riders in a rush fanned themselves and complained that no one else could be accommodated. Some were very vocal in demanding that the bus leave, while others silently asked God for patience. Patience for coping with the traffic, patience for the heat, just simple patience.

An agitated female passenger and her agitated infant son stormed off the cramped bus once she had gotten word from another passenger that doctors at the hospital were on strike again. She was so disoriented that she didn’t realize she was on the wrong bus to begin with. Whatever ailment her child had would have to wait anyway. Dear father of mine, she cried.

The bus fare collector gave a knowing whistle to the driver and banged on the side of the old bus, which was the signal to either stop or drive off. The driver had a cast on his broken left arm. An old woman almost tripped getting on the slowly-moving vehicle. She finally composed herself and crouched in a small space facing the rear of the bus. She turned around and looked forward and asked the driver, Can you drive with that thing on your arm?

Don’t fear! replied the driver as he gingerly turned the wheel and accelerated, paying no attention to the road ahead. The fare collector skipped on the edge of the retractable door that had been rusted and didn’t retract anymore.

The driver now had his head stuck out the window. He spewed profanities at a pesky motorist. In an instance, he glanced forward through the cracked windshield. He then slammed on the worn brakes to avoid crashing into an old man hauling forward a wheelbarrow full of empty bottles. After the high-pitched screech, El Mulo, who was already hunched over, put the wheelbarrow down as the bottles rattled. He took his hat off, stuck his lips out, and spat tobacco juice. The sound of the bus’s horn resonated as El Mulo nonchalantly asked the driver to kill him. In fact, El Mulo looked too old to be hauling anything. He had lived to see the indigenous people from El Doce sell their prime land, which was closest to the road, to move into the back alleys. The centenarian was young during the days of the US-led invasion.

The driver of the syndicated bus let out a profound "Conyo!" (Damn!) He then banged on the steering wheel with his functioning arm.

At the midst what seemed to be a chaotic scene, Israel sat patiently, sucking his thumb and glancing at commuters’ feet to see if they needed his services. The sucking of his thumb was a nurturing habit he was oblivious to except when ridiculed or given a verbal scolding—un boche. It was recognizable though in his worn and indentured teeth.

"Limpia bota!" (Boot cleaner!) someone yelled. But it was like no one heard. It was another shoeshine boy promoting himself looking to shine someone’s shoes. Israel had no choice but to take another approach, a nodding of the head once eye contact was made or the pointing of his finger at a pair of dirty shoes. Desperate yelping till he was numb couldn’t be his technique since Israel was mute. He lived never uttering a word. When he tried to talk, he would make incoherent sounds that were between a heavy grunt and a gasp of despair. It was frustrating. A damning limitation.

He thought it was quite obvious to others that he would clean someone’s shoes for a meager fee. He noticed early in his career that those other shoeshine boys would strain their vocal cords. Plus all that yelling seemed to have made them hungrier.

Nor did Israel fraternize with other shoeshine boys. He saw them as competition or taking food from his mouth. In El Doce, friends changed and rotated like seasonal ornaments. He liked being accompanied by loneliness.

Israel waited in vain. I’ve seen enough. Good luck.

He walked the crowded streets of Santo Domingo with his empty paint can and shoeshine box. The syndicated bus passed him by chugging like a herd of ox on a raggedy wooden plank before stopping again, this time just a meter away from an OMSA. Unlike the syndicated busses, the OMSA were the official government busses of the metropolis. People just called the actual busses by the acronym of the government agency that oversaw them. The OMSA had cheaper fares and air-conditioned units, though the public seemed to prefer the unscheduled and uncomfortable syndicated busses since they had more routes.

The congestion of traffic had created a concert of wailing horns. This time, instead of cursing, the exhausted syndicated bus driver called for God vainly. Even those who had been patient before began to curse, suck their teeth, and stomp their feet in annoyance.

The practically new, yet filthy, state bus was wedged in between an intersection on La Avenida Independencia. It belched out black smoke from either its exhaust or its engine in the rear. It spoke volumes of the country’s weak infrastructure. The OMSA bus operator yapped back into a radio, unsure where the rolling smoke was coming from. Look at that OMSA crumbling like the elevated highway, Israel thought.

