then prays & calls protective spirits into the room;
I reach into her bag & grab the tea made from thyme;
Carline’s father looks stern, but I see his hands tremble
as he settles them on the back of a chair.
He mumbles under his breath in Kreyòl,
& I wonder if he too is praying.
Tía settles Carline more comfortably
on the birthing bed I’ve made. She guides Carline to breathe,
to push, to wait. I set thick towels on the floor.
Nelson rushes to help me;
his fingers jerk sharply as we straighten the space.
Fear clouds the room, a thick fog,
but Tía’s calm voice is a flame cutting through it.
I switch places with Tía, & my arms grow heavy
where I sit behind Carline, holding her up;
I am sweating almost as hard as she is.
I try to breathe deeply as I hold my best friend up.
I try not to think of all the ways I know premature labor can go wrong.
Tía is red in the face & her eyes are weary,
although you can’t tell by her steady movements.
“One last hard push, niña, the baby is crowning.”
Carline doesn’t seem to have any more energy.
She is panting hard, her eyes squeezed shut,
& I am worried if this is not the last push—
“Come now, Carline,” I whisper.
“You did not carry this baby all these months,
not to see it into the light. Con fuerza!”
I wipe the sweaty hair at her forehead,
& she weeps into the crook of my arm,
but she pushes. & pushes. & pushes:
the small body plops down into Tía’s waiting hands
like a wrinkled fruit from a shaken tree.
The baby boy is tiny. Quiet.
Tía is a woman woven of miracles;
the reason people who are afraid of her
& her magic still call for the worst emergencies
is because Tiá’s a woman who speaks to the dead,
who negotiates with spirits, who loosens their fingers
when they clutch around the neck of someone she wants to live—
It doesn’t always work—I know personally
sometimes Tía is too late; sometimes the request is too great
& Tía’s bargaining not enough; sometimes
Tía is only a healer woman with calloused hands,
a commanding voice, with ointments & tea,
this woman who holds a baby not her own,
says, “Ven mi’jo ven.”
Sometimes, Tía is more:
she calls forward his life when it would retreat,
& the room holds its breath as if we can gift it to the child.
& Carline weeps, & Tía prays & curses & coaxes
a child to breathe breathe breathe
pressing her two fingers against his chest
beating his heart for him oblivious
to the slick of his body & blue of his lips
to the collective sob of the room
to the spirits who would greet him on their side of the veil.
Tía takes air into her mouth
& pushes it into the child’s mouth:
does this again & again
from her body to his until it seems impossible
this bringing forth of life
when death is so steadily stalking into the room
& then the baby inhales a deep gasp
just as the electricity returns to the barrio
& the small house becomes filled, brilliant bright.
I have been so entrenched
in death, & drowning, & funerals,
that this seems an amazing thing
to see this babe clutch at the air.
To see this child who should not be here
not only here but here.
Through my own tears, I see all of us are crying.
& tired Carline holds the child close
to her breasts & grips my hand.
Tía gives instructions of herb teas to brew,
ointments to make, & advice on latching.
She’ll come back if Carline needs help swaddling.
Maman hugs me to her chest as we are leaving;
she says thank you & thrusts some pesos at me.
She says she will wash the sheets & return them.
Carline holds her child; Nelson holds his hat.
The old man does not say a word,
but tears trail down his cheeks as he walks us to the door.
Camino Yahaira
They’ve made a memorial
outside of Papi’s billiards.
Under the green lights,
where the bouncers stand,
there’s a blown-up picture
of Papi smiling,
holding a glass (of what I imagine
is whiskey) out to the camera.
Dre insisted on coming with me,
& she is a sure presence behind me.
I kneel & touch my hand
to the gifts people left in Papi’s honor:
flower wreaths, so many flowers,
although Papi always said
“Why pay money
for a thing that will die in a week?”
The knickknacks build a lump
the size of a billiard cube inside my throat:
A lottery ticket,
a bottle of shoeshine polish,
a small Dominican flag,
a baseball card of Robinson Canó,
a little figurine
of a man dressed in red & black.
In history we learned
the Greeks made sure to die
with a coin in their pocket
to ensure their spirit could pay
for their way to the other side;
remembering this, I give Papi
the only kind of safe passage I have to offer.
