13
On the day she receives the first installment she feels happier than when she saw her name on the list of students accepted into the university. She’d made it onto the list, in part, out of luck: by using the same strategy on that test as she had on the one the ministry made all students take when they graduated from state school, private school, and international school: she started with the questions she knew and then selected answers to the ones she didn’t know, which was most of them, at random. The first few she chose by singing Tin, marín, de do, pingüé, cúcara, mátara, títere fue, yo no fui, fue teté, pégale, pégale que esta fue, but then she had to come up with a faster form of happenstance—the time left on the test was passing too quickly, like city time. Though it wasn’t the largest or briskest city in the world, it was far more hurried than where she used to live. Night would fall when she least expected it, and she’d find she hadn’t managed to finish anything she’d set out to do. And night sped past, like water. She hadn’t any time to rest.
Mornings were also a challenge because the sun didn’t shine on her face like it did at home, and she wasn’t roused by the fussing of chickens or people passing by, lunch slung over their shoulders, on their way to the hills to sow the land or take their beasts out to pasture. This meant she was always late to class, though that was also because she hadn’t been able to sign up for any convenient time slots: she didn’t know that students spent all night glued to their computer screens, waiting for the moment the system opened, so they could enroll for the classes taught by the best professors or in the least grueling groups. She went up to the student assistance center in the late afternoon seeking help, because she couldn’t manage on the computer she’d been lent where she was staying. So they enrolled her for what little was left: classes with several idle hours between them, laboratory sessions on the days she’d planned to visit her mom, subjects everyone avoided like the plague, and classrooms that were a long way away from each other and easy to mix up. If she walked into a class that wasn’t part of her major or her year, she couldn’t tell: she didn’t even understand what went on in the classes that were. Everything was new to her, practically in another language. The señora whose house she lived in said it was like that for everyone, but the girl didn’t think that was true because she’d see plenty of her classmates nodding along as if it were all familiar, or even obvious. At the end of the sessions, they joked about the syllabus, just as they had at the admissions test. Unlike her, they’d answered every question painlessly and left before too long. They said things like, I was expecting it to be hard, I heard it was impossible to pass, or, I thought they were teasing me. She thought they were teasing her. The truth was, they didn’t have eyes for her, but only for those who, when the grades were announced, had done as well as they had or better. They were on the lookout for new partners for their study groups, as well as for the homework assignments they didn’t share with their private-school friends or that they couldn’t work on together. They’d spot their equals and approach them before anyone else had a chance to. They knew what they wanted to achieve and who would help them get there. They didn’t have eyes for her or for the girls who’d soon become her friends. If they did notice one of them, it was because she’d gotten a really low grade, which gave them something to talk about. No one understood how a person could do so poorly on a test as easy as the one they’d just taken, a test you didn’t even have to study for: any assignment they’d done at their private school had been harder. They thought the admissions system must have failed in some way. It just couldn’t be that such a low performer had been accepted into the same place and the same courses as them when some of their schoolmates hadn’t gotten into that university or their first-choice schools. They’d have to do a year at another university that didn’t interest them but would let them transfer to one that did, because of the degree-change process, which was much more straightforward than trying to transfer credits from another university. They were sure they were far more deserving than the girls who got low grades and who they knew would soon abandon their degrees and drop out of university.
They never formed groups with them. Nor did they lend them notebooks or waste any time chatting with them. Years later, when they interned with one of them and realized she was interesting and more adept than they were, they would claim they’d never seen her before, that it was impossible to keep track of every first-year student, that the assigned lecture halls weren’t conducive to budding friendships, and that they wished they’d met her earlier. But now, which is to say back then, they pretend not to see her. They avoid any situation in which these girls might come up to them and ask a question or have them explain something. They don’t mean to be rude, it’s just that they don’t have any time for them. The coursework piles up quickly. In just a few days, a mountain of papers has grown on her desk. She’s never read so much in her life, or understood so little of what’s printed on the page. But she isn’t overly concerned: she doesn’t think they’ll ask her anything that hasn’t been covered in class. She continues to believe that things will be just as they were in high school—that is, until she’s given her first assessment and some time to answer it. She doesn’t even understand the question. Later, her classmates will tell her it was in the booklet. She’ll look it up and find it on the page they’d said it was on and cry, because even though she’d gone over those lines several times, she’d neither caught their significance nor managed to recall them. Her anguish will grow when she hears that the first test was the easiest, a welcoming gift from the professor to keep them from losing hope, a bridge between what they’d learned at state school and private school and what they’d soon learn from him.
