The Buenos Aires Broken Hearts Club

by Jessica Morrison

  When I get home, I go straight to my laptop and pull up The Plan. I read it over yet again, committing every item to memory, reminding myself where these checkmarks will take me. I find a new mantra as I climb into bed and fall asleep. I want more. It has to be more.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  I don’t need to finish my Spanish final to know that I’ve failed. As everyone writes furiously for an hour, I stare at the photocopied pages. Might as well be in Aramaic. Staring at the words really, really hard, I’ve discovered, does not make them magically register. Nor can I decipher the letters as if it’s all some elaborate spy code that will eventually yield familiar English sentences, like “You have wasted three months” and “What the hell are you doing with your life?” Marcela knows a failing student when she sees one. She sends me glances of pity across the bent heads of my brilliant classmates.

  I did study all week, like I told Mateo I would, but cramming for three months’ worth of Spanish lessons in five days is a lot like trying to stuff a watermelon in your ear. I still have the jitters from the gallons of coffee and maté I consumed, but I can’t say as much in Spanish.

  At exactly 1:45, I stop torturing myself. I hand my paper in to Marcela with a Post-it note attached in humble blue ink: “I’m sorry I didn’t do better.” Zoey lifts her head from her test and looks at me with a generous smile, as though there is a possibility that I have finished early because I am that good. I shrug, defeated, and slip out the door.

  It’s early, and the late-September day is warm. Argentina’s spring is in full bloom. Female office workers have traded their wool coats for slim cotton blazers. Not wanting to go back to Andrea’s house and sulk, I consult my map and head to the famous Porteño café that’s featured in all my guidebooks as a must-see attraction—at least that’s one thing I can cross off my list today. Three blocks to the east and a shortcut through the park should get me there in a few minutes. But I’ve forgotten it’s Thursday, and a large crowd is forming around the obelisk. There are many onlookers today, so many I can’t see the Madres. Only a single blue head kerchief, bobbing slowly to the right, is visible through the throng of people. My eyes trained on the other side of the park, I weave around amateur photographers, through gaggles of schoolchildren, under banners, and over picnic blankets. The crowd makes it hard to move quickly. I stop for a second to make sure I’m still headed in the right direction. A hand brushes against my arm. This park is known for pickpockets, my guidebook tells me. Keep a close eye on your valuables. Cameras are especially vulnerable. I passed a million cameras back there; why are they picking on me? They can have my Spanish textbook if they really want it. I don’t have much use for it, apparently.

  “Permiso,” I say loudly, trying to break free from the crowd. “¡Permiso!”

  A group of schoolchildren parts like the Red Sea. As I hurry through the temporary path, I hear a woman somewhere behind me shouting. “¡Chica, parada! ¡Por favor!” Good luck, sister.

  I walk faster, one hand moving protectively to my backpack. Nearing a clear area at the edge of the grass, I check the zipper—still closed. I breathe deeply with relief. Ten more feet to the street, and I will disappear into the throng of commuter bodies. Another hand on my arm, but this time it doesn’t let go. I laughed when my mother gave me that vial of pepper spray, threw it into the garbage at the airport when she wasn’t looking, but now I’m thinking that might have been a naive thing to do. My heart pounding, I stop and turn sharply, ready to let some punk have an earful of vitriol, and see a small woman in a blue head kerchief smiling up at me. A photo of a young man is attached to the front of her dress with safety pins. GUERO SALAZAR, it reads. 1947–1969.

  The hand on my arm, I see after collecting myself and unclenching my fists, belongs to another woman, about my age. “Hola. I am Augustina,” she says in slow, careful English. “This is my grandmother Leonora. She wants to thank you. You were here many weeks ago, yes, and you give much money for the Madres.”

  “Oh, uh . . .” Augustina saves me from my embarrassed stumbling. “She says you are very . . . generous? Generous, yes? You give so much.” I shake my head in protest. I couldn’t have dumped more than sixty pesos in their collection jar. I suppose that’s more than they’re used to seeing at once, but still, I don’t deserve such praise. What are a few pesos compared to their endless efforts? It was the beauty of the Madres that drew me out of my selfish haze that day. If not for them, I would have sat in this park and wallowed all afternoon. And about what? Antonio? I have thought of the Madres often since that day. When was the last time I thought about my Argentine fling? How embarrassingly childish it all looks in the light of their tremendous heartbreak and enduring strength.

