by Niyati Keni
Suelita stepped forward now too, and I felt the warm skin of her arm brush mine as she turned to Benny. ‘I hear you painted half of it,’ she said. He moved to stand beside her and they fell easily into conversation, their voices soft as though for privacy while they discussed brushstrokes, chiaroscuro. His long fingers played in the air as he pointed out one figure or another. Suelita, watching his hands, smiled to herself. I cleared my throat heavily. They paused and she turned to me, frowning as she took in my injuries afresh, laying, though only briefly, a hand on my arm as she turned back to Benny. As they started talking again, her hand fell away. ‘Young love,’ Cora whispered, and she winked at me.
‘You’re really good,’ I heard Suelita murmur. Benny reddened and dug his hands into his pockets.
Missy beamed at Cora, spoke loudly. ‘Suelita writes poems,’ she said, and I was astonished because I hadn’t known this. ‘She’s a good cook too. Smart. Strong.’ I felt hot suddenly. Missy laughed like she was joking but her shrewd eyes appraised the back of Benny’s head.
I stepped away from the group. My eyes scoured the mural, hoping to find fault with his work, and of course found none. Desperately, I appraised the whole composition until at last I decided, with a cold satisfaction, how like Cora it was, how obvious. And, for several moments, I didn’t care if Esperanza was to be lost or not.
Yellow Balloons, Blue Sky
The rally, scheduled to start mid morning, finally got under way just after midday, so that by the time the speakers stepped onto the stage to take their seats the crowd spilled out along Esperanza as far as the Espiritista alley, and stretched along the coast road for half a kilometre in both directions. Within the market hall, Cora moved around greeting people, like a hostess at a party. On the stage, his hand cupped over the microphone in front of him, Uncle Bee leaned forward in his chair to speak to Jonah and Pastor Levi. My father hung back, well away from the stage, with the rest of the jetty boys. I would have preferred to stand with him out in the sun but Dil was there and, once, I looked round to see the Barracuda nudge my father cheerfully as he addressed him, saw my father laugh in response. I stayed close to Benny. Aunt Mary and America, having taken a hasty merienda at the Bougainvillea, would be about by now and searching for us.
Coming to the front of the stage, Jonah held his hands up to hush the crowd. Pastor Levi said, ‘Let’s start things off right,’ and he led the crowd in the Lord’s Prayer. All around caps came off, heads lowered and eyes closed, voices swelled with the familiar words, so familiar that I uttered them while looking about me to see who’d come, to sneak glances at Suelita, who stood beside her mother near the front, her hands dug into the back pockets of her jeans, her chest pushed out like a seabird’s. I watched her mouth the words tiredly.
When the prayer finished, Pastor Levi said a few words to introduce each speaker. One by one they came forward, their gestures eager, animated, passing the microphone on but lingering still at the front as the next speech started. Jonah urged my father to come up onto the stage and have his say too, but my father crossed his arms tightly, his eyes searching out mine as he turned away.
Jaynie, Johnny Five Course’s sister, climbed onto the stage and took the microphone. I’d expected her to speak but instead she started to sing ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’. Her voice, distorted slightly by the PA system, was fine and light. It filled the covered hall and the crowd started to clap along, laughing when the whine of feedback on the high notes set a pack of street dogs howling an accompaniment from beyond the market hall. Jaynie held the last note for a long time. When at last she fell silent, the air, already swollen with the heat of the breathless afternoon and the assembled bodies, continued to buzz. There was an extended round of applause and calls for an encore, but Jonah put his hands up again for quiet.
I turned to see that my father had been joined by America and Aunt Mary. Benny and I pushed our way through to them. Aunt Mary seemed startled momentarily at the sight of me, of my bruises. We carried the cartons of food that I’d helped to prepare that morning from Jonah’s office to the side of the stage, where we stacked them, ready to give out. A space had been cleared for us there, the children already being herded into a line.
Cora stepped out now at Jonah’s behest to take applause for the mural. ‘Of course I had help,’ she said. I glanced at Benny. He was watching Suelita and she was smiling back at him. She slipped over to where we stood. I felt my face grow hot. ‘Some of these panels are the work of Benny Morelos, a very talented young artist,’ Cora continued, beckoning to him. ‘Can you give him a big hand, please.’ I thought how like a TV talk-show host she sounded, how unoriginal. Young love. Suelita put a hand on Benny’s shoulder and pushed him forward gently. I looked away. She was never so familiar with me.
