It's Saturday morning in Key West, 1984— the sky is cloudless and bright blue.
Lucia, Henry’s Cuban wife, gets on her Vespa scooter and drives to Dominics Fine Meats to pick up some ground sirloin to make a birthday cake for Che, one of the couple's Chihuahuas.
Che doesn’t know it’s his birthday because dogs aren't obsessed with time like humans are.
Dominic's Fine Meats is on the first floor of a white two-story building. Lucia parks her motor scooter on the sidewalk, going inside and telling Dominic,
señor Dominic, it’s my babies birthday and I want to make him a cake,
Miss, Key West Bakery Essentials is down the street on the left, I sell meat.
Yes, my baby's a Chihuahua. I’d like two pounds of ground sirloin.
The butcher takes 4 sirloin steaks out of the cooler, weighs them, then chops them into chunks that he runs through an electric meat grinder. He wraps the ground meat in white wax paper, tapes it, puts it in a brown paper bag and hands it to Lucia saying,
a baker's dozen of ground sirloin for the most beautiful woman in Key West. That'll be five dollars and 45 cents.
Lucia knows she has movie-star good looks, but she's offended by the butcher who's undressing her with his eyes for a few extra ounces of meat. She says, business-like,
gracias, Señor Dominic,
then turning and walking out of the butcher shop.
Back at the bungalow, she goes to the kitchen, followed by the Chis, Che, and Mia, who like all dogs, see with their noses, smelling the fresh ground sirloin.
Lucia places a bowl on the counter, puts the chopped meat in, followed by half a cup of oats, a couple of pieces of white bread, two raw eggs, and milk.
Then, with both hands, she squeezes the mix, allowing it to flow through her fingers. It's a pleasant sensation like making tortillas or mud pies.
When the ingredients are mixed Lucia fills two metal pie pans with the mishmash, placing them in the oven and baking the meat till blood seeps through, so the cakes were browned outside and rare inside.
Then, she places the cakes on the kitchen counter and goes to shower.
Henry wakes late, brewing coffee and toasting half a dozen brown sugar Pop-Tarts, buttering them, and putting them on a plate that he places on a tray with the pot of brewed coffee and a pint of half & half. Then, carrying the tray to the front porch.
Sitting at the small porch table, he drinks coffee with cream and munches on a Pop-Tart, surveying the neighborhood that looks as though life is standing still. He mulls over the 1951 film— The Day the Earth Stood Still, wondering if humanoid visitors from outer space have landed in Key West with a message of peace?
Lucia shows in her kimono, pouring herself a cup of coffee, sitting across from Henry, and picks up a Pop-Tart asking,
is this space food?
It’s a Pop-Tart, try it,
muy deliciosa, America should ship boatloads of Tartas-Pops to Cuba.
Darling, Pop-Tarts are banned in Cuba because they contain the food dyes Yellow 5, Yellow 6, and Red 40.
Lucia takes small bites and chews the Tartas-Pop slowly, extending the pleasure of eating it, the way stoners munch on a single potato chip for hours, then saying,
I love Tartas-Popas— I will risk my life to eat them.
They have a laugh, then Henry notices a German Shepard pulling a boy on a skateboard coming down the street— so much for Key West being invaded by aliens.
When the coffee's finished, Lucia carries the tray back to the kitchen, seeing that Che and Mia have leaped on a chair and onto the kitchen table where their noses are buried in the metal pans of doggy birthday cakes.
By noon Lucia's headed to Dog Beach with Che y Mia. She visits Henry's study before leaving saying,
When you came home last night you woke me, I was in the middle of a dream— with my dad, Pedro, cutting sugar cane in a Cubano field.
Maybe, your father was trying to contact you from the dead.
Papa’s a ghost? I don’t believe in ghosts. So, where'd you go last night? Don't bullshit me, Henry.
I ran into Amy, my Jamaican friend at Eddy’s Coffee Shop. We went to her room, drank wine, and talked.
Did you sleep with Amy?
No, we just talked,
you expect me to believe that?
