by Laura Resau
Mamita Luz insists on calling Sarah and Dan cumarita and cumbarigo, literally comother and cofather, but also affectionate terms for friends. Sarah and Dan chat with her easily, talking about their two years in the Peace Corps in Guatemala. Meanwhile, Silvio cleans his brother’s head wound with soapy water, applies some herbs, and wraps a bandage around it like a headband. The girls pass around warm rolls as we tell Sarah and Dan and Layla what happened. We leave out the machine guns and the poisonous flora and fauna. We can’t get around the emerald smuggling, though.
Layla puts her hand over her heart, while Sarah bites her knuckle. Dan’s face turns red. He looks at Faustino and opens his mouth to say something, then shuts it. He puts one hand over the other, in a tightly clenched fist. I’m guessing he wants to yell, How the hell could you let my son get involved in this?
Layla fixes Faustino with a hard gaze, a mix of fury and compassion. “What were you thinking, señor?”
Faustino answers in slow Spanish. I whisper the translation in Wendell’s ear. “In the cave after I ate the flowers, I was a boy again, hiding in the cave from my father. A snake came and turned into my father and he was crying and saying, Forgive me, son. And then he left and a white bird came. She turned into Lilia. I said, Forgive me, mujer. And she kissed my cheek. Still, I felt full of poison, but then a bee came and I was sure it would sting me, but it thought I was a flower, and it drank and drank and flew off. And then I felt full of nectar and it was a good, golden feeling. And then Wendell came to me, and it was really him, asking, Are you okay? And I thought, Maybe he thinks I am full of nectar. Maybe I am full of nectar after all.”
No one says anything for a moment, and I feel sure that Sarah and Dan must be thinking What the—?!, when Layla takes his hand. “If you were poison in the past and you are nectar now, be nectar.” It’s as though they have their own language. Crazy mystical-poetry language. Then she looks at me and murmurs in English, “Sometimes the cold and dark of a cave give the opening we most want.”
Faustino turns to Silvio. “There’s something I don’t understand. All those years ago, why didn’t you take the boy? Lilia wanted to give him to you and Luz. But you said no. You told her to let him be adopted by foreigners. Why?”
Taita Silvio looks at Dan and Sarah and Wendell, who are still and alert, listening carefully. “I wanted him to be safe. I wanted him far away from you. And also—” He stops.
“What?” Faustino leans forward.
“I was afraid I would turn into our father. I wanted the boy far from me, too. I didn’t know if I was strong enough.”
“But look at all these kids around you.” Faustino sweeps his arm over the room. “You two are the father and mother of the town. Everyone knows that.”
“Now I know.” Taita Silvio pauses. “There’s something else. After Lilia asked us to take him, I did a divination. I saw something. Something like a string—a red one—stretching from the baby to a gringo couple. And I saw that this was good, that they belonged together.”
“Gracias,” Sarah says, wiping her eyes, putting her hand over Wendell’s.
Faustino stands up. “I’m taking off for a while. In case those guys come looking for me.”
“I don’t think they will,” Taita Silvio says.
Faustino shrugs. “You never know. I’ll stay in Colombia for a few months until this blows over.”
Taita Silvio lifts the leather string with the two skeleton keys from his neck. “Your keys, hermano.”
Faustino puts up his hand. “Give them to the boy. The cave is his now.”
Silvio reaches out, grasps his brother’s hand. “It was wrong of me to hold a grudge for so long, hermano. I hope you visit us when you come back. You are welcome in our home.”
Faustino nods and starts out the door.
Wendell stands up. “¡Espérate! I have something for you.” He reaches into his backpack and pulls out the small bundle of translated letters. I take the remaining translations from my bag and tuck them into the red ribbon.
Faustino hesitates.
“He started writing these letters when he was eight years old,” I say. “They’re important to him.”
Faustino shakes his head. “Give them to my brother.”
A shadow of disappointment passes over Wendell’s face. Then he nods and glances at Taita Silvio, managing a halfway smile. “All right.”
Faustino takes a last look at Wendell. “Forgive me.”
