I couldn’t help but smiling at him before stepping in the doorway.
Chapter 13: Valentina
To Leonor and Josefina’s deep consternation I had been the one who had helped dress them before they left on their visit with Analisa Herdez Penalver. Since I was the only female servant in the Big House at the moment, they had little choice but to put up with my evil eyes. Their own eyes darted nervously all over their bedrooms like spiders trying to get away from an attacking shoe.
As Leonor and Josefina Sevilla stepped onto the open carriage, I handed them their parasols so they could protect their light skin from the sun. Their class was obsessed with looking European and that meant staying away from dark coloring like mine. They believed that brown skin belonged to the savages of the land and not the civilized aristocrats. According to them, the less indigenous blood running through the veins, the more superior human beings were. Once the carriage disappeared in the distance, I turned around to return to the Big House. I didn’t expect to come face to face with Lucio who had stepped behind me so quietly that I hadn’t heard him.
“Hi,” he said, smiling that easy smile of his.
“Good morning,” I returned, trying to get my bearings back with the surprise of suddenly seeing him.
He bent down and in one swoop, picked the brightest purple flower growing in a small batch on the ground. He stood up and handed it to me with a grin. “This is for you.”
I stared at his hand without making any movement towards the violet. “For me?”
“Take it, please,” he said.
“Why would you be giving me flowers?”
“Why can’t you just take it?”
“Lucio, you can’t be giving me things. It isn’t allowed.”
“Who says?”
“Your parents,” I stated, frowning.
“But—“
“I’ve got to get back in the house to finish my work,” I mumbled as I swiftly turned around without taking the flower.
“Valentina—“
“Good bye,” I uttered as I rushed to the door.
Once inside, I took deep breaths in and out. It was a good thing no one paid attention to me because it was a while before I could normalize my basic functions. I hated being so fluttery and jittery, but it seemed I had finally solved the mystery behind the flowers in my paths.
The next time I found flowers on my way home, I left them on the ground.
The next day while serving the tender chicken in special chipotle sauce I had helped my mother make, I took extra care not to look at Lucio. I didn’t glance at him even once, but I could feel his eyes on me. I nervously tried to concentrate on what I was doing. The whole family was seated at the long, dark, reddish-brown dining table for dinner. It would be unfathomable but not a bad fantasy for me to spill anything on them.
“The Orozcos have invited us to their hacienda. I think we should go,” announced Don Clemencio.
Doña Clotilde fervently shook her head. “I don’t want to associate with those people.”
“But Clotilde,” Don Clemencio said, exasperated, “What’s wrong with them?”
“They’re new money.”
“Yes, but they’ve got lots of it. It’s always good to keep the door open to those with money. It’s good business.”
“I hear things,” explained Doña Clotilde.
“Like what?”
“That Mrs. Orozco’s mother is a full blooded Taruhmara.”
“An Indian?” asked Don Clemencio with distaste.
“Yes.”
“They keep it well hidden.”
“I would think so.”
As I poured Don Clemencio his coffee, Lucio’s eyes kept steadily on me, and I grimaced.
“Children,” Doña Clotilde stated, “I’m going to tell you again. I don’t want you to associate with the Orozco children.”
“We don’t, Mama,” Josefina assured.
“I don’t see what would be wrong with it,” Lucio interjected.
“Son,” Don Clemencio stated with frustration, “why do you always fight us on matters of propriety?”
“I just don’t see why we have to have social classes.”
“We have to have them, my son,” Doña Clotilde explained, “or how would we keep things civilized?”
“Civilized?”
“Yes, civilized,” declared Don Clemencio. “We have to keep a tight control of this land or the savages will take over.”
“Savages? But—“
“Lucio, that’s enough,” chastised Don Clemencio.
“My son, you have to live up to your heritage,” announced Doña Clotilde. “Don’t forget you are a Sevilla Landa. Your bloodlines are pure from both sides of the family—from the Sevilla one and mine, the Landa, too. They go back to the best families in Madrid.”
“Why is that important?” Lucio questioned.
“Why can’t you be proud of who you are?” Don Clemencio blurted gruffly.
“I just don’t see why I should be proud of something I was born with and didn’t earn.”
“That’s enough,” demanded a furious Don Clemencio.
“Stop upsetting your father,” Doña Clotilde expressed. “Let’s have dinner in peace.”
Chapter 14: Valentina
Leonor and Josefina had many friends, many young girls who would visit. Anyone would think that they were popular but the truth was that it was their brother who was the sought after one. The giggly friends lost their breaths when they were close to Lucio, their eyelashes fluttering and eyes shining on him.
What a life, I would think. To have nothing better to do than to try to capture a boy’s attention.
Lucio would politely talk to these girls for very short periods and then leave outside with his childhood companion Leonardo. The girls would be left with deep scowls on their faces while the Sevilla sisters would be scorning them for the change in their friends’ attitudes. Leonor and Josefina didn’t like playing second fiddle to their brother.
“I don’t think any of those silly girls has won the young Lucio’s heart,” my mother would say.
“I would hope not. They strut around like peacocks.”
