As I head toward College Walk, I wish I could extend a strong arm, have her clasp it, fight for her life. The two of them, intertwined, shuttling toward me, toward a known future, is almost like a split screen: after and before or before and after.
And I forgive them for what is about to come.
LA HIJA DE CHANGÓ
“You three are really going?” Caleb asks through a mouthful of broccoli. “What if she chops your titties off?” The rest of the kids around the lunch table bust out laughing.
“Shut up, Caleb. What do you know about Santeria?” I say.
That’s the problem with these Whitney School kids, all this education and you’d think they’d be less apt to make stupid-ass comments. Me and Melo are the only ones from Spanish Harlem here, and as much as they sweat us for being from there, it doesn’t stop them from lapsing into their privilege. And hanging around them so much, me and Melo sometimes participate. Melo more than me because she enjoys all this rich shit, but every day I have to go home and smack myself back into reality.
My new boyfriend, Anthony, makes fun of me. “Hey, little princess, you want some tea? Is your chauffeur waiting for you?” He goes to public school and is just some guy from around the way. And sometimes I fear that he might look at me in my black sweater with The Whitney School scripted in pink over my heart and think that I’ll walk down these streets one day and see him as something else, or as nothing at all. Like the ones before him.
Ever since I’ve been at the Whitney School, I’ve had nothing but dating problems. Back in junior high, all a boy had to be was cute and dress nice. Now, I’m looking for a boy who’s smart, likes the things I do, and is going to go to college someday. But I don’t go out with any guys from the Whitney School. Most of them are white and the few black guys here just seem corny. It’s enough that I’ve made friends and play on the lacrosse team. I’m in my junior year, but at first, it was hard here. Me and Melo didn’t even bother trying to make friends with anybody, we figured they would just be stuck up. But then Tania and a couple of other girls in our classes were nice to us a few weeks into our first semester.
Tania, a Park Avenue girl all the way, is making the trek uptown with us today to the botánica. Even though she’s Cuban, I know she’s never been to East Harlem before, and I’m sure she’ll sit here tomorrow during fifth period lunch and regale them with stories of the big bad ghetto. But she wanted to come when she heard where we were going, insisted in fact. She says she has problems too.
I’ve known Melo since the third grade, and even then boys would turn away from their marbles to sit by her during recess. But now, some boy, Chris, a transfer student, won’t give her the time of day so she’s bugging out, hence her sojourn with me to the botánica. But to me and the majority of the world, Melo is exquisite through and through. She doesn’t realize that she is one of those girls who will never be alone 99 percent of the time. And Tania is vivacious, no matter what; her laughter can be heard across the school cafeteria. In the end, if she doesn’t have a boy, she has herself.
And me? I come from a long line of spinsters. Based on looks, sure we could get a man, but there must be something in our hearts that sends out signals. Like a snake ready to strike. So I have boyfriend after boyfriend. Anybody else would’ve been branded with a big red S on her school uniform, but my strength emanates so they don’t. They find weaker to brand.
In this long line, I want to be the shining star. Different from my mother. I want that pounding of the heart I’m sure somebody promised me when I was young. Some neighbor, male or female; family friend; doctor or nurse—not knowing my family’s charred history—must have pulled up my pigtails, considered my open face, and said right into my ear, “Someday some man is going to be lucky.” And I took that to mean that I would be lucky too. Symbiosis.
Tania keeps giggling at everything she reads. We try to ignore her even though we have matching uniforms on and it’s obvious to anyone that we’re together. We should have brought her on Friday, when we can wear whatever we want to school. The moment we’ve been waiting for, or rather dreading, arrives. She calls me and Melo over from across the store. She also hasn’t taken into account that the store is the size of my living room.
“Oh my god. Xaviera! Melonie! Come look at this. It says that to get a man you have to go to the mountains. Take all your clothes off. Mix some menstrual blood with rat feces and smear it on yourself!”
