Ignacio introduced me to his father.
“Welcome,” he told me, and asked me the name of my village. He said he knew it and had even been there once when he was a young boy traveling with his father. He said he thought we had one of the prettiest and best-kept squares he had seen. Talking about it brought tears to my eyes.
As we headed toward Ignacio’s mother and the other women, he whispered, “Don’t forget, when I introduce you to my grandmother, if she asks you what is your spiritual double…”
“I remember. A margay.”
“Sí,” he said, smiling.
Like any mother, whether Mexican or not, I’m sure, Ignacio’s mother was very interested in the girl who interested her son. Her gaze on me was intense. She was a pretty woman with brown eyes that had specks of green in them. Ignacio had told her why I had come to America, so she was very sympathetic, but underlying that sympathy was a stream of concern. I was, in her eyes, a young woman without family just when I needed guidance the most. Would I go astray? Had I already?
We talked a little about how I was adjusting to life here, and then she had to tend to the fiesta.
It was then that Ignacio introduced me to his grandmother, who reminded me of Señora Porres, because her eyes, eyes that had surely seen so many sad and tragic things, were filled with trepidation. It was as if she saw ghosts hovering in every corner. Since I was the only real stranger, she looked for signs of trouble in me and finally did ask what animal shared my fate. I glanced at Ignacio and told her the margay. It seemed to relieve her a little, but I could feel her eyes following me constantly.
We went to a table Ignacio said was reserved for us and his friends, who were not there yet. Every table already had traditional garnishes at the center. They included red and green salsas, a mixture of chopped onions and cilantro, and lime wedges. There were juices made from mangos and tangerines. Ignacio gave me a glass of the traditional horchata, a milky rice drink flavored with cinnamon.
Ignacio’s sister Rosalind had ten of her friends at her long table. All of them were dressed in traditional costumes. Ignacio’s mother had prepared a kids’ sangria for them consisting of cranberry juice, oranges and lemons mixed with 7UP. His uncle Thomas, a tall, thin man who could easily be a circus clown, organized their games and had them play Benito Juarez, which was a form of Simon Says, and then had them pin the tail on the burro. He did a great job of entertaining them.
Toward evening, the adults did most of the dancing. I offered to help with the food, but Ignacio’s mother told me they were fine, and I should just enjoy the party with him and his other friends, who had finally arrived. Three of them were boys his age who spoke English well enough to be mainstreamed in classes at our school: Luis, Manuel, and the shortest but hardest-looking one, Vicente. Despite Ignacio’s warning them that his father would be displeased, they managed to get some tequila and mix it into the sodas.
As with our fiestas back in Mexico, all of the women who attended brought something wonderful to eat. There were foods I had never had, such as a grilled jalapeño-flavored masa cake filled with queso añejo, an aged, salty, cow’s milk cheese, and sierra fish marinated with avocados, onions, cilantro, and lime juice. Abuela Anabela often made the shredded chicken stewed with onions, garlic, chiles, and fermented maguey cactus juice, as well as the tequila carnitas, a meaty stew made with pork confit cooked with chiles, onions, tequila, and beer. There were, of course, fresh tortillas in the clay gourds.
The food, the music, the games, and the dancing went on and on. Despite how I was dressed and how I felt, I was enjoying the company, the conversations all in Spanish, the sight of the excited children around the piñata, and the wonderful air of family love and comradery that filled the fiesta. I was truly, if only for a few hours, back home.
My only concern was how much tequila Ignacio’s friends from school were consuming. They were all showing off, I thought, and Ignacio was getting more and more annoyed. His father was shooting chastizing glances our way, too.
And then, right before the children were to start beating the piñata, I was shocked to see my cousin Sophia and three of her girlfriends come strutting into the fiesta. She went directly to Ignacio and introduced herself and her friends, Trudy, Delores, and Alisha. They all looked as if they were dressed for a rock concert, with dark makeup and lipstick, leather pants, and armfuls of silver bracelets. Trudy had a ring in her nose.
“We just dropped by to check on my cousin,” she said loudly enough for anyone to hear. “My mother is very worried that she is all right.”
“Of course,” Ignacio said, not knowing what else to say or do. “You are all welcome.”
“Looks like a great party,” Sophia said. Her girlfriends smiled at Ignacio’s friends.
“Would you like something to eat?”
“Anything to drink?” Sophia asked. She sauntered over to our table and seized one of the boy’s glasses. He laughed when she sipped from it and widened her eyes.
I could feel Ignacio’s father’s eyes on us.
“Why did you come here?” I asked her.
“We’re really worried about you, Delia,” she said, swinging her eyes toward Ignacio. “You know, she’s been through hell. I heard how you protected her, but we can’t help but worry.”
“She’s safe here,” he said firmly.
“We’re so grateful for that,” Sophia told him. She stepped very close to him. His friends were all smiling licentiously. This and the tequila they had drunk made them laugh at everything Sophia said and did. Soon they were all around her and her friends. She directed herself more toward Ignacio’s friends, who spoke and understood English better.
“You know what happened to my cousin, right?” she asked them.
They all shook their heads.
“Sophia,” I said. “No más.”
