“Think about it,” she’d said to me, when she’d handed back the paper. “Holden’s brother has died. Where has he gone? Where do any of us go? Where do the ducks go?”
“They fly south,” I say now, quoting my essay. I take my mother’s hand. “They fly south, and they’re reborn. They come back changed, older.”
“Is that what they teach now?” She inhales deeply, enjoying the cold air. “I always thought it had to do with death.”
I squeeze her hand harder. “But the ducks don’t die,” I point out. I’d said this to Mrs. Jacobs as well. “They just go away.”
“But maybe that’s what death is. You just go someplace else.” My mom waves her hand vaguely, gesturing towards the sky.
I don’t say anything. I stare at the pond, looking for any flashes of orange beneath the frozen surface, but there are none.
“Don’t worry.” Mom puts a hand on my shoulder. “Kurt has a huge tank in his basement for the koi in the winter.”
But I am not thinking about the koi anymore.
Chapter 10
After
Before I came to Calantes, I couldn’t picture what the local villages would look like. There were pictures in the brochures, of course, but they were stills of men assembling buildings or mothers nursing their infants. They captured moments as opposed to conveying a sense of an overall picture, and for some reason, I kept picturing the Al-Qaeda camps they show on TV, shot in Afghanistan. Only those are in the desert, and Calantes is in the heart of the Amazon rainforest, so obviously it made no sense. I also had the awareness that there might have been something vaguely racist about this thought, so I never would have admitted it out loud.
So, there was a bizarre moment when we had first gone into a village and I discovered a complete lack of goats. Whenever I’ve seen those camps on CNN, there are always goats. I’m not sure why. I’m not even sure if goats are desert animals, though I suspect not, since there was one at the San Pedro Airport. But anyway, no goats, either. What there were, were chickens. And people, too, of course. Lots of people, too many to be living in such a small space. Old people, young people. Babies crawling in the dirt or swaddled tightly in their mothers’ arms. But it was the chickens that really caught my eye, at first. I had never seen so many chickens in one place.
“Are those chickens?” From behind me, I heard Taylor’s voice, incredulous at the sheer number of roaming fowl, wandering aimlessly and pecking at the ground.
“Gives a whole new meaning to ‘free range,’” I muttered. Emerson, who had been our guide that day, looked at me, eyebrows raised, but didn’t say anything. I wondered if making jokes in a poverty-stricken village was inappropriate. My mom, who had coped with her cancer by tapping into her inner comedienne, had clearly bequeathed to me this unique trait. Instead of appreciating the gravity of such moments, I now turned into a stand-up comic, channeling my mother and her biting wit. It’s a bit of a self-defense mechanism: your brain can’t cope with the emotional overload of stressful situations and turns to humor to keep you from completely losing it.
Now, I stand amid the chickens, still unnerved at their proximity and sharp beaks. Chickens seem much more threatening in person. I can tell Taylor feels the same way, because he keeps edging closer to me. Mostly when we’ve been in the village, we’ve been supervised, shepherded from building to building: from the children’s activities to the kitchens to the wells. This is the first time we’ve just been left to stand there, to observe the reality of life and the day-to-day goings on.
People eye us, but avert their gazes and don’t come over, and I wonder what we must look like to them, in our shorts and T-shirts. Some are too busy to even look our way; almost everyone seems occupied with one task or another. A group of boys is counting some kind of fruit I don’t recognize, while a trio of girls is doing what appears to be laundry. They’re hunched over giant buckets, with long staffs for stirring, and I can’t help but think of the opening of Macbeth. They look like a coven of witches hovering over their cauldron, only instead of eye of newt they’re mixing up filthy T-shirts and stained socks. The smell, unfortunately, is distinctly toe of frog; it’s awful, and one of the girls wears a makeshift mask.
“I’m not choosing laundry,” whispers Margo, looking revolted. “You’d need an N-95 mask to block that stink.”
“Shhh,” I hiss, looking around. “They’ll hear you.”
