He pointed at the flowers on the ledge and smiled at her.
Lizzie looked and looked at the man’s face again and again. She stared at him for a long time. I know this man, she thought. Where—where have I seen him? She trembled as she remembered a dream she had had before coming to El Paso. She remembered a face she had never seen, the face of a man, still young, a dark face with dark eyes and a look of ceaseless wonder, a look that was easy to read as a child’s. And then she smiled.
Diego looked at her strangely. He shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t feel like running anymore. This woman’s face kept him frozen in place. He was not afraid in her presence, something about her was as calm as the late September air. He wanted to ask her what had happened to her hair, why she would not say anything, why she kept staring into his face, and why she was suddenly smiling. He looked down at his clothes to see if there was something on him. As he was staring at his shirt, he felt the woman’s warm hand under his chin. She lifted it.
“Diego,” she said.
He took out his pad and wrote. “How did you know my name? I don’t know you.”
“It came to me in a dream,” she laughed. “Do you believe in dreams?”
Her lips were as easy to read as Luz’s. “I have had too many dreams,” he wrote.
She took him by the hand, “And will have many more,” she said as she took him inside.
He looked back at the flowers.
“Leave them,” she said. “We’ll come back for them later.”
When they stepped inside the house, Diego was overwhelmed at the size of it. He was suddenly afraid again. He knew this woman would be taking him to his sister. He stared back at the door. Why did this woman have this power, why was he letting her lead him? It was not too late—he could still run. He thought of his mother. He thought she would think him a coward—she who had been so brave. “Today is not a good day for running,” he thought, “not a good day for raging at the past.” He stared at this young woman with the old hair, not knowing what to do, what to feel, not wanting to run, not really wanting to do anything but be led by her. Diego saw her standing at the bottom of the stairs. She was yelling. He could not make out what she was shouting.
And then he saw Maria Elena coming down the stairs. In ten years she had changed very little. Her hair was still long and black, she was still small and thin. She wore a look that was at once warm and arrogant, a look he knew, a look he remembered. She stared at him from the top of the stairs. The white-haired woman held out her hand to her. “Come,” she said. Diego could see her repeat the word. “Come.” When she reached the bottom of stairs, she looked at Diego and began to tremble. Maria Elena placed her hands in front of her and signed: “Forgive me.” She signed it again and again, signed it frantically as if she would not, could not stop until she received an answer. Diego walked closer and closer to her. He had even forgotten that she had learned to sign just to talk to him. In his anger, he had forgotten all the good things about his older sister. He took her hands and held them in his, though he could no longer see them. His eyes were full of a blinding water. They had been dry through Mundo’s funeral, but now they were a river and he felt himself lost in it. He felt her arms tight around his neck. He felt her sobs in his body, sobs that were as good as any word he had ever desired to hear.
16
LUZ WOKE AT SUNRISE. She walked down the stairs of the quiet house. It had been built as a place to dress up in, but now it looked more tike a house to take off your shoes and walk barefoot. Maria Elena’s tastes were simple—it was not a lady’s house. Luz nodded approvingly as she stood in the kitchen. She put on a pot of coffee and wrote out a list of things to be done for the evening dinner. She had promised to make the best meal any of them had ever eaten—and she intended to keep her promise. She opened cabinets and took out every pot and pan she thought she might use. She looked over the spices and found there was nothing missing—everything she’d need was there: cinammon, dried chipotle, chile pasado, cominos, fresh garlic, oregano—even fresh cilantro. She smiled. Good spices in a kitchen brought good luck.
She sat down at the table and looked over her list, the taste of the fresh coffee hot and bitter in her mouth. Luz would send Jake to pick up two pounds of masa at the tortilleria. She had not made fresh corn tortillas a mano for a long time, but now that she was going to the trouble, she wanted the masa to be as fresh as possible. She had spent the previous two days making a big batch of mole for her enchiladas, and had taught Lizzie and Maria Elena how to make flan. “Mexican vanilla,” she’d said firmly. “That’s the secret—no other kind will do.”
As she sipped her coffee, she let out a laugh. She was pleased with herself. “I’ll make my tortilla soup,” she thought. She laughed again. She looked around the kitchen. “Esta casa, no lo creo.”
“Are you talking to yourself or to God?”
Luz looked up at Lizzie and laughed.
“It’s too early to talk to God—he’s still asleep.”
“You should tell that to Maria Elena—she’s already gone to morning Mass.”
“Well, she’s pregnant—women do crazy things when they’re pregnant.”
“I do crazy things without being pregnant.”
“Oh, then you will be very fun when you get big.”
Lizzie laughed. “I don’t know if I ever want to be a mother.”
“Ahhh,” Luz nodded. “Well, it’s good to be a mother—but there’s enough of us already. And my sons, well, they threw me away. Maybe it’s better you do something else. Only, don’t ever get married. It’s better to be a mother than to be a wife.” Her arms waved in the air. Her palm hit the table emphatically as she said the word wife.
“What about lovers, then?” Lizzie asked.
