Starfields (7 page)

But as the days and nights passed the way they always had, the sun climbing through the thirteen layers of sky, traveling through the Underworld and reappearing again, Rosalba had convinced herself that such a thing as global warming wouldn’t happen here in the Highlands. The Mayan world was different, protected by the Earthlord.

Now she noticed another row of boxes. The frogs inside weren’t moving. She stepped closer.

“Those are the dead ones,” said Alicia. “Patricia and Alfredo died yesterday.”

Rosalba stared at the tiny stiff bodies. A sudden thought, a very unpleasant thought, came to mind. “Are toads dying, too?”

“Like I said — all amphibians.”

“If
toads
are in danger, who’s going to guard the Earthlord’s cave? That toad has kept watch since the beginning of time, singing his songs.” Rosalba looked in the direction of the Earthlord’s cave.

“He sounds really special.”

“He is. The toads help the Earthlord create the clouds. Without clouds, there’s no rain. Without rain, there’s no corn. And corn is life.”

Alicia’s eyes grew big. “Let’s hope that toad stays alive.”

Rosalba squinted at the mountain again, as if she could actually
see
the Earthlord’s toad. This news about the toads was more real to her than the words in Alicia’s book.

“They say frogs are the canaries in the coal mine,” said Alicia.

“The
what
?”

“Papi says that miners used to send a canary underground before they went down. If the canary died, it meant the air was bad. So many frogs dying means something is really wrong with our whole planet.”

Rosalba looked around. The trees and sky appeared as they always had.

“Let’s go inside the tent and I’ll read you the new exciting part.” Alicia knelt to unzip the door.

Rosalba crawled in behind her, into the pale green light. She noticed Alicia’s bottle of pink fingernail polish, a box containing more barrettes, a tangle of bright hair ribbons, and a teddy bear with the fur worn off its stomach.

Sitting cross-legged, Alicia opened her book with the pyramid on the front and began to read: “‘While many view the year 2012 as the inevitable end of the world, others hold out hope for humanity. Perhaps the universe is presenting a challenge for all of us. Through our collective actions, we may avoid catastrophe and enter a golden age of increased environmental awareness.’”

Alicia laid the book on her knee. “This means we have to do something, Rosalba. Everyone has to help. I’m helping Papi with the frogs. What will
you
do?”

Rosalba glanced around the tent, then back to her own hands. The question was unexpected. What
could
she do? “I weave,” she offered.

“How can
that
help?”

How could Alicia not know? “I weave for the Earthlord.”

“He’s the one who lives in the mountain, isn’t he?”

Rosalba nodded. “He needs help from us to keep the world running just right.”

“Hmm. Maybe you can do something else.”

“Could I help with the frogs?”

“You can help a little with them. But you need to think of your own big thing.”

Her own big thing.

Someone stepped close to the outside of the tent. A man’s voice said, “Don’t believe everything my daughter tells you, Rosalba.”

Alicia retorted loudly, “It’s all in my
book
!”

Her
papi
laughed.

“Don’t any grown-ups believe?” whispered Rosalba. “My
papi
didn’t laugh himself, but he made my brothers laugh.”

“Lots of grown-ups believe. The author of this book believes.” She held it up. “My
papi
is so wrong. The end of the world is coming. I know it.”

Rosalba let her shawl slip off her shoulders, revealing her
huipil.

“Your blouse is so pretty,” Alicia said, lying back, studying Rosalba’s red-and-white
huipil.
“I just love those blouses. They have such cute animals on them.”

Rosalba looked down at her
huipil.
The Earthlord
cute
?

“Maybe you could weave something that makes a statement about 2012. Let people know about it.”

Rosalba felt her jaw tighten. “When I weave a
huipil,
I weave the patterns that were woven by our ancestors,” said Rosalba. “Doing that, I help the earth. These”— she touched the ancient designs —“are so powerful that even just
wearing
the
huipil
helps the Earthlord.”

Alicia gazed at the
huipil,
nodding, but with a slight frown.

As the sun lowered itself toward the Underworld, a tree shadow fell across the tent.

“I have to get back.” Rosalba reached for the zipper on the door.

“Let me come with you,” said Alicia. “I’ll come as far as Frog Heaven.”

Outside, with the fires burning, the sky had turned a dusky yellow color. The sun had become a dull orange ball. As they descended, Rosalba noticed smoke rising in columns all over the valley, before spreading out.

“Don’t people see what the smoke does to the blue sky?” Alicia asked.

For Rosalba, smoky skies were simply necessary. Otherwise, the corn couldn’t be planted.

Yet the afternoon
was
unbearably hot.

When they reached Frog Heaven, Alicia turned to Rosalba, saying, “I might as well come with you the rest of the way,” she said. “I want to see where you live.”

“Oh, no,” said Rosalba. “Not today.” Alicia mustn’t come. “It’ll — it’ll get too dark. There’ll be spooks and demons. Demons with wings.” She lifted her arms, making flapping movements.

“I’m not afraid of those.”