The teaching assistant tells her not to feel bad: she wasn’t the only one to fail. She shouldn’t feel jealous either: many of the high scorers were taking the class for the second or third time. She just has to focus, change her study methods, and persist, fight until the very last and for every decimal point. Every point counts. He swears it. He’s never had to fight that battle himself, but he’s seen others fight it and win. He’ll help her if she wants, just not all the time or every second she needs it. He has a lot of people to see to and is constantly busy. Plus he has other classes to attend and his own exams to study for. The best time to catch him is at the end of the day. Or so she was told by a girl who was taking that course for the third time. She also told her where he parked his car. The best moment to intercept him was when he was on his way there, but you had to pretend so he wouldn’t think he was being hounded, which he was, or mistake it for some other sort of harassment. Her best option would be to sit someplace nearby with her book so that he would spot her and stop and smile, and say it was great to see she was still revising and ask if she had any questions about class that day and offer to help her understand, then invite her to come to his office during working hours and say he’d give her priority because he could tell she was interested and making an effort, and promise to see her no matter how long the line was. She also shouldn’t show up there every day. If she did, he’d tell her she had to manage on her own and learn to have confidence in what she did, that she wouldn’t get ahead if she were constantly using him as a crutch. What would she do, in future, when the courses she took were more demanding? She wasn’t sure. The only future that interested her right then was her future with that class. She had a handle on the rest of them. A pity they wouldn’t be much use in her degree. Those courses were mostly for people who wanted to switch degrees, he said. It made the process easier and ensured they didn’t arrive at their new destinations empty-handed. The girl taking the class for the third time said there’d be other opportunities if she didn’t manage it that time around, that she mustn’t lose hope. She hasn’t herself. She ought to follow her example. And her advice, too: she knows what they’ll want from them and what questions they’ll ask. It’s the same each year. She feels like she’s living a permanent déjà vu. That’s a French term. She doesn’t s
peak it, French, but she knows that term. For a second, she’d been excited and had thought she could ask her for help writing her sister in France. Now she was living closer to the organization she should’ve been going there often and asking the interpreter for help, but the fact was, she hadn’t the time. Her day started before the organization opened and ended after it closed. She’d considered going in a free period between classes, but she preferred to make headway with her reading, even though she didn’t retain any of it. Sometimes she also fell asleep under a tree, not on purpose, but because she was beaten down by the strain of studying and living somewhere new. What’s more, she still hadn’t gotten her bearings. The times she’d gone there before, it was led by her mother’s hand. She’d never taken the care to commit the route to memory. As soon as they were on the bus, she would fall asleep. Her mother would wake her when they arrived at the bus terminal, then take her onto the next bus, which brought them closer to their destination, and tug at her shirt when they were about to reach their stop so she’d collect her things with enough time to calmly make it to the door. She knew that if she moved too quickly she might fall. She’d always had trouble with balance. She was fearless when it came to crossing streets that frightened even her mother, but struggled to stay on her feet when the vehicle was moving. She had to cling on to the rails or seats to keep from falling on her knees, as if in prayer, or face-first. Which is why her mom would always get off one stop earlier, where the ground was more even. Even though they’d have to walk farther, it kept her from falling, scraping her knees, ruining her pants. It was no easy task getting hold of a pair that were to the daughter’s taste and within the mother’s budget. She had to take terribly good care of them. Which also meant watching her weight. Gaining too much meant she’d force the fabric and wear it out faster. This had happened with her first pair. While standing in line on some university errand, she’d heard a ripping sound between her legs. To keep it from getting worse, she’d refused to take a seat when her turn came. The clerk thought it impolite. The kids were always pestering her to see them more quickly than she could manage. They got annoyed. They said nasty things. Complained. They expressed their displeasure in gestures or hostile tones. She’d like to see how they would do in a position like hers. She bet they couldn’t muster even a fraction of her patience, whether with a person like themselves or somebody worse, because there was always someone worse. They wouldn’t make it through the day, much less the years she’d spent working at that office. And when they grew up, they’d forget their impertinence and greet her as if they’d been as sweet as could be. Others would spend the rest of their lives ignoring her, thinking too highly of themselves to address a plain old employee in public. And, to be frank, she wouldn’t remember them either. If they greeted her, she’d respond politely and, if she sensed some affection, would pretend to remember them as if they couldn’t be more different from all the identical people who showed up there every hour of every day of every year, always wanting her help with predicaments they got themselves into by not reading the instructions in the booklet included in the university’s welcome package.
