The Fifth Sacred Thing (73 page)

Ahead of her, the skeleton of an old pier branched off, heading across the water. The central supports were gone, but the side supports made a narrow bridge, and she took it, balancing lightly on the narrow struts. It was no worse than crossing the freeway, she told herself, although the water frightened her. She shuddered at the thought of falling in, not just because of the cold and the possible toxins but because of what was submerged below, corpses of houses and bones of the drowned, secrets, death. A shout came from behind her. She walked faster, the water lapping at her heels, licking its lips. Another shout. And now the pier ended, the struts broken in midair.

So this is the end, Papa. It must be you, coming in the shadow of my mother’s memory, speaking in the
acento
of Guadalupe. I never really believed in you, but you were a sort of hillboy, weren’t you? What does a true revolutionary do at the end?

“Haz lo que hay que hacer.” Do what there is to do
.

Shivering, she kicked off her shoes and slipped out of her clothes. This is the dark place, the place I never wanted to go. But there is nowhere else. The shout came again, from close behind her. Too close. She dove.

Cold hit her like a shock wave. She held her breath and swam underwater as long as she could, until finally she had to surface for breath. The crumbling dikes made a breakwater; within their circuit the waves were calm but she was trapped. Already she could see patrols heading out on the narrow roadway that ran along the top of the dikes. A flare of laser fire split the air. She gulped a deep breath and submerged again, giving herself to the current, which carried her swiftly out through the gap. It pulled her down and took her racing between the rocks; she began to panic as she tried to struggle toward the surface through churning whirlpools that spun her around and down.

Stay calm, she told herself, trying to slow her pounding heart. Fear will kill you now if you let it. Yemaya, Ocean Mama, carry me now. I am yours—don’t hurt me, Mama.

She was through the breakwater, and now the current relented and let her shoot up to the surface to gulp air. She was out in the open ocean where huge waves rolled up, rounded and glassy, foaming at the mouth. She remembered trips to the clean beaches of the Sonoma coast, when she was a child. Face the waves, Rio had said, don’t try to dodge them, dive straight into them. Maya
had made it a metaphor for life. And she could do it, gliding through each breaker as it struck, making herself sleek and lean as the waves pummeled her. Up for air and then head on into the next one, up when the force abated and gasp a breath before the next, again and again, until she thought she would cry from exhaustion.

And then suddenly she was through them, out beyond the impact zone, into the smooth swell. She was warm now, and the fog lifted to let a hint of sun transform the day from gray to blue. She felt strong, exhilarated. She had made it, and now she could swim forever, heading north with the current toward the mouths of the canyons that led to the hills. How far? Five miles? Ten? How far could she swim? If I go slow, if I take my time, as far as I have to.

The ocean was the mother of life. She remembered tales of medieval women of Italy who had held hands, in masses, and walked into the sea to drown, escaping the tortures of the Witch burners. At worst, she would join them. But maybe some of them, too, had escaped and swum off to safety?

The sun traveled in its low arc, moving west to meet her.

Not long before sunset, she realized she was in trouble. She had swum for hours, she thought, and she was tired and chilled. She had no idea how many miles she had covered, only that she had made it north, helped by the strong pull of the current, past the high cliffs of the palisades, to where the mountains rose steeply up from the lashing surf. Along that stretch of shore were only a few beaches, one or two openings to dry creek beds marking where water flowed during the brief rains. If only she could reach one, get ashore there, and make her way up into the mountains.…

Night was falling, and even if she got ashore the hike up to the camps would be long and cold; she’d be wet and naked in the dark. But now she must not, could not think about that; she would concentrate on landing, returning to earth. In the distance she could see an impression in the cliffs, a darker stain against the rocks that meant the crevice of a creek, and gathering her waning strength, she struck out.

For about ten minutes, she swam with a strong crawl, slow but steady, watching her breathing and instructing her weary feet to kick. She broke for a moment, treading water and shaking her hair clear of her eyes to see how far she’d come.

The creek was farther away. Even as she stopped for a moment, the strong current was pulling her away, north and west, always west, out to sea.

No, she thought. I’m tired, Mama Ocean. Let me go. Before she could panic, she struck out again, changed the angle of her direction slightly, swimming more vigorously. She made some progress this time, the shore came a tiny bit closer, even though she was still drifting north of the creek’s mouth.

But if I try harder, she thought, even as her legs began to feel heavy as stones and her breath labored in and out of her chest. I can always try a little harder, can’t I? Because it can’t be ending like this. No. I’m not ready to have it end.

If the ocean would only pause for a moment, give her a chance to rest, to collect herself. She had a sudden understanding of all the mothers she had ever heard cry out in the middle of labor, “Stop! I can’t go through with this!” But they were laboring into life, and she had always been confident that they could trust their women’s bodies to withstand the coming of life. As she trusted her body, heavy and tired and cold as it was, to get her through this.

Yemaya, I am your child. You can’t be meaning to kill me now. It doesn’t make sense to go through so much and die in you.

“But I am relentless, implacable. I am not your body, but bigger than your body. I never stop.” And even as she was hearing the words in her mind, the riptide was sucking her out, drinking in one smooth pull the distance she’d gained so laboriously.

I’m just tired, she thought. But I’m strong. I can go on. I can always go on, as long as I have to. I can’t give in.

Just then a wave caught her from behind, splashing its lip over her head so that she inhaled just a breath of water, like the fumes of a laugh. Suddenly she was gasping. Her lungs wanted to expel all their air but they wouldn’t breathe in, and her stone feet and arms were too heavy to move.

