River Walker

by Cate Culpepper

  “Rescue me, save me from my loca daughter before she cuts my throat in my sleep, ay ay ay.” The frightened voice droned off into a bored monotone as Grady stepped into the bedroom.

  The middle-aged woman lounged quite comfortably on top of the neatly made bed, her veined legs crossed, a cigarette dangling from her lips. She was applying pink polish to her ragged fingernails. The loose collar of her robe bared her shoulder, and Grady saw the same small, wine-colored birthmark there that graced the cap of Elena’s shoulder. The woman studied Grady through hooded eyes, and Grady wondered if she was seeing Elena in twenty years.

  No, she decided. There might be physical similarities, but Elena would never truly resemble her mother. Elena had a kindness and strength that shone through her features, and that light was absent in the older woman.

  “I’m Grady Wrenn.”

  “Yes, you are.” The woman blew on her nails. Her voice was deeper than Elena’s, graveled by cigarette smoke, and her accent was more pronounced. “I am Inez Juana Montalvo.”

  Grady looked around the large, dark room, noting the continuing stream of portraits of women decorating the walls. The room was its own apartment, equipped with a small kitchenette, tidy and pleasantly decorated. A television sat on a dresser, neat stacks of movie magazines were on the bedside table. No evidence of chains. “It seems everything’s okay up here.”

  Inez leaned back against the pillows and drew on her cigarette. She nodded at the wall. “Go ahead, Miss Grady, check out la familia.”

  Grady gave in and went to the framed photographs. Several of these were in color, from the early two-toned shades of the fifties to the full spectrum of more recent shots. Many of the newer photos had small shrines built around the frames, with shelves that contained offerings of dried flowers and polished stones.

  “They all look like me, sí?” Inez sounded pleasant enough.

  They all look like Elena. Grady’s fingers hovered over what seemed the oldest of the photos, a tintype, a process deemed decrepit in the early 1900s. She studied the shawled woman’s solemn face. Every woman captured in these portraits seemed to be in her mid twenties, but this one looked older, aged by tribulation, if not years.

  “That’s Juana Hidalgo,” Inez said behind her. “I’m named for the poor bitch.”

  “Mamá, you said you’d leave the fan on when you smoke in here.” Elena sounded unruffled as she entered the room. She opened the curtains and drew up a window, and sunlight danced through beams of lingering smoke.

  “My estéril daughter took you to visit Juana’s grave, Miss Grady. You remember that?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Grady figured Elena’s mother was at least ten years her senior, so cautionary courtesy was called for. She couldn’t stop staring at Juana Hidalgo’s sorrowful face. “Elena told me Juana was buried outside the cemetery because she was a witch.”

  “Our famous ancestor, verdad, Elenita?” There was genuine fondness in Inez’s voice as she spoke to her daughter, but then her tone hardened. “At least Juana didn’t go out looking for trouble. She had the sense to keep her fat mouth shut.”

  “My mother doesn’t like me telling our customers the truth about Maria, Grady.” Elena pulled the chain of the ceiling fan, then settled into a comfortable chair next to the bed. “She thinks if I stay quiet, Maria will just go away on her own.”

  “And who cares if she doesn’t?” Inez jabbed out her cigarette in an ashtray, spilling sparks. “The witch only kills worthless men who are too mean to live! It has nothing to do with us.”

  “It has everything to do with us, Mamá. All of us.” Elena was watching Grady.

  Inez snickered. “My daughter is wondering if you’ve figured out our family tree yet, college teacher.”

  Grady finally turned from Juana Hidalgo’s tintype. “Sorry. Figured it out?”

  “A smart college teacher like you should have figured us out by now. Or are you still thinking La Llorona had only two children?”

  Grady lifted a hand. “Hang on.” Calmly, she looked around the bedroom and saw a wooden chair in one corner. She went to it and carried it to the bed, then sat down. She folded her hands and reminded herself to listen with her heart. “All right, Inez. Did Llorona have more than two children?”