And he’s gone.
Chapter 29
Once Mamita Luz puts the girls to bed, Taita Silvio opens the letter in Spanish on top. It’s the last translation I did, before the pig market, which seems like years ago. “May I read it out loud?” he asks Wendell.
Wendell nods.
Taita Silvio reads word by word, in a drawn-out, labored rhythm, pausing to take a deep breath between sentences. He’s only had up to a third-grade education, I remember. But the nice thing is that when he reads so slowly, every word feels weighty with importance. And this way, Wendell and his mom and dad can understand the Spanish more easily.
Dear birth mom and dad,
Thank you for making me and giving me to mom and dad. I know you’re probably poor and maybe now you’re even starving and begging for scraps on the street. If I saw you begging I would give you money. Sometimes I cry and feel sad for you. Sometimes I feel bad that I get to go to Bojo’s on my birthday and eat pizza and Coke and cake until my stomach sticks out like a soccer ball and meanwhile you’re all dressed in rags and you can see your ribs and everything. I think you did a good thing to give me to mom and dad. You made us happy, me, mom, and dad.
Thank you,
Wendell B. Connelly,
age 12
Mamita Luz chuckles and pats her husband’s belly, soft and round. “No ribs in sight with my bread nearby.”
Taita Silvio reads a few more letters out loud and we laugh a lot and cry a little and eat bread and sip lemon balm tea. Afterward, the kitchen feels so cozy and warm that even though it has to be nearly dawn, we don’t want to leave. Dan finds the guitar in the corner and strums some tunes, humming lightly. Then Taita Silvio picks up a reed flute and starts playing along with him. Together, they create a spontaneous melody.
Wendell’s watching them while Sarah and I are watching Wendell. He’s their music. His dad is the reed and Silvio’s family’s genes are the carefully placed holes, and some mysterious force like the Absolute is the breath, and they’ve all come together to create this beautiful boy.
This boy who kissed me in a crystal cave.
This boy who chose me as his She.
After a while, Sarah and Dan start yawning and saying they’re ready to head back to the hotel with Wendell. I’m ready to go home too, but Layla’s discovered that Taita Silvio’s a healer. Now, of course, she’s in the middle of a passionate conversation with him. You’d never guess it was five a.m. by the amount of energy she suddenly has.
We say goodbye to Wendell and his parents, agreeing to meet at the market for dinner that evening. Once they leave, Layla jumps right back into her conversation, detailing her near drowning in the waterfall with dramatic flair. She’s standing up, twirling her arms around, demonstrating how the water sucked her under, as though it’s a modern dance routine.
Silvio nods gravely. “You have fright, cumarita,” he says. “At the moment you were drowning, your spirit left your body. You need to get it back.” He sips his tea. “You haven’t been yourself lately, have you?”
I answer for her. “No, she hasn’t!”
Mamita Luz pats Layla’s shoulder sympathetically. “Would you like my husband to give you a limpieza, cumarita?”
Magical words for Layla. An invitation to a spiritual cleaning. Her secret life goal, I’ve deduced, is to have her spirit cleaned in every country in the world.
This time, she really needs it.
“Oh yes! Thank you!” She hugs Mamita Luz. “Thank you for having such a lovely husband and making such delicious b
read. Thank you for everything!”
In the candlelit curing room, I sit on the bench at the wall, while Mamita Luz and Taita Silvio prepare for the limpieza. As instructed, Layla starts to undress, first unwinding her wraparound skirt.
In a cotton spaghetti-strap tank and hipsters, she stands in perfect yoga posture, with a hint of a belly poking out. She’s always refused to do crunches—they might block her golden belly chakra. She’s entering a trance state now, eyes closed, belly expanding and contracting with her breath.
Meanwhile, Taita Silvio is arranging the altar with Mamita Luz’s help. They put the huge feather headdress on his head and the strands of beads around his neck. The framed saints on the walls stare down at us. The gaze of the Virgin of Agua Santa is especially tender. Sacred water. I know that makes Layla happy. She loves water goddesses in any form.
