I couldn’t help it. I knew I sounded as if I were either reading it off a piece of paper or reciting something I had memorized. His face looked surprised, confused, and he tilted his head just a little as I started to stroke his hand and his arm the way Tía Isabela had demonstrated.
“I like you very much, and I wish I could do something for you that would make you happy,” I added.
“Oh, you don’t have to…”
I brought his hand to my breast. My heart was pounding. Surely, he felt it, I thought. He didn’t speak. I could feel Tía Isabela behind me. I didn’t turn, but I sensed she had inched closer to watch. I closed my eyes and moved Edward’s hand over my breast.
He didn’t pull away, but he didn’t speak, and his lips stretched into a grimace of confusion. Then I brought my hand and his to my lap.
“Delia,” he said. “You don’t have to…”
I knew she was watching, waiting, so I moved his hand along with mine down my thigh. It was then that he pulled back and cried, “Stop! What are you doing? Why have you come here like this?”
I looked back at her, but she had no instructions. She just stared at us.
“I wanted to thank you,” I managed.
“Not like this. This isn’t you,” he said. “I hope it isn’t you,” he added, now sounding not quite so sure. “You didn’t…you didn’t lie to me about Bradley Whitfield, did you? Delia!” he cried when I didn’t answer. His shout made me wince.
I stood up quickly. When I looked back, Tía Isabela was no longer there.
“I’m sorry,” I told him. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too,” he said. “You’d better leave. Please.”
“I’m sorry,” I said again, and ran out, the tears streaming out of my eyes.
When I stepped into the hallway, I didn’t see Tía Isabela there, either, but standing in her doorway was Sophia, and she was smiling.
“What’s going on?” she asked. “Why are you practically naked in Edward’s room, and why are you crying?” She fumbled for the little Spanish she knew.
I shook my head and hurried into my own room, closing the door quickly. I sat on my bed, stunned and confused. Why had my aunt forced me to do this, and why had she left me there? Edward thinks I was lying about Bradley now. He has lost all respect for me.
I flicked the tears off my cheeks and tried to breathe. My chest felt as if it had turned to stone. A few minutes later, when the door was opening, I expected to see my aunt, but it was Sophia instead. She stood there smiling and looking in at me.
“What did you do to poor Edward?” she asked. “I went in to see what was happening, and he was red in the face and wouldn’t speak. You didn’t try to seduce him, did you? You know what that means?”
It was close enough to the Spanish for me to understand her question. I shook my head.
“Look how you’re dressed—or undressed, I should say.” She indicated the sheer nightgown. “You tried something,” she said, laughing. “Good for you, only I could have told you it was a waste of time. Stick with your Mexican boyfriend. You’re better off.”
She stepped back, laughed, and closed the door, leaving me trembling so much I was actually shivering. I sat there anticipating my aunt, but she never came. After a while, I crawled under the covers and buried my face in my pillow. I fell asleep without even saying my prayers.
Tía Isabela did not join me for breakfast the next morning. As usual, Sophia took her breakfast in her room, but before I left to go to school with Señor Garman, Señora Rosario told me that my aunt had left instructions for me to expect her to take me shopping after school instead of during the day Saturday. She had something else she had to do on Saturday. The way Señora Rosario said it made it sound as if my aunt was going off on a date herself, maybe for the whole weekend.
Still dazed from what had happened the night before, I went out to the Rolls and quickly got in. Señor Garman was even quieter than usual and said nothing the whole trip. He grunted a good-bye at the school, and I hurried into the building.
I knew I was behaving strangely throughout the morning. I didn’t pay attention in class, and I answered Ignacio’s questions quickly and mostly with single words. All I wanted was to go somewhere and be alone. I was feeling ashamed of myself. Ignacio was very worried about me. He kept asking me questions about what was happening at the hacienda.
“Is there more trouble? How is your cousin? Were the police there? Are they questioning you?”
He fired one question after another at me, hoping I would answer one. I just shook my head.
“You’re still coming to the fiesta, aren’t you?” he finally asked.
“Yes, I am.”
“Good. But you’re not feeling well?”
“I’m just very tired today,” I said. Assuring him that I was still going to the fiesta seemed to satisfy him.
Señorita Holt, on the other hand, did not hide how cross she was with me when I missed questions, didn’t hear things she had said, or failed to follow her instructions.
“Next week,” she warned me at the end of the day, “you had better come to class better prepared and alert. I do not like wasting my time.”
I apologized and left, not remembering until I was nearly out of the building that my aunt was coming to take me shopping. I wondered, of course, what she would say about last night in Edward’s room.
The Rolls was there when I stepped out of the building. I hurried to it, and Señor Garman opened the door. I stood there for a moment. My aunt was not in the car.
“Dónde está mi tía Isabela?”
“How should I know? She just told me where to deliver you. Someone is there at the store waiting with instructions. I have her name. I’m to deliver you to the right department at the store,” he said. “Get in.”
So my aunt wouldn’t be taking me shopping. Sophia had nothing to be jealous about after all. Rather than mi tía Isabela presenting me with loving gifts from a loving aunt, she was treating me like someone who was to be paid off for carrying out orders. It made me feel even cheaper and more ashamed of myself.
