The Circle Game

by Tanya Nichols

  “Everything I find I put in a box. Not clothes or things like that. I didn’t think you’d want those. Just papers, some letters and some pictures.”

  “Photographs?”

  “Uh-huh. I got photos.”

  “Great. Can I get it all from you today?” Her spirits lifted with the thought of what she’d find.

  “Yes, yes. Come in. I’ll get it.”

  She led the way into the small, dark living room, the one window covered with a faded blue sheet to shield them from the glare of the afternoon sun. The whole place smelled of Pine Sol and something else, something delicious like homemade soup with lots of onions and some kind of meat. What furniture there was had seen better days, probably donated to some Good Will or Salvation Army where it was salvaged to furnish the Coronas’ living room.

  The olive green and brown plaid sofa sagged in three spots where the cushions had gone flat in the middle from years of holding exhausted bodies, dirty and dust-covered after long hours of scrubbing floors, pounding nails, or picking grapes and tomatoes. Patches of frayed upholstery gave way for bits of padding to escape from the arms of the tired couch. An old RCA television sat on a royal blue metal trunk, its sides full of dents and rust marks. Two child-sized plastic chairs, one red and one yellow, sat side by side in front of the screen where Scooby Doo lapped at a puddle of water outside a scary castle. Scooby couldn’t be heard over the pounding brass band that blared from a radio in the kitchen. Dark linoleum, industrial strength, covered the floors instead of the rustic hardwood Bernie imagined from the view from the street. She always pictured older homes with oak floors, sometimes hidden under stained carpet, but there hiding, a kind of saving grace or surprise for anyone brave enough to rip away the dirty rug. It was clearly a grace that didn’t find the house on Orange Avenue.

  A little girl lay on her back under the kitchen table, her legs in the air, feet pushing up on the bottom of the table.

  “Maribel, get up from there, Mija.”

  The little girl dropped her feet and rolled onto her side. Her mother prattled off another stretch in Spanish that Bernie didn’t understand, but knew by the pointing finger and stern look that it was some sort of marching orders for the kid. She scooted out from under the table and stomped over to the television, her thumb in her mouth, punched a button, and the screen went dark. Angelica disappeared, and a moment later the trumpets and singing in the kitchen were quiet, too.

  Bernie stood in the middle of the room and watched Moochie and his sister crawl back under the table while their mother was out of the room. “This is all I got,” Angelica said. She carried an old produce box, its sides weak and stretched from the burden of a load of onions or cantaloupe. A loose pile of papers and a few odds and ends were piled inside, but not much. She set the box down at Bernie’s feet, stooped over, and picked up a couple of photographs. “See, that’s them.”

  A small, dark woman, Lucero, her face round and flat, stood behind Carlos, her hands on his shoulders, almost smiling, but not quite. She cast a shy and hopeful look to the snapping lens. Beside her, his two hands loose at his sides, was Rogelio, Carlos’s father. He was square and solid, his short, black hair parted neatly on the side and combed across his forehead, his white western shirt tucked into his blue jeans, revealing a large silver belt buckle. Carlos was standing pigeon-toed and grinning so hard his eyes looked closed, as if he didn’t want to see what was out there in front of him.

  “Who took this?” Bernie asked. “They look so nice.” It was better than she’d hoped. This was a photograph of a family, a once living, breathing family.

  “Oh, at church one day,” her voice slid up a note, “the preacher’s lady, I mean his wife,” another high pitch, “she took pictures and gave them to us.” She pulled one from the back and held it out. “Here’s one of Carlos and Moochie.”

  Bernie smiled at the picture of the two boys, Moochie taller, both of them making silly faces, Moochie sticking his hand up behind Carlos’s head to give him ears. Boy stuff. She remembered that from when she was a kid. Silly pictures with her friends, when life was consumed with sleepovers and Barbie dolls. She wondered if Carlos would remember the days of acting silly with his friend Moochie before he had to cling to someone’s skirt to keep from sliding off the earth.