On the altar, candlelight reflects off the laughing Buddha with all the happy bald babies crawling over him. It makes me think of Mamita Luz and Taita Silvio and all their children. It makes me think of all the different ways to be a mother or a father, or a daughter or a son. Of all the different ways to feel at home in this world.
Mamita Luz spreads a plastic doormat under Layla’s feet so that the dirt floor won’t get muddy. Then she holds a glass goblet of water before Layla. “Sacred water, cumarita. From a melting glacier. Drink.”
Layla sips.
Mamita Luz sits down and Taita Silvio begins chanting in Quichua and whistling, meandering melodies that make me think of the flute music he played earlier. He blesses a green bottle of liquid. Mamita Luz whispers something to Layla, and Layla closes her eyes, and Taita Silvio spits all over her, forceful gusts like ocean mist in a storm. He’s at least five feet away from her but easily soaks her. Again and again he blows away the bad air, calling her spirit back.
He takes two stones from his altar. “Cumarita, think about who you really are.” He rubs them over her, patting her flesh rhythmically and chanting, as though her body’s a musical instrument. A smile to rival the Buddha’s lights up her face. This is the kind of thing she lives for.
Taita Silvio grabs a bundle of leaves.
“Chilca,” Mamita Luz whispers.
With the chilca, Taita Silvio taps Layla in a regular rhythm, making circles around her stomach, back, and neck, chanting in Quichua and whistling all the while. Now he’s focusing on her chest, just over her heart.
Layla’s shivering, and if there were more light in the room, I bet we could see her turning blue. Next, Taita Silvio puts a handful of rose petals cut into tiny pieces in his mouth, then takes a sip from the green bottle. He spits on her. “Rub the petals into your skin.” Then he gives her white stones to rub over herself. “Think of what you want, cumarita,” he says. “What you truly want.”
Layla smiles and concentrates.
Then Taita Silvio takes another swig and blows the liquid on her. This time, he lights a lighter as he spits. When the alcohol spray passes through the flame, a fireball forms and shoots across the room. I jump a foot off the bench. Just before it reaches Layla, it goes out.
Not much surprises me in healing ceremonies, but fireballs are a new one. One fireball after another, and each time I jump. All the fireballs make Layla stop shivering and bathe her in an orange glow. She looks like an angel.
My heart racing, I think, This is my mother.
And then I think, She’s back.
The fireballs stop. Layla opens her eyes and smiles at me. Mamita Luz comes to her with a pink towel and her clothes. Taita Silvio sits down, looking worn out but satisfied. “We’re finished. Your spirit is back, as strong as ever, cumarita.”
In the fresh early morning air, we head toward the bus stop, Layla and me, side by side, our strides synchronized. In my left palm, I’m clicking together the amulets I’ve brought: jade, jasper, and crystals. I’m tired, a happy tired, a tired that lets down my usual defenses and gives me the courage to say, in a raw, simple voice, “I missed you, Layla.”
“I missed me, too.” She laughs a sleepy laugh and throws her arm around my shoulders.
We walk down the road, a ribbon through masses of green, as though a sea of leaves has parted just enough for us to pass through. All this green feels delicious, painted with angled lemony light, dripping with tree shadows. Power lines crisscross the hills like silvery spiderwebs, and tiny, faraway people walk along their own narrow ribbons of road, curving here and there.
I lean into her. “What now, Layla?”
“Now, fly!” she says with another laugh.
“Seriously, Layla.”
She throws her head back and gazes at the sky. “Okay, how about this? Jeff will head back to Virginia, and maybe we’ll e-mail a little, and then after a while, he’ll fade into our memories.” She unbraids her hair, still damp, and runs her fingers through it, letting it tumble over her shoulders. “A couple of years from now, when we’re in another country, and we pass a handsome older fatherly type, or flip through a magazine and see a well-dressed man playing golf, we’ll say, Hey, remember that Jeff guy? Remember how we almost moved to Maryland?”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
I click the stones around in my hand. “And,” I say, “we’ll feel a little sad, maybe, but then we’ll blast Moroccan music and you’ll shout, Dance with me, Z!”