Being in the village makes me feel incredibly awkward. I start to feel as though everyone is silently judging me as a spoiled American brat. Margo thinks I’m paranoid, but I can’t help it. I feel as if I should apologize for every item of clothing I wear, every silly thing I say.
“There’s your boyfriend,” says Taylor, smirking. He elbows me in the ribs. “He’s looking at you.”
I give an irritated sigh as I follow his gaze to Rafael. The night after the raid, after we’d been escorted back and were tucked safely inside our mosquito nets, I’d made the mistake of mentioning in passing that I thought Rafael was hot. Taylor hasn’t let up since.
Rafael, wearing a faded red T-shirt, is standing against a tree with his arms crossed, nodding at a girl with a long braid that nearly reaches her waist. His expression is serious, and I doubt he’s even noticed I’m here. I watch as he says something to the girl, whose hands are gesturing in all directions with a certain urgency. It seems that Rafael has some kind of authority here, but it’s not clear if it’s in any sort of official capacity.
“He could be married for all we know,” I say crossly to Taylor. Taylor whistles loudly, attracting Rafael’s attention. Our eyes meet, and he lifts his hand in a small wave.
“He’s coming to see you,” sings Taylor playfully. I can feel my neck getting hot and red in the back, as if I’ve been burned by the midday sun. I glare at Taylor, and casually nod at his feet.
“That chicken is eating your shoelace.”
It has the desired effect: Taylor jumps back. “Shoo!” he shouts, waving his hands. “Shoo, shoo!”
The chickens ignore him and continue their pecking. Margo doubles over in helpless laughter, and even the laundry girls all pause briefly to chortle and point at Taylor, who is now shaking both his legs and hands at the bobbing birds.
Rafael arrives, looking puzzled. I glance over for the girl with the long braid, but she is nowhere to be seen. “What is he doing?”
Margo grins. “I think it might be the hokey-pokey.”
Now I’m laughing, too. Taylor does a sort of half-spin as one of the chickens stabs at his toes with its beak, and Margo continues in a deadpan voice. “Yup, there he goes. Turning himself around.”
Rafael is confused, but he smiles and briefly places a hand on my shoulder. It’s a casual move—the way you touch someone you don’t know very well in a country where touching is a social norm—but it feels heavy there for a moment as he brushes the strap of my tank top.
“How are you?” he asks. His voice is serious. “How is the other girl? Melanie?”
“Melody,” I correct him.
It’s been just under a week since Rafael and Eduardo escorted us back to the base. Melody has been off-duty ever since, and spent the better part of three days lying on her bed, staring silently at her mosquito net. After that, she was transferred to another barrack, and I’ve only caught glimpses of her since. I wonder what sort of placement she will choose. If she opts for something here in the village, there won’t be any way for her to keep avoiding us.
“Don’t worry about Melody.” Margo’s tone is harsh. “She has Jesus.”
“Oh,” says Rafael politely. “Is that her boyfriend?”
I start to laugh, before I realize that this is a perfectly reasonable question in a country where Jesus—pronounced the Spanish way, of course, hey-zoos—is a popular name. Still, Margo and I laugh like a pair of giggling middle-schoolers, until I realize that the laundry girls are now watc
hing us as they fish clean but permanently stained clothing from their cauldron, laboriously wringing them out. I feel foolish and spoiled and mean, like the archetypal clueless North American teenager. Biting my lip, I sober up.
“She’s religious,” I say lamely.
“Ohhh.” Rafael looks embarrassed, but doesn’t pursue it.
“I never asked you your name,” he says instead. “It was very rude.”
“Well, there was gunfire and a near-miss with the shovel,” I say reasonably. I put out my hand. “I’m Cat.”
He looks confused again. “Cat?”
“Caitlin,” I explain. “It’s a nickname.”
“Ah!” He brightens. “Catalina.”
It sounds pretty the way he says it, and I try to forget that it’s my dad’s favorite salad dressing. Thinking of my father still feels like being sucker-punched to the gut: when I picture his face, I feel like I can’t take in enough air. The emails I’ve received from him are perfunctory: How are you, I am fine, like I’m ten years old and at sleepover camp. When I call, he doesn’t answer.
