A Simple Distance

by K. E. Silva

We finished with the palms hot and sweaty, went inside for a drink of whatever juice Fatima had cold—lime. At the dining room table, we talked between ourselves about private things, like land and greed, as if Fatima wasn’t just in the next room or walking here and there between sentences.

  Outside the open shutter, a hummingbird, iridescent green, at the flamboyant’s bright orange flowers, high up in the tree. Inside with us, a small black bird with a red breast.

  If I’d been worried for my mother since she’d showed up at the Oakland airport, bloodred eyes and too many bags, I wasn’t anymore. Not so much. As long as she could keep that house—her whole self, the bodies of her father, her brother, soon maybe her mother, and now my own blood from the pineapple plant, in its earth, where she could always reach down, sink her fingers in its dirt, and grab hold for balance.

  She only ever falls apart, completely, now and then. Remains in pieces sometimes longer, sometimes shorter. Like me, to a degree.

  This is how things come around. Maybe it was no accident I’d become my mother’s daughter and a lawyer like my uncles. Those days I saw them in me everywhere I turned; the way I avoided, attacked, avoided, attacked.

  Whether I settled matters or not, I could get on a plane and go back home to a life as anonymous as I chose. But my mom was stuck there. She needed her family intact, which meant I did, too.

  CHAPTER 25

  Each step ripe with the possibility of both, it’d gotten hard to tell forward from back, right from wrong.

  But I stepped anyway.

  Granny used to say she didn’t want to be buried at Godwyn. But Granny was dead. Like Grampy and Uncle George. And her voice could no longer be heard by the people around her. She could say all she wanted, but the only one who’d hear her would be my mom, maybe, late at night in the house, as just another angry shutter banging in the wind.

  Mom, we’re giving them access. I said the words to her as they came into my head, clearly, as if the answer had been staring me in the face the whole time.

  Her face curled to object above the lime juice, yet I didn’t care. I put my foot down, cut her off before she could complain.

  Look, I said, cold like a lawyer, I can make this happen, and you can’t. They need to be able to use the burial plot, Mom. Not even you can stop them. Your land surrounds it on all sides. Any judge would give them a road.

  She complained anyway. But Charles is talking about taking the whole house. It’s my house, Jean. Look what I’ve made of it. That’s the only reason he wants it. It’s pure greed.

  Mom. Stop. Uncle Charles doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He’s a doctor. He fixes people, not problems … Call Uncle Martin at Tours and tell them to drive up here this afternoon.

  But—

  Just do it! I left; refused to let her see me weak inside. The problem was, I couldn’t do it alone. I knew that island, and my voice wasn’t strong enough to be heard by my uncles without baritone behind it.

  So I fumbled through my backpack for Mr. Petion’s business card and left a message with his secretary for him and Mr. Hill to please, come to Godwyn.

  CHAPTER 26

  And they did come: Hill and Petion. As asked.

  Uncle Charles and Uncle Martin waited until it was almost dark; pulled up the drive fast, as though they were in charge, had more important matters to attend to. The Pascals and their posturing; it’s so obnoxious.

  I rolled my eyes at Mr. Hill and Mr. Petion, looked at my watch. But we rose immediately, all four of us, from our seats on the front porch—my mom under strict orders not to say a word because she’d just set them off, squander what little sunlight we had left.

  Uncle Martin, the wise guy, mentioned to his brother as they exited the Four-Runner, Charles, I neglected to tell you. Jean has hired herself a pair of bodyguards.

  Good afternoon, gentlemen. Uncle Charles was not as amused as Uncle Martin. He would rather have bullied my mother out of Godwyn in private. Family matters.

  But he had a mother to bury, earth to move to do so.

  Mr. Hill and Mr. Petion nodded their hellos to my uncles; they already knew the plan: map out a path to the burial plot from Grampy’s old access road, draw it up on the survey, and file it with the recorder’s office in Bato before I left the island. Lock my uncles into a contract.

  My mom will grant the family a right-of-way up the hill from the access road to the graves. All this fighting is unnecessary. I attempted a tone as patronizing as the one I was sure to hear back.