Aunt Mary’s voice was low and clipped in my ear, ‘When she’s finished showing him off, fetch him back to help us, Joseph.’
Electrified by the excitement of the crowd, Jonah called down to Aunt Mary to come and speak. Aunt Mary stared back at him severely. I thought for a moment that he might persist; he was enjoying himself, wanting to stretch out the occasion. But America raised her finger and wagged it at him and he abated.
A commotion arose towards the back of the crowd. I heard my father and the jetty boys whistle a signal as they sometimes did to an incoming boat, or to each other while working. I craned to look but, over everyone’s heads, I couldn’t see anything. Aunt Mary touched my shoulder lightly and we started to hand out the food. ‘Let him through,’ Jonah said from the stage. ‘Let’s hear him out. Though of course, Mr Casama hasn’t made it in time to hear what we think.’ At which there was a low rumble of discontent.
Eddie Casama had no need to push; people moved aside for him. He came forward with Cesar in his wake and, while Eddie seemed almost to saunter, Cesar moved stiffly, gazed straight ahead. As Eddie neared the stage, he spotted Aunt Mary and cried, ‘Mary! What a pleasure to see you and your son again so soon.’ Aunt Mary nodded at him coolly. He beamed at America. ‘The rumours were certainly true about your cooking,’ he said. America reddened. Eddie looked in my direction but didn’t seem to register either my presence or my appearance.
On the stage Eddie was relaxed, a natural at addressing crowds. He looked like anybody’s uncle at a wedding. ‘You see,’ he said calmly into the microphone, ‘change is inevitable.’
Aunt Mary placed the last of the food in America’s hands and pushed the empty boxes under the stage. She straightened up, studied the crowd. Eddie said, ‘I’m not doing this for me. Eventually this project will bring prosperity to the whole town.’ Aunt Mary turned back to the stage, frowning. Eddie continued. ‘It’s a short-term sacrifice that’s asked of you. I assure you, no one will be left homeless, but you will be relocated. It’s a generous offer. Remember, this is not your land. Officially, this settlement is illegal.’ I thought of Uncle Bee building his house with his own hands, of the Espiritista chapel built by an entire congregation, of the Spanish who, centuries ago, cleared the land for themselves by force of arms, giving it away again only to those who served their purpose. There had been a time, long ago, when our people had spread across the islands, settling and building and growing their food in a simpler relationship with the soil. I thought about Aunt Mary and her family, for whom the mere fact of birth had been so fortuitous. Once established, the lines of entitlement preserved themselves. I felt cold suddenly, distant. I closed my eyes and imagined myself alone, staring out at an unfamiliar sea.
When I opened my eyes again Aunt Mary was climbing the steps to the stage. She looked calm as she accepted the microphone from Eddie and turned to face the crowd. I was sure she couldn’t have been enjoying the scrutiny. Yet, her voice when she spoke didn’t waver, ‘Mr Casama is right about one thing,’ she said. ‘The sacrifice will be yours. Not his.’ She handed the microphone back to Eddie.
From the back of the crowd, someone yelled, ‘Not yours either.’ There was a murmur of agreement, though muted, p
erhaps in deference to the regard in which she was held. She nodded, for she knew it too. I turned to America, caught the smile that moved across her face like the shadow of a cloud. Eddie shook the microphone good-naturedly in the direction of the heckler, his expression mildly reproachful. Despite myself, the gesture made me smile; he looked as if he was sprinkling holy water. He cleared his throat. Aunt Mary moved to the edge of the stage but instead of stepping down, she stopped now to examine the mural. Behind her, Eddie started to speak again. Aunt Mary studied each panel in turn. When she came to the centre one she seemed, just for a heartbeat, to hesitate. She continued her inspection for several more seconds, her profile impassive, and then moved smoothly down the steps to rejoin us. She didn’t look at Benny at all. She set off without a backward glance. Benny flashed me a look as he fell into step behind his mother. The crowd parted to let her through and we followed in a line.