“Oh, stop. She’s afraid because she’s not yet a legal citizen, but I don’t think it’s right that she was raped and no one will do anything about it,” she added without hesitation.
Ignacio looked at me sharply. “What does she say? You never said this,” he told me.
“Sophia, please, no.”
“She’s so ashamed. Imagine if it happened to your sisters,” she told them.
“Who did this to her?” Ignacio’s friend Vicente asked her, and she told them.
“He brags about how he got away with it. Ignacio saved her from even more damage,” she added.
They turned to him and asked him in Spanish if he had known. He shook his head and looked at me with some annoyance now.
“She never told me that,” he said.
“She’s just too embarrassed,” Sophia continued.
“Where is this Bradley Whitfield?” Vicente asked her.
“Oh, I know exactly where he is right this moment, in fact,” she told him. “He’s going to abuse another young, innocent girl. She might be Mexican, too. I’m not sure.”
They looked at Ignacio.
“You going to let Delia be dishonored this way?” Luis asked him.
Ignacio looked toward his father and then at me and his friends.
“No,” he said.
Sophia smiled. “Well, finally,” she said, “someone who really cares. C’mon. He’s not far. He’s having a private party in the very house in which he raped Delia. Let’s go there and surprise him.”
I shook my head at Ignacio.
“Let’s go,” Vicente said. “Time for some justice, Mexican-style.”
Ignacio hesitated.
“You should be the one telling us to go,” Manuel said.
“Sí, what’s wrong with your courage?” Vicente asked him, and Ignacio reddened.
“I am not afraid. I nearly beat him once before.”
“And now there is even more reason,” Luis said. They all agreed.
Sophia beamed.
“Wait,” Ignacio said. He pulled away from my hand and crossed to the table where his mother and some of her friends were sitting. “We
’ll be right back,” I heard him tell her. “We have a little errand to do.”
“What errand?” she asked.
“Just an errand,” he said.
She looked at me and then at her mother, who was nodding as if she had heard someone whisper in her ear, telling her something she had known her whole life.
Ignacio and his friends followed Sophia and her girlfriends out of the yard and around the side of the house. I ran after them all, hoping to turn them back. Sophia’s friends stopped me and told me to get into their car.
“Ignacio!” I shouted, but he was already in his friend’s car. They shot away from the curb.
“Well, all right,” Sophia said, exploding with excitement. “Finally, some real action.”
So, this was why she had insisted on knowing where the fiesta was being held. She had planned this all along, I thought, every part of it.
Everything was happening so quickly. I felt helpless.
Moments later, the caravan of vigilantes was heading into the night.
18
Scene of the Crime
Seeing the house in which Bradley had forced himself on me immediately made me cringe. All the way over, Sophia and her girlfriends were giggling and talking excitedly about what they anticipated happening. It was as if they were going to a show. This was to be their entertainment. Sophia’s girlfriends congratulated her on how well she had orchestrated it all and how clever she had been to get the Mexican boys angry enough to do something so quickly.
I sat there listening to them and to Sophia bragging about how easy it was to get Ignacio and his friends riled. I realized exactly how Sophia had manipulated me, too. Her gifts, her acts of kindness, and her feigned concern for my welfare were all part of her plan, and here I had thought we were finally becoming close, becoming good friends, if not like sisters. I could almost hear Señora Porres telling my grandmother, “Solamente hay amigos fieles: la esposa vieja, el perro, y el dinero.” There are only three true friends: an old wife, a dog, and money. She would turn to me and say, “Believe in nothing else. Trust nothing else.”
She would say, if she were sitting beside me now, “See? Am I not right?”
Someday I might be someone’s old wife, but right now, I had no dog, and I had no money. I had no true friends. She was right.
The house was dark except for one dimly lit window, the light flickering. The girls pulled their car up right behind Ignacio and his friends’ car. Sophia turned to her girlfriends and me and told us the light inside the house came from a candle or two.
“Jana Lawler is in there with him,” her girlfriend Trudy said. “He barely takes a breath between victims.”
“Is she Mexican?” I asked, remembering she had said that at the fiesta.
“No,” Sophia said, smirking. “Hardly.”
“But you told Ignacio…”
“Figures Jana would fall for his line,” Sophia continued, ignoring me. “He’s like a spider luring you into his web with all his romantic gimmicks. Candlelight, some wine, some soft music, and all his phony promises. Jana is the perfect little fly.”
“You should know,” Alisha said.
“Ha ha. Thanks.”
“Hey, don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it, I say,” Delores quipped, and they laughed.
Although Sophia had intended to make Bradley seem deceitful and disgusting, her girlfriends talked and looked at the house with fascination. The way they were acting, I thought each really wished she were the one who had been invited into what Sophia described as Bradley’s web.
The second Ignacio and his friends stepped out of their car, Sophia leaned out of the window.
“Go around the back. That door is unlocked,” she told them in a loud whisper. They started for it.
“This is not good,” I said.
Sophia spun around to face me. “What are you talking about, not good? You were raped, stupid, or is it stupido?”
She laughed, and the others joined her.