“Lovers? Lovers are very good. Yes, take lovers.” She moved away from the table as she spoke and poured Lizzie a cup of coffee. She placed it in front of her.
“I take sugar,” she said.
“That’s bad, Lizzie—drink it like God meant.”
Lizzie smiled and took a drink from the cup. She nodded. “Did you have many lovers?”
“Not many. Enough.”
“Enough?”
“Enough to know a lover is better than a husband. I had a husband, too, you know. He loved the bottle more than he loved me—and I was a fool because I loved him more than God. And my sons, they treated me like I worked for them.”
“What happened to him—your husband?”
“They found him dead in the street. Trago, Lizzie, le gustaba tragar. Somebody stabbed him, but really it was the liquor.”
“I’m sorry,” Lizzie said.
“Oh don’t be sorry—he had it coming. He was a thief. He finally stole from the wrong person and got caught. Sea por Dios.” She crossed herself. “You die like you live.”
“Yes,” Lizzie said, “Yes. That’s true.” She understood clearly why Diego refused to abandon this woman when he moved into the house. The house was happier for her presence. Luz had immediately taken to enjoying her arguments with Eddie and Jake, and so far she had never lost one, and neither of the two brothers seemed to mind at all, Maria Elena had whispered that “the boys” had fallen in love with Luz because she reminded them of Esperanza—though Esperanza had been less pushy. She looked into Luz’s face. “Would you like some help cooking tonight’s dinner?”
Luz nodded. “But only you. Too many cooks in the kitchen—how do you say that gringo dicho?”
“Too many cooks spoil the broth.”
“Yes—that one. Just you and me.”
Lizzie laughed. She remembered having seen this woman in her dream; she had looked tired there. Now, she did not look so tired. She watched her as she walked over to the sink and began washing out the pots she had taken from the cabinets. She left the smell of lilac where she had been sitting. Lilac and cinammon.
Diego sat at the head of the table as Luz brought in the last of the food she had spent the day cooking. The table was crowded
with the colors of Luz’s food, and the flowers Lizzie had brought in from the backyard. Luz had bought a new satin dress for the occasion, the deep green of the smooth fabric shining in the light of the candles that flickered at the table. The whole room smelled of spices and candles and chile.
“I’m so hungry,” he signed to Maria Elena, who sat at his right.
She placed her hand on his cheek. “Me, too,” she signed back, “the food looks incredible.”
Diego tried not to stare at her, but he could not keep his eyes off of her. Maria Elena’s skin looked as soft as the cotton dress she was wearing. She was lovelier now than she had been as a girl. Wrinkles were beginning to appear on her face—they gave her depth. He noticed Eddie taking her hand. “He holds it like a treasure,” Diego thought. He decided that something about Eddie would always make him look like a boy—a boy whose heart was clear. Diego remembered the first time Eddie had shook his hand, and how strong and warm it was. He had hugged him, then kissed him on the forehead. That act had made Diego laugh. Eddie had laughed, too. He was a sincere man. It was easy to be around them, and he enjoyed watching the two of them exchange words.
As the soup was served, Diego warmed his hands over the steaming bowl. He squeezed a lime into the soup, then added cheese and cilantro. When he tasted it, he clapped his hands. He finished the soup slowly, each spoonful as good a thing as he ever put in his mouth—the taste of corn tortillas, the onions, the tomatoes, the garlic, the chicken overwhelming his hungry mouth. He noticed Jake and Lizzie, how they seemed to be so close—and yet not lovers. Jake used his hands a lot when he talked and Lizzie liked tugging at her earrings. She listened carefully. He thought they were very beautiful, and he caught himself wondering how many men had fallen in love with her. Maria Elena told him Lizzie’s hair had turned white with terror and grief, but it was slowly turning back to its color.
He didn’t feel like joining any of the conversations. He just wanted to sit and eat—and watch. He wanted to see the candlelight in the eyes of the people around him. Everything felt soft and dreamy and the thought occurred to him that nothing in the room was real. He shut his eyes and prayed everything would be the same when he opened them. Let this be real. When he opened his eyes again, Nena asked him what he was doing.
He shrugged.
“Do you feel OK, amor?” she asked.
Diego nodded and wrapped his hand around her arm. He continued watching the people at the table. He thought of his suicide note and how he would never work on it again, how it was something in his past. He thought of the coffin he had found in the mountains of Juárez and how he now knew what it meant. The future was death. He had seen the future in those bones, the unavoidable fact of the body, the human body that would inevitably return to the earth. He saw himself staring at the bones. There was so little time. But little as it was, it was time for living, time for belonging, time for falling out of love with his own exile. Luz and Eddie began arguing about something; she shook her finger at him. Eddie laughed and told her to behave. Already they were old friends. He could tell Luz liked him. She was happy in her green dress, proud of the dinner she had made, her labor. Luz looked young tonight. When they had all finished the soup, Jake picked up the bowls. He said something and everyone laughed, but Diego could not see his lips which were, even in the best of circumstances, difficult to read.