  “Let me see.” Moochie hopped up from his place under the table where he sat and watched the women talking to stand close to Bernie, who held the picture out for him. “Oh man, I remember that day. That’s cool. Can I have it?”

  “Not just yet. Tell you what, I’ll get a copy made and send it to you. How’s that?”

  “Cooooool.” He ran, threw both hands down on the couch and kicked his legs out behind him, spun around and fell backward on the couch.

  “Do you miss Carlos?”

  “Yeah, he’s my best friend in the whole world.” In one swift motion he quickly flipped his body over and buried his face in the sofa cushion, hiding from the lady who talked about his best friend.

  Angelica fumbled through the papers, eager to please, proud of what she had collected. “Here’s some more. I think they took these at the fair last year. The one in Madera.” She handed Bernie three strips of black-and-white photos, one strip of Rogelio, one strip of Lucero, and one strip of Carlos. Lucero and Rogelio had four identical non-smiling headshots, the types of photos you see on a passport or driver’s license. Carlos had one serious photo, just his little face looking into the light. The other three were silly, one with his tongue sticking out, one with his fingers pulling his mouth to the sides, and one with his nose pushed up flat like a pig.

  Bernie couldn’t help but chuckle a little when she got to Carlos’s group of photos. “What a goofy kid,” she said. “He’s a cutie, that’s for sure.”

  “He’s going to get a lot of money, huh?” Angelica asked.

  “What?”

  “Carlos. He’ll get a lot of money from the court, right?”

  The question was jarring. Noni was right again—everyone wants money. “Well,” she said, careful to protect her client’s privacy but still keep Angelica happy, “I’m certainly going to do my best to make sure he’s well taken care of. The money is important, but what we need to remember is that he lost his parents, his mom and dad. And Mrs. Luna, Carlos’s grandmother, relied on her son, too. Money doesn’t make up for what they lost, but it can help take care of them.”

  “How much will she get?” Angelica asked.

  Bernie felt her spine stiffen, aware that Angelica was ignorant of any expected sense of decorum or finesse, but also aware of the lure of friends with money. She had learned long ago that there was no shortage of greedy people who want to help their friends and family win in court, hoping to be there when the check cleared. “I’m afraid I can’t really talk about that with you. I realize you were close and lived together, but you’re not a party to the case.”

  It occurred to Bernie that Crystal was right, how it must seem to people who have so little, the idea of even ten thousand dollars must be mind-boggling, a hundred thousand seeming like millions. This small house and its small rooms and covered windows had been home for two families. Where had they all slept? Unable to leave with any unanswered questions, no matter how trivial, she asked. “How many bedrooms do you have here?”

  “Two.”

  “How did all of you manage to live together in such a small space?”

  “We had a room and they had a room. We share the kitchen and living room. And the bathroom.” Angelica seemed unbothered by the questions or the living arrangement they had shared.

  “So, you and your husband and two kids slept in one room, and the Lunas slept in one room.” Bernie tried to guess the size of the house, maybe seven hundred square feet, maybe. No wonder there wasn’t much in the way of furniture. There wouldn’t have been room for all the bodies. She tried to imagine seven people sitting around the small table, or gathered in front of the small television.

  “Uh-huh.” She grinned and nodded, eage
r to please, proud of her home. “After the accident, we were gonna have somebody else move in, but then my husband went to Washington for a while.” She paused and pointed out the window with her finger, as if it was just outside. “Washington State. My mother and sister came and stayed and helped me, but now they went to Arizona to live with my brother. He has a good job there. So, we have lots of room now. My mom, she’s gonna come back though and help me again.”

  Bernie continued with her questions. “Have you lived here long?”

  “Oh yes, yes, I think five years maybe. I work for Mr. Tomassian, the owner. I clean his house and get cheaper rent. I clean lots of houses, not just his. You need help, you call me. I do very good work.” She looked nervous and scratched at her tight scalp. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.”

  “Could Carlos come live with us? I mean, him and Señora Luna. They could share the extra room.”