  “She had three.” Inez seemed to be enjoying herself. “She had a daughter. Her oldest child. Maria hid her from her father the night she and her babies were murdered. This girl saw everything that happened. She saw her father drown her baby brothers, and her mother, in the river.”

  “This child survived?” Grady spoke to Elena, but Inez continued.

  “She did. She was raised by that pinche bastard of a father, who swore her to secrecy. And Maria’s little girl told the true story of her mother’s death to no one—except, years later, to her own daughter. And Maria’s granddaughter told no one, except her own daughter.” Inez gestured to the series of photographs on the wall. “In every generation since, Maria’s descendants have all been girls—women, who have borne one daughter each. Never sons. Never more than one daughter.”

  Grady closed her eyes, needing darkness to do the math, but also because she didn’t want to meet Elena’s gaze right now. “You’re talking at least twenty generations here.”

  “Ay, I knew Elena would choose a giant brain as an ally.” Inez struck a wooden match and held it to another cigarette. Threads of gray wended through her dark hair, and like Juana Hidalgo, she looked much older than her years. “The story has passed down, mother to daughter, every detail exact, for hundreds of years. It’s the legacy of Maria’s daughters to carry the truth of her death.”

  “And the drawings in the hallway, the photographs in here—they’re all portraits of Maria’s descendants?”

  “Ending with me and her.” Inez jerked her chin at Elena.

  “Elena.” Grady made herself look at the silent curandera. “Your mother is saying the two of you are the last living descendants of La Llorona.”

  “She is the very last.” Inez exhaled smoke in a harsh rasp. “This cursed line stops with her. I think my Elenita has not told you everything, brainy gringa. Ella es una lesbiana y estéril.”

  “Mamá.” Elena flattened her hand on the bedspread, but her voice was patient. “She’s saying I’m a lesbian and I’m sterile, Grady. To my mother, they are one and the same.” The corner of Elena’s mouth lifted briefly. “I can’t bear children. I contracted a pelvic infection when I was in high school. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

  Not even remotely. The revelations were coming too fast, Grady was having trouble absorbing them, and Elena must have seen it in her face. She got off the bed, went to Grady’s chair, and knelt beside it.

  “Maria kills to defend her children, and I am her last child. There will be no more little daughters for Llorona to protect from violent men. There is no need for any more killing.” She touched Grady’s hand. “You must help me tell her, Grady. I’ve waited for Maria at the river, night after night. She never comes to me, and I’ve never understood why. You’re the only one who can tell her she can stop.”

  “And has Elenita told her brave hero why she is the only woman in Mesilla who can hear Llorona?”

  “Mamá! You shut your mouth.” Elena’s tone turned ice cold, and she rose to her feet. Mother and daughter engaged in a rapid-fire exchange in Spanish as Elena stalked to the bed. Grady registered none of it, but apparently Elena scored some telling points. Inez frowned for a long moment and then sank back against the pillows, looking honestly contrite. She looked at Grady fully for the first time.

  “I apologize to you, Grady Wrenn. I haven’t left this pinche room for years, and my Elena is right, my fear has made me mean. I wasn’t mean, always. It was cruel of me to mention your personal sadness.”

  Having no better use for her head at the moment, Grady just nodded. Elena was looking at her with a compassion that chilled her. She jumped when she heard a tapping sound from the lower level. Someone was knocking politely on the
entrance to the shop.

  “Ay, it’s Mrs. Ramirez, my two o’clock.” Elena sighed, and rubbed her forehead. “She really needs the ambra grisea for her heart. Grady, I’ll be right back.” She went to the door, then looked back at her mother. “Are you going to be good?”

  “Yes, I am. Bring me some more Pepsi from downstairs.”

  Elena smiled. “Te amo, Mamá.”

  “Te amo, Elenita.”

  Elena looked at Grady, smiled again, and left the room. Her step had barely faded down the stairs when her mother snapped her fingers at Grady.

  “Okay. Are you listening to me?” There was no apology in Inez’s eyes now, and no malice, just urgency. Grady fought off her confusion and made herself focus.

