“It’s very faded, but I can make out East Lake Boathouse,” he said.
“Where the hell is that?” Smiley asked.
“Don’t you remember, the parque used to be called East Lake Park and that lake was East Lake. They used to rent boats out and stuff in my abuela’s time,” said Ruben.
“Oh yeah,” said Smiley. “I remember my grandma talking about that too.”
“Boat house though. That means we gotta talk to Veneno,” Ruben said.
Smiley looked up at him. “Are you serious?” she asked.
“No one knows that park like Veneno,” Ruben said.
“Ugh, that old heroin addict is always looking down my shirt,” she said.
“So, wear a sweatshirt,” Ruben said. “We gotta get him on our side and he’s not too fond of Dopey, and barely tolerates me.”
“Fuck,” she said.
“Yeah, take one for team, esa,” Dopey said.
“Shut the fuck up, Carlos,” she snapped. “Fuck, when do we go? Is he even still alive?”
“He alive,” Dopey said. “Mala hierba nunca muere.”
“No shit,” Ruben said. “Vato is bad news, pero ni modo.”
The next day, Ruben had found out where the old cholo by the name of Veneno was staying. He caught him coming out of the public bathrooms at Lincoln Park where he’d been slamming heroin into his veins.
Veneno was an old cholo, heavily tatted, his salt and pepper hair neatly slicked back, creases sharp on his 501s, and flannel button-down shirt ironed, open except for the top button, and his white Nikes were spotless. He smelled of Tres Flores hair gel and starch. His face was wrinkled, with eyes deeply sunk in, the tattooed teardrops on both corners of his eyes fading into the long creases of his face. He looked mean and scary, and maybe he had been once. Now, his hands shook with a strange kind of palsy and he leaned heavily on a cane. His eyes were dreamy now, almost trancelike, which wasn’t surprising considering he’d just loaded up on dope.
“Hey, carnal,” he slurred.
“S’up,” Ruben said.
They exchanged a complicated fist bump/handshake and bowed their heads.
“My vieja wants to talk to you, ese,” Ruben began.
“It ain’t mine, I swear,” Veneno laughed.
Ruben shook his head.
“Nah, carnal, she just wants to ask you some questions about the old boat house.”
“Then why she not here then?” Veneno asked.
“She thought you might like to come to the house for some food, ese. You hungry?”
“I could eat,” Veneno said.
“Let’s go then, I got my car,” Ruben said.
“Firme.”
Back at the house, Smiley was slamming pots around and cussing up a blue streak, while Dopey tried to calm her down.
“Not only do I have to talk to that perverted old cholo, but now I gotta cook for the cabron too?” she yelled, slamming down a heavy cast iron skillet.
“We’ll get more info out of him if he’s happy and eating,” Dopey reasoned.
“Well, I’m sure he’ll be looking around trying to see what he could steal. I sent Little Junior to my mom’s cuz I don’t want him around that dude,” she said.
“You beat those eggs anymore, they going to be meringues,” Dopey said as she whisked eggs fast and furious.
“Shut up.”
“Whatcha making, Cuz?” Dopey asked.
“Shit I don’t know,” she said, laughing.
“Make migas,” Dopey said. “No one’s migas are better than yours.”
“Thanks,” she said. “Nah, I’m gonna make chilaquiles.”
“Ooh! The red ones or the green ones?” Dopey asked.
“Red,” she said, getting out the molcajete.
“Damn,” Dopey said. “I’m already drooling.”
“Then make yourself useful and go grate some cheese and chop onion or something instead of just sitting there all baboso.”
Dopey carefully folded his shirt and laid it over a chair before going to get the onions to chop.
When Ruben and Veneno arrived Smiley was sullenly serving plates of chilaquiles, fresh frijoles de la olla, and homemade tortillas. On the kitchen table were two molcajetes, one filled with fresh guacamole and another full of salsa.
“Damn, carnal, your ruca can burn,” Veneno said, stuffing his face with a fluffy flour tortilla filled with cheesy chilaquiles dripping with red sauce.
“It’s like I wasn’t even here,” Smiley said sarcastically, making Dopey and Ruben wince.
Veneno was blithely unaware of her sarcasm and held up his empty beer bottle and waved it. Begrudgingly, Smiley went to the fridge and got him another, muttering something about sexist fucking perverts that don’t belong in her house. She slammed the beer bottle down hard on the wooden table causing the beer to spill over.
Veneno jumped back.
“Damn, girl,” he yelled, “that’s not how you serve a beer.”
“Oh,” Smiley said. “I didn’t know that.”
She fluttered her lashes, “Ruben never taught me.”
Veneno looked at Ruben, once again totally missing her sarcasm. “Should teach your ruca how to serve a beer, ese. Train her up.”
Ruben smiled at him and looked worriedly at Smiley, who was wiping off a knife and glaring at Veneno.
“So, carnal,” Ruben said. “Smiley wanted to know about the boat house at East Lake.”
The old veterano smiled. “Whatcha wanna know, mija?”
Smiley gritted her teeth and smiled back at him. With a sigh, she put the knife down and pulled up a chair next to him.
“Like any stories about it,” she said. “I was walking by there the other day and wondered.”
“Oh, there were some great times in that thing,” he said.
“You know, my dad and Ruben’s grandpa worked on it, laying the brick back in the day.”
“They did?” Ruben was shocked.
“Yeah, carnal. They were laying brick and helped build that thing. That was back when Lincoln Heights was all Italian. I guess Raza came to build and stayed.”
Veneno took another drink of his beer. “Used to be a make out place too. Vato would sneak up in there with his ruca and do the nasty.” He eyed Smiley up and down.
“What else?” Smiley asked.
“Chingazos, of course,” Veneno said. The different gangs were always fighting at the park. Boathouse was off the radar.
He went on. “Not during the Cinco de Mayo riots though. Those were some straight up crazy chingazos all over the place, and dudes came up shooting, cops were marching down Mission, all hell broke loose.”
Veneno wiped a tear from his eye. “Saw lot of people bleeding on the ground. It’s a different place now, but the boathouse ain’t been touched. Still the same as ever.”
“Dang,” Ruben said. “I had forgotten the riots.”
“Shit was crazy,” Veneno said.
“That’s interesting about Ruben’s grandpa working on that boathouse,” Smiley said.
Veneno shrugged. “He was a crazy old man. I remember him always telling people he knew important stuff. My dad said he was loco.”
Ruben’s fists tightened under the table, but he said nothing.
“Important stuff?” Smiley asked.
“Not really,” Veneno said. “That vato was nuts. He was always making up these wild stories. Like he said he was a knight once when he was drunk and told my Pops that he and some other *vatos *were all knights like King Arthur.”
“King Arthur?” Dopey asked.
“Yeah, you know that vato *with the round table whose *ruca cheated on him with that vato Lance?”
“You mean Lancelot,” Smiley said.
“Whatever,” Veneno said. “That Arthur dude should have taken him out. Letting his best friend and his ruca put the cuernos on him and shit. What a wimp.”
Smiley laughed. “Well, so Ruben’s gramps thought he was a knight?”
“Nah, he was just drunk,” Veneno said. “Was talking all kinds of shit about how he and twelve other vatos were descendants from this one dude from Spain and Arthur or some shit.”
“Wow,” Smiley said. “Crazy.”