In the next room, she heard someone moving around, heels clicking against the red Mexican tiled floor. The rhythm reminded her of a slow dramatic tap dance she had performed with big red fans as a child. This memory seemed more like a dream and she wondered if she were only dreaming at the present moment. She yawned: the air was warm and heavy in the room. She stood up, sliding off the four post bed, her bare feet touching the cool tiled floor. Swaying in nausea, she steadied herself, grasping onto a bed post. She stretched her arms and smoothed her shoulder-length black hair self-consciously, suddenly afraid someone was watching her. It was her paranoia. This caused her to laugh at herself quietly and then to withdraw back into herself like a turtle sliding into its shell.
Her head pounded and she desperately wanted another shot of tequila to quiet the thunder in her mind. Gavriel, Gavriel, Gavriel… She laughed and sighed when she thought of this young man who managed his uncle’s club where she danced. It was stuffy in the room, so she raised the window and leaned out to take the warm breeze into her lungs.
People sometimes told her that she and Gavriel looked alike—like sister and brother. She found these comments strange and though they both had dark eyebrows, his were thicker, and though they both had light eyes, his were wider, and though they both had full lips, his curved upwards as if he were constantly laughing at something. This irritated her because she viewed the world as quite serious and certainly she couldn’t find anything humorous about it. His face, she thought, was much rounder. He had an olive complexion and his cheeks were often slightly flushed like he had been blushing moments before, unlike her pale face. He was better looking than any movie star she had ever seen.
With her head still out the window, she gazed at the rooftops hunching together down below, with lines of rags and undergarments blowing from them in the wind. A big clock tower rose up staring her in the face, coughing and wheezing, “Bueñas días.”
Now all she could do was sit upon the bed with her head in her hands trying to remember the night before. She was often cold and evasive with Gavriel, though he usually laughed at her and called her “bonita” or “pretty girl.” This infuriated her and made her lash out at him, sometimes calling him names like, “chauvinist pig” (which he really wasn’t) or “fat-face” because she heard his little cousins calling him this and it seemed to bother him. Her anger ignited her passion, causing her to dance on the stage on those nights with more fervor and sensuality than usual.
So often these days her dreams had been mixing with reality and she could hardly decipher between the two. Sometimes when she was awake, she thought she could fly because so many of her dreams had involved flying of some sort. She imagined now leaping into the air from the window to see if she could fly above the watch tower, but thought better of it and decided to lie back on the bed to take a short nap.
As she drifted into sleep, she thought again of Gavriel. He was unique. He wasn’t like other guys. When Barbey imagined him, she thought of a spy because he seemed to have secrets hidden beneath his playful smile. She wondered what sort of mischief he was concealing. Though he sometimes exhibited a furtive air, he seemed like the good guy or the hero-type in an espionage film. His shoulders were large and strong for his thin physique and she could imagine him as a CIA agent dressed in black, staked out upon a rooftop with a sniper gun, taking out the evil enemies below, saving Mexico from Russian terrorists or some other world terror. She fell into a peaceful sleep.
Initially when she awoke from her nap, she was startled from a kaleidoscope of colorful lights upon her bare arms and upon the white bedspread that covered her body. This was the first moment in which she had noticed the beautiful stain glass design above on the high ceiling which entailed intricate cut-glass designs of multiple colored chips of glass formed into the shape of a huge star. The star was grand and glorious, now pervading the room with colorful noon lights flickering in brilliance that caused Barbey to retract into herself momentarily from the sheer awe of the seemingly infinite nature of the light compared to the smallness of her being.
She was amazed how a seemingly plain, bare room could be suddenly transformed, in her perspective, from a single ray of light into something so utterly resplendent. If this was so—which it was—then she too could transform from her base nature into something glorious as well! This epiphany came to her in a flash of divine inspiration with a sudden certainty that she had experienced for the first time in her quarter century of life. Suddenly her entire reality had unexpectedly been flipped once again, but this time into something unfathomable and divine. She gazed up at the rays of light shimmering out of the star from something higher and greater than she had ever considered. Allegorically, the room was lit with the Endless Light of One all encompassing Infinite Loving source of energy and bliss. The essence was unfathomable without shape or form, incomprehensible to the human mind, but nonetheless, ever-present and REAL! She felt the light caressing her body, holding her warmly, and at once she knew that this love she felt was higher, truer, and more exalted than the love she could ever feel for any man. This was Truth and she would embrace the Truth!
There was a knock at the door. She pulled the white sheets over her shoulders, tensing at the neck. “Who is it?” she hollered out.
“It’s me, tonto—Gavriel. Are you going to sleep all day?”
Her eyes widened, “I’m dressed,” she was embarrassed. “You can come in…” she paused. “…I guess.”
“No, no…” he laughed, “…no problema. Meet me under the stairs in la cocina. I’ll make you lunch.”
