Yolanda lowered one sandaled foot down on the top stair. She gathered up her skirt and held it high in front of her. She went sideways, right foot down, right foot down, reaching out to grab the edge of floor. She let out a deep breath and squeezed through the hole.
She cursed as she switched her grip to the railing and step by slow step, reached bottom. She felt around for the lantern on the wall. Once the wick had been lit she could see the wooden cases, beer caps gleaming in the lamplight.
Javier had been a selfish cabron, stingy and dull. The beautiful table and chairs, their bed, all that he made for their home was because he refused to buy them. God had blessed his hands with great talent in carpentry and for that, Yolanda was grateful.
Such sensitive hands, she thought, that could feel the beauty of grain and of texture and shape, yet never learned how to pleasure a woman.
Yet there were times that she thought of him with fondness and wondered if it wouldn't be nice to have a week--no, just a day--with him back.
She pulled out a bottle, hesitated, and though the day was dwindling into evening and she'd done little but sit on the porch stringing hot peppers all day, she pulled out another.
There were the green ones of course, but the red jalapeños and the orange habañeros were the real devils of Yolanda's garden. They snickered with heat, for even as they covered the bushes as tiny white blossoms they had been courted first by the bees which then spread the fiery pollen back to the bells and the milder bananas.
That's how it happened sometimes.