Tortilla Sun (6 page)

Love, Mom

It was strange and kind of comforting to think that even though Mom was far away we shared the same sun, moon, and stars. It
surprised me she noticed the moon though. She was always too busy to pay attention to that sort of thing. One time, the moon was so fat and big I thought I could reach out and touch it from our apartment balcony. I called to Mom to come and see, but she just nodded with her face in a book and said, “Yes, isn’t it pretty?”

I traced my fingers over the picture of the waterfall. Why hadn’t she called? Didn’t she miss me at all? I had so much to tell her.

I sat at the desk to write her a letter.

Dear Mom
,

I got your postcard and even though I can’t mail this to you, it makes me feel like I am talking to you. Are you having fun? Sometimes the wind talks to me. It wants me to follow it. What do you think it wants to tell me?

Beyond the high windows in the distance, a bright yellow hot air balloon floated by, tiny as a bumblebee.

“Izzy?” Nana called from the kitchen.

I stuffed the letter in the drawer and hurried toward the kitchen for my first
tortilla
-making lesson.

As I dashed around the corner toward the kitchen, I slammed my forehead right into the top of the doorframe.
Wham!
I rubbed my aching head. Nana’s hundred-year-old house had narrow, short doorways designed to slow enemy attacks during times of war.
Plus it helped hold the heat and cool in, but I liked the battle reason better.

Nana laughed. “I can always hear you coming, Izzy. When will you learn to slow down and duck?”

The doorways sure would’ve been great protection against tall enemies. But Nana, with her four-foot-eleven-inch frame, had no problems walking through them, while I had a throbbing head.

In the kitchen, sunlight bounced across the walls, and the soothing scent of cranberry and lavender filled the air. Just walking into this room made me feel good, like lying in the warm sun and squishing my toes into soft sand.

“Are you ready,
mija
?”

“Yep.”

“Then wash your hands and make sure to say the Hail Mary
tres
times to get all the germs off.”

Suddenly, my throat throbbed like I’d swallowed a baseball. “But I don’t know it.”

Nana raised an eyebrow. “You don’t know the Hail Mary? Didn’t your mama ever take you to church?”

I shook my head, feeling small and stupid.

She took a deep breath. “We can say it together.” As I washed, Nana recited the words, “Hail Mary, full of grace …”

By the third time, I had memorized the last bit of the prayer.
Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.

Nana wrapped a worn yellow apron around my waist and gave me a squeeze.

“Now, first thing to know is that
tortilla
making is a lost art, but you don’t ever want to buy
tortillas
from the store,
mija
,” she said. “They taste like rubber.”

Nana pinned her hair up on her head with a pencil. “And the second thing is that
tortillas
are like life. It is best to keep it simple. For
tortillas
we need only white flour, lard, and hot water.”

I sat on a lopsided wooden stool at the edge of the counter and watched her small, robust hands mix the ingredients. She prepared two separate bowls, one for each of us.

“Did you ever teach Mom to do this?” I asked.

Nana nodded. “I tried. Now put your hands into the bowl and knead the dough.”

I pushed, pulled, twisted, and squeezed. But my dough didn’t look anything like Nana’s. It felt warm and gooey and stuck to my hands like glue. “I don’t think this is right.”

Nana chuckled and set my bowl aside, then handed me her own. “Your mama never liked cooking. She always preferred being outdoors. Here. Knead this dough.”

I wiped my sticky fingers across my apron and tried again. I pinched the dough between my fingers.

“Ah,
mijita
. It’s not Play-Doh! Do not press so hard. Be more delicate. Just let it take shape.”

“Maybe I’m not meant to make
tortillas
.”

“You can do anything you set your heart to.” We started again, but this time she helped me. She pressed my hands into the dough. Her hands felt like smooth pieces of glass.

“
Tortilla
making seems hard at first—it’s no bowl of
sopaipillas
, but keep at it and you will be a master
tortilla
maker in no time at all.” Nana smiled and pointed to the bowl. “
Mira
, no stickies. Let’s get Martha now.”