As we broke through the skin of the crowd we saw Eddie’s Mercedes. It was parked abreast of the hall on the other side of Esperanza Street. His driver sat behind the wheel, tapping an unlit cigarette against the dashboard, frowning out of the window at the crowd. Behind him a figure took up much of the back seat and for a moment I hoped it might be BabyLu. Then the back window slid down and a man’s suited arm came out and waved at Aunt Mary. ‘Judge Robello,’ Aunt Mary smiled, ‘how unexpected.’
‘Mary,’ the judge replied, pleasantly enough, ‘you must come to ours for dinner soon.’ I wondered if he looked a little embarrassed. ‘You really must. If Alice were here she wouldn’t let you escape without setting a date.’
‘Thank you, Joey,’ Aunt Mary said, graciously.
We joined my father. There was no sign of Dil and I was grateful for that. Aunt Mary looked about, her eyes combing the crowd. People were already coalescing now into smaller groups, in readiness for the march. America put her hands on her hips. ‘So anyway, where’s your brother?’ she said to Benny. Benny looked about then too. Like me, he’d been too distracted to notice Dub’s absence. ‘He could have shown his face for his mother’s sake at least,’ America said.
When the march left, we walked together near the rear of the crowd. As we neared the Bougainvillea’s gate, Aunt Mary squeezed my arm gently. ‘Find him,’ she said softly. I would have preferred to march on, adding my voice to the day, rather than trail after Dub, but she patted my arm again more briskly and I slipped out of the mass and into the cool tranquillity of the boarding-house garden. I stayed at the gate for a while, watching the marchers walk up the hill, and waited until the urgency in my breast had subsided and been all but obliterated by a dry sense of duty. When I’d lost sight of them, when even the sounds of the march had faded, I glanced up at a locked and empty Bougainvillea before starting back down the hill towards Prosperidad.
Knots
The doors to Earl’s garage were bolted and padlocked. I leaned back against them and gazed up at BabyLu’s balcony. The balcony doors were closed too and, in front of them, framed by the lines of door and railing, the leaves of her potted plants were as bright and still as in a painting. The sight was pleasing and I stayed on the forecourt for some time, the skin of my back growing slippery under my shirt against the hot wood.
I closed my eyes and thought about the cool interior of her apartment, the fan on her coffee table, her books. My mind fixed on these, I straightened up and set off across the street and then up the stairs to her door. I knocked, softly at first. There was no answer. From inside, I heard a sound like hands sweeping over cloth. I knocked again, more firmly. ‘BabyLu, please. It’s Jo-Jo.’ I felt foolish saying it so pleadingly, like a child. I knocked and called several times. And then, finally, the door was flung open.
BabyLu was in disarray, her hair wild, her robe sagging about her. I wondered if she’d been in bed. She gasped when she saw me and stared at me, not inviting me in. ‘Good,’ she said at last, shrilly. I was astonished and gazed back at her, bewildered. She chewed her lip. ‘I’m glad,’ she added. ‘You heard me right.’ But now she looked away as she said it. Still, I didn’t speak, and after a minute she said miserably, ‘It was your idea. The herbs. He told me.’
‘Who?’ I found my voice at last.
‘Dub.’
‘Dub,’ I repeated hoarsely.
‘You thought he wouldn’t find out?’
‘Where is he?’ I said, my voice rising, peering behind her into the flat.
She drew in her breath, remembering. ‘Eddie’s men came. They took him.’ Her eyes swept over my hands and face now, taking in my injuries. ‘You have to find him.’ Her eyes were bright with fear. I stared back at her dismayed. I thought of Aunt Mary, squeezing my arm, then patting it again.
‘Where?’ I said. I imagined Dub sitting on a settee, drink in hand, Eddie standing over him, smiling affably, sprinkling holy water.
‘I don’t know,’ BabyLu cried. I was ashamed at how relieved I felt at that. She crossed her arms and looked at me coldly, but now her eyes avoided the worst of my bruises.
I considered telling her the truth but her eyes started to brim over again and I felt the heat go out of me. I looked down at her belly where no sign showed yet. I felt an emptiness then, so engulfing that I stepped backwards. Let her believe whatever suits her, I thought. ‘Jo-Jo,’ she said softly, but I turned away and started down the steps two at a time.
