Really, she wanted to say with mock surprise, but heard her aunt’s voice again. Don’t judge. She shook herself. Why was she feeling mean? And then it came to her. Steve. Of course. Steve. Going off to Vietnam to hide his secret. “It would make a man of him,” his father had said. A dead man, as it turned out. Steve hadn’t had a chance at love. But Armando did, and he refused to take it. She took in a breath. She needed to calm down.
“I tried to explain ahead of time.” He took a sip of his margarita. “It was different in France. I was different.”
Beyond Armando’s shoulder, she saw the waiter who had dropped the load of dishes the night she met Pamela. He was carrying their order. When he saw her, he nodded toward his perfectly balanced tray. She smiled.
Armando gave the waiter a thumbs up when he set their meals in front of them, then he focused on his silverware. He adjusted the spoon and knife. “I thought maybe you could talk with Claude …”
Talk with Claude? She felt her back stiffen. What could she say? Armando loves you, but stay away. He’s nuts! She winced at the thought.
The waiter set down a basket of tortillas wrapped in a cloth napkin. She patted the napkin. The tortillas inside were steaming hot. Soon they would be cool and stiff, but she dared not open her mouth for a bite. Words might fly out. She tightened her jaw.
“Did you say something?” Armando turned toward her.
She shook her head. Had she been grinding her teeth?
“It’s better this way.”
She swallowed. Better without love? She did not think so.
Armando leaned toward her. “I’m thinking of entering the priesthood.”
She gasped. This was too much.
“It’s perfect, Callie. You must see that. I could be at peace. And I could work with the children.”
She still had not taken a bite, and yet she choked and started coughing. Was she to explain that to Claude?
He came around the table and patted her on the back. “Choucita.”
She took a sip of water. The coughing stopped, but her eyes continued to water. “I’m okay,” she said.
He sat back down, cut a piece of chicken, and swirled it in mole sauce. “I wish you would eat chicken, at least. You need more protein.”
How many times had she explained about combining whole grains and legumes?
“If I were in Salamanca, I would be close enough to help out Maestro Chávez … and you …”
But he would be thousands of miles from Claude. And filled with regret.
Armando put the forkful of chicken into his mouth.
How could he sit there eating chicken? She took another sip of water.
“You haven’t eaten a bite … Do you want me to order something else?” He turned to look for the waiter.
She pushed back her chair and stood. She had to think of a way out. “I need …” She looked around and saw a waiter with his hand out, assuming she was looking for the ladies’ room and ready to usher her inside. “I need the ladies’ room.”
He jumped up to hold her chair.
At the entry to the hotel, she turned back and saw him following her with his eyes.
His plan was ridiculous, as usual. There was no way she could explain his behavior to Claude when she did not understand herself. She should march on through the hotel, out the back door, and up the callejones to her house. But she could not just leave him sitting there. She imagined giving him a good shaking, rattling his loose screw back into place.
She pushed the bathroom door open and saw the maid dressed in blue. She sighed. She had left her purse at the table again and had not a centavo to give her. She slunk into the stall at the end, the one that felt the most private, but had a window onto a wide hallway that led to the kitchen. She closed the window, lowered her pants, and sat down. She didn’t actually have to go to the bathroom when she left the table, but as long as she was there, she might as well try. Like her mother had always said.
Now that he was no longer sitting across from her, denying the obvious, she recognized the dark pain of separation in his eyes. Felt his longing. She bowed her head.
It had been hard, at first, for her to understand his love of the church. But she did, over time, understand. The quiet chanting, the flowing robes and flickering candles, the incense and lilies, the high ceilings, the cool comfort on scorching days, even the boom of rockets.
She pictured him at three years old standing at the orphanage door. How many times had Armando recounted his first moments? How Sister Ana María had put his small pack on the chair in her office and then took his hand and led him to the chapel. How she lit a candle and put it by the statue of a lady in blue. Then she put her hands on his shoulders and told him that the lady was his mother María. Sister Ana Teresa knelt with him and showed him how to hold his hands in prayer. “You can tell her anything,” she said. From that day on, he crept into the chapel at dawn. He told the lady in blue everything that hurt his heart.
Would he have told her, too, of his love of Claude? Of the depth of his loss?
She felt the release of warm liquid and heard it splash into the toilet bowl. The attendant perched on a stool at the other end of the bathroom would have heard it, too.
“DID you ever think … ?” she said when she got back to the table. “Did you ever think the church could be wrong? About love, I mean, about love.”
He hunched his shoulders and looked down at his plate. “No …”
She pulled herself up in her seat. “Well, it’s been wrong about other things.”
He looked across at her. “It’s not just the church.”
“It can’t be Maestro Chávez.”
He looked away. “No, it’s not the maestro.”
She reached for his hand. “Well, then …”
He pulled his hand away. “I would make a good priest.”
She sighed. “And what would you say to a boy in love with another boy? Would you tell him to give up his love?”
He stared across the table at her. “If priests can be celibate, why can’t others?”
She took in a slow breath. “Is that how you would counsel a boy in love?”
His eyes darkened. “What do you know of love?”
