The Affliction

by C. Dale Young

  When Rosa Blanco returned to the old woman’s house, the door opened just before she knocked.

  “You are right on time.”

  “I am?” Rosa Blanco replied.

  “Yes. This is when I expected you to come.”

  “Now, today, this very day?”

  “Yes, this very afternoon.”

  “But ...”

  “Did you bring me the leaves?”

  “Yes, I ...”

  “Give them to me.”

  Rosa Blanco handed the leaves over to the old woman, who took them from her as if they were precious metals or jewels. She held them flatly against her palms, her two hands open and facing upward, as if she were carrying a gift to a god. She walked slowly into the sunroom in the back of the small house so as not to disturb the leaves in her hands, the sunroom adjoining the small kitchen. She didn’t so much as slow down when they passed the living room. In the sunroom, she set the leaves down on the table and asked Rosa Blanco to come sit with her.

  Nothing was asked of the old woman. Rosa Blanco never had a chance to ask anything. The old woman sat, stared at the leaves, bent her face down to them and sniffed them, then sat straight up and, without looking, clutched the leaves in her hands and crumbled them into scraps and shreds, the leaves making an uncomfortable crunching, almost crackling noise. The old woman closed her eyes and concentrated deeply as she moved her hands over the crumbled leaves. It was clear to Rosa Blanco that Flora Diaz had performed this action countless times in her life.

  “You are married,” Flora said.

  “Yes!”

  “You have two sons. You were to have had a girl but she died before you could deliver her.”

  “Yes. How did you ...”

  “Silence. I’m not asking.”

  Rosa Blanco was surprised. The old woman suddenly sounded younger, as if in the act of crushing the leaves she had grown younger, her voice now more vibrant and powerful.

  “Your husband works for the mechanic. His father and your father are like brothers. You have known each other your entire lives, have been like family from before you were married.”

  Rosa Blanco was afraid to say anything now, but she wanted to say yes to everything the old woman was saying. But she dared not speak, dared not say anything that might upset the old woman and stop her from doing what she was doing.

  “Your husband is ... Your... Your husband is a follower. He is about to find someone who can master the air, someone who can be seen but is unseen by most. Your husband is going to pick up and follow him because it will seem as if he has answers. There will be no answers. There will be nothing but time passing and air. And you will hurt. You will feel pain inside your chest. You will hurt each day you look at your sons because in them you will see your husband. And your husband will be gone. And your husband will never return.”

  Rosa Blanco wanted to scream, wanted to cry, but she did nothing like that. She thanked the old woman politely and rose. “But I am not finished ...” the old woman had started to say, but Rosa Blanco was already walking quickly back through the house toward the front door. It would be several years before she set foot inside Flora Diaz’s house again. Years would pass before she ever spoke again to the old woman.

  Rosa Blanco’s husband did, as you know, leave. Trust me, I know far more about that than anything else in this story. One night, a few months after she had visited Flora Diaz, Ricardo did not come home from his evening job at LAX airport. Weeks passed, months passed and, eventually, years passed. He never came home, never called, and still Rosa Blanco expected him to come back. There were times when she absolutely believed he would come walking through the door. She imagined she would hear a noise at the door, then the key in the lock, and then the door opening. She imagined he would walk in carrying gifts for her and the boys, that they would laugh together, that he would tell her stories of faraway places and how he had left only to be able to return like this, return with gifts and money and and and .. . But Ricardo never came back, and the boys grew taller. The boys looked more and more like their father as each year passed. And Rosa Blanco had long ago stopped trying to explain to them where their father was. She stopped talking about him altogether. And then one day, in the grocery store, at the checkout counter while talking to Carmen Jiménez, Rosa Blanco saw the old woman again.

  “I thought she was gone,” Rosa said.

  “Who, old Flora?”

  “Yes, I thought she had moved away.”

  “Girl, you crazy?” responded Carmen Jiménez. “She always around.”

  “But I have not seen her.”

