by Roy, Deanna
“My family is not happy for me. I cause big problem. My brother was the only one to help me.” She had gone back to tugging at her zipper.
“If you had a job and help, why were you on that corner?”
“I needed money he did not know about.”
“What for?”
“For protection.”
“From what?”
“My cousin, another cousin. He — he wants me. He — has me. I do not want him.”
My anger flared. “Why didn’t your brother help?”
“My family does not believe me. I cannot keep him away.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“Yes. Many times.”
“And you told your family?”
She looked down the street, her dark eyes so lost. I wanted to cream somebody, smash them into the ground.
“It is not easy. He is very smart. He talks very pretty.”
“Is he the father of the baby?”
Her head snapped around. “No!”
“How do you know?”
Her face blossomed red. “I bleed before you came. I not bleed after. He did not come then.”
I gripped the edge of the pickup, trying to stay in control. “Does he still come?”
“No, not after the baby.”
“Did he think it was his?”
“No, he could not say that. Then they would know.”
“What happened to the baby?”
“My brother would not let me work when I was fat. I had no job. My mother took Manuelito and gave him to my cousin Letty.”
“You just let her take him?”
“Letty is a nice person. They have a good house.”
“Did you tell them who was the father?”
“No.”
“And they just let it go?”
“They not ask questions.”
“But you see him?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know you are his mother?”
“He calls us all mama.”
“Is he happy?”
“Yes.”
Okay, so this could be fine. “So why not just let him grow up there?”
“Letty’s husband is gone. We don’t know where. He maybe has another woman.”
“Doesn’t Letty have family she can go to?”
“Yes, but not with my boy.”
I pressed the heel of my hand into my forehead. “They don’t consider the boy their family?”
Rosa gripped my arm. “No, no. That is not what I mean. They will take him. But she is from Guadalajara. I will never see my Manuelito again!” Her eyes brimmed over with tears. “I must have him!”
“But if he thinks Letty is his mother—”
“I am his mother!” Her voice broke and she began sobbing, a wrenching unyielding flow of tears. I pulled her into me, not knowing what to do. Not the slightest clue. I looked over the crumbling hill, the metal-roofed buildings that didn’t seem fit for anyone to live in. No matter how bad off I was, I could probably do better for the boy than this.
I had to try.
12: Corabelle
I couldn’t take one more minute.
The walls of the room were getting tighter. My father was getting smugger. My mother was increasingly silent, knitting on some purple monstrosity that was undoubtedly moving from scarf to blanket to wall covering. She could keep a freaking army warm with that thing, her needles clicking and her concentration focused so she didn’t have to listen and keep intervening.
Dad stood by the window, looking out on the city. “You know, maybe I’ll hire a locksmith and pay to get your place rekeyed. It’s worth it.”
“Dad…”
“Well, it’s silly. We can’t even get your clothes. Gavin is MIA — again — big surprise.”
“Stop it.”
Mom’s needles clicked faster. She had to be upset about Dad’s tirade. Her husband was becoming something he’d never been — a gloating pain in the ass.
I sure didn’t know what to do. Nobody could tell me when I was getting out. And even if they did, Dad had a point. Gavin had my keys.
I’d forced myself to slow down my texts to one per hour. He hadn’t answered any since early afternoon. Dinner was coming soon. Even if I did get out, the complex office was closed. Without their backup key, I wouldn’t be able to get in my own place.
Maybe I could stay with Jenny. I would not survive a night in a hotel room with my parents.
“Come on, Maybelle, let’s go. Where is your place?” He directed the question at me, but I refused to look up at him, staring at the phone, willing it to beep.
“Corabelle?” Dad’s voice was so unlike him, stern, edgy.
I heard Mom stand up, the bag rustling as she put her knitting away. “Arthur, let her have some peace, at least until tomorrow.”
“And what about after that?” Dad’s voice was rising. “And the day after that and the day after that?”
I would not lift my head. I knew what would come next. He would bring it down, try to appeal to me, play the daddy. We’d been through this cycle several times today already.
I dropped my feet to the floor, clutching the phone. I had to get out of the room, go somewhere. I didn’t even care about the gown. I passed through the door, searching for an escape, a place to be where everything was silent and at peace. My mom called after me but I kept going, stumbling past the nurse station, taking every possible turn, disappearing through the maze. My breathing was too rapid, and painful, but I made myself go faster, put more distance between myself and my parents.
The halls all looked the same, and when a nurse looked at me questioningly as I hurried down the corridor, I forced myself to slow down and look normal. The end of the ward was ahead, and even though I knew I was unwise to cut through another section of the hospital since I might attract attention, I pushed through the doors and entered the hub of the hospital that housed the elevators and the entrances to other sections.
I crossed to another set of doors. This hall was silent, no bustle, no people. A coughing fit came over me from the sudden movements, and I leaned against the wall, hacking and sucking in breaths. For a moment, spots flashed across my vision, as familiar as my intentional blackouts used to be, but I breathed through it, clutching my chest until it subsided.
