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Show All the Variables & Other Love Stories 26 work. Never saw any, not even when briefly employed. Had it bad with the drink but would never know it, since he drank no more or less than his favorite peers. Staggered for two long weeks at a stretch with the wheelbarrow or the crescent wrench, and, come payday, staked his claim in the liquor store parking lot to behold the next eight a.m. Sobered up, his only proof that there was no god, some fortnight later and began to look for work yet again. Thus it went for him. Thus, until Esperanza fell to weeping. Casabon asked her what was the matter and she confided in her dear husband that as a young girl it had been her only wish to one day marry a man who would hold a steady job. Casabon was harrowed most thoroughly by the despair that had befallen her girlish dreams. He swore upon the soul of Saint Jude, who had always been partial to Casabon, that he would grit his teeth and from this day forth tend to some industry for the rest of his days. Esperanza's grief seemed sated and Casabon saw that it was good. He took a job by the palette jack at Wal-Mart and knew the solace of honest work. The beauty of Esperanza Nogales was legendary in three states. From as far away as El Paso and Trinidad the vato and the gringo would come by Greyhound, Mitsubishi, or thumb, hoping for even the briefest glimpse of her strapless pumps. It was said that to behold this sunflower could have only two effects on a living man: it would either free his soul or lay him dead, and to make her weep was considered by all the hearts of Taos akin to heresy. So it was that Casabon took a job and was happy until he came home one day to find waiting no dinner and no wife. He had always thought himself a good husband, and no tyrant. Though it is true that he reasoned if the proper place for a man was at work, |