  “Well you need glasses, Rosa. Because she always around.”

  “I want to talk to you about something, but not here. Stop by my house on your way home tonight.”

  Rosa Blanco was more afraid of Flora Diaz then than she had been years earlier when she had visited her the second time, but she didn’t understand what that sensation was. She had been afraid of so many things in her life, but not in this way. She remembered the old woman that day, the way she had said Ricardo would follow someone who could master the air. She wondered if that meant he had gotten into a fight and fallen over a cliff side or something. She wondered if the old woman knew where Ricardo was but had been hiding so as not to have to tell her. She wanted to talk to Flora Diaz, but she was worried about what the old woman might tell her. And she was envious of Carmen, Carmen who always got good news from the old woman, wonderful and brilliant news.

  When Rosa Blanco got home from the store, the boys were nowhere to be found. More and more they, too, were missing. They would stumble in reeking of cigarette smoke, sometimes marijuana. She knew that sometimes they were drunk. And her little Carlitos, well, he wasn’t so little anymore. She sat in the kitchen and waited. She checked on the soup in the big pot, chopped up some cilantro and onions and stirred them in, chopped up a tomato and stirred it in, poured in a cup of rice and left it all to simmer. She caught her own reflection in the kettle and decided she looked old, haggard, and witch-like. She waited on the soup, waited on her boys, and waited for Carmen Jiménez to stop by on her walk home from the store. When Carmen walked by the kitchen window, Rosa Blanco stood up and moved toward the back door. She pulled the door open and pushed the screen door out as an invitation. Carmen came in chattering as always. She told her about an old man propositioning her right at the checkout stand in front of others and how she thought the new clerk was an idiot. Finally, Rosa Blanco broke in:

  “I never told you, but I went to see Flora Diaz years ago.”

  “Then why you so crazy today when she came into the store?”

  “She told me Ricardo was going to leave ...”

  “Oh, Rosa. You never told me.”

  “I took her the leaves from a plant in the backyard. I did as she wanted me to do, dried them and made sure they were brittle.”

  “And that is all she said? That he was going to leave?”

  “I wish I could say I couldn’t remember, but I do. It was strange, the things she said.”

  “Well, she is a strange old woman, that Flora.”

  “She said Ricardo would leave to follow a master of the air. I think he may have fallen over a cliff or a ledge or something. I am worried. I think he may have gotten into a fight.”

  “Rosa, you can’t worry about that man. Shit, you shouldn’t worry about him at all. He just left. You think he worried about you? That man . . .”

  “I am just worried because it makes no sense.”

  “Life never makes sense, girl. You got to know by know. It makes no sense.”

  “When I saw her today, I couldn’t believe it. I have not seen her since the day she told me that terrible thing.”

  “But Rosa, that is impossible! She lives less than half a block away from you. You must have seen her. I see her all the time.”

  “But you work in the grocery store.”

  “But I see her all over the place. Rosa, it is impossible you haven’t seen her al
l this time.”

  Rosa Blanco didn’t know what to say. She knew she had not seen the old woman. She had actually believed the old woman had moved away, or was sick, or had died. She was 100% certain she had not seen her for ages, had not laid eyes on her until earlier that day in the grocery store. And this, in Rosa Blanco’s head, had to be a sign. It had to be a sign. Maybe it was Flora Diaz’s way of letting her know it was time to talk again. Maybe it was time for Ricardo to come home.

  “It is just that I think maybe she came there today so that I would see her.”

  “Rosa, girl, you crazy. You know that? You crazy. If you want to talk to Flora Diaz, go talk to her.”

  “But why haven’t I seen her since that day when ...”

  “You had to have seen her, Rosa. You had to have seen her.”

  “Maybe I will go talk to her. It is just that...”

  “Look, girl, I have to get going. I got to get home and start dinner.”

  “Will you come with me to see Flora Diaz?”