There were no nurses, no station here, so no one noticed me. I just wanted a place to sit for a minute, to be alone. I continued walking along the corridor, thinking maybe these were offices, until I passed a partially opened door and stopped dead.
The room held a normal full-sized bed, a sofa, and a little table with two chairs. I pushed inside, my chest so tight I could barely breathe. I knew this room. I knew what it was for.
A family had just been there, I could tell. The covers were rumpled but not pulled back. The impressions of their bodies were still imprinted on the fabric. Had they held a baby? A child? Had he already died or did they stay here with him until he passed?
A pitcher of water sat untouched, the condensation beading on the glass. I walked around the bed, looking at the calming painting on the wall, abstract and soft. The wallpaper was sea green, and the bedspread a matching green with yellow. The room we had stayed in with baby Finn had been done in blues.
Something round and squishy collapsed beneath my nubby-bottomed hospital sock. I lifted my foot.
A pacifier, the hospital kind, with no cute characters or colorful plastic backs. Just the brownish nub firmly attached to a wide flexible ring.
I picked it up and clutched it tight. Finn had never gotten a pacifier. He’d always had tubes in his mouth. This baby must have been bigger, older, and at some point he must have seemed fine.
My legs gave out and I sank to the floor on my knees. Her husband wouldn’t leave her. He’d hold her hand during the funeral. They would cry together. They’d go home and look over the baby’s room. They’d fold up the little burp cloths and put away the tiny onesies. They would sit together in the living room and remember antici
pating his arrival. Sometimes, even in their grief, they might smile.
He would not leave her to do all that alone, to never smile.
I couldn’t bear it.
The phone was still tight in my hand, silent and dark. He hadn’t called. He wasn’t calling. He might never call.
The garage had closed an hour ago. He wasn’t at work. No classes today.
Where was he?
He wouldn’t leave me again. He wouldn’t.
Fear rose up that something had happened to him. I pictured his Harley skidding on the freeway, cars coming at him on all sides, running over his chest—
I had to stop this.
But it wouldn’t go. I could see the ambulance coming for him, loading him up. A crew trying to stop the blood streaming out of him. A monitor strapped to him, his heartbeat going in and out on the screen.
The beeps, slowing down. The alarm, going off.
I curled my knees up to my chest and held on tightly. I couldn’t think this way. I had to stay straight. But what other explanation was there? He’d ignored all my calls. Even if his phone was dead, he could have called from work or just come over when he got off. He would know I was worried.
A keening cry tried to work its way up from my belly. I had been so strong for so long. Just a couple weeks with Gavin and I worried about everything. Why was I so weak?
But I knew. For the first time in so long, I had something to lose.
I knew when the hyperventilating started that I shouldn’t do it. It was past. I didn’t need it anymore.
But the darkness seemed so perfect, so easy. I held my breath. I wouldn’t take it all the way. Just flirt with it. Just a moment. I relaxed into the black, waiting for my chest to heave, to force me to breathe.
But it didn’t, instead it burned, and I couldn’t catch my breath at all, and then it was too late.
13: Gavin
The ocean stayed to our right the whole ride down to Ensenada. The waves were high, peaking in white froth as they curled against the beach not fifty yards away.
Bright painted lines flew beneath us on the straight, clean highway. The old road, crumbling and black, flowed alongside. Outside Rosarito, the resorts were beautiful and pristine, the English billboards making apparent who they expected to travel there. Normally I would have smiled at a sign boasting “Last Corona for 25 miles,” but I was too intent on our destination to appreciate the journey.
My mind whirred about this boy. What did his birth certificate say? He was a Mexican national. I couldn’t take him across the border if I wasn’t listed. Did Rosa even know my last name? I wasn’t sure.
Rosa wasn’t legal to cross either. I doubted she had a passport. The news always talked about illegal immigrants and dangerous border crossings. But it was so easy for me to get through. Could Rosa? Why would they stop her if I brought her? Surely it was okay for her to visit me. Mario’s family sometimes came over, laughing loud cousins from Mexico City. Yes, it would be fine.
Her head fitted against my back the same way Corabelle’s had when we rode out into the mountains. I didn’t have much cause to bring women places on the Harley. They were the only two.
I wasn’t sure I believed Rosa’s insistence that she wasn’t a prostitute. Her explanations were designed to elicit sympathy, but they were also convenient. Trust didn’t come easy to me, someone who had proven utterly untrustworthy.
I focused on the road, the stripes down the center and the smell of the ocean that reminded me of home. I would get back to Corabelle. I would make this right. We would work it all out, somehow. But I would not keep this from her. I meant it when I said there would be no secrets between us.
I needed to call her. Something. When we stopped, I would do that first thing. Who cared about the rates, or anything? Just do it. Hopefully she’d been busy studying all day. With her parents around, she probably didn’t expect me anyway, just to have her father pull another stunt like last night.
The sign hadn’t lied. The next 25 miles were desolate, just the ocean, random palm trees, and a never-ending stretch of road. But eventually civilization returned, houses and cantinas. Rosa lifted her head and pointed to an exit. We passed a university, beautiful and trim, like anything you would see stateside. I realized I didn’t know Mexico at all. I had judged a whole country by the poor border slums.