“He’s got some time to decide who he wants to marry.”
“Maybe it won’t be a society girl.”
“It has to be one,” my mother insisted. “His parents would never allow otherwise. They’d sooner eat mud and live with pigs than have a daughter-in-law not of their class.”
“But he doesn’t seem to be interested in any of them,” I commented.
“He’ll have to pick one of them someday.”
The girls continued coming with their best dresses and adoring stares, and Lucio kept ignoring them. Lucio’s sisters finally angrily confronted him.
“Don’t you like any of our friends?” asked Leonor.
“No,” Lucio answered simply as he gave me a quick glance while I was dusting the furniture in the living room area where all of us were at.
“Why not?” Josefina asked defensively.
“They talk too much.”
“What?” blurted Leonor. “What are you saying?”
“Those girls talk and talk about nothing.”
“What do you mean they talk about nothing?” asked Leonor. “We talk about everything.”
“You talk about nothing important.”
“Lucio—“
“Leave your brother alone,” interjected Don Clemencio with a chuckle as he stepped into the room. “He’s got many refined young ladies to choose from.”
“But, Papa, he should choose among our friends.”
“There are too many girls of good lineage around for him to limit himself. Even the mayor’s daughter is interested in him, “ Don Clemencio announced proudly. “Son, you take your time in choosing.”
Chapter 15: Valentina
“Why do you ignore me?” asked Lucio one day when I was in the dairy milking one of the cows.
It was the day after his sixteenth birthday.
“Excuse me?” I said, startled by his sudden presence.
“You ignore me.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, my hands still on the cow’s teats but not pulling the milk away from them. “I don’t ignore you.”
“You do.”
“I don’t.”
“You don’t give me your full attention, Valentina,” he stated, sulking.
“You get attention from everyone around you. You don’t need it from me.”
“But I want it from you.”
“I’ve got work to do. You don’t expect me to neglect the cow, do you? Poor cow.”
“I could help you.”
I fervently shook my head. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Are you crazy? What would your parents say? Their high class heads would explode if they saw you doing farm work,” I stated as I went back to milking Matilde.
“My parents,” he frowned.
“Yes, your parents,” I stated strongly.
“I don’t care about what they think, but I care about what you think.”
“What?” I asked, stopping the milking to turn to him.
“And I’m tired of making myself stay away from you.”
“Making yourself stay away from me?”
He looked intently at me. “You do like me, don’t you?”
“Lucio,” I said, frowning. “We shouldn’t be having this conversation.”
“It’s about time we did.”
“The cow's milk is going to turn sour with all this silliness.”
He ignored me, his eyes sitting firmly on mine. “You like me, right?”
“I have to like you,” I answered, exasperated. “You saved my life, didn’t you?”
“You don’t owe me anything,” Lucio stated.
“Yes, I do.”
“No, you don’t,” he insisted. “And forget about the river. If you like me then you’ve got to like me for me—not for anything I did.”
“I guess I do like you,” I said with clumsy hesitation.
“You do?” he asked, pleased.
“Maybe.”
“Tina,” he said as a shout was heard from the outside and at a distance. His father’s voice bellowed Lucio’s name. “I—“
“You’d better go to your father.”
“But—“
“Just go.”
He solemnly nodded. “I’ll see you later, Tina,” he threw out as he headed outside.
As soon as the dairy door shut, I stared after him, unable to get back to work. When Matilde mooed, I finally snapped out of my stupor. Had he really said he was tired of staying away from me? And I didn’t even mind that he had shortened my name to Tina. It sounded like a pretty song in his mouth. He made me feel attractive, even with my simple cotton long skirt and white blouse. Having been a very skinny child, I was still trying to get used to the recent and sudden development of my body into a woman’s figure with ample bosoms, voluptuous hips, and a waist that cinched in. The girl in me was moving quickly into womanhood—in more ways than one.
Chapter 16: Valentina
This game that Lucio and I played with the flowers and him popping out of nowhere to talk to me went on without me trying to stop it anymore. We never talked about the gifts he left me on the ground, the secrets of our friendship locked deep inside of us. Even though I started picking up the flowers again, I made sure no one saw me do it. If his parents had known about us, they would’ve been inconsolable and so would’ve mine for that matter. The different classes just didn’t mix.
Ever since the conquistadores had arrived on these lands, they brought their evil ideas of superiority with them. Of course, they also created a new people—Mestizos when they took the indigenous woman. And nothing was ever the same with their destructive attitudes and wicked words permeating the air!
Dirty place.
Dirty savages.
Dirty blood.
Stained land and people.
Even when we had won independence from Spain, these evil ideas of our inferiority lingered and sucked out our humanity like slimy parasites sucking blood from vulnerable skin. The idea of European superiority reigned with Porfirio Diaz pouring white powder on his face to look lighter and the lines of social classes being clearly marked. Hierarchy. European born people were supposedly the most superior. People of European parents but born in Mexico were said to be inferior, manchados de la tierra. They were considered to be soiled by the land even though they were still exalted as better than the natives. God forbid any person be tainted with any indigenous blood!
Sangre Sucia.