Israel crossed the littered street and saw a Haitian ice cream vendor sitting on a curb gnawing on a piece of sugarcane. Israel and the Haitian both looked at the Haitian’s dusty shoes before Israel looked into his yellow eyes again. The Haitian shook his nappy head sleepily before spitting out the sugarcane fibers. The Haitian was dark, a purple black. The impressionable young Israel had been taught that Haitians did the work Dominicans thought was beneath them. Furthermore to be called a Haitian was an offense to any Dominican. Israel put his shirt over his face, which was an impolite gesture toward something that smelt awry. Fo’!

Israel couldn’t remember the last time a Haitian had bothered to shine their shoes anyway. On Sunday maybe? At the street bazaar or near their church perhaps, where he had seen theatrical preaching and a little girl crying inconsolably while the adults hooted and hollered in Creole, ’Cause of Jesus, we were able to see…’Cause of Jesus, we were able to see! The ice cream vendor who was dressed in a bright shirt put a cooler on his shoulder and began shaking a silver bell.

Israel was approached by a young woman holding a little girl’s hand. The precocious little girl was proud of her standardized school uniform. She wore a blue shirt with a khaki skirt. Israel looked doggedly in comparison with a flimsy collared shirt and gaping hole in his jeans.

Louisa usually wiped her daughter’s shoes at home with a rag, but today she had left her house in a hurry, flustered fearing being late for work. She was sure a snitch would say something. She saw from afar that due to the paralyzed flow of traffic, she would be late anyway.

Louisa was built thick and looked as if she would have been as comfortable doing manual labor as she was doing clerical work. The prospects of jobs in the economically depressed El Doce were minimal, which made OMSA ever more the juggernaut since it directly and indirectly employed many of the residents of El Doce. Luckily for Louisa, she didn’t have to operate a hair salon from her house or sell food like many other women.

For the men, it was either being a mechanic or lowering your expectations to work alongside Haitians unloading flatbed trucks of cement bags for the family-owned hardware store called Fuente De Amor. If neither of those occupations suited your liking, you could work, breaking down wooden pallets. The problem with that job was the many splinters that were acquired. Since gloves weren’t provided or available. Oh, and by the way, that hustle was also monopolized by the owners of Fuente De Amor. Death might’ve been sweeter than being enslaved at the Fuente De Amor. Fuente was a complex noun. The common English translation of Fuente was fountain or spring. De meant of. And one didn’t have to be a scholar to know amor meant love. But if one were to say Fuente Oficial it was a reliable source. Fuente could also be interpreted as a construction. Construction of Love was the definition that the owners of the gainful Fuente De Amor sought to define. They would’ve been revered as great champions in El Doce, if they would’ve donated one peso of their suspected fortune to anyone. And there would’ve been even less animosity toward them if they had bought a car that was fawned upon, wore expensive clothes or jewelry, and/or lived lavish. The well-established proprietors of the Fountain of Love seemed only to find pleasure in exploiting Haitians.

Louisa worked for her uncle, Pimo, who was the majority owner of a company that oversaw the general maintenance and repair of all the OMSA busses. She even got her husband a part-time job. In the mornings, he would work at the official OMSA garage, botching inspections and sabotaging tune-ups so that the busses would be sent to his second job, where he worked in the afternoon with Louisa.

Can you clean her shoes?

Surely, Israel thought. He then shook the bottle of dye before applying it to the student’s shoes.

Louisa raised a question, And how’s school?

Israel raised his head and looked up, waiting for the little girl to respond to the question that was actually posed for his reply. The crossed-eyed little girl was busily swatting at a mosquito. Before Louisa could tell Israel It’s with you, he simply shrugged his shoulders. He couldn’t find another way of articulating himself. As he buffed both shoes, he pondered an answer with more validity. "Why I got to study for? I can’t eat books." The not-so-sheltered little girl seemed to be offended by Israel’s silence. All indications were that he couldn’t speak. The little girl kicked the shoeshine box.

"Conyo."(Damn).

Mama, isn’t it true God don’t like him because he can’t talk any?

Don’t be problematic, Louisa said, gently correcting the girl with a