I nodded, and we settled into our own quiet thoughts until we reached the street on which the Davilas lived. Just being here where Ignacio once lived helped me to feel better. I saw his younger brother, Santos, out in the front yard trimming some bushes. He had grown quickly since Ignacio’s leaving and had the same broad shoulders. From the rear, he looked so much like Ignacio my heart actually skipped a beat. What if he turned around and it was Ignacio?
He did, and of course it wasn’t. His brother looked more like their mother than Ignacio did. He had his mother’s eyes and softer features. When he saw it was I who was going to get out of the car, he smirked with displeasure. Even though Santos looked more like his mother, his father had the greater influence on him.
“Gracias, Señor Casto,” I said.
“I will be back in an hour’s time,” he told me, and drove off.
I walked slowly to the gate. Santos returned to his bush trimming as if I weren’t even there.
“Buenos días, Santos,” I said anyway. He nodded and grunted a response, but he did not look at me. I imagined he was afraid of being too friendly because it would upset his father.
Ignacio’s mother greeted me at the door and smiled. It would be the only smile for me in that house for now, I thought. His father was sitting in the living room reading a newspaper. He glanced at me and continued reading. Ignacio’s mother led me back to the kitchen and had me sit at the table. She poured me a glass of Jarritos lime soda without my asking. She knew it was my favorite Mexican soda.
She told me Ignacio’s younger sisters were at the home of a friend.
“Cómo estás, Delia?”
“Muy bien, gracias.”
She handed me the letter, first holding it as if it were a precious jewel, stroking the envelope, her eyes mixed with joy and sadness.
“Gracias, Señora Davila,” I said, and carefully opened it. She left me in the kitchen to read it in private.
Dear Delia,
I miss your face as much as I would miss the sun if it died in the sky.
I am afraid I have some hard news for you and for my family. I was robbed last night. All the money I have saved was taken. I am exhausted from raging and screaming. It was my own stupidity. Too often I counted it where other eyes could see. I trusted the men I work with on the soy farm, and now I am paying dearly for that trust.
Rather than feel sorry for me and try to help me find the thief, the other men just think me stupid. In this world, if you are a victim, you are the one at fault. I know that makes no sense to you, but it is so.
It makes me want to be a thief myself, but don’t worry. I will not become one. I will just work harder and longer or find a cut-rate coyote to help me get back. But, as you know, it is not just a matter of getting across the border. I must also find work waiting for me and a place to live and hide. Without money and a false identity, I would be a desperate lizard, and I will not be so.
So I must ask you to be patient longer. I hope your love for me is strong enough to last.
As before, I must keep my exact whereabouts unknown not only to you but to my family. These letters are all that I can risk. It is better that they remain unable even to make a mistake. It would be an unfair burden to put on them and on you.
Kiss my mother for me.
Ignacio
I lowered my head to my arms and sobbed silently. Then I took a deep breath, drank some more of my cool soda, and rose. When I looked into the living room, I saw that Ignacio’s father had left the house. His mother sat sadly, her head turned to the window.
“Here is my letter to him,” I told her, and gave it to her. She looked at his letter in my hand. Her husband forbid her to read them, and even though he was not in the room, she would not disobey.
She took the letter from Ignacio and gently closed the envelope.
“He asked me to give you a kiss for him,” I said, and leaned over to do so.
She smiled through her tears. “You will have something to eat with me,” she said, “and tell me about school.”
What she hoped was that I would reveal what was written. I wondered if I should give her the hard news and was reluctant to do so but then thought it was better she understood why it would take him longer to return. We retreated to the kitchen for my visit.
It was truly as painful for me to tell her the contents of Ignacio’s letter as it was for her to hear them. However, Ignacio’s mother reminded me a lot of mi abuela Anabela. She had the same power of acceptance for bad news. I say power because she was able to keep it on her shoulders and go on. She, as did Abuela Anabela, believed in the will of God.
“Perhaps this is his penance,” she said, which was her only comment.
We both looked up when Ignacio’s father stepped into the kitchen. He looked from Ignacio’s mother to me and back to her.
Without comment, she handed him the letter. This time, he simply tore it into shreds and threw it in the garbage. My heart ached to see him do that. He knew, however, that if he didn’t and I took it with me, I would probably sleep with Ignacio’s letters, and there would be danger.
“I’m sorry, Señor Davila, but Ignacio does not send good news. He was robbed of all his money.”
“Maybe God is telling him to stay where he is, then,” was his response.
I couldn’t blame him for his hardness. He had suffered great pain, and in having to pretend to mourn his son, he probably buried him in his heart, not believing there would be any happy ending to our story.
Ignacio’s father left us to do some work, telling Ignacio’s mother he would have lunch with some of his friends at a local eatery. I continued to visit with Ignacio’s mother, trying to tell her only good and happy things about my schoolwork.
Afterward, she walked me out to wait for Señor Casto. He was there already, however, parked and waiting patiently on the side of the road. Ignacio’s brother apparently had gone with his father.