  But I missed my mark. Uncle Charles was far more practiced. Jean. You have this all wrong. We are not the enemy. Godwyn has been a family house since long before you were born. And it will remain that way … Perhaps it is we who have been at fault, in failing to instill in you the loyalty to this family that we have. Your mummy will never have to worry about a place to live in Baobique. You know that.

  He just didn’t get it and he was wasting our time. I looked to Uncle Martin, incredulous to find myself turning to him as the voice of reason.

  Uncle Martin. My mom has title now. That is not in dispute.

  Mr. Hill backed me up: She’s right, Martin.

  Uncle Martin listened to the man he’d called the day before in panic, to find Susan for Granny, when he’d thought she still had a chance. He could concede to Hill, not to me. Let’s hear them out, Charles.

  Uncle Martin, Hill, and Petion all dressed for town, we piled into the Four-Runner, two too many, and backtracked down the drive to the access road.

  My mom managed to maintain an uncomfortable silence until Uncle Martin passed too close to her plum tree. But that did it. Martin! Watch the damn tree. You did that just to spite me. You’d level my whole house just to beat me down, if Jean weren’t here.

  He did do it on purpose. That’s just his nature, to push and push and push until he gets at the nerve, gets his reaction.

  Oh, Sophie, be quiet! You’re getting your little house. Be happy and shut your mouth.

  Stop it! Both of you! Now I was screaming, too. The car much too small to contain us like this, Uncle Martin parked it in the middle of the access road and we all spilled out into deep red mud.

  The light was going.

  Mr. Hill pointed a long arm up the slope in the direction of the graves. Here, cut in from the plum tree toward the pomerack.

  We’d walked the route already, before Uncle Martin and Uncle Charles arrived. The slope could support a narrow road, skirting the western border, roughly parallel to the existing access road.

  No! Leave the plum tree! My mom, in high gear, not helping us at all on this grade.

  We’re leaving the plum tree! I screamed at her, hoping to drown her out.

  Uncle Charles was obstinate, having lost one battle already. That way is too steep. It will never hold.

  Yes, it will. We’ll angle along this way, I pointed, hug the existing road.

  But he wasn’t listening to me, my voice useless in all that wind. A storm was kicking up again, out at sea.

  I looked to Mr. Hill; he continued, led us up the slope and through the trees we marked earlier—the grapefruits, the coconuts—along the croton hedge to the crest, then straight to the plot. We pulled ourselves through in dwindling light, collected scratches and pricks from hidden thorns in thick, thick bush. By the time we reached the graves, it was completely dark.

  This is going to work, I demanded toward my uncles, both with arms folded tight to their chests. As if demanding made it so.

  The road will hold, Martin, Mr. Hill assured him.

  I am against this. This would never be happening if George were still here. Uncle Charles, a child losing control.

  Uncle Martin spoke to the ground as he addressed his brother. But he’s not here anymore, Charles. George is gone. And Mama’s gone …

  As Granny and Uncle Charles lost their grip on Godwyn, Uncle Martin’s hand grew stronger, steadied. That year had taken first his older brother, then his mother. He had never in his life had to be the Un
cle George, until now. He looked my way. This family needs a bridge. And the road will do … Jean, if you come to my office in Port Commons early enough tomorrow morning, we can draft the right-of-way before my court appearances.

  Everyone grew quiet. The winds had shifted along with our alliances. The fight let out of all of us, leaving behind just a sadness, deep as the night was dark.

  We could bury Granny in two days’ time.

  Only as we walked back toward the house, sticky with aftermath, did I notice the porch light and her Subaru; Susan waiting for us to return.

  CHAPTER 27

  I can leave in two days, was all I could think as we approached the house; Uncle Martin and Uncle Charles filing off to retrieve the Four-Runner from the mud in the access road; Messrs. Hill and Petion gone ahead to welcome Susan, like conquering heroes after a hard day’s battle.