“And you are Taylor, I think,” he continues, turning to Margo.
“Nope.” She nods at the real Taylor, who has successfully fended off several fowl. “My name is Margo. That’s Taylor.”
Rafael is caught off guard, but recovers quickly. Margo, watching his expression, gives a satisfied smirk. “You thought I was Taylor because it’s a girl’s name, right?”
Now it’s Rafael’s turn to blush, a rosy glow beneath the burnt brown sugar of his skin. “I should not have assumed. I was only thinking of Taylor Swift.”
“Did I hear my name?” Taylor looks harried. The chickens have disbanded, but it’s not clear who the real victor was.
“He thought I was you,” says Margo triumphantly, “because you have a girl’s name.”
“Maybe he thought you were a boy,” retorts Taylor, “because you have no boobs.”
Ouch. I wince as they get going, hurling insults back and forth. Rafael looks shocked.
“Do they always do this?” he asks.
“Only when they’re in a good mood,” I say. I shift back and forth on my feet, both out of nervousness and because my hiking boots are damp inside. There is no way to stay dry in the Amazon, and the water is constantly penetrating my socks. I can feel them, squishing and squelching with every step I take, as if I’ve filled my boots with saturated sponges. It drives me crazy, and I spend long stretches of the day fantasizing about wringing them out and drying them off. It’s a bit like having food caught in your teeth at a restaurant, and you spend half the meal planning your eventual dental-floss attack strategy.
“Is something wrong with your feet?” His eyes travel downward.
“Oh.” I feel a rush of embarrassment. “They’re just wet. From the jungle.”
He looks relieved. “I was worried it was a snake.”
“Snake?” I shiver. “Can a snake get in a shoe?”
“Yes.” His expression is serious. “It’s quite common in the jungle, though in the clearing here it’s less of an issue.”
I imagine a snake infiltrating my boot and swallowing my foot whole. In my mind, the snake looks like some sort of sci-fi creature, a Harry Potteresque basilisk with glowing eyes. Mom hated snakes, I think, imagining how she would have recoiled at Rafael’s explanation. I feel the familiar wave of sadness overtake me, trapping me underwater, stealing my breath. Here in the jungle, it is easier to forget my grief. Sometimes, it feels like something I forgot to pack, something there wasn’t room for in my suitcase, and I feel I’ve won, I’ve escaped. Then I remember, and it feels as fresh and raw as it did the night she closed her eyes for the last time.
Rafael must think the expression on my face still has to do with the snakes, because he leans in again to touch my shoulder. “Do not worry too much about snakes in your boots, Catalina. They look very sturdy.”
I glance down at my hiking boots. I’d bought them on sale, but what I’d paid for them was still probably enough to feed the village for a week. I can’t look Rafael in the eye, even though I know he’s trying to be kind.
“What’s this about snakes?” Taylor pokes his head in, looking worried.
“I was concerned Catalina had a snake in her boot,” explains Rafael. He gestures at my feet.
“There’s a snake in my boot!” Margo drawls in a Western accent. We all stare at her.
“You know, Toy Story!” she looks around expectantly. “Come on. Disney movie? Toys come to life? That’s what Woody says if you pull his cord.”
“Woody?” Rafael looks confused.
“He’s a cowboy toy, with a pull cord.” Margo mimes the action. “You haven’t seen Toy Story?”
“No,” says Rafael stiffly. “I have seen the sequel, Toy Story 2, but I don’t remember about the snake.”
At this we all fall quiet, and I marvel at how privileged our North American lives are. While Rafael is explaining the possibility of actual, live snakes burrowing into our footwear, our immediate associations are with pop culture. Smiling cowboys.
“Bueno,” says Rafael, breaking the awkward silence. “Have you decided on your placements?”
“We’re here to see where you need the most help,” I say quickly. “We’re sort of…undecided.” It’s true. None of us has been able to decide since our altercation. I don’t know what the others are thinking, but it’s left me both afraid and wanting to do more.