I’ve got to keep trying, she thought. But underneath was another voice, whispering, “I can’t do it. I need help. I can’t make it back alone.” Desperately she made one more attempt to swim. If I go with the current, don’t try to fight it, maybe it’ll take me somewhere else where I might find an easier way in.

But the current was only taking her out, and after three strokes her heart was pounding and her breath labored.

I’ve just got to stop and catch my breath, she thought, rolling over on her back. If I can just catch my breath, just rest.…

She lay on her back, the ocean carrying her, blue water around her, blue sky above her as the sun dipped ominously close to the waves. She was in the ocean and the ocean was in her, flowing in the salt water of her veins, gurgling through her lungs with each whistling breath. But I want to live, she thought. Here is the moment of my death, the gate we all pass through, the gate I’ve come so close to before, that I’ve seen so many slip across. And I’m not ready for it. I want to live.

I want to live. And there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. I cannot save myself. There’s nothing more for me to do now, except wait, and hope, and breathe. Try to slow it down, to steady the heart, to breathe in, through
the water and the pain. Don’t think about the sun, soon to hiss its steamy way down below the water. Don’t think about cold, the body’s heat running out into this icy bath. Just breathe and think about living. Drinking hot tea on Isis’ boat. Being dirty and thirsty in the canyons, longing for water, praying for water. The sun bright and the bees humming, coming to extract that sweetness. Yes, I can feel it beading on my forehead; if there were any bees here, lost in the middle of this water, they could still be fed from me. I am your water flower, Mother, be gentle with me. I will live as long as I can, in you, because nothing in me truly wants to die.

She closed her eyes, feeling a tickle on her forehead like the threads of bee feet, but her ears heard only the sounds of water, and when she opened her eyes, she saw nothing but the blue of water and the paler blue of the sky.

And all the while, the sun, like her, rode the swells into the west.

“Well, you are in a mess now, girl,” Johanna said. “How many times did I tell you to stay out of the water? What is the point of giving you advice if you don’t follow it?”

Madrone had closed her eyes so she wouldn’t see the sun set, and she couldn’t tell where Johanna was. Close, undoubtedly. I am halfway through the veil myself, she thought, maybe more.

“Didn’t I tell you, always get someone to cover your back?”

Maybe I should open my eyes, Madrone thought. If this is the last sunset I’ll ever see, maybe I shouldn’t miss it.

“Answer me, girl.”

“Help me, Johanna. Be nice to me. Please.”

“Help you? I’ve tried, child, time and time again, but you insist on going up against forces too strong for you.”

But my lids are too heavy. Still, I can see the sun through them, a red glow through my own blood.

“I don’t want you, Johanna. Go away. I want my mama, my real mama. Why doesn’t she come to me?”

Why can’t I remember her face, her living voice, instead of the cold touch of her dead skin? Mama, where are you?

Madrone heard nothing but the wind and the ringing of her ears cradled by water.

Why do you leave me all alone here? Not a word, not a whisper of presence. Mama, am I going to find you now after all these years? And what will I find? I can’t remember, I can’t remember your smell or your touch or anything you ever said to me; it’s as if you’d disintegrated, as if you’d never been.

But I remember now, I remember you told me to hide. And I hid. I heard
you screaming and I didn’t help you. I touched you, and you were all cold and bloody and I thought I’d hurt you.

I want to be cleansed of this. Look, Mama, there’s water leaking out of my eyes, I never did cry for you before, and now the tears are hot on my cold skin and salty like this water that carries me. I believe you are there, somewhere, you must be, you can’t not be anywhere. How do I cleanse this memory so I can come back to you? I’m reaching for you, but my arm is a cold weight on the water, too heavy to lift. You’ll just have to believe me, that I’m reaching, I’m opening.

But she was only opening to water. It poured out of her eyes and lapped her face and soaked the tissues of her lungs, it was in her as she was in it, and she imagined it washing through her brain, soaking through her memories. Cleansing. She opened, imagining her whole self splitting wide so that there was no longer any separation between her and the waves. They washed through her as the breeze played through her sodden lungs and the radiant blazing sun, in its descent, lit up her bowels. If this is dying, she thought, it’s not so bad. It’s a clean death, no blood, no pain, just a ride on the tide, tides of life, tides of sickness and death, great currents of
ch’i
that ebb and flow, great life womb that births and swallows and reclaims even memories.

So this is what it means to become one with the Goddess. To turn into water, water of life, water of birth and death and all that passes between, joy and pain. Yes, the pain of my laboring lungs and spirit holding to life with both hands as death loosens my grip. My pain, my mother’s pain, it’s all the same, the terrible screaming pain of a child tortured to death, the wink-out pain of every plankton cell frying in the leached ozone, the lament of the long-gone whales.

Why are we like this? You, Yemaya, womb of all life, what have you given birth to, and why? Why, why, why?

“Well, I like to experiment.”

The voice was like Johanna’s or Maya’s or Yemaya’s, familiar, the most deeply familiar voice Madrone had ever heard, as if her cells had known it forever.

“And yes, I’ve always had a tendency to go to extremes,” the voice said. “I’m a gambler, for high stakes. And no game is really exciting unless there’s a possibility you might lose.”

No, don’t be the Goddess, don’t give me philosophy, be my mother. My own mother.

“But, child, what else could I possibly be? Am I not the mother of all life? Didn’t I give you my knife, make you my daughter?”

That was you? I thought it was
La Serpiente
.

“From where does the serpent arise? Who does the midwife serve if not the mother and the new life? What cord can be cut that has not first been spun into being?”

But I just want to be rocked and cradled and held. The sun was red fire lapping the waves.

“But I am rocking you in my great lap. The whole world’s waters are your cradle.”