It seemed odd for someone like her to behave like that. At first glance, she seemed like a simple girl, though her haircut was more stylish than those of the other girls who went to that university. She dressed—and moved and spoke, too—like a country girl. Maybe she’d become stuck-up through contact with the city, and in record time. At any rate, it wasn’t her problem. She’d just give her what she wanted, along with instructions on the next step in the process, though that, too, was included in the documents she was handing her. The girl thanked her, wished her a nice day, and walked away as rigidly as she could so her pants wouldn’t rip completely before she got home. She didn’t stick around to chat with her new girlfriends or stop to ask the teacher’s assistant for some help with the things that were still unclear and would keep her from making progress with that week’s topic. She went straight home to take stock of the damage and try to mend it. But it was more than she could darn by hand with a medium-sized needle and cheap market thread, and more than a professional sewing machine could salvage. She’d have to cut, pin, and sew it, to piece everything together again. But if she managed to, they’d only fit a slimmer body. Maybe one of her little sisters. But never her. Even if she shed all the weight she’d gained, she’d never be as slight as she had been in high school or as her mother was back when she fought in the mountains, eating only the handful of cooked beans they served at camp, or the flour mixed with sugar that she carried in a little pouch in her backpack in case duty or combat kept her away when her body needed food to stay upright.
She did her best to mend them so that, when her mom demanded an explanation, she’d say it was all right, even though she later told her to be more careful with her clothes and reminded her how to wash, dry, and iron them to make them last longer. And also so that she’d understand why she’d used a portion of the first installment of her stipend to buy the replacement pants that became the object of her sisters’ praise and envy when she visited.
14
Just a few months ago, none of the girls had any intention of continuing their education. The girl who’s now at university wasn’t even going to class. Instead, she ambled with her friends through the village, the hills, around the bay, through nearby towns. She was mad because her mom had said she couldn’t pay for university, not even a state one. Even though people said it cost nothing at all, it was too much for her. You had to factor in the cost of travel there and back, packed lunches, the water she’d have to purchase from time to time since she couldn’t take it from the village well, where, though different from the stuff in TV ads, it was free and always available. Then there were the notebooks, the pencils that were too easily lost, the countless assigned booklets, no matter what her degree, and the books that got more expensive depending on the major. She hadn’t taken into account the cost of clothing because it had never mattered much to her, though she had considered the wear and tear on her shoes. It was too much money. She couldn’t allocate their entire family budget to a single end. The other girls had to eat and go to school. She’d never had to worry about toys because they were always being given them by people and churches, and they could make their own if need be, or simply entertain themselves. At their age, there was fun to be had with anything. But the matter of their eyes did concern her: she’d been told all her girls needed glasses. She hadn’t even managed to purchase a pair for her eldest daughter, who, though married and no longer under her roof, was her daughter nonetheless. She felt she owed it to her even though she’d said not to worry, she didn’t need them, she could see just fine and get by without, just as she had until then. Her littlest one needed them most urgently. She always had to sit in the front row to see what the teacher scribbled on the chalkboard and sometimes had to get up to double-check. The teacher scolded her for it. She’d tell her to behave herself in the classroom and sit down. To her mother, she’d say that the girl was too restless and stubborn: she had to repeat the same thing to her every day. Was she like this at home, too? No, she was a very obedient child. A bit clumsy, sure (she was always bashing into doors and furniture), but well behaved. Her sisters could corroborate it, and even took advantage of it. They sent her hither and thither and sometimes even got her to do their chores because the little girl never saw any ill will in anybody. Which was a lovely quality for now, but one her mother feared might bring her problems in the future. If, after a certain age, the girl was still as naive and trusting as she was now, she’d take the necessary measures to protect her, lest she go off with any old person and end up raped or kidnapped. She took after her father, whom everybody but her daughters thought charming. They never liked it when he came to visit or stayed the night. When they found out they were having a sister by him, they were upset. They didn’t want another girl. They had enough on their hands with the lost one, who proved a fierce rival for their mother’s attentions. They thought the new one
might serve as an excuse for this man they didn’t like to move in indefinitely, take their father’s place, and make them call him Dad.
But this didn’t happen because as soon as he found out their mom was pregnant, he vanished. He moved to another country with a girlfriend from another town. He wasn’t around when the doctors at the nearest hospital told her it had died inside her, then went to see to another woman. They left her waiting on the operating table for someone to come and dismember the body and remove its parts, and that’s where she gave birth. With no one to help her, in a place full of people who could have.
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