  “I don’t care what happens to Maria, Grady Wrenn. I don’t care what happens to a bunch of men who beat their wives. But Elena is calling disaster down on both of us, and you have to stop her.”

  “What is she—”

  “Elena waits on a customer, she has to talk about Maria. She heals a child, she has to talk about Maria. Elena walks through the plaza, all she talks about is that damn dead witch!” Inez folded her arms, and Grady could see the shiver that went through her. “Everyone in Mesilla knows she goes to the river, looking for Maria. They’re going to try to hurt her, Grady. They think she’s a witch.”

  “Do you know who—”

  “Just them, them!” Inez flapped her hand at the window impatiently. “The same little mob of cowards that drove Juana Hidalgo to cut her wrists a hundred years ago! Their sons are still around today. But now it’s my daughter they hate.”

  “I’m sure Elena wouldn’t do anything foolish, though, ma’am. Surely nothing that would endanger you.”

  “Don’t ma’am me. My home is not a bordello.” Inez settled back against the pillows. “And if you think Elena would not risk my life, you don’t know my ungrateful daughter as well as you think, Dr. Grady. The stupid girl believes it’s some big holy mission, stopping Maria. It’s all those bullshit stories her abuela put in her head. My mother.”

  “Stories?”

  “About our grandmothers.” Inez still sounded contemptuous, but Grady thought she glimpsed a sheen of tears. “Mamá made heroes out of those women to Elena, in these stories. How one or another of Llorona’s descendants tried to haul her sick soul off the riverbank, to bring her salvation. Mamá convinced Elena that stopping the ghost must be our life’s work. That the blood of every rotten man our ancestor kills is on our heads until we do this. She made Elena loca! She thinks stopping the suicides is worth getting us both lynched.”

  “But you don’t.” Grady let herself point out the obvious. “None of this matters to you, Inez? The family legacy, the suicides.”

  “Look, not every woman in my line is crazy, Professor. Some of us just want to live in Mesilla, pay our bills, and raise our measly one daughter in peace.” Vulnerability crept into Inez’s coarse features. “What matters to me tonight is the safety of my little girl. Grady, please. Look out for her. Elena is all I have.” She shivered again.

  Grady lifted the edge of the comforter at the foot of the bed and drew it up over Inez’s legs. “What scares you most about all this? What are you afraid might happen?”

  “I’m scared a bunch of bloodthirsty men will kill my daughter. I’m scared they’ll kill me, too. I’ve been afraid this would happen for a long time. The last time Maria came was during Juana’s lifetime. We’ve been expecting her, Elena and me. And I knew it would happen, all this—craziness. It’s Juana’s witch hunt, all over again.”

  “And staying inside the house will protect you? Do you think you and Elena are safe here?”

  “Safe, hell, of course we’re not safe here! But this building has been in my mother’s family forever. I’m not leaving it. They’ll have to burn it down around my ears.” The bravado faded from Inez’s tone. “The worst thing that scares me about all this, though. Thinking in twenty years, maybe it will be my Elena in this room. Too afraid of the world to see it again. No daughter to care for her. Turning bitter and mean, like me.”

  “Inez.” Grady waited until she looked at her. “You really see all that happening to Elena? Are we talking about the same Elena?”

  Inez studied her through lowered brows, and then a glint of humor entered her eyes. “All right. Maybe not. Elena’s a lot smarter than me. But being smart won’t help her if someone puts a bullet through her head.”

  A nasty chill went up Grady’s back. “I’ll do everything I can for Elena, Inez. I care about her, too.”

  “I believe you do.” Inez stared at Grady and then nodded. She lifted a remote control from the bed and clicked the TV on. “Okay. Go away. I got a hot date with Jerry Springer in a few minutes.”

  For a moment, Grady was tempted to settle back into the chair and wait for Jerry, too. Instead, she pulled her wallet from her pocket and took out a business card. She wrote her personal phone number on the back and left the card beside Inez’s bed. Then she walked out of the room, past the portraits of dead daughters, and down the stairs.

