“Angelina, look,” I say.
Angelina does not look up. She lies on the floor of the cayuco. I know her body is not dead because her chest still moves, and she still holds the broken doll tight in her fist. Nothing, not even a storm or tipping over, has made her let go of her doll.
I see the lights, but I am too weak to paddle. The waves and the wind blow from behind me and push me forward. I cannot tell how far away I am, but that does not matter. I must not give up. With weak arms, I lift the broken paddle and drop it into the water. I do not think this helps to push the cayuco very much, but hope makes me try.
For a long time, I do not think the lights come any closer. Maybe they are only a dream. But slowly the bright lights stretch farther and farther along the shore. After more time, I can see that this is a very big city. Nowhere in Guatemala are there so many lights. The lights ahead of me keep my arms moving. I do not let my mind think that this is the United States of America. These lights are only the dream of somebody who is almost dead. Yes, this is only a dream. But it is a good dream. I keep paddling, because I do not want this dream to end.
I do not know how much more time passes before the shadow of the shore appears. Now I have stopped paddling. The waves take me toward a stone wall that reaches out from shore. I try to paddle again, but my arms do not obey me. A man stands on the wall and stares at me as I float past him. I let the wind and the waves carry the cayuco forward. Everywhere there are lights. I hear music and people talking and shouting. There are the sounds of motors and horns.
Ahead, there is one building with brighter lights than the others. Many people are walking along the beach. I force my arms to move the paddle. The cayuco drifts forward. Lights shine across the water like long tangled ribbons. With a weak voice that does not sound like mine, I say, “Look, Angelina. Look at the lights.”
Angelina still does not lift her head to look.
Now people on the beach turn to look at the cayuco that floats toward them out of the dark. Some of them point. Still I try to pull at the water with the paddle. I must not stop. But each stroke feels like my last. And then the cayuco scrapes against the sand and stops. The paddle drops from my hands into the water.
I look up.
Many people have gathered. I do not understand the English that they speak, but later I am told that one man shouted very loudly, “It’s some of those stinking boat people!”
I hold out my hand. “Necesitamos ayuda,” I say in Spanish, trying to tell them that we need help.
“Get out of here!” another man shouts. “This is a private club!”
I do not need to know English to understand the anger in the man’s eyes and in the eyes of many others.
But then a tall woman pushes in front of the man. She has a kind look in her eyes. She kicks her shoes off and runs into the water to grab and hold the front of the cayuco. Now others also run into the water to help her. Together they pull the heavy cayuco up onto the sand.
Then hands reach down to help me. I cannot stand, so they must lift me. The tall woman reaches into the cayuco and lifts Angelina in her arms. The plastic doll drops onto the sand. I point, and the woman reaches down and grabs the doll. She carries Angelina and the doll up the beach.
There is much I do not remember because I am so weak, but I remember that people hold my arms. I cannot stand, and so they carry me. A van comes with bright lights that flash. It takes Angelina and me away. I do not know where we go, until they carry us into a bright room and I see nurses and doctors. In Guatemala, we do not go to hospitals because we do not have money. Nurses and doctors are for rich people.
They try to take Angelina away from me into a different room. Angelina screams with a voice that is too loud for a little four-year-old girl. They bring her back, and she holds me tight. A nurse comes to me and she speaks in Spanish. “Como te llamas?” she says, asking me my name.
“Santiago,” I say. “Santiago Cruz.”
“I am Juana,” she says, still speaking Spanish. “And what is this little girl’s name?”
“This is my sister,” I say. “Her name is Angelina. Please do not take her away from me.”
“We won’t,” Juana says. “Where is your home?”
I do not know how to answer this question. “We come from Guatemala,” I say.
“And where are your parents?”
“They are dead.”
The nurse looks at me with eyes that I do not think believe me. “Then how did you get here?”
“My sister and I, we sailed across the ocean in a cayuco.”
27
BLUE SKY
THEY TAKE ANGELINA AND ME into a room that has two tables. “Angelina,” I say. “Do not cry now. These people will help us.”
“Do not leave me!” she screams. Her cheeks are wet with tears. Fear dances in her eyes.
“I am here,” I say. “I will not leave you.”
Because she believes me, Angelina stops crying.
Beside me, a nurse works on Angelina. Always Angelina watches to make sure I do not leave. She feels much pain, but the worst suffering is in her eyes. I think this pain will take much longer to heal.
The nurses take off our ragged clothes and they wash our bodies. The nurse that knows Spanish, Juana, talks to me while she is working. “I do not understand your sister when she talks,” she says.
“We speak Kekchi,” I say. “That is why my Spanish is not very good. But Angelina understands some Spanish.”
“How did you get so many sores?”
“We have been on the ocean for twenty-three days,” I say. “Always there was sun and salt water.”
Juana tells me they must put needles with tubes into our arms. I think Angelina is going to cry again, but before they put the needle into her arm, I ask Angelina, “Where is your doll?”