I could feel the eyes of salespeople and customers on me as Señor Garman marched me into the store and to the young women’s department. A short woman with dark brown hair greeted us and introduced herself as Mrs. Lester. She was very businesslike and had all of the garments for me to try on set aside. There were a half-dozen dresses, another half-dozen skirts and blouses, and, amazingly, the pair of shoes I needed to match the dress Sophia had given me. Apparently, the dress had been bought here and was on some record they kept at the store.
Mrs. Lester complemented everything with the proper accessories. There were three different purses and some costume jewelry, stockings, even a stylish red hat. Señor Garman stood off to the side, waiting, but he glanced my way every time I emerged from the dressing room and Mrs. Lester studied and adjusted the clothing. An assistant was called to carry the boxes and bags out to the Rolls. Señor Garman stood there gazing at it all in the trunk.
“You hit the jackpot here, Delia,” he said. It was the first time I had heard him say my name. “You must have done something to please your aunt.”
I said nothing. I was still quite shocked myself at how much I had been given. I did not see the bill, but I did see some of the price tags and estimated it was well into the thousands of dollars. Señor Garman’s remark stirred up my guilt and embarrassment again. How could I face Edward? What would I say to him, and what would he say to me?
When we arrived at the house, I carried in as much as I could, and then Señor Garman sent for Inez to carry in the rest. Her eyes bulged. She followed me up to my room, her arms full, and then went down to get what was left. I knew her brain was twisting and turning with all sorts of questions. After all, one day I was working beside her, cleaning grease off pots and pans, and almost the next day, this. She asked nothing, however. Before she left, she simply turned to me and said, “Usted es muy afortunada, Delia.”
I
looked away.
I didn’t feel very lucky. The truth was, I was so conflicted inside that my stomach twisted like a rubber band. At the moment, it seemed everything Abuela Anabela had wished for me was coming true. I had the beautiful room and now the beautiful clothing. I was being treated like a princess, taken to school in a most expensive automobile driven by a chauffeur. I did not have to do housework, and I had been accepted as a member of the family.
Perhaps there was a way for me to apologize to Edward and win back his affection and respect. I did not know how to explain what I had done without angering my aunt, of course, but another apology might help. With that in mind, I left my room and went to his. As if he were able to see through the closed door, Jesse opened it before I knocked and stepped out, closing the door behind him. I saw from the look on his face that Edward had told him everything that had happened the night before.
“I want to speak with Edward,” I said.
He shook his head. “Edward asked me to tell you to leave him be for now. He is not very happy. No está felíz.”
My lips trembled. “I am sorry for what happened,” I said.
“He is sad, Delia. He thinks he might have hurt himself for a lie.”
“No. It is not so.”
“Just leave it be for now,” he said, holding his hand up.
I wiped a tear back before it could emerge and shook my head.
Jesse grimaced. “Why did you do it? Por qué?”
I stared at him. How could I begin to explain? What could I tell him? My aunt thought he and Edward were lovers? I was there to test Edward’s sexuality? Not only would it not make things better, but it could cause an explosion in this hacienda, and in the end, everyone would hate me.
“I think we both know why you did it, Delia. Disgusting,” he said. “Disgusto.”
He turned toward the door and then turned back to hand me something before he went into Edward’s room.
It was the CD of Spanish lessons.
I started to protest, but he closed the door in my face. I stood there looking down at the floor until I heard footsteps on the stairway and turned to see Sophia. She smiled immediately and hurried to me.
“What’s that?” she asked, nodding at the disc. “A present for Edward?”
I shook my head as the tears began streaming down my cheeks, and then I fled to my room.
She followed. I had thrown myself on my bed and lay there facedown.
“What’s your problem now?” she asked. “What’s wrong?”
I didn’t answer, but I could hear her moving about. She opened some of my boxes and looked at what had been bought for me.
“Wow. And you got the shoes, too! My mother was very generous.”
I turned and looked at her sifting through the skirts and blouses.
“Some of this she recently bought for me. In fact,” she continued, inspecting everything, checking labels, “wait a minute. It’s all what she bought for me! What the hell?”
She glared angrily at me. I had no idea what would make her so angry so quickly.
“Of course, you’ll look a helluva lot better in all this than I will.”
“I do not understand,” I said.
“My mother bought you the same clothes I have,” she said. “Same, same, you know the meaning of same?”
“Yes.”
“Well, these clothes…same,” she said, pointing to herself. “She bought them in the same store. Did she take you to Mrs. Lester?”
“Mrs. Lester, yes,” I said, wiping my cheeks. “But she did not take me. Señor Garman…”
“Where the hell is my mother?” she cried. “She’s just being bitchy. I know what she’s going to say, too, if I complain. She’ll say, what am I upset about? After all, I gave you my necklace and dress.”
She stood there with her weight on one foot, her arms folded under her breasts, fuming. I still did not understand all of what was happening. She looked at me strangely, and then as quickly as her anger had filled her face, it left, and she smiled.