I kneel on the cold, hard concrete
& fish the chess piece from my pocket.
Set her, the polished black piece,
right by a burning candle:
a queen to guard him on his way.
Papi’s billiards has always been
a gathering place, & as I stand outside of it
I remember my last time here. It was after a match;
Papi took me to his pool hall to celebrate.
He rarely did that, said billiards
wasn’t a place for children, especially not his child.
But on this night he wanted to show off
my trophy to his employees & friends.
Surprised me with a cake & a glass of Coke
he had splashed with a little bit of rum.
He pressed a code into the jukebox
so that bachata songs blared out for free all night.
My father left the country a few weeks later.
I stopped playing chess soon after.
I am quiet on the train ride home.
My head against Dre’s shoulder
as her breath puffs softly into my hair.
She knows I hate riding the train alone;
it’s one of the reasons I think
she pressed to come with me tonight.
The last time I played chess
I won, against a boy named Manny
who I’d played against before—
he always smiled at me across the table,
held my hand too long when we shook
& took both his wins & losses gracefully—
but this is not a story about Manny;
this is a story about winning,
about feeling on top of the world,
of feeling like a star had risen inside me
& maybe was shining on my face
or glittering off my trophy last summer
as I stood on the train station platform
& prepar
ed to go home.
Papi was in DR at the time, so I attended the match alone.
It was daytime & the train was packed
& I got on with my back to a man
who leaned against the train doors—
& when I felt a squeeze on my leg
I thought it was an accident & when I felt fingers
float up my thighs I thought I must be mistaken
& when he palmed me under my skirt openhanded
I dropped my trophy but did not scream,
did not make a scene did not curse him out
there was no strategy no alternate plan
no way to win, there was just me stuck,
& being felt up on a public train racing
northbound heart breath
sick lost anger has no place on the board
I was impotent in my feeling never let them
see you sweat dripped on my brow
I don’t think I liked it. It lasted more than one stop
more than two more than three
do you know what I mean
my body was not my body could not
be mine he got off at Ninety-Sixth Street
I did not pick my trophy off the train floor I did not cry
until I got home until Dre came in through
the window & saw me trembling & held me
close & did not ask me anything but still knew
still must have known how she ran the bath
& folded my skirt into the farthest corner
of my closet & we never spoke of it
I did not cry over it again but I knew
I needed to speak to Papi
I hoped he’d have some words of wisdom,
some response. But when I called he did not answer.
Once I unfroze from what happened on the train,
I tried frantically to reach him.
I wanted to speak to the most protective
man in my life; I wanted him to undo it somehow.
I had a match in two days, & I wanted to tell Papi
I didn’t want to go. I needed a break.
I don’t know why I felt like I needed his permission.
After three days with no reply,
I opened the cabinet where Papi put
all his business papers in a folder.
But the only papers were for the billiards here.
Nothing with a Dominican area code.
Then at the bottom of the cabinet,
half hidden by other files, covered in dust,
was the sealed envelope.
I knew I should put it back.
I knew it wasn’t what I was looking for.
But I opened it anyway.
After what I found & what happened on the train.
I skipped two tournaments.
Ones that had been difficult to qualify for.
But on the evening of the third tournament.
Papi called me huffing & puffing.
He’d received an email from the tournament commission.
Disqualifying me from any other summer matches.
When I answered the phone.
Papi did not ask if everything was okay.
I did not ask why he read that email
but none of my texts, replied to none of my phone calls.
He did not let me get a word in.
He didn’t ask why I answered with so much anger.
& the truth is I don’t think I would have told.
About the man & the hand up my skirt. In my panties.
About the certificate in the file cabinet that made my father a liar.
But I’ll never know. What I would have said.
Because Papi did not ask.
He only lectured me & told me he was disappointed.
After he hung up. I whispered into the phone.
All the ways that I was disappointed in him.
If Papi wanted my silence.
I vowed that day that he would get it.
When Papi came home.
A few weeks before school began back up.
He ranted & raved to Mami that I had grown stubborn.
He would walk into a room & yell I needed to grow up.