  My mom and I stayed behind, walked a bit slower than the rest. Personally, I was in no hurry for the night’s second confrontation. I dragged myself toward Susan.

  Mom, I asked, more to look busy than anything else, who is Marcus Greene? Do you know him?

  Isn’t he the man that’s dating Susan?

  Dating?

  Well, whatever it is you call it these days …

  Like my mom, I had spent many years of my life alone. Much of the time I, too, felt as if I was waiting for someone to come along and complete me the way she lay in bed all those years when I was young, waiting for someone like Harold to make her whole, shutting her eyes to me and what the two of us could have had, just by ourselves.

  There in the dark, she whispered to me about Susan’s lover. He’s a freshman in the Assembly. One of the O.O.F.I. representatives trying to link all the islands together with one voice. They tell us that’s the only way to gain international respect. People are saying he’ll be the island’s answer in a few years, just like George was, and Hill, in their time.

  Is he a lawyer?

  No, I don’t think so … He’s some type of engineer. Came back from London last year for a political career. I hear he and Susan are becoming quite an item.

  I took her arm, held her to a stop, not rough, just incredulous. Mom, I can’t believe you didn’t tell me this earlier. Don’t you know how I feel about her? I said it soft enough so the others wouldn’t hear, only loud enough for my mom.

  Well, that’s none of my business, Jean. Is it?

  Not a question; I’d nothing to say, responded silently, with as few tears as possible. But I was glad for the dark, so no one could see me wipe my face dry.

  My mom and I never talked about my lovers. In my mind, I always told myself it was because no one important enough had come along yet.

  Things were changing so fast, it wasn’t just the darkness making it hard to see.

  We reached the porch smiling wide and fake for the others.

  Mr. Hill would not hear of letting us cook, proposed taking us all out to that Trinidadian’s restaurant in Tete Queue; the only restaurant in Tete Queue. But Mr. Petion had some work to do for an early-morning audit in Bato, would catch a ride with the next passing car or truck along the windy road south. And my mom wanted to start preparing the house for Granny’s funeral. Although it was common for me to see no one but family when I visited Baobique, my social obligations were expanding.

  Mr. Hill left his daughter and me no choice. Plan B was take-out curry in Susan’s Port Commons apartment.

  Before we left, we made sure the house was locked up tight: shutters closed, padlocks clicked, one dog in, one out.

  I would walk over to Uncle Martin’s office in the morning, from Susan’s apartment, to draft the right-of-way.

  CHAPTER 28

  I was learning how a life marks time in eras, not hours; saw my arms inch along, like a clock, in their revolution. By measure I am slow to learn, hold on to heavy luggage, like my mother and her too many bags at my apartment in Oakland, come to stay for as long as it took to send me packing, back to Baobique to anchor title to Godwyn beneath her feet.

  I could do it. I could face Susan. She drove us to Port Commons; Mr. Hill gone ahead to pick up the curry. I looked out the window, felt like a child being driven to school.

  I hated that I couldn’t drive myself. Not on those roads. Especially at night, I lac ked confidence on the left side.

  We drove in silence the entire trip, neither of us anxious to go where we had to that night.

  Mr. Hill must have called ahead from his cell phone to the restaurant and driven like a sixteen-year-old boy, because he pulled up with our dinner right after us in the parking lot of the Bank Royale, just underneath Susan’s one-bedroom.

  Inside, he brought us the curry: goat and chicken. And roti, to wrap it in. He also brought plastic forks and paper plates, having had the misfortune of trying to find such things in his daughter’s apartment on prior occasions. He shook his head back and forth in domestic disapproval. Susan rolled her eyes on cue. They were sweet, together like that. A team: father and daughter.

  Mr. Hill offered me a plate of curry, placed his hand on my shoulder, winced at the way I butchered the pronunciation of roti, constitutionally incapable of keeping the t a t, repeatedly making it a d: rodi. We all gave up on that one. Susan’s touch, soft and confident, came from him.

  We avoided direct eye contact, made light with her father and the ease of his company; he was, simply, a good man.

