“Miss Calderón, as the report I’ve handed in shows, there’s been a noticeable increase in sales out there. I think we’re on target.”
It was after a lengthy discussion of this topic that Ana closed it as she turned to Terrance. “Mr. Wren, I believe we’re ready to hear about our accounts.”
Terrance was visibly nervous. He shifted back and forth on his chair and cleared his throat several times. When he picked up the report to refer to it, he dropped it on the floor. Then, as he bent down to pick it up, he knocked over a glass of water with his elbow. When the water splashed over to the next man, he jumped out of the chair trying to avoid being doused, and as he did this the chair fell over on its back. This caused everyone at the table to move or stand, and in less than a minute Ana’s meeting was in disruption.
She was the only person who had not moved. When Terrance looked over to her, he saw that she was trying to stifle a smile, and after everyone returned to their places, Ana said, “Mr. Wren, is there a hidden camera somewhere in here? I mean, are we filming a comedy?”
Everyone laughed out loud at her remark except Terrance, who was so embarrassed he could hardly speak. After the meeting, he stayed behind to apologize to Ana, and he did so with apprehension because he hadn’t forgotten her harsh manner during his first meeting with her. To his surprise, she was not upset with him. On the contrary, she seemed to have enjoyed the opportunity to poke fun at him, making the others laugh.
When she walked away from the meeting, Ana was also surprised. The irritation and annoyance he had caused her during their first meeting had evaporated, and just as she couldn’t explain her feelings the first time, she now found it impossible to find the reason for her new reaction. She decided to put aside thinking about the matter and went on with her work.
After a while, Ana asked her Chief Accountant to include Terrance in the weekly meetings. Later on, she called on him from time to time, asking for up-dates on certain figures and accounts. He seemed glad to accommodate her wishes, and after some months it got to the point that he could anticipate her next step.
He and Ana began working late in her office, and as time passed this became their daily routine. Whenever she went on a trip to any of the branch factories, Terrance now accompanied her on the plane. Some two years after being hired, he became the employee upon whom she most depended.
I began to feel different during those months, and I could tell that others had noticed. I think it was because I smiled more, or maybe it was because I chatted with the office boys and the elevator conductors. Everyone knew that I had hardly done that before.
But the change in me was real. When I woke up in the morning and slipped out of bed, the first thing I did was to draw the drapes away from the windows. The ocean that I hardly noticed before now gave me a jolt of pleasure each time I glanced at it. Everything around me seemed to become more beautiful each day, and I asked myself why I hadn’t noticed such beauty before.
During the years of Ezra’s illness, and even after his death, my work had become a routine, a mechanical thing that filled up my days. But now I looked forward to stepping out of the elevator to be with the men and women who were my staff, people who had seemed little more than furniture during other times.
I admitted that Terrance was at the heart of what was happening. I was captivated by his sense of humor and the way he was able to transform a column of zeros and fractions, making them not only interesting but charming.
I liked his company, and I was impressed by his intelligence and personality. Sometimes I found myself thinking of his looks because I found him handsome. At those times, however, I forced myself not to think of him that way, and instead I concentrated on his skills as one of my most productive employees. But I slipped often because I felt good noticing that he was engrossed with me, too. I often caught a look of admiration for me reflected in his eyes, and I liked that very much. Sometimes I would unexpectedly look up from whatever I was doing to find him gazing at me with a faint smile that lingered around his lips.
I knew what was happening to me, but whenever a faint voice inside told me that I was getting too close to Terrance, I stifled the idea by telling myself that he was necessary for the operation of the firm. Whenever I was forced to recognize that he was filling most of my thoughts, I rushed to concentrate on other matters. I was able to sweep away the nagging voice this way.
On the way home one evening, Ana was forced to confront her relationship with Terrance. As her driver managed the car through traffic on the Harbor Freeway, she sat back on the leather seat. She reclined her head, eyes closed, as if she had been asleep. But she was thinking. Something had occurred between the two of them that afternoon.
When she opened her eyes, the headlights of the on-coming cars made her blink while she thought of how her body had trembled when Terrance inadvertently touched her hand. A vibration had streaked through her body with a powerful sensation, and she knew that she had not felt anything like it since the times when she had lain with Octavio. The feeling caused by Terrance’s hand so unsettled Ana that she abruptly cut off their work without explanation.
The vehicle sped south as she wrestled with her thoughts. Her mind reached out, hoping to find an explanation, anything that would dispel the confusion she was experiencing. Then she looked out the window, staring at the span of twinkling harbor lights, and she thought of Puerto Real. Suddenly, this image connected with others. The number of years that had passed since she was a girl flashed through her memory, and she remembered that she was old, too old for Terrance. Certainly too old to feel what she thought she felt. Ana closed her eyes as she allowed this realization to seep into her. She forced her mind to concentrate and to let what she had just thought of take root.
Ana suddenly sat up. She thought that she had found the answer. She told herself that she had been mistaken, that she was beyond the age of feeling such things. She leaned back, fixating her mind on this idea. A while passed before she felt the car glide onto the long driveway leading to the carport. By the time the driver stopped the car and opened the door for her, Ana had convinced herself that she had imagined what had happened that afternoon.