She put her head in her hand breathing deeply—How can I face him at work every day after having slept with him? I’m so stupid. Now everyone’s going to find out.
She found a little bathroom with red velvet wallpaper, red curtains tied with white ribbon and a silver washing cup on the white sink basin. After splashing her face with water a few times and combing her hair down with her fingers, she was surprised to see how pleasant she looked—her eyeliner and waterproof mascara hadn’t smudged during her sleep and the glitter she had glued on her cheeks for her dance performance was still in place, twinkling in the bathroom light. She was still in her dance costume—a purple sequined bra and trunks with fringe and tassels around the hips. The feather headband must have fallen off sometime during the night somewhere. But, much to her luck, she had found her expensive sequined stilettos at the end of the bed, which she now wore on her feet. It didn’t bother her that she wasn’t dressed because Gavriel had seen her millions of times in her dance costumes anyway.
But as she walked down the stairs, she was embarrassed to see an older, stout woman with a scarf around her head who she assumed was Gavriel’s mother. The woman smiled at Barbey, tucking her blouse deeper into her skirt while speaking to her in Spanish and kissing her cheeks on both sides. “Chageet, Chageet, Chageet—una chica guapa.” She stood shaking her head endearingly as she gazed at Barbey.
Astonished, Barbey didn’t know how to respond and simply kept repeating, “Gracias, gracias, gracias…” She wondered why this woman was calling her a foreign name that scraped roughly through her ears reminding her of her father’s mother who she had overheard a few times as a child speaking Arabic to her relatives on the telephone. The name intrigued her as she began to analyze it. She noticed that the first consonant, “Ch,” in the name Chageet sounded the same as the “ch” in the composer, Bach’s, name. Then she wondered what country Bach was from because she was certain he was not an Arab.
In an aggressive, yet friendly manner, the woman pulled her back up the stairs into the hall, motioning for her to wait as she went into a bedroom and shut the door. A moment later, she returned with a long sleeved dress that she helped Barbey pull over her head. Adoringly, the woman looked at Barbey with tears in her eyes, “Mi Chageet—te quiero.” The dress was long and out of style with brown and green paisley designs and a little green bow at the neckline and a matching ribbon that tied at the waist. She felt she l
ooked like Mary Ingle from the television show, “Little House on The Prairie.”
After kissing her a few more times, she led Barbey down the stairs to a plain white kitchen with Mexican red tiled counters, white cupboards, and red tiled floor. A big, round oak table that took up most of the kitchen space was set with blue and white ceramic plates and blue glasses that had been blown into artistic shapes. Gavriel was nowhere around. The woman motioned her to sit at the table and she began dishing onto Barbey’s plate an elaborate meal of juevos rancheros, cucumber and tomato salad, beans, and rice. She poured orange juice into the tall twisting glass and all the while she kept speaking to her in Spanish and calling her “Chageet”, seemingly unaware that Barbey could not understand her. Suddenly, the woman shrieked, hurrying over to retrieve the tortillas she had been warming for her.
After the meal, the woman led Barbey onto a terrace which overlooked a business district. The woman continued talking, pointing to storefronts and people below. The sidewalks were busy with Friday afternoon shoppers bargaining with vendors and shopkeepers on leather belts, riding saddles, silver jewelry, etc. One Mexican storekeeper across the street got so angry at a customer that he threw a brand new pair of cowboy boots out onto the street. He threw his fists in the air and the customer left appalled and shaking his fists as well. Embarrassed, the woman waved her hands in the air as if to dismiss the incident, and continued talking. Barbey smiled and nodded her head often, saying, “Si, si, si…” and “No, no, no…” as if she were surprised by what the woman was saying. Then Barbey would continue nodding in recognition, straightening the green bow at her neck.
It was getting late and Barbey thought she ought to head back to her apartment that she was renting across the border. Yesterday she had made plans with Sage to watch videos at her house because her husband was out of town buying horses in Missouri and she didn’t like being alone on the ranch with just their newborn daughter. Spending time with Sage, though the visits were seldom these days, made Barbey feel normal as most of the time she lived a fast life of partying, escapism, and disconnection from meaningful relationships. Her father and Mama were in partial, early retirement and spent much of the year traveling, so she rarely spent time with them; consequently, she felt lonely and disconnected from family and all the activities that generally surround family life.
It felt great being served a home cooked meal the way a mother serves a daughter. Usually, Barbey ate on the go, grabbing a quick sandwich from the deli or living on granola bars and fruit. Now, though she couldn’t understand most of what this woman was saying, she felt strangely happy around her as if she were for this brief span of time, a member of a caring family. Even dressed in this silly dress, oddly, made Barbey feel normal. There was something about her skimpy dance costumes and the mild eroticism that she expressed on the stage that left her feeling empty and used after her performances. She had always dreamed of being a dancer in a club like in the movie, Flashdance, and now that she was actually living this dream, she felt depleted and estranged from something that she yearned for, yet didn’t quite know what that something was. At this house, she seemed to be finding that something. First, when she was in the bedroom and the lights were shimmering upon her from above and now, as she sat with this woman looking out from above at the world below. This feeling comforted her, not with that intensity that she had often sought, but with a comfort that felt everlasting. Always had she been chasing the high notes of life only to find herself depleted and hollow after the high faded. The feelings she had experienced in this home seemed true and somehow constant.
