Make Your Home Among Strangers (43 page)

A current twitched beneath her face, like when I was little and did something in front of people to embarrass her. It meant a secret viselike pinch to the back of my arm was on its way. But it never came, and the hard-line mouth slipped back behind the beatific face.

I took the reprieve and said, But I didn't know about all that, I was on the plane. I didn't hear, Mami. Of course you have to keep praying. Of course. Now more than ever.

The women began to spread back out. One close to me wore a large gold brooch in the shape of Cuba, and it pulled on her blouse and sagged at one end, the east end, so that it looked like a smear of metal dripping from her shoulder. It glinted in the sunlight like a just-brandished knife. My mother tugged my arm and pulled me to her, leaned in to my face, her breath another source of heat, and said, I'll come by later, after I eat with them. When we rotate I can visit you. You're at the apartment?

She squeezed my arm harder. It was a genuine question.

—Yeah, of course, I said.

She kissed my cheek and hugged me again, the rosary beads rolling over my back and clinking together a second time. The circle around us was almost intact once more except for her spot, the place through which I would leave it. And just outside of it was Dante in his stroller and Leidy, standing stone still until I stepped toward her.

As she charged away, the circle back to praying and safely behind us, Leidy said, What the fuck was that, Lizet?

—I don't know. You're right that she's weird.

Despite the heat, my arms and legs were freezing. And I couldn't walk fast enough. Neither could Leidy. For a step or two I was right next to her, and the sun shined off the tears on her face as they slipped from under her sunglasses, just before she swiped them away.

—Oh my god, are you crying? I said. Why the hell are you
crying
?

Instead of stopping to answer me, she wrapped her fists tighter around the handles of Dante's stroller and seemingly shifted into a higher gear. Her silver earrings rocked back and forth like angry kids on swings.

—You know how many times I came down here to ask her something and she acts like she can't hear me? Like I'm not even there?

I was walking so fast to keep up that it would've been easier to just jog. I managed to huff out, Leidy, she sees you all the time.

—Whatever, she said. It's not like you got her to come home. A lot of good you did, gracing us with your presence. All the way from
New York.

—What the hell, I said to her back. I halted in the street. I said, You're jealous that she stopped for me and not you? Is that really so shocking?

My armpits were drenched, and my sweat-soaked shirt nudged itself cold against the insides of my arms. She kept walking, the stroller's wheels scuffing ahead of her. She got smaller and smaller until a car honked beside me; I was blocking a driveway.

By the time I locked the apartment door, she was in the shower with Dante—the stroller and her sunglasses and her clothes and his clothes and his wet diaper all in a trail from the front door to the bathroom. She came out over an hour later, all wrinkled and with her hair in a towel, had stayed locked in there long enough to make it weird for me to bring up what had happened. She spent the evening wandering around the apartment, playing with Dante and then feeding him and then hanging out in our room with him, leaving me with nothing to do but watch TV in the living room, though what I was really doing was willing the phone to ring, willing my dad to call and say he'd changed his mind and would help. Or willing Omar to call and just talk to me. I kept almost hearing it—the shrill bell about to make me jump—but I knew my dad wouldn't call, that Omar wouldn't call. Omar couldn't, not after the way he'd driven off, and I didn't even really want him to—what would I say to him? I just wanted the distraction, the chance to whisper with someone the way Leidy did to Dante, to feel less lonely for a few minutes. I turned up the TV's volume, pretending not to be listening for the phone or for Leidy's hushed voice spitting my name at her son.

*   *   *

Mami came home maybe an hour before the sun went down. Leidy had put Dante to bed, and she volunteered
The baby's sleeping
once it was clear Mami wasn't going to ask about him. Mami nodded at her and grabbed my wrist, tugging me up from the couch into the kitchen.

—I don't have a lot of time, she said. I don't feel right not being there if I can be there.

I let her keep her hand clasped around my wrist.

—But I'm visiting, I said. Can't you tell them I'm visiting? I'm never here.

—It's not them, it's
my
feeling.

She raised my hand with hers, made it look like we were both pointing at her chest.