  “I can’t answer that, either. Mrs. Luna may want to stay where she is, raise Carlos there. In Mexico.”

  The question intrigued her, the mother’s friend asking to care for the boy, take in his grandmother, too. She wondered, had anyone other than her Noni wanted to raise her? A friend of her mom, maybe? Was it just money that Angelica wanted, or did she care about Carlos, her son’s best friend? Maybe her birth mother would have popped into her life earlier if she’d known there was life insurance money, or about the sale of the big home where she had lived until she was thirteen. That money paid for Bernie’s therapy, college, law school, helped her start her own practice.

  “But she’s too old to raise a little boy.”

  “Pardon me?” The singsong voice interrupted her racing mind, snapping her back to the moment at hand.

  “Señora Luna, she is old to raise a boy good. And Mexico is not so good—it’s better here.” Angelica knew how to plead a case, relentlessly jabbing away with her falsetto voice. “I have a green card. I live here eighteen years already. I speak English. I taught Carlos and his mother how to talk English. I don’t think the grandmother speaks English very good. Carlos should come here. Better here.”

  “But she’s his grandmother. She’s his family. That’s what matters now, family.”

  Bernie ended the conversation with a quick nod of her head and slight dismissive flick of the wrist, the same move she used on rambling witnesses. It was a good move, and most people picked right up on its intended meaning, but Angelica just smiled and nodded, still as happy as when Bernie walked through the front door.

  Bernie shifted her gaze to the road, away from the poor woman who happily scrubbed her landlord’s toilets and floors to live in his cracker-box house with its scorched yard and ugly floors. “I’ll let you know if I can think of anything else,” Bernie said as she reached for the carton, her manner softened. “Thank you for packing this stuff up. I’m sure it will be helpful.”

  Bernie picked up the box and carried it under one arm out to her car. There wasn’t a whole lot in there, but she was sure that was all there would ever be. Angelica had probably gone through everything in their room by then, using what she could of their simple clothes, dishes, hats, tools, or pots and pans, giving away the rest. As promised, she saved all papers and receipts, even useless papers, in the cardboard box for the lady lawyer.

  The highway was a quicker route, but Bernie chose to drive country roads back to town. There was hardly anyone else traveling on Avenue Fourteen; the empty landscape allowed her the space and time to reflect on her morning and develop a strategy for the days to come. She smiled at the memory of the pictures of Carlos and Moochie, and Carlos with his parents, but her frustration grew as she recalled Angelica’s mention of money. Was she trying to get some of that money? Or, did she really want to have Carlos with her, a part of their family, because she cared about him?

  Bernie knew the crippling grief of losing your mom and dad. Would she have clung to anyone but Noni during that first six months, when she was afraid to sleep alone for even one night? Her grandmother was safe and comfortable. Her grandmother was everything solid, not shifting under her feet. Carlos was, she decided, where he should be—with his grandmother, no matter where that was.

  Noni had made sure they both went to therapy, to get professional help with their grieving. That’s where they learned about clipping stories from newspapers. Would anyone other than Noni have helped her clip out those articles, reminding her again and again that bad things happen all the time to people everywhere? Bad things happen all the time . . . to people everywhere. She would make sure Carlos and his grandmother got therapy too.

  Noni’s words haunted her. Bad things happen all the time. Why, she wondered, did she never consider that horrific things might have happened to her real mother? Perhaps the one who gave her away was like one of those tragic victims whose stories were stashed away in a plastic box under her bed? Maybe there was a reason, maybe there was more.

  * * *

  Two hours later, Bernie sat at her dining room table with a cold Corona Extra and the mangled box of unopened mail and folded scraps of papers in front of her. Bits of earth sifted in the bottom of the box, remnants of the field where some immigrant pickers stooped and sweated for long hours in hellish heat so they could afford for their whole family to sleep in one room. Most of the papers were smudged and crumpled as if they had been headed for the trash bin at some time, but saved by Angelica.