Maria Elena signed to him. “He said he was good at picking up plates—he used to be a waiter.”
“Me, too,” Diego signed. “I hated it. Luz helped me quit—and Mundo.”
When Jake walked back into the room, he opened up a bottle of red wine and poured Diego’s glass first. When he had finished going around the table, he raised his glass.
“To brothers and sisters,” Eddie said. His lips so easy to read.
“To brothers and sisters,” everyone repeated, their lips moving in unison. Diego felt something shoot through his body. When he saw Mary at the morgue, something had shot through him like hot water being injected into his veins. When Luz had left, when Mundo had been killed, he had felt this rush of heat in his body. Now, his blood was feeling something again. Only this time, he did not feel bad. He had never known this kind of warmth before. His deafness did not feel heavy tonight. Perhaps it would never feel heavy again. He smiled, raised his glass letting it tap against all the glasses in the room. For one long second, he thought he saw Mary and Mundo sitting at the table with them. He looked into all the eyes, smiled at all the faces. He drank.
17
IN THE LARGEST CEMETERY in Juárez, people were gathering at the gates. The vendors’ carts were loaded down with cempa-súchil, candied skeletons made of pure white sugar, and copal for burning on the graves and invoking the gods. It was a good day for buying flowers, a good day for burning incense. The November sky was clear and warm, the cloud of pollution blown away by a cool wind that had come in the night as fast and as sudden as the sword of St. Michael had come down on the devil. A circle of people hiding behind skull masks danced around a grave. A child licked a candied coffin as she watched the feet of the dancers.
Diego, Luz, and Maria Elena had risen early to visit the graves of their dead at Concordia Cemetery. Diego carried a hoe and a rake to clean the gravesites. Together, they went from grave to grave, from Mary’s to Mundo’s to Rose’s. Diego raked the trash around each gravesite, intent and deliberate in his task. When Diego had finished raking, he pointed at a wall that encircled some nearby graves. “Chinese,” he wrote on his pad and handed it to his sister. “Even in death,” Maria Elena thought, “even in death, they separate them.” She looked around the cemetery and noticed all the walled-in sections. Walls and walls and walls. She laughed. She remembered what Luz had told Lizzie: “We die like we live.”
After the work of cleaning, they placed flowers on the graves and knelt in respect for the dead. Luz prayed fervently for their souls. Maria Elena simply thanked her God for their lives. Diego tried to empty his heart of the anger he still felt at losing them. Today, he would not blame. Maria Elena smiled at the thought that went through her head: “I am in love with my rituals, in love with the people who created them, the people who handed them to me.” No one attempted to speak. No one wept. They had not come here to mourn.
The house was empty for the afternoon. Everyone—Maria Elena, Diego, Jake, Eddie, Luz, and the baby—everyone had gone to the park because an autumn cool front had come in and the weather was perfect, the heat banished at last. “I’m not feeling well,” Lizzie had told Maria Elena, though she had never felt better in her life. It was a small lie, she said to herself, everyone’s entitled to a few small lies. When the residents of the house left, she walked slowly to her room, locked her door, looked out the window, and leapt out of her body as if she were a hungry leopard about to pounce on its prey. She felt as graceful as any animal, as any dancer, as graceful as her mother on her deathbed, graceful as Jake’s heron in flight.
She traveled to Juárez to watch the people buy flowers for their dead. Hundreds and hundreds of people buying hundreds of bouquets of cempasúchil, the orange flowers as bright as summer desert sunsets. The burning copal filled her with something that almost resembled faith. She remembered the first time she’d smelled that incense—in a dream—in a dream she had once had, a dream where she had not had a body. She laughed into the air, and it did not matter that there was no sound. It was a laugh, a laugh that made her feel as bright as the flowers the people were bringing for their dead. The next time I come here, it will be on foot. She crossed back over the border—slowly, slowly—wanting to remember every single sight of the early November day. She found herself in front of her favorite tree—a tree where sparrows gathered for some unknown reason, hundreds and hundreds of them, sparrows who, having gathered, did nothing other than sing. They sing and sing, out of joy or sorrow, the reason not mattering since the beauty of the song was the same. There is so much to sing about, Lizzie thought. She entered the tree, the singing of the sparrows all arou
nd her. It was the music of the desert, she thought, a music she would miss. Lizzie had found this place when she had arrived, and it had given her comfort to be around the language of these birds. It had never mattered to her that she understood very little of what the birds were singing. The hearing of the song had been enough. She would miss coming here. In the distance she could see the statue of Mount Cristo Rey. Maria Elena had said it was a place of miracles, and so it was. She followed the path of the river for a while until she came to the place where some workers were at the beginning stages of building a stone wall. She stared at the working bodies of the men as they labored on the wall. She wondered why they were allowing themselves to be used like this, but she knew the answer. They needed to eat, needed to eat because their bodies demanded it of them. For the longest time Lizzie had not known whether she wanted to have a body or not. But now, a body was all she wanted. Her mother had been right: her body was her friend.
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