Sage’s life seemed to her to have a constancy that was generally neither high nor low, yet happy. Happiness seemed to be found in the regularity of pleasant experiences over extended periods of time, rather than in the extreme highs that decayed as quickly as they flashed. Each high had been for Barbey like lighting a match into full flame and watching it quickly burn out. The flame, though beautiful and intense, quickly ran down, extinguishing into a cold, dead, charred stick. When Barbey was in that bedroom looking up at the light shining through that great star, the feeling she experienced was different than a flame that quickly extinguished. It was different than the spark of fire she felt when she danced on stage. It was even different than the spark of fire that she had felt when she was with Rave. It actually was as intense as a flash of fire, but it felt warm and lasting as well. The feeling was initially high and intense, but then waned into a gentle comfort that intuitively seemed endless and good. Reflecting on the experience, she could only describe it as the feeling of being a part of something genuine, something beneficent, something nonphysical, but nonetheless, ever-present. Unable to fully comprehend this new attachment, she suddenly felt determined to not leave this home. Now, overwhelmed with the desire to understand this new yearning which she felt, she decided she would do whatever it would take to not leave this house until she found the answer.
Shortly after leaving Barbey out on the terrace to enjoy the sun, the woman returned to the kitchen and began preparing what appeared to Barbey, who glanced here and there through the glass doors, to be a feast. There seemed to be so many culinary projects developing simultaneously; the woman kept scurrying around the kitchen as if she were performing a festive dance. She was making chicken soup with big white balls of dough. Moments later, moving back and forth between each project, she would stir a sauce, sauté onions, mix a casserole, frost a cake, etc. After this, she paused for a moment, licked her fingers one at a time and proceeded to scrub her hands with soap in the sink, moving right back to work, placing two whole chickens and a large roast in the oven. When Barbey saw her begin to chop salads, she decided to jump in and help. The woman appeared delighted and showed her how to slice cucumbers and tomatoes into small squares and then motioned her to wash and cut garnishes of green onions and cilantro.
Barbey was surprised when she saw the woman punch down a huge ball of dough in a large bowl that she had prepared earlier. The woman then opened a book written in a foreign language with letter symbols that Barbey didn’t recognize. Flipping through the pages with flour on her hands, the woman stopped at a paragraph and began reading a sentence aloud, rolling her eyes up as if she were praying. Then she tore a piece of the dough from the bread, said something else in the foreign language and burned the dough in a coffee can with hot coals on the terrace. While the dough was burning, she proceeded to read another paragraph from the book, kiss the book, and then put it away in a drawer. Now, separating the dough into three portions, the woman took one portion and braided it into a loaf, placed it in a greased pan, brushed it with egg, sprinkled poppy seeds over it, and covered it with a hand towel to rise. She pushed the rest of the dough over to Barbey who was delighted to show off her cosmetology skills of a six level braid which she applied to the other two portions of dough. Apparently, the woman was pleased with Barbey as she kissed her on the hands and then pinched her cheek saying in a high pitched voice the name, Chageet, over and over as she shook her head in joy. Barbey wondered what the name Chageet meant and why she was calling her that, but she couldn’t find the words in her limited Spanish vocabulary to ask her.
After the cooking was close to completion, the woman, speaking quickly, guided Barbey to the room she had slept in earlier, left, and then swiftly returned with another dress that she draped over a chair with a towel, a toothbrush, and some soap. She folded down the bedspread and patted the bed mumbling something while motioning Barbey to rest. After she left the room, Barbey was quite pleased that she hadn’t been forced to manipulate a way to spend more time in the house because the woman had simply expected her to stay. It was all very strange, but she was looking forward to the mysteries that lay ahead.
Barbey made a collect call to Sage from the hall phone just outside the bedroom door. “Hi, it’s me.”
“Why are you whispering?”
Barbey could hear Sage’s newborn baby crying in the background. “I’m still in Tijuana at this guy’
s house from the club and I don’t want to be a jerk or a flake to you, but I really need to stay here tonight.”
“Ooooh,” Sage said teasingly. “Who’s this guy?” her voice was sing songy and playful.
“Oh, he’s not why I’m staying.” Barbey looked around anxiously making sure nobody in the house was listening to her phone conversation. “Actually, I can’t talk about it now—though I’ll tell you everything later.”
“Oh, my gosh!” Her voice rang out suddenly.
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