PANK Magazine :: 9.12 / December 2014 :: Divorce for Cuban Dummies by Leslie Blanco
Once—very seriously—Sylvia considered that predictable thing: smashing the windows of his car. He’d refused all her offers of settlement, refused to get a lawyer, asked for half of her frequent flyer miles, lied to the mediator’s face, called her lawyer just to run up her bills. By then all she wanted was out, but still—two years later—he refused to sign the last piece of paper, said he’d re-open the mediation to investigate her finances. Her finances! Pennies between the couch cushions. Stipends spent before they came in. Student loan contracts piling up like promesas to San Lazaro.
She lit red, yellow and white candles. She offered a cigar and a glass of rum. Santa Barbara save me from my Cuban temper. Yemayá prevail, dress me in yellow, send me some doves. Changó keep your big African nose out of this.
But for three hours she considered the details.
It would require a plane ticket. Could she get there in time to smash the car before dawn? Would they let her fly with a baseball bat? Could she even find the car where he’d parked it on the street? She hadn’t seen it—Waiting to Exhale—but someone told her about it. All his clothes, all his papers, all his shit, thrown into the convertible, gasoline splattered like unholy water, a match and WHOOSH.
Of course he didn’t own a convertible, he was the fucking paragon of practicality, but she could buy the bat, she thought, the gasoline, the matches, once she’d deplaned.
