Read an Excerpt

My Bloody Life

The Making of a Latin King

Chicago Review Press Incorporated

La Familia

Puerto Rico, 1963. I was born in the back of a 1957 Chevy on the way to the hospital. I may have been born where I was conceived. Considering that my mother went into labor while sitting in the outhouse, being born in a car was not so bad. My father passed away when I was very young. I was almost five years old when he died. I don't have too many memories of him other than what my mother has told me and the personal memory of seeing him on his deathbed. I wish he could have been there to guide me through life, to give the advice that only one's father can give.

My mother was a young girl when she married my father. She was sixteen, he was seventy-four. He was a widower with six children, all older than my mother, and he had several grandchildren her age. His children resented my mother for being so young and marrying such an old man. To this day one of them still does not really accept my sisters and me as siblings.

I don't know much about my father. I never bothered to ask, but those who claim they knew him say he was a good man. I'll take their word for it I guess, but even Richard Nixon was considered a good man after he died. As you can expect from an old geezer marrying a teenager, my father died while my sisters and I were still very young. To me, the fact that a seventy-four-year-old man fathered three kids with a teenage girl is incredible. After my father passed away, my mother, still a young woman, remarried quickly. I don't remember my mother's courtship or ever meeting the man before she married him. Perhaps I was too young to remember or maybe she never stopped to think that what we thought of him was important. I do remember being beaten, almost tortured, by my aunt and cousins when my mother went away on her honeymoon. I guess I wasn't that young; after all, I do remember the pain.

We lived in a little hilltop village in central Puerto Rico. It was a village of farmers. Everybody lived off the land. My father's family was from the city. I don't remember ever meeting any of them. The village where we lived was very tranquil. There was a great deal of undeveloped land. We played baseball in an open, grassy field where we would sometimes lose the ball in the tall grass. We played hide-and-seek in the woods, climbed trees for oranges and grapefruits, and picked guavas for snacks. Our family harvested coffee, rice, and various other fruits and vegetables. It was an easy-going life until my father died and my mother remarried and went on her secret honeymoon.

I was five years old at the time. My mother left us with her sister, who had seven kids of her own. My cousins' ages ranged from three to eighteen. For some reason that I'll never comprehend, my aunt allowed her kids to brutally beat us. At any given moment we could be kicked, punched, or made into a bloody mess for no reason at all. My cousins were not punished; in fact, I remember laughter from the adults.

Alberto was our oldest cousin. At that time he was the biggest jerk in the world. Alberto would make my sisters and me run up and down a rocky hill, knowing we would fall and hurt ourselves. He would initiate the abuse by sending his little brothers to punch us, kick us, whatever. He was a very sick individual.

Our house was about one hundred yards up the hill from my aunt's house. It was unoccupied and unlocked while my mother was gone. One morning Alberto led me up to our house with the promise of giving me a slingshot and showing me how to use it. I was excited. Once we got to the house he pulled a slingshot from his back pocket and told me that mine was inside on the kitchen table. I hurried inside, happy and excited, but found nothing. When I turned to go back outside, Alberto was there behind me. Alberto picked me up, carried me into my mother's bedroom, and threw me on the bed face down. I tried to turn around and get up but he held me down by the back of my neck. Alberto pushed my face into the mattress, almost suffocating me. I felt him grab the elastic waist of my shorts and pull them down. With one strong pull Alberto had my shorts down to my ankles. I struggled. He put his other hand on the back of my head and pushed down hard. I was nearly motionless. Alberto released my head and began fumbling with my buttocks while he continued to hold me down by the neck. I felt pain as Alberto shoved his penis into my anus and I started to struggle again. Alberto laid over me and held me down. Within seconds the ordeal was over. Alberto got up and released me. As he fixed his pants, he threatened to kill me if I told anybody. I lay there in shock, catching my breath as Alberto repeatedly made threats against my life. I couldn't move, couldn't talk, couldn't even think. Alberto's voice got further away; I realized he had left the room, but then he came back. I felt something cold and wet brush against my inner thighs, up to my testicles, and between my buttocks. Alberto lifted me by the legs and tossed me toward the foot of the bed. My body turned as my legs flew through the air. He was cleaning a spot on the bed with a wet rag. I then realized that the cold wetness I had felt was Alberto cleaning me up. Slowly, with no emotion or thought, I pulled my shorts back up and stood there like a zombie. Alberto left the room, came back without the rag, and walked directly up to me. He grabbed me by the neck and lifted me so that I was face to face with him. Alberto said, "Si dices algo, te mataré como un perro" ("If you say anything, I will kill you like a dog"). He threw me on the bed and left. I sat numbly on the foot of my mother's bed for I don't know how long. I don't remember when I left the house, with whom, or how long after the rape took place.

