Rosa No-Name

by Roger Bruner

  We couldn’t understand why they’d done that. Because the villagers were so superstitious about that building, nobody would want—or be willing—to go inside.

  I understood why. This so-called church had been the only building to survive a similar black storm many years earlier. Legend claimed that it had also been the only structure to survive the storm before that one.

  I didn’t know if those things were true, but I almost felt superstitious myself now. How could we convey to the Americans that they shouldn’t open the building and go inside?

  ~*~

  Although some rubbish still littered the Americans’ campground, the night winds blew a little more away each evening.

  But the debris damming the river wasn’t going to blow away. How I wished some of the teens—I couldn’t imagine what had motivated them to come here—had time to work on an important project like clearing the dam and letting clean waters wash away the contamination.

  So when Anjelita told me that Miss Keem planned to clear up some of the village’s rubbish, I cheered in my exhilaration. But then I felt equally disappointed—nearly depressed—when I learned they weren’t going to work on the river’s dams. Instead, they were going to dispose of the trash from the front yard of the church, the area where the debris was worst.

  Miss Keem must have had a special fondness for churches. Why else would she have chosen such an odd and impractical project?

  Rob and Charlie started a bonfire a safe distance from the church. Anjelita and Miss Keem made trips to the fire carrying one armful of rubbish at a time. Anjelita dropped much of her burden while trying to load her arm efficiently. But the two worked together like true sisters, and after several days, I could see progress.

  “Why do the two of you work so hard on the churchyard instead of clearing the river of debris?” I asked Anjelita early in their project.

  “I don’t know, Momma. But this is important to Miss Keem, and I want to do whatever pleases her.”

  I nodded. Keem’s purpose didn’t have to make sense. To me, anyhow. The only thing that mattered was the happiness Anjelita’s relationship with Keem brought her. Happiness she hadn’t demonstrated any signs of since Alazne’s death.

  Perhaps not since just prior to Pedro’s death.

  ~*~

  Several things made Miss Keem’s churchyard cleanup go faster than I had expected.

  Apparently sensing the girls’ frustration over their slow progress, the other teens began using some of their limited free time to help. Even if they only carried an armload or two of debris to the fire on break or worked for fifteen or twenty minutes after supper, they seemed determined to help Miss Keem and Anjelita finish.

  Inspired by the Americans, many of the villagers started transporting rubbish as well. Even the surviving Elders—those who were too old or infirm to do construction—pitched in and helped in whatever ways they could.

  Only a handful of children had survived the aftermath of the black wind. But they accepted Anjelita enough for her to recruit them as helpers and command them like an experienced military leader. They not only accepted her leadership, they thrived under it.

  Anjelita grew tired of carrying such small amounts of rubbish at a time. So she began using the old blanket—the one I had refused to take in spite of my dubious sentimental attachment to it—as a litter. She and Miss Keem piled debris on it until it was almost too heavy to drag.

  Once they got close to the fire, they picked it up by the corners—Miss Keem managed two of them in one hand and Anjelita took a third one—and shook the contents into the flames. Although they had to pick up a few items that fell off, Anjelita’s method proved exceedingly effective.

  So effective, in fact, that the Elders and the children made litters from the blankets that had been set aside for future use. Although none of the villagers understood any better than I did why this project was so important to Miss Keem, they took to it as if the idea had been theirs.

  Never had I witnessed such a spirit of cooperation among the villagers. I hoped it would last long after the construction teams returned to their homes.

  On the day my two girls anticipated finishing, Anjelita came running to find me at my worksite. She couldn’t have sounded more excited if she had just rescued a bird with a broken wing.

  “What is it, Anjelita?” I spoke quietly, hoping the softness of my tone might calm her down. It didn’t.

  “Momma! Momma! You must see this.”

  I furrowed my forehead. “What?”

  She uncrossed her arms.

  Around her neck was a prism necklace—the very same one my grandfather had bought for my grandmother. The one I had hidden after Mother Chalina gave it to me at the age of four. The one Alazne had found in my cave when I sent her outside with her friends. The one she and Anjelita were to share. The one the black windstorm had stolen before Anjelita could wear it even once.

  At first, I couldn’t do anything but cry. But then I started laughing and crying at the same time. The Americans I was working with must have thought me insane.

  “Momma, there was a problem at first. Miss Keem thought the necklace belonged to her because she found it.”

  My mouth fell open. Miss Keem hadn’t acted the least selfish in the short time I had known her. Anything but. “Oh, my. How did you…?”

  “At first I couldn’t say anything. But then I smiled at Miss Keem and tried to explain, ‘Es mi collar.’”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Miss Keem has picked up a few Spanish words during her time here, but are you sure she understood you?”

  “Not at first. I said, ‘Es mi collar’ again. Then I pointed to the necklace and to myself. ‘Collar’? Keem repeated the word back to me. ‘Yes,’ I said emphatically. I found a stick on the ground and wrote collar in the dirt.

  “She seemed to recognize the word, although it must mean something slightly different in English.”