“My cousin Delia is very religious. She believes in forgiveness,” Sophia said. “She knows nothing about birth control, either. I’m trying to teach her.”
“Did Bradley use anything with her?” Delores asked.
“She doesn’t like talking about it, but I doubt it,” Sophia told them. “He depended on me for that sort of thing. She’s so…naive.”
They all looked at me as if I were from another planet, and then their attention returned quickly to the house and the boys.
Ignacio and his friends moved up the driveway and around the side of the house like shadows cut loose in the moonlight, hovering close together, a monster with four heads.
“Bradley is about to get the shock of his life,” Sophia said. “I hope they rearrange his face.”
No one spoke. Suddenly, Trudy realized the seriousness of what was about to occur.
“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. That short Mexican boy looked like he could kill someone, Sophia,” she said.
Sophia looked at her and then at the house.
“Trudy’s right, Sophia. These Mexican boys carry switchblades and stuff. Maybe we should follow them in and make sure they don’t go too far,” said Delores, who was sitting next to me.
“I’m not going in there,” Sophia said. “Don’t be stupid. That would be exactly the wrong thing for us to do.”
“Why?” Delores asked.
“Why? Right now, we can’t be blamed for anything that happens. We’ll say we followed them because we were afraid they might do something, understand? But we became afraid and stopped following them.”
No one spoke.
A part of me wanted me to get out and run up to the house, shouting warnings and screaming at Ignacio to stop before he got himself and his friends into big trouble, but I was too frightened to move.
“Bradley’s father is a pretty important man around here,” Delores said. Her words hung in the air like a threat.
“We haven’t done anything,” Sophia reminded them. “We can’t make boys that age do what we want, can we, especially Mexican boys? Maybe they’re all illegal or something, too. You going to get between them and their revenge?”
“Yes, but what if there really was no need for revenge?” Alisha asked her.
“What do you mean?”
“Except for your brother, you, and your mother, no one knows what Bradley supposedly did to her,” Alisha said. “And your mother didn’t go to the police.”
“So?”
“Why wouldn’t she?”
“Ask her when you get the chance,” Sophia said.
“Are you absolutely sure that Bradley raped her? You said she won’t talk about it.”
They all looked at me.
“Go on, tell them what he did to you, Delia. You can’t be bashful anymore. It’s too late. Talk.”
I shook my head.
“Alisha’s right, Sophia. What if she is lying?” Trudy asked.
“Shut up, Trudy. You’re just making everyone crazy.”
“Did your mother take her to a doctor, at least?” Delores asked. “And have her examined? They can tell if you’ve been raped.”
“No. I told you my mother didn’t do and isn’t doing anything about it. That’s why Edward got so angry and why we’re here. Which reminds me…what about my brother? Forget about Delia for a moment. What about what happened to him? He lost an eye, Delores, and you know who’s responsible. What if that happened to your brother, huh?”
“All right, all right. We’re just asking, Sophia. Don’t burst a blood vessel.”
“Then shut up,” Sophia said. She glared at me. “You could at least speak up for yourself, Delia.”
“I do not want Ignacio to get into trouble,” I said. “It is not right.”
No one spoke. We all looked at the house and waited. Suddenly, we heard the sound of something being smashed against a wall. I flinched, and so did Delores.
“What was that?” she muttered.
There was shouting
and a girl’s scream. The shouting got louder, and there were more loud bangs. Moments later, we were all stunned to see Bradley Whitfield come flying through the front window naked. He hit the floor of the front deck of the house, shards of glass raining down after him. All was quiet a moment. Then came another shrill scream.
“Let’s get the hell out of here!” Delores cried.
Trudy started the car.
“Wow,” Sophia said. “I can’t believe it. Did you see that?”
Trudy shot away from the curb and sped down the street, nearly missing the turn. The wheels screamed, and we were all thrown to one side.
“Slow down!” Delores shouted.
Trudy did, and then we made another turn and headed into the busier street.
“I’m freaking out,” Trudy said. “He came through the window! Right through the window. Did you see how it shattered, too?”
“I didn’t see him get up,” Delores said. “I looked back after we pulled away, but I didn’t see him.”
“Forget about it,” Sophia said excitedly. “Remember, we didn’t see anything. We followed the Mexican boys for a while and then lost them because we got frightened and they drove too fast. We never saw anything, because we weren’t there, got it?”
“What about your cousin?” Delores asked, nodding at me.
Sophia turned to me and leaned over the front seat. “You understand, Delia? You don’t say anything about this. Silencio or whatever,” she said, gesturing to show her lips being zipped shut. “You weren’t here.”
“Jeez, don’t you know how to say anything in Spanish?” Alisha said, and turned to me. “No diga nada, Delia, entiende?”
“You’re such a big shot, Alisha,” Sophia said. “Honor student.”
“Delia, entiende?”
I looked away. I didn’t need the translation.
“She understands,” Alisha said.
“I don’t have to speak Spanish to make sure she does. Don’t worry,” Sophia said. “Let’s go to the Roadhouse. This has all made me hungry. I need a brownie sundae right away.”
“Really?” Trudy asked her.
“Yes, just go, go,” Sophia said.