I would simply go into my room.
Or climb through Dre’s window.
To escape having to look my father in the face.
Twenty-One Days After
It’s the last day of school.
I walk through the school hallways
like an alien has crept into my body.
My arms don’t work like they used to.
I try to raise them to pick up my report card.
I try to make them pick up a pencil as I sign myself out.
I try to open my locker to remove my books.
I try to keep them from trembling.
But they only shake lightly at my side,
& it’s Dre who murmurs & reminds me
I can do this. Keep on breathing, I mean,
when it feels like the littlest thing is too much work.
I guess I keep hoping if I just don’t move at all
it’ll hurt less when the memory barges into me:
It has been three weeks.
I do not have a father anymore.
Insurance representatives for the airline come to the house.
Tío Jorge & Tía Mabel are already here.
Although Tío Jorge practiced law in the Dominican Republic,
I still think we should have a lawyer who practices here,
but no one listens to me.
The airline representatives open a folder
& list the initial findings from the National Transportation Safety Board.
I make sure to memorize the name
of the organization that will investigate what happened.
When the reps are done, they look expectantly at us.
Tío Jorge grabs the report & walks to the kitchen window,
reading in the light of the setting sun. Mami looks at me
& I know she wants me to translate; she didn’t catch every word.
“Dinero,” I tell her softly. An advance payment, to be exact.
So many dollars they’ve knotted around my father’s life.
“Un medio million,” Tío Jorge whispers.
No one else says a word. Mami begins to weep
while drilling a manicured nail into the wooden table
until the sound feels like it’s puncturing
my ear, & I put my hand over hers.
The airline representatives
say don’t say
grievance. grieve.
say don’t say
unprecedented. crash.
say don’t say
mechanical failure. dead.
say don’t say
pilot error. dad.
say don’t say
insurance policy. papi.
say don’t say
advance compensation. his name.
say don’t say
accident. sorry.
say “say
loss. sorry.”
I say:
“Say you’re sorry.”
Things you can buy
with half a million dollars:
a car that looks more
like a space creature than a car.
A designer platinum purse
to carry a small dog. A small dog.
A performance by your favorite
musical artist for your birthday.
A diamond-encrusted
bottle of Dominican rum.
A mansion. A yacht. A hundred
acres of land. Houses, but not homes.
All four years of college
or beautician school & certificate.
Five hundred flights
to the Dominican Republic.
A half million Dollar Store chess sets,
with their accompanying boxes.
A hundred thousand copies
of Shakespeare’s
The Tempest.
Apparently a father.
Money like this
makes me think
of a game show.
& I wish
I could phone a friend
or use a lifeline.
I wish a smiling host
would pat my hand & have me
crowdsource the audience
for answers
on what to guess next.
A half million dollars
is more than my dad
ever made,
more than Mami or I
can begin to understand.
Tío Jorge says
we should still sue the airline.
Tío Jorge says
it might take years, but we are due a settlement.
Tío Jorge says
he can handle the finances.
Tío Jorge says
he can sell the billiards.
Tío Jorge says
he can open me a trust fund so the money is saved.
Tío Jorge says
he can hire a financial advisor, or accountant.
Tío Jorge says
we need to set money aside for taxes.
Tío Jorge says
this should help with the funeral expenses.
Tío Jorge says
we shouldn’t tell the rest of the family.
Tío Jorge says—
Mami cuts him off:
“Jorge. You were your brother’s consentido.
& I appreciate your advice.
But the one who needed it was him,
& you didn’t offer it when he was here.”
I look from Mami to Tío Jorge
trying to understand what isn’t being said.
Did Mami know about the certificate?
Did Tío? Mami must realize how harsh she sounds
because she flattens her hands on her thighs.
“I just . . . what I mean is,
Yahaira & I will figure this out on our own.”
I’ve never heard Mami
be so brisk with Tío Jorge.
Tía Mabel lowers her eyes;
she traces the lines of wood on the kitchen table.
Tío Jorge seals his lips like an envelope
& silently exits the room.
There is a community garden
around the corner
where I know I’ll find Dre
if she’s not home
or answering her phone.
That is her happy place,
& since she is mine
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