  Anjelita’s boundless enthusiasm had prevented me from responding. I managed a quick “Oh?” while she grabbed a breath.

  “Miss Keem said something to me as she fingered the necklace. Except for the words mi collar, she spoke in English.

  “‘Little sister,’ she said—I understood her meaning without having to understand her words—‘I’ve accidentally borrowed something of yours. Here. You take it back now.’”

  ~*~

  Much to everyone’s delight, the front yard of the church was free of debris by the beginning of the second week—just hours after the recovery of the necklace. The girls proceeded to plant a rock garden of wild flowers in the churchyard. Flowers that had miraculously started growing in a field at the edge of the village soon after the black wind’s visit.

  Because of Miss Keem’s age, I had grown to think of her as my sister rather than a substitute daughter, and that made our inability to communicate even more frustrating. I wished the Americans had brought an interpreter. Why had they come to Santa María without one? Only later did I learn that this omission had been an oversight based on the need to reach us in time.

  ~*~

  We discovered that one of the boys—the younger one who looked so out of place—was actually quite fluent in our language.

  “My name is Neil,” he said as he introduced himself to several of the villagers in Spanish. “I’m only sixteen. The other kids are all eighteen. They only let me come because I was smart enough to graduate from high school two years early.”

  He didn’t sound boastful. He was simply explaining the way things were. We listened as he continued. “The other kids don’t know what to make of me because I’m younger and more intelligent than they are. That’s why Rob and Charlie haven’t told them I’m fluent in Spanish.

  “They want me to blend in as much as possible rather than be perceived as special. So I won’t talk to you except when other teens aren’t around.”

  “We understand, Neil,” I spoke for the others. “We won’t divulge your secret.”

  “But why have you co
me?” one Elderly man asked. “No one comes to Santa María from outside.”

  “We are Christians from all over the United States, and we’ve come because we love you and want to help you. I can’t tell you exactly how we got here. God must have been responsible for that.”

  God? Neil knew something about God? I wanted to ask him to explain, but the black storm had destroyed my Bible—my Santa Biblia. Could we discuss God without referring to it?

  As it turned out, we rarely spoke with Neil at first except in very small groups, and those conversations usually involved construction questions.

  Just when I was about to give up hope of getting to talk with Neil about God, something unexpected happened. Would it provide the answers I’d been seeking?

  44

  Rob and Charlie kept water and snacks for the workers inside the church building; it was the only shaded spot in the village. Although the villagers were terrified at first, they saw the Americans going in and out without suffering any dire consequences and soon put their superstitions behind them. So did I.

  Keem sat down in the front yard of the church with Anjelita at her side. She had a book in her hand, a Spanish Bible just like the one the black wind had destroyed.

  So Anjelita told me, along with other parts of this story I didn’t see personally.

  My daughter wasn’t familiar with the Bible. To the best of my knowledge, she had never looked at mine. She couldn’t imagine what her big sister was going to do with this Bible book, but—because of her adoration of Keem—she would immerse herself in the project one hundred percent, no matter what it involved.

  Keem tried reading the one-page introduction aloud, but Anjelita had to peer at the text to figure out what she was saying. While Keem struggled to pronounce a language she couldn’t speak, Anjelita silently read the Introducción, which gave her what I had always longed for—a clear, basic understanding of God that went far beyond what the dictionaries I’d looked at had said. It also mentioned God’s plan to bring sinful mankind back to himself.

  How different would my life have been now if I had read that Introducción in my own Bible years earlier? That question was impossible to answer.

  Keem finally gave up on the Introducción. Anjelita had no idea what she would do next, but she seemed to be waiting for something. Or somebody.

  Not long after that, several villagers arrived at the church building to get water and take a break.

  “Hello, Delmar! Hi, Basilio!” Keem greeted them before they entered and waited until they came out again. (Anjelita had taught Keem the names, correctly pronounced, of everyone in the village.)

  Then she began reading aloud from her Bible, apparently hoping the two men would listen. But she didn’t start in the beginning the way I had. After flipping back and forth through the pages for several minutes while the men were still inside the church, she settled on a section closer to the end of the Bible. A man named Lucas had written the part she began reading.

  Delmar and Basilio wouldn’t have cared where she started. After three weeks without books, they were starving to hear anything Keem might read. A book of fairy tales would have been just as satisfactory as this thick book on Keem’s lap.

  Snuggling close to her big sister, Anjelita followed along silently at first. But then she started reading ahead while Keem tried in vain to read aloud. No matter how hard Keem tried to make herself understood, her reading was slow and unintelligible, and Anjelita felt frustrated because of her inability to help.

  She loved Keem too much to hurt her feelings by taking over and reading for her, and the language barrier didn’t allow her to explain how she felt.

  After a moment or two of listening to Keem’s reading, however, Delmar glanced over her shoulder and stared at the words in the book. Then he said something to Basilio.