“Who’s Martha?”

Nana raised her eyebrows like I should know this. “She is one of the patron saints of cooks.” She took the plastic St. Martha statue from the windowsill and sat her next to the bowl. She stood maybe three inches high. One hand was placed over her chest and the other carried a cross. Then, Nana reached into a small cabinet, removed an amber spice bottle, and sprinkled something over the dough.

“This is a very special recipe.
La sagrada
. And this is the secret ingredient. People from all over Albuquerque come for these
tortillas
. It gets so I can’t keep up at times. But I only use the secret ingredient when someone really needs it.”

“Like when would they need it?”

“Well, Maggie likes to eat them when Gip is extra pale and she is worried. Mrs. Gomez next door ate so many when her husband died that now she looks like a stuffed
taco
.” Nana folded in the secret ingredient with her hands. “And sometimes it has nothing to do with sadness. Maybe someone’s heart just needs a blessing.”

“Do you know when someone needs it because you’re a
cura
?” I asked.

She laughed. “You mean
curandera
?”

“Yeah, that.”

She sprinkled flour onto the pine table and made balls from the dough. I pinched off a piece and copied her motions. “
Muy bien
, Izzy. Slowly. Patiently.”

Next, she pressed her wooden rolling pin into one of the balls, turning and flattening it. “Oh,
mija
, you are full of such good questions.
Sí
, I am a
curandera
. I know the old ways of finding and blending herbs to ease pain and heal others. Who told you that?”

“Mateo.”

“Ah. So you two are friends?”

I hoped so, but wasn’t sure what he thought of me after the way I had freaked out.

“I guess. So what kind of sickness? Like stomachaches?” I rolled my lopsided little ball with the rolling pin, but it didn’t
become round like Nana’s. The misshapen dough looked more like the state of Texas. “Mine doesn’t look like yours.”

Nana smiled and kept working. “Just be patient. Try again.”

She told me all the sickness she cured, like stomachaches, headaches, rashes, allergies—those sorts of things.

“What about a broken heart? Can you cure that?” I pushed the rolling pin against the dough hard and quick, thinking about Mom.

Nana stopped pressing and wiped her hands across the front of her apron. “The
tortillas
can open the heart a little at a time, to let out the sadness or fill up the emptiness. But only if the person is ready.”

“How do you know if you’re ready?”

Nana raised her fist over her chest. “You know in here, like something is missing.”

“Like how I feel about my dad? And how it’s worse because Mom never wants to talk about him?”

Nana nodded and squinted like she was thinking hard about this. Soft wrinkles formed around her eyes. “
Sí, mija
.”

I waited for her to shut me down, like Mom, but she nodded like it was all right for me to keep going. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “The other night at the
fiesta
, someone said ‘she hits like her
papá
.’ What did that mean?”

Nana motioned toward the uncooked
tortillas
. “Hand me those so I can put them on the
comal
.” I stood up and handed them to her one at a time as she snapped them on and off the flat, iron pan with the speed of a frog’s tongue catching its prey. I knew I’d never be as fast as Nana.

She stacked the
tortillas
in a basket. Before they even cooled, I grabbed one off the top and slathered butter all over it, then drizzled honey in the center and rolled it tight.

We sat at the long table in the kitchen and enjoyed our hard work. The first bite tasted warm and earthy. It eased its way into my stomach and filled me up.

Nana swiped her pinky across a dot of honey on the table. “It’s only natural for a girl to want to know her father.”

I pulled another
tortilla
from the basket on the table and drizzled it with honey.

“Your mama was very young when she met him.” Nana sighed. “I didn’t approve of him at first.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Oh, I always dreamed she would marry a Hispanic Catholic like me and my mama and hers before that.” She looked up at me through a lock of salt-and-pepper hair that had fallen from her bun. “Gip was right, you look a lot like him.”

“I do?” The sweet honey coated my insides.

“Yes, you have his cheekbones.” She moved my hair from my face. “And his eyes,
exactamente
. He was very handsome, your father,” she continued.