The customer at the counter makes a point of rolling her eyes at us. We navigate our way toward Tania, trying not to break the ceramic statues of Jesus and Santa Barbara that seem to follow our every move. We reach Tania and try to remain serious, but as always, she infects us. Lizard tongues for love. Lettuce and hair to get rid of your enemies. Milk and honey to solve your money problems. We giggle and gasp with her until the woman behind the counter, Doña Serrano, finally comes over.
We make fun of women dressed like her in the halls of the Whitney School. Bright blue leggings and an oversized yellow T-shirt with a company’s logo, barely legible: Alex’s Autos. Springfield, MA. I wonder how many arms have poked out of that shirt to travel here, to a botánica in the middle of Spanish Harlem. 116th and Lexington.
“¿Te puedo ayudar?” she asks.
I understand her, but I pray that this woman speaks English. Even though Tania is from the wrong side of the tracks—me and Melo’s code for the rich kids at the Whitney School—she probably speaks Spanish better than all the people living in East Harlem. I step up and say, “We’re looking for love spells,” even though I know it’s probably not right to call them that.
She looks us over and smiles. She reminds me of my grandmother, and not in some superficial way where all old people look alike. She really does look like her. Caramel skin that is still taut but makes you feel like it’s wrong, like it would be far more attractive and true to this person’s nature if it were crinkled and creased. And she has the same short white afro.
“What kind of spell are you looking for? Do you want him to love you more? Less? Do you want to use him and then throw him away? Do you just want his attention . . . ?” she asks.
“Well I want my boyfriend to stay with me and fall in love,” I say. What has happened with every guy I’ve met since starting at the Whitney School is that we’ve just had little in common. Like with all the boys before Anthony, things started to go badly between me and him. I try to talk to him about the things that interest me—art, lacrosse—but he doesn’t get any of that stuff and he’s just stopped trying. The only thing we can agree on is hip hop. We met four months ago at the 116th Street Festival. Melo pointed him out: “That’s the one. That’s the one you usually like.” I laughed, but his look was familiar. Curly black hair, wearing the latest gear. We kept looking at him and his boys until he finally noticed. He brought me an alcapurria and a coke. Anthony was the first boy from my neighborhood to tell me he wanted to go to college since I’ve been at the Whitney School, so naturally, I swooned.
“But to me you look like una hija de Changó,” Doña Serrano fires at me. Then pointing to Melo, “Yemaya.” And Tania, “Oshún. You three must be candela.”
That’s what she called me. La hija de Changó. My grandmother first, now her. I don’t know much about Santeria—my mother’s keeping her knowledge on the hush hush—but I hope this woman is for real and will show us something.
“So, you’re all alive I see. And you, Park Avenue Princess, I guess you didn’t get robbed,” Caleb says the next day at lunch.
“Caleb, one day I’m going to bring your white ass home with me and drop you in the middle of East Harlem with no cab money to get out,” I reply.
Caleb speaks and sprays. He always talks with his mouth full. “Latino boys love me, which is more than I can say for you and Melo. So, I’m sure I can find a way out.” He wipes at the ketchup running down his chin. “Anyway, what did you get? How does it work?”
Tania looks at me, so I speak up. After all, my grandmother and my fath
er knew all about Santeria. “First, the woman, Doña Serrano, told us we were daughters of certain orishas. Well, the ones she thinks we are, it’s a long process to find out who your orisha is, but we must have had some of their same vibes. My orisha is Changó. He’s a warrior and kind of a player.”
“Uh-huh,” Caleb says, rolling his eyes.
“You asked, Caleb. Then she told us to buy candles and pray to our saints. So we did. But I also bought a book about the history of the religion.”
“Okay, but do you think it’ll work?”
“Well, when you fall in love with me, Caleb, you can let me know,” Tania says, and the rest of us start laughing.
On our way back to class, I think about how far me and Melo have come. I realize how comfortable we are here now. I had never been real sure about Tania before. I had never met a Latina like her, one with money, and she talks just like the white girls at the Whitney School, and she looks white. Me and Melo have been to her house plenty of times, but we’ve never invited her to ours. Not even yesterday. But now, I’m sure it’s something we could do.