  “Thank you, but really it wasn’t anything. I just wanted to help a little.”

  “Every bit helps,” Augustina says kindly, looking down at her grandmother. “It is not just money. People forget, and this makes justice harder. She walks here for eighteen years. I came here a little girl and played in the park while she marched. I didn’t understand then.”

  “Was he your father?” I ask cautiously, already feeling like an intruder. Maybe this is too intimate a question.

  “My uncle,” she says, looking at the grass. “I don’t remember him much. He was tall, and he always brings Hershey’s bars.” She smiles at the memory.

  “I’m sorry,” I offer weakly. “I wish there was more I could do.”

  The women bend their heads together. There is translation. Then Leonora leans forward, blue-kerchiefed head bobbing gently toward me, and whispers throaty Spanish that I can’t understand. She takes my hand and presses it to her breast. I nod and smile.

  “She says you have a beautiful heart.”

  The words explode inside my chest like love itself. I am speechless. I want to throw my arms around this wrinkled lovely woman, around the photo of her Guero, around her granddaughter and whole family. I want so much to do more for them all. They are the generous ones.

  “Usted es demasiado abundante,” I say slowly. You are too generous. I’m not sure I’ve got the words right, but the old woman smiles warmly and shakes her head. The tail of the blue kerchief flutters softly behind.

  “Is there something more I can do to help? Anything at all?”

  “You are American?” the granddaughter asks without the slightest hint of disdain.

  “Sí.”

  “You tell people?” She pushes a pamphlet, the worn paper soft as cloth, into my hands. On the cover is a montage of photos of the disappeared. “The world cannot forget. Memory honors them.”

  Who can I tell? Sam, Trish, a handful of other friends, a few dozen acquaintances? Then it hits me: the blog. I have access to hundreds of people every day. That’s something, isn’t it? Maybe I can’t solve the world’s problems—or even my own—but I can do this. Memory honors them.

  I squeeze Leonara’s hands and look at Augustina. “Tell your grandmother I will tell people.”

  Back in Palermo Viejo, I throw open my apartment door, invigorated with purpose, and fire up my computer. Instead of my usual blog, I write about the Madres.

  I whine daily about men and love and my poor broken heart on this blog, but the Madres de Plaza de Mayo know true heartbreak. These women have lost more than you or I can even begin to imagine. They have had their children, husbands, brothers taken from them wordlessly, darkly. “Disappeared.” The word is terrifying. There was no warning, no recourse, and no closure to this horrible chapter in Argentine history, this unbearable hole in these women’s lives. And yet here they are, week after week, marching so the perpetrators can’t forget, so the world will remember. I hope you will remember them with me.

  On the top right corner of my home page, I create a permanent banner that links to the Madres’ website. “They need money,” I write, “but also to be remembered.” I hope their story has the same effect on my little community as it has had on me. After all, these virtual friends and the Madres are not so differen
t. Reach out for help, even to strangers, and hands will reach back to you. The Madres have one another and their children and grandchildren and countrymen and, hopefully now, some of my blog readers, too.

  As for me, it feels good to focus on someone other than myself, to think of something infinitely more important than where I’m going to live when I go back to Seattle in two months, how I’m going to pay the rent, or if I’ll ever be able to step outside my front door without fear of running into Jeff and his soon-to-be bride. It feels so good that when I do think of these things, as I do constantly and unavoidably, they don’t seem so wholly insurmountable. Today I dive into my scheduled daily Internet job hunt with unprecedented optimism. Surely, when you put good things out into the world, the world will bring good things back to you.

