When The Shadows Began To Dance

by Yamaya Cruz

  pots, salad bowls, and cake treys to two picnic tables that were seated in the back yard.

  There was volleyball net, and an inflated kiddy size pool with twigs and leaves floating in

  it. The house looked like it was made out of silly putty because it was painted in loud

  pastel colors that didn’t match the rest of the houses in the neighborhood. The music

  continued.

  “Papi Chulo. I want me a Papi Chulo.”

  I looked around for Ali. He had abandoned his post as my guardian and protector and

  was talking to an extremely beautiful girl. I swallowed hard as I stared at her. Suddenly, I

  knew how the Conquistadors felt when they discovered El Dorado. She was

  mesmerizing, with sweet cinnamon skin. She had long flowing hair that shined like gold

  and rich green eyes that sparkled like emeralds. She raised her hand to show off her fresh

  manicure right before she raked her fingers through her long mane of hair. She flung her

  head back and smiled, revealing a set of perfect teeth that were whiter than a string of

  pearls.

  She was wearing a spring dress with a plunging neckline that showed off her full

  breast. She had a diminutive waist, with ride em cowboy hips and a smack that ass

  derriere. I walked over to Ali. I could feel Blazen’s energy; it was foul and stank like foot

  odor. She haughtily looked me up and down; her emerald green eyes burned through me

  like lasers, destroying my confidence and self-worth.

  “Blazen, this is my sister,” Ali said.

  She took my hand and shook it limply, like it was a dirty penis that she didn’t want

  to touch.

  She was named Blazen not only because she was beautiful with a smoking hot body.

  She had a blistering temper as well. Blazen believed that she was too pretty to play by the

  rules, so she was always the first one to pick up makeshift weapons like broken bottles,

  and loose shards of glass. She didn’t play fair when it came to men either. Nothing

  stopped her from getting what she wanted. She didn’t care if they were married, straight,

  or gay. The only requirement that she had was finding one with a huge bankroll. And if

  one didn’t have enough, she was off to the next best thing. She was evil to women, all

  women, mainly because she needed constant reassurance that she was the baddest,

  prettiest bitch around.

  For some odd reason, Blazen took a liking to me. At first I thought that maybe it was

  because of Ali. It wasn’t until later that I learned that she felt that she could manipulate

  me. She forced me into following her around like her personal butler. She barked at me to

  do this, to get this, to do that. She ordered me to steal cigarettes from adults, and to pour

  vodka into her kool-aid. I had clearly had enough when she ordered me to fix her a plate

  of portioned low calorie foods. I marched up to her with the plate in my hand and

  struggled not to throw it at her. I stomped off fuming, ignoring Blazen as she called after

  me.

  I hated it here. Yes, it was a step up from where I had come from, but there was no

  way that I could live here and be Blazen’s maid. I crossed my arms in front of my chest

  and felt the tears burning behind my eyes. She was a real bitch. I thought to myself.

  Suddenly, I felt lonely. I missed my mommy. I saw an empty tree stump and walked over and sat on it. I didn’t want to be around people. I just wanted to disappear. I looked up at

  the sky; the sun was full and warm, then I jolted when I heard something squeal. There was a rowdy gaggle of men. I ran over and squeezed between two of them.

  What I saw would have made a PETA members stomach turn. Nico and ten other men

  chase around a frightened, jittery pig. The pig’s little legs struggled to support its busty

  frame as it ran around the yard. It was kicked and taunted by Nico. They circled around

  the pig, and Nico like a wild savage pounced on the pig’s back and wrestled the sixtypound hog to the ground. His entourage of man clapped their hands and cheered as they

  watched Nico go for the kill by forcefully slitting the pig’s throat. The poor pig let out a

  loud screeching howl, its body jerked, and its small legs kicked as it fought for its life. The pig’s fate was in Nico’s hands and the crowd roared as he repositioned the knife

  and with great dexterity plunged it into the pig’s chest. Its body froze from the impact

  and in a matter of seconds it was dead. Nico then stood up and with as much smugness as

  an African soldier who had just decapitated the head of a rebel spy. He waved the bloody

  knife in the air. I thought that I saw the last of the pig, until I spotted it with a long stick

  stuffed into its ass and through its mouth. Two men were holding either side of the stick

  and turned it as it cooked slowly over a fire. They paused and took turns sprinkling

  seasoning and sauces on it.

  As crazy as it sounds, I could relate to the pig. I mean, our lives really weren’t that

  much different. I didn’t live in a nasty pigsty and I never had to eat my own shit. But we

  both were tortured and picked on every day. I wondered how long it would be before

  someone stuck a knife into my throat. I sighed and looked around. Ali was standing next

  to Nico and he was motioning for me to come over. Oh shit. I walked over slowly. “Nico, this is my sister, Nelly,” Ali said.

  For some reason, I couldn’t move or speak. I had seen him once before, but this time

  I was up close and personal. And the view was much worse from here. My heart started

  to pound. My palms were sweaty; I rubbed them on the sides of my jeans and took a

  couple of deep breaths. I was scared. I had mind visuals of him being thrown out of the

  bar. Then the word brujo popped into my mind. Where did that word come from? He said something in Spanish as he extended a black bearish claw with yellow

  fingernails. Did he really think that I was going to shake his hand after he just killed and

  tortured that poor pig? I imagined it becoming severed, breaking off cleanly from his

  wrist and then crawling around my body like a giant size critter. I shivered with disgust.