  When the two men broke out in raucous laughter, Keem turned an intense shade of red. Anjelita realized the two men hadn’t meant to humiliate Keem, but she hated the way their laughter had hurt her big sister’s feelings.

  Truthfully, Keem’s pronunciation was so terrible that Delmar and Basilio hadn’t recognized the words as Spanish until Delmar looked over her shoulder. Anjelita couldn’t keep from smiling once she understood the reason for their laughter.

  They soon made amends for their unintentional faux pas.

  Basilio pointed to the first few words of the passage and pronounced them for Keem. He read slowly and distinctly so she could hear each vowel and each consonant. He repeated each word just as carefully to show where the accent fell if the word contained more than one syllable.

  Aware now that Basilio was trying to help her, Keem imitated him. He stopped her after she mispronounced the first word. He was patient. He corrected her by saying the word aloud again and indicating that she should say it with him. They did that several times. Then he pointed a toothpick at the next word.

  After drilling her until she got that word right, he pointed to the first word again. She read both words without making any mistakes, and his cheerful tone spoke praise that made Keem smile broadly.

  He read the next few words aloud, and once again she imitated him. He corrected her and drilled her the same way until she had one whole phrase correct.

  But then he pointed to the beginning of the first verse again. She made only one mistake.

  He looked as if he might let her proceed after correcting that one, but—no—he made her return to the beginning again. She didn’t make any mistakes that time, and—after lavish praise on his part—they proceeded to the next phrase.

  At some point, Delmar took over, using the same method.

  After what seemed like hours to Anjelita—probably to Keem, too—they reached the end of the first verse of Lucas, chapter one. Although the process had been tedious, I was proud to hear what my reading students had accomplished.

  “I won’t make her go back to the very beginning of Lucas every time,” he said with a wink. “But I’ll let her think I will. That will keep her alert.”

  A few minutes later, Ernesto came along.

  Delmar waved to their friend. “Señorita Keem is trying to read aloud in Spanish from a book called the Holy Bible. She doesn’t have any idea how to pronounce our language—”

  “She didn’t when she started, you mean,” Basilio said. “But we’ve been working with her, teaching her, and she’s making progress. Señorita Keem is a quick learner, but we must return to our worksite. Would you—?”

  “Yes! I will coach her now.”

  Keem probably didn’t know what Ernesto had said, but she smiled at him anyhow.

  Delmar and Basilio explained the method they had been using and requested Ernesto to keep teaching Keem the same way. Changing a process that had already proven successful might confuse her.

  From my own teaching experience, I agreed—although I might have chosen a different method to start with. Then again, none of us had ever needed to teach someone to read aloud and nothing more. Maybe their method was as good as any other.

  Ernesto continued using the same rote method until the next villager came along. The villagers were thrilled to listen to a book being read, but they wondered why anyone would start reading one so near the end rather than from the beginning.

  When I took my turn teaching Keem, I noticed something interesting. As soon as Keem turned the page, Anjelita began reading and rereading the next two pages. Then she closed her eyes and listened intently.

  Anjelita was actually memorizing large portions of Lucas’s writing. She could have taught her new big sister to read aloud as well as any of the adults, but absorbing everything she could from the Bible book seemed more important.

  Keem’s oral reading improved so much that—by mid-day the next day—she rarely needed correcting. As Basilio had pointed out the first day, Keem was a quick and capable learner, able to convert what she learned from each lesson into general rules she could apply to new words. Because the Spanish language is so consistent in its pronunciatio
n, her self-discovered rules played a major role in her rapid progress.

  Someone was always looking over her shoulder. A number of someones, in fact. People crowded together to try to make out the print.

  Keem probably didn’t realize they were reading for themselves and barely listening to her. But because reading aloud would always be slower than silent reading, those who stood behind and beside her tended to read the current two pages and then return to work.

  While breaks didn’t have official time limits, no one wanted to be considered a slacker. Not even Keem, who rarely took a break from reading.

  But when she did, someone picked up the Bible and read aloud as much as he or she could, being careful not to lose Keem’s bookmark. One person always stood guard to keep her from catching the rest of us reading without her.

  We didn’t want to hurt Keem’s feelings, but we had become so engrossed in what Lucas had to say that we didn’t waste time waiting for her to get back when we could read ahead on our own during her absence.

  One day Keem accidentally left her Bible in the churchyard when she quit for the day. I don’t know how many of us stayed there reading until dark.

  ~*~

  As our homes neared completion, we hung out in the churchyard in larger groups for longer periods.

  We no longer sought entertainment or factual knowledge from the Bible book, but hope for our future. The Bible had answers to questions we hadn’t known to ask.

  Most of the villagers gathered in the field behind the church after supper. This person and that person shared what they remembered from the day’s reading, and then we discussed its meaning.

  Young Neil came with us once, and we plied him with question after question. He was an expert at speaking our language, yes, but his understanding of the Bible impressed us even more. His comprehension was remarkable for someone so young.

  The villagers accepted Anjelita as an invaluable member of the Bible study group, for she remembered the contents better than anyone else.