  After dinner, we talked about how things were changing. Baobique missed the reins of a strong leader; bucked yokeless like a wild horse in a crowded room. Uncle George and Prime Minister Hill were alike in that way; even though they had stood at opposite poles, they took care to aim for the long run.

  The island was in need of proper guidance. But to look around, there were few individuals with the necessary foresight and charisma to do the job. And those few, still too young to hold tight the leads. So it was all petty fighting, petty fighting.

  Just like my family, I joked. The analogy too stark to ignore. We laughed, but not really.

  Susan was quiet, looked down at her plate. None of us mentioned her Marcus, a likely successor to our uncles’ old thrones.

  Mr. Hill assured me, It’s the same all over, Jean. You should have seen my brothers and sisters fight over Archie’s share of the Hill estate.

  Really? I was shocked. But you all seem so calm.

  Ha! Susan broke her silence.

  We all laughed. Really.

  So maybe I can feel a little less ashamed—about being a Pascal.

  Ah, but that is the true mark of a Pascal—placing shame on others. Susan cut to the heart with surgical precision.

  Our laughter stopped. Cold in its tracks.

  It was time for Mr. Hill to leave.

  * * *

  On the white lattice along the stairway leading to Susan’s apartment, two little lizards crisscrossed paths. One tilted its head backward, blew up its throat. The other bobbed its head up and down, up and down.

  * * *

  We waited until we were back inside her apartment and the doors were safely shut.

  Then we went at it. Fast and hard. Voices raised.

  When, in God’s name, Susan, were you going to mention Marcus? I started, claimed the moral high ground from the get-go.

  I was waiting, Jean, until you, maybe, decided to answer one of my dozen damn letters. She claimed it back.

  We retreated for a moment, regrouped, went again.

  I lowered my voice, metered my words. Do you have any idea how much it hurt to see you with him like that today? What were you thinking?

  It is a qualitatively different kind of abandonment when a woman leaves a woman for a man. Things are different in theory than they are in real life. I would’ve had no problem with Susan sleeping with men if she wasn’t my lover. I knew this was unfair, a bigotry of sorts. But it was, simply, how I felt.

  She could have done anything else, but this—this I couldn’t take.

  She let me continue. So I did. Since I ar
rived, I’ve fooled myself into thinking that you and I might be falling in love; that this past year was just one bad leg of a relationship that never really ended. But the truth is, we don’t really know each other at all … Maybe we’re just two completely incompatible people.

  Neither of us angry anymore, Susan spoke, explained. I didn’t tell you about Marcus because I wanted to give us a chance first. Jean, you shut me out of your life for a very long time. Somewhere during all those months of waiting for your reply, I stopped needing an answer. Marcus was here for me. And honestly, he’s much easier to handle than you are. You make such mountains out of molehills sometimes. Such a Pascal.

  Thank you for that.

  I am not finished. She wasn’t amused. Continued. Marcus is better to me than you ever have been. He is steady. And reliable. And affectionate. And I should want him at least as much as I do you. But right now I don’t know what I want. You confuse me.

  She left me an opening and I jumped straight through. Susan, I love you. I am sorry I’ve been such an idiot. Let me show you, I can be so much better … Come back to California with me. You’ve considered it before … Ugh. Probably not a good idea to have brought up that letter.

  Right. She sighed; then silence.

  I’d lost her. When would I learn not to lead with my fists?

  For a second I felt the desire to flee, but truth be told, I’d rather have been there fighting with Susan than anywhere else.

  My grandmother is being buried at Godwyn the day after next. I’ll be on the afternoon flight out, was all I could say.

  This is how I cut myself open: the rough edge of a coconut, crushed for milk against the rock at Granny’s beach, pressed tight against my wrist—I pulled, knowing Grampy was wrong and the sea could not possibly heal such a wound.

  I will not lose you, J. Not twice. She was crying.

  And, apparently, so was I. I felt like I was in San Francisco, not Baobique; so thick with fog I couldn’t see the bridge.

  I’d sleep on the couch. Forego the mosquito netting.