A night out in the Mission District.
We come up from the 16th and Mission BART station and stop before the escalator to listen to a bearded guy picking a banjo, give him a dollar. We move through a sea of 9-5’ers, through the urban plaza and the Spanish-language signs and the slow-moving buses. A clear but biting-cold dusk along Valencia Street.
Duck into a local pub just to get warm.
Two shots of Cazadores Blanco, and we’re wrapped in the light-change and the easy banter of the bodies on all sides. The familiarity of the moment like a memory peeled back at the corners.
Reluctantly we head out onto the street again, pushing against the cruel wind as we make our way to the taqueria. Everyone’s talking about the cold. I haven’t felt anything like it in years – certainly not since we’ve been back home. It’s a vague echo of a time past, when I lived in this very city and wore layers and multiple pairs of socks.
The taqueria is bustling as usual. Urban families and tourists and street punks. A mariachi band. The warmth inside is like a drug making us move slowly, stalling our exit. We work our way through a plate of tacos and a basket of chips. Share a Dos Equis. Order another plate just to hold onto the moment, the ruddy interior, buzz of voices, windows fogged by heat.
Pulling our jackets close, collars up, we venture out again, blinded by the wind-pierce. Only five more blocks to the bar, a friend’s birthday celebration. A smiling bouncer at the door, perched on a stool, asking for ID’s. I reach for my shoulder purse, its usual position, strap draped cross my chest, pouch at the hip.
It’s not there.
No strap, no pouch, no purse. Wallet, phone, keys, gone. Left somewhere along our path.
Panic.
The bouncer smiles sympathetically, wishes us luck. Flag down a cab, spit out the address of the pub we ducked into at the beginning of the night. Leaving the cab at the corner, I race inside, the pub ten times busier now, lean across the bar and yell to be heard. Neither bartender is particularly interested, neither bartender pays much attention, neither bartender has seen a purse.
Race back to the cab, a few blocks on, take us to the taqueria. I’m imagining the next day, on the phone with credit card companies, a police report, purchasing another crappy TMobile phone. Obviously it’s gone, a hundred or so bucks in my wallet, no reason for anyone to be honest. Not in this time of cut-backs and down-sizing, foreclosures and lay offs. An easy wad of cash, maybe a credit card purchase or two, and then stash the purse in the nearest trash bin.
The brightly painted façade of the taqueria, I rush past the security guard at the door, up to the counter, a long line of patrons to my right. Woman at the cash register, annoyed that I’m cutting the line.
“A purse, I left a purse, did anyone turn in a purse?”
She continues to count out change, hands it over to the young man with a tray full of food, looks me in the eye. A moment of silence. She reaches behind the counter and pulls out the purse. Black leather pouch, hand-cut strap.
My knees go weak.
I grab at it, singing thanks, the room a blur. Run out into the cold and the dark and into the warmth of the cab. I’m done for the evening. Take us to the BART station.
I
want to go home.
want to go home.