I don’t know how to build an altar, but I clear off a corner of my desk and place on it a picture of me and Anthony, the candles, and a picture of my mother when she was seventeen. It’s black and white so it doesn’t capture the prettiness of blue seas and pink houses. She sits on a horse in the middle of Arecibo, the town where she was born in Puerto Rico. There is a car coming toward her in the background, but she smiles for the camera with glorious brown hair at her side. Tía Chucha told me I look just like my mom when she was my age. I love how audacious she is in this picture. It’s in my room now because my mother got tired of me always digging through her photos to find it, so she just gave it to me one day. From this picture, I know that she imagined a different life for herself. That even though she may not have had grandiose plans, never dreamed of being somebody important or rich, she didn’t imagine for herself the life she has now. She never wears makeup. She never tries to be the pretty girl captured in this photo. When she comes home from work, she sits in the living room and watches TV. Her life revolves around herself. I sometimes come in and watch in silence with her. I like being with her because I think that if I’m present, even if I’m quiet, maybe she can remember, remember how she used to be.
“Changó has three girlfriends—well one is his wife—Oba, Oshún, and Oya,” I tell Tania and Melo.
“Yup, that sounds like you,” Melo adds.
“Shut up.” I’ve invited them for a sleepover because I was finally able to fix up my room. I’ve always envied Tania’s room. It’s like the ones you see in movies. There’s a bed skirt, ruffled pillowcases, and an intricate beaded duvet that covers a down comforter. I couldn’t afford all that, but I was able to save enough money to buy a bed-in-a-bag set. It’s not the same quality, but everything finally matches and it’s not a hodgepodge of pilled blankets and thin sheets.
“Three? Does he have a favorite?” Tania asks.
“His favorite is Oya, she’s the most like him; she also rules lightning. He’s married to Oba, but I think Oshún loves him the most. She’s always doing this illmatic shit to get his attention.”
“For real? Like what?” Melo asks.
“Well, she got Oba to cut off her ear and serve it in a soup to Changó. Oshún told her it would make Changó stay.”
“Daaamnnn. I guess that does sound like you,” Melo says to Tania.
“I would never be that mean,” Tania says innocently.
“Wait a minute, hold up, Oshún is the goddess of love, right? So why can’t she keep Changó?” Melo asks.
I put my index finger up in the air and take a long look at my book, but I can’t find an answer to that question.
I am super excited to take Anthony to the Ritzy, our annual fall ball at the Ritz-Carlton. Me and Melo have never gone, but this year we were determined to go, so we saved up all summer long. This is the first time he’s seeing my other world. I’ve told him what people are like at the Whitney School, but there is a big difference in me telling him and him seeing it for himself.
As soon as we sit down, Tania comes over and says, “Quick, what does ‘sycophant’ mean?”
In unison, me, Melo, Chris, and Caleb say, “Fawner.”
“I’m glad everyone has been studying,” Tania says.
We are all taking the SATs next month, so that’s all we’ve been talking about at school. Every time we see each other, it’s pop-quiz time. I hope Anthony doesn’t think it’s corny.
“Yeah, too much,” Caleb says. “I hate all this pressure. I still have to meet with my Kaplan tutor tomorrow morning. I tried to get out of it, but my parents wouldn’t let me.”
“Damn, I’m skipping tomorrow. I’ll be too sleepy to pay attention. But I feel guilty,” Chris says.
“I heard that years ago, the teachers arranged for someone to come to the school the week after the Ritzy to make up for the missed session tomorrow, since so many of us don’t go,” Melo says.
“I wonder why they don’t do that anymore. That’d be super helpful,” Tania says.
“Anthony, are you taking the SATs too?” Caleb asks him.
“Not that I know of. Is that a citywide exam? Xaviera’s been talking about it, but I just thought it was something ya’ll were doing,” Anthony says without looking directly at Caleb.