  Nico seemed to feel my animosity and kneeled down and planted a wet sticky kiss on my

  cheek. Blazen, fearful that was I hogging all of his attention, ran over. She flashed a huge

  smile while seductively resting her hands on her hips.

  “Nico, Papi are you still throwing a party for me?” she said. “Anything for you,

  baby.”

  “Oh Nico,” she said while inching forward to give him a hug.

  I struggled to hide my repulsion and keep down my breakfast as I watched Nico’s

  mobile hand travel down her body and rest on her backside. She squealed and then

  hurriedly pulled away, but not before Nico managed to give her left buttock a playful

  smack. She waved her forefinger at him, motioning for him to behave.

  “What? What?” Nico said, pulling away and revealing a devilish grin that was full of

  rotten teeth.

  “Not in front of the guests,” she said giggling. I looked over at Ali. His jaw

  hardened. They held hands, but Nico turned and focused on me.

  “Mija, make yourself at home. Me casa is tu casa,” he said, right before he was

  pulled away by Blazen.

  I was happy that Blazen had forgotten about me being her maid. She had moved on

  to bigger and better things. I spotted her by a tree, twirling her hair while flirting with a

  young man. Then, I saw he
r and the man walk into the house, my curiosity got the best of

  me and I followed them inside. After all, Nico did say to make myself at home. I searched the many rooms of the house until I came across a door that was left ajar. I

  thought that I saw a female’s bare breast. I zoomed into her face and saw a teenage girl,

  with chestnut brown hair and honey brown skin staring back at me. I jumped and was

  about to run away when I realized that she was not looking at me, but a man who was

  walking toward her. I got a full view of the girl again. She looked like she was in a daze,

  almost like she was intoxicated. I inched the door open just a little more and saw that she

  was sandwiched between two men. I couldn’t see their faces. She looked lost, confused

  and scared. A black hand slapped her across her face. My view was blocked again. All I

  saw was a head with a bald spot and a ponytail.

  When he stepped back, my heart stopped. The woman’s head was wobbling from

  side to side and she was salivating out of the side of her mouth. One of the men lifted her

  up like she was an oversized potato sack and flung her onto the bed. He grabbed a hold of

  her ankles and began to pull her to him, like a fish being reeled by a rod. Wham! The

  door was slammed shut. My heart was pounding. What the Hell was going on in there? I

  needed to tell someone, quick. I heard laughter. I looked around and realized that it was

  coming from the room across the hall. Hurriedly, I ran over and eyed the yellow beam of

  light that shot from beneath the door. I knocked loudly before I pushed it open. I found Blazen sitting on the floor with her shoes off. Her spring dress was

  disheveled and hiked all the way up to her hips. A long slim cigarette dangled from her

  fingers. Her eyes, normally as big as full moons, were lazy with half shaded lids. A

  young olive skin man, with Hollywood looks and a chiseled body was seated next to her. “Get the fuck out of here!” she screamed.

  I watched as she adjusted her dress and scurried around the room to hide their used

  condoms. I worked hard to hide my indifference. Something terribly wrong was

  happening in the other room, and she was in here, getting busy.

  “Nico!” she yelled.

  The man shot up, startled by hearing Nico’s name. He quickly dressed and abruptly

  left the room.

  “Tony,” Blazen called after him, “Tony, don’t be like that” “Tony, that’s really

  fucked up,” she said. She turned back to me looking very annoyed.

  “What’s going on in here Mija?” Nico asked while standing in the middle of the

  door.

  “I can’t live with her.” Blazen began to rant while standing up. “I swear Nico if she

  moves in here, I am going to kill her,” she said pointing her finger and squinting her eyes.

  “Relax, Mija, let me talk to her.” Nico said.

  I was a nervous wreck. I didn’t realize that I had done something wrong. I didn’t

  mean to walk in on Blazen, and I didn’t even want to know what was going on in that

  other room. I just didn’t want to exist. What was the use? I wasn’t wanted anywhere.

  Nico could see the pain in my eyes. He grabbed my hand and led me to another room. “Mija. What’s wrong? You don’t like it here?” he said.

  I lowered my head and focused on my feet. I couldn’t explain the emotions that were

  running through me. I wanted to ask him a million questions. What was going on in that

  room? What was Ali doing working for him? Are all the stories that I’ve heard about him

  true? And, are you really my daddy? Now was the time, I told myself. But I couldn’t do

  it. I just shook my head in frustration.

  “Why, because of Blazen?” he asked.

  I couldn’t look at him. I crossed my arms over my chest and focused on the ground. “You miss your momma?” he said.

  My head shot up. I looked into his eyes for the first time. They were bloodshot red,

  with black dancing pupils. A small voice began to prattle in my head. His soul is on fire.

  He leaned in closer and then whispered in my ear like he was sharing a dirty little secret. “Do you believe in dreams?” he asked.