“I’ll see that your letter is delivered the usual way,” Ignacio’s mother told me. “I am sure he waits as anxiously for it as he did for the others.”
“Gracias, señora. I will see you soon, I hope.”
“Yes, soon,” she said.
We hugged, and I hurried to Casto’s car so she would not see the tears that I could not hold back.
Casto glanced at me and drove off without speaking. We rode a long time before either of us spoke.
“You do not have good news,” he said, confirming what my face easily revealed.
“No, señor.” I told him what had happened to Ignacio in Mexico.
“I am not surprised,” he said. “Desperate people do desperate things, and there are too many desperate people back home.”
“Yes,” I said, smiling at how even after all these years, he referred to Mexico as his home.
I got out of his car a few streets back from mi tía Isabela’s hacienda so no one would see that he had taken me anywhere. Again, these precautions were wise to take.
“I need a little walk anyway,” I told him.
It was just fall now, early October, and contrary to what people who didn’t live here thought, the desert did enjoy seasons. It could get surprisingly cold during December, January, and February. It always began to warm in March and was almost perfect in April. Sometimes April would have some summer desert days, where the temperatures might even reach 100 degrees. Today, it was in the mid-70s with a gentle breeze and a sky that looked like what the first sky for Adam and Eve must have looked like, a deep blue, cloudless.
It was hard to be sad here. Nature could be so comforting and fill you with optimism. It was easier to believe in tomorrow. Somehow, Ignacio would find a way, I thought. The obstacles would be overcome. We were too strong to be defeated. Gradually, my steps became stronger, my gait faster. By the time I turned into the hacienda, my heart was not as heavy, and then it skipped a beat when I set eyes on Edward’s fancy Jaguar sedan.
Why was he here?
I hurried up the driveway.
Both he and Jesse were sitting in the living room sipping some iced tea and obviously waiting for me.
“Why are you home?” I immediately demanded.
“Well, that’s not a very nice hello,” Edward said.
I would never get used to that eye patch, even though he joked and told me it made him exotic-looking. “Like some pirate or soldier of fortune,” he said.
“We decided we were working too hard and would take the day off,” Jesse explained. He wasn’t quite as tall as Edward, but they had similarly slim builds.
I looked at them both skeptically.
Edward laughed. “She’s not buying it, Jess.”
“Okay, we were worried about you,” Jesse confessed, “and decided we would come down to take you to dinner. We can’t take you out next weekend. You’re going to a high-society party.”
“If you both flunk out of college, I will be the one blamed,” I said.
“Good. I hate being blamed for anything,” Edward replied. “So, where have you been?” he asked. “And where’s my mother?”
“Your mother went to L.A. and is probably looking for you.”
“That would be a real surprise,” he said. He waited, because I had not said where I had been.
“I’ve been visiting friends,” I told them, and he nodded, glancing quickly at Jesse. He assumed correctly that I had been to the Davilas’ home.
“Where would you like to go to dinner? You name it,” Jesse said.
“I don’t know. We rarely go to restaurants with your mother.”
“I know,” Edward interjected. “Let’s take her to La Grenouille. She has to get more familiar with French cuisine, doesn’t she?”
“Good idea,” Jesse said.
“That is such an expensive restaurant,” I said. I had never been there, but I had heard Fani talk about it and Danielle Johnson, too.
“We’ll cut back on the dark chocolate,” Edward joked.
Of course, I knew he could afford it.
“I’ll go make the reservation,” Jesse said, and rose to go to a phone.
“Where’s the stone princess? She’s not home,” Edward asked me.
“I do not know.”
“So…how are things with your friends, the Davilas?” he asked, with his soft smile.
“As they have been,” I replied. I couldn’t say much more, and I was terrified of accidentally revealing Ignacio’s existence.
He asked me about schoolwork and told me about their classes rather than talk any more about the Davilas. He sensed I was reluctant to do so. Jesse returned to say we had the reservation, but we had to be there at six forty-five.
“They’re having a big night. It was only because I used your name that we got in at all,” he explained.
“We don’t have to go there,” I said
“It’s done. I have an idea. Why don’t you wear what you think you’ll wear to the Johnson party? Let’s all go French tonight. I have a beret, and I know my mother has a great French chapeau that would fit you, Delia.”
“I cannot take her clothes without her permission,” I said.
“You won’t. I will,” Edward said.
Just then, Sophia came in with Trudy and Alisha. They burst in laughing, until Sophia set eyes on the three of us and immediately changed her expression.
“Well, I wonder what brought you home today,” Sophia said, a cold smile cut so deeply in her face it looked sliced with a bread knife. Her girlfriends wore similar smiles.
“We missed your sweet voice and face,” Edward said.
“Ha-ha. Why are you here, Edward? Did she call for help or something?”
“I think she’s doing just fine for herself,” he said, nodding at me. “What crime are you three preparing to commit this time?”
“We’re getting ready for a party, a real party,” Sophia added.
“I bet.”
“You’re all invited,” she said. “Even you, Delia.”
“We need to skip it,” Edward said. “None of us has the right inoculations.”