Chris looks down at his plate, Caleb rolls his eyes at Melo, and Tania is trying to hold in her laughter. My face prickles. I don’t want to look at him, so I stare at the students dancing to “I Will Always Love You.” Oshún is the goddess of love and marriage. When a woman wants a man, she consults Oshún. She should buy an image of Oshún in her Catholic form, Our Lady of La Caridad del Cobre. Buy a yellow candle. Place a picture of the man she wants on a small plate and pour honey over it. Oshún has an arsenal of herbs, vegetables, and magic that will always make a man succumb to a woman’s desire.
Yet Oshún cannot keep the man she wants.
I find that remarkable.
If she fails herself, what about the rest of us?
“Yeah, well it’s like Ms. Kennedy always says, we can’t be going out with these boys from around here anymore. I mean, sweetie, at the end of the day you’re going to go off to college, hopefully an Ivy League one, and what are you going to do with a guy like Anthony?” Melo says.
Ms. Kennedy is my guidance counselor from the program me and Melo are in. The program gets smart kids from “underprivileged” neighborhoods to go to these rich kids’ schools. Ms. Kennedy has been like my academic mother, the one looking out for me in terms of school stuff, but she likes to give me regular mom advice too sometimes. She says that once I get to college, I can meet a boy on my level, and that I shouldn’t waste my time with these boys from my neighborhood, that they aren’t going anywhere.
“Well, am I going to go out with some white boys, some corny dudes from our school? That’s not my style and never will be.”
“No, but I think that Ms. Kennedy is right, we’ll be changed at the end of this, no matter how much you want things to stay the same. Like, someone like Chris is cool. You know, from here, but at the end of the day will end up in the same place we will. Think about it, when you’re thirty and successful, will any of this matter?”
“Yes, yes, it will matter.”
“No, Xaviera. No, it won’t. You won’t even remember Anthony.”
I’ve used studying for the SATs as an excuse to stay away from Anthony. I told him it would just be a few intense weeks where I’d have to be on lockdown. While this is all true, I’m also giving my experimental Santeria time to work. My mother refuses to answer any of my questions about Santeria, and the closest I came to learning about it was when I was thirteen. I begged my mother to send me to Puerto Rico after I got accepted into the Whitney School.
“She is older now, but I don’t know.” I overheard my mother hesitating on the phone while talking to Tía Chucha in PR.
My tía won her over though.
When I was there, my grandmother, who hadn’t seen me since I was six, held me by the shoulders, examined me, and finally said, “Tu eres la hija de Changó. Can’t know for sure until we do un asiento, but I am rarely wrong.”
“Mai, you’re going to scare her, and you know what Elsa said,” Tía Chucha cried out.
“What? What does that mean?” I whined. It was clear my tía and my grandmother had big mouths, and I was excited at the prospect of all these family secrets tumbling from them. But with a quickness, they got as tight-lipped as my mother.
I could see the relief on my mother’s face when I got back home the following week. She was in a talkative mood as she helped me unpack, so I thought I would try again. “Can I ask you about Abuela being a Santera?”
“You didn’t see anything, did you? Chucha told me Mami doesn’t do that anymore.”
“No, they wouldn’t tell me anything. It just slipped out one day.”
My mother took a long breath and shook her head. “I just don’t like to talk about that.”
“Why? Was it scary?”
I let my question sit in the air in the hopes that she would answer it, and a few more after that.
“No, not at all.” My mother started to pick at the crusted stains on her sweatshirt. “It just reminds me of what I’ve lost. I ran away with your father before I could get initiated, and when I finally had the courage to call Mami she said that I would let our family traditions die and that because your father had been initiated as el hijo de Changó, he’d have all the power and I’d have none.”
I wish I had spent more time with my grandmother before she died to see what this gift actually is, to see if I have it. I like imagining that there is this one thing in the world that could set me, us, apart from other families. But it’s been cut off, and I wonder how my mother had the power to break away from our family but not from other things. Because it seems to me that loving my father has been the more detrimental choice. Even though she was the one who broke up with him, she’s never really left him.
Love War Stories Page 10