This idea made my own blood boil! How can a person have dirty blood because of who they were? Why was the blood of the Europeans pure and sanctified by God only because of who they were? There were even certain priests who believed and participated in this colossal lie.
I would try to forget that Lucio was part of an evil world, but I was often reminded of our differences.
“He’s rich and you’re poor,” Leonardo, Lucio’s childhood companion, told me as I stared after Lucio who was riding his horse in the corral.
“What?” I asked, taken by surprise.
“You like him,” he said with distaste, the hard angles of his face becoming harsher.
“What are you talking about?”
“He’s rich and you’re poor. Can’t you see that you’ll never be good enough for his family? Wake up!”
I stared at him open mouthed, not used to him speaking. A morose Leonardo rarely said a word. As the nephew of Mr. Velasquez, a cruel man who thought himself way above the rest of us campesinos just because he managed the hacienda and kissed up to the owner, Leonardo was part of an arrogant family. Even though neither he nor any Velasquez was allowed on the same level as the aristocrats, they still acted as if the world should be at their feet—Leonardo with his grumpy silences and tactless words and his cousins with their sneering snipes.
“I don’t like Lucio,” I snapped, finding my words.
“You stare at him like a pig seeing its first slop of the day.”
“I don’t!”
“You do,” he stated, the dark-brown of his hair and eyes seemed to be getting darker. “It’s disgusting.”
“I like horses,” I insisted.
“But—“
“You don’t know anything about me,” I blurted angrily.
“I wasn’t trying to—“
“Bye,” I threw out as I rushed away. I didn’t need an uppity servant who was only a few notches above me on the food chain to fling insults in my face. He might’ve been related to the capataz, but he was still a servant like me—no matter how high and mighty his family and he thought they were.
Chapter 17: Valentina
I don’t know what is about my birthdays but ever since I survived being born on a scorching, miserable day, my days of birth have always been eventful. Something always happens. Maybe because I expect it or maybe it’s an act of the heavens. I don’t know. But my fifteenth birthday proved to be no different even if the day started calm and seemingly ordinary.
I went to work at the hacienda as I usually did, cleaning up after Leonor and Josefina. Their fear of my evil eyes was still evident after all these years as they pretended I didn’t exist. Completely ignored, I swept their palace-like rooms while they gossiped about who was doing what. I tried to tune them out but found it impossible to shut out their loud observations.
“Claudio Bernal had already declared his love for Analisa,” Leonor scoffed as she lay on a four-poster bed, the darkness of the reddish wood contrasting with the shiny tones of the pink silk cover.
“Analisa will be stupid to hold him to it,” stated Josefina from the vanity table that matched the wood of the bed, where she sat on an ornate chair in front of a mirror and stared at herself. “Am I getting darker?” she questioned, concerned.
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Josefina had been born with a slightly darker skin tone than Leonor, who was very fair. Asking that question at least once a week, Josefina frustrated her sister.
Leonor rolled her eyes. “No!”
“Are you sure? I think I look darker.”
“Josefina,” Leonor said, exasperated, “you look the same. Stop asking me! I’m tired of your wild imagination.”
“I’m just trying to stay pretty,” Josefina stated, hurt.
“Analisa needs to come to terms with her situation,” Leonor declared, going back to the previous conversation and ignoring her pouting sister.
“Claudio can’t be expected to still love her.”
“He’s not going to marry her.”
“Of course not.”
“He told her he loved her before he knew . . .”
“Before he knew her predicament,” chortled Josefina.
“Honestly, how can Analisa expect him to want her now?”
“All her family has left is their good name.”
Leonor nodded vehemently. “I hear that they are in complete ruins. After Analisa’s father gambled away the family fortune, nothing is left.”
“Not even a dowry for Analisa.”
“It must be horrible to be on everybody’s tongue,” stated Leonor.
“Everybody knows about them. How humiliating.”
Josefina shook her head. “Analisa will never be able to live it down.”
“Or make a good match for a marriage. They say that Federico Ramos is going to ask for her hand in marriage.”
“He’s our father’s age,” Leonor blurted, horrified.
“But he’s very wealthy and is willing to take her without a dowry,” stated Josefina.
“Still—ugh!”
“He’ll save the family from ruin.”
Leonor shook her head. “I guess Analisa is lucky he’s stepping in, but I’m glad our father isn’t a gambler.”
“Nothing like that will ever happen to us,” affirmed Leonor.
Having finally finished my housework, I swiftly stepped out of the bedroom. Their frivolous conversation still pounded in my ears. While people like me worried about having enough to eat, money for doctors, and a life around the selfish needs of people like them, they filled their unoccupied minds and hearts with: Who’s saying what? Is what we own the best there is? Does everyone know how important we are?
I shook my head as I made it to the outside, relieved to be in the company of animals. They might’ve needed care, but they always seemed to appreciate it. I went towards the stables and could see from an open door that Lucio’s dour childhood mate, Leonardo, was feeding the horses. After the conversation when he had thrown in my face that someone like me didn’t belong with a person of Lucio’s class, I tried to avoid any exchange of words with him, but my parents had taught me manners.
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