  “I don’t think that is the right thing, Rosa. She don’t do groups. She don’t like to feel all ganged up on.”

  “But it is just that I think it would be better.”

  “Rosa, some things in life you just got to do on your own. You know?”

  Carmen Jiménez didn’t say much more because she was practically in the yard by the time Rosa Blanco tried to say another word. She was in the yard and then walking past the house and then on the sidewalk walking home. Rosa Blanco hadn’t even gotten up from the table. She heard the front door and the boys arguing about something. It seemed they were always arguing about something then. She called out to them that dinner was waiting, that they needed to do something about pruning the tree in the front yard. She had been asking them to trim back that straggly tree for almost two weeks, and they had ignored her time and time again.

  When Rosa Blanco made it to Flora Diaz’s house weeks later, she was prepared. She brought with her some leaves she had pulled from the unkempt small tree in the front yard, the one that desperately needed pruning. She had plucked them almost a week before and left them to dry out on the front steps. When she reached the front door of the old woman’s house, the door opened. Flora Diaz looked no older than the day three years earlier when Rosa Blanco had last gone there. Flora stood in the doorway but did not move.

  “Why are you here?”

  “I brought you some leaves.”

  “You brought me some leaves? Why?”

  “I need to know.”

  “You need to? No, you do not need to know. You want to know.”

  “My husband, what happened?”

  “You left before I could finish telling you about your husband.”

  “I was frightened then, but now I am ... I just... Please tell me.”

  “I cannot remember now. What I do remember is that you left before I could finish.”

  “But you must remember something.”

  “I threw away those leaves a week after you left. I had hoped you would return, but once I thought on it, I knew you would not return until now.”

  “But don’t you remember anything?”

  “I threw the leaves away.”

  “Nothing? You remember nothing?”

  “You should have come back to see me then. You didn’t. Why you didn’t return, only you know that.”

  “I, I don’t remember. But, I am begging you ... You must tell me the rest...”

  “I am not one to keep things like that.”

  “But you told me about the master of the air.”

  Flora Diaz stepped back and then turned, let Rosa Blanco enter her house. She shut the door and then walked to the sunroom. She said nothing as she walked. And Rosa Blanco noticed this time how bright the sunroom was, how the walls were painted yellow, how there were plants hanging in baskets and that the plants had purple leaves. She noticed how the table was pale wood, that it was unpainted, unvarnished, blonde almost, and yet it had not a single stain on it. In the corner of the room, she saw a small ficus in a large pot. She noticed the floor was white linoleum that also had not a single stain or scuff mark. It was as if Flora Diaz never walked much less lived in this room.

  “You told me he followed a master of air. Does this mean he fell over a cliff?”

  “I do not remember.” The two women sat at the table. Flora Diaz stared out the window. Rosa Blanco stared at Flora Diaz.

  “Please. I am truly sorry for leaving that day, but I need to know what happened.”

  “I promise you, I remember nothing about what those leaves gave up.”

  “But you were so ...”

  “I did not keep the leaves. I threw them away.”

  “Well, I have more leaves for you.”

  “But these will not reveal what those other leaves did.”

  “Then I can go get some crocus leaves from the yard and dry them and come back in a few days.”

  “But those will not be the crocus leaves I threw away. Don’t you see? The leaves show only one thread. No set of leaves gives you a chance to see the same thread.”

  “Okay, but these leaves I have here, might they show you a similar thread?”

  “It is unlikely. Where did you get these leaves?”

  “From the tree in the front of my house. But they might show you something, right?”

  “From the shak shak tree?”

  “I don’t know what kind of tree it is. I have no idea. It was there when we moved in.”

  “Where I am from, we call it the shak shak tree, the flamboyant tree. I have no idea, but I will try for you. I will call to these leaves, but these leaves will probably show a different thread.”

  “But you will use them?”

  “I will look.”