She directed me off the main road and into a neighborhood. The houses would have been perfectly suited in parts of California, with neat, even streets lined with cars, stucco walls, and Spanish-tiled roofs. If Manuelito were here, why would Rosa want to take him away?
She pointed to a white adobe house with brown shutters, built into the side of a hill. An enormous clay sun adorned the exterior wall. I parked the bike between an aging but still respectable Taurus and a red Chevy pickup.
When the Harley went silent, I asked her, “Are they expecting you?”
“No.”
“Will she guess who I am?”
“No. She will think you are a boyfriend.”
Rosa stood from the bike and rubbed her thighs. It was a long ride for someone unaccustomed to it. For a second I remembered that I had pretty intimate knowledge of this woman, and yet I knew nothing important, not even her last name.
“I need to call someone,” I told her, intent on Corabelle. I hadn’t even looked at my phone since I left San Diego. A quick scan of the pile of messages made me realize she was upset. She needed her keys. Her clothes. Her parents were making her crazy. I thought of how easily she’d chosen the sea a few days ago and my panic began to rise.
Rosa tugged on my jacket but I shrugged her off. “I have to make a call. Have to.”
“Look, Gavinito.”
I intended to turn away, but behind her, a small boy stood on the porch of the house, dark haired and solemn in jeans and a button-down plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He held a truck in his hand and watched us with big, quiet eyes.
I had never seen anything so beautiful in my whole life.
14: Gavin
I approached the stairs, wondering if the boy would be afraid of me, or if he too would see something that would let him know that he belonged to me.
“That’s a cool truck,” I said, sitting on a stair so that we were about the same height.
He clutched the green plastic toy to his chest and said nothing, just continued to look at me beneath long curling lashes that actually made me think of Corabelle. We both had dark hair. It seemed possible, in that fleeting moment, that this could be Finn.
Rosa stayed down on the street. I swallowed a huge lump in my throat. Even in the fading light of early evening, I could see the whorl of the cowlick that had clued me in on the photograph. I fingered my ear, staring at his.
His eyes were pure Rosa, like almonds, coming to a little point in the corners. After a moment, he decided I was not a danger and sat down, running the truck along the wood slats of the porch.
I realized he probably did not speak any English. I searched for the few phrases I knew well enough to say competently. Most of my Spanish involved beer, pool, money, or insults. I didn’t know “truck” or “toy” or anything else that might interest a small child.
“¿Tu es Manuelito?” I asked.
He scowled suddenly and smacked his small hand against his chest. “Me llamo Manuel. No Manuelito. No no no no.”
I laughed. Made sense. I wouldn’t want to be called “little” either.
“Manuel, then.”
He pushed his truck around a bit more, glancing back up at me as if wondering why I was there. “¿Tienes chicle?”
Thankfully that was also one of the few words I knew, as children along the border were always selling boxes of gum, shouting, “¡Chicle! One dollar! ¡Chicle!”
I shook my head. “No.” I fumbled a minute, then was able to say, “¿Te gusta chicle?”
He nodded, then abruptly jumped up and ran inside the house, leaving his truck.
Rosa approached then, sitting on the to
p step. “What do you think, Gavinito?”
I shrugged. Yes, I thought it was possible. But I wasn’t giving any game away to her. My feelings had shifted upon seeing him. If he was mine, then I wasn’t sure who Rosa was to me anymore.
“You didn’t tell me about him before. All those years.”
Rosa pushed the truck back and forth on the porch, the plastic tires rumbling over the boards. “Too late. I not find you when I carry him. By the time you come again, he is gone.”
“I could have helped you then.”
The door pushed open wider and Manuel came back out, proudly holding out a clear plastic tub filled with little square gum packets. “¡Chicle!” he said. “¿Mama Rosa?”
Rosa shook her head, so he pushed the container at me. “¿Chicle?”
I took one of the little squares of packaged gum, four yellow pieces wrapped in clear plastic. “Gracias, Manuel. I like yellow.”
He set the tub on the porch and reached in, fishing around until he found a green one.
“You like the green?” I asked. At his quizzical look, I said, “Te gusta…” Crap. I didn’t know “green.”
“Verde,” Rosa said. “¿Verde es bueno, no?”
Manuel fumbled with the plastic wrapper, then shoved all four pieces in his mouth.
“¡Demasiado!” Rosa said, but she laughed. “Manuelito. Hijo loco.”
Manuel chomped on the gum, trying to make it a manageable size, and resumed pushing the truck.
“¿Donde esta Mama Letty?” Rosa asked.
Manuel pointed to the door. Rosa stood up, but I didn’t want to go anywhere else. I didn’t want to see this woman who had raised my boy, who would lay claim to him, take him deep into Mexico where I could not easily go.
I wanted to help Rosa.
“I come back,” Rosa said. “Get to know your boy. He not say much English words yet, he is little, but he understands. Letty speaks English to him.”
I watched Manuel to see if he would react to that.