—You don't know what it's been like, she said. This is so important.

A wrinkle formed between her eyes, like she was concentrating or trying to beam a thought into my head. She looked like me for a second, like the face in the mirror the night I'd practiced in front of it, almost a year earlier, after sending in my paperwork to Rawlings, saying to what seemed like a serious, determined reflection,
There's something I need to tell you guys. It's about my future.
Though in the end, I hadn't said any of that, only:
I'm going to college in New York and it's too late to stop me
, starting the whole thing off even more wrong than it already was. Mami's tired face shined at the nose and forehead in the white light of the kitchen. She was trying to seem greater than herself, mustering up what little energy she had left to convince me of something.

—It's okay, I said. I understand.

She let out a breath I was scared to see she'd been holding. She said, So you'll come back with me?

—What?

—I just think, it must be a sign that you're here. Come back with me for the vigil.

Leidy, now steps closer and behind my mom's left shoulder, scowled at us like we were high school bitches in a hallway talking shit:
You hear she's pregnant? Yeah, you hear he's not gonna marry her?
She waved her hands in the air, a huge
No
.

—I just got here, I said to my mom.

—But you're here for
this
, she said, her grip tighter. Come tonight, keep me company. I have to be up the whole night for the prayer.

Her grip loosened and her hand slid down my wrist, her curled fingers hooking mine.

—I promise it's not scary, she said. It's really powerful. We all feel so strong together. You'll see it. Come, I'll wait for you to get your things.

I tried to hide my mouth from Leidy's view, but the apartment was so small, I knew she could hear me. I said, Okay.

Mami laced her fingers with mine and squeezed so hard my fingertips throbbed.

—I'm going to shower, she said. I
need
to shower. Get ready fast, okay?

Even from all those feet away, I saw over my mom's shoulder Leidy's nostrils flaring, her head jutting forward as if ready to ram me.

—I'm happy you're here for this, Mami said, reaching for my hair and pulling it over my shoulder, fixing it a little with her fingers. I'm proud you'll be part of this with me.

—Of course, I said. Me too.

I caught only the tip of Leidy's ponytail snapping out of view as she ran away, the bedroom door slamming a second later.

Mami didn't even turn around. She only said, Your sister's got the baby.

She hugged me then, pulled me into her and rubbed my shoulders. She let one hand slide down to the small of my back, where she rubbed a wide, warm circle—a motion she'd always done when we were sad or sick and bent over a toilet, a small solace as our bodies convulsed with a stomach flu or shook with despair at the way we'd let some stupid boy hurt our feelings. I felt my back rest at the familiar touch, at the comfort her hand there still sent through me. She gave me a kiss on my forehead as she pressed one last circle and then let me go.

—The baby keeps her so busy but that's how it is, isn't it? she said as she walked to the bathroom.

Once the water in the shower was running, Leidy came out and went for my arm as I stepped around her and into our room to pack some things. I smacked her hand away.

—Don't play around with this shit, she said.

—I'm not, I said like a reflex. Dante was asleep in his crib, but I was the only one who lowered her voice. What was I supposed to tell her? I said.

She looked at the crib, then snorted through her nose.

—In case you're wondering, she said, this is why I don't tell you anything.

I dropped to her bed, which still held the chaos of my accidental nap, and stared up at the ceiling, the texture of it blinking back with hints of glitter to make it seem nicer than it really was. She walked to her dresser and grabbed her purse, slung it over her shoulder. Then she picked up Dante from his crib. He murmured but managed to stay asleep.

I pulled at the crown of my hair the way Ethan would—my forehead was shellacked in sweat left over from the conversation with my mom—and said,
Leidy
. Come
on.
Please don't be mad at me about this. Do I really have a choice?

But she was at the bedroom door already, Dante perched backward on her hip with his limbs dangling away from her, his eyes closed. I jumped up and followed her through the apartment, said, Where are you going, when she opened the front door, the exposed fluorescent tube lights in the apartment's hallway buzzing low under my voice.

—Don't worry about it, you've got enough going on, she said.