“Why won’t Mom talk about him?”

“She only wants to protect you,
mija
.”

“From what?”

“From pain I suppose. She has always avoided pain—even as a little girl.”

I raised my eyebrows, puzzled.

“When she was very young she used to rush down to the river to look for fishermen. She would hide in the bushes for just the right moment. And when the fishermen put the fish in their baskets, she would sneak up and take the fish.” She laughed. “Then she would run downstream and release them! Oh, how she cried for the ones she couldn’t save.”

“Really?” I laughed too. “That doesn’t even sound like her.”

Nana nodded. “Well, sometimes people change and ignore their essence.”

“Essence?”

“It’s what you are born to be. For me? I was born to be a
curandera
. And you will have your own path. Does that make sense?”

“Sort of.”

“Now, back to your good question. Your mama and papa met when they were just sixteen. He was a star of the high school baseball team. Your papa could smack a ball to the stars.”

Nana slathered a square of melting butter into a
tortilla
and continued. “They fell in love quickly, as many young lovers do, and married during their first year of college.”

I stuffed the last bit of
tortilla
into my mouth and licked the dripping honey off my fingers.

“Soon after their marriage she became pregnant with you.”

Nana’s words echoed across the sun-washed walls and filled my empty spaces like I had eaten ten
tortillas
.

“The whole village celebrated. Everyone was so eager for you to come,” she said.

“Really?”

“Of course. You were to be the daughter and granddaughter of healers.”

“My mom is a healer?”

“She is a natural. But she has chosen not to practice her gift. You see, I was trained in the ways, but your mama, she didn’t even need the training. She could go out in the moonlight with her eyes closed to pick a healing flower. She needed only her instincts. It was like magic.”

Nana glanced at the clock on the wall. “That is all for today. I am late for cards with Gip and Tía. Remember, some stories need to be unfolded slowly so we can appreciate what’s inside of them.”

“But what do you mean by magic?”

Nana carried the basket to the kitchen counter and set it down. “It means something is enchanting and special. You being here is magic. A hummingbird’s wings, the buzzing bee, the way the sun rises every day no matter what. That’s magic.” A warm breeze drifted in through an open window carrying the scent of Nana’s roses just outside. She closed her eyes and smiled. “And sometimes you can’t see the magic, you just know it’s there because you can feel it.”

She opened her eyes and turned to me. “Life is magic.”

Nana’s words floated through the air to me on the tips of the breeze. And then I remembered the missing words on the baseball.

As soon as Nana left, I ran to Estrella and picked up the baseball from the nightstand, tracing my fingers over it carefully. “Because life is magic?” I whispered. “Is that what you wrote, Dad?” The words fit, but somehow didn’t feel right. The way Nana described it, anything and everything could be magic. That made figuring out the missing words so much harder.

Sinking into the chair, I thought about everything Nana had told me about my dad, especially how he could hit a ball to the stars. I pulled out a story card and a pen.

One summer night a handsome prince asked the girl he loved which star she liked best. She pointed to the brightest one in the sky. But the next night it had disappeared. So he set off on a journey in search of her favorite star to bring it back and …
How would he bring back a star? He’d have to reach heaven.

Tapping the baseball with the pen I wondered how someone might reach heaven? A mountain top? An airplane? I traced my finger across the empty space between the words
because
and
magic
.

“Just two little missing words,” I whispered.

The missing words reminded me of Mrs. Barney, who’d given me the story cards. She said that stories are made up of many pieces. She’d explained: “Letters are the pieces strung together to make a word. Words make sentences. And sentences make stories. It’s piece by piece. Do you get it?”

I kind of got it, but wasn’t completely sure. I didn’t want her to think she’d wasted her time on me so I just nodded and whispered, “Piece by piece.”

The next day, I made a beeline for the hammock. Dangling my right leg over the side, the hammock swayed back and forth beneath the trees as I tossed Dad’s baseball into the air. My bare toes curled into the soft earth.

“Hey, Izzy.”

I snapped straight up when I saw Mateo standing over me. “Hi.”