I dropped to the kerb at the corner of Prosperidad and Esperanza and sat, my head in my hands, waiting for my heart to stop its pounding. Esperanza was quiet, and without its usual layers of noise I could hear the soft crash of the sea. Everyone would be at the town hall by now, sharing in the camaraderie of a day from which I’d found myself excluded. It wasn’t far; I could still join them. I closed my eyes, pressing the lids tightly together. I forced myself to breathe slowly, the air humid and heavy, comfortless. The street smelled of hot dust. And after all, I thought, I had no idea where he might have been taken. Really, I shouldn’t even have known that he had been taken. I might comb the entire town and never find him. And it was hardly anything to do with me. I sat quietly. Good, she’d said, I’m glad. I got slowly to my feet and walked back to the Bougainvillea.
Street Barbers
America and I waited in the dining room for much of the morning, the house quiet around us. We’d laid breakfast out, covered it over again, eaten our own meal at the kitchen table and cleared our dishes away, until at last all that was left for us to do was sit, listening for footsteps, for the sound of doors opening, water running.
They came down one by one. Dub was the last. I hadn’t seen him since before the rally. He’d returned to the boarding house long after the evening meal had finished and stayed in his room, not touching the tray that America took up. She’d been tetchy when she came back down with it and straight away dispatched me to my room for the night.
I stared at him as he came into the dining room. His hair was short and ragged, as if he’d cut it himself in front of the mirror. He stared down at his plate as I stepped forward to serve him. I looked him over stealthily as I spooned out his eggs. His skin was its usual unblemished coffee-cream, his loose-limbed deportment apparently unchanged. He sat comfortably enough though he barely ate. He was quiet. All morning he stayed on the edge of things, not commanding the room as he usually did. Later, he went out with his mother and when he came back his hair was different again – sharply cut. It suited him, but I didn’t feel like telling him so. Even if I’d wanted to, I had little opportunity to speak to him for the next few days, for he always seemed to be flanked by his mother or by Lola Lovely, and they were quick to send me away.
America, unsettled by the change in mood at the Bougainvillea, announced that she was going to visit her village to spend a few days with her grandchildren. Sufficiently recovered, I found myself running the household and out on errands more often in her stead and it was on one of these early one afternoon that I happened to pass by the Beauty Queen parlour.
The Beauty Queen had opened on Espe
ranza Street the same year that I came to Aunt Mary’s and the sight of it, of Jaynie and even of Lady Jessica, whom otherwise I found intimidating, was always significant for me, like a lucky charm. And so I was alarmed now to see it in such disorder. Manicure tables, chairs, hairdryers were lined up on the sidewalk while, nearby, Cesar Santiago and another man stood next to an idling sedan, one of Eddie’s, watching the salon being emptied. As I approached I heard Cesar say, with his sorrowful voice and lawyer’s smile, his hands open as if offering a gift, ‘So, you see, some disruption is inevitable.’
Lady Jessica was squashing a bundle of towels into a bag on one of the chairs. She nodded sulkily at me. ‘You guys redecorating?’ I said, shooting a look at Cesar, who stood with his face creased in apology, hands back in his trouser pockets.
‘Seven years,’ said Lady Jessica, her voice, naturally a quick-fire staccato, faster than usual. ‘Seven years. And his boss is no stranger to a manicure. Or his wife. This was like her second home. More time here than at her own mother’s.’ She looked me over critically as she spoke; the bruises on my face and arms were starting to yellow at the edges. ‘You need something to cover those?’
I looked at her painted face, the make-up heavier over her jaw-line and cheeks. ‘No thanks,’ I said.
Jaynie emerged from the salon holding a box full of creams and lotions. ‘That’s the last of it,’ she said. Her face was greyish, dull; she hadn’t slept. She looked for somewhere to put the box down but the tables were already full. Cesar lurched forward as if to help but she turned her back to him. I started to clear a space and, on seeing me, she tried a smile. ‘How are you today, Joseph?’ she said softly. Jaynie’s voice always softened when she addressed me. I thought I would always feel like a child in her presence. I knew little about her in return; just that she’d married young to an American seaman but the marriage hadn’t lasted. She had a kindness about her, of the sort that in a certain kind of person might grow, instead of bitterness, out of pain.