  Money. That’s the end game of a lawsuit, but it doesn’t resolve everything at stake, especially in wrongful death. Most folks don’t realize that reality when they go to trial, seeking justice in the form of a dollar sign. And, to be fair, money buys a lot of peace and compensates for those solid damages, the dollars and cents of a human life. Money pays medical bills, puts food on the table and sends kids to college. Money matters, especially when you’ve lost your providers. Money would pay for therapy. She would make sure Carlos and Mrs. Luna would receive therapy.

  Money. Noni had said everyone wants money. Bernie had to be suspicious or at least consider that her birth mother simply wanted someone to take care of her financially. It was daunting, and exhausting, always examining motives, especially when it came to money. And Bernie was always examining motives. Always. She hated that part of her life and had no idea how to turn it off.

  Bernie tilted her head back and downed three big swallows of beer and kept shuffling, opening, reading, making piles of paper and envelopes, careful to keep everything. Some of the mail was unopened, delivered after the Lunas were dead; most of that was just junk mail. Piece by piece, she carefully examined the written fragments of a young immigrant couple. She had never met them, but the pictures and the words, even the ones in Spanish that she couldn’t read, made Rogelio and Lucero come to life before her. When she unfolded three pale-yellow Western Union receipts, she couldn’t help but smile and nod her head yes, yes, yes. Western Union receipts and photos of the happy family made her job much easier. What had Reilly said in court that day? Her expectations are unduly inflated and simply not reasonable. Jerk.

  Sitting there, staring at the faded receipts and photographs, she experienced one of those rare moments when she wished there was someone else around so she could belt out a whoohoo or hot damn! Someone would come running to see what she was yelling about, and then maybe shout along with her or even pick her up and spin her around like they do in the movies, celebrating the little slips of paper that she held in her hand. A whoop or holler in an empty house just made her feel foolish when it echoed and bounced around unnoticed. She picked up the receipts and carefully slid them into a clear plastic sheet protector with the photo of the Luna Family on top, a reminder of the magnitude of the matter at hand, a lost family. They were more than receipts and structured annuities. She went to the kitchen for another beer.

  Bernie sat drinking and considered the pile of junk mail, no intimate notes or personal messages gathered or sent. Joan Bennett had suggested that she write a letter. She supposed she could just write one and n
ever actually slip it into the outgoing mail. That was another one of the tricks she learned from her therapist years earlier. “Write it all down, Bernie. Deal with it in some physical way.” Maybe, she thought, she should write an honest letter, tell the woman about the hell she had walked through, then toss it into the fireplace and watch it burn. Her words would ignite into a fierce flame, then smolder and eventually crumble into ash. Maybe then she could make sense of the anger that seemed to linger deep inside her. That is what no one ever understood, her anger at the past. Sadness, folks understood, but not the anger. And now it was easy to focus that unresolved anger on the stranger who had given her up so long ago.

  Writing letters was what she did every day, but the pen would not move. She held it poised a fraction of an inch above the yellow legal pad, but no words would come. She should write on something else, she decided, anything but a yellow legal pad. On her desk in the spare bedroom was a ream of blank white copy paper. That’s what it should be, a blank white page, no guided lines, no color or design.

  Back at the table, fueled by one more swallow of beer, Bernie picked up the pen and scribbled onto the blank white page, “Dear,” and then realized she didn’t know what to call her. She could not call her mother, and Joan Bennett had not mentioned even a first name. She wondered then if the social worker told her birth mother what Bernie’s first name was. She stared at the single word, Dear. Why was the woman dear? Finally, she crumpled the wasted paper and tossed it on the floor.

  She started again, a new blank page, and simply wrote “Hello.” She looked around the room, searching for the right words. She couldn’t simply say I only want to meet you to let you know what a fucked up childhood I had. She thought of Noni, and how it had hurt her when she implied she wished she’d never been adopted in the first place. Still, she kept writing, reminding herself that it would land in the fireplace, or maybe in the box under the bed, an exercise in expression. Noni didn’t need to know about her private therapy. She wrote quickly, letting the words flow.