SPYING

One of my crosses disappeared this weekend and I think the maid took it. Really. It was old and wood and had odd little things nailed to it like a little chair and a sword and skulls. It was a Cool Thing, it was very Me and a gift from a friend. It had an unfortunate habit of jumping off the bathroom wall and the little Mexican talismans would become unnailed. I still have the tiny brass coffee cup whose meaning I never quite understood. Are they offering Christ a cup of coffee? Now? But when I got home from my “Time Away” while my maid cleans, it was gone.

I admit it wasn’t just Gone Gone. Gone Gone would mean I know it was there when I left the house. I vaguely recalled it falling recently in a very Linda Blair kind of way while I was shaving and scaring the shit out of me. I think I took it and decided to put it away until I could nail it up better. I might have. So where would I temporarily store a Mexican Cross, something I have for aesthetic reasons but is still, you know, a Cross? The maid walks in to find me on my hands and knees looking under the sink.

“Something something something?” she asks in Spanish.

“Si!”, I shout as I stand. “Uh, uh... CHRISTO! YAY-SUE!” Anything vaguely Spanish and crosslike. Feliz navidad!

She steps back.

“COMPRENDEZ?” I add, confusing French with Spanish as I often do. “Oui? Oui?”

This wasn’t working so I pointed to the, uh, blank white wall space. I was trying to remain calm to prevent the whole episode from teetering into Twin Peaks territory - incomprehensible dialogue, pretentious symbolism, loony Dennis Hopper. Finally I found the miniature brass coffee cup as proof of the Cross’s existence, holding it up between two fingers as if, in the midst of my outburst, I suddenly thought she’d prefer a tiny espresso instead. “Christos?” I added helpfully once again.

“Si”, she says smiling warily,”I saw it was gone when I got here but I haven’t seen it again. Maybe you put it in a drawer.”

Huh? Perhaps I was imagining subtitles. This was the most English I’d heard her say, well, ever. “Oh. Uh... ok. Merci.”

Rattled but still curious I continued the search in my walk-in closet where I discovered she’d rearranged all my clothes. It was fabulous! Like having my own Gap, like the Life of Joan Collins where her sweaters are immaculately displayed in her closet . Along the first shelf my t-shirts were stacked by color... sweatshirts... sweaters. On the upper shelf were hats. various boxes and finally my... uh-oh. Oops. Could she see that high up? Maybe she saw part of it and thought it was something else... like a prosthetic leg. You can always tell you’re in trouble when the good option involves a prosthetic leg.

Suddenly I got all Nancy Drew and solved The Mystery of the Missing Cross. The Maid decides the Loco Tall Man who smiles alot has a closet resembling an explosion at the Gap. She begins to arrange when suddenly - Dio mio! As she closes my closet door behind her, she spies the Crucifix thinking “My eyes may never heal, but I will not let yours suffer as well, Saint Hazel.” She quickly hides it in her handbag, assuming I’ll never notice.

Sorry, I’m not a “Never Notice” kind of guy. In fact, my reaction wouldn’t encourage sudden confessions - muttering, stilted reenactments of what I’d done that day. She suddenly left to go downstairs to get laundry. Good, yes, in that I wanted my clothes but Bad as a prime opportunity to hide the Loot. Naturally I chose clean clothes.

As soon as she left I poked her handbag. I did not, I solemnly swear, open it up. I stood far away and held one finger out as if I were a five year old girl with a worm. Who knows what I thought would happen, Crosses as a rule don’t tick. Perhaps I thought the purse would explode which would leave evidence needing explanation. As a child we had a Siamese Cat and my favorite game was Rabid Kitty when I fed the cat toothpaste and she’d foam at the mouth while running in circles. I could give Crest to Polly and say she ripped apart the maid’s purse in a fit of, uh. rabidity. At least I’d get my cross back.

Instead I looked and looked and haven’t found it yet. If she did take it, and in some Alternate Universe took it for reasons I’ve invented, I figure “Good for her”. It says it means more to her than it did to me. My appreciation was as a talisman alongside Buddha, African Idols and American Indian Dolls. I also have other crosses which I enjoy as well. Yet to her it might have actually represented Her God, a connection for which I don’t have an ante. She had a mission while my mission, that of bringing proof to her, was done. Two spies pass in the night and the information, the story, the image of what had occurred, is passed like an intricate package between them.

Things find their Place and even if the cross is still nestled somewhere in my apartment , tucked in a drawer, it’s exactly where it should be.

10:15:16 PM    sro home /