“It’s all right. It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about anything. I’ll fix everything. After all, we’re cousins, right? Cousins?”
“Primas, sí.”
“Yes, primas.” She smiled, and then she went over to Edward’s CD, looked at it, and turned to me. “I’ll use this and learn some Spanish. Then maybe we can get even closer, be closer, understand?”
Before I could reply, she took the CD and left my room.
Something was telling me that getting closer to Sophia was like ignoring the rattle of a rattlesnake.
I could see Señora Porres waving her finger at me.
“Foolish girl,” she was saying. “The ojo malvado lives not only in Mexico.”
The evil eye had followed me.
17
Interrupted Fiesta
“Well, guess what?” Sophia said, coming back to my room just before we were to go down to dinner.
I had showered and changed and was reading the last chapters of my ESL workbook. I had finished nearly all of the exercises and completed all of the homework Señorita Holt had assigned. I worked just to keep my mind off what was happening.
“What?”
“My mother sent word that she won’t be home for dinner and probably won’t be home until Sunday. I’m sure she’s with that Travis. He’s ten years younger than she is! It’s all right for her to act like a fool, but not us.”
“Tía Isabela no está aquí?”
“No, she’s not home. Speak English. I took the disc to learn Spanish, but you have to give me a few months.”
“What about Edward?”
“What about him?”
“Aunt Isabela is not worried?”
“He’s got his private nurse, Jesse,” she said. “What do we care? We’ll have breakfast together tomorrow, and then we’ll go out on the lounges and get some sun. Later, I’ll help you get ready for your fiesta, help you with your hair, the makeup, everything. Come on, let’s get something to eat. I’m starving. I’ll diet tomorrow or next week.”
She reached into one of my boxes and took out the red hat. I watched her put it on and adjust it in front of the mirror.
“This looks good. I don’t have one like this, come to think of it. Mind if I borrow it? Borrow? You know borrow?”
“Sí,” I said.
She kept the hat on her head and went to the door. “Come on, already,” she said, and I put my workbook aside to follow her out.
Edward’s bedroom door was still shut. How I wished I could find the words to explain why I had done what I had done so that he wouldn’t be so angry at me. Nothing bothered me as much as losing his respect.
“Don’t worry about them,” Sophia said, seeing where my gaze had gone. “They’re having a private dinner, I’m sure,” she muttered as we went by. “Good riddance.”
When we entered the dining room, she took her mother’s chair. Señora Rosario made a face when she came in from the kitchen and saw her sitting there.
“What are you growling at, Mrs. Rosario? I’m in charge when my mother’s away,” Sophia announced. “In fact, I’ve decided that we’ll have some white wine with our dinner tonight. My mother’s and my favorite is in the wine cooler. Bring us a bottle and two wineglasses.”
“Your mother did not say such a thing to me,” Señora Rosario responded. “And you know she would not like you wearing a hat at the dinner table.”
Sophia threw her a look full of darts and jumped up, went into the kitchen, and returned with a bottle of white wine and the two wineglasses. She struggled a bit getting the cork out but then smiled at me and poured us each a full glass. Señora Rosario gave me a disapproving look, but I wasn’t about to throw Sophia into one of her tantrums.
“To cousins,” Sophia said, lifting her glass and nodding for me to lift mine.
Señora Rosario returned to the kitchen.
“Come on, don’t be afraid. You’re a member of this family, not a servant,” Sophia sai
d when I hesitated. “To cousins.”
I lifted my glass, we clinked, and then we drank. I sipped mine, but she seemed to gulp hers.
“It’s good, right? Bueno?”
“Sí, bueno.”
She drank some more and poured more into her glass and into mine, even though I had drunk very little. When Inez brought out our dinner, which was a delicious chicken in some sort of lemon sauce, Sophia attacked her food as if she had not eaten for a week. Tía Isabela was always criticizing her for eating too fast. She was finished before I had eaten less than half of mine. She drank two more glasses of the wine and urged me to finish mine so she could empty the bottle.
“This is fun, isn’t it?” she asked. “With my brother and his amigo locked away, we have no one to tell us what to do and not to do.”
She glared at Señora Rosario when she came in to check on things.
“What’s for dessert?”
“There is chocolate cake,” she replied.
“I want vanilla ice cream on mine, and so does my cousin.”
Señora Rosario asked me if I did, and I told her to give me a small piece and just a little ice cream. I knew that if I didn’t eat it, too, Sophia would be upset, and the wine was making her more irritable and nasty to both Señora Rosario and Inez. It was better just to go along with everything and then go to my room, finish my schoolwork so I would have nothing to worry over during the weekend, and then go to bed. However, Sophia had other plans for us.
She finished the last drop of her wine, insisted I finish mine, and devoured the dessert almost before I had one bite of my cake swallowed.
“You want more?” she asked me. “Más?”
“No, gracias.”
She sat back to watch me eat.
“How come you’re not fat like so many of the Mexican girls I know?” she asked. Then, to answer her own question, “You were very poor in Mexico, right? Poor?” she asked, pointing to me.
I shook my head. “I was not rich, but I was not…no tenía hambre.”
“Huh? In English, I told you!”