  I didn’t answer. It was an odd question that I really didn’t know how to answer. My

  mouth filled up with saliva and my stomach felt like I had just swallowed a cup of castor

  oil. I felt vulnerable, cheap, exposed, as if I had just let a pedophile get a few cheap feels

  for a bag of candy. I wanted him to stop looking at me. To stop asking me questions. I

  started to itch all over, like there was an army of ants crawling on my skin. I winced as one of the imaginary ants bit into my flesh. I wrapped my arm over my

  opposite shoulder to scratch out the pain. I sighed from relief, only to feel another one

  bite my lower leg. I pulled up my pant leg and raked my fingers over my flesh. The

  itching didn’t stop. It spread all over my body until I felt like a voodoo pincushion doll.

  Nico smiled at me again before he answered his own question.

  “You believe in dreams because they’re coming true right now.”

  I looked at my skin. There were patches of red all over it. I knew that I hadn’t

  scratched that deeply. Instantly, I was concerned. Was I coming down with something? I

  touched my head. It felt hot.

  “Travel with me,” Nico said like a man who was trying to convince a woman to

  make love to him.

  No. No. No. No. I thought. Something inside of me was telling me that this was

  wrong. It was really wrong.

  “Travel with me,” he said again.

  I clinched my small hands into fist and began to rub them into my eyes. Suddenly,

  they were burning. “Don’t resist,” he said.

  My head jolted back. I felt like he had injected me with the Ebola virus. I could feel

  the poison running through my veins. My blood turned cold, and I started to shiver. I

  looked down at my hands and arms. They were covered in large patches of pimples that

  were filled with puss. My vision blurred. My eyes rolled in the back of my head and I

  fainted, right in Nico’s arms.

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter Ten

  King Foot! King Foot! King Foot!”

  I rushed out of my hut. I looked at my arms, my strong furry legs and my chiseled torso with amazement. I brushed my long fingers through my short stumpy hair. I looked around me and stared with amazement at the quaint village that consisted of huts with wooden frames and straw roofs. There were dirt-paved roads, strong as concrete that strung around the village.

  There was a garden in the back of the hut. The weeds were hard and wet and tangled around my feet as I struggled to move through them. The garden was vast, with sections of potato plants, papaya and squash. There were long, sword shape leaves with panicles of whitish flowers and long stalks of hard corn with brownish green tassels. I heard a twig break. Startled, I looked around and followed the sounds of bushes rumbling. A little black girl, around the age of two, stuck her head out and smiled. I smiled back, but it soon faded when I saw the Griot behind her.

  He was holding my son in his arms. Both their faces looked long and solemn. A strong feeling of loss came over me. I looked up at the sky. It was twilight. Pedro Juan held his hands out, pleading for me to take him into my arms. I embraced him tightly. I could feel his little heart beating. He was just a child, a baby and yet he understood. The Griot led the way. We walked in silence, the only thing that I could hear were the waves crashing in from the sea. I peered off in the distance. There was just water and a barren blue sky.

  My heart pounded as I look
ed at the waves. They reminded me of Isabella’s thick bouncy curls and how they blew in the wind. When she was in my canoe, she always sat, like a lady with her legs crossed, her dress tightly tucked between her thighs, always placing modesty before comfort. Her eyes shone like emeralds, with thick spider like lashes that fluttered every time she blinked. Her lips were smooth and soft and as red as berries.

  I did everything that I could to make her laugh. I straddled the canoe. I jumped into the water to wrestle a huge fish. I exaggerated when I told her all the old stories of our people and village. I did it all just to make her smile, so I could see her eyes sparkle. I wanted to touch her skin, her hair. I wanted to know everything about her. But we had come from different worlds. I was an Indian, or least that was the title that the white man had given me. And she was a Spaniard.

  I knew that her death just wasn’t about helping Indians or healing slaves. It was about me. It was because she had chosen a worthless savage of a man who couldn’t even protect and save his own people, much less an heiress associated with the Spanish crown. A feeling of anger took over me. I looked back out at the sea. The waves looked desolate and black as they swished back and forth, taking life and then giving it back again. It calmed me and I wondered about the ocean’s vitality. It held such power. It kept so many great secrets. I wondered if they would ever be told. Or would they die forever, like a slave who had drowned in the bottom of it.

  Three men in short breeches were pulling in an oversize canoe. They parked it on the shore and begun to walk away. Fishing time was over. We walked back inside the bohios and placed both children in a cotton hammock that was hanging in the corner of the room. We sat with our legs crossed and made a small fire for both light and warmth. I lit my pipe. The Griot watched me in silence. The room was filled with woven baskets that were used for storage. They sat clumsily, one on top of another. Large red and white clay pots used for cooking and drawling water peeked out of one. While calabashes of all sorted colors overflowed from another.

  “Going somewhere?” the Griot asked I looked around the room and instantly knew where he was going.

  “Where would I go? This is my home, the only place that I know.”

  “King Foot. They’re coming for you,” he said leaning forward.

  I drew from my pipe again and looked at him.

  “I thought that we stopped being afraid a long time ago?” I said.