She took a hold of the table to steady herself, but her voice shook. “I know it’s not wrong for you to love Claude. I know that much.”
He sank back into his chair. “When I was twelve, an older boy hanged himself. The next day Sister Ana Teresa asked me to help her in the garden. We weeded the tomatoes. She didn’t say anything to me. She just knelt beside me weeding. She invited me every day.” Armando smiled. “We knelt together in the garden long after we’d pulled up every weed.”
Had the boy been gay? Had the nun sensed even then that Armando was?
He leaned toward Callie. “She was compassionate.”
“And I am not?” That sounded defensive. Why couldn’t she just listen?
“Don’t you see? That’s how I want to be.”
“By breaking up with Claude?”
His eyes filled with pain. “I thought you would understand. Isn’t that what you did, retreat like a monk?” He leaned forward and looked into her eyes. “Fictional husbands don’t count.” He signaled the waiter for the check. “Let’s go.”
“I’m sorry.” She reached for his arm. “I didn’t mean …”
He pulled away, put some bills on the table, and then stood. “It’s all right.” He spread her shawl over her shoulders.
Neither of them spoke on the way up the callejón to her house. But the critical voice in her head did not cease. Why couldn’t she just have listened? Why couldn’t Armando accept his love of Claude? Why? Why? Why? Then Jacob’s voice came to her. “There’s always hope.” How many times had he said that when she’d questioned him about the latest community setback. Whether it was drop-outs or prison terms, he always responded, “There’s always hope.” She heard the warmth of his voice and felt a wave of gratitude. And loss.
Sh
e unlocked the door. “Would you like tea?”
“No thanks. I need to practice.” He went down a few stairs and then he came back up again. “Don’t worry, Calecita. I’m fine. It’s just that …”
In that moment, she saw him again as that three-year-old left at the tall wooden doors at the orphanage, and she knew. “It’s just that you’re afraid, isn’t it? It’s just that you’re afraid.”
She stood above him on the stairs, and he looked up to her. “Isn’t it better this way, that I ended it first?”
She held out her hand as if making a blessing. “There’s always hope.”
“You know …” Armando said and smiled up at her. “You would make a good mom.” He started down the stairs and then turned again. “Keep your cell by you. Would you?”
“Sure,” she said, and then whispered to herself, “There’s always hope.”
THERE’S always hope. Easy to say. But did she believe it? She wasn’t sure. She unlocked her front door. But Jacob had been sure. No matter what, he kept right on going. She pushed the door open. When she had asked him how he did it, he told her he had been inspired by Nelson Mandela. The trick was not to avoid falling, but to get up again. Every time. She entered the terrace and almost stumbled over the bag with the trumpet. Speaking of falling. She laughed and picked up the bag. Well, she had gotten up when she fell, more than once, but then what had she done? She entered the dining area. Had Armando been right about her retreating? Hadn’t she taken refuge in an orderly, quiet—yes, monastic—life? She looked at the jaguar. “And it has served me well, if you’d like to know.” She fingered the valves through the bag. She had forgotten all about practicing. Was it because she had given up hope? She put the bag down and shrugged. No time now. She had to finish the translation and get to bed.
Thirty-Five
SHE STOOD FROZEN AT THE TOP OF THE CALLEJÓN, clutching her translation. Her feet would not move. She leaned forward as if that would help, but no. She could not take a step. How would she get it to DHL in time? There was a bell sounding. She opened her eyes. A dream. She would make it to the DHL. The bell sounded again.
Still half-asleep and her legs feeling like logs, Callie managed to stretch far enough to answer the phone. “Hello.”
“So, you know,” Aunt Ida said.
“You’ve talked to Mother.” She lay back on the pillow and tried to move her legs.
“Yes, and I’ve been itching to talk with you. I can’t for the life of me figure out why your mother insists on traveling now.”
Her aunt perplexed. She smiled. That was a new one.
“When I think of all those years she refused to travel, and now when she should be deciding what to wear down the aisle, she’s taking off for Guanajuato.”
“Mother said you encouraged her to go ahead and buy her ticket.”
“I tried to discourage her. But she was bound and determined.”
Bound and determined. Another expression she would be hearing Armando say.
“It would be different if she wanted to see the mummies. But she’s doesn’t. She told me that plain enough. As for seeing you, well, you could be here in a jiffy.”
“Yes.”
“She was in such an all-fired hurry. I’ve never seen her like that. But then she’s been acting strange lately.”
Was her mother ill after all? She eased her legs over the side of the bed and sat up. “Acting strange?” She really should not be traveling.
“You know how I always complained about her hiding in the balcony behind the choir? Well, now she walks right down the center aisle to a front pew arm in arm with John.”
How secure her mother must feel with John. She picked up her robe and drew it close around her.
“You won’t believe this part. Your mother had a cat on her lap.”
“In church?”
Ida laughed. “Out by the lake, at John’s place. On the veranda.”