“Funny, funny. C’mon,” she told her girlfriends. “Three’s company here, and we don’t want to get in the way. We’re not welcome, anyway.”
They marched to the stairway.
“You know about the three witches in Macbeth?” Edward asked me.
I nodded and smiled at his comparison.
“Fair is always foul around here,” he told Jesse.
“Let’s just hope we all don’t suffer Macbeth’s fate,” he replied.
It was a legitimate worry. There wasn’t a cloud outside, but I could hear the thunder rolling in our direction.
4
Rumors
Jesse and Edward left to visit Jesse’s family. They told me what time to be ready, and I went up to shower and dress and do my hair. Now, probably filled more with curiosity than anything else, Sophia and her friends invaded my room. She saw the dress I had laid out to wear.
“That’s fancy and expensive. My mother bought that for you at Dede’s Boutique. Isn’t that the dress you’re planning to wear to Danielle’s party?” she demanded as soon as I emerged from the shower.
I had shown her what I would wear after she bought her new dress, and for a few minutes we had talked to each other about fashions. I had thought we might just get along and actually enjoy the party.
“Yes, you know it is,” I replied. I could see she was just performing for her two friends.
“Where are your two lover boys taking you?”
Her two friends had been inspecting all of my things, poking through my clothes, even looking in my drawers. They stopped when I appeared, but neither looked sorry.
“To dinner,” I said. “I thought you had to get ready for your party.”
“We don’t have to doll up for our parties,” Trudy said.
“We don’t have phonies at our parties,” Alisha added.
Both had still not been invited to Danielle’s party.
“You mean, neither of you are going to the party?” I asked, sitting at my vanity table.
I would never claim not to be afraid of them. I just knew it was better never to show them my fear. They would trample me under their insults and crude remarks as quickly as a raging bull in the bull ring. Sometimes I did feel like a matador, deflecting their sharp horns and gracefully stepping out of their way.
“You’re so funny,” Sophia said. “Don’t think my brother will always be around to protect you, Delia. And don’t think we’re going to keep all your little disgusting secrets locked up forever. Just watch your mouth.”
I brushed my hair and didn’t look at her.
“I asked you where they are taking you to dinner. I’d like an answer,” she demanded. When I didn’t answer quickly enough, she came at me. “Well? My mother’s going to want to know, too.”
“They made a reservation at La Grenouille,” I said.
“They did?” She turned to her friends. “You see what kind of money he spends on her?”
“What does she do for it, I wonder,” Alisha said, smiling lustfully.
“She’ll never tell,” Sophia said, and they laughed.
I spun on them. “Get out of here with your dirty talk,” I said.
“You’re chasing me out of a room in my house?” Sophia asked. “You, who once cleaned my toilet?”
I rose, ignoring her, and went back into my bathroom. For a while, I just stood there behind the closed door, trying to calm my racing heart. I heard them laughing again, and then they finally left. After I caught my breath, I came out of the bathroom. For a moment, I just stood there, grateful they had left me alone.
And then I saw my dress.
It had been ripped apart where the zipper began at the waist. The tear was clear down to the hem. I held it in my arms like something or someone precious who had died. The rage inside washed over me. I charged out of my room and to her bedroom, but the door was locked.
“Why did you tear my dress? Open this door!” I cried, pounding
on it.
I heard their laughter, and then Sophia came to the door and opened it, her two friends at her side. They looked like hungry coyotes surrounding a puppy.
“How could you do this?” I screamed, holding up the dress.
“It was an accident,” Sophia said. “Alisha tried it on, forgetting how thin you are, and the dress just tore. You’re good at sewing. Sew it up.”
“Aliméntese en su propia bondad y muere de hombre,” I said, actually spitting the words at her.
For a moment, the three of them simply stared at me.
“What does that mean? What did you say?”
I turned away and headed back to my bedroom, ashamed at my own rage now.
“Delia, come back here and tell us exactly what that means, or else!”
I slammed my door closed.
“I’ll find out what it means. You’ll be sorry if it was a curse.”
I sat in a chair, my torn dress in my lap, and let the steam stop coming out of my ears. Finally, I felt my heartbeat slow down. I had no fear about her translating the curse that had come to mind. I had simply said, “May you feed only on your own goodness and starve,” which was something I had overheard my grandmother mumble to herself when someone made her so angry she couldn’t keep it bottled up. I had no doubt that if Sophia were left to feed on her goodness, she would starve.
Before they left the house, she came to my door and rapped it hard before telling me I would be sorry.
Sorry? I was sorry already, I thought, now feeling guilty that I had let her get to me, but they had destroyed my beautiful dress. Sewing it would not work. I tossed it to the side and closed my eyes. The confrontation and the angry outburst drained me, and without intending it, I fell asleep. I woke when I heard a knock on my bedroom door and then Edward’s voice. The realization that I had slept nearly an hour shocked me. I leaped to my feet, scrubbed my cheeks quickly with my palms, and opened the door.
Both Edward and Jesse gaped at me, the shock clearly written on their faces. I imagined I looked like a crazy woman.