  Elena was seeing an older woman out of the shop, her hand on her shoulder. Grady heard her murmuring instructions to the woman about using the remedy she carried. She didn’t hear any mention of falsely accused witches.

  Elena closed the door behind the woman and turned to Grady. They walked toward each other and didn’t stop until they were standing fairly close. Grady looked down into Elena’s mild eyes, and words seemed superfluous for the moment. Where would she start?

  Elena’s face grew somber. “Do you have a question for me, Grady?”

  Yes. Grady had a hundred questions for Elena. But she knew the one Elena had in mind, and she had every intention of getting an answer this time. Grady opened her mouth to ask why she was able to hear the cry of Llorona.

  “How old are you, exactly?” Grady asked.

  Elena blinked. “How old am I? I’m twenty-five.”

  “Twenty-five.” Grady considered. “All right, so I’m older than you. But is thirty-four all that much older than twenty-five?”

  Elena looked at her, puzzled, and then her expression softened. “Not too much older, no.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about your family’s connection to Llorona, Elena?”

  “I didn’t tell you because I was afraid you would write me off as obsessed.” Elena made quote signs in the air as she used Grady’s term. “But I’m not sorry Mamá told you today, Grady. I believe the Goddess reveals the secrets of our world only when we are ready to learn from them.” She went up on her toes, and kissed Grady’s cheek. “Be well, Professor Gringa. You have some thinking to do.” She patted Grady’s chest. “From here.”

  Elena showed her out of the shop.

  Grady walked all the way home—over two hours and more than three miles—thinking, and touching her cheek.

  Chapter Nine

  So tonight, Mother Goddess, I have two questions for You. Please pull up a throne and sit down, this may take some time.

  Question number one. Why did You make me a lesbian? (I know I first asked this many years ago, but You have never seen fit to give me a satisfactory answer.)

  Number two. If You had to make me a lesbian, why must I have a crush on an older gringa atheist professor? (All right, she is not too much older.)

  You know how I have struggled with my loneliness, Diosa. When I lost the ability to bear children, I thought You were telling me I would never have an ordinary family life. I accepted this fate, because it meant I could channel all my energies into learning the healing arts. Other women might have the joys of motherhood, but I would have the rewards of my work. Other women might find loving husbands, but I… Well, as You know, not finding a husband never struck me as a particular hardship.

  As the years passed, I felt more and more certain that You intended me to focus purely on caring for the people of Mesilla. You never expected me to find a partner. For one thing, You planted me down here in one of the most
socially conservative plots of land in the entire desert Southwest. This little town is not a real hotbed of sexual freedom or progressive thinking, Diosa, I’m just pointing out. My poor Mamá took to her bed for two weeks when I started calling myself a feminist in the ninth grade.

  Plus, when I was younger, being alone just felt like my natural state. Most of the girls I went to school with talked about getting married all the time, but no boy ever caught my eye or my heart. I figured You just designed me to live a solitary life.

  But then there was Bella, in high school. I never told her how I felt, of course. I never told Toni or Melissa about my feelings for them, either. My other amigas knew that I cared for them, but always with the simple affections of friendship, the same platonic fondness they had for me. I’ve never told a woman that I love her—that kind of love. I’ve never heard those words from a woman, or felt her intimate touch.

  And after all of this time, mi Diosa, I assumed I never would. I have become Your chaste priestess, a curandera made stronger by my chastity, and so forth. And now, out of some contrariness on Your part or Your typically warped sense of humor, You send me this maddening, fascinating, wounded, sexy, sexy Grady Wrenn. What are You thinking? I should be focusing all of my mind, all of my skills, on finding vindication for the desolate spirit they call the River Walker. Why now, of all possible seasons, do You delight in throwing this perplexing gringa into my life?

  Someday, Grady’s role in the fate of La Llorona will be over. She will go back to her students, her classes, her educated friends, and I will not see her again. Like Bella, like Toni and Melissa, she will fade from my life.

  Please give me peace in this, Mother. Give me the wisdom to enjoy the innocent pleasures of Grady’s friendship, and the grace to return to my solitude without bitterness after she has moved on.