When the Elephants Dance (48 page)

I was awake before Oscar. I remember becoming instantly alert and padding barefoot to his room. “Oscar, psst,” I whispered. There was really no need to whisper; I could have shouted to the rafters and no one would have stopped me. The men in our family were allowed to shout and throw tantrums whenever we wished. Oscar was such a heavy sleeper that I kept chunks of garlic in a tin beside my bed, which I used in place of smelling salts. I took out a clove, hammered it loudly with the heel of one of my best shoes, and shoved it into his nose until he woke up shouting and we wrestled to the ground.

Oscar was a good fighter; he managed to flip me over and land on top of me before he even opened his bleary eyes.

“Oscar, the cliffs, remember?”

“¿Qué?
Oh, the cliffs!
Sí. Bien. Vamanos
. What are you waiting for, imbecile? Get dressed.”

I rolled my eyes and immediately put on my short pants and shirt. When I looked over at him, I realized what he had meant by telling me to get dressed. He had fallen asleep in his clothes, still wearing his sandals from the night before. I remember I had left him at a card game with a woman five years his senior draped over him.

“What hour did you come home?” I asked.

He merely smiled. “If you’re not old enough to stay awake, baby, then you’re not old enough to ask.”

I hated when he called me that; it was short for baby brother, but it was incredibly embarrassing in front of the women.

We took two of our uncle Hector’s new Arabian stallions; they were loco, not broken in yet, but not as crazy as Oscar and me. We laughed as the horses threw us a couple of times and kicked out at tree stumps. We flew through the woods, dodging the trees as the horses sped left, right, left, right. They were magnificent. We were so stupid.

“Come on, Eighth, I dare you!” Oscar shouted. That was what we called the curse. It became a being we were fighting against, no longer an idea, but an actual force of energy.

We hired sea gypsies to take us across the turquoise freshwater lakes in their battered boats and colorful masts, to Palawan. Barracudas cruised alongside and bared their fangs at us as we maneuvered past the fissured limestone rocks. When we arrived at the chalk cliffs on Coron Island, we looked up in shock. They were tall, fifty meters, eighty in some places. There were little crevices, thin and narrow, where you could barely stick your fingers in. Oscar began to shout and take off his shoes and shirt.

“Come on, little brother, I will show you how this is done.” Oscar loved to be the one to say he had initiated me into this or that habit. So of course I liked to beat him, to say I had done it first.

Within seconds I had stripped down to my trousers. He had gotten a head start of about two feet when I reached up and grabbed his ankle and pulled him down and then scrambled up without looking back at him.

As I scrambled up the cliff, he shouted, “I am coming, Fredrico, damn you, you had better hurry!”

It was very dangerous, this thing we were doing. The rocks were not smooth, like the ones in the ocean, curved from the passage of time and water. These were like pointed sickles. You had to spread your legs on either side of you, like this, and you had to spread your arms so that you were anchored in more than just one area. You had to curl your toes like this, tightly, as if they were trying to write with a pencil. The cliff in some areas jutted forward, so at times you were hanging with your back parallel to the ground.

It was going smoothly, our little adventure, when I got to an area where the cliff jutted forward. I could have moved to the right, but then Oscar would have passed me. I shoved my fear down my throat and reached for the protrusion.

“Fredrico, no!” Oscar shouted as I lost my footing. We were hanging twenty feet in the air and I with my back even with the ground. I gripped as hard as I could and my other foot scrambled to stay put, but the cliff began to crumble and soon I was hanging only by my hands, and then by only one hand. I could have died. And do you know what Oscar did? He let go of one of his hands and put it beneath my back until I regained my footing. I was breathing hard, the tears stinging my eyes.

Then I heard it, the awful crumbling, the breaking off of a portion of the cliff. And when I turned to look, Oscar went sliding down the face of the cliff. He hit his leg on the way down and landed with his arm twisted behind his back.

That was how my brother started the first day of his nineteenth year. We arrived home with Oscar roaring drunk from the doctor, with his broken arm in a sling, and the party for his birthday had just begun. “The Eighth tried to grab me today. But I spat in his face,” Oscar boasted. My uncles clapped him on the back and roared that he was now a man.

