—Matthew twenty-two, verses thirty-seven to thirty-eight. The lady looked up from her Bible. —Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.

—I do love God.

—And the second is, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

—If you met my neighbors, you would know they are hard to love. They blast the music and piss in the elevators. It’s hard to love people like that.

—Do not judge and you will not be judged. That white man is not your neighbor. You don’t judge him, but you judge the people around you.

—I’m not judging.

—Second Corinthians five, verse seven. We know things are true by believing, not by seeing. God bless you, child, she said to Esperanza as she exited the train.

We know what’s true by believing, not by seeing. What did that mean? Esperanza did see Bobby Ewing. But no one would believe her.

Maybe Bobby Ewing had been on the train before and she hadn’t looked up to notice.

Who were her neighbors? Did she judge them? She noticed a woman with the look of new love, smiling to herself, feasting on a recent memory. And she envied that look of anticipation and longing. Why hadn’t she seen that before? She envied the children looking up at the signs, captivated by any new word or image. She envied the guy drinking his cup of coffee, listening to the small radio by his ear and laughing to himself. Why did she think that everyone around her was miserable? Maybe she was the one who was miserable. Maybe she was the one without hope. She should’ve taken the autograph from Patrick Duffy. Something to prove their meeting.

Bobby Ewing wasn’t as handsome as Esperanza imagined. Seeing him changed everything. She wasn’t going to Dallas, or California for that matter. Over sixteen years in Nueva York, hoping to live her dream, and suddenly someone turned on the lights and she was awake. What had she been waiting for? Did she really think a man like Bobby would knock on her door and sweep her off her feet? Or that she would wake up one day and Santo would be by her side again? If she didn’t pay those damn credit cards, she wasn’t ever going to own anything but the shoes on her feet. When Santo died, she had been warned by the financial adviser that it would take thirty years to pay off the cards. It had now been six years since then, and she had hardly made a dent.

Instead of going straight home, she went to the credit union.

—Señora Esperanza Colón, said the same man who had helped her before. He was no longer in college, but a professional with a degree, who recognized her from the building his mother lived in.

—You have to help me. If I don’t pay these bills, I can’t get a loan, I can’t buy anything. I work and work. I have no retirement plan. I’m not getting any younger.