I don't remember feeling shame or anger. I don't remember crying or feeling pain or discomfort after the incident. In fact, although I remember that episode as if it was yesterday, I can remember little else about life in Puerto Rico from that day forward.

Chicago

Our new father's name was Emilio. He was a short man with a light complexion and light brown hair. I never got to know much about him. I heard he had children from a previous marriage. Other than that, Emilio was a total mystery. My mother must have been pregnant months before she and Emilio were married. Shortly after we moved out of the village she gave birth to a baby girl. I now had three sisters. Soon after the birth of their daughter, Emilio moved the family to the United States.

The first couple of years in the States were great. We lived in Chicago, the Windy City, the city of broad shoulders, and all that other bullshit. I was going on seven years old when we first came to Chicago. I was very curious about everything that surrounded me. How fascinating were the things in this great city, so different, so new. I remember sitting on the back porch of our very first apartment in Chicago and getting excited about the silver and green train going by on the elevated tracks located about a half-block away. I dreamed of some day riding that big green machine that decorated the skyline.

People were everywhere in Chicago. They socialized at all times of the day. This city was alive. In Puerto Rico the nearest neighbors were a quarter-mile away and they were usually relatives. The houses were made of wood and the toilet was a simple outhouse. In Chicago strangers lived next to, above, and below each other. Oh, and the miracle of indoor plumbing. What a difference there was in lifestyle and scenery. I fell in love with Chicago. I had trouble learning English, but other than that I was in heaven.

At school I was placed in a preschool setting because of my language barrier. It wasn't so bad. At almost seven years old I was the biggest kid in class and I got to go home at noon. (I discovered that I had to attend school only in the morning after spending half the afternoon searching for the "go home" room on my first day. If it hadn't been for a Spanish-speaking teacher that I ran into that day I might still be wandering the hallways.)

We lived on the South Side of the city around Twenty-sixth Street. It was a predominantly Mexican neighborhood. For the most part they weren't very friendly to Puerto Ricans. Their favorite chant was "Arriba Mexico, abajo Puerto Rico" ("up with Mexico, down with Puerto Rico"). I think their dislike of Puerto Ricans stemmed from the fact that while we were citizens of the United States at birth, they had to literally sneak into this country. But that seemed to be predominantly an adult attitude; the kids didn't seem to care. I made friends with kids who spoke Spanish as fluently as they did English. That helped my sisters and me learn English faster.

At home, Emilio's attitude toward us changed as his daughter got older. In short, he became an asshole. He would do things like padlock the refrigerator so that only his daughter could drink milk. He would hang a box of crackers from a rope high up on the ceiling so that we couldn't have any. All of his anger was taken out on us. Whether it was money problems, the baby crying, or an itch he couldn't scratch, we were beaten for it. Why my mother let him do those things I'll never know, but I'm sure it had a lot to do with avoiding my stepfather's anger. By the time I was eight the only thing my two sisters and I had to look forward to was going to school. We were pretty much confined to our bedroom in order to avoid Emilio's wrath. We went outside only when Emilio wasn't around, which was usually when we were in school.

Then Emilio lost his job. I didn't know what he did for a living to begin with ... but during this period he was always at home. With him there all the time, the ranting and raving was constant. Then suddenly and for no apparent reason, Emilio started leaving the house early and would not come back until late at night.

With Emilio not around, our childhood became a joy again. The city, the snow, our new friends — my sisters and I loved every minute of it. Meanwhile Emilio got himself in some sort of trouble trying to scam the Social Security Administration. The rumor was that the FBI had picked him up for questioning. And just like that, Emilio disappeared. No goodbyes, no "I'll be back"; he just left and never returned. My mother, a very attractive woman and somewhat ignorant for a woman of her experience, was alone with four kids and on welfare. My mother's mother didn't let her go to school so she could learn to be something other than somebody's housewife. Now here she was in the land of opportunity, illiterate and with no skills, counting on others to do for us. She didn't stay single for long, though. I guess she used the only survival skill she knew — she found another man.

His name was Pedro. He was from the North Side of the city, where most of Chicago's Puerto Ricans lived. Pedro was five feet, five inches tall, weighed three hundred fifty pounds, and was fat, toothless, stinky, and loud — a truly trifling individual. He was a widower with a grown son named Hector. Pedro had this habit of cleaning his snot on his T-shirt, sometimes even blowing his nose into it, then walking around like that. The man rarely bathed and even when he did he smelled horrible.

Pedro was a very successful illegal lottery dealer. He bought a brand- new car almost every year and carried a large amount of cash on him at all times. My mother looked like a frail toothpick next to Pedro. I don't think it was any secret that the only thing my mother saw in Pedro was his money. It's how she chose to provide for her children; it's the only way she knew how. When he would come over my mother would send us outside. After a couple of months of that we all moved to the North Side.