“My boy, have you visited the church today?” asked Friar De Guzman.

“I said enough prayers to satisfy our Maker today, “Oscar replied. “Say one for me when you go home tonight, Padre.”

The friar sniffed. “I am to accompany your group. I have been invited.”

Oscar looked at the friar curiously, but our
tito
Jorge grabbed my brother by the arm and paraded him around to all the lovely señoritas, saying, “This is my nephew.”

“Que guapo,”
said the young señoritas behind their black-lacquered fans. How handsome. Zoila Rodriguez was there.

Zoila was tall and statuesque, with a graceful neck, much like a swan. Her hair was the color of honey, and her eyes were like sherry. But she was not a sweet girl. In fact, she was spoiled like a rotten papaya. She bruised easily if her wishes were not followed, and she would never let you forget it.

In the middle of the evening I noticed that Oscar was having trouble with
his woman. She was becoming sour, stomping her feet and looking away from him. Zoila also was watching us from across the room. Friar De Guzman walked over to them. I did not like his familiarity with Zoila.

The men were uneasy, like a group of caribous in a field of lionesses. Oscar stood beside me and put away a small glass of whiskey. He was glassy-eyed, and he smelled of alcohol. My brother could drink even a Russian to his grave and afterward run faster and fight better than any man I knew. Except for the smell, you could not tell how many bottles Oscar had enjoyed. Alcohol affected him differently; it enhanced his coordination, it made him stronger.

“What is happening with the women? Why are they staring at us like that?” I asked.

“They forget their place. Guadalupe believes she has influence over me. I only let her entertain the idea. They know where we are going tonight.”

I leaned back and looked up at Oscar. “Where are we going?”

Oscar grinned. “Didn’t Tito Jorge tell you? We take a trip to the other side of the island.”

“Where do you mean?” I frowned, knowing the other side of town was infested with Filipinos. “Why not go to one of the dance halls on our side? Surely we have better, cleaner ones.”

“It is not the dance halls that we care about, Fredrico.” Oscar laughed. “Just when I think you are catching up to me, I realize that you are still just a boy.”

You can imagine how his taunt irritated me. He was watching my face. He threw back his head and laughed, then bent close.

“It is not the dance halls we are interested in, but the dancing girls.” He grinned. “Tito Salvatore knows a place. All virgins.”

I made a face. “That is what they all say. Why are you interested in such women? Our women are ten times lovelier than any in the world.”

“But what about our
other
women? Do we not have their blood running through our veins as well, brother?”

“That is just a rumor.”

Oscar studied my frown. “Oh yes, and your skin turns a deep brown in the summer for no reason. Of course, you can stay here with the women if you like.” He clapped a hand on my shoulder. “We shall tell you all about it in the morning. You’ve had too much excitement for the day, Fredrico.”

I pushed his hand away. “Lead the way, imbecile.”

Oscar put his good arm around me and announced to the room, “My brother has spoken. We go.”

I was unsure about the whole affair. It was true we had Filipino blood running through our veins, but we had been brought up as mestizos; we looked
down upon the natives. They were unintelligent and unsophisticated. I hated the way they squatted in the streets begging for food, or the way they ate with their hands, like savages. I could not imagine Oscar wanting to lie down with one of these women. But I was always curious and always game for anything.

“L
OOK AT THESE
streets.” I gestured wildly with my hands from the window of our
kalesa
. “They are riddled with squirrel holes. What could
Tito
be thinking bringing us all here?” We had ridden with a caravan of men, at least forty of us from the party and some we had picked up along the way. We were going through a very poverty-stricken part of town, and the villagers sat out on their stoops, watching us curiously. I shifted uneasily in my seat. I entertained thoughts of dingy chairs supporting my weight and my clean suit soaking in the dirt. I thought of roaches walking over my fine Italian shoes.

Young boys dirty and dark from the sun ran up to our carriage with their hands outstretched, begging for money. Little girls with their unkempt hair plastered to their faces stood in the streets barefoot, twisting their skirts.