The next evening when Terrance came to her office, his arms loaded with reports and papers, Ana felt afraid, but she resisted her fears and reminded herself that she was a professional woman, above such nonsense. She sensed an awkwardness in him, but she nonetheless launched into working until they were reminded of the time by a delivery boy who brought them sandwiches and coffee. After the boy left, Ana decided that they had done enough work, and they went to the coffee table at the far side of the office where they chatted as they ate.
Terrance often told her of his childhood, of his school days and even of his years in college. She liked listening to him because he had a charming way of telling of his experiences. Ana was grateful, especially that evening, for any small talk that might lighten the stiffness that had grown between them with each passing minute.
Instead of his usual lighthearted adventures, however, Terrance began to tell Ana of an unhappy memory in his life. “I remember that sometimes I used to sleep under a sink with my face pressed against a cold pipe. Isn’t that strange, Ana?”
“Under the sink? Are you sure you weren’t playing a game?”
“Hmm. Maybe. The truth is that I can’t remember anything else. I don’t even remember people or things, just the dumb cold water pipe. Sometimes I think that it was just a bad dream.”
Ana was looking at him intently. “I wish I had known you then. I’m old enough, you know.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Nervously changing the subject, Terrance said, “Hey! Did I ever tell you about the first time I got drunk? I was a freshman in college and…”
Again he stopped suddenly and turned to her as he took her hand. She was surprised, but she didn’t resist because she was instantly overcome with emotion. She looked at his face and saw that it was beautiful, and that the vein in his neck had
thickened, and that it was throbbing. Neither of them spoke as they drew closer to one another. She knew what was happening, and although the inner voice tried to scream out to stop, that she was too old for him, that something was wrong, she suppressed it when she felt his lips on hers. She tasted his tongue, and submitted to him.
Ana removed her clothes and watched Terrance as he did the same thing. Then he reached out, cupping her still firm breasts in his hands, and he lowered his face to kiss her neck. She returned his caresses and kisses as she drew him towards her, and when they laid on the carpet, they remained still for a few moments, feeling each other’s body. Then they rolled over each other, tumbling over and over as if wrestling until, almost out of breath, Ana wrapped her legs around his waist and surrendered to his penetration.
The earth was quaking beneath me, and I knew that I had never loved anyone as I did Terrance. My body and mind and heart exploded, catapulting me into a world so sublime and beautiful that all the hatred and anguish that I had tasted vanished, and in its place there was only beauty and pleasure. When I gave myself to him, I forgot everything. I forgot my age, my loneliness, and everyone who had ever entered my life. We were lovers for nearly a year before our happiness ended.
It was raining in Los Angeles that early December morning. Ana and Terrance sat in the airport lounge waiting for his flight to New York; they were checking last minute changes to the report he would be presenting on arrival. She looked happy, serene, and the only thing that disturbed her was that she wasn’t able to go with him because she was scheduled to fly to Houston.
When the announcement was made that his flight was ready for departure, Terrance moved closer to Ana and kissed her lips. He didn’t say anything, but his eyes told her that he loved her. After a few moments, he said, “I’ll return in three days. We’ll spend Christmas in San Francisco.”
She smiled at him and pressed his hand against her cheek. “Buena suerte. I’ll be waiting.”
Terrance took his briefcase and went to the exit where he turned to look at Ana. He smiled again and waved goodbye. As he walked away from her, she moved over to a window where she could see him make his way across the blacktop to the ramp leading up to the plane. She watched him as he pulled his hat down in an attempt to shield his face from the drizzle, and she kept her eyes on him until she saw him climb the steps and disappear into the small entrance of the plane.
Ana remained looking at the plane for a long while. Then her eyes scanned the runway that glistened with the moisture of soft rain, and she smiled as she recalled the days she and Terrance had spent recently in Santo Domingo. As she watched the plane begin to move, she remembered the tropical sun on her face and the emerald-colored water that had transported her back to where she had been born. She, with Terrance by her side, had lived the most beautiful days of her life on the island where, for the first time, she had felt free. They had passed days in which they danced, loved and conversed.
Ana returned to her office later that day and she worked without stopping for lunch. She dictated several letters, received representatives from competing firms, and met with three plant managers. As the sky began to darken, she noticed that it was still raining, and she paused for a few minutes for a cup of coffee. Terrance was on her mind.
When her secretary walked in with the evening newspaper, Ana was startled by the shocked expression on the woman’s face. Ana stared at her for a few moments, and then without saying a word, she took the folded newspaper and spread it out on the coffee table.
Jet airliner en route to New York goes down in snowy Iowa corn field. All aboard perish.
Ana looked at the secretary, trying to find a contradiction on her face of what the newspaper was telling. But the expression that she saw was a confirmation, not a denial. Ana was stunned, and she refused to accept what her mind was beginning to tell her. She rushed to the desk where she fumbled clumsily, scattering papers onto the floor while looking for her reading glasses. When she finally found them, she dashed back to the newspaper and scanned the report. Her index finger slid down the center of the fine print as she mumbled out the name of the airline, the flight number, its place of departure, its scheduled place of arrival.