She knew the cabin. Steve sometimes took her along Saturdays when he spent the afternoon with his uncle. They would sip Tang on the veranda and watch geese glide low over the lake. She didn’t remember any cats. But there was a dog the day her parents agreed to go along. “Damned dog,” her father grumbled when the dog would not stop following her mother around. “Damned dog.” What would he say now? She felt a little sad thinking of her father all alone in the ground. She shook herself. What an odd thought. Her mother had every right to marry someone else. Especially someone like John. Damned dog. Oh, my. Her thoughts were unruly.
“There she was, sitting peaceful as could be. I saw the mass of orange and thought she was knitting, but when I got out of the car and walked across the yard, I caught the flick of a tail. Your mother didn’t get up. She sat there, pinned under that cat.” Aunt Ida laughed. “Can you imagine?”
Her mother, with a cat on her lap? Strange, but not fatal.
“She never had the time of day for cats, and there she was holding one—and happy, Callie. Happy as pie.”
She went on some about John, what a great guy he was, and how he had been in love with Callie’s mother for years. “He loved her all along.”
Had her father known? Was that why he would speak disparagingly of John’s acreage, or was it just the usual sour grapes he spit out regarding anyone he judged more successful than himself? She sighed. Wasn’t it time she stopped these ungenerous thoughts?
“One day, years after your Dad died, John and I were playing golf.” Aunt Ida said “golf” with an ironic ring, as if she still could not believe she had taken up the sport after scoffing at those who amused themselves chasing after the small pock-marked balls. “He missed a putt on the ninth, but he looked so downcast, it couldn’t have been about the putt. Then it came to me. That picture I took at your parent’s wedding. John standing apart, his hands in his pockets, looking forlorn.
“I started putting two and two together. How he would stop over, ‘on church business,’ he would say. And it always seemed to be the night your mother came to dinner. And then how stricken he looked that day your mother swooned at the church social.”
“Swooning!” Now was her chance. “Well, that settles it, Mother should not be traveling alone—or traveling at all for that matter.”
“Oh, it was nothing. Her blood pressure was a little low. That’s all. Dehydration. I gave her a glass of water with a pinch of salt, and she was fine in no time.” She chuckled.
Her mother’s health was at issue here. Why was her aunt so blasé?
“Anyway, John wanted to call an ambulance. He can be on the thrifty side, you know. But not when it came to your mother. That clinched it. It wasn’t the putt he was forlorn about. It was your mother. I wondered then what he was waiting for.”
John, at least, seemed to have recognized the gravity of the problem. Perhaps she should call him. He wouldn’t want her mother swooning at thirty thousand feet, and with no companion on the plane to look after her.
“I confronted him and told him in no uncertain terms not to waste any more time. But he kept on waiting. For what? I don’t know. I began to think he was like that Henry James character who would go to his grave without popping the question. What was his name? You know.”
She looked toward the beams over her head. “John … John Marcher.”
“John, you say.” She laughed. “Well, the name fits. Imagine waiting all that time to propose.”
Her aunt sounded incredulous, but Steve’s Uncle John must have had his reasons. It would have been, must have been, a question of honor.
SHE had just undressed to shower when she heard the sound of a conga drum. She paused. It sounded as if it were in her room. Had she left a radio on? She wrapped a towel around herself and went back into her bedroom, her head turned to one side searching for the sound. The radio was off. Neither was there a percussionist hiding in her armoire. She kept walking. It was her backpack. The drum stopped. Then started again. She opened the top pocket and found her new cell. What the … ? Oh, Armando. He must have changed
the ring tone when she had left the table at the restaurant.
“I decided not to become a priest.”
Thank God. “Oh?”
“A Jehovah’s Witness stopped by this morning. He asked if I’d seen a dog and handed me a flyer of Tavelé. He had not even begun his spiel yet, you know, about whether I had found Jesus.”
“Perhaps you have,” she said.
“Wearing a pressed shirt and slacks? Maybe.” He laughed. “Thanks, by the way.”
“How did you know?”
“He said a güera waving a Virgin de Guadalupe gave him the flyer. Who else could it be? I suppose you got it from Juanito.”
“The flyer?”
“You know what I mean. And the statue is cracked, isn’t it, or missing something. Like all the other things you buy from him?”
All but the trumpet, she thought, picturing it in the bag by the French doors. She should get back to practicing.
“You really need to get rid of those things, now that your mother is on the way.”
“What?” How did he know?
“Your aunt Ida called this morning. Early. She’s sure your mom would appreciate seeing the mummies.”
“She told me Mother was not interested.”
“She seemed to think she would change her mind. She’s bound and determined that your mom see them.”
Bound and determined. So Armando had picked up another of her aunt’s phrases. She smiled.
“She said there was no way you would take your mom there.”
Callie laughed. “Well, she was right about that.”
“By the way, I heard about that junk of yours.”
“Junk?”
“You know, all that broken stuff you bought from Juanito. Jorge said you paid to get it fixed and then bought it again.” He tapped out a drum roll. “Good going, Callie.”
“It was for a worthy cause.”
“If you get tired of it, let me know. Meanwhile, what about the trumpet? Wouldn’t you like to donate it to the home? Pamela could give the boys lessons. Better than wasting your time. Which you won’t have anyway with your mother here.”
The Trumpet Lesson Page 20