Layla snakes her hands up in a quick belly dancing move. “And you’ll roll your eyes, and groan, It’s the middle of the night, Layla! What about the neighbors? But you’ll join me anyway.”
I breathe in the mist rising off the shiny green cornfields in the valley, the luxurious gown of Pachamama—Mother Earth—embroidered with emerald leaves and crystal lace, trimmed with the silk ribbons of rivers, fringed with petals and leaves. “And secretly, I’ll love it.” I raise a calculated eyebrow at her. “On the condition, of course, that we establish some rules.”
“Hmm.” She lifts her hair, twirls it, and ties it in a loose knot. “No rules. How about agreements?”
“Okay. Agreements.”
By the time the bus arrives, we’ve agreed that we’ll put ten percent of our money away for my college fund, ten percent for her retirement, ten percent in investments, and ten percent for emergencies. I’ve agreed to complain less about her boyfriends. And she’s agreed—very reluctantly—to take turns doing the dishes.
Finally, the most important agreement: I get to choose what country we go to next. I just need to figure out where that will be. Which involves, of course, Wendell.
A few days later, at six a.m., Jeff and Layla and I are standing in a drizzle in our courtyard. He’s stopped by on his way to the airport, left his SUV, engine running, on the street. He’s particularly handsome in the rain, his skin damp, his eyes the same iron gray as the sky, looking wistful. I feel a little stab of regret that we’ll probably never see him again.
He launches into a speech. “Thank you for everything, ladies. You’re looking at a different man from the one you met on the plane.” He even sounds like a Handsome Magazine Dad, sturdy and sentimental. “I’ve got it all planned out, thanks to you. I’ll take Spanish night classes. I’ll go on a weeklong trip to a different country every year. And I’ll always order the daily special.”
“But will you eat it?” I ask.
“At least a bite.” He grins. “Even if it’s snake or iguana.”
I look away as Layla gives him a long kiss goodbye and whispers in his ear.
Before he climbs into the SUV, I give him a copy of Rumi.
Inside the apartment, Layla and I watch a few minutes of golf with the volume turned down so we can hear the rain on the roof. We list a few things we like about Jeff, sort of a memorial service to their failed relationship. Layla tears up a little as we stick the TV back in its box. Later that morning, we’ll sell it at a pawnshop and put the money in our brand-new money market account.
A week later, I come home from the market to find Wendell and Layla drinking foamy papaya juice on the sofa. They l
ook excited. Before I can ask what’s going on, Layla leaps up and announces, “Wendell has a surprise for you, Z!”
She runs behind me and covers my eyes with her hands. They’re warm and sticky and smell like papaya, like a little kid’s hands.
“Uh, Wendell,” I say, “care to enlighten me?”
“You’ll see,” he says.
Layla leads me to my bedroom, sits me down on my mattress, and removes her hands. “Open your eyes, love!”
I open my eyes. My room feels different. It’s no longer empty. And in a split second, I figure out why. Nine prints hang on the previously bare wall. They’re photos, Wendell’s photos, some color, some black and white, some sepia, and they fill the wall, floor to ceiling.
The center photo is of steaming bread in a shaft of sunlight. Then there’s the crystal cave in warm candlelight. The mountain Imbabura, towering and shrouded in mist. A close-up of watercress by a trickling stream. Wendell on the floor with drying watercolors surrounding his face (I took that one). Me in the café, the first day we met, when he talked about the light hitting my hair (and yes, you can actually see red highlights). Gaby sitting like a queen at her booth, among scarves and clothes of all colors. The waterfall at sunrise, all silver spray. A portrait of Mamita Luz and Taita Silvio and the girls, standing proudly in front of their house, smoke rising from the chimney like a child’s drawing of a happy home.
Wendell sits next to me on the mattress. “Like it?”
I’m speechless for a moment. “Que pleno,” I say finally. “I love it, Wendell.”
“Good!” Layla says. “Now I’m off to my class. Late as usual.” She kisses me on the forehead and breezes away.