Pedro's son Hector was a younger, taller version of his father. He was twenty-three years old, six feet, three inches tall, and weighed four hundred pounds. He was a sports fanatic and had a particular taste for big flashy cars. An orange Cadillac Coupe de Ville with a white top or a powder blue Lincoln Mark IV — these were the kinds of cars Hector drove. He had the personality of a kid. Hector enjoyed playing practical jokes on people and had a knack for making people laugh. Like his father, Hector also dabbled in the illegal lottery. Unlike his father, Hector was also a drug dealer. Although he himself didn't drink, smoke, or use drugs of any kind, he was always surrounded by junkies. Hector sold heroin. His girlfriend Missy, a junkie, was a tiny woman whose teeth had rotted away because of her craving for sweets. Missy's sister Jeannie was also a junkie. In fact just about everyone who hung around Hector was a junkie, including his previous girlfriend, the mother of his child, his sister-in-law, and her boyfriend. Hector enjoyed their company. They worshipped him. They did anything he wanted at his command.

It wasn't until we moved that I realized how big and racially diverse Chicago was. So many worlds collided with each other on the way north from the Mexican area of Eighteenth Street and Western Avenue toward the Puerto Rican area at Western and Potomac Street. We went past an African American neighborhood, then through Polish and Italian areas. I saw railroad tracks, parks, and kids enjoying themselves in the spray of water coming from a fire hydrant. The buildings changed in style, each telling their own unique architectural story. It seemed like the city embraced its dwellers the way a mother demonstrates love for her child. My love for Chicago grew stronger by the day.

Humboldt Park

I Made Friends very quickly on the North Side. We all seemed to have something in common other than being of the same race. I was eight and a half when we moved to the North Side. The area we moved to seemed predominantly white but there were also plenty of Puerto Ricans. We lived in the Humboldt Park area. Humboldt Park was the most beautiful park I had ever seen. There was a beach for swimming, a lake for fishing, and many baseball diamonds. To me it was like a world within a world. Our home was a second-floor, three-bedroom apartment above a grocery store. There were wooden porches in the back with stairs that led down into a walkway that went into an alley. Next door to us was a three-story building with a bar on the street level.

I was enrolled at Von Humboldt School, which was located about six or seven blocks from where I lived. By now I had become somewhat proficient in English, but there was still a lot I did not understand. I was still very ignorant in the ways of American youth. I was going on nine years old. At Von Humboldt I was put in the fifth grade with kids my own age. Having spent the last two years with kids much smaller than myself, I wasn't prepared for such a drastic change. I went from being the biggest kid in class to being one of the smallest. I didn't like it at all. On the very first day of school the school bully confronted me. His name was Ricardo, but everyone called him Ricky. He was a big, ugly, black-skinned Puerto Rican. Ricky wasn't muscular, but he was big. He had a big afro and could easily have been mistaken for an African American until he spoke. Ricky proclaimed himself the toughest guy in school and pointed out a certain girl as his girlfriend. He warned me to stay away from her. Her response to Ricky's claim was, "I'm not your girlfriend. You better stop saying that." The next person I met was a guy named Jorge. He was short with big feet and curly hair and was an easy person to get along with. Jorge introduced me to his buddies Noel and Julio. Noel looked more like a white boy than he did a Puerto Rican. He had dirty blond hair, blue eyes, and rosy skin. Then there was Julio. He looked more like a stereotypical Puerto Rican. He was brown skinned with pushed-back black hair and a very deep Latin accent. Jorge and Noel were born and raised in Chicago. Their families had been some of the first Puerto Ricans to inhabit the Humboldt Park area. They told me a lot of horror stories about white violence toward Puerto Ricans. As new additions to the neighborhood, Julio and I could only take their word for it.

The stories the guys told about the white people in the area were never pleasant. Jorge showed me scars he claimed were caused by a group of white boys who jumped him because he was Puerto Rican. They assured me it wasn't as bad as it once was but warned me to avoid any groups of white boys. I don't know why, but deep down I didn't believe a word the guys told me. All the white people I had encountered since coming to Chicago were friendly and nice. I told the guys about some white boys I had passed on the way to school. They seemed friendly enough. They kept pointing at the sky with their middle fingers. I thought they were showing me how beautiful it was. They also yelled words that I understood to be friendly gestures. I had never heard these words before. They yelled "punk," "spic," "pussy," "son of a bitch," and I think they even offered me a pork chop. Julio, Jorge, and Noel laughed uncontrollably as I told them about these white boys. After the laughter they explained to me what I was being called and what the middle finger pointed at the sky meant. I felt like an idiot. All day long I kept thinking about what the white boys were saying to me. Now I was scared. I had never experienced such hatred. I became wary and cautious of the company I kept.

---

Excerpted from My Bloody Life by Reymundo Sanchez. Copyright © 2000 Reymundo Sanchez. Excerpted by permission of Chicago Review Press Incorporated.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---