  Again, she held the leaves in her upturned palms and stared at them for what seemed like an hour to Rosa Blanco. She crumbled them on to the table and bent toward them and inhaled. She sat up and then placed her hands over them. Her brow furrowed and then she closed her eyes. After a minute, she put her hands in her lap and sighed.

  “You saw Ricardo, didn’t you? You saw him.”

  “No. I did not see him.”

  “You are lying. You saw him. I could see the change in your face.”

  “It was a different thread. It was completely different.”

  “But it was related, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “So why won’t you tell me about him. Where is he? Is he okay? Do I need to call the police?”

  “The thread is related but is not the same. I could not see your husband. These leaves show nothing of your husband.”

  “Then why won’t you tell me what you saw?”

  “I just think... I just think that sometimes it is best not to reveal what is seen in a thread.”

  “Please. I am begging you.”

  “It is just that it isn’t a good thing.”

  “I don’t care this time. I want to know the whole thing. I am not leaving this time. I need to know. I will not leave until you tell me the entire thing. Do you understand me?”

  “Trust me, you do not want to know this.”

  “I do. I want to know, you terrible old woman, you terrible old bruja!”

  Rosa Blanco could not believe her own mouth, could not believe what she had heard herself say. It was as if she were listening to someone else speaking, as if she were watching the whole thing on one of the telenovelas. She must have remembered Carmen in the kitchen, remembered her saying she was crazy. And there, for what may have been the first time in her life, Rosa Blanco likely believed she might well be going crazy. She wanted to know. She wanted the smug old woman to tell her the truth, to tell her what she had seen in the leaves.

  “Fine. I will tell you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “In your yard. In your very yard, one of your lives will end another.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “One part of you will end another part of you.”

 
“I am going to hurt myself? Am I going to fall in my yard and break something?”

  “One Ricardo will kill the other Ricardo.” The old woman closed her eyes and spoke slowly, very slowly: “One son will kill the other son.”

  Rosa Blanco said nothing. She put her head down on the table, her forehead against the clean wood and cried like she had never cried. She sobbed and shook. She felt herself shaking and could not stop it. She felt as if she were gasping for air. And Flora Diaz? She stood up from the table, walked back through her house, picked up her small hand broom and went out on the front step to dust it off. She swished the small broom back and forth. She paused and looked the length of the street from right to left, looked up toward Rosa Blanco’s yard. She had no idea what to do with Rosa Blanco. She had seen the future, but she had no idea what to do now to help this strange woman. Inside, the sobs were still sputtering out of Rosa. Flora Diaz stood on her tiny front porch. She crossed it two or three times like a pacing cat. She swished the broom back and forth, the rhythm of it a background noise for the sobbing woman still in the sunroom next to her kitchen. She watched two figures coming down the road, easier and easier to make out as they got closer. The Blanco boys. She watched them but pretended to be sweeping the front steps.

  V. Desaparecido

  People play games. They cannot help it. They play them long after they are age-appropriate. They play them because they play them. No one knows why. Haven’t you seen old women playing cat’s cradle or duck duck goose? Haven’t you watched grown men playing dodge ball, tug-of-war, punch-the-target, and the penknife game? The ones where they shout out different kinds of dares and exact various punishments on each other? People play games, and the Blanco boys were no different.

  “When are you coming home? The boys keep asking.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I need another month or so.”

  “Really? A whole month more?”

  “At least a month, but maybe more.”

  “Do you have a good job? Will you send us some money?”

  “No, bitch! Not a dime.”

  The boys laughed out loud. Pedro always made their father into a cursing and vulgar man, even though he had never heard his father curse or utter a bad word to their mother or anyone else when he still lived at home with them. I can tell you that long after Ricardo left his family he remained very much a man who never used vulgar language or casual profanities. Bad language, surprisingly, was something Ricardo carefully avoided. Not once in our time together did I hear him curse. But this was Pedro’s version of his father, this man who called his wife “bitch.” Carlitos always laughed. He couldn’t help it. Pedro would laugh, and then he had to laugh, too. It was infectious.