  Unless folding sweaters at the Gap and running a hot dog stand are good things, my new theory doesn’t hold much water. The only job in Seattle that looks even remotely related to my qualifications requires, ironically, fluency in Spanish. Two hours, seven job sites, six cover letters, and four versions of my résumé later, I am no closer to gainful employment. A quick e-mail check reveals no responses from yesterday’s applications, either. Don’t these people see what a great catch they’re passing on? Cassie Moore, ex–Web producer, ex-fiancée, expat. How does one go about un-exing herself if no one wants her? My optimism gives way to sulking. Oh well, my old bedroom in my parents’ house is always waiting for me. Why, just imagine all the eligible men who will be beating down the door to date me.

  I curl up on the love seat, the cool evening air easing in through the French doors, and indulge my self-pity by contemplating throwing myself off the Juliet balcony. Don’t be ridiculous, I hear Trish’s mocking voice say. It isn’t in The Plan.

  A gust of warm, wet wind pushes across the darkening courtyard and into my room. The trees rattle. The French doors shudder. The air calms again. Did Andrea mention something about a storm coming today? Or tomorrow? Nervous about my final, repeating verb conjugations in my head, I was only half listening. “You know it’s spring when the storms begin,” she said. That must be it. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky all day, and now this urgent humidity.

  It reminds me of home. There was nothing better than falling asleep to the sound of heavy rain thumping against a window. I could use a good Seattle rain. I grab my purse and my cardigan from the back of the chair and head out into the dusk.

  Beyond Andrea’s courtyard, things are stormier than I expected. No rain yet, but the wind throws a tantrum against trees, screen doors, and garbage bags left on the sidewalk. My hair flies in every direction, settles, then flies out again. Old women latch shutters. Small children peer through upstairs windows. Transvestite hookers run for cover, holding their hair and skirts. The night is warm and wild and I love it. I button my cardigan to the top, wrap my arms tightly around my rib cage, and try not to think about how nice it would be to have someone walking beside me. For a moment I feel Jeff’s long fingers lace through mine, the phantom limb of our severed relationship. I shake it out and hold tighter on to myself.

  Not in the mood to be alone and surrounded by couples and groups, I head south toward the smaller, less popular plaza a few blocks west. I’m not sure what I’ll do when I get there—have a coffee somewhere or maybe cry into a slice of pizza. Along the way, the universe, perhaps feeling bad about the whole job situation, offers up an ice cream parlor. The glowing pink HELADO sign hanging over the door is a welcoming beacon. Inside the startlingly fluorescent-lit room, empty except for the teenage boy behind the counter (the Buenos Aires equivalent of the Starbucks barista), I decide on four scoops of the chocolate almond—my favorite—and a huge fudge-dipped cone.

  The boy raises his eyebrows. “¿Cuatro?” he asks.

  “Sí,” I say, tempted to make it cinco. With my discount on Gap sweaters, hiding a few extra pounds should be no problem.

  Out in the humid night again, it doesn’t take long before the chocolate is oozing toward the cuff of my cardigan. I am mid-wrist-lick, tongue coiling around the back of my hand, when my eyes meet Mateo’s. Three things stampede through my brain: I didn’t return his message yesterday, wishing me luck on my Spanish test; he looks adorable with his hair twirling around in the wind; and who the hell is the woman with her elbow locked through his?

  “Hola, Cassie,” he says with a smile. What happened to Cassandra?

  He leans in to kiss my cheek (letting go, I note, of the woman’s arm) but stops short and laughs lightly. He rubs a thumb gently across my jawline and licks it. “Chocolate almond?”

  “Of course.” I return the laugh and pat my face with a napkin. Is it wrong that, for just a second, I wish I could rub the ice cream all over my body? “Thanks.”

  I look from him to the woman. She watches us expectantly, eyebrows raised. Everything about her is refined and lovely. Even her long straight brown locks seem to dance playfully in the wind. My hair sticks to my mouth, fingers, and ice cream cone in long, wet chunks.

  “This is Anna.” Mateo mumbles something to the woman in Spanish. She nods and smiles broadly. What did he say? This is my friend’s tenant. No one of importance. Just smile and we’ll be on our way.

  “Hola,” I say a bit too loudly. “Me llamo Cassie.”

  “Encantada,” she replies softly with a fragile smile and leans in for the obligatory kiss. This must be the kind of Argentine woman people talk about when they talk about Argentine women.

  “So how did you do?” Mateo asks jovially. If I look as awkward as I feel, he doesn’t seem to notice.