“One touched me on the neck the other night.”

Alicia shrugged.

“There’ll be bats.”

“I love bats.”

Rosalba planted herself so Alicia couldn’t pass. “All right, then. My papa doesn’t want me to see you.”

Alicia wrinkled her forehead. “Why not?”

“A long, long time ago, right before I was born,
ladinos
tried to take our cornfields. They wanted the land for themselves.”

“That wasn’t fair.”

“It wasn’t. And now Papa doesn’t like
ladinos.
He won’t even like you.”

“Not like
me
?” Alicia flashed her biggest smile.

“It’s not your fault,” Rosalba said. She glanced ahead at the path, calculating how long it would take Papa to come down from the cornfield. Might he get home before her? Touching the back of Alicia’s hand, she said, “Someday he may change his mind.”

Alicia leaned forward to kiss Rosalba, first on one cheek, then the other. “I hope so.”

Rosalba scrambled up the main trail, then up the tiny one to her hut. There was no sign of Papa or the boys. The patio was deserted except for the two white dogs lying under a bush.

When Rosalba pulled back the blanket over the door, she saw only girls and women: Mama, Nana, Adelina, Tía Yolanda, and Sylvia.

“Rosie!” Adelina ran to her.

“Where were you?” Sylvia asked when Rosalba had settled herself.

Rosalba glanced at Mama.

Mama gave a slight nod.

Rosalba plunged forward: “I was seeing my new friend. She’s a
ladina.
”

Sylvia wrapped her shawl more tightly around her, staring at Rosalba with her large black eyes.

Rosalba bit her lip. Now Sylvia was unhappy. Another girl had come between them.

Sylvia stirred the embers with a stick of green wood, asking, “What do you do together?”

Rosalba recalled how she and Sylvia had once played house, taking turns being the papa, making Anselmo be the baby. They’d cooked mud stews. One spring when Rosalba had broken her ankle, Sylvia had sat with her, telling stories. Nowadays they liked doing each other’s hair, winding bright ribbons into the braids.

“We looked at frogs in boxes. Many many frogs,” she finally answered. “They’re sick. A fungus is killing them. . . .”

The embers popped and sparks flew.

“Dying frogs means the world is going to end,” Rosalba persisted.

Sylvia rolled her eyes.

The man-beasts advance into our jungles, searching out our people in their small huts.

Believing in the return of the Blond God, our people bow down in gratitude and submission. They do not fight these hairy men, but make offerings. When they make offerings of gold, the men clench their fists tight around the yellow metal dug from our land.

But it’s more than gold they seek. They want our people to make offerings to their god. And only to their god. The man-beasts defame our gods, smashing the stelae of our temples. They burn the sacred texts, the codices that the people, even living so simply in the jungle, have still guarded. Into the heavens the truth of our gods rise as smoke.

They carry their own god on two crossed sticks. He sheds blood from his palms, feet, chest, and the crown of his head. The hairy ones proclaim him to be the only god. But how can one be god of creation and of destruction? Of the moon and the sun? Both god of life and death?

This leader does not proclaim himself to be Kukulkan. Perhaps he is not. The Green Morning Star, after all, still hangs in the sky.

When the slaying of our people begins, the Golden One kills the most. He bears down on innocent women and children until the rivers run red with their blood. How could he be the long-proclaimed Feathered Serpent?

A
s Rosalba completed the last row of the front of her
huipil,
she lifted her hands in triumph.

“Congratulations,” said Nana. “You’re halfway finished.”

“It’s pretty, Rosie,” said Adelina, lightly touching the threads.

Mama brought out four bright red
refrescos,
saying, “I’ve kept these to celebrate this moment. Congratulations, Rosita.”

Rosalba smiled at the way Mama had called her “Little Rose.”

“Ooh, strawberry!” Adelina exclaimed when Nana handed her a bottle with the cap twisted off.

Ever since she’d begun the
huipil,
Rosalba had looked forward to this day. Now, sipping the bubbly drink, surveying her work, she felt proud of the way she’d continued the ancestral tradition, connecting herself to something larger.

Maybe Alicia was wrong in thinking that weaving couldn’t be her one big thing. Alicia didn’t know what it meant to be a Mayan. Rosalba lightly touched the bright threads stretched across the loom. If she kept weaving, all would be well.

In the early afternoon, Rosalba called through the door of Sylvia’s hut: “Would you like to go with me to the spring?”

The spring was located uphill, on the way to the cave of the Earthlord.

For a moment, Sylvia made no response. At last she said, “Well, yes. We need water.”

Rosalba and Sylvia walked up the mountain, empty clay jars on their heads. The sky was still as yellow as ripe corn. The smoke made Rosalba long for the upcoming rains.

Now that the fires had died down, the men had gone to the cornfields with gourds filled with seed. Across the slopes, Rosalba could see the tiny figures plunging their digging sticks through the layer of new ash. Others followed, dropping corn into the holes. Everyone hurried to complete the planting before the rains arrived.