The details confirmed that Terrance was dead, but still Ana resisted. She looked first at the secretary’s blanched face, then back at the newspaper. The headlines leaped from the newsprint, wrapping themselves around her throat. She began to choke, to suffocate. Breathing became difficult. A throbbing began in her head; initially it was a dim, dull pulsation, then it expanded, growing, enlarging, until she felt that the pounding would destroy her brain and kill her. She raised her hands to her head in an attempt to relieve the pain.
“Miss Calderón, maybe you ought to lie down…here…”
“Please leave me. Please! Nothing more. No calls…no one…Please!”
The woman left the room and closed the door silently, leaving Ana with her hands clutched to her head. When she was alone, she felt that her body was losing strength. She had no control over it as it inertly fell to the floor. There she rolled into a tight, round ball, knees tucked under her chin.
My hands and forearms would not let go of my head. Flashes of my short time with Terrance blurred with those of my childhood and with the memory of my father’s curse. I understood that the pain I was now feeling was greater than the punishment inflicted on me by his fists, and that it surpassed even his hatred. This thought forced my mind to stop, to look around and to remember that I had once before experienced an agony equal to this one when Octavio had wrenched Ismael away from me.
The distant ringing repeated, four times, five times. A voice interrupted the sixth ring. “Hello.”
“Mr. Wren?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Wren, I’m calling from Los Angeles. My name is Ana Calderón. Do you know of me?”
During the seconds of silence that followed, Ana could hear distant voices crisscrossing, mixing, blending on the line. She could also hear the man’s breathing at the other end.
“Yes, Miss Calderón. Our son spoke often of you, of his work and of Los Angeles. But especially of you. He wanted us to meet you soon.”
She felt her throat on the verge of exploding. She had not allowed herself to weep, but she knew that sooner or later she would have to cry, if only to relieve the pressure that was growing in her chest.
“Yes…thank you. I’m calling to extend my condolences to you and Mrs. Wren. I’m also at your service. I mean…if there’s anything I can do for you.” After a long pause, she added, “How is Mrs. Wren?”
The man sighed deeply, but his voice was steady. “She’s having a hard time. He was everything to us.”
Ana wanted to tell him that Terrance had been everything for her as well, but instead she said, “I would like to accompany you and your wife at this time.”
“And we want you to be with us. We’ve decided to have a simple graveside service with only the people closest to Terrance and to us. You’re one of them, of course. I’ll notify you as soon as the time and place is settled.”
Ana was listening keenly. There was one more thing she needed to ask. “Mr. Wren, what about his body?”
“It’s en route at this moment. My wife and I will be at the airport to receive it.”
“Thank you. I’ll wait for your call.” Ana returned the telephone receiver to its cradle. She was home; she was alone because she had instructed her staff to leave and not to return until she called them. She walked out to the front terrace, where she stood gazing vacantly at the ocean; it was a massive sheet of grayish slate. She stood for a long while in the drizzling rain, feeling its moisture chilling her burning skin.
Two days later at the airport in San Francisco, Ana walked over to the waiting car after leaving her plane. She was dressed in a plain black woolen suit and a small hat that curved down shading her eyes. As she slid onto the stuffed leather seat, she asked the driver if he knew his way to the cemetery. When he affirmed that he did, s
he sat back and closed her eyes. She had not slept since the news of the plane crash, nor had she been able to eat, and she had not reported to her office. Isolation was the only way she could deal with her grief.
The rain had stopped, giving way to dense fog as the limousine approached the inner area of the cemetery. The car glided slowly up to the grassy knoll where the gatekeeper had directed them, to where Ana saw a small group of people. They were dressed in black, and they huddled around the coffin which had been placed on a bier. The vehicle was still moving, but her eyes were riveted on the box piled high with flowers.
The car slid up to the curb and stopped. The driver walked around to open the door for Ana, who was already scanning the group, trying to identify Terrance’s parents. Her attention was caught by a tall man wearing metal-rimmed glasses, and next to him stood a woman whose face, which was sad but composed, told Ana that she was Terrance’s mother.
Ana got out of the car and moved toward the mourners, who had already seen her and seemed to be waiting to greet her. She found walking difficult because the heels of her shoes sank into the moist sod with each step. But as she approached the Wrens, she put out her hands to greet them. No one said anything because they understood that they shared the same loss. It wasn’t until moments later that Mr. Wren spoke to Ana.
“We thank you for being with us today. It means a lot to the both of us.”
She managed a weak nod in recognition of his words, and she was grateful when the minister asked them to take a seat in front of the coffin so that he could begin the service. As he read from the Bible, Ana’s mind drifted back to the chicken ranch and she saw Amy reading from the book with black covers, her face illuminated by the bluish light cast by the kerosene lamp. When Ana’s attention returned to the present, the minister was reading a psalm that told that no one need fear because, like the shepherd who seeks out the lost sheep, the Lord will come to the rescue.
The Memories of Ana Calderón Page 21