Yes of course,
well I don't, because I know you fucked her, women know these things.
Amy and I are just friends,
but you fucked her in the hot tub a few weeks ago.
That was a one of Lucia, Amy’s a hooker. Look, what’ll you say we go out for a drink this evening?
OK, darling, you know I get jealous because I love you.
I love you too dear.
They hug and kiss. It was always this way, clashes ending with a smooch.
The phone rings, it's a collect call from Dwayne Lucowski, Henry's brother who lived a thousand miles away in California, he says,
I need help big brother, I’ve hit rock bottom.
Dwayne had lost his job in July when the company he worked for, an aluminum siding outfit, was busted by the Federal Trade Commission for doing siding jobs with defective materials. He proceeds to tell Henry his hard-luck story.
I can’t make my house payment, I’m losing everything— I’ve sold my wife’s station wagon, she’s diabetic and needs treatment. Last week I hurt my back, carrying my TV, a Sony, to the pawnshop to hawk. I need your help, your my last resort, if you don’t help us we'll end up on the street.
Henry doesn't have money to boot, regardless he caves in.
OK, I get the picture, how much?
Fifteen hundred would cover my mortgage payment and leave us some change for groceries.
I’ll transfer the money to your Wells Fargo account. Dwayne, promise me you’ll look for a straight-up job— bagging groceries at Red Owl or working at Seven-Eleven. Stay away from chiselers and get rich quick schemes.
You’re a lifesaver.
They talk a little more, Dwayne asks bout Lucia, Henry says,
She’s the sexiest woman in the world, a holy terror in the bedroom, and funny to boot, she’s got it all Dwayne.
Broh, you scored big time when you bagged her. I can't get it up with my old lady anymore, she drinks two sixes a day and has a beer belly.
Mandy?
Yeah, Mandy,
She's diabetic, drinks two sixes a day, Dwayne? Does she have a death wish?
I'm no shrink, but she's shattered emotionally, scared, and suicidal because we're broke, living from day to day.
My God Dwayne, Mandy committing suicide because you're broke. The world's in a hell of a shape, the glitter of gold shines so brightly in the modern world that everyone thinks only material goods can satisfy them. So they spend their waking hours trying to grab as much as they can, inventing schemes to satisfy their cravings.
Henry, your the only one in the family born with the brains to be a writer.
Check your account, Monday Dwayne.
I won’t let you down, I’ll pay back every cent of the loan.
Henry knows he won't see the money again. There are a million and one things moochers would rather do with money than pay a loan.
That evening Henry and Lucia go out for a drink and light supper at Sloppy Joes, open since 1933— Ernest Hemingway's favorite watering hole, a joint that juices Hemingway's image to the nth degree.
The hoopla at Sloppy Joe's has more to do with Hemingway’s beard and what he drank than his writing. The crowd who frequents the joint, locals and tourists, are as literary as a rock.
The couple grabs a side table just as four people get up to go, sitting under a five-meter-long taxidermy Blue Marlin surrounded by black and white photos of Papa Hemingway. The fish wasn’t caught by Earnest but the photos are original prints, taken in the day, as they say, his day.
When the waitress shows, she stares fixedly at them— Henry says to Lucia,
I think the stare down means we need to order, the waitress snaps back,
That's right order or leave, there’s a crowd waiting for tables who are here to eat and drink.
Order or leave, we’ll order. Lucia orders,
Señora, we’ll have a pound of peel and eat Key West Shrimp, a pulled pork sandwich, a Caesar Salad, and a pitcher of Guinness.
We have slaw and house salad, no foreign salads. Lucia says,
Señora, I’m a foreigner, Cuban. Señor Hemingway lived in Cuba for thirty years, and he loved Caesar Salad. As they get up from the table Henry says in earshot of the waitress,
come on Lucia, let's eat at Blackfin Bistro, next to The Tennessee Williams Museum. Tennesee Williams aficionados are more refined than the gorillas at Sloppy Joe's. She laughs and says,
Your not refined, you're an ape, Henry.