“Fredrico—” My brother elbowed me. “Stop frowning, you shall frighten the children.”

“Well, how long do we plan on staying?”

“We have not even arrived yet! Heavenly Father, you are starting to sound like Mama.”

Our retinue continued down the crippled street, and thankfully the houses began to look more respectable. As we approached a satisfactorily large house, I was surprised to find we had left my brother’s party to arrive at another. Music was coming through the large double doors; they were thrown open, with two servants sitting on the steps. Two stocky Filipinos stood as we alighted, and they looked at us with cold eyes.

“Look at them. They do not want us touching even their whores.” I shook my head, stepped down, and began to roll up my sleeves. “I would have preferred not to fight tonight.”

Oscar lifted his chin at them and glanced at me. “Whores? What are you speaking of, baby? This is a birthday party. There are no whores here. Not publicly. These are all young women from well-to-do Filipino families.”

“Madre de Dios
. You will get us killed tonight, brother.”

M
Y UNCLE
F
LAVIO
led the way as the rest of our uncles looked at the Filipinos and made a good joke about them. Friar De Guzman stayed close behind my
uncles. We walked into a grand hall and people stared. I heard whispers of “The Spaniards have arrived,” and all the guests turned to look. The women were nervous, while the men gazed at us with stone faces. A group of ten men came to stand before us, their arms crossed.

“Get out of my way. You block my view,” Uncle Jorge ordered.

“Tito,”
I said.

A woman came and invited us to sit. I remained standing, expecting a fight to break out at any moment. Oscar strode right up to the birthday girl and asked for a dance. She blushingly went out onto the floor with him. I stayed stuck to the wall.

I watched the women as they ran around trying to make things right. The air filled with tension with each gesture they made. Their men watched us through slits, their mouths tight. The birthday girl’s mother offered us drinks and sweets as the rest of our group told jokes and took bets on whether they would bed her daughter by nightfall. Friar De Guzman disappeared behind a table of tubâ. He filled a glass for himself and then boldly took out a flask from his robe and proceeded to fill the tin, heedless of the deadly looks the Filipinos directed his way.

“We shall get shot,” I muttered, cursing. It was ludicrous, all this way when we had our own women waiting for us at home. Does a dog in heat go searching in the next yard when he has a willing mate nearby? “To hell with this,” I said, and went outside to smoke a cigar.

A boy of nine or ten stepped out, looking about as if I were the one he was searching for. I blew smoke and looked down at him from the corner of my eye. I do not think he expected to find me so quickly, for suddenly he seemed shy and stayed flat against the house. I chuckled, for he reminded me of myself just minutes earlier.

“Come out for a smoke, too,
eh, joven?”

He shook his head, looking down at his shoes. I recognized him as the birthday girl’s younger brother. “You are a Spaniard,” he stated.

“You have not seen one before?” I joked.

“Your hair is brown. Mine is black.” He pointed to his head.

“Yes, that is so.” I nodded, tapping the ashes from my cigar.

“But your eyes are brown like mine. Not so different.” He made a lopsided inspection of me from shoes to head. He put his shoes next to mine. They were the same type of design, what is called “wing-tipped” these days. Where the design at the tip is shaped in two arches, like wings.

“Same shoes,” he said boldly now. He went to stand in front of me with his arms crossed. “Not so different, what makes you so different?”

I stopped smoking and looked at the boy with appreciation. I shrugged. “Different blood, from different countries. Our ancestors are from different countries,” I said, satisfied with my answer.

The boy sniffed. “You were born in the Philippines?”

“Well, yes, but—”

“Then that makes you Filipino.” He watched me carefully.

I pursed my lips, then could not help but grin. “You could say that.”

“I did.”

He stopped once more to study me, looking even more unimpressed, before he went back inside. I remained, feeling properly dressed down, so that I laughed out loud.

N
OTHING MORE HAPPENED
that night. Of course, Oscar bedded the birthday girl in the back of our
kalesa
. The carriage still smelled of sex when we entered, and I angrily lit another cigar to burn out the sweet stench. My uncles and all the other men had had their share of the women as well.