Angelina points across the room to a table. When she looks back at me, the needle is already in her arm. The nurse, Juana, smiles at me.
“Will they help my doll?” Angelina asks me.
“Oh, yes,” I say. “But first they must help you.”
“If you want to help my sister,” I tell Juana quietly, “you must also help her doll.”
“I think we can do that,” Juana says. “And your parents,” she asks. “You say they are dead. How did they die?”
This is a very hard question to answer. Now I am the one who cries. “The soldiers,” I say. “They came in the middle of the night and burned my village. They killed everyone.”
“How did you escape?”
“My mother woke me up and told me the soldiers were coming. She gave me Angelina and told me to run. And so I ran. After I escaped, I looked back and could see the night sky burning red.”
Juana gives us water to drink but tells us we cannot eat tonight because maybe they will find broken bones and need to operate. She turns and tells the other nurses something in English. They all look at me and they look at Angelina. The look in their eyes is very kind. Juana asks me many more questions. I try to answer all that I can, but I am very tired. Angelina and I fall asleep before the nurses finish putting bandages on all our sores.
When I wake up, I am lying on a bed in a small room. It is dark, but light comes in through the door, and I can see Angelina beside me in the same bed. I think it is a dream that I am here and not in the cayuco, so I close my eyes and sleep again.
But it is not a dream. When I wake up in the morning, the sun shines through the window like a river of light. Angelina is awake and stares around the room with big eyes. She, too, must think that this is a dream. Both of us have bandages all over our bodies. I have a big bandage on the side of my head where the sail pole has hit me.
“Good morning, Angelina,” I say.
She looks at me. Her eyes blink. “Where are we?” she asks.
I smile. “This is the United States of America.”
She stares out the window. “I think I like the…” She stops. “Where is this again?”
“The
United States of America.”
She nods. “It is a good place.” She looks around the room. “Did you tip the cayuco over again?”
“Yes, a very big storm made the cayuco tip over.”
A nurse hears us talk and comes into the room. It is not Juana, but this nurse also speaks Spanish. “Did you sleep well?” she asks.
I can only nod.
“They tell me that you two sailed the ocean alone,” she says.
Again, I nod.
“Did you sail during the storm last night?”
“Yes,” I say. “We tipped over.”
“That was the worst tropical storm we have had in years.”
“I am glad it is over,” I say.
“Are you hungry?” she asks.
Angelina nods.
“Yes. Yes, very hungry,” I say.
“Well, then, let’s get you two something to eat.”
The nurse leaves and comes back soon with two trays. “I only want you to eat bread and pudding this morning,” she says. “Later today, you can have more.”
I do not tell the nurse that bread and pudding will be a feast for us.
“There are some men who want to talk to you after you finish eating, okay?”
“Where is my doll?” asks Angelina.
“The nurses had to work on your doll almost all night because she was hurt so bad,” the nurse says. “Juana will bring her to you soon.”
“My doll did not die, did she?” Angelina asks.
“No, your doll did not die,” says the nurse.
Angelina looks worried, but she does not cry.
We finish eating, and there are two men who come in to visit. They close the door and sit beside our beds in chairs. They speak Spanish, and they say they are from the Immigration and Naturalization Service. I do not know what that is, but I think they are from the government, and this makes me scared, because in my country we are always afraid of the government.
The men are not angry, I do not think. But they do not smile when they ask me questions. When I talk, they write many things on paper. Because they keep asking me about my family, I do not know if they believe me. I do not think they believe that we sailed here. “I will show you the cayuco,” I say.
“We have already seen your cayuco,” one of the men says. “Where did you learn to sail?”
“I do not know how to sail very much,” I say. “My uncle Ramos, he taught me a little, and so did his neighbor, Enrique. Also, the ocean has taught me much. But I do not know all of the names of every part of a boat. I do not know how to read a map or tell you where I am with the stars. No, I am not a sailor.”
The man studies me and finally he smiles. “If you sailed from Guatemala in that little canoe, you are one hell of a sailor. And you are either very foolish or very brave.”
“I was very scared,” I say.
When the men finish, they do not tell me why we have talked or what they are thinking. “We will talk more tomorrow,” they say.
When they open the door to leave, there are many more people outside the door. A nurse comes in and tells me the people work for radio and television stations. They want to talk to me about my trip.
I do not care if we talk, but I do not understand why they want to talk to me.
These people also speak to me in Spanish, and again I answer many questions. Angelina is afraid, so she crawls over and sits on my lap. I think everyone likes Angelina, because many times the questions stop and people watch her. They laugh and take pictures of her.
I tell the group the words that Uncle Ramos told me the night he died. “‘Go as far away as you can and tell what has happened this night,’” I say. “That is what he told me. I will never forget those words.”
And so I tell everything that has happened. Again I cry when I tell about my family dying and about Uncle Ramos and about Carlos with his legs cut off and about the red sky at night. I think I will always cry when I think about those things. I also tell about the white butterflies, the mud in the gas tank, and the pigs in the cayuco. Everyone laughs. I finish by telling about the pirates and the fishhook and the storm. And I tell them about our game, staying alive.