  “With what?”

  “Your test.”

  “Oh. I don’t know. Okay, I guess.” Before I am forced to elaborate, wind kicks up a bale of street detritus—leaves, plastic bags, shopping receipts, dirt—into the air around us. Sheltered by Mateo’s height, the beautiful Anna is spared. With slim, manicured fingers, she removes a small leaf that made its way down her ample caramel-colored cleavage while Mateo and I brush debris from our arms and shake things from our hair, laughing.

  “Felicitaciónes.”

  “What?”

  “Congratulations. On the test.”

  “Oh, right. Duh.” I laugh at the irony of my ineptitude. What can only be called a snort erupts from my mouth. Anna grimaces, looking terribly embarrassed for me. Mateo laughs and pulls a piece of blue string from my hair.

  “Well, it was good to see you, Cassie. I’m glad to hear your test went well. I really should get Anna home before this storm gets worse.”

  Why the formality? I wonder. For Anna’s sake, no doubt. I really should get Anna home. That stings more than it should. You’re the one who stopped returning his calls, I remind myself.

  “You’re on your way home, too, I hope.” He looks at me with concern and presses his hand to my elbow when he says this. I almost drop my ice cream cone. There he goes again, acting all sweet and thoughtful and . . . Mateo threads his arm through Anna’s. No, forget it, I’m not getting sucked into that fantasy again. Still, I can’t help imagining what it would be like if I were the one on his arm tonight, his broad shoulders shielding me from the coming storm. In all the commotion, I’ve forgotten about my ice cream cone, which, besides the recently acquired topping of street grit, is seriously in jeopardy of collapsing into a pool of goo on the sidewalk. I know exactly how it feels.

  “Yeah, I should get going, too,” I squawk, trying to sound peppy, breezy. “Great to see you, too. Buenas noches.”

  “Buenas noches,” he says softly.

  Anna smiles cordially, and they move past me into the dark and muddled night.

  The air is getting thicker by the second. I toss the cone into a garbage can and double my pace back to the yellow house. Every few feet, tiny tornadoes whip themselves and everything around them into frenzies. With no way to avoid it, I dip my head down and soldier on, continuously brushing bits of branches from my hair, images of Mateo and Anna from my head.

  The streets are empty; not
even the crazy motorcyclists have ventured out, Argentines all having the good sense to get inside when a storm is brewing. I seem to be the only one left in Palermo Viejo, the only one left in the world. But the solitude matches my mood perfectly. As long as I make it home before the rain starts.

  Two blocks from the house, the air gets eerily, suspiciously still. And hot. Very, very hot.

  Something hits my cheek gently. Then my collarbone. My knee. Forehead. Stomach. Thigh. Cheek. The hits come faster and faster. What it is or where it’s coming from, I have no idea. It feels like I’m being pelted with small nuts from every direction. Something hits the sidewalk and windows and car hoods, making snapping sounds. Hail? I remember an afternoon in Seattle when I was four or five, chunks of ice the size of walnuts crashing down for mere minutes, my arms covered in tiny bruises, to my mother’s dismay. Only when I pass a large brick house, security lights blaring, do I see that it isn’t hail. Dozens of cockroaches the size of my thumb thrash through the fluorescent beam. They’re flying! Those are giant flying cockroaches! I look down, and they are everywhere. Not dozens, hundreds. One hits my ear, and I can hear it fighting to free itself from my hair. I scream and shake my head, then clamp a hand over my scream. If one of these things gets in my mouth, I will die, I swear, right here on this empty Buenos Aires street. Now, there’s a scenario I didn’t think of.

  My lips locked, my flip-flopped feet crunching down on grounded roaches, I run like I’ve never run before.

  The swarm thins about a block from Andrea’s, but I keep running until I’m safely behind the door. Inside the dark entrance hall, I hold my breath and shake my head, torso, and limbs furiously until I’m convinced all is clear. Nothing flapping in my hair, nothing clinging to my sweater, nothing thwacking against the walls. One hand over my thumping heart, the other feeling for the long bench that runs along the wall, I stretch my mouth and gulp at the air.