After the slam came Dante's crying, high and receding as Leidy bolted down the stairs. I ran to the window: Leidy strapped Dante into his car seat, then stomped to the driver's side. She rested her head on the steering wheel for a second and then turned the key in the ignition. She didn't look up at the window, not even once. Behind me, the shower shut off, and I scrambled to my room, to the things I was supposedly gathering.

I dumped everything in my book bag out onto Leidy's bed, then put certain things back inside: my toothbrush, my wallet, a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt for sleeping in, underwear, a small towel of Dante's I grabbed from the dresser. Focusing on packing for the sleepover aspect of the vigil made what I'd be doing that night feel more normal. This was what I'd come for—to face this head-on and drag my mom away from it. The word
infiltrate
hovered in my mind, somehow feeling more cumbersome than the
betray betray betray
my dad had thrown around a year before. I tossed my deodorant back in the bag. I looked at my pillow and wondered if I could cram it in there.

Mami came into my room with her hair wet, but she wore the same black shirt and loose black pants she had on before. Did Leidy leave? she said. I told her yes, but Mami didn't seem at all worried. She looked at me—she'd redone her eyeliner—and said, Don't be so worried, your sister knows what she's doing. I let myself believe her, made myself remember everything Leidy had kept from me over these last weeks. Mami checked the buttons on her blouse and said, Ready? And I slung my bag over my shoulder and moved and we were out on the street, the moon low in the sky, Mami not even looking twice at the vacant parking spot, our steps falling into the same rhythm.

 

32

I WANTED TO ASK HER
a million questions. How often do you sleep there? How much work are you really missing? But each one seemed too pointed, too worried, too quickly exposing why I'd ditched Leidy to come along with her. We passed the now-smaller circle of women praying outside of Ariel's house. She waved to them but we didn't head over to join it, and I asked her why not.

—Your clothes, she said.

My jeans were a little thin at the knees but clean, my T-shirt maybe a bit tight across my chest. She lifted the latch on the chain-link gate surrounding the house across from Ariel's, the one I'd seen in pictures on the news with the white tent covering the lawn.

—No, it's just you're not wearing black, she said. Come on, you can stay inside.

—Was I supposed to –

—It's fine. Just come inside.

—I can go back and change, I said, still standing outside the gate.

She climbed up the three concrete steps to the house's front door and pushed it open, waved for me to follow.

Once inside, it was hard to remember we were only a couple blocks from the apartment. The overhead lights of a small kitchen bled out into what looked like the dining room. Every window was covered with sheets and duct tape, but the sheets hung loose at the bottoms, allowing people to look out when they needed or wanted to. The house was packed and loud with talking. Right away I almost lost my mom in the crowd; she slipped between men and women she seemed to know, touching their shoulders as she passed. I tried to stay close, though my book bag made it tough to squeeze around people. When she stopped, I pushed up right behind her. We were stuck against a long table loaded with food: a platter piled high with grilled chicken drumsticks, pink and brown juices pooling beneath them; aluminum trays filled with yellow rice next to stacks of Styrofoam plates; hunks of Cuban bread cut from a long loaf and then sliced in half again. I was about to ask if I could grab a piece of the bread—I was starving—when my mom handed me a plate. She forked a couple slimy plátanos onto it.

—Eat something, she said.

I slid the bag off my shoulder and tucked it between my feet.

—Where'd all this come from? I said.

—Everywhere. People bring things, places donate things.

Someone pushed by me to stab a chunk of avocado from a bowl on my right—a younger guy with dark hair and a thin beard. He looked like someone I could've gone to high school with. My mom continued to load my plate for me—rice, chicken, tostones, black beans drenching all of it. The guy did the same thing, grabbing a handful of forks and stocking his plate mostly with sharing-friendly foods. My mom nudged the plate into my hand and said, Hi Victor, and the guy said, Wassup Lourdes. He leaned away from the table and bent behind me, kissed my mom on the cheek while chewing. I watched him leave, and he only looked back at me once—with green eyes so surprising they looked misplaced, transplanted into his head from some long-lost Cuban cousin of Ethan's—just before he looked down and hid them and pushed his way into the crowd, his plate of food held high over his head.