“Tell them about the river of garbage where you found my doll,” Angelina tells me.
And so I tell about the river of garbage and about Angelina’s broken doll.
“Where is the doll now?” one of the women asks.
Before I can speak, a nurse that is in the room says, “The doll was broken and had a missing arm and was hurt very badly. So we had to work all night to fix her. But I think she is better now.” The nurse looks at Angelina. “Do you want to see your doll now?”
Angelina nods very hard.
The nurse Juana walks into the room holding something behind her back. “Close your eyes and hold out your hands,” she tells Angelina.
Angelina closes her eyes and puts out her short bandaged arms. I think she is peeking when a brand-new doll is placed in her arms. The doll has long black hair and a new red dress and dark skin as smooth as glass. On the right arm there is a white bandage.
Angelina can only stare. I think there is a light inside her head because her eyes shine so bright. I know she has never seen anything so beautiful. The group claps, and they take many more pictures with their cameras. Angelina hugs the doll. She smiles, and big silent tears fill her eyes. When I see her tears, I think that with time maybe she will be all right.
Before the group leaves, one man tells me we will be on the television tonight. “Is there anything else you wish to say?” he asks.
The group waits for my next words, but I am finished. I shake my head slowly. I can speak no more. Tears have filled my eyes, and the hurt of my memories squeezes my throat like a strong hand.
After the group leaves, later in the afternoon, the nurses change our bandages, and we eat again. This time they let us eat some bread and hot chicken soup. Angelina eats the bread with both hands. I think she will hurt herself if she tries to put any more into her mouth without swallowing. I do not think they will ever bring enough food to fill our stomachs. Later we ask for food again, and we eat. They bring us more soup, tortillas, and tamales.
After the evening meal, Juana turns on the television. I have seen televisions before when I traveled with my father to Lake Izabal. But Angelina has not, and she stares at the moving picture with big silent eyes. Tonight I cannot believe what I see: pictures of the cayuco sitting on a beach and pictures of Angelina and me in the hospital room. I do not understand the English, but Juana tells me everything that is being said. She says that they are telling our story.
Other nurses and a doctor stop in the room to watch what we are seeing. Angelina keeps staring at the television like it is magic. Every time the camera shows her, she claps and screams, “Look at me! Look at me!”
We smile.
After the television is finished showing pictures of us, the doctor and the nurses leave. Juana is busy, so she, too, must leave. But she returns after it is dark and talks with me. We talk very late, long after Angelina falls asleep. I tell Juana about Enrique and Silvia. “Without their help, I do not think we would be alive today,” I say. “I wish somehow they could know that we did not die.”
Juana is a very nice lady. She reminds me of my mother. I think that I can trust her, so I ask her something very important. “Will your government send Angelina and me back to Guatemala because we do not have our papers?” I ask.
Juana shakes her head and smiles. “After what has happened to you and all the stories about you that ran tonight on the television, you will never have to go back to Guatemala until you want to.”
“Someday, I want to go back,” I say. “But I do not want to go back until the soldiers stop killing mothers and fathers and children.”
“Someday, that time will come,” Juana says. “And I think that time will come sooner because of your courage. Until then, the United States will be your new home. It will be hard, because there are many things new and
different here. You and Angelina will need to learn English, but you are young and you will learn.”
“Thank you for being our friend,” I say.
Juana’s smile is very kind. Even with Angelina asleep, she says, “Good night, Santiago and Angelina Cruz. Welcome to America. Now, if I don’t get back to work, they’ll think I went home.” Quietly she turns and leaves.
After she leaves, I lie awake and look up into the black night. For a long time, I am afraid to close my eyes. I wish that Juana was still here talking to me, because I know that when I fall asleep, my dreams will bring back the screams and the guns and the fire. Even now I can see the red skies again. These are things that can never be forgotten.
But finally I do let my eyes close because I am tired. I know that the night will be long—this, I cannot change. But I also know that when the morning comes, the red will disappear and the sun will shine and the sky will be blue again. Maybe someday that is how it will always be. Skies should always be blue.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
MANY ACCOUNTS have documented the tragic military massacres in Central America during the 1980s. In Guatemala alone, more than 450 villages were torched, and tens of thousands of people were tortured and killed. Men were killed first, then women, and lastly the children. Because of this, many children witnessed the atrocities, and some escaped to tell of them. Today a generation of children still carries these memories like scars.
Many Americans dismiss these events simply as tragic. But we, too, share much blame. Our government did, in fact, provide training and weapons to those soldiers who attacked the Guatemalan villages during those nights when the sky glowed red.
Fighting communism was the excuse given by our military leaders to defend these massacres during congressional hearings. But the fact will always remain that most of those killed had never heard of communism and surely were not armed by communists. Most went to their graves armed with only machetes, sticks, and the will to protect their families and homes. This is the will that exists in each of us when all that we know and love is taken away.