Rafael nods. “I can help you, if you would like.”
“She would definitely like,” says Taylor slyly, and I glare furiously at him.
Rafael turns to Margo. “You could help Sofia’s group with preparing food.”
Margo bristles. “Because I’m a girl, I should be in the kitchen?”
“Not the kitchen,” says Rafael patiently. “With the chickens.”
“Huh?” Margo looks behind him at a group of chickens, pecking furiously at the ground. Taylor eyes them suspiciously.
“Slaughter,” clarifies Rafael. “Sofia’s group needs someone to help slaughter the chickens, and you look like—how do you say it in English?—that you could handle it.”
I laugh out loud. I can’t help it.
Margo glares at both of us. “What else is there?”
Rafael looks thoughtful. “Elena’s group is also looking for help,” he says pleasantly, “with the latrines. Plumbing can be a problem in the jungle, and—”
“I’ll take the chickens,” interrupts Margo hastily. Rafael whistles loudly, and a tiny slip of a girl with braided hair appears at his side.
“This is Sofia,” he says to Margo. “She will teach you what you need to know.”
“Great,” says Margo. She throws me a sympathetic look over her shoulder as she leaves. “Sorry about the caca,” she says. “Good luck.”
I look at Rafael warily. Our eyes meet, and his expression softens slightly. He reaches over and brushes something off my shoulder. I stiffen at the unexpected touch.
“Mosquito,” he says, looking embarrassed. “Sorry.”
“No, no,” I say, blushing. “Thank you.”
“Don’t worry,” he says. “Elena does not really need help with the latrines. Your friend seemed like she needed a bit of—how would you say it in America?—a kick in the pants?”
I laugh a little. “Margo is tough,” I say diplomatically.
“What about me?” interjects Taylor. He’s also looking wary. “I don’t want anything to do with the chickens.”
Rafael looks thoughtful, eyeing Taylor’s muscular build. “Chopping wood?”
Taylor makes a face. “Nothing with sharp objects,” he says. “I once needed twelve stitches from slicing a bagel.”
“Well, we should certainly keep you away from an ax then,” says Rafael gravely, but I can see he’s trying not to laugh. He
pauses. “How are you with computers?”
Taylor brightens. “Okay, I guess. Good. Like some basic HTML and stuff. You have Internet, right?” He looks around hungrily, as if somewhere close by someone has a sleek new MacBook Air and a high-speed WiFi connection that’s just out of his reach. Slow connections and crappy computers are a reality of life at the base camp, making sending and receiving email nearly impossible, let alone checking a Facebook account or Twitter feed.
Rafael nods. “You can help Eduardo. He does communications and social media.”
Eduardo. That was the other guy with Rafael after the shooting. The one who looked like an IT Geek. I can’t help but grin—I was right.
“Where is Eduardo?” Taylor asks, looking around. The laundry girls take out another load for wringing and drying. These are all baby clothes. Tiny sleepers with mended holes and worn fabric, cloths for diapers, with the scrubbed stains still faintly visible. I think of the bulk diapers and cheap sleepers on sale regularly at home and feel another wave of First-World Guilt.
Rafael explains where to find Eduardo and his computer. I hope, for Eduardo’s sake, that his Internet connection is fast and that he likes celebrity gossip. I once found Taylor angrily banging on one of the keyboards, trying to load up Perez Hilton.
When he’s gone, I wait expectantly for my assignment. I know I can say no to Rafael, but I also know that I won’t. It’s still not clear that he has any kind of authority here—not officially, anyway—but he radiates leadership. Politico, Margo called him. Political. I wonder what that means, and once again feel the pangs of my privilege-associated shame. In my world, if you were political, you might run for student council.
“Anna desperately needs help in the Enfermería,” Rafael says tentatively. His face searches mine.
In the what? I wrack my brain, trying to decipher what he’s saying without having to ask and look stupid.
“Enfermería,” he repeats, noting the blank look on my face. “Like…nurses. For sick people?”
Undiscovered Country Page 10